FEBRUARY MEETING, 1900.
A Stated Meeting of the Society was held at No. 25 Beacon Street, Boston, on Wednesday, 21 February, 1900, at three o’clock in the afternoon, the President, Edward Wheelwright, in the chair.
After the Records of the January Meeting had been read, and approved, the Corresponding Secretary reported that letters had been received from the Rev. Edward H. Hall and Mr. John Gorham Palfrey accepting Resident Membership.
Mr. George Parker Winship, a Corresponding Member, was present.
Mr. Henry H. Edes offered the following Minute, which was unanimously adopted by a rising vote: —
The members of The Colonial Society of Massachusetts, assembled on the eve of the birthday of Washington, wish to place on record an expression of the sympathy which they felt for their distinguished associate the Honorable Edward J. Phelps, and his family, during his recent severe illness, and of the satisfaction with which they have learned of his convalescence.
The members of the Society embrace this opportunity to give expression to their deep sense of the exalted character of their associate, whose public services, private virtues, and profound learning have received the deserved homage of his countrymen.
Resolved, that an attested copy of this Minute be sent to Mr. Phelps.
The President then said: —
It is my melancholy duty to announce the death of our esteemed associate, the Rev. Edward Griffin Porter, on the fifth of February, at his home in Dorchester, after a very short illness, at the comparatively early age of sixty-three.
Mr. Porter was elected a Resident Member of this Society, 15 March, 1893, and was soon after appointed a member of the Committee of Publication. This position he continued to hold until his death.
He was a very constant attendant at our monthly meetings, at which he often read interesting papers and took an active part in the discussions. At the December Meeting in 1893, in the discussion following the presentation of two documents by Mr. G. Arthur Hilton, he made remarks, in reply to Mr. Abner C. Goodell, Jr., on the so-called Boston Massacre and the Boston Tea Party.
At the April Meeting in 1894, he gave a most interesting account of the events which took place at Lexington and Concord in April, 1775, illustrated by a large map which he had prepared of the localities. This account was entirely extemporaneous. At the April Meeting of 1895, he spoke again on the same topic and had announced his intention of continuing his narrative at the April Meeting of the present year, when he should be able to exhibit documents, newly discovered, bearing upon the subject. He had also promised to reduce to writing all that he had said, or should say, on these three occasions in order that the whole might be printed together in our Transactions. His long residence at Lexington, as Pastor of the Hancock Church, had given him abundant opportunity of becoming thoroughly acquainted with the locality and its history.
At the April Meeting of 1895, he also paid a tribute to the memory of our late Vice-President, Leverett Saltonstall. At the Annual Dinner in November, 1897, he made a speech in behalf of the Gould Memorial Fund.
At the December Meeting in 1897, he gave an account of the visit to Boston of Lieutenant-General George Digby Barker, of the British Army, and Governor of Bermuda, whom he accompanied to Bunker Hill and other places of historic interest; he also gave a sketch of the discovery and identification of the Diary of Lieutenant Barker, who was present with the British troops at Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill, and who proved to be the grandfather of his guest, General Barker.
These are only a few of the papers and remarks contributed to our Transactions by Mr. Porter. He seldom attended a meeting at which he had not something to say, and he said it with an ease and fluency and felicity of expression no less remarkable than his accuracy of statement and his extraordinary memory for facts and dates.
Born in Boston, he took the keenest interest in its ancient history, knew all the lanes and alleys of the old North End, gathered from the oldest residents the history and traditions of its Colonial buildings, private and public, and embodied the results in that delightful book, — through which I first knew him by name, — Rambles in Old Boston.
I first met him on hearing him deliver a lecture, or rather talk, before a social club at a private house, when he gave an account, illustrated by maps, plans and views, of a visit he had made to Alnwick Castle, the residence of the Percy family, — Dukes of Northumberland. This was some years before he joined this Society, perhaps before The Colonial Society of Massachusetts came into existence. The story of his hospitable reception, the permission given him to examine the archives of the family, his discovery of papers concerning the Lord Percy who covered the retreat of the British after Concord Fight, papers which had been previously overlooked, was delightful. He must have made a most favorable impression upon his host, for on his departure the Duke promised him a copy of a portrait of the Lord Percy best known to Americans, and accordingly sent it to him, handsomely framed, after his return to America. Mr. Porter, with the Duke’s approval, presented it to the Town of Lexington, where it may now be seen in the Town Hall.
The loss of Mr. Porter creates a void in our Society which will long be felt. Not by any means an old man, he seemed to have the promise of many years of usefulness before him. He appeared, in fact, younger than he really was. His tall, spare figure, his dark hair, as yet unbleached, his alert, quick motions, betokened a youthful vivacity of body as well as of mind. His genial temperament, his courtesy, unblemished by the least approach to stiffness and never degenerating into undue familiarity, the patience with which he listened, no less than the ease with which he spoke, made him a most agreeable companion.
Mr. Samuel Swett Green spoke at length of his friend and classmate, especially of Mr. Porter’s college life, his genial social qualities, his fondness for society, his love of children, his public spirit, his interest in historical research, and his recondite knowledge of the antiquities of Boston and the events of the nineteenth of April, 1775.
Mr. Robert N. Toppan, also a classmate of Mr. Porter, spoke of his absolute sincerity as one of his most prominent characteristics.
Mr. Toppan then announced the formation of the —
ORDER OF THE DESCENDANTS OF COLONIAL GOVERNORS PRIOR TO 1750.
The order was founded in January, 1896, by Miss Mary Cabell Richardson of Covington, Kentucky. The present Governor-General is Mrs. Henrietta Dana Skinner of Detroit, Michigan. There are now eighteen branches, including one in Canada. The Chairman of the Massachusetts branch is Mrs. Prentiss Webster of Lowell.
“The order recognizes as Colonial Governors all persons invested with supreme executive authority in the government of Colonies comprised within the thirteen Colonial States, under whatever title that authority was exercised, and whether derived from the Crown by appointment, from the people by election, from another Governor or from a chartered Company by commission.”
Membership is honorary and by invitation only.
Mr. Worthington C. Ford remarked upon Washington’s views on many public matters and showed how modern some of them were. His canal policy foreshadowed the existing railway system, which connects the Atlantic with the West; and his methods of agriculture anticipated the change which came in Virginia farming after the close of the Revolutionary war. Mr. Ford portrayed Washington as the scientific farmer far in advance of his time. He also made the following communication: —
COLONIAL AMERICA.
In determining the economic position and capacity of a nation, the natural environment of the people is of quite as great importance as the artificial, which is itself developed from and largely dependent upon, the natural. A desert may with assiduous care and labor be changed into a garden; latent powers of production may be developed and combined in almost endless variations to serve a useful purpose. But not only must the materials be at hand, — the intelligence to work the change must also be present and actively exerted. The climate, the nature of the soil and relative situation, determine the productiveness of a region, and the labor of man by controlling and directing these agencies, by combining and assimilating forces, may develop almost indefinitely their capacities, producing an economy that would before have seemed impossible.
Such a co-operation of productive factors, resulting in an economic development of almost marvellous rapidity and magnitude, a history of production in the United States would show. An outline, so far as is essential to the purpose of this work, will be here attempted, necessarily imperfect, because subordinated to other ends.
The natural capacities of America were great even under the most imperfect instruments. A writer contemporary with the Revolution, estimated the area of the colonies to be 102,000 square miles, or about the area of the British Isles.679 The English area of settlement at that time extended from the coast of Maine to Georgia, or between 45° and 31° north latitude, but was confined for the most part to a narrow strip of territory along the coast between the ocean and the Appalachian range, where a river supplying ready means of penetrating inland plantations or farms would be found; but few settlements worthy even of the name of town existed in the interior, except where the hostile attitude of the Indians made such an aggregation necessary for defence, or where a peculiarly rich trade with the Indians centred. In either case, these outlying posts were merely stockaded forts. No river penetrated beyond the Blue Ridge range in the South, and none beyond the present western limits of New York in the North; and this constituted another natural restriction upon the area of settlement.
The territory ceded by Great Britain under the definitive treaty of peace in 1783 embraced about 830,000 square miles, of which less than half could be assigned to the original thirteen colonies. Blodget, one of the earliest of American statisticians, estimated that the improved lands in 1774 did not exceed 20,860,000 acres, or less than 33,000 square miles, a small part of the settled area.680 In New England more than one-half of the land was in cultivation in 1790, and in Connecticut scarcely one-tenth remained in a wild state.681 In New York only one-fifth of the country could be said to be improved,682 and in Virginia and Maryland, devoted as they were to the cultivation of a very profitable crop, only about one-tenth could be so designated.683 The insalubrity of the Carolinas, the sparseness of the population, the system of land tenure, the methods of agriculture and the cheapness and abundance of land, offered further obstacles to an intensive and careful cultivation of the soil in the Southern colonies.
The population of the colonies was estimated in 1754 to have been about 1,500,000 souls; at the outbreak of the Revolution it had nearly doubled through immigration and natural increase, and more especially through natural increase. There were few checks to early marriages and the rate of increase was favored in every way. The population more than doubled itself in every twenty-five years, no account being taken of the immigration, which, however, was not large, as the East and West Indies were attracting the larger part of emigrants from European countries.684 The war checked the growth, for in 1790 the population was only 3,929,326, of which nearly 700,000 were slaves.
As the distribution of population did not materially change between 1775 and 1790, the census of the latter year may be taken as a guide. In New York, Pennsylvania and South Carolina, the predominant “group” was from two to six to the square mile; while another group, from eighteen to forty to the square mile was found chiefly in Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Virginia. The coast of Maine was dotted in 1776 with forts, and at the head of the Hudson River, on the highway to Canada, settlements existed. But a line drawn southeast from the foot of Lake Champlain to the head of the Savannah river would include more than what was then the inhabited parts of the British colonies in North America.
The natural conditions which the first colonists from Europe found on the eastern shore of North America, were peculiarly adapted to the foundation and rapid development of a rich and prosperous empire. The climate was nearly the same as that of Europe; the soil when prepared for agriculture was for the most part rich and virgin, for only a small proportion of the Indians had attained the village stage where the tillage of the ground had in a measure superseded the chase.685 From the ocean and rivers the bulk of their food was still obtained. The physical formation of that part of North America which was settled before the Revolution gave a diversity of climate that, taken in connection with the natural qualities of the soil, allowed of a greater variety of crops than was then afforded by Europe. The winters were longer, yet the shorter summer was so nearly like the summer of Europe that all the plants and animals of the older continent could be cultivated and reared on the new continent with almost equal success.
The soil, however, was by no means ready for immediate use. The region north of the Susquehannah had been affected by glacial action (drift), and the resulting soil was of a clayey nature, abounding in stone, difficult to subdue and render fit for continuous cultivation. The face of the country was covered with dense forests which must be cleared before planting could begin, and against which the Indians with their feeble appliances had proved almost powerless. The contest between man and nature was severe and continuous, and the great obstacles to be met and overcome, the limited means for removing them, controlled the course of settlement, and in the beginning rendered the progress of the colonies slow and painful. The poorer soils, narrow strips lying along the banks of rivers and the shore, where cultivation was comparatively easy and access to the ocean ready, were first occupied; and had it not been for maize, a crop that yielded a high return and was more reliable than European cereals, the subsistence needed and obtained in other ways would hardly have proved sufficient to maintain the colonists while engaged in the severer tasks of clearing and subduing the richer lands in the interior. Two months of labor were required to make each acre of this region fitted for effective tillage;686 only in Virginia and Maryland was there found a soil on which a crop could be at once grown.
The colonies may be divided according to their physical characteristics into three classes. In the New England provinces the soil was little adapted for profitable agriculture, furnishing barely sufficient food for its inhabitants. The population found employment in shipping and fishing, developing a carrying trade and a commercial interest which compensated for the comparative niggardliness of nature and formed the peculiar feature of that section of the country at the period of the Revolution. In the middle colonies the soil lent itself more readily to cultivation, and cereals early became an article of export; while in Virginia and Maryland the fertility of the soil and the commercial policy of England made tobacco the most valuable staple of culture and export. To the South, the swamps of the Carolinas, destructive to the white man but capable of being exploited by slave labor, were devoted to rice, and as in the tobacco colonies, imposed upon the people a system of slavery which cramped their growth save in narrow and increasingly unprofitable lines, and frittered away the natural wealth of the land under an economic régime which has never proved successful and never compatible with progress in civilization.
In 1766 Franklin described the body of the people in the colonies as farmers, husbandmen and planters. Agriculture was the chief pursuit of the country; its prosperity and very existence were dependent upon farming; its commerce and relations with other peoples were based upon the products of the soil, and the kindred industry — the fisheries. By agriculture alone could a market be commanded in Britain itself. All else was subordinated to and controlled by the results obtained from the soil.
It was very natural that land should be the chief form of wealth, for it was the most productive agent at hand and that to which all the labor and capital either created and saved within the colonies, or coming to them from Europe, turned for employment. This, said Adam Smith, was the principal cause of the rapid progress of the dependencies to wealth and greatness.687 The terms upon which lands could be obtained were inducements to settlement. In Pennsylvania, where the soil was readily brought into cultivation and where the liberal administrative system offered the most immediate advantages to the immigrant, land could be purchased for £5 a hundred acres, and one penny sterling per acre quitrent. In New York and New Jersey crown lands were sold for fifty cents or one dollar an acre, and the price was about the same in the New England colonies. In the Southern provinces lands were given away in limited tracts to settlers, but could be purchased at almost nominal prices. Eddis said that the rich lands of Maryland could be bought for about seventy-five cents an acre. In 1774, according to Blodget’s estimates, the average price of cultivated land throughout the colonies was two dollars and a half an acre; and of lands in their natural condition, thirty-five cents an acre. Generally speaking, real estate was valued at only seven years’ purchase.688
The abundance and cheapness of good land, and the ease and notoriety with which it was obtained and transferred, rendered the introduction of feudal tenures and feudal ideas of the nature of real property impossible. In the Charter of the Massachusetts Bay Company (1628) it was provided that lands should be held “in free and common socage, and not in capite or by knight service;” and before the Province Charter of 1691 was issued, all feudal tenures had been swept away in Great Britain itself.689 Feudal vassalage could not take root in any of the colonies, and leasehold estates were almost totally unknown. The law of primogeniture was recognized in some of the colonies as being agreeable to the law of nature and the dignity of birthright. Rhode Island, though one of the most democratic of the colonies, admitted the systems of entail and primogeniture, as did Virginia, the most aristocratic of the colonies. In some cases primogeniture was not formally abolished until some years after the Revolution,690 while estates tail lingered many years after.
The feature of the land policy of the colonies, by which any immigrant could look forward to owning a portion of the soil and developing its capacities for his own benefit, obviated the occurrence of that narrow dependence on land which in other countries resulted in serfage, tenants adscripti glebœ. The colonists, except when “indented” for a term of years, were free to come and to go, and the absence of restraint exerted a lasting influence upon the domestic economy of the northern and middle colonies. The equal distribution of property in those provinces tended best to encourage the full and free development of economic powers. There was no glaring inequality between rich and poor; the situation was that which pleased Rousseau: no citizen was so rich that he could buy the others, and no one so poor that he might be compelled to sell himself. Burnaby travelled 1200 miles in New England and the Middle colonies without meeting a beggar. Even in Boston, where the profits of a lucrative trade centred, fortunes were moderate, and Burke thought there were not two persons in either Massachusetts or Connecticut who could afford to spend £1000 a year away from their estates.691
The “almost universal mediocrity of fortune” that prevailed in America was regarded as a happy situation, preserving the people from idleness and its consequent errors.692 Most of the people cultivated their own lands, or followed some handicraft or trade, and so nearly every man was a producer. Franklin, in an essay intended to set the true condition of America before intending and too hopeful emigrants from Europe, described it as “the land of labor, and by no means what the English call Lubberland, and the French Pays de Cocagne, where the streets are said to be paved with half peck loaves, the houses tiled with pancakes, and where the fowls fly about ready roasted, crying, Come eat me!” A mere man of quality, he thought, would be despised and disregarded. “The husbandman is in honor there, and even the mechanic, because their employments are useful.”
The general distribution of land tended to a general distribution of political power, for land and power are almost inseparable. The farmer of the colony was a freeholder and had early established his privilege, if not his right, of controlling local concerns.
In describing landholding in America, Story says, —
“The tenants and occupiers are almost universally the proprietors of the soil in fee simple. The estates of a more limited duration are principally those arising from the acts of the law, such as estates in dower and in curtesy. Strictly speaking, therefore, there has never been in this country a dependent peasantry. The yeomanry are absolute masters of the soil on which they tread, and their character has from this circumstance been marked by a jealous watchfulness of their rights, and by a more steady resistance against every encroachment, than can be found among any other people, whose habits and pursuits are less homogeneous and independent, less influenced by personal choice, and more controlled by political circumstances.”693
The Southern colonies were under a very different social régime, and the difference between rich and poor, even apart from landowner and slave, was greater than in the Northern colonies. The opulence of the planters, more apparent than real, contrasted sharply with the poverty of the whites who owned neither land nor slaves, who had no regular occupations, and led a precarious existence. The prevalence of slave labor discouraged the introduction of free labor and of those manual operations which such labor can pursue. The planter was generally deeply in debt. The scarcity of capital, and the large operations of the planter required much capital, induced him to look to English bankers and merchants for his needs. His lands were purchased and cleared with foreign capital; it was with such advances that his slaves were bought, the crop planted, garnered, and finally transported to market. The greater share of the carrying trade was conducted by the capitals of merchants residing in Great Britain, and even the tobacco warehouses in Virginia and Maryland were owned by British factors.694 This did not prevent the planter from seeking to gratify his expensive tastes, for he could mortgage his future crops, and run the risk of failure through a bad crop, a sickness among his slaves, or a failure in the slow machinery of colonial trade, when the English factor might intervene and deprive him of his estate.695
The poor settler was lazy and shiftless, having no interests to subserve and intent only upon satisfying his immediate wants. Among the whites of Virginia Chastellux found the first evidences of poverty he had met. In such a population the habit of saving was undeveloped and real wealth, apart from land and slaves, out of the question. Large plantations, rudely cultivated so as to waste their fertility, costly labor, and spendthrift habits were not elements of success. Adam Smith noted that no such wealthy planters came from the tobacco, as from the sugar colonies. Good management and foresight did amass large fortunes and estates; but regarded as a whole the southern people were poorer than those of New England, in spite of the show and outward glitter their habits induced them to make.
Notwithstanding the almost universal prevalence of agricultural pursuits, there was no systematic study of the science of farming, and the methods employed were, even for that day, slovenly and wasteful. No attention was given to husbanding the benefits of nature, and the settlers were more likely to imitate the Indians in the arts of destruction than in the art of preservation. If a forest was to be cleared, it was burned; or the trees were girdled and left to decay where they stood. A field once cleared was worked into comparative sterility by a succession of the same crops, and no attempt was made to maintain or renew its fertility other than by the rude and partial method of allowing an exhausted field to lie fallow. The original richness of the soil was such that for a number of years crops could be raised from it without impairing its productiveness; and when it showed signs of failing it was cheaper and easier to plough up a new field and abandon the old to regain strength as best it could. The system of cultivation was thus extensive, and not intensive; certain lines of production were worked to the utmost, and while some of the natural advantages of the soil were utilized under such a system, all others were sacrificed. In fact land was too cheap to make even a moderate expenditure in improvements profitable.
The methods of cultivation were nearly the same after as before the war: —
“Unproductive fallows precede crops; after crops, the land is generally given up for a number of years to weeds and poor natural grasses, until it shall come into heart again; the husbandman in the mean while, employing his labors upon his other fields in succession.”696
General Warren said, before the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, that a man in America, —
“that farms 150 acres, would think a stock of £100 sufficient. One miserable team, a paltry plough, and everything in the same proportion; three acres of Indian corn which require all the manure he has; as many acres of half-starved English grain from a half cultivated soil, with a spot of potatoes, and a small yard of turnips, complete the round of his tillage, and the whole is conducted perhaps by a man and a boy, and performed in half their time; no manure but the dung from the barn, which, if the heaps were not exposed to be washed away by the winter rains may amount to fifteen or twenty loads; and if they are so exposed, to much less, without any regret to the farmer. All the rest of the farm is allotted for feeding a small stock. A large space must be mowed for a little hay for winter; and a large range for a little feed in summer. Pastures are never manured, and mowing lands seldom; but nothing will give a clearer idea of the different management than the following facts; in England rents are high and labor low; in America it is just the reverse, rents are low and the rate of labor high; yet in England, it would be difficult to find an instance where the labor did not amount to more, and in many instances, to perhaps three times as much as the rents; and in America, as difficult to find as instance where the labor on the farm equalled the rent.”697
While this description applied more especially to the farming of the New England colonies, it would apply also to the general system used in the Southern and Middle colonies, with the possible exception of Pennsylvania.
“There is, perhaps, scarcely any part in America, where farming has been less attended to than in this State [Virginia]. The cultivation of tobacco has been almost the sole object with men of landed property, and consequently a regular course of crops has never been in view. The general custom has been, first to raise a crop of Indian corn (maize), which according to the mode of cultivation, is a good preparation for wheat; then a crop of wheat; after which the ground is respited (except from weeds and every trash that can contribute to its foulness,) for about eighteen months; and so on, alternately, without any dressing, till the land is exhausted; when it is turned out, without being sown with grass seeds, or any method taken to restore it; and another piece is ruined in the same manner. No more cattle are raised than can be supported by lowland meadows, swamps, &c., and the tops and blades of Indian corn; as very few persons have attended to sowing grasses and connecting cattle with their crops. The Indian corn is the chief support of the laborers and horses. Our lands, as mentioned in my first letter to you, were originally very good; but use and abuse have made them quite otherwise.”698
Mitchell also bears witness to the degeneration of lands in the Southern colonies as early as 1767.
“Their lands are so exhausted that they do not produce above a third part of what they used to do. Formerly they made three and four hogsheads of tobacco a share, that is, for every laborer, where they cannot now make one; and they used to have fifty and sixty bushels of corn to an acre of land, where they now reckon twenty a good crop.”699
Burnaby describes the agriculture of the Southern colonies as in a “very low state,”700 and Kalm applies nearly the same words to that of Pennsylvania,701 while he speaks in even more disparaging terms of farming in New Sweden.702
The result was that comparatively small returns were obtained from the land, barely eight or ten bushels of wheat to an acre, when twenty-five was an average yield in England and eighteen in France.703 The cause of this was that —
“the aim of the farmers in this country is, not to make the most they can from the land, which is, or has been cheap, but the most of the labor, which is dear; the consequence of which has been, much ground has been scratched over, and none cultivated or improved as it ought to have been: whereas a farmer in England, where land is dear and labor cheap, finds it his interest to improve and cultivate highly, that he may reap large crops from a small quantity of ground. That the last is the true, and the first an erroneous policy, I will readily grant; but it requires time to conquer bad habits, and hardly anything short of necessity is able to accomplish it. That necessity is approaching by pretty rapid strides.”704
In localities the yield might have been larger. Kalm, at an earlier date, noted that on well prepared land in Pennsylvania, a bushel of rye sowed on an acre of land returned twenty bushels, and the returns from wheat were about the same.705 In New York, from twelve to twenty fold was the rate of return for wheat; but one half-bushel of maize would yield one hundred bushels.706 In Buck’s County, Pennsylvania, fresh lands would give from fifteen to twenty bushels to the acre, the market price of which would generally cover the cost of the land.707
In spite of this wasteful system of culture, the wheat-growers of America possessed decided advantages over those of England, though, as yet, these advantages were not appreciated. Arthur Young proved in his Political Arithmetic that in 1774708 the American farmer, exempt as he was from rents, tithes, and poor rates, and paying comparatively light taxes, could not only supply the West India market with flour more cheaply than could the English farmer, but even exclude the latter from the home markets. Although this was a temporary relation, it was soon to become permanent, for the period of the Revolution marked an important change in the economy of England as regards its food supply. From 1715 to 1765 — a period of fifty years — hardly five years could be found in which the harvest had proved so deficient as to produce a marked influence upon prices; and when compared with former years, prices were uncommonly low. This was the case not only in England, where bounties were paid to encourage the export of grain, but also in France, where imports were encouraged and exports prohibited — a proof that the range of low prices was due to natural and not artificial causes.
This period of plenty and cheapness of food, in which, as the author of the Corn Tracts tells us, bread made of wheat became more generally the food of the laboring people, was followed by ten years of comparative scarcity, due principally to a succession of deficient harvests. So great was the change that government took action, and more than once prohibited the export of grain while allowing its free import, and even paying bounties upon imports. Again was this situation not peculiar to Great Britain, but extended to Ireland and the continent. In England, however, an important change was produced. Heretofore wheat had been an article of export, and had even been sent to the American colonies; it now became an article of import,709 evidence that under existing methods England could no longer be depended upon to supply the food required by its own population.710 Though the colonies were not in a position to take advantage of this change, and did not for more than fifty years, the tendency of England to look to other countries for its food dates from this time. Great Britain thus lost the colonies at the very period when they might have become what they did become half a century later, the granary of Europe.
In the pursuit of agriculture live stock is one of the great essentials, though not so much an essential in colonial times, when the natural fertility of the soil had not been exhausted and the crops could still depend upon the rich vegetable mould, as at a later day, when the exhausted soil requires some artificial stimulus. The live stock of the colonies was meagre and of poor quality, for little attention was paid to its improvement. Jefferson in his Notes on Virginia advanced the belief that the live stock had deteriorated since its introduction from Europe.
“In a thinly peopled country, the spontaneous productions of the forests and waste fields are sufficient to support indifferently the domestic animals of the farmer, with a very little aid from him in the severest and scarcest season. He therefore finds it more convenient to receive them from the hand of nature in that indifferent state, than to keep up their size by a care and nourishment which would cost him much labor” (p. 83).
The use of domestic animals in agriculture was far more common in the Middle colonies than in either the Eastern or the Southern. In the latter slave labor was a substitute, while in New England the tendency appears to have been to use horses instead of cattle, though the greater care and higher quality of food must have made them the more costly instrument and so restricted their employment.711 It was in the neighborhood of Philadelphia that Silas Deane noted the “finest team horses” he had ever seen, though New England exported horses largely. In all the colonies cattle appear to have been neither housed in winter nor tended in summer, and little effort was made to collect and preserve manure. Sheep were raised for farming purposes and also for their wool, and some of the colonies offered special inducements to encourage the keeping of sheep; but these attempts were not regarded with favor in Great Britain, where the many severe restrictions intended to maintain and favor the English wool industry, not only forbade the improvement of colonial stock by prohibiting the export of sheep, but also tended to make the raising of sheep for wool of little profit to the farmer by limiting his market. The policy of the mother country was also calculated to discourage greater attention to the cattle of the colonies. Cattle, alive or dead, could be exported from America to almost any market, but the privilege was little else than an empty name, because, unless salted, meat could not be transported to any distance.712 On the other hand, hides and skins, which were easily transported and merchantable, could only be exported to Great Britain, a market already well supplied, and where a low price only could be obtained.713
Thus agriculture in the colonies was in a very backward state. While farmers in England were introducing better methods and new implements, and improving the breeds of cattle and sheep, those of America, favored by an abundance of fresh soil, were content with the most primitive husbandry. In England a —
“more rational system of cropping now began very generally to supersede the thriftless and barbarous practice of sowing successive crops of corn [wheat] until the land was utterly exhausted, and leaving it foul with weeds, to recover its power by an indefinite period of rest. Green crops, such as turnips, clover and rye-grass began to be alternated with grain crops, and hence the name alternate husbandry, by which this improved system is generally known. The land was now generally rendered clean and mellow by a summer fallow before being sown with clover or grasses.”714
These important improvements had not been carried to the colonies before the war, or for some years after, though they might have been practised in isolated cases. Land was too cheap to justify the expense of alternate crops or manuring, and the implements in use were quite as crude as the methods of farming. The plough generally used had a mould board of wood715 — for those of iron were imported at heavy cost — and could not be pressed into the soil for fear of breakage. On the tobacco plantations the hoe was the chief instrument of culture — a “great clumsy lump of iron” attached to a handle as “thick at the butt as a weaver’s beam.”
In spite of these drawbacks and disadvantages there was evidence of some progress. The experimental stage was past; the climate and soil were better known and their capacities developed so far as the meagre knowledge and experience of the colonists would allow. The plants suited to each description of land had been noted, and the cultivation required to produce a given result had engaged some attention. In transferring animals and plants from the old world to the new costly errors had been made, but the experience gained was of value. When Connecticut sought to raise cotton, or when cinnamon and silk were to be produced under unfavorable conditions, failure could only result, no bounty being able to overcome the hostility of nature.716 These errors and failures did not deter new attempts, and —
“so extensively did these experiments go on, and so completely had they been tried, that not a single species of domestic animal, and but one species of cultivated plant (sorghum), that had been introduced since the Revolution, was of sufficient importance to be enumerated in the census tables.”717
The life of a farmer under such conditions was simple almost to an extreme. He raised the grain and vegetable required by his family and stock; from his cows he obtained milk which could be worked into butter or cheese, both merchantable articles; once a year he killed a bullock or a pig, salting down what was not required for immediate consumption; he raised flax which was worked up in the family into homespun goods, and the wool obtained from his sheep was utilized in the same manner; he knew how to extract the juices from fruits. In each town there would be found a person who, generally a farmer himself, practised in his leisure time some trade like that of a grain miller, a tanner, or a carpenter, his labor being sufficient to meet the wants of the town. In other cases, like that of the shoemaker, the tradesman would visit the various towns, put up at a farmer’s house, and using the leather supplied to him, would, in a few days, make sufficient footwear for a year’s wants. The miller took a part of his flour as pay, and the tanner, after a year’s labor in tanning a hide, retained one-half as his perquisite. The chief articles which the farmer purchased were iron and salt; the surplus product of his farm was sufficient to enable him to buy these, to lay aside a little “hard money,” and to increase his holdings in land. Two or three times a year he would go into the nearest importing town and indulge in a few modest “luxuries” — like a calico gown for his wife, and, as a rule, some rum for himself. Is it strange that many of the vices of the old world should spontaneously disappear under such simple conditions?
The manufactures of the colonies were few and on a scale intended to satisfy local wants, scarcely deserving more than the name of household industry, yet there were the beginnings of an industrial life which required only the proper surroundings to be developed. The usual stimulus was war, which interrupted communication with the mother country and threw the colonies on their own resources. A voyage across the ocean involved from two to four months, and vessels were often so infrequent that the masters, i.e. ships built especially to convey masts to England, were taken by those who wished to reach the other side and to whom no better accommodation presented itself. It was the political troubles of England during the Cromwell rebellion that first led to the construction of ships in New England. For emigration was suspended and the intercourse between parent country and colony so interfered with that their supplies for which they looked to England were well nigh exhausted.
“The general fear,” writes Governor Winthrop in his journal, “of want of foreign commodities, now our money was gone, and that things were like to go well in England, set us to work to provide shipping of our own.”
Every war in which England took part thereafter, led the colonists to add a little to their beginnings of manufacture. During the war with France this tendency to develop their own resources was especially marked, and when the Stamp Act troubles still further increased this tendency, the jealousy of English manufacturers was excited, and an inquiry instituted by the Commissioners of Plantations and Trade into the manufacturing capacity of the colonies. The replies of the colonial governors were nearly in the same strain, — that there were no manufactures of any consequence, — replies, said Franklin, that were “very satisfactory” to England as betokening no danger of competition.718 For example, the Governor of New Jersey reported that there were no woollen or linen manufactures worthy of the name; eight blast furnaces for making pig iron, and forty-two forges for beating out bar iron, beside one slitting mill, one steel furnace and one plating mill, but the last processes were not “carried on with vigor;” and finally a glass house, for making bottles and coarse green glass for windows.719 Very little more had been done in 1774, though a new slitting mill had been erected as an appendage to a grist mill, to evade the prohibition of such mills by Parliament.720 In 1774 Governor Tryon wrote to the Board of Trade that the manufactures of the Province of New York were: the making of pig and bar iron, distillation of rum and spirits, refining of sugar and chocolate from imported sugar and cocoa, the making of soap, candles, hats, shoes, cordage, and cabinet ware, tanning, malting, brewing, and ship-building.721 This was, probably, as comprehensive a list as any other colony could have shown, and even that appears larger than it really was, for the growth of manufactures was checked by the limited market, by the dearness of labor, by the greater advantages offered by agriculture, and by the jealousy and restrictions demanded and imposed by British industrial and mercantile interests.
While the colonies were dependent upon Great Britain there was no such thing as a colonial market. Their geographical structure made them independent of one another, offering an obstacle to a commercial and political union that then seemed almost insuperable. The coast, indented by bays and harbors of refuge, and the navigable rivers piercing the interior regions and offering seats for settlements accessible to the outer world, invited the colonies to trade, but it was to trade with Europe and not among the colonies that the efforts of the Americans and the English were directed. The little commerce that passed among themselves was carried by water. “We never had any interior trade of any importance,” Jefferson wrote in his Notes on Virginia. Land carriage was too costly.722 The roads were badly kept,723 and as the articles to be transported were, as a rule, bulky, they could not be carried far. In Pennsylvania, little favored as it was with navigable rivers, the farmers would come one and two hundred miles on horseback, leading pack horses laden with the goods they were to barter in the nearest market.724 To the interior salt and gunpowder were about the only articles that would bear the cost and trouble of transport. This separation and isolated interests, intensified by commercial policy or social differences, checked the growth of a compact colonial union.
The want of a free and regular interchange of commodities among the colonies has deprived the economist of one of the best of guides — a scale of prices from year to year. As the producer was generally also the immediate consumer, there was little machinery of trade needed. Stated markets, regulated by law, there were; but everything was local, and prices among the rest. Wheat might be selling in one place for a few shillings a bushel; in another locality not one hundred miles distant the inhabitants might be on the verge of starvation. The failure of a crop, the uncertainty of an ocean voyage,725 or a miscalculation in the needs of the market, might force prices to an extreme pitch in either direction, showing on what a little margin beyond their actual wants the colonies were existing.726
Another obstacle to the conduct of manufactures was the dearness of labor. In the South the prevalence of slavery not only rendered hired labor unnecessary but prevented the rise of any industry other than that conducted by slaves. “I am not able to give you the price of labor,” wrote Washington to Young, “as the land is cultivated here wholly by slaves, and the price of labor in the towns is fluctuating, and governed entirely by circumstances.” And Mitchell more fully treated the question: —
“They who estimate the price of labor in the colonies, by the day, do not know what their labor is, and much less the value of it. There is no such thing as day laborers on plantations, and it is inconsistent with the design of them, to admit of any. Day-laborers are only to be found in populous and well improved countries, where they have a variety of employments which afford them a daily subsistence; but as nothing will do that without manufactures, they who would estimate the price of labor in the colonies, by the day, must of course admit of manufactures. But on plantations every one is employed by the year, in order to make a crop, which lasts for a twelvemonth. Now, the wages of such laborers are four or five pounds a year for men, and forty shillings for women, who are the chief manufacturers; this brings the price of labor at a medium to 3l a year, which is but two-pence a day, for every day in the year.727
“The dearness of day-labor in the colonies proceeds from two causes; first, the laborers who are thus employed by the year, in order to make a crop of staple commodities for Britain, and their provisions with it, may lose their whole crop by neglecting it for a few days, and cannot spare a day’s work without losing ten times as much as it is worth, and perhaps their whole year’s subsistence; which is the true cause of the dearness of day labor in the plantations.
“Secondly, if there are any common laborers to be found, who are not engaged by the year, as there seldom are, they cannot find employment for above a few days in a month perhaps; and for that reason, they must have as much for two or three days’ work, as will maintain them for as many weeks; but at the year’s end they have not perhaps earned two-pence a day, for all the wages they may get, which is generally a shilling a day, meaning always sterling cash. Thus the day laborers of the colonies, if there are any, are only the vagrants, and not the laborers of the country; who stroll from place to place without house or home, are clothed in rags, and have not bare necessaries, notwithstanding the supposed high price of their labor.
“About populous towns the case is very different, and labor much dearer; they do not there make the necessaries of life, which enhances the price of labor; they have likewise a variety of employments, and a demand for laborers, who are employed on plantations in the country, and by that means are scarce and dear. Thus we are not to estimate the price of labor from a few towns, as Boston, New York, or Philadelphia, which we only hear of in Britain. These are not plantations, but trading or manufacturing towns, which shall not be inhabited without Tradesmen and Artificers, says the wise man; whose labor is still dearer, because Artists are scarce, and have not constant employment, and so much the better for Britain.”728
The dearness of labor was a result of the higher advantages to be derived from land, to which whatever labor and capital came to the colonies was attracted. “In new colonies,” says Adam Smith, “agriculture either draws hands from all other employments, or keeps them from going to any other employment,”729 and the latter was the case with the American settlements. “The mother country has very little to apprehend from any manufactures in the colonies, while there continues to be plenty of land for the people to settle on as farmers.” That was the assurance of Governor Franklin of New Jersey.730
“Nor is there the smallest reason to expect that manufacturers will be encouraged in Carolina while landed property can be obtained on such easy terms. The cooper, the carpenter, the bricklayer, the shipbuilder and every other artificer and tradesman, after having labored for a few years at their respective employments and purchased a few negroes, commonly retreat to the country and settle tracts of uncultivated land . . . . Even the merchant becomes weary of attending the store and risking his stock on the stormy sea, or in the hands of men where it is often exposed to equal hazards, and therefore collects it as soon as possible and settles a plantation.”731
Scarcity of labor was a condition natural to the plantations; the restrictions and prohibitions dictated by commercial and industrial jealousy were artificial barriers to the growth of the colonies. But this will be best described in connection with the mercantile system and the trade of the colonies.
The institution and maintenance of slavery in the colonies were productive of no less important economic than political results, and for more than seventy years after the Revolution exerted such an overwhelming influence as to be the pivotal factor in American history. One of the results of the treaty of Utrecht was to give to England the trade in slaves for the Spanish colonies for thirty years, and the traffic with the British colonies was encouraged that the vent might be larger and the demand more active. Prior to 1740, said Bancroft, there may have been introduced into the colonies nearly 130,000 slaves; before 1776 the number had more than doubled. Even before the English had secured a monopoly of this infamous traffic the Northern colonists had questioned its utility and morality, while those of the South in later years expressed a doubt whether it was for their interest to have so much labor as to glut the market with the products of slave labor and so lower their profits. But whether guided by a repugnance to a traffic in human beings or by a selfish interest, the colonists were powerless to direct or control the trade, being subject to the will of Great Britain. The trade was profitable to England; for its shipping was encouraged, its manufacturers were admitted to the African market with their products, and the production of the Southern colonies was thereby turned into channels in which it would redound to the greatest advantage to the mother country. No question of morality could be admitted; for the slave trade rested upon trade principles and could not be attacked on moral grounds while commerce was the chief end of its administration.
A broadside circulated at the beginning of the eighteenth century recognized but one evil connected with this traffic, — that it should be a monopoly, exercised by a privileged company.
“It is well known, that the Riches of the Plantations consist in Slaves, by whose strength and labor all their Commodities, as Tobacco, Sugar, Cotton, Indigo, Ginger, &c. are produced; and the more Slaves those Plantations are supplied with, the more Commodities are made, and the stronger they are to defend themselves against any Insults. Neither can there be any more danger of being overstockt with Negroes, than there is that too much Tobacco, Sugar, &c. should be sent to England; for it is a plain consequence, the more Negroes the more Goods will be produced, the more Goods the more Custom paid, and all those Commodities rendered here at home so cheap as will enable this Nation to send them abroad cheap also to the great discouragement of the Plantation Trade of all other Nations. Wherefore it is very plain, that a large supply of negroes will not only bring great Riches to this Kingdom, but will also greatly increase our navigation.”732
At the time this question of free trade or monopoly in the slave trade was being debated in England, Pennsylvania was seeking to abolish the right of holding slaves.
The African Company, in whose hands the slave trade chiefly rested, found little profit in its privileges, being checked by the frequent seizures of its property in America, by the dishonesty of its own agents and servants, and by the opposition of the colonies. In spite of the support of the government, the company was finally glad to relinquish its costly specialty. The colonies more than once sought to crush or discourage the trade, but Great Britain interfered to protect the profits of its traders.
“Great Britain, steadily rejecting every colonial limitation of the slave trade, instructed the governors, on pain of removal, not to give even a temporary assent to such laws; and but a year before the prohibition of the slave trade by the American Congress, in 1776, the Earl of Dartmouth illustrated the tendency of the colonies and the policy of England, by addressing to a colonial agent these memorable words: — ‘We cannot allow the colonies to check, or discourage in any degree, a traffic so beneficial to the nation.’”733
In the slave trade the New England colonies participated. Man stealing was denounced by some as piracy; but the purchase and use of slaves were recognized as legitimate, from a fanatical belief in a sanction of religious conviction.734
“One good old Elder, whose ‘ventures’ on the coast had uniformly turned out well, always returned thanks on the Sunday following the arrival of a slaver in the harbor of Newport, ‘that an overruling Providence had been pleased to bring to this land of freedom another cargo of benighted heathen, to enjoy the blessing of a gospel dispensation.’”735
As the Elect to whom God had joined the heathen for an inheritance, the New Englanders defended a trade which was after all encouraged because of the profit that could be drawn from it. Those colonies further possessed great facilities for engaging in this traffic. Small-sized ships, varying from fifty to two hundred tons burden, were found to be the most profitable, and they cost to build from twenty-four to thirty-four pounds a ton, the builder usually receiving a part of his pay in commodities. The crew was small in number, the running expenses light in comparison with the freight, and the profits large, for it was a double commerce, with the West Indies as well as with England and Africa. Provisions, lumber, horses and rum, were shipped from New England to the West Indies; there a part of the cargo was exchanged for cocoa, indigo, sugar, coffee and molasses; thence the vessel proceeded to England where a further exchange was made for cordage, duck and articles demanded by the African market; in Africa slaves were obtained, and on the homeward voyage a cargo of molasses was brought to New England to be converted into rum. In this way a series of exchanges grew up which employed every movement of the vessel and under favorable conditions made the voyage a succession of advantageous ventures.
The basis of the slave trade, and indeed of New England carrying trade, was rum, in the preparation of which those colonies excelled. In the middle of the eighteenth century it was accounted the “chief manufacture” of Massachusetts, and the “grand support of their trades and fisheries without which they could no longer subsist.” It was a staple article in the Indian trade and the common drink of laborers, lumbermen, and fishermen; it was exported to Guinea to be exchanged for gold and slaves, and finally it enabled the New Englander to barter his “refuse fish” and “low priced horses.”736 On Price’s map of Boston (1733) eight distilleries are marked, and the quantity of spirits made was as surprising as the cheap rate at which it was sold.737
“With this they supply almost all the consumption of our colonies in North America, the Indian trade there, the vast demands of their own and the Newfoundland fisheries, and, in a great measure, those of the African trade; but they are more famous for the quantity and cheapness than for the excellence of their rum.”738
In 1764 a gallon of molasses, costing in the West Indies about thirteen pence per gallon, was quoted in Boston at one shilling and sixpence “out of merchants’ storehouses.” The cost of distilling was five and one-half pence per gallon, and good distillers expected to turn out gallon for gallon, but the average was about ninety-six gallons of rum to every hundred gallons of molasses. In Africa £12 sterling, or one hundred and ten gallons of rum, were considered in 1762 a fair price for a “likely” slave, and he could be sold in the West Indies at prices ranging from twenty to forty pounds, according to the condition of the market. So that after all losses were deducted, and the mortality of slaves on shipboard was great, the return to the adventurer was highly profitable, and the competition keen. Newport, the centre of the trade, had no less than one hundred and twenty ships engaged in the West Indies, African and European commerce.739
To show why the slave trade was encouraged is not to explain its social effects and why the practice of slave holding, at one time general, was gradually confined to the Southern colonies. It was the avarice of adventurers that introduced the system of slave labor; the avarice of English merchants and manufacturers maintained it. The native Indian population was first enslaved by the Spaniards, greedy for gold, and was nearly exterminated by the severe and unremitted toil which devoted them to starvation, disease, and torture. The lands that once supported large populations threatened to become deserts. It was at this juncture that Las Casas, in endeavoring to protect the native population from destruction, framed his scheme of favoring emigration from Spain and of allowing every Spanish resident to import twelve negro slaves. From the islands African slavery spread to the mainland, and about the time the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock, the Dutch sold twenty African bondmen at Jamestown, Virginia. It was not long before slaves were held in every colony.
The conditions, however, that made slave labor advantageous were not present in every colony, or the “institution” might have survived in Massachusetts and New York as well as in Virginia and the Carolinas, exerting a dominating influence on the social and political organization. It was because the necessary conditions were absent that the Northern and Middle colonies escaped, and because they were present that the Southern colonies became slave colonies. Origin and climate were not the determining factors; difference in color and in mental and moral capacity widened the gulf between the governing class — the slave holders — and their slaves, but did not account for the presence or absence of slavery. Natural conditions and the physical features of the territory, especially when assisted by local habits and local institutions, account for the difference between North and South, and while in one sense these habits and institutions were a result of slavery, they caused slavery to be maintained long after it had been condemned for moral, political, and economic reasons. Had not Great Britain early devoted Virginia and Maryland to the cultivation of tobacco by forbidding its growth at home and by that regulation afforded a monopoly market for the colonial produce, slavery would not have secured the foothold that it did in those colonies. The colonial pact confined the South to certain staples, tobacco, rice and indigo, which could only be cultivated with profit on a large scale and with an abundance of labor, or which from the methods of culture demanded a constant supply of new labor. But free labor was throughout the colonies high in price and difficult to obtain; so the planters deemed themselves fortunate in being able to command an almost unlimited supply of slave labor, labor that seemed to them cheap. Undoubtedly it was cheap in the beginning. There was an abundance of rich and virgin soil at their disposal, and the wasteful and ignorant methods of slave labor were not felt, almost any labor yielding high returns. The products were all derived from the cultivation of the soil, for which kinds of production slaves were alone adapted, and they were such as would allow of the development of that organization by which the labor of slaves can alone be made of profit to their owners. The law favored large holdings in land, and the local government — the county forming the unit — was a result as well as a surety of the plantation system. Where tobacco, rice and indigo were cultivated on a large scale, slave labor could be employed; but where cereals formed the chief crop, slaves could have no place; they were not needed, they were in the end far too costly for such culture.740 This circumstance brought a system of labor which depended upon slavery into disfavor among the Middle colonies — New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania — where other conditions, like an unlimited extent of land and high fertility, would seem to favor it. A single laborer can cultivate twenty acres of corn or wheat, while he would be unable to manage more than two acres of tobacco.741
Even at this early period the evils of slave cultivation were experienced and deplored by the wisest observers. It was admitted that the negro could earn less than a freeman when the results of his toil were measured and compared with the product of free labor.742 He was ignorant, unskilful, indolent, and without adaptation. Hence a culture once introduced under his labor must be continued, for he was incapable of change. Rotation of crops was unknown, and the same culture applied year after year to the soil without any care being taken to maintain its fertility or improve it when impaired, could only result in exhausting the producing capacity of the land. Favored by soil and climate, encouraged by bounties or by a monopoly market, certain lines of production were pushed to an extreme, while all other resources of these colonies were neglected and allowed to go to waste. The results, which made the structure of society “essentially different from any form of social life which has hitherto been known among progressive communities,”743 were not sufficiently marked before the Revolution to come under this survey; they will demand consideration in a later period; but nothing could be more widely divergent than the aims and tendencies of the Northern colonies from those of the South. The free labor of the North was the direct antithesis of the slave labor of the South; in each the returns of production united in one person, but in the one case every inducement was held out to the laborer to exert his capabilities and study the means of increasing his returns, in the other the toil was yielded reluctantly, and extorted from a sense of fear. The farmer of the North obtained for himself all the gain due to his labor, and formed an active unit in the community; the slave of the South was awarded a bare subsistence, was a standing menace to the peace of the community, and all the returns of his industry increased the profits of his master.744 The economic difference arising from these conditions was beyond measurement, and in colonial days the economic aspect of slavery was of far greater importance than the social and political.
Tocqueville has pointed out that the natural conditions of New England were —
“entirely opposed to a territorial aristocracy . . . . To bring that refractory land into cultivation, the constant and interested exertions of the owner himself were necessary; and, when the ground was prepared, its product was found to be insufficient to enrich a master and a farmer at the same time. The land was then naturally broken up into small portions which the proprietor cultivated for himself.”
This influence was made stronger by laws favoring the free purchase and devising of lands, making slave labor the most expensive and consequently the least efficient instrument of production for that region, and practically impossible when brought into direct competition with free labor. Negroes were found throughout New England and the Middle colonies; but the social structure did not rest upon a basis of slave labor, and with the growth of society, the principle of slavery was extinguished.745
Slavery, however, even in the Southern colonies, was not at this time an active and aggressive force, either politically or economically. While each colony recognized the supremacy of Great Britain and held aloof from one another, there was neither the opportunity nor the occasion for political power, nor for the exercise of that peculiar political influence, devoted to the gain of power, which became the marked feature of slave policy in later years. There was no conflict between slave and non-slave States for political supremacy, or for the defence, maintenance, extension or suppression of slavery. The general opinion in every colony was against slavery; it had been tolerated but discountenanced at the North; it was maintained at the South only by the functions imposed on the colonies by the colonial policy of Great Britain. In competition with free labor it had failed at the North; as the basis of a labor system it was being condemned at the South. The Articles of Association adopted by Congress in 1774 bound the signers to import no more slaves, and to strike at the supply of slaves was to strike at slavery itself.746 This action was in alignment with the instructions prepared by Jefferson. “The abolition of domestic slavery is the great object of desire in those colonies, where it was, unhappily, introduced in their infant state. But previous to the enfranchisement of the slaves we have, it is necessary to exclude all further importations from Africa.” That the royal veto “preferring the immediate advantage of a few British corsairs to the lasting interests of the American States, and to the rights of human nature,” had repeatedly defeated the attempts of the colonists against this practice, constituted one of the grievances enumerated by the colonies against Parliament and English rule.747 The slave trade was denounced in the original draft of the Declaration of Independence, but the passage was omitted in the perfected instrument.748 When Virginia, as a State, enjoyed freedom of political action, the importation of slaves was prohibited in 1778 by a law which the veto of no king could set aside.
The holding of slaves was deprecated more from a moral than an economic motive. Jefferson saw clearly that the morals and industry of the population in slave colonies were suffering.
“With the morals of the people, their industry is also destroyed. For in a warm climate, no man will labor for himself who can make another labor for him. This is so true, that, of the proprietors of slaves, a very small proportion indeed are ever seen to labor.”749
During the Revolution the inconsistency of fighting for one’s own liberty, while inflicting bondage on another was recognized, and the cause of emancipation gained ground. In 1766 Christopher Gadsden of South Carolina had written: —
“We are a very weak province, a rich growing one, and of as much importance to Great Britain as any upon the continent; and great part of our weakness (though at the same time ’t is part of our riches) consists in having such a number of slaves amongst us . . . . Slavery begets slavery.”750
When Virginia prohibited the trade in slaves, a clause providing for the freedom of the offspring of slaves and deportation after a certain age was considered, but rejected as premature.751 The constitution of no State, North or South, contained the word slave, except that of Delaware. By 1784, slavery had been prohibited or the beginnings of emancipation laid in almost all the States, in one form or another. Such was the position of slavery at the end of the Revolution.
Mr. Albert Matthews then read the following —
NOTES ON THE PROPOSED ABOLITION OF SLAVERY IN VIRGINIA IN 1785.
As some of the extracts I am about to read, though relating chiefly to the proposed abolition of slavery in Virginia in 1785, refer to Washington, it seemed appropriate to present them at this meeting.
The followers of John Wesley early became prominent as missionaries in this country, and among the most noted of these were Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke, from whose writings we get interesting glimpses of the anti-slavery agitation. Bishop Asbury, referring to the Conference at Bristol, England, in 1771, said: —
“Before this, I had felt for half a year strong intimations in my mind that I should visit America; . . . At the Conference it was proposed that some preachers should go over to the American continent. I spoke my mind, and made an offer of myself. It was accepted by Mr. Wesley and others, who judged I had a call.”752
At once Asbury made his preparations, sailed the next month, and for thirteen years wandered up and down the American continent, until, on 14 November, 1784, he records that, to his great joy, he “met those dear men of God, Dr. Coke, and Richard Whatcoat; we were greatly comforted together.”753 On 24 December he rode to Baltimore, where he met a few preachers, and —
“it was agreed to form ourselves into an Episcopal Church, and to have superintendents, elders, and deacons. When the conference was seated, Dr. Coke and myself were unanimously elected to the superintendency of the Church, and my ordination followed, after being previously ordained deacon and elder.”754
On 30 April, 1785, while in Virginia, he says that he —
“found the minds of the people greatly agitated with our rules against slavery, and a proposed petition to the general assembly for the emancipation of the blacks. Colonel — — and Doctor Coke disputed on the subject, and the Colonel used some threats: next day, brother O’Kelly let fly at them, and they were made angry enough; we, however, came off with whole bones, and our business in conference was finished in peace.”755
On 22 May, he continues, “we rode to Alexandria, to meet Dr. Coke,” and on 26 May “we waited on General Washington, who received us very politely, and gave us his opinion against slavery.”756 Later, but while still in Virginia, he relates, under date of 15 November, that —
“our conversation turned upon slavery; the difficulties attending emancipation, and the resentment some of the members of the Virginia legislature expressed against those who favoured a general abolition.”757
These remarks by Asbury form a fitting introduction to the extracts I have now to offer, — those, namely, taken from a book which appears to be little known.758 It is entitled Extracts of the Journals of the Rev. Dr. Coke’s Five Visits to America,759 and was published at London in 1793. The author, Thomas Coke, born in Wales in 1747, a graduate of Jesus College, Oxford, in 1776 came under the influence of John Wesley,760 and in 1784 was urged by Wesley to go to the United States. Coke left England in September, 1784, and reached New York the third of November. At once proceeding south, he made extensive tours in that section of the country; he ordained Asbury, as we have already seen; and on the fifth of April, 1785, he “dared for the first time to bear a public testimony against slavery,” and did “not find that more than one was offended.”761 This calm was of short duration, for on the tenth of April he says: —
“I had now for the first time a very little persecution. The testimony I bore in this place against slave-holding, provoked many of the unawakened to retire out of the barn [in which he was preaching], and to combine together to flog me (so they expressed it) as soon as I came out. A high-headed Lady also went out, and told the rioters (as I was afterwards informed) that she would give fifty pounds, if they would give that little Doctor one hundred lashes. When I came out, they surrounded me, but had only power to talk.”762
Luckily his host, at whose house Coke and his fellow-preachers were obliged, on account of numbers, “to lie three in a bed,” was a justice of the peace, and the rage of the multitude was restrained; though on the following day he narrowly escaped severe treatment, for —
“Here a mob came to meet me with staves and clubs. Their plan, I believe, was to fall upon me as soon as I touched on the subject of slavery. I knew nothing of it till I had done preaching; but not seeing it my duty to touch on the subject here, their scheme was defeated, and they suffered me to pass through them without molestation.”763
Undeterred by these rebuffs, he attended a quarterly meeting in Mecklenburg County, Virginia, 24 and 25 April, and says: —
“Here I bore a public testimony against Slavery, and have found out a method of delivering it without much offence, or at least without causing a tumult: and that is, by first addressing the Negroes in a very pathetic manner on the Duty of Servants to Masters; and then the Whites will receive quietly what I have to say to them.”764
The opposition to slavery was not started by Coke, for action against it had been taken in the Conferences for 1780 and 1783;765 but the stringent rules drawn up in 1784 were very likely due to Coke’s influence. These rules are as follows: —
“Q. 42. What Methods can we take to extirpate Slavery?
“A. We are deeply conscious of the Impropriety of making new Terms of Communion for a religious Society already established, excepting on the most pressing Occasion: and such we esteem the Practice of holding our Fellow-Creatures in Slavery. We view it as contrary to the Golden Law of God on which hang all the Law and the Prophets, and the unalienable Rights of Mankind, as well as every Principle of the Revolution, to hold in the deepest Debasement, in a more abject Slavery than is perhaps to be found in any Part of the World except America, so many Souls that are all capable of the Image of God.
“We therefore think it our most bounden Duty, to take immediately some effectual Method to extirpate this Abomination from among us; And for that Purpose we add the following to the Rules of our Society: viz.
“1. Every Member of our Society who has Slaves in his Possession, shall within twelve Months after Notice given to him by the Assistant (which Notice the Assistants are required immediately and without any Delay to give in their respective Circuits) legally execute and record an Instrument, whereby he emancipates and sets free every Slave in his Possession who is between the Ages of Forty and Forty-five immediately, or at the farthest when they arrive at the Age of Forty-five:
“And every Slave who is between the Ages of Twenty-five and Forty immediately, or at farthest at the Expiration of five Years from the Date of the said Instrument:
“And every Slave who is between the Ages of Twenty and Twenty-five immediately, or at farthest when they arrive at the Age of Thirty:
“And every Slave under the Age of Twenty, as soon as they arrive at the Age of Twenty-five at farthest.
“And every Infant born in Slavery after the above-mentioned Rules are complied with, immediately on its Birth.
“2. Every Assistant shall keep a Journal, in which he shall regularly minute down the Names and Ages of all the Slaves belonging to all the Masters in his respective Circuit, and also the Date of every Instrument executed and recorded for the Manumission of the Slaves, with the Name of the Court, Book and Folio, in which the said Instruments respectively shall have been recorded: Which Journal shall be handed down in each Circuit to the succeeding Assistants.
“3. In Consideration that these Rules form a new Term of Communion, every Person concerned, who will not comply with them, shall have Liberty quietly to withdraw himself from our Society within the twelve Months succeeding the Notice given as aforesaid: Otherwise the Assistant shall exclude him in the Society.
“4. No person so voluntarily withdrawn, or so excluded, shall ever partake of the Supper of the Lord with the Methodists, till he complies with the above-Requisitions.
“No Person holding Slaves shall, in future, be admitted into Society or to the Lord’s Supper, till he previously complies with these Rules concerning Slavery.
“N. B. These Rules are to affect the Members of our Society no farther than as they are consistent with the Laws of the States in which they reside.
“And respecting our Brethren in Virginia that are concerned, and after due Consideration of their peculiar Circumstances, we allow them two Years from the Notice given, to consider the Expedience of Compliance or Non-Compliance with these Rules.
“Q. 43. What shall be done with those who buy or sell Slaves, or give them away?
“A. They are immediately to be expelled: unless they buy them on purpose to free them.”766
In the first week in May, Coke records that —
“A great many principal friends met us here to insist on a Repeal of the Slave-Rules; but when they found that we had thoughts of withdrawing ourselves entirely from the Circuit on account of the violent spirit of some leading men, they drew in their horns, and sent us a very humble letter, intreating that Preachers might be appointed for their Circuit . . . . After mature consideration we formed a petition, a copy of which was given to every Preacher, intreating the General Assembly of Virginia, to pass a Law for the immediate or gradual emanicipation of all the Slaves. It is to be signed by all the Freeholders we can procure, and those I believe will not be few. There have been many debates already on the subject in the Assembly.”767
Nor was slavery his only cause for annoyance. On the fifteenth of May he preached to a large congregation, and says: —
“During the sermon, after I had spoken very pointedly concerning the impropriety of going in and out during divine service, two dressy girls walked out with such an impudent air, that I rebuked them keenly. After the public service, whilst I was administering the sacrament, baptizing, and meeting the Society, their father who is a Colonel, raged at the outside of the Church, declaring that as soon as I came out, he would horse-whip me for the indignity shewn to his family. But his two brothers (all unawakened) took my part, and insisted that I had done my duty, and the young ladies deserved it. However, finding that our preaching in that Church, which we do regularly, chiefly depends upon him, I wrote a letter of apology to him as far as the truth would permit, when I came to my lodging. We had a good time during the sermon and the Sacrament. But when I enlarged to the Society on Negro-Slavery, the principal leader raged like a lion, and desired to withdraw from the Society. I took him at his word, and appointed that excellent man (Brother Skelton) Leader in his stead. When the Society came out of the Church, they surrounded Brother Skelton, ‘And will you,’ said they, ‘Set your Slaves at liberty?’ (He has many Slaves) ‘Yes,’ says he, ‘I believe I shall.’”768
On the twenty-fifth of May he met at Alexandria “that dear, valuable man, Mr. Asbury;” and on the twenty-sixth their visit to Mount Vernon took place. He writes: —
“Mr. Asbury and I set off for General Washington’s. We were engaged to dine there the day before. The General’s Seat is very elegant, built upon the great river Potomawk; for the improvement of the navigation of which, he is carrying on jointly with the State some amazing Plans. He received us very politely, and was very open to access. He is quite the plain, Country-Gentleman. After dinner we desired a private interview, and opened to him the grand business on which we came, presenting to him our petition for the emancipation of the Negroes, and intreating his signature, if the eminence of his station did not deem it inexpedient for him to sign any petition. He informed us that he was of our sentiments, and had signified his thoughts on the subject to most of the great men of the State: that he did not see it proper to sign the petition, but if the Assembly took it into consideration, would signify his sentiments to the Assembly by a letter. He asked us to spend the evening and lodge at his house, but our engagements at Annapolis the following day would not admit of it. We returned that evening to Alexandria.”769
His experience had taught him caution, and at a conference held 1 June at Baltimore, —
“We thought it prudent to suspend the minute concerning Slavery, on account of the great opposition that had been given it, our work being in too infantile a state to push things to extremity.”770
Coke returned to England the same month, and though later he made frequent visits to this country and to the West Indies, he does not seem again to have visited Mount Vernon.771
In connection with Dr. Coke’s characterization of Washington as “quite the plain, Country-Gentleman,” it is pertinent to quote an extract from a letter which our associate Mr. Ford has just placed in my hands. It is dated Philadelphia, 25 December, 1783, shortly after Washington had taken his departure, and is interesting as having been written to Elias Boudinot by that arch-enemy of Washington, Dr. Benjamin Rush. It is as follows: —
“Our beloved Gen Washington left us a few days ago after receiving a thousand marks of respect & affection from all classes of people. In his way to Baltimore he was caught in a shower of rain, & sought a shelter from it in the common stage waggon. When the waggon came to a tavern, the tavern keeper, who knew him, received him with the greatest respect, & offered to prepare a dinner for him & his aids in a separate room. ‘No — no,’ said the General, ‘It is customary for travellers in this waggon to dine together. — I will dine nowhere but in this common room with these my fellow passengers,’ & accordingly sat down & ate his dinner like any other Virginia planter with them. This act throws a greater lustre over his character than all his victories. It shows him to be a man — a citizen — & a philosopher. His victories can only denominate him a General.”772
Allusions to this early attempt to abolish slavery in Virginia appear to be rare, but we can trace out the result from other sources of information. On Tuesday, 8 November, 1785, there was presented and read, in the Virginia House of Deputies, —
“Also, a petition of sundry persons, whose names are thereunto subscribed; setting forth, that they are firmly persuaded, that it is contrary to the fundamental principles of the christian religion, to keep so considerable a number of our fellow creatures, the negroes in this State, in slavery; that it is also an express violation of the principles upon which our government is founded; and that a general emancipation of them, under certain restrictions, would greatly contribute to strengthen it, by attaching them by the ties of interest and gratitude, to its support; and praying that an act may pass to that effect.
“Also, a petition of sundry inhabitants of the county of Mecklenburg, whose names are thereunto subscribed, in opposition thereto; and praying that the act, ‘empowering the owners of slaves to emancipate them;’ may be repealed.
“Ordered, That the said petitions do severally lie on the table.”773
On Thursday, the tenth of November, —
“On a motion made, The House proceeded to consider the petition of sundry persons presented on Tuesday last, which lay on the table, praying for a general emancipation of slaves, and the same being read:
“A motion was made, and the question being put, to reject the said petition,
“It passed in the affirmative, nemine contra dicente.
“Resolved, That the said petition be rejected.”774
These entries show the fate of the petition. From Madison we get something more than the bare details. Writing to Washington 11 November, 1785, he says: —
“The pulse of the House of Delegates was felt on Thursday with regard to a general manumission, by a petition presented on that subject. It was rejected without dissent, but not without an avowed patronage of its principles by sundry respectable members. A motion was made to throw it under the table, which was treated with as much indignation on one side as the petition itself was on the other. There are several petitions before the House against any step towards freeing the Slaves, and even praying for a repeal of the law which licenses particular manumissions.”775
Again, writing 22 January, 1786, to Jefferson, then in France, Madison says: —
“Several petitions (from Methodists chiefly) appeared in favor of a gradual abolition of slavery, and several from another quarter for a repeal of the law which licenses private manumissions. The former was not thrown under the table, but was treated with all the indignity short of it. A proposition for bringing in a bill conformably to the latter was decided in the affirmative by the casting vote of the Speaker; but the bill was thrown out on the first reading by a considerable majority.”776
Finally, from Jefferson himself we get light as to the cause of the failure of the petition. Under date of 22 June, 1786, he says: —
“Of the two commissioners who had concerted the amendatory clause for the gradual emancipation of slaves Mr. Wythe could not be present as being a member of the judiciary department, and Mr. Jefferson was absent on the legation to France. But there wanted not in that assembly men of virtue enough to propose, & talents to vindicate this clause. But they saw that the moment of doing it with success was not yet arrived, and that an unsuccessful effort, as too often happens, would only rivet still closer the chains of bondage, and retard the moment of delivery to this oppressed description of men.”777
Jefferson concludes with one of those vigorous denunciations of slavery to which he so often gave vent.
Mr. Andrew McFarland Davis communicated a copy of a curious document relating to the Rhode Island Land Bank which is believed to have been written by Dr. William Douglass.778
Moses Coit Tyler, LL.D., of Ithaca, New York, was elected a Corresponding Member.
1 Court Files Suffolk, vol. dcvii. no. 102, 491.
2 Court Files Suffolk, vol. dcvii. no. 102, 491.
3 Court Files Suffolk, vol. dcvii. no. 102, 491.
4 Court Files Suffolk, vol. dcvii. no. 102, 491.
5 Court Files Suffolk, vol. dcvii. no. 102, 491.
6 Court Files Suffolk, vol. dcvii. no. 102, 491.
7 Connecticut Archives: Trade and Maritime Affairs, vol. i. no. 161.
8 Publications of this Society, v. 98.
9 Colonial Records of Connecticut, vii. 390.
10 Colonial Records of Connecticut, vii. 421
11 See Publications of this Society, v. 104.
12 Connecticut Archives: Trade and Maritime Affairs, vol. i. nos. 168, 169.
13 Ibid. vol. i. no. 167.
14 Concerning the land controversies in Maine and their final settlement, see ante, v. 291 and note
15 The Pemaquid Patent will be found in 1 Collections Maine Historical Society, v. 207–214; Suffolk Deeds, iii. 52–56; and in J. Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, pp. 70–74; a part of the Letter of Instructions, in Johnston, pp. 97, 98; and some of the documents, — including the Patent which fills pp. 33–39, — in the Order of Both Branches of the Legislature of Massachusetts, to appoint Commissioners to investigate the causes of the difficulties in the County of Lincoln; and the Report of the Commissioners thereon, with the Documents, in support thereof. Boston, 1811, 8vo, pp. 174, —sometimes called the Lincoln Report. It has been thought best, however, to print here such papers as might be necessary to make the story clear, especially as the last named work is now of some rarity. This Report shows how the Pemaquid Proprietors (see pp. 52, 53, post) derived their title.
16 Johnston, in his History of Bristol and Bremen, gives brief accounts of our four litigants, — Bailey, p. 277; Eliot, p. 333; Randall, p. 334; and Yates, pp. 290, 446. On a plan facing p. 1 can be seen the location of the houses of Bodkin, Bayley, and Yates; and the location of those of Eliot and of Randall may perhaps be made out. Bodkin’s Deposition may be found in Order of both Branches, etc., p. 127.
Johnston (p. 468) says that in 1767 and 1768 Thomas Bodkin brought actions against these four tenants; “what the result was is not known, but probably the trial never took place.” Until 1797, under the Statutes, the legal depository for the Records of the Superiour Court of Judicature in all the Counties of Massachusetts, including the District of Maine, was in the Clerk’s office in the County of Suffolk; thereafter the Records were kept in the respective counties. This fact being overlooked, it was in many quarters supposed that those earlier Records of Maine were missing, and a traditionary fire conveniently explained their loss.
17 They are recorded in the Records of the Superiour Court of Judicature: —
- 1770, xxix. 136, James Bayley v. Thomas Bodkin,
- 1771, xxx. 117, John Randall v. Same
- xxx. 120, James Yeates v. Same
- xxx. 120, Simon Eliot v. Same.
The original papers are found in Suffolk Court Files, vols. dcccxci, dcccxcii, and dcccxciii, group-numbers 139,413; 139,429; 139,469; 139,495; 139,498; 139,532.
18 Nicholas Davison and Richard Russell were among the most prominent and wealthy citizens of Charlestown, and Russell was the founder of the most distinguished family ever resident in the town. He arrived in 1840, and held high public office until his death, 14 (3) 1676, in his sixty-fifth year. Six members of this family, representing five generations, sat in the Executive Council of the Colony, Province and Commonwealth. For notices of him, of his English ancestry, and of his part ownership of the Pemaquid Patent, see Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, ii. 829; Heraldic Journal, iv. 32, 33, 102–109; Savage’s Genealogical Dictionary of New England, iii. 593, 594 Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England i. 405, 406, 511, 512, ii 1009; Appleton’s Cyclopedia of American Biography, v. 354; Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen pp. 77, 78; Drake’s Dictionary of American Biography, p. 789; and Pope’s Pioneers of Massachusetts, pp. 395, 396.
Concerning Nicholas Davison, see post, pp. 37, 38, note.
19 Interlined in the original.
20 Interlined in the original.
21 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139, 495: 2.
22 Records of the Superiour Court of Judicature, 1771, xxx. 117.
23 For the will of Robert Aldworth, an Alderman of Bristol, England, and some facts concerning him, see Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, i. 632–637, 660, 734, 735; and Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, pp. 21, 57, 76, 85.
24 Gyles Elbridge was a kinsman — Thornton says a nephew —of Robert Aldworth and a principal legatee under his will, proved in 1634. In 1650, Thomas Elbridge, a son of Gyles Elbridge, was sole owner of the Pemaquid Patent. On the first of February, 1651–52, Thomas Elbridge sold one half of it to Paul White (Suffolk Deeds, ii. 69–72) who, for £150 sterling, sold it, 27 April, 1653, to Richard Russell and Nicholas Davison (Ibid. ii. 68). Davison subsequently (14 April, 1657) bought of Elbridge, the other half of the Patent (Ibid. iii. 50; cf. pp. 46, 57–59), and of Richard Russell, the remaining quarter and two islands near Pemaquid, on the twenty-first of July, 1657 (Ibid. iii. 49, 50) Nicholas Davison thus became the sole owner of the Pemaquid Patent.
For Gyles Elbridge’s will, and some notices of his English connections and of his ownership of the Pemaquid Patent, see Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, i. 633–636, 655, 735, ii. 1009; and Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, pp. 57, 70, 76, 78, 85, 95, 96.
Elbridge Gerry, Vice-President of the United States, traced his descent from Gyles Elbridge
25 Inasmuch as, in the copy in the Early Suffolk Court Files, the copyist had run the tender of issues together in some confusion, — as appears at once on inspection, —it has seemed best, in printing, to follow the text of the original plea, still on file in the Court of Common Pleas in the County of Lincoln, Maine.
26 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139, 413: 3.
27 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,498: 1.
28 The early visit of Samoset and his hospitable greeting has always been an interesting incident in the history of the Pilgrims, and with the various embellishments has played a conspicuous part therein. Its first mention is in Mourt’s Relation. The passage, as it is given in full in Mr. Matthews’s Note hereto appended, is now omitted; and the like course will be followed as to all references to Samoset, only such matters being here retained as are not there included. The Relation goes on to show that “Saturday in the morning we dismissed the Salvage,” and that on Sunday he came again, and “Stayed with vs till Wednesday morning.” It also gives a full description of him and of the entertainment given him. There is also an account of a third visit. Governor Bradford’s narrative adds some interesting details.
“All this while ye Indians came Skulking about them, and would sometimes show them selves aloofe of, but when any aproached near them they would rune away . . . . But about ye 16. of March a certaine Indian came bouldly amongst them, and spoke to them in broken English, which they could well understand, but marvelled at it. At length they understood by discourse with him, that lie was not of these parts, but belonged to y Eastrene parts, wher some English-ships came to fhish, with whom he was aquainted, & could name sundrie of them by their names, amongst whom he gott his language. He became profitable to them in aquainting them with many things concerning ye State of ye cuntry in ye east-parts wher he lived, which was afterwards profitable unto them; as also of ye people hear, of their names, number & strength; of their situation & distance from this place, and who was cheefe amongst them. His name was Samaset” (History of Plimouth Plantation, 1856, p. 93).
“Christopher Levett’s Voyage into New England begun in 1623 and ended in 1624,” gives an account of his acquaintance with Samoset: —
“Came many savages with their wives and children . . . . Somerset, a sagamore, one that hath been found very faithful to the English, and hath saved the lives of many of our nation, some from starving, others from killing . . . . And Somerset told that his son (who was born whilst I was in the country, and whom he would needs have to name) and mine should be brothers and that there should be mouchicke legamatch (that is friendship) betwixt them, until Tanto carried them to his wigwam (that is until they died)” (1 Collections Maine Historical Society, ii. 87, 92, 93).
However little doubt there may be as to the identity of “Capt. John Somerset” and “Samoset,” a question has been raised as to which was the earlier, or original, name. The a priori argument is strongly in favor of “Samoset.” The historical argument leads almost irresistibly to the same conclusion. The doubt raised by Mr. Drake seemed to have no sufficient ground for it, and his contention to lack any actual proof.
I am under great obligation to our associate, Mr. Albert Matthews, for his exhaustive and seemingly conclusive Note, appended to this Paper (pp. 59–70), in support of the opinion just expressed; and to our associate, Mr. Henry H. Edes, for many of the most valuable and interesting footnotes to this communication.
29 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139, 532: 17.
30 Recorded with Suffolk Deeds, liii. 180.
31 Shem Drowne, one of the largest and most active and influential of the Pemaquid Proprietors, though to a considerable extent a man of affairs and activity, and engaged in many important matters in the early days of Boston and Charlestown, is perhaps best and most popularly known as the artisan who made the Indian upon the old Province House and the Grasshopper on Faneuil Hall, and will owe his civic immortality to them. The Indian is now in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society, by the gift of Mrs. William Appleton. Its Proceedings for December, 1876 (xv. 178–180), in the remarks of Dr. George E. Ellis, contain an account of the gift and a description of the figure, — “the handiwork of Deacon Shem Drowne, who afterwards made the grasshopper on Faneuil Hall, after the pattern of that on the Royal Exchange, London.” (See also Shurtleff’s Topographical and Historical Description of Boston, pp. 597–599; Memorial History of Boston, ii. 90; and Hill’s History of the Old South Church, i. 455.) Hawthorne, too, in his Legends of the Province House, has thrown a touch of romance about him and linked his name with the Royal Governors of the Province. Drowne’s fame as an artisan, however, was not confined to Boston. In 1765, the old weather-cock on the steeple of the Deerfield Meeting-house was taken down to be repaired and regilded. The bird was then “furnished with ‘new globe eyes’ by Shem Drowne of Boston, and returned to his new perch where, until 1824, he kept watch and ward over the going and coming generations of men. He still fulfils the duty assigned him in 1729, on the spire” of the Meeting-house built in 1824, and still standing,—the Unitarian Church of to-day (Address of George Sheldon, at Deerfield, 28 July, 1901). Drowne was married 18 September, 1712, by the Rev. Benjamin Colman, to Katherine Clark, daughter of Timothy Clark (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxviii. 39; and Suffolk Probate Files, No. 7017). His death is briefly told in the Diary of Thomas Newell, under date of 13 January, 1774: —
“Thursday, more moderate weather. Very good sledding; great plenty provisions and grain. Old Mr. Sliem Drown, ob. Æ. 91; he was the first tin-plate worker that ever came to Boston, New England” (I Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for October, 1877, xv. 348).
32 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,413: 10.
33 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,413: 11.
34 Abraham Jennings is here referred to. See post, p. 51.
35 Interlined in the original.
36 Interlined in the original.
37 Interlined in the original.
38 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,532: 27.
39 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,413: 46.
40 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,413: 20.
41 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,498: 32.
42 Ibid. No. 139,498: 47.
43 Cancelled in the original.
44 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,532: 28.
45 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,413: 17.
46 Ibid. No. 139,413: 23.
47 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,413: 25.
48 Ibid. No. 139,413:18.
49 Savage’s Genealogical Dictionary of New England, ii. 24.
Nicholas Davison (ante, p. 14 and note) was admitted an inhabitant of Charlestown in 1639. In 1642, he was living at Medford, Massachusetts (Middlesex Deeds, iii. 116). In 1655, he went to Barbados, and returned, in the Speedwell, to Charlestown the following year. He had only the two children mentioned in his will (see post, p. 39, note). His sole ownership of the Pemaquid Patent and his title thereto have been already shown (ante, p. 17, note. See also, Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, p. 77). He also owned a valuable estate in Dock Square, Boston, at the easterly corner of Shrimpton’s Lane, later known as Royal Exchange Lane and now as Exchange Street. His title to this property, however, does not clearly appear of record. It was a part of the original Possession of Robert Nash who for £150 mortgaged it, with the dwelling house thereon to Nicholas Davison, 1 (11) 1648 (Suffolk Deeds, i. 98). The mortgage was discharged 8 (10) (1649) (Ibid. i. 110). The next recorded evidence of Davison’s ownership is in 1667 (after his decease), when the estate is mentioned, in abuttal, as land of Mrs. Jone Davison (Ibid. v. 360). It is similarly referred to in 1675, as belonging to the widow Davison or her children (Ibid. ix. 380). Daniel Davison, the only son of Nicholas Davison, for £226, conveyed one half of the estate to John Phillips of Charlestown, 14 April, 1682 (Ibid. xii. 200). The title to the other half was vested in the Honorable Joseph Lynde, who had married Sarah Davison. He, for love to his daughter Margaret, wife of Colonel Thomas Savage, conveyed his moiety to her, 28 February, 1705–6 (Ibid. xxii. 470). Thomas and Margaret Savage reconveyed to Joseph Lynde, 20 May, 1708 (Ibid. xxiv. 10), and he and John Phillips, for £1000, conveyed the whole lot to Thomas Savage on the following day (Ibid. xxiv. 10). Colonel Thomas Savage died seized, 3 March, 1720–21 (Boston Town Records), after mortgaging the estate to Andrew Belcher and others, Trustees, 1 July, 1715, when it had a frontage of 34 feet on Dock Square and a depth of 121 feet on the Lane (Suffolk Deeds, xxix. 232. Cf. Province Laws, i. 750–752). The Inventory describes the property as " A Brick house, Land and Stable in Dock Square, Boston, £1400 " (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 4403). The premises descended to Colonel Savage’s two daughters, Margaret, wife of John Alford, and Elizabeth, wife of Joshua Winslow. Joshua and Elizabeth Winslow conveyed her share to Benjamin Alford, 1 March, 1725–26 (Suffolk Deeds, xlvii. 91), and he reconveyed it to Joshua Winslow in his own right, 20 January, 1732–33 (Ibid, xlvii. 91), so that the title was then vested in Margaret Alford and Joshua Winslow, in equal shares. In the Partition of Joshua Winslow’s estate (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 14,559), his moiety of the Dock Square property was set off to his son Isaac Winslow, Junior (see post, p. 129). As an illustration of the rise in real estate values, it may be stated that this property was assessed, in 1899, as three estates, — $129,000 for the 3650 feet of land, and $13,500 for the brick buildings thereon, a total of $142,500.
For notices of Nicholas Davison and his family, see Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 283, 284; Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, i. 630; and Pope’s Pioneers of Massachusetts, p. 134
50 Cancelled in the original.
51 Mrs. Davison married (2) Richard Kent of Newbury, 6 January, 1674–75 (who died 25 November, 1689), and died at Newbury, 30 October, 1699 (Newbury Town Records).
52 Major Daniel Davison, of Charlestown and Newbury, was born at Charlestown, Massachusetts, 9 January, 1650–51; married Abigail Coffin, daughter of the Honorable Peter Coffin of Exeter, New Hampshire, 16 December, 1673; and died 18 January, 1717–18 (gravestone at Newbury). Of his eight children, Sarah married Colonel Stephen Dudley, great-grandson of Governor Thomas Dudley; Mary married Jacob Sheafe of Boston; Abigail, baptized 23 July, 1699, married Zachariah Fitch of Boston (see post, pp. 42, 43, notes); and Captain Nicholas, by wife Anne who died at Newbury, 6 July, 1731, in her 43d year (gravestone), had (i) Mary, who died in 1709, (ii) Elizabeth, baptized 15 October, 1710, who married Captain Robert Ball, at Charlestown, 26 June, 1728, (iii) Daniel, baptized 19 April, 1713, who married Margaret Ogleby, and (iv) Ann, born about 1715, who married John Goodwin. (Newbury Town Records; Newbury Church Records; and Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 284.) There is a portrait of Elizabeth (Davison) Ball, by Blackburn, and one of her husband by Smibert, in the possession of our associate, Mr. Henry H. Edes, — one of their descendants in the fifth generation.
53 Sarah Davison was born at Charlestown, 31 December, 1647, married the Honorable Joseph Lynde, 24 March, 1664–65, and died, of small pox, 13 December, 1678. Lynde subsequently married (2) Emma or Amy (Anderson) Brackenbury and (3) Mary (Luttrell) Winthrop, widow of the Honorable Adam Winthrop, and died 29 January, 1726–27 at the great age of about 90 years (The Boston Weekly News-Letter of Thursday, 2 February, 1726–27, No. 5, p. 2/2). He was of the Committee of Safety, 1689, Representative, and a member of the Council. A considerable number of the Pemaquid Proprietors (see post, pp. 52, 53, note) derived their title through their descent from Joseph and Sarah Lynde, — especially through their daughter Sarah Lynde, born 5 December, 1666, who married (1) Thomas Clark and (2) Seth Sweetser; and their daughter Margaret Lynde, born 24 January, 1668–69, who married Colonel Thomas Savage, of Boston, son of Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas and Elizabeth (Seottow) Savage, and grandson of Thomas Savage, the emigrant, and became the mother of Elizabeth Savage, born 1 August, 1694, who married Joshua Winslow, and of Margaret Savage, born 10 September, 1698, who married the Honorable John Alford (see post, pp. 128, 129, note).
54 Cancelled in the original.
55 Cancelled in the original.
56 See Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 20.
57 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,532: 21. The original will, wholly in the elegant handwriting of the testator, is still preserved in the Middlesex Probate Files, No. 4070.
58 Suffolk Court Files, No. 713. The Inventory in the Middlesex Probate Files (No. 4070) includes Real Estate in Boston, Charlestown, Pemaquid, and 2,100 acres at Windsor, Connecticut. Among the items of personal property enumerated are a hall clock, sword, rapier, cutlasses and pistols, fine linen, 139 ounces of plate, six ounces of silver buttons, cypress cabinet, eight pieces of gold therein, broadcloth, French and Spanish books, and two negroes, — Conungo and Maria. The amount the Inventory was £1869. 11. 11.
59 Abigail Fitch was born in Boston 6 September, 1723, and was baptized at the Old South Church. She was a daughter of Zachariah and Abigail (Davison) Fitch. Her mother was a daughter of Major Daniel Davison of Charlestown and Newbury and granddaughter of Nicholas Davison. For her paternal ancestry, see New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 1901, lv, 288–293. See also ante, p. 39, note.
60 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,532: 41.
61 Elizabeth Gorrod was the youngest child of Zachariah and Abigail (Davison) Fitch. She was born in Boston, 31 January, 1731–32, and was baptized at the New South Church. Her Intention of Marriage with Samuel Gorrod was recorded in Boston, 13 October, 1757, and again in December, 1760 (Boston Record Commissioners' Reports, xxx. 26, 38). The record of her marriage has not been found. She was a sister of Abigail Fitch (see ante, p. 42, note).
62 Suffolk Court Files, No. 130,532: 42.
63 Interlined in the original.
64 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,498: 53.
65 David Anderson was grandson of John Anderson, named in Nicholas Davison’s will, ante, p. 40 (Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 21).
66 Interlined in the original
67 Interlined in the original
68 Interlined in the original
69 Cancelled in the original.
70 Interlined in the original
71 Cancelled in the original.
72 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,532: 22.
73 Henry Phillips of Dedham, Boston and Charlestown, had a son Samuel Phillips, baptized 2 November, 1662, who was a stationer in Boston, married Hannah Gillam, and had by her, among others, Hannah Phillips, who married (1) David Anderson and (2) Habijah Savage; and Faith Phillips, the deponent, who married (1) Arthur Savage and (2) the Honorable Daniel Russell. Habijah and Arthur Savage were brothers of Colonel Thomas Savage (see ante, pp. 37, 38, 39, notes). Faith Russell died at Weston, 6 June, 1775, aged 84 years (Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, ii. 742, 743, 746, 831, 847, 848).
74 Cancelled in the original.
75 Interlined in the original.
76 Interlined in the original.
77 Cancelled in the original.
78 Cancelled in the original.
79 Cancelled in the original.
80 Cancelled in the original.
81 Cancelled in the original.
82 Cancelled in the original.
83 Interlined in the original.
84 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,532: 66
85 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,169: 2.
86 Bowditch’s Suffolk Surnames contains the following Dedication: —
To the Memory
of
A. Shurt,
“The Father of American Conveyancing”
whose name is associated alike
with
My Daily Toilet and my Daily Occupation.
4
In the same work the author says: —
“Abraham Shurt, of Pemaquid (now Bristol, Me.), took an acknowledgment of an Indian deed in 1626, twenty years before any enactment on that subject, and is considered the ‘Father of American Conveyancing’” (p. 101).
The appellation given him by Thornton, followed by Bowditch, seems not undeserved. The acknowledgment, now so firmly established as an essential part of every conveyance, appears to have owed its earliest use to him, and the form employed on that Indian deed of 1626 is practically identical with that in use to-day. The acknowledgment in question may be read in Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, p. 55.
In the New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 1871 (xxv. 131–137), Professor John Johnston has a long and interesting account of Shurt as filling an important place in early Maine history; and there is a further account in his History of Bristol and Bremen: “He became a resident of Pemaquid soon after his arrival in the country, and spent here the rest of his life” (p. 59. See also Ibid. pp. 56, 57). He is supposed to have come over about 1625. As to the date of his death, Johnston says there have been various guesses and mistakes, — Williamson, for instance, giving both years 1680 and 1690; but he thinks it more likely that it occurred soon after Shurt’s visit to Boston in 1602. Johnston speaks of him as “a just and upright man, . . .a magistrate of influence in the colony, . . .an honest man and upright magistrate,” — no slight praise. Much of the credit of his services between the savages and the colonists, however, he is inclined to think belongs to one John Earthy, and not to him, “excellent man as he was.”
Hubbard gives the story of a retaliatory attack made by some hundred Eastern Indians in thirty canoes, upon Agawam, in the summer of 1631, and relates how they —
“slew seven men, and wounded John and James, two sagamores that lived about Boston, and carried others away captive, amongst whom one was the wife of the said James, which they sent again by the mediation of Mr Sliurd of Pemaquid, that used to trade with them” (General History of New England, chap, xxv., in 2 Massachusetts Historical Collections, v. 145).
The same occurrence is noted in Prince’s Annals of New England: —
“Sept. 17. Mr Shurt or Shurd of Pemaquid sends Home to Agawam, James Sagamore’s Wife, who had been taken away [in] the Surprize at Agawam” (Ibid. 2, vii. 34 of the second pagination).
Another incident in which Shurt figured is given by Hubbard, chap. xxix.: —
“In June, in the vear 1633, fell out a very remarkable accident upon some that belonged to Pemaquid. One Abraham Shard . . . bound for Boston in a shallop, intending to turn into Pascataqua by the way, but just as they were entering into the river’s mouth one of the seamen, going to light a pipe of tobacco, set fire on a barrel of powder, which tore the boat to pieces, laden with about £200 worth of commodities, which were all lost. That seaman that kindled the fire was never seen more, (though the rest were all saved) till afterwards the trunk of his body was found with his hands and his feet torn off, which was a remarkable judgment of God upon him; for one of his fellows wished him to forbear taking tobacco till they came ashore, which was hard by, to whom he replied, that if the devil should carry him away quick, he would take one pipe” (Ibid. 2, v. 195, 196).
The same is also more briefly told, but in much the same words, in Prince’s Annals (Ibid. 2, vii. 62, 63 of the second pagination). Hubbard (chap, liv.) has also another story of Shurt: —
“The same summer [1644], Mr Vines, agent for Sir Ferdinando Gorges, at Saco, Mr. Waunerton, that had some interest in the government of Pascataqua, and Mr. Shurt of Pemaquid, went to La Tour to call for some debts, &c. In their way they put in at Penobscot, and were there detained prisoners a few days, but were afterward (for Mr. Shurt’s sake, to whom D’Aulney was in debt) dismissed” (Ibid. 2, vi. 484, 485).
Shurt was a legatee, to the amount of £200, under the will of Robert Aidworth of Bristol, England, who calls him his servant (Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, i. 735). See concerning Shurt, Ibid. i. 635, ii. 983; Suffolk Deeds, i. 131; York Deeds, i., Part I., 41; Savage’s Genealogical Dictionary of New England, iv. 88; and Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, ii. 865.
87 Interlined in the original
88 Interlined in the original
89 Suffolk Court Files, No. 139,498: 61
90 The title-page of the first book is as follows: —
Pemaquid Proprietors
Book
of Records.
1743
No I.
The first meeting was held “at ye Orange Tree Tavern in Boston upon Wednesday the Thirty first Day of August, 1743.” The Records in this first book run from 31 August, 1743, to 9 June, 1768; while those in the second book extend from 16 June, 1768, to 24 November, 1774. Besides the entries given in the text, there are others not without interest in connection with them.
The following List of the original Proprietors (see ante, p. 13, note) is copied from the Records (i. 2): —
Boston, Tuesday November 15th. 1743.
The Proprietors mett according to Adjournment and Settled Each Proprietor’s Proportion in ye Aforsd. Lands Agreeable to the Following List viz: —
|
Habijah Savage Esqr |
30 Votes |
|
|
George Craddock Esqr |
5 |
|
|
Adam Winthrop Esqr |
5
|
40 |
|
John Alford & Joshua Winslow Esqrs |
2½ |
|
|
Sarah Sweetser |
2½ |
|
|
John Philips |
2½ |
|
|
Joanna Philips |
2½ |
|
|
Benja. Stevens |
2½ |
|
|
Ezekiel Chever Esqr |
2½ |
|
|
Shem Drowne |
15
|
30 |
|
Jonas Clark Esqr. |
2 |
|
|
Samll. Clark |
2 |
|
|
Thomas Ruck |
1 |
|
|
John Chandler Esqr |
2 |
|
|
Joseph Fitch |
1 |
|
|
Thimothy Parrott |
|
|
|
Abigail Tillden |
||
|
Christopher Tillden |
||
|
John Kneeland, guardian to his Daughter Prudence |
|
|
|
Anderson Philips |
1 |
|
|
Henry Philips |
1 |
|
|
Shem Drowne |
8
|
20
|
|
90 |
It is hoped that these valuable and interesting Records may be printed in the not distant future as a new volume of the Archæologia Americana.
91 Seth Sweetser was a prominent citizen of Charlestown for more than half a century. He was born in that town 5 February, 1703–4, — the son of Seth Sweetser by his wife Sarah, daughter of the Honorable Joseph Lynde and the young widow of Thomas Clark; graduated at Harvard College in the Class of 1722 with President Clap of Yale College and Judge Richard Saltonstall; was the Schoolmaster of Charlestown 1724–1750, and its Town Clerk, 1755–1778; and during the Revolution served the town on important committees (Frothingham’s History of Charlestown, pp. 272, 288, 300). There can be little, if any, doubt that to his vigilance and care we owe the preservation of the Vital and Town Records when the town was burned by the British during the Battle of Bunker Hill. He died, suddenly, 15 January, 1778. The Boston Gazette of Monday, 23 February, 1778, No. 1225, p. 3/2, 3 contains a long obituary notice. The Rev. Dr. Seth Sweetser of Worcester (H. C. 1827) was his great-grandson. (See Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. x, note, 217, ii. 922, 923; and Memorial History of Boston, ii. 320, 321.)
92 Pemaquid Proprietors' Records, i. 87–89.
93 Pemaquid Proprietors’ Records, ii. 2, 3. There are also many other votes from time to time providing for the oversight of the suits and appropriating money for expenses incurred. William Cushing and John Adams were of counsel for the Pemaquid or Bristol Company, as the Proprietors were called, during the decade ending with 1774 (Pemaquid Proprietors’ Records, i. 44; ii. 12, 50, 57).
94 Ibid. ii. 13.
95 Pemaquid Proprietors’ Records, ii. 13.
96 Pemaquid Proprietors’ Records, ii. 14, 15
97 Ibid. ii. 25.
98 Pemaquid Proprietors’ Records, ii. 33.
99 Supposed to be the present Monhegan.
100 Supposed to be the present Monhegan.
101 For an interesting note on the possible derivation of Samoset, by the Rev. Dr. M. C. O’Brien of Bangor, Vicar-General of the Diocese of Portland, Maine, see the Genealogical Advertiser, ii. 30, 31.
102 For a bibliography of Samoset, compiled by Mr. and Mrs. W. P. Greenlaw, see the Genealogical Advertiser, i. 100–102.
103 This letter is also printed in J. P. Baxter’s Sir Ferdinando Gorges and his Province of Maine (Prince Society), iii. 276, where William Gorges is called “Gouvernor of Somersett;” but presumably the “New” has been inadvertently omitted.
104 This is also printed in J. P. Baxter’s George Cleeve of Casco Bay (Publications of the Gorges Society), pp. 216–221. As James I. died 8 April, 1625, the date of the document must be 27 January 1636–87.
105 Tho deed of 30 June, from Vines to Winter, is printed in facsimile in the same volume, facing p. 107; but it is mutilated.
106 There seems to be some confusion in regard to the application of the name New Somerset during the second quarter of the seventeenth century. Sullivan said in 1795: —
“Cleaves . . . obtained a letter of agency from Sir Ferdinando Gorges, . . . In his deed to one Tuckerman [a mistake for Tucker], he calls Casco in the Province of New Sommersett. There was an early mistake in calling the Province of Maine New Sommersett, which was the county, not the provincial name of the territory” (History of the District of Maine, p. 315).
Commenting upon this passage in 1830, Folsom observed that “New Somerset was uniformly styled a province, not a county, in the instruments executed before 1640” (History of Saco and Biddeford, p. 53). This statement seems to be correct so far as it goes, but both titles occur in the documents quoted in this Note. Williamson remarks: —
“A division of the Province was in fact made [after the Charter of 3 April, 1639], by the river Kennebunk, into two Districts, or Counties, ‘East and West.’ No names appear to have been assigned to either by the Court, though the western district, or county, gradually acquired the name of York, and terms of an Inferior Court were appointed to be holden at Agamenticus, by a portion of the Council, three times in a year; and the other, being commonly called Somerset, or New-Somerset, had three terms of a like Inferior Court holden annually in the same manner within it at Saco” (History of the State of Maine, i. 285).
The statement made by W. S. Southgate in 1853, that “in 1639 the King confirmed Gorges Patent, changing the name of the Province from New Somersetshire to Maine” (1 Collections Maine Historical Society, iii. 31), is misleading. Neither in the division of 3 February, 1634–35, nor in the Charter from the King of 3 April, 1639, does the title New Somersetshire occur; nor is that title employed by Sir Ferdinando Gorges in his Briefe Narration, written not later than 1647, or by his grandson, Ferdinando Gorges, in his Description of New-England (in America Painted to the Life, 1659).
107 How closely Somerset Island was associated with the Brown family is shown by some biographical details. John Brown of New Harbor, the first of the name, married Margaret Hayward and had (i) John Brown of Framingham, the second of the name, who married and had John Brown of Saco, the third of the name; (ii) Elizabeth Brown, who married Richard Pearce; and (hi) Margaret Brown, who married (1) Sander, or Alexander, Gould, and (2) Maurice Champney. Alexander and Margaret Gould had a daughter Margaret, who married (1) James Stilson, Sr., and (2) Thomas Pittman. James and Margaret Stilson had (i) James Stilson, Jr., and (ii) Margaret Stilson, who married William Hilton. It was at the request of James Stilson, Jr., and his sister Margaret Hilton that the deed of 15 July, 1625, was recorded 26 December, 1720; and it was at the request of Margaret Hilton that the deed of 8 August, 1660, was recorded 1 December, 1720.
108 This document is not dated, but as Dongan became Governor of New York in 1683, as John Palmer and John West were sent to the Eastern parts in June, 1686, “with full power and authority to treate with the Inhabitants for Takeing out Pattents and Paying the quitt rents" (Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, p. 153), and as on 19 September, 1686, the " ffort and Country of Pemaquid in Regard of its Distance from New Yorke” (Ibid. p. 157) was detached from New York and placed under Sir E. Andros, it is probable that the license was granted about 1686. If my identification of Muscongus Island and Somerset Island is correct, it follows that “the small Island thereunto adjacent” is Marsh Island. It maybe added that this is also the opinion of Professor Johnston, though he does not give his reasons for reaching this conclusion (ibid. pp. 154, 238, 243, 464). It should be remarked that this license is the only document not relating to the Brown family in which Somerset Island is mentioned
109 Presumably an error for 1625.
110 This deed, already mentioned by James Stilson. if ever given, is not extant.
111 Alexander Gould’s widow, Margaret (Brown) Gould, married Maurice Champney (or, as the name is variously spelled, Chamblett, Chamblet, Chamles, Champnye, etc.). Though the wife of James Stilson, Sr., was Margaret Gould, the daughter of Alexander and Margaret (Brown) Gould, yet it is not surprising that, after the lapse of so many years, Ruth Barnaby should have alluded to her as Margaret Chamber (i.e. Champney), rather than as Margaret Gould, thus confusing the step-father with the father. For this information as to Maurice Champney, as well as for several valuable suggestions, I am indebted to Mr. William P. Greenlaw, Assistant Librarian of the New England Historic Genealogical Society. (Cf. Genealogical Advertiser, i. 100, ii. 28.) At some unspecified time, but apparently between 1674 and 1720, Maurice Champney (or, as he is called, Morrice Chamles) was described as of Marblehead, but “formerly of Sumersett Island at the eastward” (Johnston’s History of Bristol and Bremen, p. 235).
112 In addition to Somerset Island, there was formerly in the same neighborhood a place called Somerset Cove. For information and for documents relating to Somerset Cove, I am indebted to the kindness of Mr. William D. Patterson, of Wiscasset, Maine. On the United States Coast Survey Chart of the Damariscotta and Medomak Rivers there is a small cove a little way below Muscongus Harbor and nearly abreast of the lower end of Hog Island, the nearest sounding figures being 4¼, and next above that 3¾. In the opinion of Mr. James H. Varney, Register of Deeds for Lincoln and formerly Town Clerk of Bristol, this cove was known as Somerset Cove. Apparently. it is the same cove which, in the deed of the Pemaquid Proprietors to James Morton, dated 21 September, 1703 (recorded in Lincoln Registry of Deeds, viii. 93), is called “Somerset Cove in Muscongus River”; and which also is mentioned in an indenture dated 18 June, 1766 (recorded in Lincoln Registry of Deeds, v. 152). In this indenture, made between Robert Gould of Boston and Hezekiah Eggleston, the latter is described as of “a Place called Somerset Cove in the County of Lincoln;” and it is recited that Eggleston is indebted to Gould in the sum of £355 lawful money for which he has given bond to pay on or before 18 June, 1767, and that as a collateral and further security for the payment of said sum he conveys unto the said Gould —
“a certain Tract of Land lying at a Place called Somerset Cove aforesaid containing about four hundred Acres butted and bounded as follows that is to say, Northerly in the Front upon Muscongus Island there measuring eighty Rods, and running northwest into the Country two Miles keeping the same breadth of Eighty Rods all the way, and Southerly in the Rear on Hog Island so called, and there measuring eighty Rods.”
There is also mention of “Somersits cove” in a deed dated 25 October, 1719, from Cesar Moxis and Gustin, two Indian sagamores, to William Hilton (Lincoln Deeds, xl. 240).
In a deed dated 6 July, 1750, from Thomas Loveland to Isaac Moseley (Ibid. xiii. 177), of a part of land formerly of Richard Pearce, the tract is described as being part of “a larger Tract of Land adjoining to New Harbor, near Pemmaquid. called Miscongus alias Somersit,” indicating that Somerset was also used as a name for the Muscongus region. In a deed from Pearce, dated 1734 (Ibid. xvii. 1), of land near “Whale Cove,” there is mention of “Town ship of Summersett.” Mr. Patterson cannot locate Whale Cove, but believes the land described is in the Muscongus region
113 Mr. Patterson informs me that the name Loud was probably not applied to the island until about the year 1776.
114 At the Stated Meeting of the Society in December, at which these gentlemen were nominated by the Council, the Hon. Justin Smith Morrill, LL.D., was also proposed for Honorary Membership. Senator Morrill died in Washington, however, on the twenty-eighth of December, — before the Society has had an opportunity to confirm the action of the Council and enrol his name.
115 Paige’s History of Hardwick, pp. 523–525.
116 Fiske’s American Revolution, i. 236. The Proclamation is printed in Ford’s Writings of Washington, v. 201, 202.
117 See Province Laws (Standard edition), vol. viii., — Resolves 1704–5, chap. 79, and 1707, chap. 8, for a full account of this case.
118 Lovell married Mary Middleton, 24 November, 1760 (Registers of Trinity Church).
119 Col. Ethan Allen was captured 25 September, 1775, and exchanged 6 May, 1778. In 1779, he published at Philadelphia a curious and, at times, amusing Narrative of Colonel Ethan Allen’s Captivity, . . . Containing His Voyages and Travels, . . Interspersed with some Political Observations. The extracts from it given in our succeeding notes are from the Boston reprint of 1779.
120 This was Francis Proctor, Senior — or Procter, as the name was sometimes spelled — of Pennsylvania. He was appointed Lieutenant in his brother Thomas Proctor’s Company of Artillery 29 November, 1775 (Pennsylvania Colonial Records, x. 416); was dismissed 8 December (Ibid. x. 423, 424); was captured not long after by the British; and in May, 1776, was placed on the Mercury, under the command of Captain James Montague, off Cape Fear, and taken to Halifax where he arrived in June. On the same ship was Ethan Allen, who later wrote:–
“A Capt. Francis Proctor was added to our number of prisoners when we were first put on board this ship: This gentleman had formerly belonged to the English service. The Capt. and in fine all the gentlemen of the ship, were very much incensed against him, and put him in irons without the least provocation, and he was continued in this miserable situation about three months” (Narrative, p. 20).
We next hear of Proctor in a letter dated Jerseys, 5 November, 1776, by James Lovell to Captain Thomas Proctor, in which Lovell says: —
“I left Captain Francis Procter, your brother, on board the prison-ship Glascow, in New-York harbour, the 3d of this month. He is in good health, has some encouragement of being speedily exchanged, but hopes his friends will exert themselves to bring about that desirable event, as much as if he had not received any hints about it, for he fears those hints are only to amuse him. He has once wrote, and he now earnestly wishes that proof may be sent to General Washington of his having had a regular discharge from the Irish Artillery, and consequently that he is not a deserter, as is sometimes thrown in his teeth. I have been his fellow-prisoner for months at Halifax, where he had fared hardly, but greatly better than when under the control of Captain Montague, who seemed to aim at his life” (American Archives, Fifth Series, iii. 519).
Proctor was soon after exchanged, for on 24 January, 1777, we find him writing from Philadelphia to the Council of Safety of Pennsylvania as follows: —
“I make no Doubt you are acquainted with my first unsuccessful attempt to Exert my Utmost in defence of the great Cause of American Liberty in General, and the State of South Carolina in particular; And therefore Chuse not to trouble you at present with a Narrative of my long Imprisonment, Cruel Treatment, and other distressing Circumstances during that Period to the time of my Enlargment, But have the Honour of acquainting you that I Cannot be an Idle Spectator of the present Glorious Contest whilst my Country wants a man, and therefore take the Liberty of Informing you that I am now going (by Desire of General Knox) to Head Quarters to take Command of a Company of Artillery in the Continental Service” (Pennsylvania Archives, Second Series, i. 696).
Proctor was appointed Captain of the 4th Continental Artillery 3 March, 1777, and dismissed 14 April, 1778 (Ibid. xi. 201). We get a final glimpse of him, in quite a different calling, however, in the Pennsylvania Evening Post of Saturday, 18 July, 1778, No. 506, iv. 245: —
THE subscriber begs leave to inform his friends and the public in general, that he now occupies the LIVERY STABLES formerly John Hales’s in Lombard-street, near the New market, where he will entertain horses by the year or night, having the best accomodations, and suitable places for carriages.
Philad. July 18.
FRANCIS PROCTOR, sen.
For a notice of Thomas Proctor, see Appletons’ Cyclopædia of American Biography.
121 “Among the prisoners,” wrote Allen, “there were 5 in number, who had a legal claim to a parole, viz. James Lovel, Esq; Capt. Francis Proctor, a Mr. Houland, master of a Continental armed vessel, a Mr. Taylor, his mate, and myself” (Narrative, p. 23). Consider Howland and Jacob Taylor were, respectively, master and mate of the privateer brig Washington (American Archives, Fifth Series, i. 1283, 1284).
122 “Among the prisoners,” wrote Allen, “there were 5 in number, who had a legal claim to a parole, viz. James Lovel, Esq; Capt. Francis Proctor, a Mr. Houland, master of a Continental armed vessel, a Mr. Taylor, his mate, and myself” (Narrative, p. 23). Consider Howland and Jacob Taylor were, respectively, master and mate of the privateer brig Washington (American Archives, Fifth Series, i. 1283, 1284).
123 This was Richard Carpenter, of Boston (Ibid.).
124 A biographical note on James Lovell will be found on pp. 79–81, post.
125 This letter was written to Col. Henry Bromfield, concerning whom see ante, v. 202 note.
126 Henry Bromfield (1751–1837) was the son of Col. Henry Bromfield by his first wife, Margaret Fayerweather. He was a successful and wealthy merchant, and long resided at Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England, where he died, childless.
127 Hannah Clarke, daughter of Richard Clarke, — Col. Bromfield’s second wife. See ante, v. 210 note.
128 Elizabeth Bromfield, born 1763, died 1833. See ante, v. 210 note.
129 Thomas Bromfield, born 1733, died 1816. For a sketch of the Bromfield family, by our late associate, Dr. Daniel Denison Slade, see New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1871 and 1872, xxv. 182–185, 329–335; and xxvi. 37–43, 141–143.
130 For a Petition, dated 10 May, 1780, from the inhabitants of Charleston to General Lincoln requesting him to “send out a flag, in the name of the people, intimating their acquiescence in the terms propounded,” and for a facsimile of the signature of Henry Crouch, one of the signers, see Year Book, City of Charleston, 1897, pp. 394, 398. In November of the same year, Crouch, together with other citizens of Charleston on parole, was sent by Cornwallis to St. Augustine (Ramsay’s History of the Revolution of South Carolina, 1785, ii. 169, 459).
131 William Phillips, born 1722, died 1804. See Memorial History of Boston, ii. 543, iii. 29, 38 note; and American Quarterly Register for 1840, xiii. 12.
132 Joseph Trumbull and James Lovell were both of the Harvard Class of 1756, and both were delegates to the Continental Congress. Col. John Trumbull graduated at Harvard in the Class of 1773, which he entered as a Junior in January, 1772.
133 Court Records, vol. v. last page.
134 Edward Randolph (Publications of the Prince Society), ii. 89.
135 Massachusetts Colony Records, v. 517.
136 History of New England, iii. 486.
137 5 Massachusetts Historical Collections, v. 140.
138 Edward Randolph (Publications of the Prince Society), iv. 116.
139 a biographical note on John Colman will be found on pp. 86–89, post.
140 See ante, iii. 10, 12, 13, 14, 17, 72, and 75.
141 Council Records, Massachusetts Archives, vii. 132.
142 An earlier volume of the Records of the Court of General Sessions (1671–1681) is now in press and will be issued by the City of Boston.
143 Catalogue of the Library of George Brinley, i. 189. This pamphlet was anonymous, but by Sabin is attributed to E. Wigglesworth.
144 A biographical note on James Gooch will be found on pp. 90–92, post.
145 Col. Stephen Minot, son of Capt. John Minot, was born in Dorchester, 10 (6) 1662; married Mercy, daughter of Capt. Christopher Clark of Boston, 1 December, 1686; removed to Boston, where he was a prominent merchant, an early member of the Church in Brattle Square, Colonel in the Militia, Justice of the Peace, and Selectman, 1707, 1708, 1723–1725. He resided in Sudbury Street, where he died. This estate had been the homestead of Henry Messenger the younger, whose young widow and heir, Mehitable (Minot) Messenger, for £220, conveyed it to her cousin-german, Stephen Minot, 11 July, 1687 (Suffolk Deeds, xv. 153.) It was on the westerly side of Sudbury Street, on which it had a frontage of 66 feet, and extended through to Court Street, where it measured 77 feet. The site is now (1899) covered by brick buildings numbered 89–97 in Sudbury Street and 131–139 in Court Street. The Boston Weekly News Letter, No. 1502, from Thursday November 2 to Thursday November 9, 1732, contains the following announcement of his death, the full date of which nowhere else appears in print: —
“Boston, November. 9. On the Night after the last Lord’s Day [5 November], Died here Col. Stephen Minot, in the 71st year of his Age.”
(Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, viii. 41, 45, 172, 180, 185, xxi. 8; Records of the Church in Brattle Square; Savage’s Genealogical Dictionary of New England, i. 392, iii. 218; and Whitmore’s Massachusetts Civil List, pp. 127, 128.) See Suffolk Probate Files, No. 6310.
146 Increase Robinson was of Taunton, Massachusetts. He was the son of Increase and Sarah (Penniman) Robinson of Dorchester who, in or before 1668, removed to Taunton, where the son married Mehitable Williams, had a large family, and died in 1738. The offence which brought him before the Court, 25 April, 1720, was that on the fifth of February, 1719–20, at Dorchester, he —
“did maliciously from his own Imagination pronounce & publish certain scandelous & contemptuous words of the Honoble. Colo. Penn Towusend of this [Suffolk] County Esqr. Chief Judge of the Comon pleas;”
for which he was ordered to —
“pay a fine of Six pounds to the King or be whipped ten stripes at the Publick whipping post & Recognize to his Majesty himself in the sum of 50l & two sureties in the sum of 25l pounds each until the next Court of Genl sessions to be holden in July next, & pay Costs of prosecution Standing Committed,” etc. (Records of the Court of General Sessions of the Peace, folio 37).
In the list of the military company of Taunton, 30 May, 1700, are the names of Increase Robinson and his brothers Ebenezer and Josiah. Administration on the estate of Increase Robinson was granted to his son William Robinson, 20 March, 1738. The Inventory amounted to £1.584. 03. 02 (Bristol Probate Records). See Bristol Deeds, xiii. 358; and Suffolk Deeds, xxxvi. 42.
147 A biographical note on Jeremiah Belknap will be found on pp. 93, 94, post.
148 See ante, iii. 10 note. I am indebted to our associates, Mr. Henry H. Edes, Mr. Frederick Lewis Gay, and Mr. Albert Matthews, to Mr. Robert H. Kelby of New York, and to Mr. Edmund M. Barton of Worcester, for information concerning several valuable discoveries recently made by them, which they have kindly permitted me to use in the notes to this communication.
149 The Boston Town Records and the Records of the Church in Brattle Square state that this marriage was solemnized on the Sixth of December, 1733.
150 William Hobby gave £2 towards the building of King’s Chapel, in July, 1689, and, in May, 1694, £2 towards building pews in the church. He was a Warden, 1693, 1699–1701, and so, likewise, was his son, Sir Charles Hobby, 1713–1715. (Koote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, i. 89, 117, 175 note; ii. 603, 605.)
151 These children were (i) John, who was at Harvard College in 1714 and 1715, and later at Barbados, whose widow Amey had married a Crichlow before 14 July, 1749, (ii) Elizabeth, who married James Gooch, Jr., 30 September, 1715, and (iii) Mary, born 19 February, 1702, who married Zechariah Hubbard, 15 May, 1722. Lady Hobby was buried, 17 November, 1716. (Suffolk Probate Files No. 3690; Suffolk Deeds, xxxix. 174, 175, xl. 129, Ixxvii. 11, 173; Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxiv. 15, xxviii. 58, 107; Boston Town Records of Deaths.)
152 Our associate, Mr. Albert Matthews, calls my attention to the following extract from a Tory pamphlet, — The American Times, By Camillo Querno, London, 1780, p. 37, which seems to show that Gooch, Gouge, and Googe had the same pronunciation as late as 1780, since Governor Gooch of Virginia is supposed to be here referred to: —
Ev’n whilst I write a monster fierce and huge
Has fix’d his station in the land of Googe;
Virginian caitiff! Jefferson by name;
Perhaps from Jefferies sprung of rotten fame.
153 She was probably identical with Hannah, daughter of Samuel and Mary (Scott) Emmons, who was born in Boston, 1 March, 1672–73 (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, ix. 76, 123).
154 See ante, p. 88, and note.
155 Joseph Hiller was born in Watford, Hertfordshire, England, 26 June, 1653. On the twenty-first of September, 1677, he came to Boston and there married, 11 June, 1684, Susannali Dennis, born 29 May, 1655, who joined in the deed to Belknap. They were the great-grandparents of Major Joseph Hiller of the Revolutionary army, — the first Collector of the Port of Salem and Beverly under the Federal Constitution, appointed by Washington in 1789. Major Hiller’s silver punch-strainer has been long in the possession of our associate Mr. Henry H. Edes (Genealogy of the Cleveland and Cleaveland Families, 1899, pp. 234, 235). Cf. Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, ix. 174, xxiv. 151, xxviii. 52, 279; and Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 504.
156 I am indebted for the following note to the kindness of our associate, Mr. Henry H. Edes: —
“It is an interesting fact, that, nearly ninety years afterwards, the son of Martin and Lucretia Lane, our late associate, suggested the Latin motto upon the monument erected by the Wardens and Vestry of the Chapel to the memory of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. (See Annals of King’s Chapel, ii. 629.) On removing to Charlestown, Mr. Martin Lane connected himself with the Second Congregational (later the Harvard) Church, of which the Rev. James Walker was the minister for twenty-one years. Here, on the twenty-fifth of July, 1824, he baptized Mr. Lane’s two daughters, Elizabeth-Minot (born 28 January, 1817), and Lavinia (born 31 October, 1820), and his son, George-Martin, who was destined to become Professor of Latin in Harvard College two years before Dr. Walker himself passed from the Alford Professorship to the Presidency.”
157 Addresses at the Inauguration of the Hon. Edward Everett, LL. D., as President of the University at Cambridge, Thursday, April 30, 1846, pp. 19–24.
158 Lehrbuch der griechischen Staatsalterthümer, Heidelberg, 1855, § 76, p. 219.
159 Hyperidis Orationes Duae, Gottingae, 1853, p. vii.
160 Cf. Life, Letters, and Journals of George Ticknor, i. 358, 359.
161 The Nation, No. 1671, 8 July, 1897, lxv. 28.
162 A Latin Grammar for Schools and Colleges, New York and London, 1898.
163 A Latin Dictionary for Schools, New York, 1889, p. vi.
164 Publications, iii. 348–350.
165 Publications, v. 257–297.
166 A notice of George Glas is in the Dictionary of National Biography, xxi, 415–417.
167 The Massachusetts Gazette of Thursday, 11 April, 1771 (No. 3523, p. 3/1), contains the following notice: —
“NEW-HAVEN, April 5 . . . . . . . A few days since died at Danbury Mr. ROBERT SANDEMAN.”
168 In 1766, Geyer presented to the Town an account amounting to £173. 4. 1 for repairs on Faneuil Hall (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xvi. 171).
The Massachusetts Centinel of Wednesday, 7 December, 1785 (iv. 23, p. 3/2), contains the following notice of Mr. Geyer’s death: —
“Last Sunday morning, after a lingering illness, departed this life, Mr. Henry Christian Guyer, an eminent Stone-cutter in this town, aged 58, of whom it may be said in a few words, he was a good Christian, a friend to America, and an honest man; his remains will be interred from his dwelling-house near the Rev. Mr. Wight’s Meeting-House this afternoon, precisely at 4 o’clock, at which time his relations, and friends are requested to attend.”
169 Cf. 1 Massachusetts Historical Collections, x. 71.
170 Delano A. Goddard, in Memorial History of Boston, iii. 129, 130. In a letter received from Dr. Edward Everett Hale since this paper was written, he says of the Sandemanians: —
They were pure rationalists. As far as you can understand anything of what distinguished them in belief, it was the postulate that a man must understand what he is talking about. The miracle of Grace, or of union with God, is not wrought without the intelligent cooperation of God’s child.
I think, but I do not know, that they carried such heavy guns that the regular Boston preachers did not interfere with them. Methodists would not have liked them, but the old Boston line in that time was too far gone in rationalism to care to attack them.
171 This name appears as “Dechezzan, Adam,” in Barrell’s List of Refugees in 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for December, 1880, xviii. 266–268, which also contains the names of other Sandemanians. He was married by the Rev. Andrew Le Mercier to Susanna Cosno, 28 January, 1730 (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxviii. 153).
172 For notices of Hopestill Capen, see ante, v. 270, 271, 297, 298.
173 For a notice of Benjamin Davis, see post, pp. 124–127.
174 For a note on Isaac Winslow, Senior and Junior, see post, pp. 127–130.
175 There are several references to Colborn Barrell in the Letters of John Andrews printed in 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for July, 1865, viii. 318, 335, 374 and 375. He was of the Boston Latin School Class of 1744. His portrait was painted by Copley.
176 Walter Barrell was Inspector-General of the Customs at Boston. In March, 1776, he and his family left Boston with the British troops (1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for December, 1880, xviii. 266). “In 1779, he was a member of the Loyalist association formed in London” (Sabine’s Loyalists, i. 211).
177 This, probably, was Moses Peck, watchmaker, who died in Boston, 27 March, 1801, aged 83. He married, 17 January, 1758, Elizabeth Townsend, born 18 December, 1729, — a younger sister of Shippie Townsend (post, pp. 116, 122). She died in Boston 26 June, 1793, aged 62 (Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, ii. 734, 949; and Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxx. 27, 289).
178 For the parentage of Mary and Keziah West, see note on John West, post, p. 122.
179 This may have been Abigail Stayner, whose name appears in Barrell’s List (1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for December, 1880, xviii. 268). See New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1865, six. 321.
180 Snow’s History of Boston (edition of 1825), p. 256; and Drake’s History and Antiquities of Boston, pp. 686, 687. Several of these persons were Protesters against the Solemn League and Covenant (1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for October, 1870, xi. 394, 395).
181 For a note on Isaac Winslow, Senior and Junior, see post, 127–130.
182 History of Boston (edition of 1825), pp. 256, 257. Cf. Memorial History of Boston, ii. 245, 246.
183 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for October, 1877, xv. 337. Cf. Suffolk Probate Files, No. 9826, — Benjamin Edwards, 1751,— the father of Alexander Edwards, cabinet-maker, referred to in the text.
184 In the Boston Gazette of Monday, 12 April, 1773 (No. 910, pp. 3/2, 3/3 and 4/2) are the following Cards, which are of interest: —
I.
“JOSEPH KETTELL takes this Method to return his hearty Thanks to his Friends and Fellow Citizens, and to the Town of Charlestown, for their extraordinary Kindness and Activity at the late Pire, and shall ever esteem himself their much obliged humble Servant.”
II.
“Messieurs. PRINTERS.
Mr. Edwards begs leave to inform the Publick through the Channel of your Paper, that the late Fire broke out in a Store 40 Feet above his Shop, which consumed his two Warehouses with all his Stock and Tools to the amount of 600 1. Sterling.
As he is very suspicious that those Buildings were set on Fire by some Ill-minded Person or Persons, he now promises a Reward of TEN POUNDS L.M. to any who shall give Information of the perpetrators of so Wicked a Deed, in order that they may be brought to Justice: And takes this opportunity to return his most sincere and hearty Thanks to his Friends and the Publick for their kind assistance and peculiar mark of Friendship.”
III.
“Lost at the Fire on the 4th Instant, a Leather Bucket, mark’d F. Green, No. 2. Whoever can, are requested to inform where the same may be found.”
IV.
“The Person who received a very large CHINA BOWL from Capt. Barrett’s House, in Friend-Street, during the late Fire in that Neighbourhood, shall be handsomely Treated if he will return it, or Prosecuted if he does not.”
Similar Cards appeared in the Supplement to the Massachusetts Gazette of Friday, 16 April, 1773.
185 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxiii. 171.
186 History of Boston (edition of 1825), p. 257.
187 These plans were drawn by Mr. Louis Packard Streeter of Boston who has since removed to New York City.
188 Since this paper was written, I have discovered that the site of the second Meeting House is marked on Osgood Carleton’s Plan of Boston, 1795, which appeared in the Directory for 1796. The key to the Plan,-however, does not explain the mark.
189 Suffolk Probate Files, No. 14,416.
190 See Copp’s Hill Epitaphs and Records of the New North Church, Boston, for facts concerning this family.
191 Mitchelson is elsewhere styled “lapidary” (1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for October, 1870, xi. 393). He was a Refugee from Boston in 1776 (Ibid, for December, 1880, xviii. 267).
192 Suffolk Deeds, cxvi. 37.
193 Ibid. cxx. 15.
194 Delano a. Goddard, in Memorial History of Boston, iii. 129.
195 Topographical and Historical Description of Boston (1891), p. 109.
196 See Maps of the Street-Lines of Boston, made for the Selectmen in 1819 and 1820 by John Groves Hales (1894), p. 253.
197 Suffolk Deeds, cxxiv. 93.
198 Ibid, cclxvi. 132, 133.
199 Cf. Plans in Suffolk Deeds, ccxxx. 305, cclxxxviii. 27, cclxxxix. 288, ccxcv. 284, and cccxxxvii. 305. See also Shaw’s Topographical and Historical Description of Boston (1817), p. 267, note.
200 Suffolk Probate Files, No. 14.716. See also New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1865, xix. 231, 232.
201 Suffolk Deeds, cxxiii. 251, 252. Cf. Isaac Winslow’s additional Inventory, taken 15 August, 1797 (recorded Suffolk Probate Records, xcv. 414, 415), in Suffolk Probate Files, No. 20,095; and Suffolk Deeds, cxxiii. 36, and cxxv. 135.
202 This, doubtless, was Elias Dupee (Memorial History of Boston, iii. 160). See also New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1864, xviii. 339; and Suffolk Probate Files, No. 18,647.
203 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxv. 282.
204 Ibid. xxv. 285.
205 Ibid. xxv. 318.
206 I am indebted to the Honorable Samuel Abbott Green, LL.D., for this identification, drawn from the manuscripts of the late John Langdon Sibley.
207 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxvii. 116.
208 Ibid. xxv. 251, 256, 264, 266, 267, 278 and 283. See also Ibid. xxvii. 101, 191 and passim.
209 Ibid. xxii. 12.
210 Suffolk Deeds, clxxxix. 40, 41.
211 Shaw’s Topographical and Historical Description of Boston, p. 267.
212 Boston City Records.
213 Drake’s History and Antiquities of Boston, p. 687, which, however, gives the name, age, and date erroneously. He was born in Boston, 19 October, 1739, the son of Alford and Elizabeth (Robinson) Butler (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxiv. 235; xxviii. 195). He is thought to have been of the Boston Latin School Class of 1748 (Catalogue, 1886, p. 69 and note). See note on the West family, post, p. 122
214 Suffolk Deeds, ccccxvi. 198
215 Ibid, lxxxv. 90.
216 The following List of persons known to have been Sandemanians who were also Addressers of Hutchinson and of Gage has been furnished by our associate, Mr. Albert Matthews, who is preparing entirely new Lists of the Addressers from original sources. I am also indebted to Mr. Matthews for other valuable facts used in this paper: —
|
Barrell, Colborn: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774. |
|
|
Capen, Hopestill: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774. |
|
|
Davis, Benjamin: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774, |
|
|
Gage, 6 October, 1775. |
|||
|
Foster, Edward: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774. |
|
|
King, Edward: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774. |
|
|
Mitchelson, David: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774. |
|
|
Winslow, Isaac: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774, |
|
|
Gage, 6 October, 1775. |
|||
|
Winslow, Isaac, Jr.: |
Hutchinson, 28 May, 1774; |
Gage, 8 June, 1774, |
|
|
Gage, 6 October, 1775. |
|||
217 Suffolk Probate Files, No. 15.912; and 2 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for May, 1895, x. 164, 172, 173.
218 Biographical Sketches of Loyalists of the American Revolution (1864) i. 432. See also 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for December, 1880, xviii. 266; Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxviii. 211, 245; New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1865, xix. 340: and Records of the New South Church.
219 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, viii. 90.
220 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, viii. 91, 92. Cf. Ibid. viii. 118, 119, 132.
221 Wyman’s Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, ii. 864, 949
222 Suffolk Deeds, xc. 235, 237, 238.
223 Ibid. clxviii. 120; clxxi. 26.
224 I am indebted to our associate, Mr. Henry Winchester Cunningham, for the following note: —
John West of Boston, housewright, was born in Boston 26 March, 1697. He was the oldest child of Richard West and his wife Anna, daughter of Robert Sanderson, goldsmith, and at one time partner of John Hull, the Mint Master. He was married at Yarmouth, 26 April, 1720, to Mary daughter of Samuel and Keziah (Taylor) Eldredge, by whom he had nine children, the births of the last seven being recorded in Boston: —
(i) John; (ii) Sanderson, married in Boston, 7 November, 1746, to Mary Avery; (iii) Anna, born 25 November, 1726, married in Boston, 27 October, 1747, to Ephraim Green; (iv) Mary, born 4 July, 1729, died in September, 1730, aged 14 months; (v) Mary, born 7 June, 1731; (vi) Keziah, born 3 February, 1732, married in Boston, 20 January, 1771, to Alexander Linklester; (vii) Eunice, born 2 December, 1734, married (Intentions recorded 27 January, 1763) to Alford Butler; (viii) David, born 9 May, 1736; and (ix) David, born 25 August, 1737, married, 3 May, 1761, to Sarah Presbury.
In 1725, John West bought the interest of the other heirs of his grandfather Sanderson in “a tenement near the Mill bridge” and “a tenement on Middle Street “(Suffolk Deeds, xli. 3). On the first of October, 1740, he made his will, in which he said he was about to set out for Virginia, and there he may have died, as his widow administered his estate on the twentieth of March, 1741–42 (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 7717).
The West family do not appear to have been Loyalists, like so many of the Sandemanians, and, so far as I know, they were all Patriots. David, the youngest son, is said to have died at sea, in 1779, while serving in some official capacity on an American privateer. His son David, Jr., was the well-known bookseller, who at one time had a store in Washington Street on land now covered by a part of the Sears Building; and, later, he was a partner of Lemuel Blake. David West, Jr., was twice married, (1) to Hannah Watts, by whom he had one child, David, who died unmarried; and (2) to Abigail, daughter of Zephaniah Leonard of Raynham (Yale 1758), who was Lieutenant-Colonel of the Bristol County Regiment during the Revolution. By this marriage he had one daughter, Abigail Leonard West, who married Andrew Cunningham, who were the grandparents of the writer of this note.
Many members of the West family were booksellers and publishers, — among them John, who published the Boston Directory for 1796. Alford Butler, who married Eunice West, was a book-binder, and had a son, Samuel Butler, who was a partner in the firm Thomas & Andrews. See ante, pp. 113,119 and note.
The connection of the West family with Robert Sanderson is proved in an article by John E. Alden in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1898, lii. 23
225 Suffolk Deeds, cv. 66.
226 The Third, or Old South, Church was founded by the liberal and progressive element in the fellowship of the First Church, nut, however, without much acrimony and contention which, finally, was transferred to the Legislature.
“The next election turned chiefly on the question, Who are for the old church and who for the new? and so strong was the popular feeling against the conservatives, that a majority of the members of the House of Deputies of 1670 lost their seats, and more enlightened men were chosen to succeed them. It was not then required that a deputy should reside in the town represented by him, and this made it possible for several leading members of the Third Church to be returned to the new House. Thomas Savage was elected for Andover, William Davis for Springfield, John Hull for Westfield, Hezekiah Usher for Billerica, and Thomas Brattle for Lancaster. Major Savage, who had filled the chair in 1659 and 1660, was again chosen speaker. a majority of the magistrates was favorable to the new church, and with the ever faithful secretary, Edward Rawson, at his post, its friends were now prepared to bring to speedy silence the carping criticism and calumnious aspersions with which they had borne so long and so patiently” (Hill’s History of the Old South Church, i. 107, 108).
Mr. Hill’s History also records the active part which Captain William Davis took in the proceedings preliminary to the gathering of the Old South. See also Historical Catalogue of the Old South Church, p. 215. Concerning Captain Davis’s mission to England in 1661, see 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, vii. 170; and John Hull’s Diary, pp. 205, 206.
227 I am indebted to Mr. Edmund M. Barton, of Worcester, for this interesting and valuable item.
228 In 1766, an interesting pamphlet appeared in Boston entitled —
“A Plain and Full Account of the Christian Practices observed by the Church in St. Martin’s-le-grand, London, And other Churches (commonly called Sandemanian) in Fellowship with Them. In a Letter to a Friend. Acts, xxviii. 22 . . . . Boston: Printed and Sold by Z. Fowle, in his Printing-office in Back-Street, near the Mill-Bridge. MDCCLXVI.” (12 mo. pp. 28.)
It fully describes the love feasts, the kiss of charity, and other practices of the sect
229 My thanks are due to Mr. Julius H. Tuttle for this obituary notice. I embrace this opportunity to make my grateful acknowledgments to Mr. Tuttle for his constant and uniform kindness and courtesy and for his valuable aid in many undertakings.
230 He is also called Isaac Winslow, Junior, in the will of his maternal aunt, Margaret (Savage) Alford, 1785 (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 18,461).
231 Journal and Letters of Samuel Curwen (1864), p. 673. Curwen’s Editor, George Atkinson Ward says that Winslow soon after married Mary Davis, daughter of Benjamin Davis, Esq., of Boston (see ante, p. 126), and adds: —
“Mr. Winslow was a particular friend of [the second] Sir William Pepperrell, and his first wife a cousin of the Baronet. Whilst Mr. Winslow was in the British provinces, they corresponded, and Sir William’s letters evince great charity for his political opponents notwithstanding the bitterness which marked their writings and conduct” (Ibid.).
See A Loyalist in the Siege of Boston, in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for January, 1902, lvi. 48–54.
232 For notices of Glas and Sandeman, see Dictionary of National Biography, xxi. 417, 418; l. 255, 256. The late Colonel Sir Robert Groves Sandeman, whose career in India was distinguished, was a great-grandson of Thomas Sandeman, a brother of Robert Sandeman. There is a notice of Sir Robert in the Dictionary of National Biography, 1. 256, 257; and a biography, by Thomas Henry Thornton, was published in 1895.
233 Faraday appears to have been an Elder. There are references to the Sandemanians in Bence Jones’s Life and Letters of Faraday (1870), i. 4, 5; in J. H. Gladstone’s Michael Faraday (1872), pp. 21, 35, 91; and in Silvanus P. Thompson’s Michael Faraday (1898), pp. 4, 51, 286.
234 Dr. Snow says: —
“As to church officers, they always had two elders (teachers) and deacons: no deaconesses are recollected. Daniel Humphreys, esq. (brother to the late Col. Humphreys) was early a deacon here, but soon removed to Danbury, Conn, to officiate as an elder. Mr. H. is still living and resides at Portsmouth, N. H. being Dist. Attorney of the U. S. He is an elder in a small society there, of which Mr. [Alford] Butler above-named is also a living member” (History of Boston, 1825, p. 257).
See ante, p. 114; and 1 Massachusetts Historical Collections, x. 61. Humphreys was born at Derby, Connecticut, 18 May, 1740, graduated at Yale in 1757, and died at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 30 September, 1827 (Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, ii. 471–474).
In the forthcoming Report of the Boston Record Commissioners (xxx.) containing the Boston Marriages, 1751–1809, are found entries of marriages performed by Sandeman and Mitchelson (pp. 43, 45, 53, 57). In one case the record reads, “married by Robert Sandeman Minister of the Congregational Church assembling in Mason’s Hall, at the Sign of the Green Dragon, 9 Feby 1767”; and in another, the marriage is recorded as having been solemnized by “David Michalson Sandemanian Teacher,” 25 November, 1769. In the list of Protesters against the Solemn League and Covenant, Colborn Barrell is described as “Merchant and Sandemanian Preacher” (1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for October, 1870, xi. 393). Apparently, therefore, Mitchelson and Barrell were the two Elders of the Boston church.
235 A view of this building and some account of the way in which the services of the Sandemanians were conducted are in Barber’s Connecticut Historical Collections, pp. 368, 369.
236 In If, Yes, and Perhaps, Boston, 1868, pp. 199–241.
237 Ibid. pp. 171–198.
238 The Ingham Papers, Boston, 1869.
239 If, Yes, and Perhaps.
240 Mr. Porter promised to comply with this request, but died before he found time to do so. The brief abstract of his Remarks in the text is made from notes taken at the time by a member of the Society.
241 An allusion to this Petition will be found, under date of 25 May, 1775, in Journals of each Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, 1838, pp. 257, 258.
242 A companion portrait of Martha Washington was also engraved by Norman.
243 General History of New England, 1815, p. 22 (2 Massachusetts Historical Collections, v. 22). Though written for publication about 1680, this work was not printed until 1815.
244 American Geography, 1789, p. 141
245 New-England Farmer; or, Georgical Dictionary, p. 152/2.
246 Monthly Review, 1787, lxxvi. 139, 272.
247 History of New-Hampshire, iii. 6.
248 A View of the Soil and Climate of the United States of America, By C. F. Volney, Translated by C. B. Brown, Philadelphia, 1804, p. 9. The form “inter-vale,” so far from indicating a refinement of intention on the part of Brown, was doubtless merely a printer’s error.
249 Travels through the Northern Parts of the United States, iii. 191, 192.
250 Vocabulary, or Collection of Words and Phrases which have been supposed to be peculiar to the United States. First printed in the Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. iii., Part ii., pp. 439–536; published at Cambridge the same year; and reprinted, with additions, at Boston in 1816.
251 Travels; in New-England and New-York, 1821, ii. 328, 329.
252 History of Vermont, Part i., pp. 6, 7, note.
253 J. R. Bartlett’s Dictionary of Americanisms, Second edition, p. 217.
254 M. S. De Vere’s Americanisms, p. 176.
255 In saying that “bottom” was a peculiarly American word, Professor Whitney was in error, as the term had been in use in England three centuries before the settlement of this country. See the Oxford English Dictionary.
256 Names and Places: Studies in Geographical and Topographical Nomenclature, p. 231.
257 “Interval, Intervale. [Intervale (the vale between) is probably the original word.] In New England, a tract of low or plain ground between hills or along the banks of rivers” (Imperial Dictionary, 1882).
“Interval, intervale, s. [Etym. doubtful; probably from pref. inter-, and vale.] A tract of low or plain ground between hills or along the banks of rivers. (American.)” (Encyclopædic Dictionary, 1885.)
“Intervale, n. [A var. of interval, as if < inter-+ vale.] A low level tract of land, especially along a river; an interval. See interval, 2. [Local, U. S.]” (Century Dictionary.)
258 Travels, 1809, iii. 192, 193.
259 Letter to the Honorable John Pickering, on the Subject of his Vocabulary, 1817, p. 18.
260 Thus the words Interval and Intervale have never been employed in Rhode Island, simply because the particular kind of soil denoted by the terms is unknown in that State. Nor will they be found anywhere along the seacoast of New England.
261 This shows that Interval and Intervale occur in about the proportion of seven to ten, respectively; but, at the present time, Interval is the more common form.
262 Concise Account of North America, 1765, pp. 49, 53, 66, 67, 84. The form Intervale occurs at p. 48.
263 Descriptive Sketch of the Present State of Vermont, 1797, p. 44. The form Intervale occurs at pp. 65, 135, 148, 166. Both these books were printed in London.
264 The following are the early forms: Enteruail, Enterual, Entervail, Entervaile, Enterval, Entervale, Entervall, Intervail, Intervaile, Interval, Intervale, Intervall, Intervayle, Intreval. By about 1750 these had been reduced to the two forms now common.
265 See the extract below from R. Putnam, 1788.
266 Glossary of Supposed Americanisms, pp. 6, 7.
267 Professor O. F. Emerson, of Western Reserve University, writes me from Cleveland, Ohio, that “no one here is able to tell me of their use.” Professor G. C. S. Southworth, of Salem, Ohio, writes from that place: —
“While in Cleveland I met several gentlemen, who are familiar with the Western Reserve and the State of Ohio. I received categorical replies that they had never heard the word Interval or Intervale used popularly in Ohio. I am satisfied that the word is not used in this State, for bottom-land, or meadow.”
268 No example of the terms south of Pennsylvania is known to me.
269 In his Preliminary Report on the Surface Geology of New Brunswick 1885, G G 48, R. Chalmers writes: —
“Intervales accompany every river in New Brunswick with greater or less breadth, and comprise thousands of acres of the very best lands . . . . The freshets deposit a thin stratum of silt upon them, which, by yearly increments, has given them their present thickness, and there seems no reason to doubt that these intervales have been wholly formed in this way, that is, from the sediments of spring freshets” (Geological and Natural History Survey of Canada, Annual Report, New Series, Vol. i.).
Our associate, Professor G. L. Kittredge, of Harvard University, has called my attention to the two following extracts from Australian books: —
“The alluvial lands of New South Wales, or what the people of New England would call interval lands, (I presume because they constitute the interval between the rivers and the open forest-country,) are in general heavily timbered” (J. D. Lang, Historical and Statistical Account of New South Wales, 1834, i. 89).
“These floods are not periodical. Until 1806 none of importance had occurred; the people had settled down on the rich ‘interval’ land, the deposit of former overflowings” (S. Sidney, The Three Colonies of Australia, 1852, p. 49).
As Sidney clearly copies from Lang, and as Lang refers to New England usage, these extracts do not prove that the term is in vogue in Australia; and the conclusion that the word is not there in use is confirmed by Professor E. E. Morris, of the University of Melbourne, the author of Austral English: a Dictionary of Australian Words, Phrases, and Uses, 1898. To an inquiry, Prof. Morris kindly replied as follows:
“I think I may say that none of the terms you mention as belonging to New England have taken root in Australia. You give two instances of the word ‘intervale’ from Australian hooks, but in both cases they are exotic, and the result of authors having read New England literature, not local to Australia.”
270 Since this paper was written, the section of the Oxford English Dictionary containing the terms in question has been published. From this it appears that the statement in the text requires modification to the extent of recognizing a single Scottish example, as follows: —
“This City of Fez is situate upon the bodies and twice double devalling faces . . . of two hills . . . ; the intervale, or low valley betweene both . . . being the Center” (1632, Lithgow, Travels, viii. 365).
271 1653, Early Records of Lancaster, Massachusetts, 1884, p. 27.
272 1659, History of the Town of Harvard, Massachusetts, 1894, p. 16.
273 1661, History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, 1890, ii. 506/2.
274 Will of S. Gates, 1662, in New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 1877, xxxi. 401.
275 1673, Early Records of Groton, Massachusetts, 1880, p. 46.
276 1685, Massachusetts Colony Records, v. 482
277 1694, B. Wadsworth, in 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, i. 103,104.
278 1723, in G. Sheldon’s History of Deerfield, Massachusetts, 1895, i. 405.
279 1725, S. Willard, in Appalachia, 1881, ii. 343.
280 1730, Pennsylvania Gazette, 29 October–5 November, in New Jersey Archives, xi. 225, 226. This is the earliest example of the word known to me in print. Similar advertisements appeared in the New York Gazette of 30 July, 1733, and of 3 December, 1750 (New Jersey Archives, xi. 321; xii. 693).
281 1730, Colonial Records of Connecticut, vii. 581, 582.
282 1741, W. Bryent, in New-Hampshire Provincial Papers, vi. 351.
283 1746, A. Clough, in Collections of the New-Hampshire Historical Society, 1834, iv. 202.
284 1749, J. Eliot, Essays upon Field-Husbandry in New-England, 1760, p. 23.
285 L. Evans, Middle British Colonies, 1755, p. 28. This is the earliest appearance of the word in a printed book. Evans was perhaps not a New Englander.
286 1760, P. Coffin, in 1 Collections of the Maine Historical Society, iv. 262.
287 1764, Sir W. Johnson, in F. B. Hough's Diary of the Siege of Detroit, 1860, p. 254. Johnson was not a New Englander.
288 1764, T. Hutchinson, History of the Colony of Massachusett’s Bay, Second Edition, 1765, p. 484, note.
289 1768, E. Cleaveland, in F. Chase’s History of Dartmouth College and the Town of Hanover, New Hampshire, 1891, i. 104.
290 Boston Gazette, 10 July, 1769, p. 2/3.
291 1771, J. Adams, Works, 1850, ii. 273.
292 B. Romans, Concise Natural History of East and West Florida, 1775, i. 317. Romans was born in Holland.
293 T. Hutchins, Topographical Description of Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and North Carolina, 1778, p. 4. Hutchins was born in New Jersey.
294 1779, D. Gookin, in New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 1862, xvi. 29.
295 1788, R. Putnam, in M. Cutler’s Life, Journals and Correspondence, 1888, i. 378.
296 1793, J. Drayton, Letters written during a Tour through the Northern & Eastern States of America, 1794, p. 104. Drayton was a South Carolinian.
297 S. Williams, Natural and Civil History of Vermont, 1794, p. 35.
298 I. Allen, Natural and Political History of the State of Vermont, 1798, p. 5.
299 T. M. Harris, Journal of a Tour into the Territory Northwest of the Alleghany Mountains, 1805, p. 96.
300 1806, T. Ashe, Travels in America, 1808, i. 13. Ashe was an Englishman. He alludes to Pennsylvania.
301 C. T. Jackson, Third Annual Report on the Geology of the State of Maine, 1839, p. 124.
302 1844, J. G. Whittier, The Bridal of Pennacook, Poetical Works, 1888, i. 81.
303 R. W. Emerson, Musketaquit, Poems, 1847, p. 228.
304 1853, H. D. Thoreau, A Yankee in Canada, Excursions, 1894, p. 51.
305 1856, J. G. Whittier, Mary Garvin, Poetical Works, 1888, i. 154.
306 J. Winsor, The Mississippi Basin, 1895, p. 230.
307 Works, 1894, iv. 226.
308 An early instance is the following: —
“This is the freshest, the most busie and stirring Intervall or time betweene, that husbandmen have” (P. Holland, The Historie of the World, 1601, i. 591).
Dr. Murray’s readers have been able to furnish him with but a single extract before Chaucer, and with but a single extract between Chaucer and Holland; and the statement in the text is confirmed by Dr. Murray’s remark that “the appearances of the word till the beginning of the 17th c. are quite sporadic, having little or no historical connexion with each other.”
309 Sir George Downing wrote from England 8 March, 1647: —
“For the state of things heer, it hath been very various, not only in the time of warre, but more since: we having since the sheathing of the swourd some times enjoyed our lucide intervales, but then all hath quickly been o’reclouded, that no mortall eye could in the face of things see any thing but ruine” (4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, vi. 540).
“This Court in the intervales of the Genll Court doe desire and impower the Governor and Assistants . . . to be a Council to order and transact such necessary occasions and concernes as shall be to be atteuded in the sayd intervalls of the General Court” (1682, Colonial Records of Connecticut, 1859, iii. 113).
In a letter of instructions written from London in 1683, it was ordered that —
“no Street be laid close to the back of another without an Intervale of at least a pair of Butts” (New Jersey Archives, 1880, i. 431).
310 In 1574, Archbishop Grindal wrote: —
“My fits of cholic, stone, and strangury are very grievous when they come; but God sendeth me some intervalla, else they were intolerable” (Remains, 1843, p. 351).
In 1644, the Rev. W. Chillingworth said: —
“These heatdrops, this morning dew of sorrow, though it presently vanish, and they return to their sin againe upon the next temptation, as a dog to his vomit, when the pang is over; yet in the pauses betweene, while they are in their good mood, they conceive themselves to have very trite, and very good repentance; so that if they should have the good fortune to be taken away in one of these Intervalla, one of these sober moods, they should certainly be saved” (A Sermon Preached At the publike Fast Before his Maiesty at Christ-Church in Oxford, p. 18).
Dr. Murray gives examples from Mabbe (1622) and from N. Bacon (1647).
311 In the Second Part of King Henry the Fourth, v. i. 91, Shakspere wrote: —
“I will denise matter enough out of this Shallow, to keepe prince Harry in continuall laughter, the wearing out of sixe fashions, which is foure terms, or two actions, and a shal laugh without interuallums” (Bankside Shakespeare, 1891, xiii. 170).
312 For instance, J. Minsheu’s Guide into the Tongues, 1627; and T. Blount’s Glossographia, 1661.
313 On the word Intervale, Dr. Murray observes: —
“In former English use, only a rare variant or collateral form of Interval: cf. OF. entreval and entrevale, -valle, and the 14–16th c. Eng. intervalle. But by Lithgow in 1632, and from 17th c. in New England, associated with vale, in the specific American sense 3.
“It is not clear whether the association with vale, valley, was, in the first place, one of popular etymology, favoured perhaps by the partial survival of the old variant form in -vale (cf. intervail in sense 2), or whether this was in New England a natural development of the sense, arising from the fact that the chief intervals in the primaeval forest were the bottoms of the river valleys, and giving rise to an association with vale, as used in English in such names as the Vale of Clwyd, Vale of Llangollen, Vale of the Yarrow, etc. It is possible that both principles operated together; and it is to be noted that, in this specific sense, intervale has not, even in American use, ousted interval.”
314 I wish to express my indebtedness to Professor Kittredge for aid rendered in the treatment of the etymology of the terms under discussion.
315 Since this communication was made to the Society, a portrait in oil has been painted from this miniature by Mr. Joseph De Camp at the charge of Mr. Francis Randall Appleton (H. C. 1875), and by him presented to the Porcellian Club, of which Professor McKean was the Founder. Members of the Club will contribute to the new college fence, soon to be built, a gate, to be known as the McKean Gate. It will span the entrance to the College Yard between Boylston Hall and Wadsworth House.
316 Professor Joseph McKean (H. C. 1794) was born at Ipswich, Massachusetts, 19 April, 1776, and died in Havana, 17 March, 1818. He was the minister of the First Church in Milton, Massachusetts (1797–1804), and, in 1809, succeeded John Quincy Adams as Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory in Harvard College. He was an active member of the Massachusetts Historical Society, of which he was Librarian, Cabinet Keeper, and Recording Secretary. A silver pitcher, presented by Dr. McKean’s father to Mr. Samuel Curzon, in whose house Dr. McKean died, is still preserved as an heirloom. It bears the following inscription: —
Presented
To
Mr. Samuel & Mrs. Margaret Curson
by
William McKean
as a testimonial of his gratitude
to them
for their kind & affectionate attentions
to his Son,
Reverend Joseph McKean,
who died at their house in
Havanna
March the 17 A. D. 1818.
His body was buried in “nitch No. 345 of the Cemetery Espada en la Habana where it rested, undisturbed, until the year 1840 in which year all the nitches which were not re-rented were emptied of their contents and the bones were transferred to the osario, in other words, to the indiscriminate heap in the corners of the cemetery.” The marble tablet placed over the nitch by Dr. McKean’s father disappeared at the same time. A Memoir by Professor Levi Hedge is in 2 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 157–167. See also Teele’s History of Milton, pp. 260–265.
317 These lines appeared in the Columbian Centinel of Saturday, 2 May, 1818, No. 3555, p. 4/1. It is not improbable that they were written by Levi Frisbie (H. C. 1802), who had recently passed from the chair of Latin to that of Philosophy at Cambridge. See Teele’s History of Milton, p. 265 note.
318 Brief notices of Mr. Lisle are in Teele’s History of Milton, pp. 144, 512; and Drake’s Dictionary of American Biography. He was a lawyer, a prominent Free Mason, and the author of an Oration on Washington. He died in 1814.
319 These stanzas are in manuscript, and their authorship is not known. They appeared in the Columbian Centinel of Wednesday, 20 May, 1818 (No. 3560, p. 4/1), preceded by this paragraph —
“☞ We recognize in the following, the pen which often times has delighted and instructed our readers and conferred unfading renown on American Genius and Poesy. It has been deeply lamented that a Harp so tuneful, should have ‘so long hung on the willows.’”
A “corrected” version of these lines appeared in the next issue of the Centinel,— of Saturday, 23 May, 1818 (No. 3561, p. 4/1), which has been followed in our own text. The manuscript version combines the “Lines” and the “Impromptu.”
320 Professor McKean’s family know nothing of this portrait and will welcome any information concerning it.
321 This composition is in manuscript, and its authorship is unknown. It was printed in the Columbian Centinel of Saturday, 18 April, 1818, No. 3551, p. 4/1.
The Centinel of Wednesday, 22 April, 1818 (No. 3552, p. 2/4), contains a notice that —
“The Solemnities appointed by the Government of the University at Cambridge, as a tribute of respect to the memory of the late Rev. Dr. McKean, . . . will take place in the University Chapel this afternoon, at 3 o’clock.”
In the same issue (p. 4/1) is an obituary taken from the Daily Advertiser.
322 Colonel Winthrop died at Atlantic City, New Jersey, on the eighth of April, before receiving notice of his election. He graduated at Yale in the Class of 1851, and served through the Civil War as a volunteer. He subsequently entered the Regular Army and was Professor of Military Jurisprudence at West Point. Some time after leaving college Colonel Winthrop discarded his middle name.
323 Letter to Hezekiah Niles, editor of the Weekly Register, 13 February, 1818, in Novanglus and Massachusettensis; or Political Essays, published in the years 1774 and 1775, on the principal points of controversy between Great Britain and her Colonies, etc., Boston, 1819, p. 233.
324 The Provincial Governor in the English Colonies of North America, by Evarts Boutell Greene, New York, 1898, in Harvard Historical Studies, vii. 205.
325 Massachusetts Colony Records, v. 200.
326 The Rights of the British Colonies asserted and proved. By James Otis, Esq. Boston, MDCCLXIV, p. 33.
327 Novanglus and Massachusettensis, etc., p. 245.
328 Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, America and West Indies, 1681–1685, No. 264, p. 128. See also Publications of the Prince Society: Edward Randolph, by Robert Noxon Toppan, iii. 111, where the letter is given with some differences of phraseology.
329 The Regulations Lately Made concerning the Colonies, and the Taxes Imposed upon Them, considered. London, 1765, p. 57. This tract is attributed to George Grenville.
330 Ibid. p. 79.
331 15 Charles II., 1663, ch. 7, § 5. The Statutes at Large (edition of 1735), ii. 627.
332 Bancroft’s History of the United States (edition of 1883), iii. 193. These Remarks of Lord Mansfield were made in 1766.
333 The Regulations, etc., p. 88.
334 History of the United States (edition of 1840), iii. 100.
335 Massachusetts House Journal, 29 January, 1727–28.
336 Ibid., 21 August, 1731.
337 Ibid., 2 February, 1731–32.
338 Ibid., 2 April, 1741.
339 See the case of Frost v. Leighton in the American Historical Review for January, 1897, ii. 229–240; and Publications of this Society, iii. 246–264.
340 Massachusetts House Journal, 27 June, 1729, p. 16. This letter of the Agents is dated London, 25 April, 1729.
341 Journals of the House of Commons, xxv. 815.
342 History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay (edition of 1768), ii. 394.
343 Ibid. ii. 395.
344 Ibid. ii. 295.
345 History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay (edition of 1768), ii. 396.
346 Massachusetts State Papers. Speeches of the Governors of Massachusetts, from 1765 to 1775; and the Answers of the House of Representatives to the same, etc. [edited by Alden Bradford], Boston, 1818, p. 394.
347 Novanglus and Massachusettensis, etc., p. 39.
348 A Letter from a Country Gentleman at Boston, To his Friends in the Country, p. 9. The Letter is dated, “Boston, June 10th, 1740.”
349 A Letter To the Merchant in London, To whom is Directed A Printed Letter relating to the Manufactory Undertaking, dated New England, Boston February 21st 1740, 1. Printed for the Public Good. 1741, p. 28.
350 The Boston News-Letter, Nos. 2927 and 2928, of Thursday, 17 and 24 August, 1758.
351 See a paper by our associate Professor Franklin B. Dexter, entitled The Founding of Yale College, in Papers of the New Haven Historical Society, iii. 1–31.
352 Our associate Mr. Abner C. Goodell. See Dr. George E. Ellis’s estimate of Dummer’s character in Memorial History of Boston, ii. 82, 83.
Dummer was the son of Jeremiah Dummer, of Boston, goldsmith, who served his apprenticeship with John Hull, the Mint-Master. The date of birth of Jeremiah the son does not appear, but if his age is correctly given on his monument he was born in or about 1681. In the Baptismal Register of the Old South Church in Boston the following entries appear: —
- 1675/6 Febr. 13 Jeremiah, son of Jeremiah Dumer.
- 1678 Dec. 29 William, son of Jeremiah Dumer.
We have here the record of baptism of Lieutenant-Governor Dummer and of an elder brother Jeremiah, who must have died in infancy since the goldsmith, in his will (1715), calls William his eldest son (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 4055). In 1679, the father transferred his relations to the First Church, to which he was then admitted, and of which he became a prominent member; but the First Church Records at that period were imperfectly kept and the baptisms of his younger children are not found. There are fine portraits of Lieutenant-Governor Dummer and of Jeremiah Dummer, the Province Agent, in the possession of the Misses Loring of Boston. They were engraved for the Narrative and Critical History of America, vi. 114, 115. The portrait of Jeremiah Dummer has been ascribed to Sir Godfrey Kneller.
Dummer was buried at West Ham, Essex. The inscription on his monument reads —
The Remains
of
Jeremiah Dummer
of New England, Esqr.
distinguished by his excellent life
probity and humanity.
His age 58
1739
In his will (signed Jeremy), dated 7 June, 1738, Dummer described himself as of Plaistow, in Essex. It was proved 1 June, 1739 (New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1881, xxxv. 268, 269; and Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, i. 200, 201). Concerning his English ancestry, see Sewall’s Diary, i. xxi, xxii.
353 See George B. Reed’s Sketch of the Life of the Hon. John Read of Boston.
354 See New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1849, iii. 117–122, 220–222; and Quincy’s History of Harvard University (1860), i. 130–114.
355 December, 1897. Publications, v. 77, 78.
356 “A Board of Trustees was constituted by the Charter of 1701, and by an explanatory Act of the General Assembly in 1723 the Rector was made ex-officio a Trustee, though this Act was not accepted by the Board until 1728. By the Charter of 1745 the Presidency of the Corporation was made into a separate office, and the other Trustees were styled Fellows” (Yale Triennial Catalogue, p. 1).
357 A full notice of Woodbridge is in Sibley’s Harvard Graduates, ii, 461–470. See also Allen’s Biographical Dictionary; and New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1878, xxxii. 294. Woodbridge addressed Cotton Mather in verse on his completion of the Magnalia, to which the lines are prefixed. I cannot learn of the existence of any portrait of Woodbridge.
358 Beside the documents here printed, Mr. Edes exhibited two diplomas on parchment issued by Yale College to graduates of the Classes of 1709 and 1729, and a manuscript copy of the “Orders and appointments to be Observed in the Collegiate School in Connecticut.” This paper is dated 1 December, 1725, and is attested by Robert Treat and Daniel Edwards, Tutors.
359 There is little, if any, doubt that Lord Cornbury is here referred to. Edward Hyde, Viscount Cornbury, was born in December, 1661, the son of Henry Hyde, second Earl of Clarendon, and the grandson of the great Earl. Bred at Oxford, he sat in the House of Commons for Wilts and Christchurch, 1685–1701, when he was made Governor of New York and New Jersey. Before coming to America, he had held various offices, among them that of Master of the Horse to Prince George of Denmark. He was also Page of Honor to James II. at his coronation, 23 April, 1685, but, in 1688, deserted the cause of James, who, it will be remembered, had married his aunt. Cornbury, therefore, was cousin-german to Queen Anne.
In 1705, with Joseph Dudley, Cornbury presented to the Privy Council complaints against the Charter Governments, which were heard and dismissed. In 1708, Cornbury’s rule in New York ended, and he returned to England, where he succeeded to the Earldom of Clarendon on the death of his father, — 31 October, 1709. In 1711, he was made a Privy Councillor. In 1713, he and Dudley again made complaint to the Privy Council against the Charter Governments, but without success.
Cornbury is thus shown to have been identified with two previous attempts to deprive the American Colonies of their Charter rights. As to his character, there seems to be but one opinion. On the ninth of February, 1707–8, Lewis Morris, afterwards Chief-Justice of New York and New Jersey, wrote to Secretary Boyle, on the eve of Lord Cornbury’s removal from office, a long letter in the nature of a scathing review of his administration, — “an administration no where so exactly parralel’d as in that of Gessius Florus Governour of Judea” — and of his behavior, in which he tells of the Governor’s “dressing publicly in woman’s cloaths every day, and putting a stop to all publique business” (Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, v. 33–38). Dr. J. Romeyn Brodhead describes him as “mean, vulgar, foolish, [and] profligate” (Historical Magazine for 1868, Second Series, iii. 71, 72). Colonel Chester says that he —
“earned a most unenviable reputation, which he appears to have fully deserved, and his character and conduct were equally abhorred in both hemispheres . . . . [He] died 31 March, [1723], in obscurity, and deeply in debt, but had honourable burial [5 April] in the vault of his ancestors, whose good name he had so sadly disgraced” (Westminster Abbey Registers, p. 308 and note).
The progress of the unsuccessful movement, in 1715, for the “regulation” of the Charter Governments, which caused Dummer to write his famous Defence of the New-England Charters, can be traced in the Journals of the House of Commons (2 George I.). On the tenth of August, a Committee, to which had been referred a “Petition of the Agent of Carolina, in America, and several Merchants trading thither,” reported a Resolution for an Address to the King, which was adopted (xviii. 262). On the same day the House —
“Ordered, That Leave be given to bring in a Bill for the better Regulation of the Charter and Proprietary Governments in America; and for the Encouragement of the Trade of this Kingdom, and of his Majefty’s Plantations; and for the Security of his Majefty’s Cuftoms (xviii. 262).
On the thirteenth, the Bill was presented and was read the first time (xviii. 268). On the fifteenth, the Bill was read a second time, and was referred to a Committee which was ordered to meet that afternoon “at Five a Clock, in the Speaker’s Chamber” (xviii. 269). This action, doubtless, was the occasion of Dummer’s hurried letter in the text, which was followed by a more formal letter to the Connecticut authorities dated 20 August, 1715 (cf. Colonial Records of Connecticut, v. 522). At this Session of the House (15 August) the Guardian of the young Lord Baltimore petitioned for a clause to be inserted in the Bill to save the rights of his ward (Journals, xviii. 269). On the following day (16 August) Dummer, as Agent for the Province of the Massachusetts Bay and the Colony of Connecticut, petitioned the House to except his constituents from the operations of the Bill (xviii. 270). See Dummer’s Defence of the New-England Charters, passim; Chalmers’s Introduction to the History of the Revolt of the American Colonies (1845) ii. 5, 6; Palfrey’s History of New England, iv. 487 and notes; New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1869, xxiii. 457–459; Dictionary of National Biography, xxviii. 393; and G. E. C[okayne]’s Complete Peerage, ii. 277, 278.
360 For a notice of Benjamin Hoadly, successively Bishop of Bangor, Hereford, Salisbury, and Winchester, see the Dictionary of National Biography, xxvii. 16–21. The bull Unigenitus was published by Clement XI. in 1713. The book referred to by Dummer was possibly Hoadly’s Satirical Dedication to Pope Clement XI., prefixed in 1715 to Sir R. Steele’s Account of the Roman Catholic Religion, or more probably A Preservative against the Principles and Practices of the Nonjurors both in Church and State, published in 1716.
361 For a notice of Daniel Williams, a prominent Nonconformist divine, see the Dictionary of National Biography, lxi. 385–389. His will, dated 26 June, 1711, with a codicil, 22 August, 1712, gave rise to a controversy which was not settled until 26 July, 1721. The will is printed in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1892, xlvi. 436–439; and in Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, i. 628–631.
362 The Corporation referred to by Dummer in this letter and in another dated 25 February, 1724–25 (post, p. 202), and still existing in England under the assumed name of The New England Company, is often referred to by historical writers under many variants from its legal name, — such as “The Indian Corporation” (Ibid.), “the Society for propagating the Gospel in America” (post, p. 203), the “Corporation for promoting the Gospel among the Indians in New England” (British Museum Catalogue), and the “Corporation for the Spread of the Gospel in New England” (Dictionary of National Biography, vi. 120, 121). It is even confounded with the still existing great Missionary Society of the Church of England, chartered by William III., 16 June, 1701, under the name of “The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts,” an Historical Account of which, by the Rev. Dr. David Humphreys, its Secretary, was printed in London in 1730. It was this last named Society and its operations here which gave rise to the Mayhew Controversy, so called, in which the Rev. Dr. Jonathan Mayhew and the Rev. East Apthorp were the principal actors (see Annals of King’s Chapel, ii. 241–280). It has seemed well, therefore, to state briefly the facts concerning the legal name and the career of the organization which played an important part in aiding the work of the Apostle Eliot and in printing the Indian Bible. These facts have been drawn chiefly from a small volume of ninety-two pages entitled A Sketch of the Origin and the Recent History of the New England Company by the Senior Member of the Company [Henry William Busk] . . . London, 1884.1
On the twenty-seventh of July, 1649, the Long Parliament passed an Act to create “A Corporation for the Promoting and Propagating the Gospel of Jesus Christ in New England” (p. 8). It established a Corporation in England consisting of sixteen persons, — a President, a Treasurer, and fourteen Assistants, to be called “The President and Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England,” with power to acquire real and personal estate not exceeding the annual value of £2,000. Nearly £12,000 was raised by voluntary subscription in England and Wales and invested in real estate in Eriswell, Suffolk, in Plumstead, Kent, and in London. “The Corporation at once appointed Commissioners and a Treasurer in New England, who, with the income transmitted to them by the Corporation from England, paid itinerant missionaries and school teachers amongst the natives” (pp. 9, 10).
At the Restoration (29 May, 1660), the Corporation became defunct, but through the exertions of the Hon. Robert Boyle and others, it was revived by an Order of Charles II. in Council, 10 April, 1661, “for a new Charter of Incorporation vesting in the Company then created (and now subsisting) the property which had been given or bought for the purposes of the late reputed Corporation” (pp. 12, 13). The Charter passed the Seals on the seventh of February, 1661–62, and created “the Company for Propagacion of the Gospell in New England, and the Partes adjacent in America” (p. 60), which was limited in its fellowship to forty-five persons (p. 64). The Charter-members included the Earl of Clarendon, the Earl of Manchester, Viscount Saye and Sele, the Hon. Robert Boyle, and many Aldermen and citizens of London (pp. 14, 57–59).
“For a few years after 1775, when the American War of Independence broke out, no missionary work was done in America at all, and the funds were allowed to accumulate.” After the Peace of 1783, the Company transferred its operations to New Brunswick, and, in 1822, to other parts of British America (pp. 17, 21).
The funds of the Company are derived (1) from the original subscription, in 1649, of about £12,000, (2) from “a fund arising under the will of the Hon. Robert Boyle, the first Governor of the Company,” who died 30 December, 1691, and (3) from “property derived under the will of the Rev. Dr. Daniel Williams, who died 26 January, 1715–16, and whose will was confirmed by his sister and heiress-at-law, and by decree in Chancery in 1720” (p. 18). It was not until 1745, however, on the death of the life tenant, to whom Dummer refers, that the Company “came into possession of considerable landed property in Essex, in trust, partly for supporting itinerant preachers in the West Indies, and partly for the benefit of the college of Cambridge in New England” (p. 19). This is the devise referred to in Dummer’s letter in the text.
1 As it nowhere appears in Mr. Busk’s History when or by what authority the present name of the Society was adopted, a letter was addressed to the Society’s office in London requesting information upon these points. From the reply of William Marshall Venning, D. C. L., the Clerk of the Company, the following extracts are taken: —
“The name of this Society was never changed to the New England Company by Royal Charter, by Act of Parliament, or by process of law. In fact, its name has never been changed at all since the date of its Charter, its full legal title still being ‘the Company for propagation of the Gospel in New England and the parts adjacent in America.’ For the sake of brevity, and perhaps partly to distinguish it from the Society for the propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, it has long been commonly called ‘the New England Company.’ . . . The earliest record I can find . . . of this Society having been called ‘The New England Company’ is in the Minutes of a meeting of the Company held on the 3rd April, 1770. These are the earliest Minutes in the Company’s possession with the exception of the Minutes of nine or ten meetings held at various dates between the years 1662 and 1720 in all which cases the longer title is used.”
The Company has since privately printed a volume of much interest to students of our Colonial and Provincial history entitled — Some Correspondence between the Governors and Treasurers of the New England Company in London and the Commissioners of the United Colonies in America, the Missionaries of the Company, and others between the years 1657 and 1712, to which are added the Journals of the Rev. Experience Mayhew in 1713 and 1714. Printed from the Originals in the possession of the New England Company . . . . London, 1896, pp. 128.
See Dr. Venning’s paper on the Origin of the New England Company, London, with an Account of the Labours on Behalf of the North American Indians, in the Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 1885, New Series, ii. 293–301.
363 Elisha Williams (H. C. 1711) of Wethersfield was a Tutor in the College (1716–1718) before his induction to the office of Rector, in 1726. His service as Tutor was wholly at Wethersfield, — in charge of the “remnant” or “secession,” encouraged by Woodbridge, which resisted, for a time, the removal of the Seminary from Saybrook to New Haven. After the breach had been healed, Williams’s name was inserted in the list of Tutors. See post, p. 206, note.
364 Elisha Lord (Y. C. 1718). He was the child of Woodbridge’s last wife by a former marriage. See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 187; and Sibley’s Harvard Graduates, ii. 468.
365 Colonial Records of Connecticut, vi. 83, 84.
366 Captain Ephraim Minor of Stonington is probably here referred to.
367 John Whiting, son of Captain Joseph Whiting, was Treasurer of the Colony from 1717 to 1749.
368 The signatures to this document are autographs
369 Rev. Samuel Andrew (H. C. 1675) of Milford, Connecticut. For an excellent notice of him see Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, i. 269 note.
370 Rev. Samuel Russel (H. C. 1681) of Branford, Connecticut.
371 Rev. Thomas Buckingham (H. C. 1690) of Hartford.
372 As I was unable to interpret this paragraph I sought the aid of our associate Professor Franklin Bowditch Dexter, who replied as follows: —
“I cannot decipher . . . ‘the Revd. Mr. Izzard.’ The phrases ‘Wait-still Hoping’ and ‘Mr. Immovable’ seem to point to some recent pamphlet with a nomenclature resembling the Pilgrim’s Progress. The reference to ‘ye late Council at Stratford’ is probably to a council held there in April, 1720, when the town was divided on the question of calling Samuel Russell, Jr. (yale 1712), as a minister in succession to Cutler. Cutler speaks of Mr. Izzard’s ‘great distance’ as likely to prevent his attendance at the Trustees’ Meeting, and this would seem to point either to Moses Noyes of Lyme or to Eliphalet Adams of New London.”
I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to Professor Dexter for other valuable suggestions in connection with this communication.
373 Sibley records the gift of this bell by Madam Woodbridge, but assigns the date of it to the year 1723 (Harvard Graduates, ii. 469). His authority was Clap’s Annals of Yale College, p. 79, but Clap is untrustworthy about such small matters.
374 For notices of Dr. Cutler, see Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, v. 50, 52; and F. B. Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 201–203, 270–273. See Foote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, i. 306 et seq.
375 Cf. Mr. Davis’s Remarks, p. 211, post.
376 This, doubtless, was John Dixwell of Boston, goldsmith, a Ruling Elder of the New North Church. He was the son of the Regicide; born in New Haven, 6 March 1680–81; and died in Boston of small-pox by inoculation, 21 April 1725 (Records of the New North Church).
377 Captain James Wadsworth of Durham was of the Governor’s Council and had to do with the Brief for collecting money for the Rector’s house which had been ordered in May, 1721 (cf. Colonial Records of Connecticut, vi. 256).
378 Judge Edward Lyde, of Boston. He died 11 May, 1724 (Sewall’s Diary, iii. 337). See Foote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, i. 178 note.
379 Rev. Samuel Russel (H. C. 1681) was a Fellow of Yale, 1701–1730; Rev. Samuel Andrew (H. C. 1675) was a Fellow of Harvard, 1679– c.1684, and of Yale, 1701–1738, and Rector, 1707–1719; and Rev. Thomas Ruggles (H. C. 1690) was a Fellow of Yale, 1710–1728. See post, p. 201, note.
380 Colonel William Tailer of Boston. He was Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay 1711–1716 and 1730–1732. He was universally esteemed. Although a Warden of King’s Chapel, his death called forth affectionate tributes from the Congregational clergy, who publicly praised “the prudence, justice, and moderation of his administration” (Foote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, i. 183, 184 and note). See post, pp. 267–270 and notes, 278–281.
381 This refers to the Presbyterian Congregation in New York which Jonathan Edwards subsequently served (see post, p. 200, note). They wanted a preacher and Cutler names those who had been thought of for that service.
382 Samuel Whittelsey (Y. C. 1705) was minister of Wallingford, Connecticut, from 1709 till his death, 15 April, 1752. He was a Fellow of the College from 1732 till his death (Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, i. 268–270; and Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 40–44).
383 Rev. Joseph Noyes (Y. C. 1709) was the New Haven minister. He was Tutor 1710–1715 (Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 85–89).
384 Rev. Samuel Hall (Y. C. 1716) was Tutor, 1716–1718. See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 154–156.
385 Henry Caner, the builder of the first College edifice at New Haven. He was the father of the Rev. Dr. Henry Caner (Y. C. 1724), afterward Rector of King’s Chapel in Boston.
386 Rev. Daniel Browne (Y. C. 1714) was Tutor 1718–1722. See Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, v. 54, and Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 118–120.
387 William Smith (Y. C. 1719) was Tutor 1722–1724. See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 207–211. See also post, p. 197, note.
388 Bibye Lake, Esquire, was created a baronet in 1711. He was Sub-Governor of the African Company, and died in 1744. He was grandnephew to Sir Edward Lake, Baronet, LL.D., Chancellor of the Diocese of Lincoln, who was made a baronet for his remarkable loyalty to Charles I., especially at the battle of Edge Hill. Sir Edward died in 1674. His wife was Anne, daughter and coheiress of Simon Bibye, of Bugden, in Huntingdonshire (Betham’s Baronetage of England, 1803, iii. 153–157).
389 “On the Twenty-seventh day of June, 1721,” wrote Dr. Holmes, in 1869, “Zabdiel Boylston of Boston inoculated his only son for small-pox, — the first person ever submitted to the operation, in the New World” (Medical Essays, 1891, p. 347).
390 Captain Joseph Whiting was Treasurer of the Colony from 1678 to his death in October, 1717, when he was succeeded in the office by his son, John Whiting.
391 Lieutenant-Colonel George Lucas, whose daughter Eliza married Charles Pinckney of Charleston, S. C., became Lieutenant-Governor of Antigua in 1743, and died in 1747. (V. L. Oliver’s History of Antigua, ii. 200–202, iii. 320; Mrs. H. H. Ravenel’s Eliza Pinckney, pp. 1, 133; and cf. Colonial Records of Connecticut, vi. 325.)
392 Rev. Daniel Browne (Y. C. 1714).
393 Rev. Timothy Cutler (H. C. 1701).
394 Rev. Samuel Johnson (Y. C. 1714), Tutor, 1716–1719, afterward President of King’s College. See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 123–128; T. B. Chandler’s Life of Samuel Johnson; E. E. Beardsley’s Life and Correspondence of Samuel Johnson.
395 Samuel Shute had been appointed Governor of the Massachusetts Bay 15 June, 1716. He reached Boston, 5 October, following, and after six stormy years, during which he was in constant controversy with the Legislature, under the lead of Elisha Cooke, Jr., he suddenly left Boston, 1 January, 1722–23, and went to England, where he presented his grievances to the Privy Council. The result of his mission was the issue of the Explanatory Charter, so called, which passed the seals 12 August, 1725. His commission as Governor fell with the demise of the Crown, 10 June, 1727.
396 The famous Francis Atterbury, for a notice of whom, see the Dictionary of National Biography, ii. 233–238. See also ante, v. 79.
397 Rev. Samuel Johnson (Y. C. 1714).
398 Rev. John Rogers (H. C. 1684) of Ipswich, Massachusetts, who married Martha Whittingham, a sister of Saltonstall’s then wife.
399 James Pierpont, Jr. (Y. C. 1718), Tutor, 1722–1724, was the son of the Rev. James Pierpont (H. C. 1681). See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 189, 190.
400 William Smith (Y. C. 1719). He removed to New York, where he was a member of the Governor’s Council, 1753–1767, and Judge of the Supreme Court, 1763–1769. See ante, p. 191, note.
401 Daniel Turner, a physician of some note, received a degree from Yale in 1723. “His medical attainments were small, and the records of cases are the only parts of his works of any permanent value.” For a notice of him, from which this passage is taken, see the Dictionary of National Biography, lvii. 332, 333.
402 The allusion is to the Great Rebellion which broke out in 1641. In a letter which is not dated, but which must have been written about the time that Dummer’s was, the Rev. Daniel Neal said: —
“I was last night in company with the governor [Shute] who has laid his memorial before the board of trade, where it was maintained that the conduct of the assembly in the affair of the militia was no less than high treason by the laws of England, as appeared to them by their own printed votes . . . . The cry of the city [London] here runs exceedingly against you, and they revive the story of 1641” (Hutchinson’s History of the Province of Massachusetts-Bay, 1767, ii. 290 note).
403 Presumably Pelatiah Kilborn (Y. C. 1724). See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 305.
404 Presumably, the Rev. Daniel Chapman (Y. C. 1707) of West Farms (since the Revolution called Green’s Farms, and now included in the town of Westport), Connecticut, is here referred to. As his parish was not far from the New York border, he would naturally have been thought of in connection with such a mission. See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 65, 66.
405 Jonathan Edwards is here referred to. In August, 1722, almost immediately after he had been licensed to preach, he began to minister to a small Society of Presbyterians in New York, but left them in April, 1723. On the twenty-eighth of July, 1727, he married Sarah Pierpont, sister of the writer of the letter in the text (Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, i. 330; and Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 218–226).
406 James Pierpont (Y. C. 1718) was born 21 May, 1699 in New Haven, where he died 18 June, 1776 (Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 189). He was the eldest son of the Rev. James Pierpont (H. C. 1681) who came of a good family early settled at Ipswich, and later at Roxbury, Massachusetts, where he was born 4 January, 1659–60. In 1685, he was ordained as pastor of the church at New Haven. One of the first persons received into full communion after his settlement was John Dixwell the Regicide, who was known in the community as James Davids until his death, after which his identity was revealed. Mr. Pierpont was one of the original Trustees of Yale College. It is said that to his activity and influence the College was largely indebted for the benefactions of Governor Yale; and he is the reputed author of the Saybrook Platform adopted by the Synod held at Saybrook, in 1708, of which he was an influential member. He was thrice married, — (i) to Abigail Davenport, a granddaughter of the Rev. John Davenport, (ii) to Sarah Haynes, a granddaughter of Gov. John Haynes, and (iii) to Mary Hooker, a granddaughter of the Rev. Thomas Hooker, who became the mother of the wife of Jonathan Edwards. Pierpont’s remarkable story of the mirage at New Haven in 1647, — “the apparition of the Ship in the Sky,” may be read in the Magnalia (1702), Book I. pp. 25, 26. Cf. Winthrop’s History of New England (1853), ii. 399, 400, note. Pierpont died 22 November, 1714. Among his descendants were the younger President Edwards, President Dwight, President Theodore Dwight Woolsey, and Aaron Burr, Vice-President of the United States (Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, i. 205, 206; Sibley’s Harvard Graduates, iii. 222–230).
407 Our associate Professor James Bradstreet Greenough, suggests that these letters may stand for Pastori Ecclesiae Christi.
408 This refers to the attempt then being made to induce the Rev. William Russell (Y. C. 1709), of Middletown, Connecticut, to accept the Rectorship of Yale. He was Tutor, 1713, 1714. See Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 90, 91.
409 Rev. Samuel Russel (H. C. 1681). He usually signed, and his contemporaries usually wrote, his name with a single final “1.” A diploma issued to a Yale graduate of the Class of 1709, thus signed by Mr. Russel as one of the Fellows, was exhibited at this meeting. See ante, pp. 176, 190, notes.
410 We have here an anticipation of Berkeley’s thought expressed in the famous stanza beginning —
“Westward the course of empire takes its way.”
411 John Read (H. C. 1697).
412 Gurdon Saltonstall.
413 For a notice of this Society and its various names, see ante, p. 180, note.
414 Colonel Samuel Shute, Governor of the Massachusetts Bay 1716–1727. See ante, p. 195, note.
415 Elisha Cooke, Jr., who had been sent to England, in 1723, by the House of Representatives of Massachusetts as its Agent to answer and to controvert the charges of Governor Shute made to the Privy Council.
416 See Palfrey, History of New England, iv. 484–486.
417 Elisha Williams (H. C. 1711). For a notice of him, see Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, i. 281–284; and Dexter’s Yale Biographies and Annals, i, 321, 322, 632–635. See also ante, p. 184, note
418 The Bishop of London was Edmund Gibson, and the Bishop of Salisbury Benjamin Hoadly. The pamphlet referred to is doubtless An Enquiry into the Reasons of the Conduct of Great Britain, with relation to the Present State of Affairs in Europe, published by Hoadly in 1727. Dummer seems to have been mistaken in associating Gibson with this pamphlet.
419 See Colonial Records of Connecticut iv. 306–311, vii. 109, 191 and note, 571–579.
420 Rev. Samuel Johnson (Y. C. 1714).
421 The reference is probably to a Commission to Gibson, 1 George II. (29 April, 1728), which is printed in Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, v. 849. See also ante, v. 112 note
422 Jonathan Belcher was a classmate at Harvard of Jeremiah Dummer (1699) and Governor of the Massachusetts Bay, 1730–1741.
423 Elisha Williams (H. C. 1711) was Rector of the College at the time this letter was written.
424 See Colonial Records of Connecticut, vii. 254, and Collections of the Connecticut Historical Society, iv. 174–180, 184–190.
I am indebted to our associate Mr. Albert Matthews, for aid and valuable suggestions in the preparation of the notes to this communication.
425 For notices of Governor Joseph Talcott, see S. V. Talcott’s Talcott Pedigree, 1876, pp. 39–51; New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1869, xxiii. 460 note; and Waters’s Genealogical Gleanings in England, ii. 1125, 1126.
426 In a letter to John White, Treasurer of Harvard College, dated 12 July, 1721 (J. Quincy’s History of Harvard University, 1860, i. 528).
427 In a letter to Dr. Colman, dated 27 January, 1726–27 (Ibid. i. 529).
428 Manuscript letter of Thomas Hollis to President Leverett, dated 18 January, 1722–23, in the Archives of Harvard University.
429 Owing to Mr. Field’s absence from the country when the proceedings of this meeting were put in type, and the importance of having the proof of this Diary read with the original, the document is reserved for publication in another volume.
430 The following quasi-historical societies have also been incorporated: —
boston veteran firemen’s association.
Purposes. “To promote social and charitable purposes with each other, and for the prosecution of antiquarian, historical, and literary subjects, relating to the Fire Department of the City of Boston.”
Date of Charter. 1 March, 1898.
the castilian club.
Purposes. “For the prosecution of historical and literary research in matters relating to Spain.”
Date of Charter. 27 April, 1898.
barnicoat fire association.
Purposes. “To promote social and charitable purposes with each other, to perpetuate the name of William Barnicoat (Chief Engineer of the Boston Fire Department from 1836 to 1854) and for the prosecution [of] antiquarian, historical, and literary subjects relating to the Fire Department of the City of Boston, Mass.”
Date of Charter. 9 May, 1898.
431 On the bottom of a silver waiter, once owned by the Hon. Theodore Atkinson of Portsmouth and his wife Hannah (Wentworth) Atkinson, — a sister of Governor Benning Wentworth, — are engraved the names of fortyeight persons who were connected by ties of blood, marriage, or friendship with the Wentworth family, together with the dates of their death and their ages. Arthur Slade’s name is eleventh in this List, which covers the period 1740–1771 and is printed in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1861, xv. 172. A Family Bible gives 17 January, 1747, as the date of his death.
Administration on the estate of Arthur Slade, “formerly of the parish of St. Nicholas, Deptford, in the County of Kent, but at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, deceased, was granted 7 October, 1747, to Elizabeth Slade, his widow, relict,” etc. (Waters’s Gleanings, Ibid, for 1889, xliii. 160, 161.)
Administration on the estate of Arthur Slade, late of New Market, New Hampshire, gentleman, had been previously granted, 28 January, 1746–47, “to Henry Keese of Portsmouth and Elizabeth his wife,” who, at a Probate Court held at Portsmouth, 29 April, 1747, filed an Inventory of the estate which had been taken on the seventh of February (Rockingham Probate Records at Exeter).
432 The facts relating to Slade’s paternal ancestry were communicated by his son, Denison Rogers Slade.
433 His estate was administered here in 1854. (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 39,263.)
434 The English ancestry of the Reverend Nathaniel Rogers has been so often stated with great inaccuracy that the attention of those interested therein is called to the elaborate article on the Rogers Family, by Henry F. Waters, in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1887, xli. 158–188. That paper contains abstracts of English Wills of the Rogers and Crane families, besides a tabular pedigree.
435 New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1892, xlvi. 129.
436 Ipswich Town Records.
437 For an account of Mr. Rogers’s connection with the Second Parish of Exeter, and for a copy of his epitaph, see Bell’s History of the Town of Exeter, New Hampshire, pp. 196, 197.
438 See ante, v. 210, note.
439 To these might be added others with whom he was collaterally allied, as, for instance, John Singleton Copley, who lived on terms of intimacy with the Bromfield family. See Mr. Denison R. Slade’s paper on Henry Pelham, ante, v. 193–211.
440 See ante, v. 202.
441 New England Magazine for March, 1890, New Series, ii. 3–20.
442 This paper has not been printed. It was entitled A Boston Merchant of 1791. See ante, v. 210, note.
443 Henry Bromfield Rogers’s Family Record.
444 In the old deeds, as recorded, the name is spelled Molineaux.
445 Boston Gazette, No. 1019, of Monday, 24 October, 1774, where an obituary notice may be read. See also Suffolk Probate Files, No. 15,715; and Suffolk Deeds, clxxv. 67.
446 “Gleaner,” in Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, v. (Second edition) 120, 121.
447 See Drake’s Old Landmarks of Boston, p. 357.
448 On either side of the entrance gate, on Beacon Street, were curiously constructed semi-subterranean stables and coach-houses, the flat roof of which, tarred and gravelled, formed the first step in the series of terraces, and effectually concealed these buildings from the view of one looking from the house. The arched doorways of these stables form a conspicuous feature of what is said to be a fairly accurate picture of the Rogers house comprised in a view of the State House printed in blue upon sets of contemporaneous earthenware. Dr. Slade gave an elaborate description of the house in his paper, A Boston Merchant of 1791 (ante, p. 218, note). Dr. Slade’s paper was accompanied by a colored drawing of the exterior of the house, made by himself from memory, and by other drawings, plans, models, and portraits. The house is also described by Lord Lyndhurst, in a letter dated Boston, 21 January, 1796, printed in A Life of Lord Lyndhurst, by Sir Theodore Martin, p. 42.
449 Elizabeth Bromfield Slade was baptized at Brompton, in the parish of Kensington, near London, 13 September, 1821; married in Boston, Henry Schmidt, of Bremen, Germany, 12 August, 1841; and died in Wiesbaden, Germany, 10 March, 1880.
450 This house was the more westerly of the two houses which were finally built in Mr. Rogers’s garden, and fronted on Mount Vernon Street. The two houses are now joined, much enlarged, and styled the Commonwealth Building, No. 11 Mount Vernon Street. As there has been some uncertainty as to Dr. Slade’s actual birthplace, he himself not being sure in which of the three houses mentioned his birth took place, it has been thought desirable to insert the foregoing particulars, derived from a Family Record written by his uncle, the late Henry Bromfield Rogers, in 1827, a copy of which was lent to the writer by Mr. Denison R. Slade.
451 Mr. Slade left Boston on Monday, 25 April, 1827.
452 Suffolk Probate Files, Nos. 28, 523, 28, 524, 28, 525. The petition for guardianship was signed by Henry B. Rogers, also by Elizabeth Rogers, sole surviving grandparent, and by John Rogers, uncle, and Hannah Rogers, aunt, of the children.
453 Daniel Denison Slade, by Charles R. Eastman, Ph.D., Reprinted, with additions, from the New-England Historical and Genealogical Register for January, 1897, li. 9–18.
454 Twelve Days in the Saddle, p. 32.
455 See ante, v. 198 n., and 205 n.
456 Mr. Blanchard was succeeded in the occupancy of the Bromfield mansion by his wife’s brother, Henry Bromfield Pearson, whose residence it was when it was destroyed by fire, 3 August, 1855.
The Rev. Ira Henry Thomas Blanchard died 9 April, 1845, in Weymouth, where he was born 9 September, 1797. His wife, Margaret Bromfield (Pearson) Blanchard, to whom he was married 30 May, 1825, survived until 29 November, 1876. By her will she gave a generous portion of her estate to found a school, to be located on the site of her grandfather’s homestead, as a monument to him. Among the Trustees appointed by Mrs. Blanchard to manage the school was her kinsman, Daniel Denison Slade. In 1887, his son, Denison Rogers Slade, was chosen a Trustee, to fill a vacancy in the Board. The Bromfield Schoolhouse, a view of which is in the History of Harvard, was erected in 1877–78. (Nourse’s History of the Town of Harvard, pp. 231, 232, 379–383; and ante, v. 198 n., 202 n., and 203 n.).
457 Slade refers to this in a memorandum quoted by Dr. Eastman, in his Memoir, p. 5.
458 The gaining of this medal may have first kindled the desire for similar distinctions which, later, seemed to have become almost a passion with him. The medal, with the original blue ribbon attached to it, was carefully preserved through life by Dr. Slade, as well as files of Monthly Reports of the Latin School.
459 These prizes are awarded “pro insigni in studiis diligentia.”
460 We can imagine the suppressed glee with which he must have treated this unsavory subject.
461 Some years ago, when there was much discussion as to the modes of celebrating Class Day formerly in vogue, Slade’s Diary was vainly appealed to for a description of the “exercises around the Tree,” as practised in 1844. All he says on the subject is: “Our dance around the tree was much admired.”
462 My Garden Acquaintance (in My Study Windows, Boston, 1871), p. 2.
463 Charles Henry Boylston Snow.
464 Henry Augustin Johnson.
465 This was at the house of his uncle and guardian, Henry Bromfield Rogers, in Joy Street, Boston, which, after the death of his grandmother Rogers, in 1833, had become his home.
During his residence in Cambridge as an undergraduate, Slade roomed in his Freshman year at Mrs. Mary Gurney’s. Her three-story frame house is still (1899) standing, and is now numbered 11 in Appian Way, — on the northwesterly side, midway between Garden and Brattle Streets. In his Sophomore year, he roomed at Mr. John Sweetman’s, whose house is now (1899) No. 28 in Dunster Street, on the north-easterly corner of South Street; and in his Junior and Senior years in Hollis, 26.
466 The Class of 1844, Harvard College, Fifty Years After Graduation, Cambridge, 1896.
467 Keene, New Hampshire, was then the residence of his classmates George Silsbee Hale and Horatio J. Perry, and was often visited by others of the Class. Cf. ante., i. 320.
468 In Paige’s History of Cambridge (p. 413) is an account of the “Men of Cambridge who fell in defence of the Liberty of the People, April 19, 1775,” one paragraph of which is of interest in this connection: —
“Moses Richardson, born probably about 1725, was a carpenter, and resided in the house which still [1877] stands at the north-easterly angle of Holmes Place, and which was afterwards the home of Mr. Royal Morse for about three-quarters of a century.” [The site is now (1899) covered by Austin Hall. The house is seen in the Plan of Cambridge about 1750, which faces page 212. It is the largest and most easterly of the row of four houses facing south upon the Common.]
In a foot-note Dr. Paige refers to —
“the late Mr. Royal Morse, born in 1779, whose memory of events which occurred during his life was remarkably comprehensive and accurate, and whose traditional lore was almost equivalent to authentic history.”
Lowell, too, preserves interesting recollections of Mr. Morse in his Fireside Travels (edition of 1864, pp. 34–36), — in the chapter on Cambridge Thirty Years Ago: —
“Or shall the two town-constables be forgotten, in whom the law stood worthily and amply embodied, fit, either of them, to fill the uniform of an English beadle? Grim and silent as Ninevite statues, they stood on each side of the meeting-house door at Commencement, propped by long staves of blue and red, on which the Indian with bow and arrow, and the mailed arm with the sword, hinted at the invisible sovereignty of the state ready to reinforce them, as —
‘For Achilles’ portrait stood a spear
Grasped in an armed hand.’
Stalwart and rubicund men they were, second only, if second, to S., [Francis Sales, Instructor in Spanish and French at Harvard, 1816–1854,] champions of the county, and not incapable of genial unbendings when the fasces were laid aside. One of them still survives in octogenarian vigor, the Herodotus of village and college legend, and may it be long ere he depart, to carry with him the pattern of a courtesy, now, alas! old-fashioned, but which might profitably make part of the instruction of our youth among the other humanities! Long may R[oyal] M[orse] be spared to us, so genial, so courtly, the last man among us who will ever know how to lift a hat with the nice graduation of social distinction! Something of a Jeremiah now, he bewails the decline of our manners . . . . ‘Why, sir, I can remember when more respect was paid to Governor Hancock’s lackey at Commencement than the Governor and all his suite get now.’ M. is one of those invaluable men who remember your grandfather, and value you accordingly.”
Mr. Morse was an auctioneer, the son of Royal and Katherine Morse (born in England and at Cambridge, Massachusetts, respectively) and a native of Cambridge, where he died, 31 January, 1872, at the advanced age of ninety-three years, seven months, and twenty-five days (Cambridge City Records). The Records of the First Church tell us that he was baptized — “Royal, of Katherine Morse” — 12 January, 1782, and that his mother was admitted to full communion the same day (pp. 123, 125). Obituary notices of Mr. Morse appeared, 10 February, 1872, in the columns of The Cambridge Chronicle and The Cambridge Press.
469 Mary Ellen Slade, died 24 February, 1845, in her nineteenth year.
470 It has not been ascertained where or when this article was published. No copy of it has been found.
471 See Publications of this Society, i. 270 and note.
472 Graduates’ Hall, now known as College House, is the long brick building owned by the College, still standing on the westerly side of Harvard Square. It extends northerly from the passageway between it and Lyceum Hall to the point where the street turns, north-westerly, at an obtuse angle, and thence to Church Street. The banking-rooms of the Charles River National Bank are on the lower floor of the southern end of the building, in one of the rooms of which the Α Δ Φ was established in 1846. The name was changed from Graduates’ Hall to College House about, or soon after, the time that the building was extended north-westerly to Church Street, – about 1860.
Old College House – more familiarly called “The Old Den,” – a large wooden building, set back from the street, stood on that part of the lot which lies between the obtuse angle, just mentioned, and Church Street.
473 See Dr. Eastman’s Memoir, p. 10.
474 For October, 1892, xii. 518–524.
475 Dr. Slade preserved among his papers a certificate from the Master of the House (whose name is illegible) testifying that Mr. Daniel Slade of Boston was a resident pupil in the Lying-in Hospital, Rutland Square, Dublin, from 6 August to 26 September, 1851; also a letter, dated 19 February, 1851, from the Director of the École Nationale Vétérinaire d’Alfort, authorizing “M. Slade à suivre pendant deux mois les cours de physique et d’anatomie,” at that institution.
476 These friendships, like all those formed by Dr. Slade, were life long. Dr. Hodges, from his death-bed, sent the message, “Give my love to Slade,” while Slade, who was dying at the time, urged that Dr. Hodges be sent for. Dr. Green says of him: “My regard for Slade was more than friendship, — it was love.”
477 These lectures were printed at the time in the Boston Traveller. They obtained for Dr. Slade a reward from the Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture. (Letter of Benjamin Guild, Secretary, 6 June, 1853.)
478 These lectures were printed in the Massachusetts Ploughman.
479 Volume i., number 4.
480 The Boston Veterinary Institute, of which Dr. Slade appears to have been the first President, was incorporated by the Legislature of Massachusetts 28 April, 1855 (Massachusetts Special Laws (chap. 251), x. 362), and seems to have been the earliest institution of the kind in the State. The persons named in the Act were George H. Dadd, David Roberts, Jonas Chapman, and John P. Jewett.
The American Veterinary Journal was edited by George H. Dadd, Veterinary Surgeon, and published by S. N. Thompson & Co., 97 Union Street, Boston. The writer has seen only two numbers of the Journal, — those for January, 1856, and December, 1857. This last contains an Introductory Lecture by George H. Dadd, Dean of the Faculty, as part of “the exercises commemorative of the third session of the Institute,” and also Remarks of Col. Moses Newell, President of the Institute, from which it appears that Dr. Slade did not long hold that office
481 Letter of Captain Charles E. Stevens, 7 March, 1898.
482 One of these, the Fiske Fund Prize Essay of 1860, has passed through three editions, the last being issued in 1896, — thirty-six years after obtaining the prize. Its title is, Diphtheria: its Nature and Treatment.
483 Henry Bromfield Slade, died 23 March, 1879. Dr. Slade’s eldest son, Denison Rogers Slade, has recently been elected a Resident Member of this Society.
484 Later, this dream was more literally realized by the purchase of an “abandoned farm” near Lake Winnipiseogee, in New Hampshire, of which Dr. Slade wrote an account for The Nation of 4 September, 1890.
485 See Publications of this Society, iii. 203.
486 Documents of the United States Sanitary Commission, ii. Document No. 74. (New York, 1866.)
487 Ibid. Document No. 79, Appendix B.
488 Ibid. Document No. 79.
489 Ibid.
490 Ibid.
491 The United States Sanitary Commission Publications, F., Report, etc., 8°, Boston, 1861. See also History of the United States Sanitary Commission, Appendix No. 7, by Charles J. Stillé, Philadelphia, 1866.
492 The Class of 1856 issued their first Report in 1860, and a second in 1861. The Class of 1858 also published a Report in 1861. The Classes of 1861 and 1864 published Reports in the last named year almost simultaneously with Slade’s. (Letter of W. G. Brown, Deputy Keeper of the Archives of Harvard College, 23 February, 1897.)
493 This note is printed in full in Dr. Eastman’s Memoir of Dr. Slade, p. 11. The absence of the signature of the Class Secretary is accounted for by the fact that he was then travelling in Europe.
494 Report upon the Bussey Institution for the year 1877–78.
495 See Introduction to his Twelve Days in the Saddle.
496 Letter of W. G. Brown, Deputy Keeper of the Harvard College Archives, 15 April, 1898.
497 Only fourteen of Slade’s literary productions-were published separately, as books or pamphlets (including two not in Dr. Eastman’s list); ten are reports of lectures, or courses of lectures, addresses and speeches; twenty were published in medical journals, and twenty-six in various magazines and newspapers. It is not certain that all his printed works have been enumerated.
498 This pamphlet is not included in Dr. Eastman’s list,
499 The American Monthly for April, 1865, lxv. 308–312.
500 Letter of Ransom Noble Porter, M.D., to Slade, 29 September, 1863.
501 Ibid.
502 For an account of these transactions and the further history of the Door, see a paper by the Rev. Peter Voorhees Finch, read before the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, and published, at their request, in The Greenfield Gazette and Courier, Vol. lix., No. 7.
503 See The Greenfield Gazette and Courier, of 2 March, 1868.
504 Dr. Slade’s purchase and return of the Indian Door are mentioned in Parkman’s Half Century of Conflict, i. 65, note. A representation of the Door, as it now appears in the Hall, accompanies a paper on Old Deerfield, by Mary E. Allen, in the New England Magazine for September, 1892, New Series, vii. 33–46.
505 See Publications of this Society, i. 45.
506 See The Greenfield Gazette and Courier of 18 August, 1884.
507 For October, 1888, xx. 281–285.
508 Forts Massachusetts and Shirley, together with Fort Pelham, were the three “Province Forts” built in 1744 by order of the General Court for the special protection of Slade’s beloved Deerfield valley. These forts stood within the present towns of Williamstown, Heath, and Rowe, respectively. See Narrative and Critical History of America, v. 187.
509 The title of this little tract of forty pages, first printed in Boston, in 1748, is the same as that given by the Rev. John Williams (H. C. 1683), to his Narrative, first published in Boston, in 1707, of the destruction of Deerfield, 29 February, 1704–5, and of his experiences during his captivity in Canada. See Narrative and Critical History of America, v. 185, 187 and notes; and Sibley’s Harvard Graduates, iii. 249–262.
510 Acts of 1891, chapter 352.
511 Denison Memorial, Ipswich, Massachusetts, September 20, 1882. Two hundredth Anniversary of the Death of Major General Daniel Denison. Biographical Sketch by Prof. D. D. Slade. Historical Sketch, by Augustine Caldwell. Printed by the Request of the Denison Memorial Committee. Dr. Slade’s Address fills twenty-five of the fifty-two pages of the pamphlet.
512 The Celebration of the Two Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the Incorporation of the Town of Ipswich, Massachusetts, August 16, 1884. Boston, Little, Brown, and Company, 1884.
513 New England Historical and Genealogical Register, xlvi. 127–132.
514 Publications, i. 116–132.
515 Volumes xxvi. and xxvii.
516 See ante, p. 217; and v. 202.
517 See Reports in newspapers of the time. Dr. Slade joined the Bostonian Society in 1894, but had ceased to be a member at the time of his death. See ante, pp. 218, 219, and notes; and v. 210 n.
518 Volume xlvi. 15–20.
519 Publications, i. 269, 270.
520 Volume iii., number 6.
521 See ante, p. 233, and note.
522 The Grave was that of Mary Goodnow of Marlborough, killed by Indians in 1717. The same story is told in his Twelve Days in the Saddle, pp. 29–31.
523 The American Academy of Arts and Sciences having removed from the Boston Athenæum Building to that of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and its former Hall being required for the purposes of the Athenæum, this Society accepted the hospitality of the American Unitarian Association, proffered by its Treasurer and our associate, Mr. Francis H. Lincoln, in the Building of which the Meetings of the Society will in future be held.
524 Mr. Anthony was a native of New Bedford, where he was born, 14 October, 1797, where he always resided, and where he died, 7 July, 1840 (Letter of his son, Rowland C. Anthony, of New York City).
525 Capt. Phinehas Stevens, the son of Joseph and Prudence (Rice) Stevens, was born at Sudbury, Massachusetts, 20 February, 1706–7 (Sudbury Town Records), and was baptized 27 April following (Sudbury Church Records). He married at Rutland, Massachusetts, 18 January, 1733–34, his cousin, Elizabeth Stevens, youngest daughter of Simon and Mary (Wilder) Stevens (Rutland Town Records). His christian name is often spelled Phineas, and in two documents he so spelled it himself (Massachusetts Archives, lxxiv. 51, xciii. 102); but in other documents he signed himself Phinehas Stevens (Ibid. lxxiii. 57, 210, 644, 690, xcii. 30, 85, 105, 201, xciii. 48, 74, 84), and his name is so spelled in the Records of his birth and baptism. For notices of Stevens, see Appletons’ Cyclopædia of American Biography, v. 675, 676; New York Colonial Documents, x. 97 note; J. Farmer and J. B. Moore, Collections, i. 184; A. S. Hudson, Annals of Sudbury, Wayland, and Maynard, p. 22; H. H. Saunderson, History of Charlestown, N. H., pp. 556–568; C. Stark, Memoir and Official Correspondence of Gen. John Stark, pp. 372–385; Collections of the New Hampshire Historical Society, v. 199–205; New Hampshire Provincial Papers, vi. 22, 312; and Year Book, Massachusetts Society of Colonial Wars, 1901, p. 84.
In a paper read before this Society in March, 1896 (ante, iii. 220), Mr. Noble remarked that Stevens “is said” to have been presented with a sword by Sir Charles Knowles. The matter seems to be placed beyond a doubt by these extracts: —
“Friday last his Excellency Governour Knowles arrived here in the Comet Bomb from Louisburg” (Boston Gazette of Tuesday, 14 April, 1747, No. 1309, p. 3/1).
“We hear that the Honourable Commodore Knowles is so well pleased with the gallant Behaviour of Capt. Stevens, that he has given Orders to purchase the best silver-hilted Sword that can be made in Town, to be presented to that Gentleman, as an Acknowledgement for his Bravery and good Conduct” (Boston Evening-Post of Monday, 27 April, 1747, No. 611, p. 4/2).
“Last Week a very beautiful Silver-hilted Sword was purchased by Order, and at the Expence, of the Honourable Commodore Knowles, to be presented to Capt. Phinehas Stevens, for his Bravery in the Defence of the Fort at N. 4. as was mention’d in our last” (Boston Post-Boy of Monday, 4 May, 1747, No. 650, p. 2/1).
Stark and Saunderson both give the sixth of April, 1756, as the date of the death of Captain Stevens; but that this date is erroneous, is shown by the following extracts: —
“We have an Account of the Death of Capt. Phinehas Stevens, who, in the Year 1747 bravely defended the Fort at No 4 on the Frontiers of this Province, and whom Admiral Knowles presented with a handsome Sword for his gallant Behaviour” (Boston News-Letter of Thursday, 26 February, 1756, No. 2799, p. 2/1). The same notice appeared in the Boston Gazette of Monday, 1 March, 1756, No. 48.
“We have also the melancholy News of the Death of the brave Capt. Phinehas Stevens, Lieut. Alexander, and Ensign Judd, all of the New-England Troops in Nova Scotia” (Boston Evening-Post of Monday, 1 March, 1756, No. 1070, p. 2/2, 3).
The true date is doubtless the sixth of February, as appears from the gravestone of Capt. Stevens’s wife in the cemetery at Charlestown, New Hampshire, which bears this inscription: —
Capt Phinehas Stevens
died at Chignecto, N. S. Feby 6, 1756, who had been for many years in the Wars, and was Commandant of the Garrison in this town, and at different periods had many combats with the French and Indians.
Elizabeth, his wife, died Feby 15, 1778.
526 The name is spelled “Debelina” in all the versions of this letter of 7 April, 1747, printed in the contemporary Boston newspapers, as specified in the note which follows. So far as I am aware, attention has not before been called to this fact. Belknap, writing in 1791, refers to the letter printed in the Boston Evening-Post of 27 April, 1747, but spells the name “M. Debelinè” (History of New-Hampshire, ii. 248); by President Dwight, the Frenchman is spoken of as “Monsieur Debelinì” (Travels; in New-England and New-York, ii. 102, 103); but, as stated by Parkman, the usual form of the name is “Debeline.”
When Mr. Noble’s paper, mentioned in the preceding note, was read, the real name of the French commander had not been discovered. Mr. Sulte’s letter containing this information was received as the third volume of the Society’s Publications, in which Mr. Noble’s paper appeared, was going to press, and enabled the Committee of Publication to insert the full name of de Niverville in the plates and also in the index.
527 Boston Evening-Post of Monday, 27 April, 1747, No. 611, p. 4, where the letter is headed: “The following is a Letter from Capt. Phinehas Stevens, Commander of the Fort at No. 4. about 40 Miles above Northfield, dated April 7th 1747.” The letter is also printed in the Boston Post-Boy of Monday, 27 April, 1747, No. 649, p. 2; in the Boston Gazette of Tuesday, 28 April, 1747, No. 1311, p. 2; and in the Boston News-Letter of Thursday, 30 April, 1747, No. 2350, p. 2. To whom the letter was addressed is not stated in the contemporary newspapers. Saunderson and Stark, who print the letter, say that it was addressed to Gov. Shirley (History of Charlestown, p. 35; Memoir and Official Correspondence of Gen. John Stark, p. 380); while a very similar letter, printed in the Collections of the New Hampshire Historical Society, iv. 109–113, is said to have been addressed to Col. W. Williams. The original letter would of course settle the point, but I do not know where the original is, a search in the Massachusetts Archives having failed to disclose it there. For the reference to the News-Letter, no copy of which is to be found in the Boston or Cambridge libraries, I am indebted to Mr. Edmund M. Barton, Librarian of the American Antiquarian Society.
528 A Half-Century of Conflict, ii. 238, 239. The record referred to by Parkman is printed in French in Collection de Manuscrits contenant Lettres, Mémoires, et autres Documents historiques relatifs à la Nouvelle-France, iii. 272–313, 326–369; and in English in New York Colonial Documents, x. 89–132.
529 New York Colonial Documents, x. 32, 42, 96, 97.
530 The correspondence with Sir John G. Bourinot and Mr. Sulte was conducted by Mr. Edes; but, owing to stress of work, Mr. Edes was unable to prepare a communication at this time and asked me to do so. In a subsequent letter, Mr. Sulte gave some additional details which have been incorporated in the text.
531 Pierre Boucher bought of Jacques Leneuf de la Poterie in 1660 a fief to which he gave the name of Niverville after a domain in Normandy near the place where Boucher was born. Fief Niverville, which had been purchased in 1648 by Leneuf from François de Champflour and had been obtained by the latter from the Hundred Partners about 1642, is now a part of Three Rivers. Boucher published in 1664 a book on New France, for a reprint of which see a paper by Mr. Sulte, entitled Pierre Boucher et son Livre, in the Proceedings and Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada, Second Series, ii. 99–168.
532 See ante, iii. 378.
533 Edits et Ordonnances, ii. 518, 519, 529, 551.
534 Daniel, Grandes Familles, p. 421.
535 Daniel, Aperçu, pp. 51, 59; Edits et Ordonnances, ii. 551
536 New York Colonial Documents, x. 32, 42.
537 Ibid. x. 97.
538 Ibid. x. 158, 177.
539 Ibid. x. 580.
540 Ibid. x. 607.
541 Tanguay gives her name as Marie Joseph Chatelin.
542 New York Colonial Documents, x. 994, 996, 1018.
543 See ante, iii. 378.
544 In preparing this paper, use has been made of the Dictionnaire Généalogique des Familles Canadiennes, par l’Abbé Cyprien Tanguay.
545 Records of the Superiour Court of Judicature, 1772, xxxi. 180.
546 Suffolk Court Files, vol. mxvii., group number 148,037 (Middlesex).
547 Part of Townsend was included in the new town of Ashby, 6 March, 1767; and part of Lunenburg was established as Fitchburg, 3 February, 1764.
548 See Mr. Noble’s sketch of Oliver, ante, v. 71–74.
549 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxi. 155. Lieutenant-Governor William Tailer was the son of William Tailer, “a great Boston Merchant,” and his wife Rebecca, the sister of William Stoughton (Memorial History of Boston, ii. 538). He married (1) 2 March, 1698–99, Sarah Byfield, youngest surviving daughter of the Honorable Nathaniel Byfield (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, ix. 251; Sewall’s Diary, i. 493; Suffolk Deeds, xxi. 148; and cf. Suffolk Probate Files, No. 6449; and New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1864, xviii. 288, 289), and (2) 20 March, 1711–12, Abigail, daughter of Benjamin Gillam, the widow of Thomas Dudley, son of Paul Dudley and grandson of Governor Thomas Dudley (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, ix. 162, xxviii. 9, 37; New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1856, x. 130, 131, and for 1865, xix. 254). As early as 1666, his father lived in the house at the southerly corner of Elm and Hanover Streets (Suffolk Deeds, xxi. 144), where he died, by his own hand, 12 July, 1682 (New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1853, vii. 56), and where his widow entertained Andros, when he came to Boston, in 1686, where also, for a time at least, Andros took up his abode (Sewall’s Diary, i. 162 n., 202 n.). It was afterward sold to Edward Lyde, in 1701–2 (Suffolk Deeds, xxi. 148) He had had some share in ecclesiastical affairs, and served with Joseph Dudley as vestryman, and with Savill Simpson and Thomas Newton as Warden of the infant Episcopal Church, — King’s Chapel (Quincy’s History of Harvard University, 1860, i. 359; Foote’s Annuals of King’s Chapel, i. 184 and note, 395, ii. 603, 605). He also had something to do with the affairs of the College, for when the Reverend Timothy Cutler claimed the right to sit as an Overseer, and the Board, by its vote, denied it, — as an undue Stretching of the term “teaching Elders,” “the Honorable William Tailer entered his dissent,” 15th June, 1727. The General Court, memorialized, sustained that decision in the following December, and subsequently, by a like decision, closed the question, in June, 1730 (Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. 368–376). As his title of Colonel indicates, he was not without military experience. In the fleet which sailed from Boston for the reduction of Port Royal, that “nest of hornets” which was taken in October, 1710, he commanded one of the two Massachusetts regiments which made a part of the force (Memorial History of Boston, ii. 104, 105).
550 In his Massachusetts Civil List, Whitmore says that Belcher “arrived at Boston August 10, 1730” (p. 43). This conveys a slightly incorrect impression. From a long account, filling more than a column, of the exercises which took place on that occasion, the following extract is taken: —
“On Saturday last [8 August], about the middle of the Afternoon we were notified by a Signal from Castle William, of the near Approach of His Excellency Governour BELCHER, in His Majesties Ship of War, appointed for his Transportation; which could reach no further that Night, than the Mouth or Entrance of the Narrows. Here His Excellency was waited upon, as soon as possible, by an honourable Committee from the General Assembly, with a Number of other Gentlemen, who were all received and entertained with that Nobleness and Affability which is natural to our Governour. The usual Services of the Sabbath were attended by His Excellency at the Castle, with decent & religious Solemnity” (New-England Weekly Journal of Tuesday, 11 August, 1730, No. 177, p. 1/2).
On landing, 10 August, Belcher went to the Council Chamber, where his Commission was opened, exhibited, and published, after which an entertainment was given at the Bunch of Grapes.
The following extracts fix the dates of the arrival of Lieutenant-Governor Tailer’s Commission and of his meeting the General Court: —
I.
Thursday last being the Anniversary of His Majesty’s happy Accession to the Throne; the same was observed here with the usual publick Demonstrations of Joy . . . .
The Honourable WILLIAM TAILER Esq; having received from His Majesty King GEORGE II. a Commisssion appointing Him to be His Majesty’s Lieutenant-Governour of the Province of the Massachusetts-Bay &c. in the room of the Honourable WILLIAM DUMMER Esq; our late Lieut. Governour & Commander in Chief; on the same Day in the Afternoon the Gentlemen that were and had been His Majesty’s Council, the Justices &c. waited on His Honour at the House of Col. Byfield, and conducted him to the Council Chamber, where the said Royal Commission was open’d and read, when His Honour took upon him the Affairs of the Government, and had the proper Oaths administered to him (New-England Weekly Journal of Monday, 15 June, 1730, No. 169, p. 2/1).
II.
The SPEECH of the Honourable WILLIAM TAILER Esq; Lieutenant GOVERNOUR and Commander in Chief in and over His Majesties Province of the Massachusetts-Bay in New-England: To the General Assembly of the said Province, Met at Cambridge, June 30th. 1730.
Gentlemen,
HAVING since your last Meeting had the honour to receive His Majesty’s Commission for Lieutenant Governour of this Province, which was forwarded to Me by His Excellency Jonathan Belcher Esq; lately Appointed our Captain General and Commander in Chief; I am now to acquaint you, That I have caused the said Commission to be Published in the usual Form, and in Pursuance thereof have taken upon Me the Administration of the Government, which occasions My Meeting you at this time . . . (Ibid. of Monday, 13 July, 1730, No. 173, p. 2/1).
551 Two events in this earlier period connect Tailer in a peculiarly interesting way with the history of Boston, however slight his share in them, one running into an indefinite future, the other having to do with its Provincial splendors and the legends and traditions of its past. The story of Boston Light is told in a Note on pp. 278–281, post. The other incident in Tailer’s official life concerns the old Province House, established then as the residence of the Royal Governors and probably having as its first official occupant Governor Samuel Shute: —
“The Committee [of the Province Legislature] appointed to consider of a suitable place for the reception & entertainment of Col. Burges upon his arrival to this Government, Reported that inasmuch as there is no suitable house to be let, and the Mansion House, land & garden &c of Peter Sargeant, Esq., deceased is now upon Sale: The Committee are of opinion that it would be for the interest and benefit of this Province to purchase the same for their use and improvement” (Shurtleff’s Topographical and Historical Description of Boston, p. 596).
After this Report, made on the third of June, 1715, an Order was passed by the House —
“That Mr. Speaker, the Representatives of the Town of Boston, and Col. Thaxter, be committee to provide a suitable Place for His Excellency’s present rec̄ption, and entertainment when he shall arrive, and to invite him thereto; and compliment His Excellency in the name of this House upon his safe arrival” (Ibid. pp. 596, 597).
This action was approved, £2300 appropriated on the seventeenth of December, the purchase made, and the deeds were passed, on the eleventh and twelfth of April, 1716, to Jeremiah Allen, Treasurer of the Province, Jeremiah Dummer, Treasurer of the County of Suffolk, and Joseph Prout, Treasurer of the Town of Boston (Suffolk Deeds, xxxii. 133, two instruments). The subsequent history of the historic Mansion is also given by Shurtleff. See also Hawthorne’s Legends of the Province House, in Twice Told Tales.
552 Quincy gives a most interesting and vivid account of the religious and political situation at this time, and of the condition of the College (History of Harvard University, i. chap, xvi–xviii).
553 Diary, iii. 340, 341 and note.
554 History of Harvard University, i. p. 330. See Peirce’s History of Harvard University, p. 141.
555 Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. pp. 330, 331. See also Sparks’s American Biography (First Series), vi. 327.
556 Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. 331, 332.
557 The paper is printed in full in Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. appendix lx, pp. 558–560. See also Ibid. i. 340, 341.
558 Milton Town Records. He was a son of Captain Samuel Wadsworth, who lost his life in Sudbury Fight (Bodge’s Soldiers in King Philip’s War, 1896, pp. 218, 219).
559 Memorial History of Boston, ii. 197.
560 Diary, i. 432.
561 Paige’s History of Cambridge, p. 490; Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxviii. 350. The office of Steward of the College was held by William Bordman, the emigrant, for several years ending in 1668; by his two sons, Andrew (1682–1687) and Aaron (1687–1703); by his grandson, Andrew (1703–1747); and by his great-grandson, Andrew (1747–1750). See Paige’s History of Cambridge, pp. 490, 491.
562 Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. 339.
563 Ibid. i. 339, 340.
564 Ibid. i. 381.
565 Ibid. i. 382.
566 Memorial History of Boston, ii. 423.
567 History of Harvard University, i. 404
568 Ibid. i. 386; and Wadsworth’s Diary, pp. 45, 63.
569 Ibid. i. 386.
570 Ibid. i. 386.
571 Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. 387.
572 Ibid. i. p. 387; and Wadsworth’s Diary, p. 63.
573 Ibid. i. pp. 387, 388; and Wadsworth’s Diary, p. 63.
574 Ibid. i. 396.
575 Ibid. i. 396.
576 The New-England Weekly Journal of Monday, 29 June, 1730 (No. 171, p. 2/1), contains the following paragraph: —
BOSTON.
Wednesday last the 24th Currant, was the Annual COMMENCEMENT at Cambridge for this Year, (it being the Fourth of the more private Commencements,) when the following Young Gentlemen, had their Degrees given them, after they had held their publick Disputations in the Church of that Town, viz . . . . .
[Then follow the names of the “Batchelors in Arts” and of the “Masters in Arts.”]
577 Massachusetts Colony Records, ii. 30.
578 See ante, p. 273, note.
579 Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. 441, — citing Wadsworth’s Diary, p. 27.
580 See Quincy’s History of Harvard University, i. 439; and Neal’s History of New England (1747), i. 203 et seq.
581 Massachusetts Colony Records, i. 264.
582 Massachusetts Colony Laws (editionof 1672), pp. 37, 38.
583 Massachusetts Colony Records, iv. (Part I.) p. 20. Cf. Ibid. iii. 202.
584 Ibid. iv. (Part II.) p. 532.
585 Massachusetts Colony Laws (edition of 1672), p. 207.
586 Massachusetts Colony Records, v. 372.
587 Massachusetts Colony Laws (edition of 1672, supplement), p. 294.
588 Ibid, p. 158. The Act was passed by the General Court at its session held at Boston, 19 October, 1652 (Massachusetts Colony Records, iv., Part I., pp. 101, 102).
589 1681
In Answer to the petition of mr Henry Jenkins humbly desiring the favor of this Court that his Appeale from ye Commissioners Court for wch he hath entred into security for the next Court of Assistants being a strainger & ready to Goe out of ye Country may be heard at this Court This peticon was Granted & fryday next Appointed for the hearing of the Case he presently giving in his reasons of Appeale to ye Commissionrs or their clarke: ye sajd mr Henry Jenkins desired a Jury & entring his Appeale after his peticon the Commissioners Judgment Reason of Appeale & other euidences in the Case were read Comitted to the Jury & are on file the Jury brought in a speciall virdict vizt In ye Case of mr Henry Jenkins wee find him Guilty of saying that he was as Good a man as mr Stoddard & saying to the Constable A pox take your tricks = And if the Constables affirmation on the oath of a Constable be a legall euidenc to convict a man in such a Case then wee find the sajd mr Jenkins Guilty of saying that the Barber was wayting vpon a better man then the Commissioners & saying to the Constable A pox take yow otherwise not guilty = The Court on Consideration of this virdict Judg meet to Confirme the Judgment of the Comissioners (Records of the Court of Assistants, 1673–1692, original p. 140)
Mr Jenkins Case
Commissioners Judgt Confirmd =
590 Cheerful Yesterdays, by Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 1898, p. 139.
591 The Christian Register of 21 April, 1898, lxxvii. 429.
592 A file of very interesting letters from Dr. Martineau to Dr. Allen remains to show how close this friendship was. These letters were communicated by our associate Mr. Henry H. Edes to the Society at its Stated Meeting in March, 1900, and will appear with the published Transactions of that meeting.
593 Joseph Henry Allen in The New World for June, 1898, vii. 300.
594 These documents were recently bought in London by the Trustees of The Public Library of the City of Boston
595 William Bollan practised law in Boston for several years before his appointment as Advocate General by Shirley, to whose beautiful daughter Frances he was married, 8 September, 1743, at King’s Chapel, Boston, where a mural monument preserves her and her mother’s memory. He was appointed Collector of Customs for Salem and Marblehead, was sent by the Province on a successful mission to England to obtain indemnity for the cost of the expedition to Cape Breton, and subsequently was Agent of the Province in London. Displaced by the Assembly for political reasons, he was similiarly employed by the Council and rendered distinguished service. He favored conciliatory measures toward the Colonies. Bollan was the ablest of all the Agents of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay at the British Court. He is said to have died in 1776.
596 At the April Meeting, 1899. See ante, pp. 157–172.
597 The Regulations Lately Made concerning the Colonies, and the Taxes Imposed upon Them considered. London, 1765.
598 See post, pp. 314, 315 and note.
599 There are in New England several small brooks to which the name of Purgatory is given, either because they drain swamps or because they flow through or near rock chasms which are called Purgatories. There is, of course, no connection between these swamps or rock chasms and the Purgatory River of Colorado; and the Purgatories of New England do not come within the scope of this paper.
600 The printed word is “asserting,” — an obvious misprint.
601 Maj. Z. M. Pike, An Account of Expeditious to the Sources of the Mississippi, etc., 1810, p. 163.
602 Account of an Expedition from Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains, . . . under the command of Major Stephen H. Long, . . . compiled by Edwin James, Philadelphia, 1823, ii. 66, 76, and note.
603 But “Purgatory Cr.” is found in one of the “Maps and Plates,” published in 1822, which accompanied the work in question. It also appears as “Purgatory Cr.” In the General Atlas published by F. Lucas, Jr., 1823, No. 49; as “Purgatory Cr.” in S. Hall’s New General Atlas, 1830, No. 44; and as “Rio de las Animas or Purgatoire,” in the map by J. Gregg in his Commerce of the Prairies, 1844.
604 Journal of Jacob Fowler, edited by E. Coues, 1898, pp. 41, 148 (American Explorers Series, i). In a letter to the present writer, Dr. Coues aptly characterized Fowler as the “bronco speller.”
605 Lieut. W. H. Emory, 4, 5 August, 1846, Notes of a Military Reconnaissance, from Fort Leavenworth, in Missouri, to San Diego, in California, 1848, p. 17.
606 Lieut. J. W. Abert, 13, 14 September, 1846, in W. H. Emory’s Notes, etc., 1848, pp. 436, 437. On 14 January, 1847, Abert refers to the stream as “the ‘Rio de los Animas,’ or Purgatory” (Notes, etc., p. 523).
607 G. F. Ruxton, Adventures in Mexico and the Rocky Mountains, 1847, p. 291.
608 Capt. J. Pope, Report of Exploration of a Route for the Pacific Railroad, 1854, p. 16. (Pacific Railroad Reports, vol. ii., Part iv.)
609 W. A. Bell, New Tracks in North America, 1869, i. 80. No doubt “Pickel-Wire” is a misprint for “Picket-Wire.”
610 The Rocky Mountain Directory and Colorado Gazetteer, For 1871, p. 61.
611 G. Barringer, Étude sur l’Anglais parlé aux États-Unis (La Langue Américaine), in Actes de la Société Philologique, 1874, iii. 302. The author is of course mistaken in locating the Purgatory in New Mexico.
612 R. I. Dodge, The Plains of the Great West and their Inhabitants, 1877, p. 21.
613 J. D. Whitney, Names and Places: Studies in Geographical and Topographical Nomenclature, 1888, p. 161. In a note, Prof. Whitney quotes Col. Dodge, and refers to Emory and Abert as “the earliest scientific explorers of this region.” It is clear that Prof. Whitney had not made a study of the subject; for, as we have already seen, Emory and Abert had been preceded by Pike and Long.
614 H. Inman, The Old Santa Fé Trail: The Story of a Great Highway, 1897, p. 395. In a note Col. Inman adds: “‘River of Souls.’ The stream is also called Le Purgatoire, corrupted by the Americans into Picketwire.”
615 The Purgatory River is sometimes referred to as the Rio de las Animas Perdidas. Thus, Col. Inman, alluding to the top of Raton Peak, recently wrote: “Far below this magnificent vantage-ground lies the valley of the Rio Las Animas Perdidas” (The Old Santa Fé Trail, 1897, p. 486). Such a designation is wrong, and is due to confusion with the Animas River, the tributary of the San Juan mentioned at the beginning of this paper. In a letter to the present writer, the late Dr. Coues spoke of the confusion as one made by “blundering writers;” yet Dr. Coues himself twice fell into the trap, and on my pointing out the mistake, characteristically remarked that he was waiting “to get a chance to abuse himself in print about it.”
616 New Tracks in North America, 1869, i. 88, 89.
617 Our Wild Indians: Thirty-three Years’ Personal Experience among the Red Men of the Great West, 1882, pp. 229, 230. The following description of a bull-whacker is from the pen of John White, an English traveller: —
“The men were of the wildest Western type, either miners from the mountains or ‘bull-whackers’ from the plains. The profession of ‘bull-whacking’ has, in ante-railway days, been one of the foremost in the West. The bull-whacker is a teamster, who uses his waggon and team of oxen for bringing supplies westward from the Missouri, and otherwise carrying on the trade of the country. The number of prominent men in the Far West, who started in trans-Missourian life as bull-whackers, is said to be very great, and the gains of the profession, hitherto, to have been very large. The good bull-whacker must be fearless of Indians, and the cleaner he shoots his men, the better; he must be able to stand any hardship; he is generally of fine physique, with a vigorous rollicking, devil-me-care look about him, which makes him a handsome specimen of manhood,” etc. (Sketches from America, 1870, p. 259).
618 In 1859 a French Canadian settled at the mouth of Gray’s creek four miles below Trinidad; in 1860 settlers built cabins in the valley opposite Trinidad; and in 1862 several persons “staked off a number of lots, built cabins, and thus originated the nucleus” of Trinidad. (The Rocky Mountain Directory and Colorado Gazetteer, For 1871, pp. 397–398.) Florida was ceded by Spain to the United States in 1819.
619 J. F. Meline, Two Thousand Miles on Horseback: Santa Fé and Back, 1868, pp. 93–95.
620 So Dr. Coues wrote me. After my own investigations were completed, I applied to Dr. Coues in the hope of obtaining further information. In spite, however, of his immense knowledge in such matters, he was unable to furnish me with any facts not already known to me, except the reference to Escalante’s Diary. When Dr. Coues acknowledged himself baffled, others need not be ashamed of their ignorance.
621 “Dia 8, salimos del rio Pinos y Vega de San Cayetano, rumbo oesnoroeste, y á las cuatro leguas llegamos al rio Florida, que es mediano y menor que el de los Pinos; . . . Pasado el rio Florida, caminamos al oeste dos leguas y al oesnoroeste poco mas de otras dos; bajamos una cuesta pedrosa y no muy dilatada, llegamos al rio de las Animas, cerca de la punta occidental de la sierra de la Plata, en que tiene su origen . . . . Dia 9: salimos del rio de las Animas, . . . anduvimos por ella una legua al oeste, y declinamos al oeste cuarta al noroeste, y andadas tres leguas por un monte frondoso de buenos pastos, llegamos al rio de San Joaquin, por otro nombre de la Plata, el cual es pequeño” (Escalante’s Diario y Derrotero, 8, 9 August, 1776, in Documentos para la Historia de Mexico, second series, 1854, i. 388). My attention was called to this work by Dr. Coues; but I am indebted to our associate, Mr. A. P. C. Griffin, for kindly procuring me a copy of the entries for 8 and 9 August. Maps of Escalante’s route will be found in the Atlas accompanying the Exploration du Territoire de l’Orégon, des Californies et de la Mer Vermeille, exécutée pendant les Années 1840, 1841 et 1842, par M. Duflot de Mofras, Paris, 1844, No. 1; in P. Harry’s account, written in 1860, of Escalante’s Diary, in Captain J. H. Simpson’s Report of Explorations across the Great Basin of the Territory of Utah for a direct wagon-route from Camp Floyd to Genoa, in Carson Valley, in 1859 (published in 1876), p. 489; and in H. H. Bancroft’s History of the Pacific States of North America, xx. 342. There is nothing in Escalante’s Diary for those two days to indicate that the names Pinos, Florida, Las Animas and La Plata — all of which are retained to the present day — originated with himself; while he does distinctly say that in years past several expeditions started from New Mexico to exploit certain lodes of metal in the cañon of the Rio de la Plata.
622 Escalante’s name is Rio de las Animas. How “Perdidas” came to be added is a mystery which cannot be fathomed. Curiously enough, I cannot find the slightest allusion to the Animas River from the days of Escalante to those of Captain J. N. Macomb, who explored the stream in 1859. (See Professor J. S. Newberry’s Geological Report in Captain Macomb’s Report of the Exploring Expedition From Santa Fé, New Mexico, to the Junction of the Grand and Green Rivers of the Great Colorado of the West, 1876, pp. 76, 78, 79.)
623 “Purgatorio: Geog. Altura de la serranía de Turumiquire, en la sección Cumaná, Venezuela, á 1548 m. sobre el nivel del mar. Río de la sección Cumaná, Venezuela; naoe en la serranía de Paria y desagua en el golfo del mismo nombre” (Diccionario Enciclopedico Hispano-Americano de Literatura, Ciencias y Artes, 1895, xvi. 657).
624 The Century Atlas, 1897, No. 68.
625 So I am informed by a correspondent.
626 “PURGATORIO. — Frazione del com. di Capriata d’Orba, prov. di Alessandria. L’ ufficio postale è a Capriata d’Orba. PURGATORIO. — Frazione del com. di San Massimo, prov. di Molise . . . . PURGATORIO (Amine del). — Frazione del com. di Spoleto, prov. dell’ Umbria” (Dizionario Corografico dell’ Italia compilato per cura del Prof. Amato Amati, Milano, vi. 672). This work is undated, but was published about 1869.
627 Dorothy Quincy was baptized at the Church in Brattle Square, 17 May, 1747.
628 An interesting memorial of Madam Hancock’s interest in the First Church of Shirley remains in the large Bible, inscribed with her name, which she gave for the pulpit on the occasion of the opening for public worship of the new Meeting-House, on the twenty-fifth of November, 1773. See post, pp. 321–323.
629 The Records of the Church in Brattle Square, and the Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxx. 141, give the date of Madam Hancock’s marriage as 27 July, 1796.
630 Captain James Scott died 19 June, 1809, at the age of 63 (Columbian Centinel of Wednesday, 21 June, 1809, No. 2631, p. 2/4, which see). His will is in Suffolk Probate Files, No. 23,366.
631 Loring’s Hundred Boston Orators (1853), pp. 106, 107. Madam Scott’s will is in Suffolk Probate Files, No. 29,160.
The Columbian Centinel of Saturday, 20 February, 1830, No. 4786, p. 1/3, contains a long obituary notice of Madam Scott from which the following extract is taken: —
She was near to, and in sight of the battle ground, when the first blood flowed in Lexington . . . . Madam Hancock was justified in the opinion of her friends, when she gave her hand to a second husband, Capt. James Scott, whose amiable temper and worthy character, she had long and intimately known. With this excellent man, she enjoyed as much happiness as may well consist with the lot of humanity.
632 These dots are in the original from which nothing has been omitted in printing.
633 The reference is to the childless rich widow of the richer Thomas Hancock from each of whom Governor Hancock inherited a fortune. See Note on Lydia Hancock, post, pp. 321–323.
634 Katharine Quincy was baptized 3 June, 1733 (Records of the Church in Brattle Square). She died, unmarried, 9 June, 1804, at the age of 71, her funeral “proceeding,” on the eleventh, “from the house of James Scott, esq.” (Boston Gazette of Monday, 11 June, 1804, No. 798, p. 2/3).
635 Lydia (Henchman) Hancock.
636 Edmund Quincy, the son of Judge Edmund and Dorothy (Flynt) Quincy, was born 13 June, 1703 (Braintree Town Records, p. 682); married Elizabeth Wendell 15 April, 1725 (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxviii. 128); was a merchant in Boston; and a prominent member of the Church in Brattle Square, where his children were baptized. He died on Friday, 4 July, 1788, at the age of 85 (Massachusetts Centinel of Saturday, 5 July, 1788, ix. 129/3). His letter-book is in the Cabinet of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Two letters contained in it, addressed to his son-in-law John Hancock and to Madam Lydia Hancock, describing the evacuation of Boston, are printed in the Society’s Proceedings for April, 1858, iv. 27–41. A notice of Mr. Quincy is appended to the letters (pp. 41–44).
637 Hancock had been commissioned by Hutchinson Captain of the Independent Corps of Cadets in May, 1772. He was dismissed by Governor Gage 1 August, 1774, whereupon the company disbanded and returned their colors to the Governor.
638 Governor Thomas Hutchinson.
639 Lieutenant-Governor Andrew Oliver.
640 These were the famous letters which Dr. Franklin secured in England and sent over to Thomas Cushing, Speaker of the House, early in December, 1772. They were printed in Boston in the summer of 1773 and produced the greatest excitement and alarm throughout the Province. Cf. Hutchinson’s History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, iii. 394, 395 and notes; Diary and Letters of Thomas Hutchinson (London, 1883), i. 159 et seq.; and 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for February, 1878, xvi. 42–49
641 This lady may have been Mrs. Lydia Boyle whose death, at the age of 76, was announced in the Mercury and New England Palladium of Friday, 26 November, 1802, p. 3/1, without the date of her demise being mentioned. Her funeral, however, occurred, on the twenty-sixth, and proceeded from the house of her son, Col. John Boyle, bookseller and stationer, No. 18 Marlborough Street, Boston. See Suffolk Deeds, clxxxii. 168. Col. Boyle was twice married, and if the reference in the text was not to his mother it was, doubtless, to his first wife, Cœlia, daughter of Martin Gay the Loyalist (see ante, iii. 379–400), to whom he was married 12 March, 1772 (Records of the West Church, Boston). She died at Hingham, Massachusetts, 11 April, 1776 (New England Chronicle of Thursday, 25 April, 1776, No. 401, p. 3/2). See History of Hingham (1893), ii. 265. Col. Boyle married (2) Elizabeth Casneau, 20 June, 1778 (Records of the New North Church) and had by her several children who were baptized at the Church in Brattle Square, among them Dorothy Hancock Boyle, baptized 18 May, 1788. Col. Boyle died of apoplexy in Boston, 18 November, 1819 (Boston Town Records). The Columbian Centinel of Saturday, 20 November, 1819, No. 3716, p. 2/4 thus announces his death: —
In this town, John Boyle, Esq. aged 73. During the revolution he commanded a regiment and was aid-de-camp to Gov. Hancock.
642 The Nation, 7 September, 19 October, 23 and 30 November, 1899, lxix. 187, 296, 390, 409.
643 Publications, iii. 61, 62.
644 Reprinted from Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for March, 1883, xx. 122–157.
645 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for March, 1883, xx. 149–151.
646 Records of the Court of Assistants (1673–1092), ii. 139. The citations of these Records which occur in this communication are from the original manuscript.
647 Records of the Court of Assistants (1673–1692), ii. 139. In connection with Jack’s case are two bills of costs and expenses, which have one or two points of interest: —
I.
Joseph Hawley’s Bill of Charge As An Evidence In the Case Referring to Jack the Negro is as followeth:
|
Imp: To hire of An horse & shoeing: — |
00 – 15 – 00 |
|
To ferridg |
00 – 01 – 04 |
|
To time; 15 days out & home |
01 – 10 – 00 |
|
To horse Pasturing &c. |
|
|
charge for the horse on the Journey: |
00 – 06 – 00 |
|
02 – 12 – 04 |
This is Justly Due In money wch I Doubt not that yor Honrs will Alow or to be payd At Money price:
Sept. 10 1681:
Joseph Hawley
Allowed E[dward] R[awson] S[ecretary] in Country pay [Endorsed]
Hauley’s Costs
— (Suffolk Court Files, xxiv. 2020: 1)
II.
A Bill of
Charges due to Medad Pumry for time and expence About Jack Negro impr to make Irons to secure him at Northampton
|
And to conuey him to Springfield |
00 – 04 – 00 |
|
it my selfe one jorney to Springfield |
|
|
with Petter Henricks |
|
|
To ferig and horse pasture |
0 – 00 – 01 – 00 |
|
To 15 days out And home to giue in |
|
|
Testimony at the Court of Assistance |
|
|
To horse hire for the jorney |
0 – 0 – 15 – 00 |
|
To pasture for my horse here |
0 —— 06 – 00 |
|
To ferrige |
00 —— 01 – 04 |
|
03: – 02 — 4 |
Allowed E R S
in Country pay
[Endorsed]
Medad Pumry &
Hawley’s Costs.
– (Ibid. xxiv. 2020: 2).
648 Suffolk Court Files, xxiv. 2023.
649 Suffolk Court Files, ccxii. 26.559: 4, not dated.
650 Ibid, ccxii. 26.559: 3
651 Ibid, ccxii. 26.559: 2.
652 This blank is in the Record.
653 Records of the Court of Assistants, ii. 138.
654 Suffolk Court Files, ccxii. 26.559: 1.
655 Suffolk Court Files, ccxii. 26.559: 6.
656 Edward Rawson.
657 This was John Green of Cambridge who was appointed to office 3 June, 1681 (Massachusetts Colony Records, v. 322) as successor to Edward Mitchelson (see ante, iii. 454) whose daughter Ruth he had married. During the Usurpation, Green was superseded in office (1687) by Samuel Gookin, but was re-instated 15 August, 1689. He died 3 March, 1690–91. (See Paige’s History of Cambridge, pp. 567, 568, 610.)
658 Records of the Court of Assistants, ii. 139.
659 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for March, 1858, iii. 317–320.
660 Massachusetts Colony Records, i. 246.
661 Whitmore’s Biographical Sketch of the Laws of the Massachusetts Colony, lxii.
662 Records of the Court of Assistants (1673–1692), ii. 262.
663 Records of the Superiour Court of Judicature, under date of 25 April, 1693.
664 Gloucestershire Pleas, pl. 216.
665 Pollock and Maitland’s History of English Law, ii. 492.
666 This is very well summarized in Laws respecting Women, London, 1777: —
This benefit of clergy does not extend to women; for by an express act of parliament it is directed, that women convicted . . . . . ; and by a subsequent statute (3 & 4 W. & M. c. 9), a woman being convicted of an offence for which a man may have his clergy, shall suffer the same punishment that a man shall suffer that has the benefit of his clergy allowed; . . . . but the benefit of this Statute can be pleaded only once (4 & 5 W. & M. c. 24, s. 13). Such was the law until the beginning of the present century (pp. 342, 343). Upon the whole then it appears, that women cannot claim the benefit of their clergy, but the benefit of the statute, which is equivalent to it. Before the passing of which law, women were entitled to no mitigation of the punishment for felonious offences (p. 343).
667 The same authority says: —
The judgment against a woman for high treason is not the same as against a man traitor, . . . but she is to be drawn to the place of execution and there burnt. For the public exhibition of their bodies, and dismembering them, in the same manner as is practised to the men, would be a violation of that natural decency and delicacy inherent, and at all times to be cherished in the sex. And the humanity of the English Nation has authorized by a tacit consent, an almost general mitigation of such part of their judgments, as savours of torture and cruelty; a sledge or hurdle being allowed to such traitors as are condemned to be drawn; and there being very few instances (and those accidental and by negligence) of any person being embowelled or burnt, till previously deprived of sensation by strangling (p. 344).
668 Blackstone states that, “the punishment of petit treason in a man is, to be drawn and hanged, and in a woman to be drawn and burned” (Commentaries iv. 204). And he goes on to say that “the usual punishment for all sorts of treasons committed by those of the female sex” is death by burning. This continued till the statute 30 George III., which changed the penalty to hanging.
669 And if any perſon . . . . . ſhall . . . wittingly, and willingly, and felloniouſly, set on fire any Dwelling Houſe, . . . . the party or parties vehemently ſuſpected thereof, ſhall be apprehended by Warrant from one or more of the Magiſtrates, and committed to Priſon, there to remain without Baile, till the next Court of Aſſiſtants, who upon legal conviction by due proof, or confeſſionof the Crime, ſhall adjudge ſuch perſon or perſons to be put to death . . . . . [1652.] (Massachusetts Colony Laws, edition of 1672, p. 52).
670 Mr. Abner C. Goodell, in 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for March, 1883, xx. 149, 150.
671 John Duntou’s Letters from New-England (Prince Society’s Publications), p. 118.
672 Ibid. p. 121 and note.
673 Magnalia (1702), Book vi. p. 40. See also Sibley’s Harvard Graduates, iii. 69, 70, where may be read the full title of this discourse which was first printed, separately, in Boston in 1699.
674 Mather’s reference is to William Cheney (see ante, iii. 62) of Dorchester. He was son of William Cheney, the emigrant, of Roxbury and married Deborah (born 24, baptized 30 May, 1641), daughter of Deacon John Wiswall of Dorchester, who removed to Boston and became Ruling Elder of the First Church. Notwithstanding his good social connections, Cheney was neither a valuable nor respected member of society, as may be seen in Tilden’s History of Medfield, pp. 343, 344, where his seven legitimate children are enumerated — not nineteen or twenty as Mather’s fertile brain imagines — the last of whom, a posthumous child, lived less than three weeks (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxi. 16, 18, 30). The facts concerning the crime for which Cheney was hanged are set out in the Records of the Court of Assistants, under date of 6 September, 1681 (ii. 139 2), and in Suffolk Court Files, xxiv. 2024. Cheney’s remarkable will, made the day before his execution and in recognized anticipation of it, contains valuable particulars, was witnessed by Hudson Leverett and two others, and was proved 29 September, 1681 (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 1189). His widow married Ebenezer Williams, Senior, of Dorchester, where she died, 26 February, 1717–18 (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxi. 130; Suffolk Probate Files, Nos. 1617, 3950; Suffolk Deeds, xxi. 571, 572; and New England Historical and Genealogical Register for 1851, v. 90, 468). We do not find these facts in Pope’s Cheney Genealogy, p. 42.
675 The passages from the two Mathers were quoted in the communications in The Nation, — the first attributed, however, to the wrong Mather, and the other so curiously and carelessly misquoted, as, on its very face, to fail of sustaining the correspondent’s contention.
676 Old Virginia and her Neighbours, ii. 265 note.
677 Boston News-Letter, No. 3440, 7 September, 1769, p. 2/2. The passage was sent to Mr. P. A. Bruce, by whom it was printed in the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography for January, 1897, iv. 341
678 South Carolina Statutes at Large, 1840, vii. 422.
679 Mitchell, Present State, p. 133, note.
680 See the Public Domain; Report of the Public Land Commission, 1883, p. 10. General Walker makes the settled area in 1790 only 240,000 square miles, though many settlements had been made beyond the mountains (Economica, p. 60)
681 Noah Webster, Essays, p. 365
682 Tryon to the Earl of Dartmouth, 11 June, 1774 (New York Colonial Documents, viii. 441).
683 Burnaby, and Webster’s Essays, l. c.
684 The population of Massachusetts increased 8,310 yearly before the Revolution. Adam Smith, Malthus, and Franklin accepted the estimate given in the text. Between 1700 and 1719, an aggregate of 105,972 persons emigrated to the Dutch East Indies; between 1747 and 1766, 162,598 (Saalfeld, Geschichte des holländischen Kolonialwesens in Ostindien, ii. 189). Franklin, in 1751, estimated the aggregate number of English inhabitants in the North American colonies at 1,000,000, of whom only 80,000 had immigrated into the country. The Germans came in larger numbers, nearly 20,000 going to Pennsylvania in 1749 (Kalm, i. 58).
685 Maize was the principal plant cultivated by the Indians. They also raised squash and pease (Kalm, i. 139, 140).
686 Professor Shaler.
687 Wealth of Nations, i. 371. All my references to this work are taken from the edition of Prof. Thorold Rogers.
688 Thirty years in England (Wealth of Nations, ii. 196).
689 12 Charles II.
690 In Connecticut in 1792; in Pennsylvania in 1794.
691 Present State of the Nation.
692 Franklin, Works, viii. 173.
693 Commentaries, i. 121.
694 Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, i. 371.
695 I am aware that Adam Smith asserts that he “had never even heard of any tobacco plantation that was improved and cultivated by the capital of merchants who resided in Great Britain” (Wealth of Nations, i. 167). As an object of speculative investment a tobacco plantation was not so desirable as a sugar field, and it was as a speculation that Adam Smith treated the question. The involved condition of the planters of the tobacco colonies is beyond all doubt. See Burnaby’s Travels, p. 19.
696 American Museum, ii. 447. See Kalm, i. 102, 185, 186.
697 American Museum, ii. 344. Wealth of Nations, ii. 145, 146.
698 Washington to Arthur Young, 1 November, 1787.
699 Present State, p. 140
700 Travels, p. 46
701 Travels, i. 185.
702 Travels, ii. 190
703 Young, Travels in France, i. 384.
704 Washington to Young, December, 1791. See also Jefferson’s Notes on Virginia (Eighth edition), p. 130.
705 Kalm, Travels, ii. 125
706 Ibid. ii. 245
707 “The price of improved lands varied with the price of wheat, — the principal article for making money. When wheat was at 3s. a bushel, land was worth £3 an acre, and wheat at 5s. meant land at £5” (Hazard’s Register of Pennsylvania, iii. 408).
708 A year of comparative high prices in England.
709 Huskisson, Speech on Parnell’s Resolutions on the State of the Corn Laws, 5 May, 1814.
710 While the balance of exports of wheat from 1742 to 1751 had been 4,700,509 quarters, the balance of imports from 1766 to 1775 had been 1,363,149 quarters; and not until 1785 did the price fall to the rate at which the bounties on exportation attached, or at which any exports were made (Tooke, History of Prices, i. 8). The Corn Laws, it is hardly necessary to add, merely postponed the final dependence on foreign supplies.
711 Franklin, Works, vii. 434.
712 “The market for butcher’s meat is almost everywhere confined to the country which produces it. Ireland and some parts of British America, indeed, carry on a considerable trade in salt provisions; but they are, I believe, the only countries of the world which do so, or which export to other countries any considerable part of their butcher’s meat” (Wealth of Nations, i. 240).
713 4 Geo. III. chap. 15 (Wealth of Nations, ii. 158, 227).
714 Encyclopedia Britannica (Ninth edition), art. Agriculture.
715 One of Jefferson’s achievements was the invention of a new mould board for ploughs. See Jefferson’s Writings, vii. 87, 445; and Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, iv. 313–322.
716 Adam Smith thought the dearness of labor in America would prevent a successful culture of the silk-worm (Wealth of Nations, ii. 230).
717 Shaler, in Tenth Census, iii. 135.
718 Franklin, Works, vii. 393.
719 Gov. Franklin to the Earl of Hillsborough, 14 June, 1768 (New-Jersey Archives, x. 30–32).
720 Gov. Franklin to the Earl of Dartmouth, 28 March, 1774 (Ibid. x. 444).
721 New York Colonial Documents, viii. 449.
722 “Take this Province [New York] throughout, the expence of transporting a bushel of wheat, is but two-pence [by water], for the distance of one hundred miles; but the same quantity at the like distance in Pennsylvania [by land], will always exceed us one shilling at least” (Independent Reflector, N. Y. 1753).
723 “High roads, which, in most trading countries, are extremely expensive, and awake a continual attention for their Reparation, demand from us, comparatively speaking, scarce any public notice at all” (Ibid.).
724 Smith’s History of New York (Quarto edition), p. 203.
725 The old marine policies give an idea of the risks of navigation: —
“Touching the Adventures and Perils which we the Insurers are contented to bear, and do take upon us in this Voyage, they are of the Seas, Men-of-War, Fire, Enemies, Pirates, Rovers, Thieves, Jettisons, Letters of Mark and Counter-Mark, Surprisals, Takings at Seas, arrests, Restraints and Detainments of all Kings, Princes and People, of what Nation, Condition, or Quality soever, Barratry of the Master (unless the assured be owner of said vessel) and Mariners, and of all other Perils, Losses, and Misfortunes that have or shall come to the Hurt, Detriment, or Damage of the said Ship.”
726 No attention need be given to the prices of commodities as fixed by law. Such regulation laws were, as a rule, the result of some foolish financial experiments for creating money and capital through the fiat of the legislature, — experiments that invariably terminated in disastrous failure.
727 Mitchell was answering the statement of those who were seeking to show that the earnings of the colonists at agriculture were three shillings and sixpence a day.
728 Present State, p. 300, note.
729 Wealth of Nations, ii. 191. See also Macpherson, Annals of Commerce, iii. 187.
730 Governor Franklin to the Earl of Hillsborough, 14 June, 1768 (New Jersey Archives, x. 32).
731 Hewat, in Carroll’s Historical Collections of South Carolina.
732 Some Considerations: Humbly Offered to Demonstrate How prejudicial it would be to the English Plantations, Revenues of the Crown, the Navigation and general Good of this Kingdom, that the sole Trade for Negroes should be granted to a Company with a Joynt-Stock exclusive to all others (American Historical Record, i. 24).
733 Bancroft, iii. 416
734 Cf. Froude, History of England, viii. 480.
735 Mason, African Slave Trade in Colonial Times (American Historical Record, i. 311–319, 338–345).
736 Barry, History of Massachusetts, ii. 248, 249.
737 In 1750, 15,000 hogsheads of molasses were annually converted into rum in Massachusetts alone; and in 1774, sixty distilleries produced about 2,700,000 gallons of rum.
738 European Settlements, ii. 174.
739 Mason, African Slave Trade in Colonial Times; Moore, Slavery in Massachusetts, pp. 66, 67, 107.
740 Wealth of Nations, i. 391.
741 Russell, Agriculture and Climate of North America, 141.
742 John Adams, Works, ii. 498; Jefferson, Works, i. 29.
743 Cairnes, Slave Power (Second edition), p. 143.
744 “The experience of all ages and nations, I believe, demonstrates that the work done by slaves, though it appears to cost only their maintenance, is in the end the dearest of any” (Wealth of Nations, i. 391).
745 “To borrow the words of Tocqueville, the overthrow of slavery in the Northern States was effected ‘by abolishing the principle of slavery, not by setting the slaves free.’ The Northern people did not emancipate negroes who were enslaved, but they provided for the future extinction of slavery by legislating for the freedom of their offspring. The operation of this plan may be readily supposed. The future offspring of the slave having by the law of a particular State been declared free, the slave himself lost a portion of his value in that State. But in the South these laws had no force, and consequently in the South the value of the slave was unaltered by the change. The effect, therefore, of the Northern measures of abolition was, for the most part, simply to transfer Northern slaves to Southern markets. In this way, by an easy process, without incurring any social danger, and at slight pecuniary loss, the Northern States got rid of slavery” (Cairnes, Slave Power, Second edition, p. 157).
746 “We will neither import nor purchase any Slaves imported after the first day of December next; after which time we will wholly discontinue the Slave trade, and will neither be concerned in it ourselves, nor will we hire our vessels, nor sell our Commodities or Manufactures to those who are concerned in it.”
747 A Summary View of the Rights of British America.
748 The omitted passage read as follows: —
“He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him; captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. The piratical warfare, the opprobrium of Infidel powers, is the warfare of the Christian King of Great Britain. Determined to keep open a market where men should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce. And, that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished dye, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them; thus paying off former crimes committed against the liberties of one people with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another” (Jefferson, Works, i. 23, 24; Peter Force in National Intelligencer, 16 and 18 January, 1855).
749 Works, viii. 403.
750 Historical Magazine, September, 1861, v. 261.
751 Jefferson, Works, ix. 278, 279; i. 48, 49.
752 Journal of Rev. Francis Asbury, Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, New York, 1852, i. 11.
753 Asbury, Journal, i. 484.
754 Ibid. i. 486. Asbury was ordained Deacon 25 December, Elder on the twenty-sixth, and Superintendent on the twenty-seventh, each time by Coke. It may be explained that the title of “Superintendent” was at first used, but was soon displaced by that of “Bishop.” In the Minutes of the Annual Conferences for 1785, 1786, and 1787, Coke and Asbury were called Superintendents; in 1788, for the first time, the two men appear as Bishops. Yet, as we have seen, the title of Methodist Episcopal Church was adopted at the Baltimore Conference of 1784. Just before leaving England, Coke had been ordained Superintendent by Wesley; but Wesley was utterly opposed to the assumption of the title of Bishop, and thus expressed himself in a letter to Asbury written 20 September, 1788: —
“How can you, how dare you, suffer yourself to be called Bishop? I shudder, I start at the very thought! Men may call me a knave or a fool; a rascal, a scoundrel, and I am content: But they shall never, by my consent, call me Bishop! For my sake, for God’s sake, for Christ’s sake, put a full end to this!” (H. Moore’s Life of the Rev. John Wesley, ii. 340.)
In regard to the assumption by the American Methodists of the titles of Episcopal and Bishop, and the heated controversies thereby engendered, the reader is referred to the Minutes of the Annual Conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church, New York, 1840, i. 21, 22; Minutes of Several Conversations between The Rev. Thomas Coke, LL.D., The Rev. Francis Asbury and Others, etc., 1785, p. 3; J. Whitehead’s Life of the Rev. John Wesley, ii. 416, 417; H. Moore’s Life of the Rev. John Wesley, ii. 327–340; L. Tyerman’s Life and Times of the Rev. John Wesley, New York, 1872, iii. 435–449.
755 Asbury, Journal, i. 495.
756 Ibid. i. 496.
757 Ibid. i. 502.
758 Neither our associate Mr. W. C. Ford, who found the title in a catalogue (but attributed to Dr. Cook) and called my attention to it, nor our associate Mr. L. Swift had ever seen the book.
759 Copies will be found in the Boston Public Library and in the Harvard College Library. The latter has also a copy of Extracts of the Journals of the Rev. Dr. Coke’s Three Visits to America, London, 1790. It is dedicated to John Wesley, and in the preface Dr. Coke says that —
“the very favourable reception my little Journals have met with, demonstrated by the rapid sale of the former editions, induces me to publish the whole of them collectively; and to add thereto an extract of the Journal of my first visit to America, which was never printed before.” (p. v.)
After the death of Dr. Coke, which took place in 1814, there was published at Dublin, in 1816, Extracts of the Journals of the late Rev. Thomas Coke, LL.D.; comprising several Visits to North-America and the West-Indies; his Tour through a Part of Ireland, and his nearly finished Voyage to Bombay in the East-Indies: To which is prefixed A Life of the Doctor. A copy of this book is in the Boston Public Library.
760 Under date of 13 August, 1776, Wesley wrote: —
“I preached at Taunton, and afterwards . . . went to Kingston. Here I found a clergyman, Dr. Coke, late a gentleman commoner of Jesus College, Oxford, who came twenty miles on purpose to meet me. I had much conversation with him; and a union then began, which, I trust, shall never end.” (L. Tyerman’s Life and Times of the Rev. John Wesley, iii. 214.)
761 Extracts, etc., 1793, p. 33.
762 Ibid. p. 35. The expression “high-headed,” the meaning of which is perhaps not obvious at a glance, is explained by the following extract: —
“Q. 18. Should we insist on the Rules concerning Dress? A. By all means. This is no Time to give any Encouragement to Superfluity of Apparel. Therefore give no Tickets . . . to any that wear High-Heads, enormous Bonnets, Ruffles or Rings.” (Minutes of Several Conversations, etc., 1785, pp. 9, 10.)
The noun “high-head” was not uncommon at that period, but Coke’s adjective “high-headed” is unrecorded in the Oxford Dictionary.
763 Extracts, etc., 1793, pp. 35, 36.
764 Extracts, etc., 1793, p. 37.
765 See Minutes of the Annual Conferences, i. 12, 18, 20, 21, 24.
766 Minutes of Several Conversations between The Rev. Thomas Coke, LL.D., The Rev. Francis Asbury and Others, at a Conference, begun in Baltimore, in the State of Maryland, on Monday, the 27th. of December, in the Year 1784. Composing a Form of Discipline for the Ministers, Preachers and other Members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in America. Philadelphia, . . . M, DCC, LXXXV. Pp. 15–17. A copy of this little book will be found in the Boston Athenæum.
767 Extracts, etc., 1793, p. 39.
768 Ibid. pp. 40, 41.
769 Extracts, etc., 1793, p. 45.
770 Ibid. p. 46. The official record is as follows: —
“It is recommended to all our brethren to suspend the execution of the minute on slavery till the deliberations of a future Conference; that an equal space of time be allowed all our members for consideration, when the minute shall be put in force. N. B. We do hold in the deepest abhorrence the practice of slavery; and shall not cease to seek its destruction by all wise and prudent means.” (Minutes of the Annual Conferences, i. 24.)
In 1795 it was recommended that a general fast be held for the purpose, among other things, of lamenting “the deep-rooted vassalage that still reigneth in many parts of these free, independent United States;” while in a recommendation for a general thanksgiving, it was remarked that “for African liberty; we feel gratitude that many thousands of these poor people are free and pious.” (Minutes, etc., i. 64.) Thereafter all references to slavery apparently disappear from the Minutes.
771 In 1789 a congratulatory address was sent to Washington by the Methodists at their Conference, much to the disturbance of the English Wesleyans. Washington’s reply to this address will be found in Sparks’s edition of his Writings, xii. 153, 154.
772 The extract occurs in a letter written 23 November, 1854, by J. W. Wallace to Dr. Griswold, from an original in the possession of Wallace.
773 Journal of the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of Virginia, etc., Richmond, 1828, p. 27. The reference is to “An act to authorize the manumission of slaves,” passed in May, 1782, by which, under certain conditions, manumission was permitted. (See the Virginia Statutes at Large, xi. 39.)
774 Journal of the House of Delegates, etc., p. 31.
775 Madison’s Letters and Other Writings, i. 199, 200.
776 Ibid. i. 217, 218.
777 Jefferson’s Writings, edited by P. L. Ford, iv. 184, 185.
778 This document is printed at the end of Mr. Davis’s paper entitled “Previous Legislation,” a Corrective for Colonial Troubles, communicated at the Stated Meeting in March, post, pp. 403–414.
779 Sketch of the Life and a List of Some of the Works of John Singleton Copley, 1873, p. 126.
780 The officers of the Social Law Library in 1829 were: — President, William Sullivan; Trustees, Lemuel Shaw, William Minot, Benjamin Rand, Samuel Hubbard, and George Morey; Treasurer and Clerk, Edward Blake; Librarian, James Boyle.
781 Rhode Island Colonial Records, iv. 375.
782 Moore’s History of North Carolina, 1880, i. 99. See below, p. 389.
783 In the Newport cemetery is a stone which records the death of Ann Howard, wife of Martin Howard, 28 September, 1758, aged 59 years. Another stone is to the memory of Sarah Howard, daughter of Martin and Ann Howard, who died 13 January, 1734, aged 3 years, 11 months, 13 days. In the Friends Records is the following entry: —
Ann Howard, of England, died at Widow Wait Carr’s house, Newport, 11 June, 1719 (Arnold’s Vital Record of Rhode Island, vii. 109).
784 See will of Ebenezer Brenton, below, p. 387, note.
785 Rhode Island Colonial Records, v. 386.
786 Ibid. v. 505.
787 Ibid. vi. 257, 336.
788 Mason’s Annals of the Redwood Library and Athenæum, Newport, R. I., 1891, pp. 42, 45, 59.
789 A fac-simile of Martin Howard’s autograph is in Mason’s Annals of Trinity Church, Newport, Rhode Island, 1698–1821 (1890), p. 91 note.
790 Major Ebenezer Brenton (1687–1766) of South Kingstown, Rhode Island, had two daughters, Ann and Elizabeth. Ann married, as her first husband, Jonathan Concklin, 14 June, 1740, at Trinity Church, Newport (Rhode Island Vital Record, x. 438, 443). Brenton’s will, dated 16 March, 1765, proved 13 April, 1766, makes his son-in-law Martin Howard, Jr., of Newport, executor, and bequeaths to him a life estate in a farm at South Kingstown, with remainder to his grand-daughter, Ann Howard (Austin’s Genealogical Dictionary of Rhode Island, pp. 254–257).
791 I am indebted to the present Rector of St. Paul’s, the Rev. F. B. Cole, of Wickford, Rhode Island, for this interesting extract from the parish Register. This entry was inaccurately printed by Mason in his Annals of Trinity Church, Newport, R. I., 1698–1821, p. 91. See Arnold’s Vital Record of Rhode Island, x. 337, 343.
792 Sabine says that “James Center married one of his [Howard’s] daughters, and after her decease, became the husband of another” (Loyalists, i. 547). I do not find a record of either of these marriages, or of the birth or baptism of another daughter of Martin Howard. Elizabeth Howard may have been one of Center’s wives, but that he did not marry her sister Ann Howard I shall hereafter show. Ann Howard’s birth is imperfectly recorded in the Newport Town Records: —
Howard, Ann, of Martin, . . . . Aug. 15 —
(Arnold’s Vital Record of Rhode Island, iv. 101).
793 Rhode Island Colonial Records, vi. 514 and note; vii. 196.
794 John G Wanton had no middle name but assumed the initial G as a designation. A son of Governor Gideon Wanton, he was a Friend, a merchant of Newport, and a corporator of Rhode Island College, now Brown University. See Friends Records in Arnold’s Vital Record of Rhode Island, vii. 37 (two entries), 80 (two entries), 211.
795 Letter of Miss Maud Lyman Stevens.
796 These pamphlets are entitled: —
I.
A Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax, to his Friend in Rhode-Island, containing Remarks upon a Pamphlet, entitled, The Rights of the Colonies Examined. Newport: M.DCC.LXV.
II.
A Defence of the Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax, to his Friend in Rhode-Island, Newport: M.DCC.LXV.
The facts concerning these publications are briefly told by Charles E. Hammett, Jr., in A Contribution to the Bibliography and Literature of Newport, R. I., 1887, p. 63: —
Late in 1764, Hopkins’s pamphlet, “The Rights of [the] Colonies Examined,” (with no other signature than the initial “P”) was published at Providence by the authority of the General Assembly; shortly afterwards also with the imprint of William Goddard (Providence, 1765), and in the next year at London, by John Almon (London, 1766), the title here being changed to “The Grievances of the American Colonies Candidly Examined.” The position taken by Hopkins was also supported in James Otis’s “Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved” (Boston, 1764), but was opposed in the anonymous pamphlet, “A Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax to his Friend in Rhode Island, etc.” (Newport, S. Hall, 1765), which was written by Martin Howard, Jr. In the same year appeared an answer to Howard by James Otis (published, however, anonymously) entitled “A Vindication of the British Colonies Against the Aspersions of the Halifax Gentleman, etc.” (Boston, Edes and Gill, 1765). A second anonymous pamphlet by Howard was entitled “A Defence of the Letter From a Gentleman at Halifax to his Friend in Rhode Island” (Newport, Samuel Hall, 1765), and this, in turn, was answered by Otis in his anonymous pamphlet, “Brief Remarks on the Defence of the Halifax Libel on the British American Colonies” (Boston, Edes and Gill, 1765). See Ibid. pp. 66, 67.
797 Moore’s History of North Carolina, 1880, i. 99.
798 Ibid. i. 99, 100.
799 Abigail Greenleaf was born in Boston, 17 September, 1743 (Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxiv. 249). For several years, her parents were connected with the New South Church and the West Church, but they subsequently transferred their relations to Trinity Church. Her sister, Anstis Greenleaf, married Benjamin Davis (see these Publications, vi. 126). A very fine portrait of Mrs. Davis by Copley is owned by Mrs. Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch of Cambridge.
800 Moore’s History of North Carolina, i. 117.
801 Bancroft, in his account of the North Carolina Regulators, says: —
Besides, the Chief-Justice was Martin Howard, a profligate time-server, raised to the bench as a convenient reward for having suffered in the time of the Stamp Act, and ever ready to use his place as a screen for the dishonest profits of men in office, and the instrument of political power. Never yet had the tribunal of justice been so mocked (History of the United States, 1854, vi. 184, 185).
Sabine briefly sums up the character and career of Chief-Justice Howard and says that —
The suspension from office of one who “was notoriously destitute not only of the common virtues of humanity, but of all sympathy whatever with the community in which he lived,” was a matter of much joy. In 1775, he was present in Council, and expressed the highest detestation of unlawful meetings, and advised Governor Martin to inhibit and forbid the assembling of the Whig Convention appointed at Newbern . . . . . His reputation does not appear to have been good, nor does it seem that the calm and moderate respected him; while from others he sometimes received abuse, and even bodily harm. Careful pens speak of his profligate character, and of his corrupt and wicked designs, and aver that the members of the Assembly hated him (Loyalists of the American Revolution, 1864, i. 547).
802 Moore’s History of North Carolina, i. 117–119.
803 Craven County.
804 Life and Correspondence of James Iredell, one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1857, i. 363, 364.
I had hoped to glean some further particulars of Judge Howard’s career in the South from the Records of North Carolina, but as these documents have been printed without index, table of contents or strict chronological arrangement, the value to historical students and scholars of the twenty volumes thus far published is seriously impaired.
805 See Rhode Island Colonial Records, vi. 514, 588, 589; vii. 196, 216.
806 Rhode Island Colonial Records, vii. 216.
807 Loyalists of the American Revolution, i. 547.
808 The date of Judge Howard’s death is erroneously given by Sabine (Loyalists, i. 547) as December, 1781, and by Mason (Annals of Trinity Church, Newport, p. 91 note) as 9 March, 1782.
809 I am indebted to the courtesy of the Rev. H. E. J. Bevan, the present Rector of St. Luke’s, for this valuable register.
810 The will was proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, at London, 14 January, 1782, when administration “was granted to Abigail Howard, Widow, the relict & Annie Howard Spinster, the daughter of the said Deceased.” An exemplified copy of this will was sent to Boston and recorded in the office of the Secretary of the Commonwealth (Volume lettered Probate Courts, 1761–1784, pp. 158, 159). It was also recorded in the Records of Land Evidence of Newport, Rhode Island, viii. 497, 498. It will be observed that the will makes no mention of any descendant of the testator except his daughter Ann; but see his letter to Judge Iredell (above, p. 392) in which he refers to his “little family,” and Sabine’s statement quoted above (p. 387, note).
811 For this and other extracts from the Register of Trinity Church, Newport, I am indebted to the courtesy of its Rector, the Rev. Henry M. Stone. I also wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to our associates Mr. Albert Matthews, Mr. Henry W. Cunningham and Mr. Henry E. Woods for valuable aid in the preparation of this paper.
812 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxiv. 306; xxx. 58.
813 See Bond’s Genealogies and History of Watertown, pp. 905, 906, for a sketch of this family of Spooner. See also Suffolk Probate Files, Nos. 13.391 and 14.399.
814 Boston Record Commissioners’ Reports, xxii. 250.
815 Ibid. xxx. 470. Elizabeth Sparhawk was also a lineal descendant of Chief-Justice Sewall and a niece of the second Sir William Pepperrell (Materials for a Genealogy of the Sparhawk Family in New England, in Essex Historical Collections, vols, xxv., xxvi., xxvii.). Her father, Nathaniel Sparhawk, Jr., married his cousin-german Catherine Sparhawk, 1 January, 1766, at Kittery (Kittery Church Records), where their eldest daughter, Elizabeth — recorded Eliza — was baptized, 6 December, 1767 (Ibid.).
816 The Jarvis Family (Hartford, 1879), p. 209 gives the date of Elizabeth Sparhawk Spooner’s birth as 25 November, 1799.
817 The Register of Trinity Church records the burial of Mrs. Mary Greenleaf, wife of Stephen Greenleaf, Esq., 23 September, 1780, at the age of 68.
818 Little Cambridge, legally known as the Third Precinct of Cambridge, was that part of the town which was south of the Charles River. It was incorporated as the town of Brighton 24 February, 1807.
819 For notices of Charles Apthorp and his family, his portrait, and a view of his mural monument, see Foote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, ii. 142–147, 466.
820 The Life and Letters of Charles Bulfinch, Architect, 1896, p. 70.
821 These children of John and Hannah (Greenleaf) Apthorp, born between 1766 and 1772, were named Hannah, Frances Western, and John Trecothick. I have been unable to find any public record of their birth or baptism. (i) Hannah married her cousin, Charles Bulfinch, the architect, 20 November, 1788 (Trinity Church Register), and died 8 April, 1841, aged 74 (Boston City Records), (ii) Frances Western married Charles Vaughan, 7 July, 1791 (Trinity Church Register), and died at Hallowell, Maine, 10 August, 1836 (Letter of Francis W. Vaughan). A family letter, dated 27 February, 1790, states that she would be of age in November of that year, (iii) John Trecothick died 8 April, 1849, aged 79 years, 3 months, and 15 days (Boston City Records).
John Apthorp’s will, dated 8 October, 1771, was proved 19 December, 1772. It makes generous provision for his two daughters in England, Grizzell and Catharine, children of his first wife,1 and for his then wife, Hannah (Greenleaf), and her three children. He names as one of his executors his brother-in-law Martin Howard, Chief-Justice of North Carolina, who accepted the trust (Middlesex Probate Files).
Sheriff Stephen Greenleaf, the last to hold the shrievalty in Suffolk under the Crown, was so fortunate as to escape the confiscation of his property at the Revolution. He was rich and lived on a fine estate in Tremont Street facing the Common. His mansion was adorned with many fine portraits from the pencils of Blackburn and Copley, which have survived to our own time. The portrait of himself and that of his daughter Mrs. Davis are owned by Mrs. Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch of Cambridge (see above, p. 390, note). In his will, dated 15 May, 1787, proved 10 February, 1795, he bequeaths to his daughters Mary Phips and Abigail Howard all his family portraits except that of his daughter Hannah Apthorp, deceased, which he gives to her children. He then devises two fifth parts of all his real and personal estate to his daughter Mary Phips, and two fifth parts to his daughter Abigail Howard. The following paragraph of the will explains the reason for this unusual division of his property and recalls the fallen fortunes of two of his sons-in-law: —
Item. In consideration of the children of my late daughter Apthorp, deceased, having a handsome estate left them by their father, and considering also the reduced circumstances of my two aforesaid daughters by the late War, I think it right and hope they will esteem it so to give only the remaining fifth part of my estate to my said Grandchildren, and accordingly I do hereby give and bequeath to Hannah Apthorp, Frances Western Apthorp and John Trecothick Apthorp, the three children of my daughter Hannah Apthorp, deceased, one fifth part of all my estate, real and personal, to be divided equally between them or the survivors of them their heirs and assigns forever as they shall respectively come of age.
The executors named in the will are the Rev. Dr. Samuel Parker, Joseph Greene, William Scollay and the testator’s daughter, Abigail Howard (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 20.395).
Sheriff Greenleaf’s mansion has been described by Col. John T. Apthorp, one of the orphan grandchildren referred to: —
You know the place where their childhood was spent, — the fine old house, standing back from the street, on about the spot where Temple Place now is, the whole space to the corner of West Street being enclosed in the garden attached to the house (afterwards known as Washington Gardens). I remember well the low brick wall that enclosed it, and the fine old trees that overhung the street, and the belt of shrubbery that bordered the wall (The Life and Letters of Charles Bulfinch, Architect, 1896, p. 70).
This estate was acquired by Mr. Greenleaf by several purchases between 1742 and 1754. It had a frontage of two hundred and ninety-two feet on Tremont Street on which it measured one hundred and forty-two feet and four inches. The lot was two hundred and ten feet deep on the north-easterly line, — next to the church property; but the symmetry of the estate was destroyed by a lot having a frontage of sixty-five feet and nine inches on West Street and a depth of one hundred and ten feet which Mr. Greenleaf did not acquire. This property was appraised at Mr. Greenleaf’s death at the modest sum of $15,000. It was sold by his executors for $18,166.66 to Henry Jackson, Esquire, of Boston (Suffolk Deeds, clxxxii. 229), and later was conveyed to Trustees for Madam Swan. As an illustration of the enormous rise in the value of real estate in Boston during the past century, it is interesting to note that the sixteen estates now constituting the Greenleaf property, — seven on Tremont Street, eight on Temple Place, and one on West Street, — were taxed in 1902 by the Boston assessors for $3,714,000, of which amount $3,297,800 was on the 38,938 square feet of land, and $416,200 on the buildings.
1 Mr. Apthorp’s first wife was Alice (or Alicia) Mann, born 30 May, 1739, daughter of Galfridus Mann and niece of Sir Horace Mann, British Ambassador to Florence from 1740 till his death, 6 November, 1786 (Betham’s Baronetage, 1803, iii. 255, which gives his name as Horatio). She died at Gibraltar, 20 October, 1763 (Foote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, ii. 143, 144, notes). Her brother Horatio Mann (1737–1814), who succeeded his uncle in the baronetcy, changed his given name to Horace, and thus, perhaps, arose the confusion in the minds of American writers who have described Mrs. Apthorp, some as sister and others as niece of Sir Horace Mann, British Minister at Florence.
822 Suffolk Probate Files, Nos. 15.270, 15.271, 15.272.
823 Trinity Church Register.
824 Suffolk Deeds, clxxxii. 78. Madam Howard’s executor sold this estate for $6,000 to John Quincy Adams, 18 January, 1802 (Ibid. cc. 45).
825 A block of sixteen three-story brick dwelling houses built by Bulfinch on the south-westerly side of Franklin Place between Hawley Street and what is now Devonshire Street. A plan and elevation of the Tontine Crescent appeared in the Massachusetts Magazine for February, 1794 (iv. facing 65), which states that the entire range of the Crescent will be four hundred and eighty feet long, that half of it is nearly completed, and that work upon the remainder will be pushed in the spring (Ibid. p. 67). The Plan is reproduced in 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for April, 1794, i. between 66, 67. This block of houses stood until about 1855 when they gave place to stores and warehouses. See The Life and Letters of Charles Bulfinch, Architect, 1896, pp. 97–104.
826 The beautiful Miss Emily Marshall, afterwards Mrs. William Foster Otis, also lived with her father, Josiah Marshall, in the Tontine Crescent, — in the house nearest to the Federal Street Theatre, which Mr. Marshall bought in 1823 (Suffolk Deeds, cclxxxi. 134).
827 Mr. Apthorp had been a Warden of Christ Church, Cambridge, in 1796; and he was Treasurer and Receiver General of the Commonwealth, 1812–1817.
828 Suffolk Probate Files, No. 21.249.
829 The Trinity Church Register records her burial 5 October, 1801.
830 Suffolk Probate Files, No. 21.534. The will is dated 10 October, 1798, and was proved 13 October, 1801.
831 Among these bequests is one to her niece Frances Western Apthorp, daughter of John and Hannah (Greenleaf) Apthorp, who subsequently married Charles Vaughan, Senior, whose son, Charles Vaughan, Jr., was the father of Mr. Francis Wales Vaughan, the Librarian of the Social Law Library, who discovered the identity of the Copley canvas, long in his official custody.
832 David Phips (H. C. 1741) was a son of Lieutenant-Governor Spencer Phips. Born in Cambridge, 25 September, 1724, he held the offices of Colonel of the militia, Representative to the General Court, in 1753, and Sheriff of Middlesex, 1764–1774. He married Mary Greenleaf, eldest daughter of the Sheriff of Suffolk, 13 September, 1753 (Trinity Church Register), by whom he had seven children (1757–1770). He inherited his father’s homestead on Arrow Street, near Bow Street, Cambridge, later known as the William Winthrop estate, where he resided till the Revolution, when he adhered to the Crown. Paige says that he “went with his family to England, where he died, 7 July, 1811. His estate here was confiscated; but the loss was repaired by benefits which the British Government bestowed on him and on his children” (History of Cambridge, p. 627).
833 The Inventory mentions the portrait of Judge Howard which is appraised at fifty dollars, and “5 painted, 2 Gilt frame family Pictures $100” (Suffolk Probate Files, No. 21.534).
834 Suffolk Probate Files, Nos. 21.596, 21.597, 21.598.
835 Dr. Spooner graduated at Harvard College in 1778. He was an Overseer of the College (1810–1834), Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a member of the Massachusetts Historical Society.
836 For these and other facts pertaining to the Spooners I am indebted to the kindness and courtesy of Miss Isabella Mary Hubbard Jarvis of East Oakland, California, a daughter of Edward Scott Jarvis. The following extract from a recent letter of Miss Jarvis is of interest: —
I remember very distinctly seeing the Commission of Chief-Justice Howard in my Aunt’s [Anna Howard (Spooner) Jarvis] possession. It was written on parchment, signed by the King’s own hand, sealed with the Royal Seal, and tied with a broad blue ribbon. I wish that I had it now; it would be almost invaluable, but it was destroyed by fire long years since.
837 Edward Scott Jarvis was Collector of the Customs for the District of Frenchman’s Bay, Maine, 1818–1841 (Letter of the Hon. James Phinney Baxter).
838 The Jarvis Family, Hartford, 1879, p. 209 and Supplement, p. 12.
839 The Life and Letters of Charles Bulfinch, Architect, 1896, pp. 239, 288.
840 See Suffolk Deeds, ccccii. 302, and ccccv. 233.
841 Mr. Jarvis’s first wife was Miss Mary Hubbard Greene of Boston, to whom he was married 15 August, 1816, by his classmate the Rev. Charles Lowell (West Church Records).
842 Town Records of Surry.
843 As we have already stated (above, p. 385, note), Chief-Justice Shaw was a Trustee of the Social Law Library in 1829 when Mrs. Jarvis, then Anna Howard Spooner and sister-in-law to Leonard Jarvis, gave her grandfather’s portrait into its keeping.
844 Palmer’s Necrology of Alumni of Harvard College, 1864, p. 39.
845 Rhode Island Colonial Records, v. 8–14
846 Cf. William Douglass’s Summary, etc. (edition of 1749), i. 493, 494.
847 History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay (edition of 1767), ii. 436.
848 14 George II. c. xxxvii. The Statutes at Large (edition of 1742), vii. 473, 474.
849 See Publications of this Society, iii, 22, 23.
850 See Ibid. vi. 157–172.
851 See Publications of this Society, vi. 305–307.
852 History of the Province of Massachusetts-Bay (edition of 1767), ii. 395, 396.
853 This document was communicated by Mr. Davis to the Society at its February Meeting. See above, p. 380.
854 “Debitis nobis pastorem qui reformabit et eriget collapsam ecclesiam.”
855 The date of the election is found in the Histoire Générale d’Espagne by Ferreras translated into French by Hermilly, 1751, viii. 531. In the biographical dictionaries, the year only is given.
856 The reference is to Dr. Allen’s work, which was first published in January, 1861, entitled Hebrew Men and Times from the Patriarchs to the Messiah.
857 The reference is to Dr. Allen’s work, which was first published in January, 1861, entitled Hebrew Men and Times from the Patriarchs to the Messiah.
858 Manchester New College, now Manchester College, Oxford.
859 James Martineau, D.D., LL.D., was born in Norwich, England, 21 April, 1805. His early education was in the Norwich Grammar School and the school of the Rev. Lant Carpenter at Bristol. In 1821 he began to prepare for the calling of a civil engineer, but deeply moved by the death of a young friend, a minister, he decided to enter the ministry. He spent five years at Manchester College, taught for a year, and then, in 1828, was ordained as a minister in Dublin. From Dublin, three years later, he went to Liverpool, where he remained for twenty-five years; during this period he published Endeavours after the Christian Life, became one of the editors of the Prospective Review (later succeeded by the National Review), and began to teach in Manchester College. In 1853 the College was removed to London, and in 1858 Mr. Martineau found it necessary to remove there also. From 1858 to 1869, in addition to his work as a teacher, he was, with John James Tayler, the Principal of Manchester College (then become Manchester New College, London), joint minister of the Little Portland Street Chapel. On Mr. Tayler’s death, in 1869, Mr. Martineau succeeded him as Principal and also continued in charge of the Little Portland Street pulpit alone till 1872, when he resigned the pulpit. In 1885 he resigned as Principal of Manchester New College, after serving it for forty-five years in all. In the period which followed, he published first his Types of Ethical Theory, then, in 1887, his Study of Religion and, in 1890, the Seat of Authority in Religion. He was one of the Foreign Honorary Members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He died 11 January, 1900. A full account of his life and work is given in A. W. Jackson’s James Martineau, a Biography and Study, Boston, 1900.
In an article entitled James Martineau, in the Atlantic Monthly for September, 1900 (lxxxvi. 317–327), our associate Dr. Charles Carroll Everett closes with these words: —
His [Martineau’s] power consists in the fact that he dwelt among the realities which systems so imperfectly represent. To some who love and admire him most, the Endeavours after the Christian Life is still regarded as his best contribution to the world. Others find most inspirations in his splendid personality, all aglow as it was with religious faith. He had fairly faced doubt and denial. He had explored the gloomiest stretches of world-weary speculation, and he could still stand in all the joy of his first faith, and proclaim that –
God’s in his heaven,
All’s right with the world.
Whatever we may think of his system as a whole, his works will long remain a storehouse of important thoughts in regard to the matters with which philosophy and theology have to do. It is pleasant to remember that the first collection of his miscellaneous works was made and published in this country, and that Harvard was the first university to give him official recognition.
860 Hebrew Men and Times from the Patriarchs to the Messiah.
861 In 1853, the President and Fellows of Harvard College had filed a petition asking the Supreme Judicial Court to decree the separation of the Harvard Divinity School from the University. The Society for Promoting Theological Education, which, from its organization in 1816, had taken large part in maintaining the Divinity School, was expected to assume entire charge of the School in case the petition was granted, and in 1859 agreed, though reluctantly, to do so, at the same time protesting against the step as “unnecessary and inexpedient.” “The Court reserved its decision from year to year, till, in 1865, under a change of views on the part of the Corporation [the President and Fellows], the petition was dismissed by the Court at the request of that body.” (The Society for Promoting Theological Education, printed in 1898 and made up in large part from the pamphlet compiled by Rev. William Newell, D.D., Secretary of the Society, in 1877).
The constitution of the Faculty of the Harvard Divinity School has been for twenty years or more substantially that here suggested by Mr. Martineau; the professors have been chosen both as “eminent for learning and candour” and as representing “different theological complexions.”
862 John James Tayler, Principal of Manchester New College, London (now Manchester College, Oxford), from 1853 till 1869 when Mr. Tayler died and Mr. Martineau succeeded him.
863 Rev. Edward Everett Hale.
864 The allusion is to Mr. Allen’s removal to a new home, at Jamaica Plain.
865 Hebrew Men and Times from the Patriarchs to the Messiah.
866 The reference is to the London Inquirer, newspaper, an organ of the English Unitarians. It is not improbable that this letter of Mr. Allen was addressed to the Editor of the Inquirer.
867 The passage occurs in a letter to the editor of the Glasgow Herald, dated 20 January, 1863, printed in The Liberator of 20 February, 1863, xxxiii. 29/5.
868 The Rev. Stephen Higginson Tyng, D.D., of the Harvard Class of 1817, is doubtless here referred to.
869 Dr. Allen was editor of the Christian Examiner, at first in the department of current literature only, from July, 1857, till November, 1869.
870 In the History of the Harvard Church in Charlestown (Boston, 1879), p. 204, note, is an account of the Christian Examiner Society, which was organized 27 January, 1829, and disbanded 5 February, 1863. The Examiner continued to be published till November, 1869. It was succeeded in 1870 by Old and New, which survived till 1875.
871 Democracy on Trial, by William Francis Allen, in the Christian Examiner for March, 1863, lxxiv. 262–294
872 Edward Tertius Whitfield, a publisher, chiefly of Unitarian works, in the Strand.
873 It should be remembered that Dr. Martineau belonged to the high Tory party and naturally reflected its opinions.
874 James Spence, author of The American Union, — a Defence of the South.
875 Francis W. Newman.
876 Rev. Edward Brooks Hall, D.D. (1800–1866), H. C. 1820.
877 The allusion here is to Charles Henry Pearson, who in July, 1862, succeeded R. H. Hutton as editor of the National Review, a position which he retained for one year. See Charles Henry Pearson, edited by William Stebbing, 1900, pp. 94–96; and the Dictionary of National Biography, xliv. 162–164.
878 The Emancipation Proclamation.
879 It is a matter of regret that a gap in the preserved correspondence occurs at this point. It would have been interesting to read what Dr. Martineau wrote to Dr. Allen after what he had declared to be “impossible objects” had become accomplished facts.
880 Dr. Allen was Lecturer on Ecclesiastical History in the Harvard Divinity School from 1878 till 1882.
881 Christian History in its Three Great Periods.
882 The reference is to George Croom Robertson (1842–1892), a graduate of the University of Aberdeen in which he was made assistant-professor of Greek in 1864. At the time of his appointment (1866) to the professorship of Mental Philosophy and Logic in University College, London, Dr. Martineau was also a candidate. Robertson belonged to the empirical school of philosophy and for that reason had the active support of Grote and Mill against Dr. Martineau.
883 William Kingdon Clifford (1845–1879), F.R.S., a mathematician and philosophical writer of note. He was a graduate and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Professor of Applied Mathematics in University College, London.
884 Study of Religion: Its Sources and Contents. Dr. C. C. Everett’s Notice appeared in the Unitarian Review for June, 1888. xxix. 485–508.
885 Rev. James Edwin Odgers, D.D.
886 Of which a copy is at the rooms of the American Unitarian Association.
Dr. Odgers writes to me as follows concerning this “proposal”: —
I have no doubt that this refers to a matter discussed between myself and Mr. Allen, — first opened to me by him when I was in Boston in October, 1888. I regret that I cannot lay my hands upon documents in relation to it; but I destroyed a number of letters and papers when I left Bowdon for Oxford, in 1894. The successor of the National Review, the Modern Review, and the revived Christian Reformer had come to an end; and in 1888, the English Liberal Non-conformists were without an “organ” of the higher and more solid sort. I believe I am right in saying that Mr. Allen proposed to me (October 10, 1888) to attempt turning the Unitarian Review into an International Theological Quarterly, England to furnish a sufficient subsidy and a co-editor. On my return, I printed and circulated his letter, asking for expressions of opinion, which were discouraging. To this, Dr. Martineau undoubtedly refers in January of the next year. His reasons are based upon just the same sort of considerations as he refers to in his memorable letter to Mr. Allen printed at the end of Mr. A.’s Unitarianism Since the Reformation (1894), pp. 247–249 . . . . Dr. Martineau would have nothing to do with a Unitarian Review; and Boston intended to fly that flag.
887 See above, p. 441, note 2.
888 An English penny weekly magazine of a sort indicated sufficiently by its title.
889 Professor Charles Barnes Upton, of Manchester New College.
890 Rev. James Edwin Odgers, D.D. Mr. Allen was a guest of Mr. Odgers at his house in Bowdon, Cheshire, at the time this letter was written.
891 Miss Mary Catharine Jevons was a cousin of William Stanley Jevons, LL.D., F.R.S., the economist and logician.
892 Our senior Vice-President, William Watson Goodwin, D.C.L., calls my attention to the fact that in using this Greek word (meaning man-midwife) Dr. Martineau “refers to the common, jocose remark of Socrates, that he was the son of a midwife (see Plat. Theaet. 149 A, ὡς ἓγώ εἰμι υἱὸς μαίας), and that he acted as a midwife to deliver other men of the thoughts that were in them, though he never gave birth to anything new himself. This is found in the Theaetetus, after the words quoted.”
893 By the Rev. Howard N. Brown, in The Unitarian for October, 1890, v. 490–492.
894 Frederic Henry Hedge, the leading article in the Unitarian Review for October, 1890, xxxiv. 281–301, written by Mr. Allen, then editor of the Review.
895 Memorial of Joseph and Lucy Clark Allen (Northborough, Massachusetts). By their children. Boston, 1891.
896 Positive Religion: Essays, Fragments and Hints, Boston, 1891.
897 Dr. Martineau’s statement is not strictly accurate. Mrs. Martineau was Helen Higginson, eldest daughter of the Rev. Edward Higginson (1781–1832), Unitarian minister and schoolmaster at Stockport and Derby. She was married at Derby 18 December, 1828, and died 9 November, 1877, at the age of seventy-three (Dictionary of National Biography, xxvi. 372; and Supplement, iii. 146–151).
Mrs. Kirkland, born Elizabeth Cabot, was baptized at Beverly, Massachusetts, 2 October, 1785, married at King’s Chapel, Boston, 2 September, 1827, and died 17 August, 1839. She was a daughter of the Hon. George Cabot, United States Senator from Massachusetts, and his wife Elizabeth Higginson, daughter of Stephen and Elizabeth (Cabot) Higginson. Stephen Higginson (1743–1828), the eminent merchant of Boston and the reputed author of the Writings of Laco, was Mrs. Kirkland’s maternal uncle and the father of Stephen Higginson (1770–1834), long Steward of Harvard College who was sometimes styled the Man of Boss.
898 Miss Caroline Julia Bartlett, ordained in 1889, since the wife of Dr. Augustus Warren Crane of Kalamazoo, Michigan. She is now called Mrs. Bartlett Crane.
899 Monton is a suburb of Manchester. Miss Bartlett preached in the pulpit of Dr. Martineau’s nephew, the Rev. Philip Higginson, whose church is regarded as the most beautiful Unitarian Chapel in England.
900 An Historical Sketch of the Unitarian Movement since the Reformation (American Church History Series), New York, 1894.
901 The reference is to Dr. Allen’s golden wedding anniversary which occurred 22 May, 1895.
902 The Old School and its Work. An Address before the Alumni of the Harvard Divinity School, 23 June, 1896. It is also printed in Dr. Allen’s Sequel to Our Liberal Movement, Boston, 1897, pp. 1–21.
903 Daughter of Dr. Frederic H. Hedge.
904 Sequel to Our Liberal Movement, Boston, 1897.
905 The reference is to Miss Anna Swanwick (1813–1899), LL.D. She was a Hebrew, Greek and German scholar, and translator, and was deeply interested in social questions, especially that of women’s education. She was of the Councils of Queen’s and Bedford Colleges, London, and assisted in founding Girton College, Cambridge, and Somerville Hall, Oxford. A prominent Unitarian and a delightful conversationist, Miss Swanwick was the friend of Crabb Robinson, Tennyson, Gladstone, Browning, Martineau and Sir James Paget who, with many other distinguished men, were frequent visitors at her house. She received from the University of Aberdeen the degree of Doctor of Laws (Dictionary of National Biography, Supplement, iii. 374).
906 Many of the details of this episode were printed in McClure’s Magazine for December, 1898, xii. 179–185.