USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Berlin > History of Berlin, Connecticut > Part 18
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When Mr. and Mrs. Boldero left England they supposed they were coming to a wilderness and they brought chest upon chest of clothing, all made up, sufficient to last a lifetime. Mrs. Boldero used to wear to church a pink silk petticoat and a blue silk long shawl. After the service they would wait until all the congregation had gone out, when Mrs. Boldero would say, "My dear, I think we may venture now." Then she would lift her skirt daintily, take her husband's arm, and step down the aisle. They always walked about the yard arm in arm. There were two or three young ladies in the village to whom Mrs. Boldero took a fancy and these favored few were occasionally invited to take a cup of tea with her. The Boldero house was afterward occupied by Sherlock C. Hall, who about 1852 was postmaster. The office was kept in the south front room of the dwelling.
In 1857 Deacon Edward Wilcox sold his property in East Berlin to Daniel M. Rogers and purchased the Boldero place, where he died in 1862. His wife, who was Harriet M. Dowd, died in 1865, and their daughter, Harriet Newell, died in 1893. Deacon Wilcox and his wife and daughter were all devoted to the interests of the church of which they were members, and were eminently useful there and in the community at large.
Deacon S. F. Raymond, who inherited the Wilcox place from his cousin Miss Harriet N. Wilcox, died January 19, 1905, greatly lamented by his many friends.
The name of Edward Wilcox brings to mind a work in which he was greatly interested. In 1857 a manual of the Sec- ond Congregational Church of Berlin was published, which represented many weeks of patient research and labor by the Rev. William DeLoss Love, Deacon Benjamin Savage, Deacon Edward Wilcox, and Deacon Alfred North. It is remembered that every meeting of that committee was opened by prayer ..
The book contains, besides thirty-four pages of historical memoranda and other matter, a chronological index of every member of the church, from its organization in 1775 up to 1857. Dates of deaths and ages are given and at the end is an alphabetical index.
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Mayor Giles Curtiss, who was a Revolutionary soldier, lived next south of the Bolderos. He died in 1842, aged eighty-nine.
The Curtiss house, which stood near the sidewalk, was very well built, with fine mouldings about the ceilings. The prop- erty was purchased by Samuel C. Wilcox about 1861, and when he built his new house back on the hill, the old house was taken down by Chauncey Griswold, removed to Meriden and set up again, on Britannia Street, where it is still in use as a tenement house.
On what is now the lawn of the Wilcox place, between the Curtiss house and the great button ball tree, there was once a grocery store kept by a Mr. Latimer.
The Methodist church, situated directly opposite Horace Steele's driveway, was built in 1830. At that time there was no building on that side of the way between it and the Brandegee store.
In 1871 the Methodist society bought the Universalist church and their own building was sold to Eben Woodruff, who moved it down on to his place north of the town hall, to be used as a tobacco barn. It is said that the church fell to pieces as the first load of tobacco crossed its threshold.
The house on the corner south of the Methodist church, now. occupied by Bryan H. Atwater and his sister, Miss Mary Atwater, is one of the oldest in Berlin.
Some years since, when the house was repainted, the date 1769 was discovered on the brick work of the chimney, about half-way between the roof and the top of the chimney. It was built to be used as a tavern with a public hall and ballroom on the second floor.
Miss Abby Pattison used to say to her mother, Abigail Miller, attended a ball at Fuller's tavern in 1789. It was that same year when Washington, on his return by stage from Bunker Hill to New York, escorted, as recorded in his diary, by Major Jackson, Mr. Lear and six servants, "breakfasted at Worthington at the house of one Fuller."
Amos Kirby assumed the proprietorship of Fuller's tavern about the year 1814, and lived on the place until his death in
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1846 at the age of seventy-one. During the latter part of his years he carried on the business of a butcher and peddled meat about the town.
A barn formerly stood close to the street north of the Kirby house. There was no fence in front of the house or barn. A roof extended from this barn over the street and underneath were scales for weighing hay. High up under the roof was a large wheel with a shaft that extended the width of the build- ing. Two great ropes, with strong hooks at the end, were wound around the wheel and were connected to a small wheel with a crank and windlass in a room at one side, on the ground.
The carts then in use had but two wheels. They were drawn into the building, the ropes were let down, and the hooks were caught into the cart wheels. Then by turning the crank of the windlass the load was raised to the shaft at the top of the building. Two hooks from the scale balance were secured to the wheels, then the ropes were thrown off and by movable weights, like those used on steelyards, the load was weighed.
On the corner south of the Kirby house there was formerly a building used as a liquor saloon.
The following letter, written by Mr. Atwater and addressed to Mr. F. L. Wilcox, gives further information of interest concerning the ancient tavern :*
December 31st, 1904.
Hon. F. L. Wilcox :
DEAR SIR: In response to your request I have outlined below a few points concerning the Masonic chart which is in my house on Berlin street and which may be of interest to you at this time. The house, as you know, was built in 1769, and some twenty years ago upon removing the paper from the east room upstairs we discovered painted upon the plastering of the east side of the room the chart referred to. Although not a Mason myself I am told that this shows various degrees from the Lodge to the Commandery. Two brazen pillars surmounted by the arch and keystone of the chapter are con- spicuous in the center, and from the keystone hangs, suspended by a ribbon, the letter G, while in the foreground are represented three persons clothed in royal robes, one under the center of the arch and
* See also The Hartford Courant for June 21, 1914.
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one at each pillar. Surounding the arch and columns are repre- sented numerous Masonic symbols, the Templar star with its nine points and passion cross entwined with a serpent; cross, pens with three crowns representing three kings; the ark and dove, the Jewish tabernacle and many others. The wonder is that this chart should have been so completely lost to memory these last sixty or seventy years. Good authorities suppose it to have belonged to Harmony Lodge, No. 20, of New Britain, which formerly held their meetings there. This lodge was first located in Berlin under the name of Berlin Lodge, No. 20, and was organized in 1791, two years after the grand lodge of Connecticut was established. The house was a tavern and relay house of the Boston and New York line of stage coaches.
The room in which is now the chart spoken of was first a part of the dance room of the tavern, running across the house from east to west. It afterwards changed hands and was converted into the Masonic lodge room spoken of and the house with its surroundings was known for many years as the Kirby place, which bears an addi- tional historic interest as it is mentioned in the diary of George Washington which diary is now in the possession of Mr. James F. Joy of Detroit, Michigan, and in which he writes under date of Tuesday, November 10th, 1789, as follows :
"Left Hartford about seven o'clock and took the middle road (instead of the one through Middletown which I went) breakfasted at Worthington, in the township of Berlin, at the house of one Fuller, bated at Smith's on the plain of Wallingford, thirteen from Fuller's which is the distance Fuller's is from Hartford and got into New Haven which is thirteen miles more, about half on hour before sundown. At this place I met Mr Geary in the stage from New York and he gave me the first certain account of the health of Mrs. Washington."
A gentleman of Hartford, prominent in the Order, states that from 1797 to 1800 the lodge had Dr. James G. Percival for master. He was the father of James G. Percival, Jr., the poet, linguist and geologist. A more complete description of the early history of Harmony Lodge was given by the late Hon. Robert J. Vance in his Centennial address, before that order in 1891 and which is shown on the records of the above lodge in New Britain. Trusting this information will be of interest to you, I remain
Yours truly,
BRYAN H. ATWATER.
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When Amos Kirby was landlord of the Fuller tavern, he and his guests were within easy call of a physician. Dr. Wil- liam M. Hand lived across the street, in the house now owned by Mrs. B. K. Field. He had an office in the south yard, near the well. This little office building was moved up north, onto the Levi Deming farm, and clever, old black Lindy, sister of Charles Stocker, lived in it for a time. Afterwards it was moved up to Twenty Rod, where it was burned.
A medical treatise, entitled, "The House Surgeon and Phy- sician," published in 1818, was highly valued in our old families. It was always called "Dr. Hand's Book," although his name did not appear in it. A much-thumbed copy, for- merly owned by Mr. Reuben North, shows that it was well studied. One day, Mrs. North had the misfortune, in yawning, to dislocate her jaw. She was unable to close her mouth or to speak a word, and she was two miles from a physician. She found in "Dr. Hand" the directions for treatment in case of "Dislocation of the Lower Jaw," which read as follows :
Set the patient on a low stool, so that an assistant may hold the head firm by pressing it against his breast. The operator is then to thrust his thumbs (being first secured by wrapping them in leather or linen cloth, so that they may not slip,) as far back into the patient's mouth as he can, while his fingers are applied to the jaw externally. After he has got firm hold of the jaw, he is to press it firmly downward and backwards, by which means the elapsed heads of the jaw may be easily pushed into the former sockets.
Mrs. North carried the book to her husband and pointed to the directions, which he followed and made a successful opera- tion. A tribute to a discreet wife. Some wives would have been allowed to remain speechless-at least until a doctor could be called.
Dr. Hand was succeeded by Dr. Josiah M. Ward.
William Bulkeley remembers hearing that Dr. Hand, or Dr. Ward, he is not sure which,* was called down to Westfield to visit a sick person, who lived opposite the church. He found his patient so dangerously ill that he decided to remain
* It appears later that it must have been Dr. Ward.
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all night. To pass away the time he went out and sat on the stone steps of the church, where he took a cold that caused his death.
Dr. Josiah M. Ward and Son.
One of the first names placed on the list prepared of those to be invited to Berlin's Old Home Day celebration, last Sep- tember, was that of Alexander M. Ward, son of the faithful family physician, Josiah M. Ward.
Your correspondent* had the pleasure last week of a morn- ing's visit with Mr. Ward, at his home in New Haven.
So far as known, Mr. Ward has the distinction of being the . next oldest living person born in Berlin. He will celebrate his ninetieth birthday next year (1907), and the doctor tells him that he is good for a hundred.
Mr. Ward is in possession of all his faculties and in a race would distance most men twenty years his junior. He said I might tell you that, with the exception of a little rheumatism in one arm and shoulder, he had not felt a pain or an ache for thirteen years. He attributes the good time he is now having to an experience of his boyhood. He was sick and it was feared that he was going into consumption.
Captain Norman Peck, who was a brother of Mrs. Ward, used to carry cargoes of American goods to Scotland, and then on his return he would bring a load of Scotchmen over to this country. One day when he called to say "Good bye" to his sister, he saw young Alexander, as he lay in his mother's bed. The captain said: "Give me that boy and I will cure him. I will take him to Scotland and bring him home well."
The mother gave her consent, and asked what clothing she should provide-he had not a stitch of wool about him unless it might be a pair of trousers. His uncle said, "Do not get anything, I will see that he has an outfit when we reach New York." And so his mother wrapped a great camlet cloak with a cape about her child, and off he was carried in that rig.
* That is, Miss North.
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The first night in New York the boy was put onto the ship, where sloops, filled with rocks, were coming alongside. The rocks were for ballast, and were thrown on deck. Alexander, just out of his mother's bed, was set to throwing them down into the hold. The next he knew they had weighed anchor, and were off for Charleston, where they were to take on a cargo of cotton. He said, "Where are my clothes ?" "I declare," said the captain, "I forgot all about them. Well, we'll get some in Scotland." One of the seamen gave him a vest, that came well down over his body, and finally another gave him a woolen jumper, so that he was made fairly comfortable.
At Charleston, the vessel was ladened to its fullest capacity with bales of cotton. One bale was left out in a certain spot to make a place where Alec and another boy could sleep, but there was not room for both there at the same time, unless they lay spoon fashion.
On the return voyage, as the vessel neared New York harbor, and the city was in full view, Alexander said to himself, "I have not done a single smart thing that I can tell the boys at home about. At that moment his eye caught sight of his country's flag floating from the royal mast. The very thing! Up aloft he climbed, shinned the flag pole, sat on the truck and folded his arms, the ship under full sail. He said, "It makes me shiver to-day to think of it."
Can you see the rugged sailor boy, who, a few days later, skipped up the bank, across the way from Kirby's tavern, clasped his arms around the neck of Mrs. Ward and called her "mother ?" No camlet cloak for him now! He tipped the scales at a hundred and sixty-five. What life more noble, more self-sacrificing than that of a country doctor ? He, his wife and his children hold a place in the hearts of the people, equaled only by that of a faithful minister and his family. It would be a pity should the names and good deeds of our Berlin physicians be forgotten.
In 1825, the spotted fever, which for several years was prevalent in New England, raged in Berlin so that it came to be called "the Berlin fever." One story was that the disease
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was brought from the South, by one of the young men who had been there peddling goods. The day after his return he played a game of ball with the Berlin boys, and the next day he was dead of the fever. Others said it was caused by the clogging of Spruce Brook. At that time Mr. Josiah Wilcox, who for many years manufactured tinners' tools at North Greenwich, Conn., was an apprentice with J. & E. North at East Berlin. Shortly before his death, in 1883, he passed over Stoney Swamp road, on his way to East Berlin, and noticed that the meadows were overflowed. He said, "If your people do not clean out the bed of that stream, you will have sickness here," and then he went on to tell of that fearful typhus epidemic, which he said was caused by stagnant water on those flats.
Dr. Josiah M. Ward was then in his prime, and he had sixty cases of the typhoid on his hands. Day and night he rode and visited his patients until he was so exhausted that he would sleep anywhere, even on horseback. Parson Graves and his family in Westfield were all down with the fever, and it was while in attendance there that Dr. Ward fell asleep on the steps of the church opposite the house. He awoke in a chill-the precursor of the fever, from which in his worn condition he could not rally. He died August 25, 1823, at the age of forty- three. Mrs. Ward and three of their children took the fever. One morning the clock struck eight and the children did not come down to breakfast. Diadema, a half sister, went to the chamber and said, "It is late, you must get up." She lifted the little Samuel, four years old, and carried him down the stairs, in her arms. On the way he spat on the floor, and Diadema reproved him. The children were never allowed to do such a thing as that in the house.
In was the beginning of the sickness. In twenty-four hours the child was dead. Mary was sick two days and died. Laura's fever ran two or three weeks and she recovered. The mother was restored to health after a second attack of the disease.
During the epidemic many heads of families were stricken. Among the victims were Blakeslee Barnes, the first Mrs. Free-
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dom Hart, and the wife of Colonel Richard Wilcox. The patients would call for "water, water!" but not a drop was allowed them.
William Bulkeley remembers hearing that the "Street" was strewed with tan bark in order to deaden the sound of the wagon wheels, and that the hearse was not put up in its place at all so steady was it in use.
Mr. Ward said that when his father knew that he could not live he called his wife to sit beside him and gave her directions about their business affairs.
It was not customary in the schools of Mrs. Ward's genera- tion to teach arithmetic to the girls. Dr. Ward advised her to go to some good arithmetician and learn to keep accounts. Diadema Ward attended school in Hartford and taught there out on the hill. She learned to paint in oils, and had classes in painting.
In August, 1839, Louis Daguerre first made known the details of the process discovered by him of producing permanent pictures by the action of light on a sensitive surface. Morse, the American electrician, discoverer of the magnetic telegraph, was also an artist. While abroad he heard of Daguerre's inven- tion, visited him, and learned the process, which on his return to New York, he imparted to a class of young men. Diadema Ward read accounts, in the New York papers, of the interest excited in the new, lovely, soft pictures. She wrote to her brother Alexander about it and said she thought the business might be a good one for him. He took her advice, went to New York, saw Mr. Morse, joined that class and was one of the first six in America who learned to take daguerrotypes. He ordered a machine, brought it to Berlin, set it up at home in the south chamber over the kitchen and practiced on his mother. She did not like to sit for him and would make up faces, but he still has a fine likeness of her, made at that time. William Sage made cases for the pictures.
Mr. Ward had an uncle, who lived in Newburg, N. Y. This uncle wrote to him that no one there had seen the new pictures, and if he would come there he would have all the business he
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could attend to. Accordingly he went to Newburg where he was rushed with work. His plates, made in Waterbury, were heavy and not very sensitive. He spoiled so many that he had to sit up all night scouring and cleaning them. After a while he returned to Berlin and hired a room for a studio in the house north of the old church. He took one picture there for which he received five dollars.
For success, it was necessary to sit perfectly still for five minutes, at least it seemed five minutes, without as much as winking. The head was secured by an instrument resembling a pair of tongs, and children were scared almost to death when placed in the chair. Even their parents wore an expression so serious, so funereal as to seem ludicrous to this generation. Materials were costly and Mr. Ward found that his receipts were not sufficient to cover expenses. In 1844 he went to the West Indies. There in Barbadoes he sold his machine. He said he showed the purchaser how to use it, but never heard what success he had.
Mr. Ward had much interesting information to give relating to the days of his boyhood.
The wife of Landlord Kirby was an Atwood. She was well educated and was a violinist. She used to play for all the dances at her hotel.
Allen North, who lived on the Jarvis corner, used to come out every summer night, after his work was done, and sit on the bank and play his violin. The boy Alexander would go out to listen and he said he thought it was lovely music. Mrs. Ward sold the doctor's office for just what it cost to build an arbor over the well, that was in it.
The Bolderos made a friend of young Alexander and employed him to bring in wood, etc. Mr. Boldero always kept a supply of half cents on hand so that he might make exact change. Mr. Ward said he often cited Mrs. Boldero to the young ladies of his acquaintance, as an example of the proper way of lifting a dress skirt. He said when they had to cross a muddy street, they would catch up one side, and let the other side drag in the dirt. When Mrs. Boldero started for church
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she laid one hand in her husband's arm; with the other she reached back to the center of her skirt and gave it a little twist; then she would lift it in such a way that it escaped the ground entirely. That was London style.
When Mr. Boldero died, a worthy neighbor, who had lived within a stone's throw nigh on to forty years, ventured to attend the funeral. Mrs. Boldero noticed her, and said, "Who is that woman ?" When told, she said, "I do not know her; it annoys me to have her here."
Mr. Ward remembers the flourishing debating society formed in connection with Worthington Academy. He spoke especially of Edward Dunbar, born in Berlin, a son of Esquire Daniel Dunbar, who lived in the house now owned by Mrs. Hopkins. Edward Dunbar showed his intellect by his powerful arguments in the meetings of that debating club. He went to New York, where he became a bank note engraver, then he published a commercial paper, and was the originator of Bradstreet's Com- mercial Rating Agency.
In 1802, Abel Hollister, George Hubbard, Jesse Heart, and Leonard Sage were appointed a committee to "Sell the Brick School House and Land adjoining Belonging to ye old South west District, in Berlin, Worthington."
A deed, dated June 10, 1802, shows that the said committee, for the consideration of two hundred dollars, conveyed the property to Jonathan Sage. Roger Riley and Elisha Cheney witnessed the deed. This schoolhouse stood close on the corner, south of the Dr. Hand place, on property now owned by C. M. Jarvis. The building was fitted up for a tenement.
Miss Julia Brandegee remembers that once upon a time a woman lived there who had a daughter called "Crazy Lois," and that the children used to take a bee line from the south school to see "Crazy Lois," who would come to the door and scare and chase them.
Another well-remembered tenant was Trout Wright, who was a typical, old time, bloated drunkard, and his wife was
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a good second, but she was industrious and earned a living by going out washing at fifty cents a day. She used to carry a bottle of "tea" in her bag, to keep up her strength. Trout gained his nickname in this way: He was fond of fishing, and one day when he had caught a fine trout, he was heard to say, "Trout, you are Captain Trout's trout now." He used to say that a pint of rum would go farther in his family than a dollar's worth of flour.
The couple were clever and peaceful when sober, but they quarrelled with each other when they were having sprees. He would get her down and beat her until he was tired. Then he would wait and say "Enough! 'nough! say 'nough and I'll stop!" If she refused to speak he would go on beating her again until she cried "Enough."
At these times the boys delighted to tease them by such tricks as throwing dead kittens in at the window. They would retali- ate by throwing hot water at the boys, and Trout would rush out brandishing an axe, with threats to kill them. They were not at all afraid of him he was so weak and tottlish.
Poor Trout ! At last he had delirium tremens. He was seen in the Brandegee orchard trying to run up the trees to escape the devil, who he said was after him. He went over to East. Berlin to get away from his tormentor. It was a Sunday. He went into the factory of F. Roys and B. Savage to hide, and squeezed himself back of a boiler where, after church, he was discovered by his screams. Mr. Roys pulled him out and told him to go home, get into a feather bed, and nothing would hurt him.
The old schoolhouse was used at one time by the father of Philip North as a stoncutter's shop," and when, about twenty- five years ago, John Thompson built the house that Mr. Jarvis recently moved farther west, he pulled the building down.
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