Genealogical and personal memoirs relating to the families of the state of Massachusetts, Volume I, Part 120

Author: Cutter, William Richard, 1847-1918, ed; Adams, William Frederick, 1848-
Publication date: 1910
Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company
Number of Pages: 924

USA > Massachusetts > Genealogical and personal memoirs relating to the families of the state of Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 120

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(V) Colonel Benjamin Franklin Baldwin, son of Loammi, born at Woburn, Decem- ber 15, 1777, died suddenly October II, 1821, aged forty-three, while on his return from the cattle show in Brighton ; married, May 1, 1808, Mary Carter Brewster, born September II, 1784. died June 18, 1874, daughter of Benja- min and Mary Carter (Brewster) Coolidge. He carried on the business of a yeoman, and left his widow a handsome estate. She after- wards married Wyman Richardson, Esq., and still later Burrage Yale, and spent the last of her life with her children at Pomfret, Connec- ticut. Benjamin Franklin Baldwin held the office of captain in the militia from 1800 to 1805, of major from 1807 to 1811, and of lieu- tenant-colonel of the local regiment from ISII to 1816. Rolls of his company of date 1802 are extant. It is said that in addition of his other pursuits he devoted himself to the busi- ness of civil engineering, and assisted his brother in the construction of the milldan across the Back Bay in Boston, and in other works. Children : 1. Mary Brewster, born March 26, 1809, died December 28, 1817. 2. Clarissa, born November 29, 1810, died July 15, 1813. 3. Loammi, born April 25, 1813 ; see forward. 4. Mary Brewster, born January 16, 1815, died October 23, 1854; married, Decen- ber 28, 1836, Professor Roswell Park. Pro- fessor Roswell Park, of the University of Pennsylvania, later entered the ministry and

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became Rev. Roswell Park, D. D .; born Octo- ber I, 1807, died July 16, 1869. 5. Clarissa Coolidge, born December 1, 1819, died January 22. 1900; married, May 16, 1843, Dr. Lewis Williams.

Loammi, born April 25, 1813, died March I, 1855; married, March 2, 1847, Helen Eliza Avery. Their children were: I. Mary Emily, born January 31, 1848; married, September 25. 1872, Darius Mathewson ; son, George Bald- win, born June, 1881, died May, 1882. 2. Loammi Franklin, born November 6, 1849; married, September II, 1873, Kate Wyman Richardson ; children : Clara Richardson, born September 1, 1874: Mary Brewster, born Sep- tember 17, 1875: James Rumford, born De- cember 19, 1880.

Clarissa Coolidge ( Baldwin ) and Dr. Lewis William had no children.

Children of Mary Brewster ( Baldwin) and Roswell Park: I. Mary, born March 4, 1839. 2. Clara, born January 12, 1845, died Decem- ber 21, 1845. 3. Helen, born April 13, 1848, died October 14, 1855. 4. Roswell, born March 4. 1852; married, June 1, 1880, Martha Pru- dence Durkee, who died November 14, 1899; children : Roswell, born August 12. 1885; Julian Durkee, born November 6, 1888. 5. Bald- win, born October 14, 1854, died October 19, 1855.

(V) Loammi (2) Baldwin, son of Loammi ( I ) . was born at North Woburn, May 16, 1780, and died June 30, 1838, intombed at Woburn. He was fitted for college at Westford Academy, and graduated from Harvard College in 1800. His early inclinations were towards mechanical subjects, to which very little attention was paid in the learned education of that time ; and during his college life he made with his own hands a clock which kept good time and was the wonder and admiration of his class. He was put down as No. 9 in a list for "an exhibi- tion in mechanics." In 1806 he was vice-presi- dent of the Phi Beta Kappa. In 1799 his father wrote to his friend Count Rumford, then residing in London, that "I have a son at college, whose genius inclines him strongly to cultivate the arts. I have therefore thought whether it would not be best to en- deavor to provide him with a place for a year or two with some gentleman in the mathe- matical line of business in Europe, who is actually in the occupation of making and vend- ing mathematical and optical instruments. It may be that you know of some good place.

He is very lively, ready and enter-

prising. Count Rumford wrote a reply ex- plaining the situation very fully, but he said that "no instrument maker or dealer in such would, without a very large premium, under- take to instruct a young gentleman in the course of two or three years, and make him perfect in both branches of the trade."

This scheme, however, was not followed any further. Upon graduating from college he entered the law office of Timothy Bigelow, at Groton. Here he constructed a fire-engine, of which the town stood in great need; and the small machine was still in active service a short time ago. He completed his studies at Groton, and opened an office in Cambridge in 1804, and in 1807, having abandoned the prac- tice of the law for engineering, he went to England for the purpose of examining the various public works of that country. He in- tended at that time to visit the continent, but was prevented by the difficulty of reaching France. On his return he opened an office in Charlestown and began the life for which he was so admirably fitted. One of the earliest works upon which he was engaged was the construction of Fort Strong, in 1814, during the war, one of the strong forts erected for defense against the British in Boston Harbor. He was chief engineer with the rank of col- onel, at this time a title which has sometimes con founded him with his father, who bore that rank in the army of the revolution. In 1819 he was appointed engineer to complete the undertaking of building the Milldam, or West- ern avenue, now the extension of Beacon street, Boston, beyond the Common. From 1817 to 1820 he was engaged upon various works of internal improvement in Virginia. In 1821 he was appointed engineer of the Union Canal in Pennsylvania. An elaborate description of this work was prepared in 1830 by W. Milnor Roberts.

In 1824 Mr. Baldwin went to Europe and remained there a year, mostly in France, de- voted to a careful examination of the import- ant public works in that country. He went also to Antwerp to inspect the docks there, and at this time he laid the foundation of the larg- est and best professional library of engineering works that was to be found in America,-to which he added, until at his death it had cost nearly eight thousand dollars.

In 1825 he was associate with the projectors of the Bunker Hill monument. He recom- mended the obelisk now seen there, two hun- dred and twenty feet high, etc. His original

.Loammi Franklin now resides with his family in the old Baldwin mansion at North Woburn.

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report is preserved among the papers of the monument association.

Among the early projects in the neighbor- hood of Boston with which he was connected were the Salem Mildam corporation, 1826, and the project of connecting Boston with the Hud- son river by a canal, but the day for canals was passing away, and in 1827 he was appointed by the governor of Massachusetts to procure sur- veys and estimates for a railroad from Boston to the Hudson river. This work, however, was put into the hands of his brother James, as Loammi had at that time accepted an appoint- ment from the United States government which led to the two great works of his life,-the naval dry docks at Charlestown and at Nor- folk. These two structures were in process of building from 1827 to 1834, and were carried on both at the same time and with the crude appliances of that day. The first when finished was in all 306 feet long, thirty feet deep and thirty feet wide. The depth of water at high tide was twenty-five feet, and the rise and fall of tide eleven feet. The surface of the site was about nine feet below ordinary high tide. The cost was $677,090.

The Norfolk dock was a similar structure, but of greater cost, owing to the extra price of stone and labor, both of which were sent from the North. Mr. Baldwin's salary on this work was fixed by himself at $4,000 a year. with additional allowance for travel and expense of living when away from home. His time was spent between the two docks, the summers at Charlestown and the winters in Norfolk, his leading assistant alternating with him at those two places.

In addition to this work he was consulting engineer on other important works connected with the general government-the Dismal Swamp Canal, the survey for which was made through an almost impenetrable swamp, but Congress was unwilling to carry it out in his day. In 1834 he made an elaborate report upon introducing pure water into the city of Boston, which was published. He also had considerable to do with water power in Maine, and also with a canal in Georgia, but the latter was never completed.

Mr. Baldwin was independent and positive in his professional opinions, and dared even to differ to his face with the aggressive General Andrew Jackson, then president of the United States. The general at their last interview at first received him with politeness; but the bridge (the General's pet scheme, as was natural), came up as the great thing in the

mind of the President, and he said : "By the bye, Mr. Baldwin, I have read your report on the bridge ; and, by the Eternal, you are all wrong, I have built and have seen built many bridges ; and I know that the plan is a good one, and that the bridge will stand." "General Jackson," quietly replied Mr. Baldwin, "in all pontoon or temporary bridge-work for military purposes, I should always yield to your good jadgment, and should not venture to call it in question : you must remember that this bridge should be built as a permanent structure, and should stand for all coming time. And I yield in such matters to no one, when I have applied scientific principles to my investigations and am sure of my conclusions. Good morning. Gen- eral Jackson." It is hardly necessary to say that the appropriation was not made, and that the pet bridge was never built, much to the chagrin of the President, but to the quiet satis- faction of Mr. Baldwin.

In addition to the numerous works already referred to, Mr. Baldwin was connected in re- gard to many others, from a dam at Augusta, Maine, to a marine railway at Pensacola, from the construction of buildings at Harvard Col- lege, to a canal around the falls of the Ohio river, from a stone bridge called the Warren Bridge at Charlestown to the Harrisburg Canal in Pennsylvania. His skill was in demand, and that, too, in a very active manner in a great majority of the internal improvements. undertaken at that formative period in the United States.

He was also noted as an author. His manu- script reports were always drawn up in his own neat, uniform and compact handwriting. He published in 1809 a pamphlet of seventy pages entitled, "Thoughts on the Study of Political Economy as connected with the Popu- lation, Industry, and Paper Currency of the. United States." A large number of printed reports on engineering enterprises are listed in the catalogue of his special library on that and co-ordinate subjects, given by his niece .. Mrs. Griffith, to the Public Library in Woburn, several years ago. He is said to have written an account of the Middlesex Canal, and also a memoir of his father's friend, Count Rumford, but neither of these papers are in the above collection. His reports were prepared with the greatest care, and were models for style and remarkable for the exact and proper nse- of words. In 1835 he was a member of the executive council of the Commonwealth, and in 1836 a presidential elector.

But there is little more to say. In person

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Loammí Baldwin (2nd) eminent for his services as a civil engineer.

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he was over six feet in height, and superbly built. His face presented a rare combination of intelligence, manliness and dignity. He was a thorough gentleman in his manner and his intercourse with others. He detested sham and pretense in everything and everybody ; was liberal in his mode of life, and hospitable in his home. To his work he gave his whole strength. Fine portraits and a bust of him remain to give posterity an idea of his noble personal appearance. About a year before he died he had a stroke of paralysis; a second attack proved fatal. He died, as before stated, at Charlestown, Massachusetts, June 30, 1838, at the age of fifty-eight.

Mr. Baldwin was twice married; first to Ann, daughter of George Williams, of Salem. She was sister of Samuel Williams, an emin- ent American banker in London ; second, June 22. 1828, to Catherine, widow of Captain Thomas Beckford, of Charlestown. She died May 3, 1864. Child by first marriage: Sam- uel Williams Baldwin, born 1817; died De- cember 28, 1822. aged five years.

The compiler is indebted for facts for this sketch to such authorities as Vose, Felton, and others.

(\') James Fowle Baldwin, son of Loammi (1). born at Woburn, April 29, 1782, died at Boston, May 20, 1862, aged eighty ; married. July 28. 1818, Sarah Parsons, daughter of Samuel ( Yale College, 1779) and Sarah ( Par- sons ) Pitkin, of East Hartford, Connecticut. James was the fourth son of his father, and received his early education in the schools of his native town and in the academies at Biller- ica and Westford. About 1800 he was in Bos- ton acquiring a mercantile education, in which city he was afterwards established as a mer- chant ; but the influence of his early association with the engineering faculties of the older members of his own family turned his atten- tion in that direction. Ile joined his brother Loammi in the construction of the dry dock at Charlestown Navy Yard. In 1828. he, with two others, were appointed commissioners to make the survey for a railroad to the western part of the state, this being then a new and un- tried enterprise, and the survey was made from Boston to Albany. Upon this work he was en- gaged for more than two years. It was not prosecuted at the time, but subsequently the Western railroad, so called, was built upon the location selected by him and his plans were generally adopted. He always looked upon this, next to the introduction of pure water into Boston, as the most important of his profes-

sional works. In 1832 he began the location of the Boston & Lowell railroad, which was constructed under his superintendence. He was also employed on engineering lines by the Ware Manufacturing company, the Thames company of Norwich, Connecticut, and the proprietors of the locks and canals at Lowell. He also determined the relative amount of water power used by the mills of the different companies at Lowell.

In 1825 the subject of the water supply of Boston attracted the attention of the authori- ties, and an investigation of the sources for a pure supply was made, and in 1837 he was appointed on a commission to inquire still fur- ther into the matter. He dissented from the majority in the recommendation of Spot and Mystic ponds, and recommended Long Pond (Lake Cochituate ). Others high in authority differed from his conclusion, but still he was immovable in adherence to his recommenda- tion, in spite of rejection by popular vote, to which it had been submitted, and it was not renewed till 1844, when he was again in a posi- tion of influence on the commission. His plan was, however, adopted March 30, 1846; the ground was broken five months after, and on October 25, 1848, he had the pleasure of seeing his plan, so long resisted, finally triumphant, and the public fountain playing for the first time in the presence of a large concourse of people. He was for several years a senator from Suffolk in the Massachusetts general court, and the first president of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers.

The Boston Daily Advertiser, in a notice of him at the time of his death says, "He was of a kindly and benevolent disposition, affable in his manners, warm and unfaltering in his attachment to his friends. His sense of justice and his fair appreciation of the rights of others showed to great advantage in many of his public works."

.A memoir of Hon. James Fowle Baldwin, by Dr. Usher Parsons, was published in 1865. From his memoir are gleaned the following tributes :

"Ile was a gentleman of highly respectable attainments, and surpassed by none as a scien- tific and practical engineer. He was employed by the State to superintend the construction of its gigantic public works. He was a prominent member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and during many years held the position in that learned society in the section of Technology and Civil Engineering." Upon his decease a brief sketch of his life and public

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services was presented and read before that society, and soon after published in its Trans- actions.

Hon. James F. Baldwin had the care of the affairs of Count Rumford's daughter, the Countess Rumford a great part of her life, and she at her decease left him a generous bequest. "It may be fairly claimed that the city of Bos- ton is pre-eminently indebted to the forecast, firmness, and professional skill of Mr. Baldwin for the present abundant and constant supply of pure water from Cochituate." Instead of three millions of gallons daily for the first ten years, the amount was actually fifteen millions of gallons during that period.

"Mr. Baldwin was of commanding presence, being considerably about six feet in stature, and remarkably well proportioned." His mind was clear, but not rapid in its operation. He came to his conclusions by successive steps, carefully taken and closely examined ; but the results once reached, his confidence in them was rarely shaken. Confidence in his integrity enabled him to settle questions of the transfer of property with a facility that was surprising, especially with those persons who had not the clearest conviction of the invariable upright- ness of corporate bodies in their dealings with individuals. He endeavored to encourage and assist young students who were pursuing the study of civil engineering. and the number were many who remembered him with affec- tion and veneration.

He was especially the friend and protector of the orphans. His last illness was of short duration. Returning from a walk on the day of his death, he complained of indisposition, and speaking a few words to his wife, he soon expired.

(V) Clarissa Bal 'win, daughter of Loammi (I), born at Woburn, December 31. 1791. died there May 27, 1841. aged forty-nine : married, January 20, 1812, Thomas Brewster Coolidge, of Hallowell, born December 8. 1785, son of Benjamin and Mary Carter ( Brewster ) Cool- idge. of Boston and Woburn. Children : I. Benjamin. born at Hallowell, Maine, Novem- ber 10. 1812, died at Lawrence, Massachusetts, August 25. 1871: married, October 1, 1844, Mary White, born at Medford, Massachusetts, January 14, 1810, died at Lawrence, April II, 1883. daughter of Jonas and Mary (Wright) Manning, of Woburn. Two children: Bald- win, born at Woburn, July 7, 1845 ; see for- ward. Brewster, born November 10, 1848, died at Lawrence, June 21, 1853. 2. Thomas

Brewster, born at Hallowell, May 3, 1815, died at Woburn, unmarried, February 18, 1895.

Baldwin Coolidge, son of Benjamin Coolidge, and grandson of Clarissa Baldwin (5), was born at Woburn, July 7, 1845 ; was married, at Lawrence, February 7, 1866, to Lucy, born at Newburyport, Masachusetts, November 24, 1844, died at Woburn, August 13, 1904, daugh- ter of Nathan Thomas and Hannah ( Noyes) Plumer, of Newburyport ; was a soldier in the Sixth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Mili- tia, campaign of 1864, in the civil war .* He was band boy at the funeral of the first soldier killed in the civil war, viz .: Sumner Henry Needham, who was killed in the fight at Balti- more, April 19, 1861. Mr. Coolidge was the first city engineer of Lawrence, Massachusetts, and having inherited the Baldwin scientific ingenuity and versatility of mind, he has be- come distinguished by his mechanical feats in photography, and for the artistic excellence and number of his productions in that line of work.

(V) George Rumford Baldwin, son of Col- onel Loammi ( I), was born in the Baldwin mansion at North Woburn, January 26, 1798, and died there October 11, 1888, "having de- voted his lengthened life, with the full posses- sion of his facilties till its close, to the pursuits of practical science, as a surveyor, a civil engi- neer, and a constructor." The lands of the original Henry Baldwin held by his descendant George R. Baldwin at the time of his death in 1888, included between five and six hundred acres. The mansion is one of the noteworthy survivals of our earliest times in size, arrange- ment. adornment, and in its well-preserved relics. Within it are to be found implements. household utensils, paintings, ornaments, and sundry furnishings, with luxurious appliances, gathered by the generations which have occu- pied it from birth to death. Piles of trunks and boxes contain their private papers and settlements of estates. Most interesting among its contents is a large, select, and valuable library of many thousand volumes, collected principally by the father and brothers of George R. Baldwin and by himself. giving evidence of their scientific and literary tastes. Learned tomes in many languages, costly ilustrated works, series of scientific publications on con- struction and engineering, and sumptuous edi- tions of the best writers in various departments of literature, are among its treasures. The

*The Sixth Regiment went to the front three times- in 1861, 1862, and 1864, being the call regi- ment.

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house and its contents is a memorial of one of the oldest and most distinguished families of its citizens.

His father was the earliest civil engineer in this state, and on the projection of the first of our public enterprises for more extended inter- nal communication the connection of the waters of the Merrimack with those of the harbor by the Midlesex Canal, chartered in 1793, the father of George R. Baldwin was one of its leading promotors. Its course lay through his own estate, the several hundred acres belong- ing later to George R. Baldwin, and it was completed in 1803. Of this then signal enter- prise the father was surveyor, engineer, and constructor under the supervision of an Eng- lish engineer, Weston by name, who was then a resident of Philadelphia. The canal served its uses until superseded by the Lowell rail- road. It is necessary to know these facts in order to gain a background for the after career of the son, George Rumford Baldwin. He early found opportunity for the exercise of the family ingenuity by engaging in the profession of work of the older members of the family.

He was the son of his father's second wife. His middle name recalled the friendly and intimate relations which existed between his father and the distinguished Count Rumford. When the friend had attained rank and title at Munich, a correspondence began between the two which is of great personal and his- torical interest. In a letter following the birth of George Rumford Baldwin, the father writes to the Count. "I have had a son born to me to whom I have given your name." The father wished this boy, as he grew up, to enter Har- vard College, but the son was disinclined to scholarship in that institution as its standard then was, and from his earliest years his bent was for mathematical and scientific studies. pursued by himself, and for practical out-of- door work in waterways, surveying and en- gineering, in the examination of mills and water-power, dams and raceways. He, as we have already noticed, had marked facilities for practice of this sort, with preliminary train- ing in a school kept by Dr. Stearns in Medford, and by accompanying his father and brother in field and office work. In his fourteenth vear he made some sketches of the fortifica- tions of Boston harbor in the war of 1812, of which his brother Loammi Baldwin was the chief engineer.

A series of his diaries for more than fifty years contain daily entries of his employments and occupations. He lived a life of marvellous

industry, of wide travel, and useful service. He was called upon as expert witness, referee or examiner in many ways, at a period when the development of our railroads and manu- facturing enterprises made a demand for talent and skill. He helped form the first associated company of engineers. He was naturally shy, modest, diffident, and reticent, of most retiring and undemonstrative ways, therefore when called upon for any utterance in public before many persons it was for him a serious strain. His social intercourse was limited, and under no circumstances could he have made a speech in public of advocacy or argument. The follow- ing were some of his early engagements : 1821, built P. C. Brook's stone bridge ; 1822-1823, in Pennsylvania with his brother; 1823-25, at factories in Lowell; 1826, surveyed Charles- town Navy Yard; executed Marine Railway : 1831-33. in England ; 1833-34, on Lowell rail- road : 1834-36, in Nova Scotia ; 1837, in Geor- gia, on Brunswick Canal. In 1845 he was chief engineer on the route of the Buffalo and Missis- sippi railroad. In 1846 he was employed on the examination of the water power of Au- gusta, Georgia, and by the national government on the Dry Docks in Washington and Brook- lyn. In 1847 he was summoned to Quebec to engage on a professional task which occupied him till he completed it in 1856. This was the introduction of water into the city. He was in full superintendence, under the mayor and a water board. In the course of the work he sailed with his family to Europe to superintend the casting of the pipes, gates, etc., and to arrange for their shipment.

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Genealogical and personal memoirs relating to the families of the state of Massachusetts, Volume I, Part 120

Author: Cutter, William Richard, 1847-1918, ed; Adams, William Frederick, 1848- Publication date: 1910 Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company Number of Pages: 924

Author: Cutter, William Richard, 1847-1918, ed; Adams, William Frederick, 1848-
Publication date: 1910
Publisher: New York, Lewis historical publishing company
Number of Pages: 924