USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Historic homes and places and genealogical and personal memoirs relating to the families of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 17
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(XI) Cyrus Baldwin, son of James (9), born at Woburn, November 5, 1740, was drowned at Dunstable, November 5, 1790; married Ruth Wilson, of Bedford, and died without issue. His wife was perhaps Ruth, born October 6, 1745, daughter of James and Lydia Wilson, of Bedford. Samuel Thomp- son, Esquire, of Woburn, wrote in his diary, under date of November 5, 1790: "Fair. Cy- rus Baldwin, Esquire, drowned at Dunstable," and on Sunday, November 7, following, he recorded the item : "Cyrus Baldwin, Esquire's, corpse brought to Woburn"; and on Novem- ber Io, he wrote: "Very cold. Came home from Salem. Cyrus Baldwin buried."
Cyrus Baldwin was taxed in the West List, Woburn, 1776, and received his proportion of a war assessment which he had paid before 1777. He lived for a time during the Revolu- tionary War in Boston, and was first lieuten- ant of the Eighth Ward company in Colonel Henry Bromfield's (Boston) militia regiment, and commissioned such, November 25, 1776. In the dignified manner of the newspapers of that day, the following is the only public men- tion of his death : "Died-At Dunstable, Cyrus Baldwin, Esq., formerly of this town."-Co- lumbian Centinel, Boston, November 24, 1790.
*Captain Samuel (4) Baldwin (Samuel 3, Henry 2, Henry 1) wrote a narrative in his eighty-second year, which possesses considerable interest. He mentioned his marriage to Millicent Cutler, the daughter of Cap- tain Ebenezer Cutler, of Lincoln, and the names of their children. He removed from Weston to North- bridge in 1766, and thence to Windsor, Berkshire county, Massachusetts .- Letter of Mrs. Mercy (Bald- win) Howard, July 22, 1907.
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The "Varnum Genealogy," p. 68, shows that Elizabeth Varnum, born April 26, 1741, daughter of Abraham and his second wife Ra- chel Varnum, married Cyrus Baldwin, of Chelmsford, possibly a second wife of the above Cyrus Baldwin. This wife was proba- bly the Mrs. Betsy Baldwin who died at Dra- cut, January 6, 1827.
(XII) Colonel Loammi Baldwin, son of James (9), born January 10, 1744-45, at "New Bridge" (North Woburn), died at his birth- place, October 20, 1807, aged sixty-three years (monument at Woburn) ; married first, July 9, 1772, Mary, died September 29, 1786, aged thirty-nine years, daughter of James Fowle, Jr., (Major John 3, Capt. James 2, Lieut. James 'I, Fowle) and Mary (Reed) Fowle, (daughter of Lieutenant Israel and Hannah Wyman Reed) ; second, May 26, 1791, Mar- garet, born October 6, 1767, died August 8, 1799, daughter of Josiah (Major John 3, Capt. James 2, Lieut. James I Fowle) and Margery (Carter) Fowle. Children : I. Cy- rus, born June 22, 1773, see forward ; 2. Mary, born April 24, 1775, died May 15, 1776, "of canker rash"; 3. Benjamin Franklin, born De- cember 15, 1777, see forward; 4. Loammi, born May 16, 1780, see forward; 5. James Fowle, born April 29, 1782, see forward; 6. Clarissa, born December 31, 1791, died May 27, 1841 ; married, January 20, 1812, Thomas B. Coolidge; see forward; 7. George Rum- ford, born January 26, 1798; see forward.
In early life he discovered a strong desire for acquiring knowledge, and attended the. grammar school in Woburn under the instruc- tion of Master John Fowle, a noted teacher of that time, the school being a moveable one be- ing kept at successive periods first in the cen- tre of the town and secondly at the precinct, or the part of Woburn now incorporated in the town of Burlington. At a more advanced per- iod of life, with the intention of obtaining a thorough acquaintance with natural and ex- perimental philosophy, he would walk from North Woburn to Cambridge, in company with his schoolmate, Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, and attend the lectures of Professor John Winthrop at Harvard College, for which liberty had been given, and upon their return home on foot they were in the habit of illustrating the principles they had heard enunciated in the lecture room by mak- ing rude instruments for themselves to pur- sue their experiments.
He was present in the battle of Lexington. As early as 1768 he had enlisted in a company of horse-guards, and was not wholly destitute
of military experience when summoned a lit- tle before the break of day to the field at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. In his own statement he says: "We mustered as fast as possible. The Town turned out extra- ordinary, and proceeded toward Lexington." Holding the rank of a major in the militia, he says, "I rode along a little before the main body, and when I was nigh Jacob Reed's (at present Durenville) I heard a great firing ; proceeded on, soon heard that the Regulars had fired upon Lexington people and killed a large number of them. We proceeded on as fast as possible and came to Lexington and saw about eight or ten dead and numbers wounded." He then, with the rest from Wo- burn, proceeded to Concord by way of Lin- coln meeting house, ascended a hill there, and rested and refreshed themselves a little. Then follows a particular account of the action and of his own experience. He had "several good shots," and proceeded on till coming between the meeting-house and Buckman's tavern at Lexington, with a prisoner before him, the cannon of the British began to play, the balls flying near him, and for safety he retreated back behind the meeting-house, when a ball came through near his head, and he further retreated to a meadow north of the house and lay there and. heard the balls in the air and saw them strike the ground. Woburn sent to the field on that day one hundred and eighty men.
At the beginning of the war he enlisted in the regiment of foot commanded by Colonel Samuel Gerrish. Here he was rapidly ad- vanced to be lieutenant-colonel, and upon Col -. onel Gerrish's retirement in August, 1775, he was placed at the head of the regiment, and was soon commissioned its colonel. His regi- ment was first numbered the thirty-eighth and was afterwards numbered the twenty-sixth. Its original eight companies were increased to ten. Till the end of 1775, Colonel Baldwin and his men remained near Boston; but in April, 1776, he was ordered with his command to New York city. On April 19 of that year he was at New York; on June 13, 1776, at the Grand Battery there; on June 22, the same ; and on December 26, 1776, his regiment, com- manded by himself, "went on the expedition to Trentown" (Trenton). In this regiment was one company from Woburn commanded by Captain John Wood. On the memorable night of December 25, 1776, in the face of a violent and extremely cold storm of snow and hail, General Washington and his army crossed the' Delaware to the New Jersey side, and took by
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surprise the next morning at Trenton about one thousand Hessian troops commanded by Colonel Rahl, and Colonel Baldwin and his men took part in this daring and successful enterprise.
Colonel Baldwin's experience in the cam- paigns in New York and New Jersey is told in his letters to his family at home, and many of these letters have been sacredly preserved by his descendants. During 1775-76 he was stationed with about two hundred or more of his men at Chelsea, while other companies of his regiment were stationed about Boston at Brookline and Medford. The "History of Chelsea," about to be published by the Massa- chusetts Historical Society, contains a great mass of material relating to the stay of a por- tion of the regiment at Chelsea, where their duties were those mostly of guards.
Colonel Baldwin resigned from the army in 1777 on account of ill health. His subsequent life was spent in his native place, and was marked by an enterprising spirit and the ac- tive habits of his youth. He had a talent and capacity for business. He was, in his public career, appointed on many committees on im- portant town business ; the records of the town and many autographic town papers are ample evidence of this. He was appointed high sher- iff of Middlesex county in 1780, and was the first to hold office after the adoption of the state constitution. In 1778, 1779, and 1780, and the four following years, he represented Woburn in the general court. In 1794 he was a candidate for election to congress, and had all the votes cast in Woburn but one. In 1796, on three trials for the choice of the same officer, he had all the votes for the first two in Woburn, and on the third seventy-four votes out of the seventy-six cast in Woburn. At other elections he was a prominent candidate among those held up in Woburn for-the offices of state senator, lieutenant-governor and pres- idential elector.
From his acquaintance with mathematics and the arts and sciences of his time, he was chosen a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and to the publications of that body he contributed two papers, enti- tled, "An account of a Curious Appearance of the Electrical Fluid," (Memoirs Am. Acad. vol. I. 1785, pp. 257-259) ; and "Observations on Electricity and an Improved Mode of Con- structing Lightning Rods," (Memoirs, vol. 2, pt. 2, 1804, pp. 96-104). The first paper was written in 1783, and the "curious appearance" described was produced by raising an electri- cal kite at the time of a thunder shower. The
experiments, however, were tried in July, 1771. At that time the author mentions that there stood some lofty trees near his house, and also a shop near by it. His parents, fam- ily, and neighbors witnessed the "electrical ef- fect" he succeeded in producing. The date of preparing the second article was January 25, 1797. Colonel Baldwin wrote a sketch of Count Rumford which was printed in a local publication in 1805. He was also the author of a report on the survey of the Boston and Narragansett Bay Canal, 1806. Of the Acad- emy he was elected a Fellow in 1782, and was a member of the council 1785 to 1796, and from 1798 to 1807. Further, see Cutter, "Lo- cal History of Woburn," p. 203. He received from Harvard College the degree of Master of Arts in 1785. He was not one, however, who for the sake of popularity would sacrifice his principles of duty to the public, though, as the above votes show, he was deservedly a favorite with his townsmen and fellow citizens generally. Thus he pro- tested with others against the action of the town in 1787 in the time of the Shays Rebel- lion, when the majority of the citizens of Wo- burn voted not to give any encouragement to the men called out to go on the present expedi- tion, nor to aid or assist it. But against this proceeding of the town Colonel Baldwin and thirty-six others at once entered their pro- test, and two days after, the town itself re- considered the votes it had passed on this sub- ject.
He took a prominent part in the construc- tion of the Middlesex Canal, completed in 1803, one of the earliest enterprises of the sort in the United States.
To him the discovery and the introduction to public notice and the earliest cultivation of the Baldwin apple, about 1784, has been justly ascribed. He was one day surveying land at a place called Butters' Row, in Wilmington, near the bounds of that town, Woburn and Burling- ton, when he observed one or more birds of the woodpecker variety flying repeatedly to a certain tree on land of a Mr. James Butters, and prompted by curiosity to ascertain the cause of their attraction, he at length went to it, and found on the ground under it apples of an excellent flavor and well worth cultivating ; and returning to the tree the next spring he took from it scions to graft into stocks of his own. Other persons induced by his advice or example grafted trees of theirs from the same stock; and subsequently when Colonel Bald- win attended court or went into other parts of the county as high sheriff, he carried scions
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of this apple and distributed them among his acquaintance, so that this species of fruit soon became extensively known and cultivated. The original tree remained, it is said, till 1815, when it was blown down in the famous "Sep- tember gale." The apple thus became known as the "Baldwin apple.'
His name is also associated with that of the celebrated Count Rumford. In childhood they were opposite neighbors, playmates and schoolmates. They attended lectures at Har- vard College together. Baldwin befriended him when arrested by one of the local military companies as a person inimical to the cause of the colonies, and he was tried and acquitted by a court of which Baldwin appears to be one of the members. To the last, though sepa- rated by the ocean and political preferences, they were enthusiastic friends and correspond- ents-the one was an American officer, and the other an officer in the opposing British forces.
The history of his house, which is still standing at North Woburn, may be told in the following words taken from the recorded statements of different members of his family at different periods. The house was built in 1661, as appeared by the date on a timber which was lying about the house in 1835. It was owned by Henry (I) Baldwin from 166I to his death in 1697. He was succeeded by Henry (2) Baldwin, who latterly went to New Hampshire. Henry (2) was succeeded in ownership by James (9), who died June 28, 1791, and son of Henry (2) ; Loammi, son of James, to 1807, who put on a third story in 1802 or 1803. Benjamin F. Baldwin, son of Loammi, was the owner from 1807 to 1822; Loammi (second) and Mary and Clarissa Baldwin were joint owners from 1822 to 1836; and George R. Baldwin, sole owner, from 1836 to his death, October II, 1888. Mrs. Catharine R. Griffith, daughter of George Rumford Bald- win, is the present owner, 1888 to 1907. Colo- nel Loammi Baldwin's estate embraced from his inventory, which is very lengthy, a very large amount of land, in 1801, according to a town assessor's list, 212 acres. His son Benja- min F. Baldwin occupied his estate from 1807 to about 1822, as above mentioned.
The selectmen of Boston, at a meeting on April 15, 1772, paid Loammi Baldwin, of Wo- burn, forty dollars, the premium they ad- judged to him for raising the greatest number of mulberry trees in response to an advertise- ment published in Edes and Gill's Gazette, 1768. The selectmen took a receipt of Bald- win, and also an obligation to dispose of one- half the trees under the conditions mentioned
in said advertisement. The first premium was awarded to Loammi Baldwin. Under this com- petition Mr. John Hay, of Woburn, received twenty dollars as the premium adjudged him for raising the third greatest number of mul- berry trees. The statement in the advertise- ment was that a gentleman of Boston had de- posited one hundred dollars with the selectmen to be distributed as premiums to encourage the raising of mulberry trees in the province. The conditions of the awards were also given. The name of the donor was William Whitwell.
In accordance with the dignified custom of that time the following notice of Colonel Loammi Baldwin's decease was published in the leading Boston newspaper of that date. "Died-In Woburn, yesterday morning, Hon. Loammi Baldwin, Esq., aet. sixty-two. His funeral on Friday next, which the friends and relatives are requested to attend, without a fur- ther invitation."-Columbian Centinel, Octo- ber 21, 1807.
(XIII) Reuel Baldwin, son of James (9), born June 30, 1747, died April 18, 1775 ; mar- ried October 4, 1769, Keziah, born April 8, 1748, died October 23, 1822, daughter of Zebadiah and Abigail (Pierce) Wy- man. She married second August 5, 1777, Reuben Johnson. Children: I. Reuel, born December 21, 1770. 2. James, born October 7, 1773. 3. Ruth, born June 5, 1772. 4. Josiah, born May 14, 1775. The probate of Reuel Baldwin's estate, April 22, 1776, names Keziah, his widow, and his four minor chil- dren-Reuel, Ruth, James, and Josiah. Ac- cording to these papers Josiah was dead before 1794. James, born 1773, a deacon, died November 25, 1827, at Nashua, New Hampshire (monument at Little's Cemetery at that place). Ruth Baldwin married Icha- bod Richardson, Jr., both of Woburn, Sep- tember 21, 1791.
(XIV) Cyrus Baldwin, son of Loammi (12), born at Woburn, June 22, 1773, died at Chelmsford, June 23, 1854; married April 28, 1799, Elizabeth, born September 5, 1782, died December 7, 1853, daughter of Bradley and Rachel (Butterfield) Varnum, of Dracut. He was for many years the agent of the Middle- sex Canal Company, and resided at the head of the canal in Chelmsford. He was appoint- ed inspector and sealer of gunpowder at the factory which was first Hale's and afterwards. Whipple's, at Lowell. One child, died May 28, 1815.
(XV) Colonel Benjamin Franklin Baldwin, son of Loammi (12), born at Woburn, Decem- ber 15, 1777, died suddenly October II, 1821,.
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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 Benjam- in 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 lieutenant-colonel of the local regiment from 18II to 1816. Rolls of his company of date 1802 are extant. It is said that in addition to his other pursuits he devoted himself to the business of civil engineering, and assisted his brother in the construction of the milldam across the Back Bay in Boston, and in other works. Children: I. 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 Janu- ary 16, 1815, died October 23, 1854; married December 28, 1836, Professor Roswell Park. Professor Roswell Park, of the University of Pennsylvania, later entered the ministry and became Rev. Roswell Park, D. D .; born Octo- ber I, 1807, died July 16, 1869. 5. Clarissa Coolidge, born December I, 1819, died Janu- ary 22, 1900 ; married May 16, 1843, Dr. Lew- is 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 Baldwin, 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 Williams 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 Prudence Durkee, who died November 14, 1899; children: Roswell, born August 12,
1885; Julian Durkee, born November 6, 1888. 5. Baldwin, born October 14, 1854, died Oc- tober 19, 1855.
(XVI) Loammi Baldwin, son of Loamni, (12), was born at North Woburn, May 16, 1780, and died June 30, 1838, intombed at Woburn. He was fitted for college at West- ford 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 educa- tion 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: ad- miration of his class. He was put down as No. 9 in a list for "an exhibition in mechan- ics." In 1806 he was vice-president of the Phi Beta Kappa. In 1799 his father wrote to his friend, Count Rumford, then residing in Lon- . don, 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 endeavor to provide him with a place for a year or two with some gentleman in the mathematical line of business in Europe, who is actually in the occupation of making and vending mathemati- cal 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 carliest 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.
*Loammi Franklin now resides with his family in the old Baldwin mansion at North Woburn.
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He was chief engineer with the rank of colonel, at this time a title which has some- times confounded 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 Western 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 descrip- tion 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 associated with the pro- jectors of the Bunker Hill monument. He recommended the obelisk now seen there, two hundred and twenty feet high, etc. His or- iginal 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 Milldam corporation, 1826, and the project of connecting Boston with the Hudson river by a canal, but the day for can- als was passing away, and in 1827 he was ap- pointed by the governor of Massachusetts to procure surveys 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 appointment from the United States gov- ernment which led to the two great works of his life,-the naval dry docks at Charlestown and at Norfolk. 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 sur- face of the site was about nine feet below or- dinary 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 ex- pense 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 con- nected with the general government-the Dis- mal 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.
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