USA > Massachusetts > Norfolk County > Brookline > Historical sketches of Brookline, Mass. > Part 11
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THE NEW CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH.
commodations, Mrs. Tolman's parlor was open. In her old age this good woman became wholly blind, but she bore her privation with wonderful patience and cheerful fortitude till released by deatlı from darkness and pain.
The opposite corner of School Street was a part of the Craft farm. It was separated from the streets by a low stone wall and within it were two or three apple trees. It sloped steeply down to the brook at the bottom of the meadow, and was a good coasting place in winter for chil- dren not venturesome enough to try the steep north side of Holden's Hill.
Until the year 1844 there were but two churches in Brookline, the Unitarian and Baptist. The families of Orthodox Congregationalists either worshipped with the Baptists or were united with the more distant societies of Brighton and Roxbury.
In 1843 steps were taken to unite these various inter- ests in one society, and secure a place to build a church. The corner lot, then owned by the late Samuel Crafts, was secured for that purpose, and in 1844 the present church edifice was built. It was dedicated August 20 the same year, and a church of twenty-eight persons was formed. In May of the following year Rev. R. S. Storrs, Jr., was invited to become the pastor. He was installed the following October. In a little more than a year Mr. Storrs was called to Brooklyn, N. Y., where he has ever since labored as pastor of the Church of the Pilgrims. Since then the church has had five pastors : Rev. Joseph Haven, Rev. M. M. Smith, Rev. J. L. Diman, Rev. C. C. Carpenter, and Rev. C. M. Wines.
The material prosperity of this society is sufficiently indicated by its enterprise in building the elegant stone edifice on the corner of Harvard and Marion streets, and the subsequent sale of the old building to the Methodists in the spring of 1873.
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
THE CROFT HOUSES.
Nearly opposite the Methodist Church, on the corner of Washington and Cypress streets, stands now the ancient gambrel-roofed house which was occupied in 1740 by Captain Samuel Croft. How long it had then been built we have not ascertained, but afterwards it was the prop- erty of Dr. Aspinwall. The house has been occupied during the last hundred years by successive families, till they would form quite a host in the aggregate. In 1805 or 1806, it took fire in the roof and narrowly es- caped destruction.
Captain Croft was born in 1700. The land, it will be recollected by those who have read these historical papers thus far, on both sides of the street in this locality, was very early in the town's history a part of the Cotton estate.
From the Cottons a part of it came into possession of the Sharps, and from them to the Crofts.
The elder Captain Samuel Croft built in 1765 a large house on the north side of the street, in what is now the garden of T. P .. Chandler, Esq., a rod or two west of the house.
At the time of his death in 1771 it was owned by his son, Captain Samuel Croft, Jr., who married into the Sharp family. With this house was included as the Croft farm all that part of the Sharp farm from the corner of School Street to a point nearly up to the pres- ent residence of Thomas Griggs, Jr., and extending back to Stephen Sharps' part of the farm.
Captain Croft's house was a large, square, two-story house, with a spacious front yard, well filled with tree's and shrubbery. Behind the house was a deep ravine, and here was a spring of cold and excellent water, over- shadowed by two very large buttonwood trees.
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SUSY BACKUS.
An old barn stood opposite the house on the site of Mrs. Crafts' present residence, and there for some time was kept the hearse, until a permanent place was pro- vided for it near the Unitarian Church. In more recent times a large barn stood east of the house on the same side of the street.
The old couple had no children, and they adopted a ' member of the Davis family, a lovely girl, whose name was Sarah. She had a fine voice, and her singing at the dedication of Brookline meeting-house * in 1806 was the occasion of much commendation.
This young lady died in 1808. It was during the fatal illness of Miss Sarah, that the hearse was brought, to be kept in the barn opposite ; and Mrs. Croft, almost super- stitious in the matter of signs and omens, feared that her adopted daughter should know it. It might perhaps have been unpleasantly suggestive, but the young lady is said to have been " a lovely Christian," who had no fears or weak dread of a change which to such as she would bring only release and joy.
The energy of three or four generations of Sharps con- centrated in Mrs. or Madame Croft, as she was often called, and she carried sway with a high hand. If the Scriptural doctrine that "it is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth," is to be understood literally, there were and are those who derived great good from a residence in this household. At least they bore " the yoke " there, according to unquestionable testimony.
Perhaps the most distinctly remembered personage of this household, inasmuch as she lived the longest, and . was a marked character, was an old colored woman named Susy Backus. We say old because she called her- self fifty, for about forty years, and neither she nor any
* Then the only one in town.
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154 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
one else knew her age ; but she was a young girl when taken into the Croft house as servant, and here for board and clothes she rendered such service as money cannot buy, during the lifetime of her master and mistress.
It has often been said by Brookline people that Susy was a slave, but this was not the case. Her father was a kidnapped African who served a blacksmith in Dorchester, and was called by his name, Backus. After the death of the blacksmith, the negro kept on with the business in the same shop, but assumed the more aristocratic and im posing title of " Mr. Cleveland."
There was a poor Indian woman living in Brookline by the name of Molly Hill, and " Mr. Cleveland " re- lieved his solitude and perhaps added to his importance by marrying her.
. Susy was the child of this marriage, but somehow the name of Cleveland would not stick to her, and she was always known as Susy Backus.
Susy was cook, chambermaid, milkmaid, hostler, and gardener for the Croft family. In fact her service was only limited by the fact that there are but twenty-four hours in the day, and that poor humanity must sleep sometime. She shoveled snow in winter and gathered vegetables in summer which her own hands had planted in spring.
The Captain had a white horse and an old-fashioned, square, standing-top chaise, a most cumbrous " one-hoss shay," which had done duty from time immemorial ; - also it came to pass that in later years he possessed a new and most respectable vehicle for those times.
So when there had been a rain on Saturday, Susy was sent out on Sunday morning to run the length of "the new lane," as Cypress Street was then called, to see if the mud was deep enough to imperil the respectability of the new chaise, and on her report, to the one vehicle or the
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SUSY BACKUS.
other the white horse was harnessed to convey master and mistress to " Brookline meeting-house."
Susy's seat was in " the negro pew," a high and nar- row place above the singer's gallery in the old meeting- house where Dr. Pierce preached. She was the last person who occupied that place.
Captain Croft died in 1814. In 1818 Dr. Charles Wild, . then a young beginner in the practice of medicine, came to Brookline and took up his- abode with Madame Croft. He became quite a favorite with the old lady, and at her death a few years later, she gave him two acres of land on the opposite side of the street.
To Susy she left two hundred dollars ; and the money was placed in the hands of Dr. Pierce as her guardian.
Mr. Croft also left provision in his will " for support- ing and maintaining in sickness and in health but not in idleness, except when past labor, my faithful servant Susanna Backus during her life."
The old Croft house was let for several years, and then sold to Mr. John Kendrick, who lived in it a short time. He then left town, and when the estate was sold to Mr. Chandler, the old house was moved to Thayer Place, where it still serves the purpose of a tenement house.
The farm became the property of Mr. Samuel Crafts, who was Mrs. Croft's nephew. From the Croft family Susy went to Mrs. Downer, formerly a Wyman, who was a daughter-in-law of the Dr. Downer in the Punch Bowl Village, and in this family she lived thirty-nine years, rendering devoted service.
With the intense loyalty of her race she identified her- self with them and theirs, and no labor was too hard or sacrifice too great for her to make for them. And her fidelity was appreciated. Though her voice was rough, and harsher than that of men in general, and her physi-
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
ognomy would have delighted the heart of Darwin, though for years and years she was bent almost double, so that it was a marvel how she could walk at all, she never looked repulsive or even unlovable to the children and grand-children of the household.
Yet there was a picturesqueness about her as she . walked to church on a Sunday morning in her white dress with a bright flower pinned upon the bosom, her handkerchief carefully folded outside her book and a large fan in her hand. She made regular visits in some of the most respectable old families of Brookline ; those at some little distance, like Deacon Clark's, for instance, she called her foreign visits, and at certain houses she was always invited to tea with the family.
When she grew too old and infirm to walk to Dr. Pierce's church she went to the Baptist, and in both churches she was treated with marked courtesy and con- sideration. Indeed no one was ever disrespectful to Susy, except rude boys in the village, who sometimes called after her, or occasionally threw a stone, because she was old, and black, and crooked.
But a beautiful soul dwelt in the uncomely body. Truth, and justice, and kindly charity were her charac- teristics ; and the singing of the earliest bird and the blooming of the first daffy in spring called out her in- nocent delight. She had been taught to read, and her well worn and much used Testament gave evidence of faithful perusal.
At last the time came when the provision made for her in the Croft will was needed, and the money was paid semi-annually as long as she lived.
For several years before her death Susy was entirely blind, cataracts having grown over both eyes. She still lived on, in the family of Mrs. Hancock (the daughter
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MISS HANNAH ADAMS.
of Mrs. Downer), her efforts to help often a hindrance, and the infirmities of her great age making her a cease- less care ; but she was not disposed of in hospital or poor- house, as was suggested by some advisers, for her love and devotion in her better days forbade the thought of such a requital. So she felt her way about the familiar house, and was indulged in her pet whims, which were few, a handful of peppermints and a glass of rum once a day being her luxuries.
After a four weeks' illness she died in 1863, probably eighty-four years of age, if not older, judging from her recollection of ancient events. To the very last her hear- ing was acute and her love of life strong. The old Croft tomb in Brookline cemetery, which had not been unclosed for nearly forty years, was opened to receive the body, worn out with a long life of toil for others, - and then closed up forever.
Who shall doubt that her white soul was welcomed in the better land with a " Well done, thou good and faithful servant."
After the death of Mrs. Croft, the house was occupied by Mrs. Walley, formerly of Walnut Street, and with her, boarded in the latter part of her life, Miss Hannah Adams, a literary lady of much celebrity at that time, who is well remembered by many persons now living, and whose memory deserves to be kept green.
Miss Adams was a native of Medfield in this State, but spent most of her life in Boston and vicinity. In her childhood her father was in comfortable if not affluent circumstances, but his failure and loss of property and the early death of her mother, threw Miss Hannah upon her own resources.
She was of a sensitive and delicate organization, and apparently little calculated by nature to grapple with the
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
world, but like many others of her sex who do not care to battle for rights, and desire no right but that of filling some domestic niche peacefully and honorably, she was forced to an energy not natural to her and developed talents and resources of which her friends would have scarcely supposed her to be the possessor.
In her childhood she had few advantages. She was too feeble in health to attend school, but she learned to read at home, and devoured volumes of poetry and novels, which she said in after years, made her keenly sensitive to the evils of life, but gave her no strength and vigor of mind to rise above them or overcome them.
When it became necessary for her to maintain her- self, or partly do so, she learned to weave bobbin lace. This was in the Revolution, and as soon as the war was over all demand for such a home-made fabric ceased. She tried straw-braiding, and other feminine employ- ments, but the profits were but slight, and wholly inade- quate for support.
She taught a country school a few summers, but her health could not bear such a strain upon her vital pow- ers, and she relinquished this employment. In the mean time, however, some literary gentlemen who boarded at her father's, taught her at her own request Latin and Greek, which it was then considered the height of folly for a woman to spend her time in learning.
About this time she became accidentally interested in the points of difference between different forms of relig- ious belief, and was led to read all the works treating of various denominations, which were available. The result of this was her writing a book called " View of Religion.' Speaking of her reading, preparatory to writing this work, she says she soon became disgusted with the want of candor in the authors consulted, " in giving the most
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MISS HANNAH ADAMS.
unfavorable descriptions of the denominations they dis- liked, and applying to them the names of heretics, fanat- ics, bigots, enthusiasts, etc." It is one of the cheering signs of progress in society that the bitter hatred once ex- isting between rival sects is now modified to kindly toler- ance, which offers ground for hope that some future day may find many of them uniting upon one common ground of faith and hope.
Miss Adams' work went through several editions and brought her a moderate compensation. In the hope of larger pecuniary success she wrote after this, a " History of New England," there being at that time only two works of the kind extant, Mather's " Magnalia " and Neale's " His- tory," neither of which came down to the American Revo- lution. It was a laborious task, involving much perusal of old manuscripts and other close investigation, and some journeyings. Before the work was completed her eyes failed, and for two years she was totally debarred from all use of them in reading, writing, or any close applica- tion, and it appeared that all literary work must be aball- doned forever. She however so far recovered the use of them, under skillful medical treatment by Dr. Jeffries of Boston, that she could make a moderate use of them and completed her work.
As there was no history of our country at that time adapted to schools, Miss Adams intended to abridge her work and adapt it to school uses. But in this she was anticipated by a clergyman who stepped between her and her prosperity and reaped the benefits.
In the mean time her History was well received and met with a large sale. But through some unfortunate cir- cumstances connected with the printing and publishing she received but little profit for all this labor.
Her next work was a " History of the Jews," a care-
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
fully prepared work which occupied several years, and afterwards she wrote a little volume entitled " Letters on the Gospels." It was so unusual a thing in those days for an American woman to read the dead languages or attempt authorship that Miss Adams was looked upon by uneducated persons as a sort of human phenomenon, a curiosity to be gazed at and criticized. Her works were of solid worth, yet the compensation she received for them all was trifling, compared probably to what a modern novel-writer receives for a sensation story.
She would have suffered in old age from want, but for the kindly thoughtfulness and generosity of a few gentle- men and ladies, who admired her talents and loved her for her personal worth. These settled an annuity upon her which made her declining years comfortable, and filled her warm heart with the liveliest gratitude.
The Hon. Josiah Quincy, Stephen Higginson, and William Shaw, were the principal movers in this gener- ous deed.
The Rev. Joseph Buckminster, his successor Rev. Mr. Thacher, and other eminent clergymen and authors were her personal friends, and her correspondents both in this country and abroad were people of eminence. The elder President Adams in writing to her once said : -
" You and I are undoubtedly related by birth ; and although we were both born in obscurity, yet I presume neither of us have any occasion to regret that circumstance. If I could ever suppose that family pride was in any case excusable, I should think a descent from a line of virtuous. independent, New England farmers, for one hundred and sixty years, was a better foundation for it than a descent through royal or titled scoun- drels ever since the flood."
There are various anecdotes extant respecting Miss Adams' little peculiarities, most of which rose from
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MISS ADAMS' PECULIARITIES.
extreme sensitiveness and diffidence or underrating of herself. Some however grew out of her lack of knowl- edge of most common things, her attention having been always so absorbed by books, and some from a singular absence of mind, or concentration on one subject to the exclusion of all otliers.
Dr. Pierce used to relate an incident of her which was characteristic. She stayed all night in a friend's house and slept in a room where in the morning for the first time she saw a knob instead of a latch upon the chamber door. Having made her toilet she tried to open the door, but the knob refused to pull out or push in, or lift up or go down. It never occurred to her to try to turn it, so she labored at the refractory thing, till finding it all in vain she sat down and waited till a maid-servant finally came and let her out.'
The anecdote of her forgetfulness about her baggage in travelling is perhaps too familiar to be repeated liere, yet it may be new to young readers. A gentleman was very desirous of making her acquaintance, having heard that her conversation was highly interesting. Learning that she was to ride in a stage-coach on a certain day, he also took passage in the same. But in vain he tried to draw her into conversation. She seemed oblivious to everything about her, but kept repeating to herself, " Great trunk, little trunk, band-box, and bundle," a for- mula with which her friends had charged her memory, because she was so apt to be wholly unmindful of her possessions.
A hack was called to take her home from some place in Boston, where she had been visiting for the day. She was at that time boarding with a Mr. Perkins in Leverett Street, but she told the driver to carry her to Mr. Lev- erett's in Perkins Street. The man drove about Boston
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
till eleven o'clock in the evening trying to find Perkins Street. He could get no further information from his absent-minded passenger, and at last drove back to the stable to ask his employer what was the next thing to be done. The stable-keeper went out and looked into the carriage. "Oh, that's Miss Hannah Adams," said he, "carry her to Mr. Perkins' in Leverett Street," and so at last the estray was deposited in safe quarters.
The librarian at the Athenaeum often found it impos- sible to get her away from the library when it was to be locked up at the dinner hour, and so was obliged to lock her in, and leave her there during his absence. On his return he found her so absorbed with her reading that she did not even know that he had been out.
She was considered by some as eccentric, and by many as a sort of walking Greek dictionary, or an animated History of the Jews, yet she was as simple-hearted and affectionate as a child, and was dearly beloved by those who cultivated her acquaintance enough to overcome her natural diffidence.
She wrote her last letter from one of the large, sunny front chambers in the old Croft house, in November, 1831. In it she says to her friend, " I need not inform you, and I am unable to express, how much pleasure it would give me to see you in Brookline. The lady with whom I board is all goodness."
She perfectly delighted in the sunshine and the beau- tiful prospect from the pleasant apartment, so in contrast to the closeness and limited range of a Boston house. " How can any one be tired of such a beautiful world ?" she said to a friend who called upon her, as she pointed out the beauties of the scenery.
She died the same winter, at Mrs. Walley's, at the age of seventy-six. A portrait of her in her close white cap,
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DR. CHARLES WILD.
and lawn handkerchief, not unlike a Quaker's garb, can be seen in the Boston Athenaeum.
Miss Adams was one of the first persons buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery. Her memoir, begun by her- self, but finished after her death by a friend, is in our Public Library.
Opposite the residence of Mr. Chandler, on the site of the barn before mentioned as belonging to the Croft place, Mr. Samuel Crafts built the house, which is still standing, somewhat more than thirty years ago.
Mr. Crafts was a native of Brookline, and lived in the southwest part of the town in his early years, then re- sided several years in the house formerly owned and occupied by his uncle, Stephen Sharp, and finally built the one above alluded to, in which he resided till his death in 1856. Mr. Crafts was very active in establishing the Congregational Society in this town, and was an in- fluential man in the church.
The next place west was the house-lot of two acres which was given to Dr. Charles Wild. Dr. Wild was so thoroughly identified with Brookline for over forty years that his name is a household word. It is hardly possible to prepare a satisfactory sketch of a man whose biography should be fully written by some able pen, or to describe him as he was known among his patients so that those who never saw him can have any adequate idea of him.
Dr. Wild was born in Boston in January, 1795. He was a graduate of Harvard College of the class of 1814. Dr. Walker, late President of Harvard, Judge (Pliny) Merrick, W. H. Prescott, the historian, and other eminent men were his classmates.
In the year 1818, when Dr. Charles Wild came to Brookline, Dr. Aspinwall, the skillful and beloved phy- sician of the town and vicinity for many years, was in
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
the decline of life, and his son the young doctor had just been removed by death. A good field for practice was open, and the Doctor began business under favorable cir- cumstances, and soon made for himself a name and repu- tation. He built his house, married young, and reared a large family of children.
The Doctor was of course in those days a practitioner of the old school. People thought they had not their money's worth of service from a doctor unless they swal- lowed physic in fearful doses, and were blistered and bled within a small fraction of their lives, and Dr. Wild was " equal to the occasion."
Those who can remember the Doctor in his prime, can well recall his tall, well-formed figure, his firm tread, his deep voice which seemed to come from cavernous depths, and the eyes which seemed to look from behind his spec- tacles into and through one.
If there was occasion to send for him, unless the case was represented as a matter of life and death, the chances · were even that he might not appear till the patient either died or recovered, unless the call were repeated two or three times. Not that the Doctor was intentionally heed- less or neglectful of his patients when he found them very severely sick, but the difficulty was to find him, and get the impression made that he was actually needed. In serious cases he was devotedly attentive, and so great was the public confidence in him that in ordinary illnesses people would wait his tardy attention rather than send for another physician. It was quite as likely to be a successful hunt for him, to go through the streets and look for " old Sal," his sorrel mare, and the familiar old buggy before some house door, as to go to his house for him, for he had a way of going from one patient to another for a day and a night or more, without going
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