USA > Massachusetts > Norfolk County > Brookline > Historical sketches of Brookline, Mass. > Part 21
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His white locks and affable manners will always be kindly remembered by the boys whom he thus propitiated, as well as by many others.
NEIGHBORHOOD OF THE RESERVOIR, THE BOYLSTON PLACE.
On the site of the present residence of Mrs. Bowditch, near the Reservoir, formerly stood a large house, owned and occupied by Richard Sullivan, Esq. He was succeeded by Judge Jackson. He was judge of the Supreme Court ten years. He also rendered important services on the Commission which reported the Revised Statutes of Massa- chusetts, in 1835 .* Both these gentlemen were distin- guished for their elegance of manner and genial traits, as well as for high culture, and the house was the resort of many distinguished persons. The place was next owned
* Allen's American Biographical Dictionary.
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
by the late Jolin E. Thayer, who removed the old house and made preparations for building a new one, when the work of constructing the Brookline Reservoir was com- menced, and it was thought it would damage the location, and consequently he chose a new site and built upon War- ren Street. Mr. Benjamin Howard of Boston next pur- chased this fine place, built the present house, and lived here eleven years. During the time of his residence here, his son Chandler Howard, at that time a rising young merchant, widely known, and much beloved for the excel- lence of his character, lost his life by an accident with his horse while riding to Boston over the Mill-dam. Within a few years after, a sister of Mr. Howard met the same fate in almost the same way, while riding near the Cook place on Warren Street. Two such tragedies in one family in a short time, were enough to overshadow the . brightest household, and the remnant of the family left Brookline not long afterwards. The place was then pur- chased by its present owners.
The ground now covered by the Reservoir was a large meadow lying lower than the level of the street. The embankment on the side next the street is wholly arti- ficial. Instead of being a disadvantage to the vicinity as many persons feared, the great improvement caused by the Reservoir is apparent to all.
The part of Boylston Street, from the gate-house of the Reservoir to the junction of Heath Street and Brighton Street, it should be remembered is a part of the old road, and was merely widened when the turnpike was built, but was not turned from its course. On the north side of it, between these points, are three very old and interesting places.
The large, old-fashioned wooden house on Boylston Street, opposite the westerly end of the Reservoir, now
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INTRODUCTION OF INOCULATION. 297
owned by Henry Lee, Esq., was known for many years as the old Boylston house, - afterwards, for many years more, as the Hyslop place. It is one of the most interest- ing historical places in the town.
Thomas Boylston came to this country from England and settled in Watertown in 1635. His son Thomas, born in that town in 1644, became a surgeon. He took an active part in the Narragansett war. He married Mary Gardner of Muddy River, in 1665, and settled upon the place which we are describing, and from that time for- ward the Boylstons were identified with Brookline. There were twelve children of this marriage. His son Peter in- herited the homestead. One of the daughters, Susanna, married John Adams, of Braintree, and was the mother of John Adams, second President of the United States. The second child of Dr. Thomas Boylston, was the emi- · nent Dr. Zabdiel Boylston, born in 1680, who acquired wide celebrity and at first a most unenviable one, by the introduction of inoculation for the small-pox. His memoir has been written, and is full of interest .* The small-pox was making fearful ravages in Boston in 1721, when the Rev. Cotton Mather communicated to Dr. Boylston an account of the transactions of the Royal Society respect- ing inoculation as practiced in Turkey. Instead of allow- ing the disease to be taken in its natural way, the chances being that more than one sixth of the patients would die, the matter was forestalled by preparing the system for it by medical treatment and then scarifying the skin and applying the virus under a nutshell. Under inoculation it was seldom that a patient lost his life. The practice was not even begun in England when Cotton Mather sug- gested it to Dr. Boylston for experiment. He introduced the subject to the attention of other physicians in Boston
* See American Med. Biography, by J. Thacher. 20
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
and vicinity, and was met with violent opposition ; the medical men, both in this country and in England, taking the ground that it was a crime which came under the classification of poisoning, while the clergy. preached against it, and wrote pamphlets, arguing that the small- pox was a judgment from God for the sins of the people, and that to try to check its sway would only " provoke Him the more."
A sermon was preached by a Rev. Mr. Massey, in 1722, against " The Dangerous and Sinful Practice of Inoculation," from the text, "So Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown," - from whence he argued that the Devil was the first inoculator and Job his first patient. Some fifty years afterward an epigram appeared in the " Monthly Miscellany," on this sage opinion of the Rev. Mr. Massey, as follows : -
" We're told by one of the black robe, The Devil inoculated Job; Suppose 'tis true, what he does tell, Pray neighbors, did not Job do well ? "
The inhabitants of Boston and vicinity became so excited, that men patrolled the streets with halters, in search of the Doctor, threatening to hang him to the ' nearest tree. The Doctor was secreted fourteen days in his own house, in a hiding-place known only to his wife. During this time the house was repeatedly searched for him, by day and by night, without success. One evening, a hand-grenade was dashed through the par- lor window, where his wife and children were sitting. Fortunately the fuse was knocked off against a piece of furniture, and the family escaped death.
The Doctor could only visit his patients in the night, and in disguise. Yet, notwithstanding all this violence,
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DR. ZABDIEL BOYLSTON.
he was brave enough to persevere with his experiments, being sanguine of success. He inoculated his own child and two servants, and though they all had the disease mildly and recovered, the authorities of Boston sum- moned him before them to answer for his practice. He underwent repeated examinations, and received insults and threats. During the year, however, he inoculated two hundred and eighty-six persons, of all ages, from infancy to old age, of whom only six died, while of five thousand seven hundred and fifty-nine, who took it in the natural way during the same period, eight hundred and forty-four died. The success of the practice was established, but the opposition did not cease. During this time the Doctor was in correspondence with the court physician in England, Sir Hans Sloane, and was invited to visit London. This invitation he accepted, and on his arrival he was treated with great attention, and was made a " Fellow of the Royal Society," one of the first Americans thus honored. He remained in Eng- land a year and a half and then returned.
As he grew somewhat infirm with years, he retired from his profession, which had kept him much in Boston, and devoted himself to his farm in Brookline, which he bought of his brother Peter, and on which he built the present house. He was greatly interested, and very successful in improving the breed of various domestic animals, especially horses, for which his farm became celebrated. He often broke the animals himself, being a fine horseman. His biographer speaks of him as having been seen in Boston after he was eighty-four years of age, riding a fine colt he was breaking. He lived to see inoculation universally practiced. This custom prevailed till it was superseded by vaccination, as practiced by Dr. Waterhouse, in Cambridge, and Dr. Aspinwall, in Brook-
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
line. He died at the age of eighty-seven, and was buried in Brookline Cemetery. His epitaph is said to be a just and appropriate one : -
"Sacred to the memory of Zabdiel Boylston, Esq., and F. R. S., who first introduced the practice of inoculation into America. Through a life of extensive benevolence, he was always faithful to his word, just in his dealings, affable in his manners, and after a long sickness in which he was exemplary for his patience and resignation to his Maker, he quitted this mortal life in a just expectation of a happy immortality, March 1st, 1766."
It is said that Dr. Boylston, in his will, bequeathed his house and farm to the town, as a home for the poor, on certain conditions, to which one of his relatives was expected to accede, but this not being complied with, the town missed the donation.
From Dudley Boylston, a brother of the Doctor, who married Susanna Gardner, descended the first wife of the late Deacon Joshua C. Clark. Her daughters are the last of this old family, in Brookline. From Thomas, another brother, descended Thomas, who died in London, a wealthy merchant, who made bequests to the city of Boston. His sister Mary married a Hallowell. One of her sons became Admiral Sir Benjamin Hallowell, of the British Navy. Another of her sons, preferring the family name of his mother to that of his father, changed his name to Ward Nicholas Boylston. He became a mer- chant of London, acquired great wealth, and was dis- tinguished for his liberality. He returned to his native place, and lived for several years in Roxbury, and after- wards in Princeton. He gave large bequests to many charitable enterprises, and munificent donations to Har- vard College and the Boylston Medical Society and Library.
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THE HYSLOPS.
Thomas Boylston, the son of another brother, settled in School Street, Boston, and was identified with Brattle Street Church. He endowed a Professorship at Harvard College. He directed his executors to purchase the home- stead of his ancestors in Brookline, and convey the same to the First Church in this town, on condition that the church officers would allow his nephew, Joshua Boylston, to live upon the place, for which he should pay a rent of ten pounds annually to the church. The estate was to be entailed in the male line from this heir, in the same way from generation to generation, and failing the heir, who should have the right to live upon it, it should go to the church. But the property was in the hands of Mr. William Hyslop, who had bought it of the Doctor's heirs, and the Brookline Church never received the in- tended bequest, neither did Joshua Boylston ever have a male heir, and with him the family name became ex- tinct in Brookline.
THE HYSLOPS.
Mr. William Hyslop, the purchaser of the Boylston house, was a native of Scotland. He came to this coun- try in his youth, and began business as a peddler of dry goods, which he carried from house to house in a pack upon his back. He was very successful in this humble beginning, and having invested money in goods at a fortu- nate time and way, he was able to enter the dry goods trade still more extensively, and became very wealthy.
He had a son of the same name, the one mentioned as having lived for some years in the house now occupied by Mr. Chapin, a son David, and one daughter, Elizabeth, who became the wife of Governor Increase Sumner.
There was a Scotch Presbyterian clergyman with whom Mr. Hyslop was acquainted in the old country, who emi-
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
grated to Massachusetts with twenty or more of his parishioners, and settled in Worcester. His name was Abercrombie. After a residence for some time in Wor- cester Mr. Abercrombie removed with his people to a more congenial situation on the Pelham Hills. When this good man could number eleven " olive plants round about his table," he was suddenly left a widower. The youngest had been named Mehitable, for Mrs. Hyslop, and when the little girl was six years of age Mr. Hyslop adopted her as his own, and she remained in his family till her marriage. Mr. Hyslop's business called him oc- casionally to Europe, and on his return at one time he brought with him a slab, or pier table, which was sup- ported by a pair of large spread eagles, the claws of which each clasped a round ball. It was placed between the parlor windows. This was a highly ornamental piece of furniture for those days, and as such was much admired and prized. When the Revolutionary War broke out, Mr. Hyslop was in Europe, and the contingencies of the war were such that he could not return till it was over, without imperiling his life. While the British troops occupied Boston, a great alarm was one day created in tlie upper part of Brookline, by a man who rode up the old road furiously, on horseback, telling all whom he met that the British troops were at the church green. This was at the green in front of the church on Roxbury Hill ; but the people of the upper part of this town naturally enough supposed that the Brookline church green was meant, and great was the terror that ensued. The first impulse was to flee for safety ; the second to carry off something valuable ; but like distracted people at a fire, who throw mirrors out of the windows and carry mat- trasses carefully down-stairs, they seized upon anything but what the British would have taken had they come.
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THE HYSLOP HOMESTEAD.
The table with the spread eagles was hurriedly torn from the wall and laboriously carried up into the woods, which then covered the whole hill back of the house, and there buried by the servants. The little adopted daughter was not to be outdone by the rest of the family, and she secured a new pair of red bellows which hung beside the fire-place, and never let them go during the flight and the temporary absence.
Colonial troops were afterward quartered in the house ; and the family took refuge in Medfield, from the fortunes of war. When a return was safe, and the buried eagles were dug up, for restoration to their proper place, one was broken. It was mended and the table replaced, be- ing fastened to the wall with nails instead of screws, thus making the thing legally a part of the house, and not a movable article. Not many years ago the eagles were claimed by Governor Sumner's descendants as a part of their inheritance, but it was shown that they were a part of the house, and the demand was not allowed. They remained there at the last accounts, and 'are an appro- priate adornment for the ancient and curious house. Mr. Hyslop returned after the war was over, and died in 1796, aged eighty-five years.
His son David inherited the homestead. This singular man is well remembered by many persons now living. He was lame, of uncouth figure, and such excessive home- liness of countenance as is seldom seen, amounting al- most to hideousness. He also had an impediment in his speech, or rather never learned to speak plainly, always articulating his words like a little child, and the order of his mind being below the average he never acquired much education. But he inherited great wealth, and this con- sideration, in the eyes of many, counterbalanced all his defects.
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
" Oh, what a world of vile, ill-favored faults Look handsome in three hundred pounds a year."
He found a wife, notwithstanding his personal pecu- liarities, was left a widower, and when quite advanced in years, married a lovely young girl of great personal beauty, who was sacrificed to her father's ambition for . wealth. Mr. Hyslop was not a bad man, however, but his singularities were a source of annoyance or amusement to all with whom he had any dealings. He had a strange aversion to music of all kinds, and especially to the in- struments used at church, and the anthems so much prac- ticed in those times and which he always called " tan- trums." He would not attend church on Thanksgiving days, on account of the "tantrums," which formed a prominent part of the service. Soon after the old gentle- man brought his young bride to Brookline, a bassoon was added to the orchestra at church by Captain Robert Davis, who played well.
Mrs. Hyslop lingered one Sunday after service to hear the choir practice a little, while her husband went out for his horse. As soon as he was ready, however, he made his appearance at the church door, and beckoning to his wife he called out loudly in his broken speech, "Jane ! tome ! tome along ! don't 'tay there to hear the bag- pipe."
It was his custom to make a long prayer every morn- ing before breakfast, at which every member of the house- hold was requested to be present. He always prayed with his eyes open, and the consequence was that material things and spiritual were apt to get decidedly mixed. On one occasion, while thus praying he happened to see, through the open door into the kitchen, a monkey which he kept, making free with the sausages which had been set frying before the morning worship began. Pausing
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AN "IRON STUDY."
in the prayer, he interpolated a direction to "Hetty," that the sausages should be protected, and went on with his prayer without the slightest perception of anything ludicrous in the situation. His remark must have had a peculiar effect on those who had not observed the per- formance in the kitchen.
In the third story of the house at the southwesterly corner was a small room which was dark and only acces- sible through another room, and not easily noticed. (Perhaps this was where Dr. Boylston was secreted from "his enemies.) This room Mr. Hyslop called his "iron 'tudy," - and it was the only " study " of which he ever made use. In this he hoarded up all the old iron he could collect on the premises, and quantities of other things useful and useless. The key he always carried with him. Articles of daily domestic use often disappeared. Inquir- ies and search were of no avail. After weeks or months, perhaps, the proposal often before made, that he should look in his "iron study," for the missing article, re- sulted in the restoration of it, as composedly returned as if no inconvenience had arisen from its absence.
Anything on the place, from a silver spoon to a bread trough, a rake or a halter, was liable to spend a season in the "iron study." His peculiar ideas were also evinced in his management of his fruit. The place abounded in choice fruit, especially peaches, plums, and cherries. These he could not use, would not sell, and did not give away. Bushels upon bushels of the finest fruit lay and perished under the trees every year.
There were two daughters and one son by this mar- riage, and both the former died in childhood. The son, who was a fine lad, lived till within a few days of his twenty-first birthday.
While John Adams was President of the United States,
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
he came to Brookline, and was the guest of Hon. Jona- than Mason, who lived on what is now Colonel Lyman's place. While there he spoke of the last time he had passed along that road as riding on horseback, carrying his mother on a pillion behind him. He never lost his interest in this home of his ancestors, and in 1821, when he was very aged, and so infirm that he was unable to walk without assistance, he expressed a wish to visit once more the old place where his mother was born, and where his grandparents had lived and died.
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Accordingly, Mr. Hyslop made a dinner party, and invited the venerable ex-President, Governor Brooks, General Sumner, and other distinguished guests. It was a grand affair, and passed off with great éclat, but there was something pathetic in the sight of the almost help- less old man, supported by his grandson, going feebly about the place, and taking a last look of scenes once so familiar to his boyhood.
Mr. Hyslop died in 1822, at the age of sixty-seven, and thus ended the Hyslop name.
His widow married again ; her second husband being Mr. John Hayden. There were no children ; she sur- vived her husband, and at her death, the Hyslop wealth, which comprised much real estate in Roxbury and Chel- · sea, as well as the place in Brookline, went to the heirs of Elizabeth Hyslop, and by them the homestead was sold to the present owner.
THE SEAVER, OR HAMMOND PLACE, AND THE ACKERS PLACE.
West of the old Boylston house, on the crest of the hill, was built in 1742, a house which stood until since the purchase of the place by the late Francis Fisher, Esq. All the land, as we have before mentioned, from Cypress
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THE SEAVER PLACE.
Street to Brighton Street, and from the old road to the brook, was held among the Gardners. John Seaver married a Gardner, and lived on the place we are de- scribing. His son Nathaniel built the house above men- tioned, and it was afterwards occupied by his son of the same name. This Nathaniel Seaver was twice married, and there were eight children ; from one of the sons descended the present Seavers of Boston (Highlands). The late Mayor, Benjamin Seaver, was one of them. Nathaniel, the only son of the second marriage, was on board a vessel as supercargo, when it was wrecked, and he with the captain and part of the crew, were cast away on a desert island, where after great sufferings and hard- ships he died. A book was afterwards written by Captain Ockington, his brother-in-law, who was rescued, containing an account of their strange experiences, and of the death of young Seaver. His mother died young, leaving two daughters, who were afterwards married, the one to one of the Gardners, the other to Mr. John God- dard, the father of the late Benjamin Goddard. As none of the Seavers settled upon the old place, it was sold to John Deane, and afterwards to John Lucas. This man had become wealthy in the business of a baker, and re- tired to enjoy the fruits of his industry upon this beauti- ful place. He lived many years in Brookline, was an attendant upon Dr. Pierce's ministry, and showed his great regard for him by frequently taking him on jour- neys or short trips, bearing his expenses, and always bespeaking the best of hospitalities for him on the ground that he was his " wife's minister."
Mr. Lucas died in 1812, and the place was next owned for many years by Samuel Hammond. The mansion house stood a little in front, and east of the old farm- house which still remains, and the terrace on which it stood is still to be seen.
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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF BROOKLINE.
On the site of the house built by the late Francis Fisher, stood a large old-fashioned house, known as the Ackers house. John Ackers was. a resident of Muddy River in 1656, and for more than two hundred years his descendants, to the sixth generation, have lived on or near that spot. The first house built by this first John Ackers, was on the west side of Brighton Street, then called " the lane from the country road to Cambridge" (Brighton it must be remembered was then a part of Cambridge). This land was an interesting piece of territory, and still is, from old associations. In 1648, it was " Voted that Jacob Eliot should have the swamp that joyneth to his allotment at Muddy River next to Cotton Flax (sometimes spelt Flack's), he receiving lybertye to cut Hedgyng wood in it for the Common fence that runneth through the said swamp." The " Com- mon was a part of the five hundred acres set apart by the town of Boston at Muddy River for perpetual com- monage ; " but which in time was all of it alienated, or taken up and improved. This Jacob Eliot was the brother of John Eliot, the famous Apostle to the Indians. He was a deacon of the Roxbury Church, of which his brother was minister. About the year 1640, Jacob Eliot was appointed to lay out a highway from Boston to Cambridge, which was laid out and trees spotted along the old Indian trail as far as " the falls of Charles River." All the territory on the north and northwest side of the river, being for several years called Cambridge. This road led along what is now Walnut Street, Heath Street, Pound Lane, and Reservoir Lane, to Nonantum Hill. . At this place was an Indian village, or settlement of "praying Indians," and an Indian burying-place was located on what Jolin Ackers bought for his farm, on the west side of Brighton Street, including Ackers'
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JOHN ACKERS' FARM.
Avenue, and all the ground now occupied by the Irish population. There was probably an Indian village here also, as many Indian relics have been ploughed out, on this ground, as well as at Nonantum Hill. Many years after all the Indians were gone from this locality, some old Indians travelled a long distance from the west to visit these old graves of their fathers. Jacob Eliot's " Swamp," it is quite evident from old deeds, included all the meadow land from Ackers' Avenue to the new Reservoir. This Jacob Eliot died in 1651, leaving among other children a Capt. Jacob Eliot (also a deacon) and a daughter Mary, who married Theophilus Frarey of Bos- ton. It seems that this Captain Eliot and his brother-in- law Frarey retained this property, until the death of the Captain in 1693 rendered it necessary to sell it in set- tlement of his estate. A curious old deed, still in pos- session of the Ackers family, written in 1698, bears the names of Theophilus Frarey, and the widow and chil- dren of Deacon Jacob Eliot, who joined in deeding a part or all of this land (twenty acres ) to John Ackers. The cellar of the original Ackers' house was traceable within the memory of persons now living.
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