USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Peabody > History Of Peabody Massachusetts > Part 15
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In Congress, and by the press and individuals throughout the land, the most sincere tributes were paid to his memory ; and nowhere more deeply than in his native town and among his own kindred and neighbors, was his loss felt and grieved for, and his character appreciated and lauded. He was in the truest sense a representative of the best element of New England; stainless in private character, unas- suming in life and manners, clear and vigorous in in- tellect and while not seeking advancement, not shrinking from any responsibility which came as his duty ; inflexible in principles and fearless in their utterance, yet never desirous of useless quarrels ; having "malice toward none and charity for all." His character gathered weight with years, until he wield- ed an influence which seemed inexplicable to those who looked at the surface and saw only the plain, quiet and unobtrusive man, not marked by striking qualities of appearance or address, and hardly sug- gesting in his kindly and genial face that intellectual and moral vigor and energy which always rose to the full height of the occasion. Without laying claim to the title of a great man, he filled every position to which his remarkable fortune called him, nobly and with effective results.
Beside his political honors, he was for many years a trustee of the Massachusetts Lunatic Asylum, a member of the Essex Historical Society, of the Es-
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
sex Natural History Society and of the New Eng- land Historico-Genealogical Society. He was a mem- ber and trustee of the Massachusetts Society for pro- moting agriculture, and an officer of the Essex Agri- cultural Society.
His political life seemed to be in its very prime of successful vigor when he left Washington never to re- turn. Mr. Upham, to whose very interesting and valuable memoir the writer of this brief outline is chiefly indebted for his materials, believed that if Mr. King had lived he would have been within no long time Governor of Massachusetts. Certain it is, that in the stormy times which followed, his voice and his influence would ever have been found on the side of liberty, union and equal rights for all.
GEORGE PEABODY, the son of Thomas and Judith Peabody, was born February 18, 1795, in a house still standing in Peabody, on the northerly side of Wash- ington Street, the old Boston road. The Peabody family is one of historic distinction, both in England and in this country. George Peabody was a descend- ant of Lieut. Francis Pabody, who emigrated from St. Albans, Hertfordshire, England, in 1685, and set- tled in Topsfield, then a part of Salem Village, in 1667, where he died in 1698. The name of Peabody is found in the early annals of the province, and sev- eral of the name served honorably in the various wars in which the mother country enlisted the services of her colonists ; and in the Revolution from Bunker's Hill and the siege of Boston, to the end of that triumphant struggle, the name is borne upon the roll of honor of those who faithfully served their country.
The branch of the family to which George Pea- body belonged, was but poorly endowed with worldly goods at the time of his birth. He gained his early education in the district school of the town, and when but twelve years of age he went to work in the grocery store of Captain Sylvester Proctor, in 1807. Captain Proctor's store stood for many years in the place now occupied by Mr. Grosvenor's apothe- cary store. It was a small building, the upper part being used as a residence; and in the attic George had his room while he worked with Captain Proc- tor. His treatment here was kind, and Mr. Peabody always retained a warm feeling for Captain Proc- tor, and when in 1852 he gave the beginning of the fund which was to found a public library in his native town, he requested that the venerable Captain Proctor should be selected to lay the corner stone of the edifice. Unfortunately, the old gentleman did not live to perform that ceremony, to which he had looked forward with the deepest interest.
Mr. Peabody is said to have told the story that the first dollar he ever earned was while he was yet a school-boy, for tending a little booth for the sale of apples and other delicacies at some celebration. He stuck to his post, in spite of the fascinations of the country sports about him, and was rewarded for
his faithfulness with a dollar, which he said gave him more pleasure than any transaction in all the great and successful financial operations of his later days.
After remaining with his first employer about three years, he went to Thetford, Vt., where he lived for a year with his maternal grandfather, Jeremiah Dodge, a farmer. In 1811 he became a clerk in the store of his brother David, in Newburyport. It is recalled that his superior penmanship, a characteristic which he pre- served throughout his life, caused him to be selected, while in Newburyport, to write ballots for the Federal party, for which he received payment outside of his scanty wages as clerk.
He had not been long in Newburyport, when a disastrous fire, which he himself is said to have been the first to discover, caused great injury to that town, and so affected his brother's business that he was again thrown upon his own resources.
Although but sixteen years of age, he was gifted with a manly and vigorous frame, a handsome face and figure, and a prepossessing manner and address, which with his previous experience, enabled him successfully to venture in business by himself. He obtained from Mr. Prescott Spaulding, of Newbury- port, letters which enabled him to purchase on credit from James Reed, of Boston, two thousand dollars worth of goods, which he disposed of to advantage. He always spoke with gratitude of Mr. Spaulding and Mr. Reed, and ascribed to their kindly assistance his first success in commercial life.
In 1812 he accompanied his uncle, Gen. John Pea- body, to Georgetown, D. C., where the two engaged in business together for two years. After his establish- ment in business here, the first consignment made to him was by Francis Todd, of Newburyport. He en- tertained a warm regard for that town, though he had lived there so short a time; and in after years he made a donation to the public library of the town.
He manifested unusual ability as commercial as- sistant in his uncle's business. His unfailing courte- sy and affability won him many friends. It was said of him in after life that he would be " a popular man if he was not worth a dollar ;" and that quality was no small factor in his success. Even in the height of his commercial importance he was remarkably unas- suming in dress and deportment ; he was serupulous- ly exact and punctual in the discharge of his obliga- tions, whether business or personal; and his success was no more than the natural result of a life singu- larly well-planned to effect financial success.
He was a good writer and speaker, and some of his speeches and letters are remarkable for a simple and natural eloquence of style and expression. His con- versational powers were of a high order.
He never married, and when living in London he never had a house of his own, but lived in lodgings; and his personal expenses were never, even in his
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latter days, large, for he cared little for luxuries, and his tastes were simple. At the sumptuous dinners which he often gave, he was wont to fare simply from some common dish, though he was particular about the appointments of his table, and prided himself on its excellence. Fruit was almost his only table lux- ury. Until his failing strength made it a necessity, he kept no valet.
He had a very retentive memory, particularly in regard to names and places, and would give the most minute particulars of events that had occurred many years before.
He was very fond of singing, Scottish songs being his favorites.
In 1814, when only nineteen years of age, he en- tered into partnership, in the wholesale dry goods business, with Mr. Elisha Riggs, in Georgetown ; Mr. Riggs furnishing the capital, and Mr. Peabody con- ducting the business as active partner.
During the War of 1812, although under age, he joined a volunteer company of artillery, and did mil- itary duty at Fort Warburton, which commanded the river approach to Washington. For this service, to- gether with a previous short service at Newburyport, he long afterward received one of the grants of land bestowed by Congress upon the soldiers of that time.
The war over, he entered heartily into the develop- ment of his business, and frequently took long jour- neys alone on horseback to extend the sales of the house. In 1815 the house removed to Baltimore, and in 1822 branch houses were established in New York and Philadelphia.
The business proved very successful, owing chiefly to the talent and industry of Mr. Peabody ; and when by the retirement of Mr. Elisha Riggs, in 1830, Mr. Peabody became the senior partner of the firm, the house of Peabody, Riggs & Company, took rank with the leading concerns of the country. In the course of his business he made several visits to Europe, going to London first in 1827.
In 1837, having withdrawn from the firm of Pea- body, Riggs & Company, he began business with oth- ers as a merchant and money broker, by the style of "George Peabody & Co., of Warnford Court, City." The firm held deposits for customers, discounted bills, negotiated loans and bought or sold stocks. He was remarkably successful in his operations, and soon be- gan to accumulate the foundation of the large fortune which he eventually attained.
He never forgot his American citizenship, but was known throughout his life as the upholder of the credit of American securities; his assistance availed to carry the finances of his adopted State, Maryland, safely over a critical period, and at a time when faith in American securities was depressed in London, his far-sighted and patriotic action helped greatly to re- establish confidence and credit. Speaking at Balti- more, in November, 1866, he said, " Fellow-citizens, the Union of the States of America was one of the
earliest objects of my childhood's reverence. For the independence of our country, my father bore arms in some of the darkest days of the Revolution; and from him and from his example, I learned to love and honor that Union. Later in life, I learned more fully its inestimable worth ; perhaps more fully than most have done, for, born and educated at the North, then living nearly twenty years at the South, and thus learning, in the best school, the character and life of her people ; finally, in the course of a long residence abroad, being thrown in intimate contact with in- dividuals of every section of our glorious land, I came, as do most Americans who live long in foreign lands, to love our country as a whole; to know and take pride in all her sons, as equally countrymen; to know no North, no South, no East, no West. And so I wish publicly to avow, that, during the terrible con- test through which the nation has passed, my sympa- thies were still and always will be with the Union ; that my uniform course tended to assist, but never to injure, the credit of the government of the Union ; and, at the close of the war, three-fourths of all the property I possessed had been invested in United States Government and State securities, and remains so at this time." During the war he gave liberally to various sanitary fairs.
At the time of the Great Exhibition of 1851, in the absence of appropriations by Congress, the American exhibitors at the Crystal Palace found themselves in serious difficulty for lack of funds to fit up the American department, and for a time the exhibitors were disheartened. At this critical moment, Mr. Peabody did what Congress should have done, and by the advance of a large sum enabled his countrymen to take their proper place in the Exhibition. It was an act which earned the gratitude of all Americans. In the same year he gave his first great Fourth of July feast, at Willis's Rooms, to American citizens and the best society of London, headed by the Duke of Wellington. Mr. Peabody, after this, extended his hospitality to a larger extent than ever before; he invited to dinner every person who brought a letter of credit on his house ; and celebrated every Fourth of July by a dinner to the Americans in London, inviting some distinguished English friends to meet them.
Mr. Peabody had now accomplished the object of his life, so far as concerned the acquisition of a large fortune. He had always been liberal in giving to worthy objects; in 1836, when the Lexington Monu- ment in Danvers was erected, he contributed the balance of several hundred dollars necessary to com- plete the work. When the South Church in Danvers was destroyed by fire, he made a liberal contribution toward rebuilding it; and the spirit which he after- ward showed had already been manifest in smaller things.
But about this time he seems to have conceived the idea of giving his great wealth in such a way that he
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
might direct the application of it while he yet lived. In 1852, he made the gift to the town of Danvers, of which an account has been given elsewhere, of $20,000, which was increased before his death to $200,000.
The same year, he provided the means of fitting out the " Advance," Dr. Kane's ship, for the Arctic voyage in search of Sir John Franklin.
In 1857, he made his first donation to the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, to which he gave in all up- wards of $1,000,000.
In 1856, Mr. Peabody visited this country. He was tendered a public reception by a committee of dis- tinguished Americans, but declined all public recep- tions except in his native town.
On the 9th of October, 1856, a reception and dinner was given to Mr. Peabody by the people of Danvers. The children of the schools made up a procession brilliant with emblematic costumes and banners; elaborate decorations were placed upon public and private buildings, and across the streets arches of wel- come were placed. A distinguished gathering of in- vited guests met in the Peabody Institute, and among the speakers were Gov. Gardner, Edward Everett, President Walker, Prof. C. C. Felton and other emi- nent men. A full account of this reception, includ- ing a sketch of the Peabody Institute to that time, was published by the town.
Mr. Peabody did not long remain in this country at this visit.
In 1859 he set about carrying out a long cherished purpose of establishing homes for the deserving poor of London ; for this purpose, he gave in all, including a bequest in his will, £500,000. This great charity has been admirably managed by the trustees, and the value of the property nearly or quite doubled, by the investment of income. Over twenty thousand persons are accommodated in the tenements comprised in this charity, the average rent of each of the five thousand separate dwellings being 48. 9}d. per week. The tenants are not paupers, but artisans and laboring men and women of a great variety of occupations. There are eighteen different locations where blocks of buildings have been erected under the trust.
In 1866 Mr. Peabody again returned to this coun- try, and set about the arrangement of a series of gifts to charities and institutions of learning which was without a parallel, and which doubtless formed the inspiration for later gifts by wealthy men during their lifetime.
He first turned his attention to his native town of South Danvers, and by a gift of one hundred thous- and dollars, placed the institute there on a substan- tial foundation. He gave fifty thousand dollars to the Peabody Institute in Danvers in September, 1866. About the same time, he established libraries on a smaller scale at Thetford, Vermont, and at George- town, Mass., the residence of his mother.
In October, 1866, he made a donation of one hundred
and fifty thousand dollars to Yale College to found a museum of natural history ; and the same month he gave one hundred and fifty thousand dollars to found a museum of American archæology and ethnology in connection with Harvard University.
In January, 1867, he gave twenty thousand dollars to the Massachusetts Historical Society ; and during the next month he gave one hundred and forty thousand dollars to found the Peabody Academy of Science in connection with the Essex Institute in Salem. At about the same time he gave twenty-five thousand dollars to Kenyon College, of which his friend, Bishop Mellvaine, was then president. In 1867, too, he gave fifteen thousand dollars to New- buryport, for the public library. He gave to Phillips Academy, at Andover, Mass., the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars.
During this visit he began the erection of a memorial church in the name of his sister, Mrs. J. P. Russell, and himself, to the memory of his mother, in George- town, at a cost of one hundred thousand dollars. It was dedicated in 1868, and John G. Whittier wrote a poem for the occasion.
The greatest of his American charities, the South- ern Education Fund, was begun by him during this visit to America ; by the gift to a board of trustees of one million dollars in available funds, and one mil- lion dollars in bonds of the State of Mississippi, which it was hoped the nature of the gift might im- pel that State to redeem, as it had been decided she was legally bound to do. But this hope has never yet been realized; and on his last visit, in 1869, Mr. Peabody added one million to the cash capital of the fund, making the whole gift three million dollars.
His health had already begun to fail before his last visit, in 1869. He was very desirous to meet once more the various boards which had in charge his princely charities, and particularly the trustees of the Southern Education Fund ; and he accomplished that object.
The last visit of a public nature which Mr. Peabody made to his native town was in the summer of 1869, when he invited a number of personal friends, and several of the trustees of his various charities, to meet him at the Peabody Institute. Among the guests were Charles Sumner, Robert C. Winthrop, Ex-gov- ernor Clifford, and Oliver Wendell Holmes. Brief remarks were made by several of the guests, and Mr. Holmes read a short poem.
A remark of Mr. Peabody's, spoken at the reunion, is characteristic of his life and its objects. " It is sometimes hard for one who has devoted the best part of his life to the accumulation of money, to spend it for others ; but practise it, and keep on practising it, and I assure you it comes to be a pleasure."
His last appearance in public was during the great Peace Jubilee, 1869, when he made a speech. He sought rest and renewed health at White Sulphur Springs, in Virginia, but without success, and re-
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turned to London in the hope that the change of air to his accustomed haunts might be of benefit to him. But he did not rally as he hoped, and, growing rapidly worse, he died November 4, 1869.
The highest honors were paid him, both in Eng- land and in his native country. A funeral service was performed over his coffin in Westminster Abbey, and the Bishop of London preached a funeral ser- mon in the Abbey on the Sunday following. The British war-ship "Monarch," one of the finest iron- clads in the British navy, was ordered by her Majes- ty's government to convey the remains of the philan- thropist to his native land, and it was convoyed by an American war ship, and also a French vessel detailed by the Emperor for that service. One of the royal princes, Prince Arthur, accompanied the expedition, and attended the funeral exercises in this country as the representative of his mother, the Queen.
The funeral fleet brought the body to Portland, Me., where it lay in state; thence it was brought to his native town, then called by his own name, where, after lying in state in the building which he had given, it was buried in the family lot which he had selected in Harmony Grove Cemetery. The funeral exercises were held in the Old South Church, on the site where in a former edifice he had attended divine service as a boy. The whole town was in mourning ; great crowds of strangers filled the streets; the funeral oration was eloquently and fittingly pro- nounced by Robert C. Winthrop; and amid a wild snow-storm, which sprang up during the ceremonies, the solemn procession wound its slow way to the burial-place.
The following is a list, not wholly complete, but giving most of his larger contributions to charity, ed- ucation and progress :
To the State of Maryland, money due him for nego-
tiating State loan of #8,000,0 0 ... $60,000
To the Peabody Institute, Baltimore, including ac- crued interest.
1,500,000
To the Southern Education Fund.
3,000,000
To Yale College.
150,000
To Harvard College. 150,000
To the Peabody Academy of Science, Salem. 140,000
To Phillips Academy, Andover. 25,000
To the Peabody Institute, Peabody 200,000
To the Peabody High School, Peabody.
2,000
To the Peabody Institute, Dany ers.
50,000
To the Massachusetts Historical Society
20,000
To Kenyon College, Ohio.
25,000
To Newburyport for the Public Library
15,000
To the Memorial Church in Georgetown, Mass.
100,000
To the library in Georgetown
5,000
To the library in Thetford, Vermont.
5,500
To Kane's Arctic expedition.
10,000
To different sanitary fairs
10,000
To unpaid moneys advanced to uphold the credit of States ...
40,000
To homes for the poor in London.
2,500,000
Total .. $8,007,500
Besides these, Mr. Peabody made a large number of donations for various public purposes in sums ranging up to one thousand dollars, and extending back as far as 1835.
His great charitable gifts brought world-wide recognition during his life-time. The Queen, on his refusal of a baronetcy, sent him an autograph letter, which he had indicated as a gift which would be specially valued by him, and accompanied it by a miniature portrait of herself in enamel on gold, by Tilb, which is deposited at the Peabody Institute, Peabody, as a recognition of his munificent gift to the poor of London. In 1866 Congress ordered that a gold medal valued at five thousand dollars be given him for his great gift to the South. The city of London presented him with the freedom of the city in a gold box, and the Fishmongers' Company and Merchant Tailors' Fraternity, of the ancient London Guilds, honored him with membership in their bodies, the Fishmongers presenting their memorial in a gold box, These valued gifts were presented by Mr. Peabody, with other valuable papers and memor- ials, to the Peabody Institute in Peabody, where they are treasured in lasting remembrance of his bene- factions.
FITCH POOLE, the son of Deacon Fitch Poole, was born June 13, 1803, in the house in Poole's Hollow in the South Parish of Danvers, built by his great- grandfather, John Poole, about 1757. He was edu- cated in the common schools of the town, and having learned the trade of sheepskin and morocco manu- facturer, he engaged in that business in a store close by his birth-place, and during many years was inter- ested either by himself or in company with others in that branch of industry. He very early developed a decided taste for literary pursuits, and became a correspondent of the newspapers of the vicinity, sometimes treating of political matters and sometimes of the early history and traditions of the locality, in which he was deeply versed, and which he made a life-long study, becoming a recognized authority on antiquarian matters, and displaying a never-failing enthusiasm in research and in the discussion of all that pertained to town and early colonial history.
His reading was varied and extensive, and his writing was marked by a natural and expressive style, which showed the originality of his thought, and was constantly flavored with a piquancy of idea and expression springing from his keen and delicate sense of humor, a quality which entered largely into his genial and winning personality, and which made him through life a delightful companion whose every- day greeting had a cheerful and sunny influence, and who brought smiles into every company.
The artistic temperament was clearly shown in him, not only in his literary work, but in various other directions, particularly in a cleverness for cari- cature and humorous sketches with the pencil, and an aptitude for modelling in plaster, which was remark- able considering his lack of elementary training for such work. Some portrait busts, and also some original conceptions in plaster, particularly a series of representations of humorous characters in Irving's
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PEABODY.
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
"History of New York," show traces of distinct power and originality.
His fondness for the humorous, and his quickness of wit, made him, particularly in his younger days, the centre of a little band of choice spirits, whose amusing exploits are still remembered by many of the people of South Danvers.
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