History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 200

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed. n 85042884-1
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1538

USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I > Part 200

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In 1686 an agreement was made with Corporal Per- kins to furnish a school-room, with a fire-room in it, for the space of six months, for ten shillings, and John Perley was engaged for the term ensuing ; his salary, twenty pounds " in pay " or ten pounds in money per year.

In 1700 a Grammar School was established, and Robert Hale, son of the first minister, appointed teacher at a salary of ten pounds. In 1701 Daniel Dodge was the teacher, and in 1704 James Hale,

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brother of Robert, taught writing, reading, casting accounts, Latin and Greek grammar, at a salary of thirty pounds.

In 1720 this school was kept by Pyam Blowers, son of the second minister.

In 1782 the Grammar School was discontinued, for which the town was presented to the Court of Ses- sions, when it was resumed and kept till 1825. It was held in various places till 1798, when it was estab- lished in a new house on Watch Hill, the second story being fitted up for town purposes.

About the middle of the century the teacher was required to return a list to the selectmen of the names of parents and masters and the number of children and servants instructed by him. The select- men were to tax the parents and masters for the sup- port of the schools, and the children and servants of persons refusing to pay their proportion of fuel were not allowed to warm themselves by the school- house fire.

In 1749 the sum of thirty-two pounds, old tenor, was granted to the inhabitants of the eastern part of the town, towards a school, during four months, and in 1752 a Grammar School was kept there a time pro- portionate to the amount of taxes paid. From 1754- 1825 various changes were made, until the Grammar School was abolished, and it was voted to divide the school money raised among the ten school dis- tricts.

In 1836 these school regulations were revised, and a list of books for study prescribed.

In 1797, " considering the populous and increasing state of the town, and the decayed state of the school- house on the common, the town voted it expedient to build a new Grammar School-house, 43x32} feet, of two stories, each about ten feet stud, with room below of about thirty-one feet square for the school, and the same above for town-meetings and other purposes, with room convenient for selectmen and assessors, with one below for a library and with a convenient entry and stairway."

The site on Watch Hill was bought of the heirs of Larkin Thorndike, by the building committee, and the next year, 1798, school was opened here under the tuition (it is believed) of Andrew Peabody, father of the Rev. Dr. Peabody, whose successor was Silas Stickney, who was succeeded by Isaac Flagg.

Until 1841, when the town, having bought the Thorndike mansion and fitted it for a town-house, the hall in this building was used for municipal por- poses.

Then the district bought the school-house and land and gave it the name of Briscoe, in honor of Robert Briscoe. In 1873 the school-gronnds were enlarged by the addition, by purchase, of the lands of several adjoining estates, and the old school-house removed to the lot on the common, where it now stands, but little distant from the site of the original school building of 1674.

In 1875 the Central Grammar School was opened in this building, the name of which was changed to the Hardie School, in honor of the first school-mas- ter, Samuel Hardie.

Just after the Revolution a school was established by a few of the citizens in Dike's Lane (now Elm Square). It was in a small, plain building, heated by a large open fire-place, and about forty scholars was the maximum attendance. The price of tuition was four dollars per quarter, and none of the teachers, all of them college graduates, received over five hundred dollars salary. There was a class in Latin and Greek, and the English scholars were divided into three classes. The sexes were about equally represented. This school lasted about thirty years, Isaac Flagg being the last teacher, who, when this was discon- tinued, took charge of the Grammar School in Bris- coe Hall.

Among the early teachers of this school was Wil- liam Prescott, a son of Colonel Prescott, of Bunker Hill fame, afterwards a distinguished judge, who came to Beverly to study law with Hon. Nathan Dane. He established his first law-office in Beverly ; his daughter, Mrs. Franklin Dexter, is one of the oldest sea-shore residents.

The High School was not established until after a conflict of several years, the opposition being not so much against the establishment of the school itself as from a fear that the money devoted to its support would be proportionately taken from the various district schools, all of them being popular local in - stitutions, and each with its special neighborhood at - tractions.

The towns had become large enough to be liable in law to support a High School, and some of its friends got so far ont of patience in waiting for the town to establish it that they had it indicted. This but in- tensified the opposition, which was then a decided majority, and they at first attempted to defend the town; but eventually yielded, though the school was at first established at the West Farms, at some dis- tance from the centre of population.

It was established in October, 1857, under John R. Baker as master, the scholars mostly going to it by railroad.

In 1860 it was voted to discontinne the school, but in 1861 the subject was referred to a committee of one from each school district, who reported in favor of locating it in Odd Fellows' Hall, then on Railroad Avenne. Afterwards the town bought the present armory building on Cabot Street, where the school was held until the completion of the Briscoe Build- ing, in which excellent accommodations had been provided for it. The principals have been John R. Baker, Joseph Hale Abbott, Leroy N. Griffin, Wil- lard G. Sperry, Edwin C. Colcord, Enoch C. Adams, Benjamin S. Hurd, who have always had the services of valuable assistant teachers.

Within the past twenty years the greatest improve-

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ment has been made in the schools and buildings. Anticipating for several years the abolition of the district system in 1866, the school-houses throughout the town had fallen into decay; and this condition of things necessitated vigorons measures when the town took charge. New buildings were erected in every district save one (at the Cove), where the house was enlarged and beautified.

1875,-In January of this year the finest school building in town was dedicated, standing in the place of the Hardie school-house, and known as the Bris- coe. The total cost of this brick structure, the arch- itect of which was J. Foster Ober, a son of Beverly, was abont seventy-five thousand dollars.

The school census of Beverly recently completed, shows sixteen hundred and eighty-four children be- tween the ages of five and fifteen years-an increase of twenty-eight over last year,-

In the South District about 479

Iu the Briscoe District about. 417

In the Washington District about. 364

In the Cove District about. 142

In the Farms District about 130

In the Bass River District about 65

In the Centreville District about 52

In the Dodge's Row District about. 35

In 1873, at the age of seventy years, Joseph Hale Abbot deceased, in Cambridge. Mr. Abbot was well known to the people of this town through his long connection with the High School, and his mar- riage with the only daughter of a prominent citizen, Captain Henry Larcom. He was a descendant of the first minister of Beverly, Rev. John Hale, and a rela- tive of Rev. Abiel Abbott. He left a widow, who sur- vived him but a short time, and several children. One of his sons, Edward S. Abbot, is buried here, having died in his country's service.

Of Beverly's place in literature, it is yet early to write. Of the published productions of the earlier writers-Hlale (tract on witchcraft, and sermons), Champney, Hitchcock, Willard, McKean (published sermons), Dr. Abiel Abbott and Rev. Joseph Emerson (sermons hy the former, and " Letters from Cuba ;" scientific and educational essays hy the latter)-men- tion has been made. The greatest contribution to legal lore was by Hon. Nathan Dane, in his "Digest of American Laws," etc.

A daughter of Dr. Abbott, Miss Anne W. Abbott (still living, at nearly eighty years of age), wrote many charming story-books for children, as: " Kate and Lizzie," 1845; "The Tamed and the Untamed," "The Olneys," etc. ; and a popular game of her invention forty years ago, "Dr. Busby," is still puh- lished for the delight of the youth of to-day.

One of the first books descriptive of the islands of the South Sea was written by a Beverly lady, Mrs. M. D. Wallis, under the title of " Life in Fejee."

One who wrote throughout a long life was Wilson Flagg, whose delightful descriptions of nature are unsurpassed. His first observations were conducted

in Beverly, and his first literary productions ema- nated hence. The books that have made his reputa- tion, as a poetic and thoughtful student of nature, are " Birds and Seasons," and " Woods and By-ways of New England." Besides these, he published other books and contributed for many years to the maga- zines and papers.

Another eminent anthor, whom we may claim as a native of Beverly by right of birth, is Rev. Dr. A. P. Peabody, whose valued works on Christianity and Ethics are familiar to all readers. His most popular- ly-known books, perhaps, are " Conversation" and " Reminiscences of European Travel."

Of America's distinguished women, one who has modestly won an enviable position in the world of letters, is Miss Lucy Larcom, another descendant of Beverly's pioneer families. Miss Larcom began to write verses while running about the fields and hills of Beverly, as a child, and continned to do so during her earlier years, while a mill-girl at Lowell. She was, perhaps, the youngest contributor to the Lowell Offering, published by the working-girls of that city, many years ago. She continued to write for publica- tion during the years that followed, while studying and teaching in young ladies' schools.

Her first volume of poems was published by Fields, Osgood & Co., about 1868. This was followed by other volumes of verses : " An Idyl of Work," "Child- hood Songs" and "Wild Roses of Cape Ann." A complete collection of her poems has recently been added to their "Household Edition," by Houghton. Mifflin & Co. She has also compiled several works, as, " Breathings of a Better Life," "Roadside Poems for Summer Travelers," "Hillside and Seaside in Poetry," etc.

To travel and history, Frederick A. Ober, a native of Beverly, has contributed "Camps in the Carib- bees," a personal narrative of adventure in the West Indian forests, "Travels in Mexico," a "History of Mexico," the "Silver City," and other stories of ad- venture.

Yet another descendant of the first of his name in Beverly, is George E. Woodberry, author of a " His- tory of Wood Engraving," a "Life of Edgar A. Poe," of a threnody entitled, "The North-Shore Watch," and of other poems, which have won the admiration of scholars and critics.

In 1849 deceased, at West Needham, William B. Tappan, who was born in Beverly, the author of that beautiful hymn, " There is an Hour of Peaceful Rest." Of other writers, mention may be found in the pages preceding ; but it is not claimed that the list is an ex- haustive one, and the historian craves the reader's in- dulgence.

In January, 1875, Rev. George Trask, the anti-to- bacco philanthropist, died in Fitchburg, at the age of seventy-seven. Mr. Trask did battle for principle throughout a long and active life, and was an honor to Beverly, the town of his birth.

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1876 .- The oldest inhabitant of Beverly died April 20th, this year-Jacob Groce, who was born February 12, 1780. In early life he followed the sea, making many trips to the West Indies, Europe and elsewhere. In 1800 or 1801, while on a passage to the West Indies in the schooner "Sally," with Capt. Gideon Ray, his vessel was chased by a French privateer, captured and taken into Guadaloupe; sailing thence, on board the privateer, they were again captured, by a British man-of-war, and afterwards sent home on an eastern lumber vessel, after remaining a while in Martinique. In 1812 he was takeu prisoner by a British sloop-of-war, carried into Bermuda and thence to Halifax, where he and his companions were nearly starved. Mr. Groce's life was unambitious though serene in his latter years, and his example was one of goodness and charity to his fellow-men.

1878 .- March 17th passed away the then oldest in- habitant, in the person of Mrs. Elizabeth Whitney Page, at the age of ninety-five years and three months. Her husband was Josiah Page, who was drowned off the coast of Sumatra, 1810; and she was a daughter of Dr. Elisha Whitney, whose wife, Eunice, was daughter of General Michael Farley, of Ipswich, a descendant of the Farley who came from England in 1675.

1879 .- Dr. Wyatt C. Boyden deceased, after a long residence in Beverly, at the age of eighty-seven. He was born in Gardner, Mass., in 1794, but reared in Tamworth, N. H., where his early life was passed on a farm. He graduated from Dartmouth in 1819, a class-mate with Rufus Choate, and he was the last survivor of his class. Dr. Boyden came to Beverly Farms in 1823, where he first taught school, and there married and began practice as physician. In 1825 he removed to the centre of the town, and in 1826 succeeded to the practice of Dr. Abner Howe. As citizen and physician he was held in high esteem ; he took a lively interest in local affairs, and especially in the cause of education ; was a trustee of the Fisher Charitable Society for fifty-one years.

1880 .- November 1st, Dr. Augustus Torrey, son of Dr. Joseph Torrey, a well-known physician of Salem, and in his later years of Beverly, and a grandson of the famous Rev. Manasseh Cutler, of Hamilton, died, this date, in his seventy-sixth year. He graduated at Harvard in 1824, and from its medical school in 1827. He married a niece of Nathan Dane, and left a family of five sons and two daughters. He is re- membered as a worthy citizen, a man of fine literary tastes and a skilled practitioner. In the same profes- sion as his father and grandfather is Dr. Samuel Tor- rey, son of Dr. Augustus Torrey, who maintains the prestige of the family to-day.

Two physicians long identified with the town were the Drs. Kitteredge, father and son, who are men- tioned elsewhere in this volume.

1881 .- There died in Philadelphia, March 31st, where he had resided since 1867, Dr. Isaac Rea, at

the age of seventy-four. He was a son of Beverly, educated at Phillips Academy and Bowdoin College, and studying medicine at the Harvard Medical Col- lege. He practiced medicine in Portland and East- port, Me., and was appointed superintendent of the Maine State Lunatic Hospital in 1841, and of the Butler Hospital for Insane, at Providence, R. I., in 1846, where he remained till 1867. He won high recognition for his practice and theory of the medical treatment of insanity, and published many valuable books on the subject, which are recognized as author_ ities. The physicians practicing in Beverly to-day maintain the reputation of their predecessors. The oldest practitioner is Dr. Chas. Haddock, who has had thirty-five years of service here, and with whom is now associated his son, Dr. Chas. W., the next being Dr. Oscar F. Swazey, with thirty years of prac- tice in our midst.

September 28th, James Stone, long prominent in maritime offairs. and a prisoner of 1812, deceased, at the age of ninety-two years.

1882 .- October 13th, the soldiers' monument was dedicated, which stands on the triangular lot of land at the junction of Abbot and Endicott Streets. It was erected by the comrades of " John H. Chipmau " Post 89, G. A. R., from the proceeds of various fairs, during several years, and subscriptions hy our towns- people. Four years previously, after advertising for designs for a soldiers' and sailors' monument, the post accepted the design submitted by the Hallowell Granite Company, of Maine, at the price of four thousand eight hundred dollars.

The corner-stone was laid October 10, 1882, and a box deposited beneath it containing, among other papers, a brief sketch of each full company furnished by Beverly for the war : Company E, Eighth Regiment, Capt. F. E. Porter; Company G, Twenty-third Regi- ment, Capt. John W. Raymond; and Company K, Fortieth Regiment, Capt. E. L. Giddings, as also their memorable battles, etc.

The dedicatory exercises were held on the 13th, and called to Beverly many distinguished people as par- ticipants, among them the Goveruor, John B. Long, and staff, and veterans from other Grand Army of the Republic organizations.

The procession formed was the largest the town had ever witnessed within its limits, containing twenty- six hundred, with delegates from all the county posts, members of the entire Fire Department of Beverly, and no less than fourteen bands of music and drum corps. A section of Battery C, of Melrose, fired the salutes of the day, opening with seventeen guns for the Governor, and closing with a national salute of thirty-eight guns, at the end of the exercises at the monument.

The chief marshal was Col. John W. Raymond, of Beverly, with Col. H. P. Woodbury as chief of staff, and Dr. Chas. Haddock surgeon-general. Col. F. E. Porter commanded the First Brigade, which con-

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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

tained Post 89 with its one hundred and fifty mem- bers, led by Wm. H. Morgan, commander. The mon- ument was dedicated by Post Commander Wm. H. Morgan ; prayer was offered by Wm. Stafford, chap- lain of the post, and an address by Rev. J. F. Lover- ing, of Worcester. Owing to an accident, by which the platform on which were the invited guests, seventy- five in number, was thrown to the ground and several people injured, the exercises here were interrupted and the procession moved to the common, where a dinner was served in the mammoth tent, and toasts were responded to by the eminent guests of the oc- casion.

Many buildings along the ronte of the procession were handsomely decorated. At one point was sta- tioned an old war-horse, thirty-four years of age, from whose back was killed Col. Wells, of the Thirty- fourth Massachusetts Volunteers, and in whose body were several bullets received in battle.

The monument was cut from fine white granite, is thirty-six feet in height, with a square base, twelve by twelve feet. The plinth is six feet six inches square, and on the dies, five feet four inches square, are the inscriptions :

"To the soldiers and sailors of Beverly ;

"Erected in behalf of the citizens of the towa by Post 89,

" Department of Massachusetts, Grand Army of the Republic, 1882 ;

"Embalmed in the memories of the succeeding generations, the heroic dead will live oo in immortal youth ;

"Teaching io eloquent silence the lesson of the Citizen's duty to the State."

The corners of the dies are ornamented with carved cannon. The shaft is surmounted by the figure of a soldier loading at will.

Post 89, Beverly, G. A. R., was organized June 6, 1869, and took its name from John H. Chipman, who went out a second time to the war as captain of Com- pany C, Fifty-ninth Regiment Massachusetts Volun- teers, which was recruited in town and composed in part of Beverly men.

The Post has a membership of 200, and has paid out, for the benefit of comrades and families of de- ceased members, in the past six years, over $6,000. On the 1st of November, 1882, the monument was for- mally presented by the Post to the town, with public exercises in the town hall, presented by Commander Morgan, and accepted by John I. Baker in behalf of the town, and a list was published of the soldiers and sailors who had died in service since the war.1

In April, of this year, died Capt. Jona. H. Lovett, a retired sea-captain, and David Lefavour, at the age of seventy-six, one of the first shoe manufacturers of the town.

The Beverly Times, a valuable local paper, was es- tablished this year by Messrs Morgan & Bates.

1883 .- The Rev. Edwin M. Stone, formerly minis- ter of the Second Parish Church, 1834-47, representa- tive 1842 and 1844, and the author of a " History of

Beverly," died in Providence December 22d, aged seventy-eight years. The latter part of his life was passed in Providence, R. I., where for some years he was a city missionary. He had done much literary work in the course of his life, his latest and most val- uable publication being "Our French Allies in the Revolution."

Miss Elizabeth Manning Hawthorne, the last sur- viving sister of Nathaniel Hawthorne, died January Ist, aged eighty years and nine months. For the thirty years then past she had lived a very retired life in a farm-house at Monserrat, almost unknown to her neighbors. She was two years the senior of her gifted brother, who, it is said, often declared that she could attain fame if she would devote herself to literary pur- suits. Hawthorne's grandmother, daughter of Jona- than and Lydia (Cox) Phelps, was born in Beverly, June 1, 1734, in the house that stood on or near the site occupied by the Roman Catholic parsonage.

In excavating for the foundation of the Lawrence Pottery, to replace the one destroyed by fire, an an- cient brick kiln was unearthed. The bricks were somewhat longer and wider than those now in use, and thinner.

November 17, Benjamin O. Pierce, aged seventy-one, died in Beverly, well known as a public educator.

1884 .- January 9, Lieut .- Col. Henry P. Woodbury died at the age of forty-eight years. One of the first to respond to the call for three months' men, in 1861, as first sergeant, under Col. Porter, he re-enlisted at the expiration of this term of service as first lieu- tenant under Capt. Raymond, in Company G, Twenty- third Regiment. He fought gallantly to the end of the war in 1865, sustaining injuries from which he never recovered. He left a widow and two sons, and an aged mother, Mrs. Nancy Woodbury, who is now living (1887), in excellent health, at ninety years of age. Colonel Woodbury represented the town in the Legislature in 1877.

May 6, at Cambridge, died Wilson Flagg, aged seventy-eight years and six months. Mr. Flagg was an ardent lover of nature, and the author of several books on birds and trees: "Studies in Field and Forest," 1857 ; " Woods and Byways of New Eng- land," 1872, and other books, as well as many arti- cles in the Atlantic Magazine. His rare musical talent he inherited from his father, Isaac Flagg, the school-master and choir-leader of the old South for many years. "One of his most wonderful feats in the musical line was his arrangement of the songs and notes of the birds to music, as given in their grand anthems of May and June, particularly the song of the vesper bird, the peculiar trilling notes of the 'veery' and the solemn tones of the wood-thrush with its strange cadence. One can say, in the words of Emerson, as he wrote of Thoreau : 'His soul was made for the noblest society ; wherever there is knowledge, wherever there is virtue, wherever there is beauty, he will find a home.' "

1 Pub. in Citizen of Nov. 4, 1884.

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BEVERLY.

In December, 1884, the South School-house was destroyed by fire with a loss to the town of $2,000. A new building was erected in 1885 at a cost of $25,000.

1885 .- In June this year the old mill at the head of Bass River was burned. It is about two hundred and fifty years since the first mill was erected in Beverly, probably by John Friend, who had a grant of land (ten acres) in 1637, and one hundred more in 1638. In 1665, after Friend's death, his heirs granted and confirmed to Jolin Leach, son of Law- rence, "the mill and mill-house standing in Bass River, with all the appurtenances, with two acres of land adjoining and twenty acres a little dis- tance off, all on Ryall's Neck side. "This was re- ognized as the property of Lawrence Leach by the town of Salem, in 1627, when it decided that the way from the meeting-house to said mill shall be directly in the country way to Edmund Grover's (near the present corner of Cabot and Beckford), etc., substantially as Mill Street to-day, but crossing the mill-pond farther up the stream than the present road over the dam. Relics of the old dam and gate- way may still be seen, and the course of the ancient roadway may yet be traced.

The original mill was probably much nearer the head of the stream than the last one. At the point where Bass River Brook meets the tide-water is a high embankment, which once served as a dam and another still farther up. One of these dams was used to confine the water for the cotton-mill erected there in the last century.

The oak frame of the old mill, or a portion of it, is in one of the barns formerly owned by Aaron Dodge, near the mill-dam. In 1669, John Leach, miller, sold to John Dodge, Jr. for two hundred and fifty pounds, all the lands, dwelling-house, mills and privileges. This Capt. John Dodge, Jr., was a son of William Dodge, the first of the name here. In 1702 he deeds to his son-in-law, Ebenezer Woodbury, for two hun- dred pounds in silver, "all my grist-mill, alias corn- mill, in Salem, with 2 acres of land in Salem & 1} acres in Beverly, with all streams, water tools, imple- ments, etc."

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History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 200

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed. n 85042884-1 Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1538

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed. n 85042884-1
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1538