History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 260

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1672

USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 260

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Regent-F. N. Flanders. Vice-Regen1-Warren Hoyt. Orator-W. F. Thayer. Secretary-E. H. Emerson. Collector-Herman F. Morse. Treasurer-Albert Le Bosquet. Chaplain-W. H. Lawrence. Guide-C. II. Worthen. Warden-James Langley. Sen .- B. F. Leighton. Trustees-Alden P. Jaques, Walter S. Goodell, B. F. Leighton. Del. to Grand Council-R. A. Grieves.

Officers of the Union Steamboat Company of Haverhill and Newburyport for 1888.

Directors-Oliver Taylor, (. W. Morse, Henry N. Sheppard, F. N. Keezer, Levi Taylor, J. F. Tilton.

Treasurer-G. M. Goodwin.

Clerk-C. H. Brown.

Building Committee-E. P. Shaw. George M. Goodwin, C. W. Morse, Fred. N. Keezer, G. F. Tilton.

Committee on By-laws-E. P. Shaw, C. W. Morse.

Trustees of the City Hospital.

George II. Carleton-ex officio-as mayor, Nathan S. Kimball, Addison B. Jaques, Amos A. Sargont, Samuel M Currier, John Crowell, trustees : John Crowell, secretary.

Some Charitable and Mutual Benefit Societies.

Major How Relief Corps. Mutual Relief Lodge, I. O. O. F. Plymouth Rock Colony, P. F. Court Pentucket, A. O. F.

Court Phoenix, A. O. F.

Major How Post 47, G. A. R.

Kenoza Lodge, D. of R. Palestine Lodge, K. of P. Burtt Lodge, A. O. U. W.

J. G. Whittier Council, R. A. Enterprise Council, Jr. O. U. A. M.

Excelsior Lodge, K. and L. of H.

J. K. Jenness Camp, S. of V. Haverhill Commandery, K. G. C.

Washington Council, O. U. A. M.

Mizpah Lodge, I. O. O. F.

Excelsior Council, A. L. of H. Lincoln Relief Association.

Puritan Council, Home Circle. Eagle Assembly, R. S. G. F. Excelsior Lodge, N. E. O. P.

Pentucket Lodge, K. of L.

The eighth annual report of the Board of Health, for the year 1887, is comparatively satisfactory. The board is progressive in its views and action, and cn- deavors, each year, to hold up and sustain a higher standard of sanitary condition. From this report to the mayor and City Council, dated January 2, 1888, have been gleaned some facts and extracts of interest.

During the year past eighteen tenement-houses were ordered vacated on account of unsanitary con- dition, eleven of which were put in proper order and seven were vacated.

Night-soil is removed by a person under license, and at a price fixed by the board. Ashes and gar- bage are collected by the Highway Department, but the method of disposing of them is not satisfactory to the board, which believes they should be completely destroyed by cremation, or some other equally effec- tive method. House-offal is collected by an agent, acting under contract with the board.

Only one complaint of an offensive trade was mado to the board during the year.

During the current year it is intended to make a systematic inspection of all school buildings, with a view of determining their sanitary condition.

Most of the sickness from zymotie diseases is as- cribed by the board to defective systemis of house- drainage and poor workmanship. After careful study

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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

of the theory and practice of some of the best known authorities onthis subject, and comparison in the light of information obtained by their own experi- ence, a code of regulations for the construction of house-drainage was framed and adopted by the board in October. They are believed to be practicable, and not too stringent.

Although diphtheria and scarlet fever were un- usually prevalent in Massachusetts last year, there wa- a marked reduction in the number of cases re- ported at the office of the Board of Health in Haver- lill. The whole number of cases of contagious diseases reported during the year was 258 against 362 in 1886. Of this number, 142 were diphtheria, 34 were scarlet fever, 72 typhoid fever, and 10 cases of measles were reported. The number of deaths was forty-five, five less than in 1886, and making 17.40 per cent. of the cases reported. By far the larger number of conta- gious diseases reported are from the poorer class of tenement-houses and in families, where, by reason of poverty and overcrowding, the necessities of isola- tion cannot be commanded.

The mortality records for the twelve months end- ing December 31st show that 1887 was one of more than average good health. While the population of the city increased, the number of deaths was less than in 1886. The whole number of death's in the city was 465, exclusive of still births, as compared with 481 for the year previous. Estimating the mean population at 25,000, this represents an annual death- rate of 18.60 for every 1000 of population. This diminution in the death-rate has occurred chiefly in the constitutional class and the zymotic diseases, which class comprises those commonly considered to represent the sanitary condition of places, because in a measure preventable by the observance of sanitary regulations. The ratio of deaths in this division was 22.58 per cent. of all deaths against 25.36 in 1886, and varying in different wards from 10.00 to 38.46 per cent. This proportion of preventable deaths, although not so large as last year, is a good deal higher than it should be.

The disease which most largely contributed to mor- tality in this class was cholera infantum, which caused thirty-five deaths, which number, notwith- standing the unusually high temperature of the sum- mier months, did not differ materially from that of the preceding year.

I'nder the constitutional class 97 deaths were re- corded, or 20.86 per cent. of the total mortality. Cases of consumption numbered 72, or 15.27 per cent. of all deaths, as against 14.76 per cent. the year before.

From the local class were 189, or 40.64 per cent. Diseases of the heart caused 7.74 per cent. and acute lung diseases 8.62 per cent. of deaths from all causes.

The mortality in the development elass, including 19 deaths from old age, was 51, or 19.67 per cent., and the number of violent deaths, or those caused by ac- cident, negligence or suicide, was 16, or 3.44.

The number of deaths under five years of age was 162, or 34.84 per cent. of the whole number, as against 37.00 per cent. in 1886, and those under one year constituted 20.64 per cent.

The whole number of deaths occurring among French Canadian residents was fifty-nine. The cen- sus of the French Canadian population, taken under the supervision of St. Jobn the Baptist Society in July, 1887. places that portion of the population at 2872; on this basis, with the total before given, the annual death-rate was 20.54 to the thousand. Con- sumption, the leading disease of the constitutional class, caused 15.36 per cent. of the whole number of deaths, and 33.89 per cent. were in the zymotic class.

The mortality among children under five years of age was 57.62 per cent. of the 59 deaths recorded, more than one-half; and 33.89 per cent. were under the age of one year. Owners of tenement-houses are growing to realize more and more the value of im- proved sanitary conditions, particularly in regard to the plumbing work in new buildings, the standard of which was raised very much during 1887, and they are more willing to give intelligent support to meas- ures for the public health. Though great improve- ment must yet take place, before the sanitary condi- tion of Ilaverhill can be regarded as satisfactory, the board believed that there was a better condition of things than ever before in its history as a city.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

ROBERT GREEN WALKER.1

The Walkers are a family long established in IFav- erhill, and many of its members have been much employed in the town matters. February 23, 1737-38, Nathaniel Walker married Lydia Ayer, both being of Haverhill. Theirthird son, James, was born January 17, 1748-49. This is undoubtedly James Walker, of whom Chase says that "he was of the sixth genera- tion since the settlement of the town." During the Revolutionary War he was ensign in a company raised here, and it is said that on the night previous to the battle of Trenton, December 25, 1776, he com- manded a detachment of men in charge of the boats employed to carry one of the divisions across the Delaware. From 1818 till his death, February 8, 1846, at the age of ninety-eight, Mr. Walker was a pensioner. In 1840 there were six pensioners still living in Haverhill-James Walker, at ninety, and David flow, at eighty-four, heading the list.

Nathaniel Walker, the father, died April 10, 1775. Ju 1765 he was one of the selectmen. His fourth son, Samuel, born August 7, 1751, married Abigail Badger, of Haverhill. Their children were Samuel Ayer

1 By John B. D. Cogswell.

Robert F. Walker

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HAVERIIILL.

Walker, the late well-knowu auctioneer nf Boston, and Robert Green Walker, born June 19, 1803, the subject of this sketch.

Nathaniel Walker, second son of Nathaniel, Sr., was born 1744, and married Hannah Peaslee, Oct. 17, 1771. Their eldest son, Samuel, born January 26, 1779, was probably that Samuel Walker, of Haverhill, who graduated at Dartmouth College in 1802.

Nathaniel Walker, the elder, is in the list of Hay- erhill tax-payers in 1741, and was enrolled in the militia in 1757. He was moderator of the town-meet- ing April 9, 1770, at the beginning of the troubles with Great Britain, when it was voted "that we will by all lawfull ways and means, exert ourselves and expose to shame and contempt all persons who shall offer to make sale of British goods imported conterary to the agreement of marchants, or that shall purchase such goods in this town, or be aiding or assisting to bring them Into it, till a general im- portation of such goods shall take place, and that all persons who shall violate or Counter act this vote and resolve, shall be rendered incapable of being ehosen to any office of proffit or Honour in this town." And Nathaniel Walker, with Thomas West, Nathaniel Peaslee Sargent (afterwards chief justice) and others, were made " a committee to inspect and see that all salutary resolves and agreements with respect to such Goods be Duly obsarved, and to give notice & expose all who sball violate them ; that their names may be remembered with infamy." " The moderator dismissed the meeting."

July 28, 1774, " Nathaniel Walker, Jr.," was placed upon the Committee of Inspection upon the same general subject. He was a member of the Artillery Company, organized September, 1774, and, with Bailey Bartlett, Israel Bartlett, Thomas Cogswell, Nathaniel Marsh and Doctor Brickett, sent to England for a copy of the " Norfolk Militia Book," in which to study tactics.

In 1779 he was one of the town's creditors for money advanced to meet its expenses. Ten years before, in 1769, he was the " clark " of the company which or- ganized to buy the first fire-engine. The three brothers, Nathaniel, James and Samuel, were mem- bers of the Fire Society. Nathaniel and Samuel both find a place in the valuation list of householders in 1798. In 1801 Benjamin Willis, Jr., Nathan Ayer, Samuel Walker, Jonathan Soutber and Jesse Harding petitioned the town " for leave to conduct the water by means of au aqueduct, from the round pond, so- called, into this part of the town, for private and public convenience." This was the beginning of the Haverhill Aqueduct Company which was organized the same year under a general State law.

Nathaniel Walker, the elder, was a witness to one of the bills of sale by which the " negro boy Cesur" was transferred. July 10, 1739, Thomas Russ, of Suncook, " cordwainer," in consideration of one hundred pounds, sold his "negro boy named 1293

Cesur, being about seven years old," to Benjamin Emerson, of Haverhill, yeoman. June 16, 1640, Em- erson sold him to Nathaniel Cogswell, of Haverhill, trader; and August 23, 1742, being now about ten years old, Nathaniel Cogswell sold him for one hun- dred and fifteen pounds to Samuel Phillips, Jr., of Andover, " trader " (the son of Reverend Samuel Phillips, first minister of the South Parish in An- dover). Nathaniel Walker and Jonathan Buck (of Water Street) witnessed this last bill of sale. These were all highly respectable people, and the public conscience did not begin to be disturbed about do- mestie slavery for many years after.

Samuel Walker was ensign of Captain Thomas Cogswell's company, drafted for Continental service in 1775. He also marched, September, 1777, with a volunteer detachment to reinforce the Northern army. Samuel Walker was afterwards a prominent person in town affairs. For more than thirty consecutive years and to the day of his death he hell positions of honor and trust. He was especially interested in the school system. October, 1790, he reported to the town, as chairman of a committee, a cole of thir- teen rules, which was adopted, for the government of the grammar schools in the town. They are printed by Chase in his history, in substance. They are very elaborate, even minute in character, and wholesome in tendency. The school committee of the First, or Centre District, a little later, was habitually composed of the sterling and most highly educatel men of the town.

At a town-meeting, December 12, 1791, a proposi- tion was made to divide the town into school dis- tricts, and a committee of twelve was chosen for the purpose, Samuel Walker being chairman. At an ad- journed meeting, December 26th, the committee re- ported a recommendation that each of the four par - ishes be erected into a school district. The report was adopted.

The record of the First School District says: "In 1793 the town was divided into school districts. At the town-meeting, held on March 26th the following Gentlemen were chosen a Committee for District No. 1, viz: Rev. John Shaw, the Rev. Hezekiah Smith Bailey Bartlett, Esq., Samuel Blodgett, Esq., Samnel Walker, Joseph Dodge, Doet'r Saltonstall, Doct'r Briekett and William Cranch." Mr. Shaw was the minister of the First Church and Mr. Smith of the Baptist. Bailey Bartlett was sheriff and soon after Congressman. Dr. Nathaniel Saltonstall and Generał Briekett were distinguished citizens, and William Craneh, then a young lawyer here, was afterwards chief justice of the District of Columbia. Samuel Walker continued to be chosen annually of this com- mittee for a number of years. He died July 12, 1817.

Robert Green Walker was educated at the Haver- hill schools, and at the Bradford academy, under the celebrated Benjamin Greenleaf. He went to Boston at

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the age of twenty and found employment there ; after- wards to the South, where he was engaged in travel- ing commercially for a year or two, making his head- quarters at Charleston, South Carolina. About 1837 he entered into business in Haverhill with Moses E. Emerson, under the firm-name of Emerson & Walker. Their place of business was Bridge Street, and their neighbors there were William Smiley and Edmund Kimball.

June 30, 1835, Mr. Walker married Mary W. Emer- son, of Haverhill, who died in 1872. Their only surviving child was Frances Abby, who married Charles Butters, of Haverhill, July 22, 1863. Their only child is Robert Green Walker Butters, at present (1888) a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Robert Green Walker died suddenly February 19, 1862. IJe was interested in the first steamboat enter- prise between Haverhill and Newburyport-the steamer "Merrimack," Capt. William Haseltine which made her first trip from Ilaverhill April 8, 1828. The boat continued running, though quite irregularly, for several years, when the enterprise was abandoned.

Like his ancestors, Mr. Walker was for many years active and prominent in the affairs of the town. He was moderator of the town-meeting in 1846, and from that time till the day of his death was engaged in the town business.

He was on the Prudential (School) Committee from 1848 to 1857. He was selectman from 1851 to 1861 with the exception of two years, and during one of those the board employed him to keep the records and practically conduct the business, surrendering their compensation to him.

He was assessor from 1849 to 1854, inclusive. He was also road surveyor for many years.

In 1852, when party feeling ran very high, Mr. Walker was the only selectman chosen at the first meeting.

The reason why Mr. Walker was so much in the public employment is to be found in his great apt- ness and skill in the conduct of business of that character. He was neat, accurate and methodical and had a decided taste for that kind of work. Ile took pride in doing it well. Again, his system and promptness were appreciated by the public. He had a genuine interest in the public schools, which en- deared him to teachers and pupils alike ; testimonials from them to that effect are highly prized by his family.

Mr. Walker took a similar interest in the affairs of the religious society with which he was a worshipper -the Centre Congregational. He was never weary of arranging details for its meetings and providing that everything should be done decently and in order.

In a word, he loved to be useful, and had a great capacity for taking trouble. The same tendency made him very valuable as a road surveyor. Emerson and

other streets, bear witness to his efficiency in that de- partment.

He was always ready to accept new methods, and never discarded a proposition simply because it was novel.

In 1859 the town appointed a committee to con- sider the subject of building a new town hall, to obtain estimates, make plans and report. Hon. James H. Duncan was chairman of the committee; Mr. Walker was the second named upon it, and took deep interest in the affair. January 7, 1861, the committee reported a plan, which was adopted, and measures were at once taken for the erection of a new building. During its construction Mr. Walker was indefatigable in his attention to details connected with it. This is the structure which, with some alterations, has so far served acceptably as the City Hall.

In private life Mr. Walker is spoken of as a genial and agreeable gentleman, whom it was always a pleasure to meet, ever social, with cordial manners and ready wit. One gentleman. said, " I remember him as a tall, well-proportioned man, very courteous, though I thought a little reserved, and very well bred. He had great aptitude for public business, and in that respect, as in every other, much confidence was re- posed in him. Too much cannot be said in judicious praise of Robert G. Walker."

Mr. Walker was a faithful, kind and indulgent husband and father.

He was from an early day a member of St. John's Lodge of Masons in Boston.

It is characteristic of Mr. Walker's scrupulous care in all things that to him, according to the historian Chase, is to be ascribed the preservation of the in- valuable roll of the "minute-men " of 1775, which had been " part of a parcel of loose papers in an old bag which had been kicked about the assessor's room for years." He rescued and carefully preserved it.

PAUL SPOFFORD.

Among her citizens who have been an honor to Haverhill, was Paul Spofford, the son of Joseph Spof- ford and Mary Chaplin. He was born in 1792, in the neighboring town of New Rowley, now Georgetown. and was sixth in descent from the Rev. John Spofford, appointed by the House of Lords in 1642, Vicar of Silkstone, in Yorkshire, and who resigned in 1662, when seventy-four years okt, rather than at the sacrifice of his convictions become a conformist. The present Vicar of Silkstone, the Rev. W. S. Barker, in a recent letter to one of Mr. Spofford's family says :

"I enclose you an extract from Wilkinson's Wors- borough which quotes the character of your ancestor." " Chapter 23, page 278, John Spofford. Vicar of Silk- stone was 74 years of age when, refusing to comply with the terms of the Act of Uniformity, he resigned his living, and spent the few remaining years of his life at the house of Mr. Cotton, one of his parishioners, who

Pan Shopfort

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HAVERHILL.

resided at Hawkhirst in Silkston. The character giveu of him by the biographer of the nonconforming clergy, is that he was a pious man, of competent parts and abilities, very plain in his preaching, holy in his life, facetious in discourse, and a lover of all good men."

The Spotfords had lived in Yorkshire from before the time of the conquest in 1066. At that date their an- eestor's chief seat was in that county, where, and in the neighboring counties he had large possessions. A large portion of them were seized by that ruthless rob- ber, William the Conqueror, and bestowed on William de Perey, one of his followers.

Johu Spofford, son of the viear, and ancestor of the New England Spoffords, was one of the pilgrims who accompanied the Rev. Ezekiel Rogers, to this country in 1638, of whom their contemporary Governor Win- throp says, Mr. Rogers arrived in this country with about twenty families of his Yorkshire friends, " godly men " and " most of them of good estate."

The subject of our notice, until the age of nineteen worked upon his father's farm. His mother died when he was a child, but he had a kind and devoted father, and loving sisters, and it was a happy household.

As a boy he was fond of riding, shooting, wrestling, skating and other athletic sports; he had but little time for them, for there was plenty of work on his father's farm, and he was not one to shirk it. He had quite an inventive mind. When a mere child, he built himself a mill upon the little brook that ran through their place, and using a piece of tin which he had notched into a saw, and potatoes for his logs. he would saw out the slabs to the great delight of his little sisters. On one of the few holiday afternoons that fell to his lot, he obtained his father's permissiou to go duck-shooting. Taking with him Mr. Aubin, a man that worked upon their farm, he went to the Pond a mile or so distant, but when in the middle of it the boat upset, and as he could not swim a stroke, down he sunk to the bottom. The writer has heard him say that, as he lay there, he was free from pain, but that thoughts and memories rushed through his mind with such inconceivable rapidity that it seemed as if everything in his life was before him, and that he thought how his father and sisters would mourn when they should hear that he was drowned. But Mr. Aubin, who was an excellent swimmer, found him, after diving several times, and seizing him by the heel brought him to the surface, and got him ashore. He soon revived and was able to walk home, where a heartfelt welcome, a dry suit, and a good fire soon made him feel all right.

In 1812 he came to Ilaverhift as a clerk in a store. Soon after this his employer opened a general country- store in Salem, N. H .. and Mr. Spofford went thither with him, but a good opening offering in Haverhill, they again returned to the city. While yet a clerk his employer chanced to be siek, at a time when it was necessary to go to Boston to buy a general assort-

ment of goods. With many misgivings he entrusted this, to him all important matter, to his young clerk. In those days a trip to the city of Boston from the re- mote little village of llaverhill was a great affair. Mr. Spofford, though a county lad, probably on his first visit, spared no pains to justify the trust reposed in him. Fortunately he could carry in his mind the exact appearance of the goods shown him, the fine- ness of eloth, the eolor and grain of the sugar, the flav- or of the tea, the pattern of crockery, indeed the appear- ance of the various articles needed for a general country-store, and by prieing eachat several stores, he could judge which were the best bargains. So well did he perform his trust, that his employer always sent him afterwards to make the Boston purchases, and soon found it for his interest to promote him to a full partnership.

Much of their business was a barter-trade. At times some of the articles taken-such as shoes, hats, ete .- suited for the South, would accumulate. It was very desirable to find a ready outlet. Mr. Spofford decided to establish a commision-house for that pur- pose, and proposed to his friend, Thomas Tileston, then editor of the Haverhill Gazette, to join him. They formed a partnership, and, in the spring of 1818, founded the house of Spofford & Tileston, which in time became so well and favorably known through all the commercial world. In this age of steam and telegraph we cannot realize how formida- ble this undertaking must have been to them-the going so far from friends and home, unknown, with an untried business, and but slender means to make their way amongst strangers. What a contrast be- tween leaving Haverhill now in the afternoon, arriv- ing in New York in time for supper, after a ride of seven and a half hours in luxurious cars, and their journey.

They left Haverhill in May, 1818, in the stage- coach, at 7.30 A.M. The roads were bad and the whole day was consumed in getting to Boston. Early the next morning they left Boston by stage, and an- other day was spent in reaching Providence, R. 1. The following morning they took stage, and by night- fall they reached Norwich, Conn. At an early hour the next day they embarked in the steamboat, and arrived at New Haven about eleven that night, and thought that they had made an excellent pas- sage. They were transferred to another steamboat, which lay along side (I think it was the Fulton), and about noon next day were landed at Fulton Street, New York. Two or three years after this, Mr. Spof- ford was the only through passenger from Boston to New York. Only one stage came out from Boston that day. All his fellow-passengers had left by the time they reached Hartford, and at that city other passengers took their places. This stage was about forty-eight hours from Boston to New York.

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History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 260

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1672

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1672