History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 54

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 54

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Much of the so-called " evidence," in all the trials, was sheer drivel and inane twaddle, upon which no person now, upon any charge whatever, could be held two minutes in a police court.

The Chebacco petitioners admitted the reality of witchcraft itself, but interposed in behalf of Procter and his wife as persons innocent of it. Their friendly action, in this instance, is therefore no indication that they did not believe in the common superstition of that day. They said that they "reckoned it within the duties" of their "charity, to offer this much for the clearing of our neighbors' innocency ;" saying that they "never had the least knowledge of such a nefarious wickedness in our said neighbors ;" neither did they "remember any such thoughts con- cerning them," nor "any action by either of them directly tending that way." They further said : " What God may have left them to, we cannot go into God's pavilion clothed with clouds of darkness round about. But as to what we have ever seen or heard of them, upon our consciences, we judge them innocent of the crime objected."

The following are the names of the thirty-two signers, spelled as they were written : John Wise, William Story, Sen., Reinalld Foster, Thos. Choate, John Burnum, Sr., William Thomsonn, Tho. Low, Sen'r., Isaac Foster, John Burnum, Jun'r., William Goodhew, Isaac Perkins, Nathanill Perkins, Thomas Lovekin, William Cogswell, Thomas Varney, John Fellows, William Cogswell, Ju'r., Jonathan Cogs- well, John Cogswell, Jr., John Cogswell, Thomas Andrews, Joseph Andrews, Benjamin Marshall, John Andrews, Ju'r., William Butler, William Andrews,

1187

ESSEX.

John Andrews, John Chote, Se'r., Joseph Proctor, Samuel Gidding, Joseph Eveleth, James White.

The petition was evidently written by Mr. Wise As printed, the spelling is modernized. In the original, of which a verbatim copy is in my possession, there is, in accordance with the usage of the time, as liberal a use of capital letters at the beginning of words as in Cotton Mather's Magnalia. The follow- ing sentence is an illustration : " We cannot Go into God's pavilion Cloathed with Cloudes of Darkness Round About." Satan is spelled "Sathan."

Of the signers, three were near family connections of Procter, one of them being his brother Joseph, which fact will account for their special activity in his behalf, as well as for the visit of one of them, Thomas Choate, to Procter's cell, in the jail at Salem, where he witnessed the signing of his will. Thomas Var- ney's wife was a sister, whose maiden name was Abi- gail Procter; and Thomas Choate's wife was her daughter, Mary Varney. Three of the signers were ancestors of the writer of this history,-viz. Thomas Varney, John Choate, Senior, and Thomas Choate.

John Procter was born in England, and at the age of three years came in the ship "Susan-and-Ellen," in 1635, with his father, mother and a sister one year old. He had subsequently three brothers and four sisters, all born in this country ; of whom Joseph was the eldest.

The family lived first at Salem, afterwards in Ips- wich town, at one time occupying the house near the stone bridge, which was long the residence of the late Capt. Samuel N. Baker, and was standing a few years since. He went to Chebacco, probably, with others of his family, at what time is not known. Here he be- came owner of a farm, upon which he lived for several years, leaving this place for Salem Village. His age, at his tragical death, was about sixty.

It was his second wife, much younger, who with him was condemned, but reprieved.

DISAGREEMENT AMONG HEIRS .- In the court records of the county, under date of March 15, 1696-97, John Choate, eldest son of John, first settler, entered " caution to ye Honored Judge of probate of wills," saying, " I have matters of weight to offer that my father's Will may not be approbated while I have opportunity to allege against it, as witness my hand, JOIIN CHOATE."

What the point or points of objection may have been, we do not know from anything in the entry ; but some time later Rev. Benjamin Choate, his brother, " in consideration of having received a col- lege education," renounced all claim to his father's estate.

It was in those times insisted upon as equitable, that where a son received a liberal education he should be content with that as his share of the prop- erty, or at least have the cost of it deducted from his share.

SLAVERY IN CHEBACCO .- Persons of African, and

sometimes of Indian, descent were held as property in this place at an early period ; but the precise or even approximate number of them I have not been able to ascertain, after the most diligent research and in- quiry. I think, however, that they were never more than a small proportion of the entire population.

In 1755, twenty-five years before the adoption of the State Constitution of 1780, there were in the en- tire township of Ipswich, including this parish, of course, sixty-two persons, over sixteen years of age, comprising both sexes, held as slaves.

The following specific allusions to four persons who invested in this species of personal estate were orig- inally derived from a public journal, printed at the seat of the colonial government, and from written public records.

I. MR WISE'S RUNAWAY-The Boston News-Letter, in the year 1713, contained an advertisement inform- ing the public that a slave had run away frem Rev. John Wise, of Chebacco, and that at the time of his departure he had on " wooden-heel shoes." A reward was offered for his capture and return. However wooden he may have been about the heels, he was not so wooden-headed but that he discovered a method of enlarging the area of his own personal freedom. Possibly he may have been reading, if he knew how to read,1 or at least may have heard, of cer- tain proceedings in 1787, when his master revolted against Sir Edmund Andros, who thereupon re- strained him of his personal liberty, for exercising the gift of free speech.

I have not found any recorded evidence that the runaway ever complained of any ill treatment from his master ; and from the known liberality and mag- nanimity of Mr. Wise, we might reasonably suppose that the fugitive had always had enough to eat and drink and wear, and had not been over-tasked. Perhaps he was allowed a pair of leather-heeled shoes to wear to meeting on Sundays ; although leather may have been scarce and costly in those days, as com- pared with its abundance and cheapness at the present time.

HI. Jonathan Cogswell, a grandson of John, the first settler of that name, in his will, dated July 9, 1717, mentions " my Negro man slave called Jack, and also my Indian maid slave called Nell," both of whom he bequeaths to his wife Elizabeth.

I11. and IV. Three weeks later, July 30, 1717, Cupt. Jonathan Burnham, of Chebacco, grandfather of the late Capt. Nathaniel, and great-great grandfather of Luther, Calvin, Nehemiah, Nathaniel and Dr. Cæleb Burnham, paid £ 64 to Joshua Norwood, of Glouces- ter, for a negro boy. Norwood had previously bought him of Capt. Thomas Choate, of Hog Island. The wife of Norwood, Elizabeth Andrews, daughter of Ensign Wm. Andrews, was a native of Chebacco.

1 A law or regulation of the colony required that servants be taught to read ; and in 1681, an inhabitaut of Ipswich was complained of for ne- glecting to so instruct his servant.

1188

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

ONE OTHER CASE, LEARNED FROM AN ORAL SOURCE .- An elderly inhabitant, who passed away many year- since, informed me that a family of the ancestors of the late Mr. Jacob Story, senior, held originally at least two slaves, a man and his wife ; to whom several children were born while the parents were inmates of the Story household. These children followed their mother in legal status, as chattels personal.

Mrs. Story, the mistress, during the same years, also gave birth to several children; and during these recurring periods she and theslave-mother alternately unred each other with equal care and patient faith- fulness. This last-mentioned circumstance indicates that the relation of bond and free. in this instance, existed, probably, as much in name as otherwise.

In fact, slavery existed, in this precinct, in a mild form, the subjects of it, as a rule, being humanely treated ; and it was, no doubt, maintained more from conformity to the usage and custom of the time than from any pertinacious desire for its permanent continuance.

In a mortuary record kept by John Cleaveland, there is, under date of July 8, 1795, less than four years prior to his deccase, a mention of "Titus, a black belonging to Rev. Mr. Cleaveland," who, at an accident at a barn-raising, where one man was killed, was " di-asterd, but like to recover." As the State Constitution of 1780, was held to have abolished slavery in Massachusetts, this Titus must then have served Mr. Cleaveland voluntarily. Perhaps he had been his slave previously to 1780.

LEGAL BASIS OF SLAVERY IN THE COLONIES,-It would seem from the reports of the ultimate results of the judicial proceedings in the two following cases, copied from the court records of Essex County, that the reliance of the claimants of slaves in this vicinity, failed entirely when sought to be based upon any express statutory provisions. It is probable that in the Massachusetts colony, at least, the common law of England, re-affirmed occasionally by a court decision, was regarded as the principal legal sanction of the institution.

.Jenny Slew, a mulatto, brought suit against John Hhippte, of the Hamtet, Ipswich (now Hamilton), for restraining her of her freedom and compelling her to labor as his slave.

The Interior Court of Common Pleas, sitting at Newburyport, in September, 1765, gave judgment in favor of the defendant, Whipple.

The plaintiff, Jenny Slew, appealed to the Supe- rior Court of Juchiensture, sitting at Salem, in Novem- ber, 1766, which reversed the decision of the lower court -a jury giving a verdict in her favor, entitling her to damages in the sum of four pounds, besides costs to the domount of god. 5d.

In the Inferior Court of Common P'leas for the Powoly ot kasex, for the July term of 1774, a negro more of brou ght want deminst Mc Caleb Fader, of Beverly,

to obtain his freedom ; and a verdict was given in fa- vor of the servant, "there being no law of the pro- vince [that is, no statute law], to hold a man to serve for life."

GRAVE-YARD ROBBERY .- In the month of April, 1818, the year immediately preceding the incorpora- tion of this parish into a town, the people of Chebac- co were startled and excited to an unparalleled de- gree by the announcement of the discovery that eight human bodies had been surreptitiously taken from their resting-place in the village burying- ground.

At this distant point of time, a verbal detail of the occurrence hardly conveys to those who have since come upon the stage of life an adequate idea of the intensity of feeling in regard to it at an earlier period. When I came first to reside here, twenty- two years after the event, there was still a pungeney and acerbity in every occasional allusion to it by the majority of the adult population, who freshly remem- bered all the circumstances.

HIand bills with startling head lines, and printed verses of various degree of literary merit, were soon after the discovery, scattered throughout this and the neighboring villages. A printed sheet, the paper browned by age, given to me many years ago by a friend, who was a resident here at the time of the occurrence, contains two of these metrical composi- tions, from each of which I present an illustrative stanza :

LUNES ON A RECENT INHUMAN, BARBAROUS AND ATROCIOUS AFFAIR PERPETRATED AT CHEBACCO IN IPSWICH.

Hark ! the sad tidings from the bell now sounding, To warn the people of some wretched monster, Who, for the sake of gain and filthy Jucre, Robbed the grave-yard !

0! what is this mine eyes are now beholding ? See the graves open and spertators mourning, Friends and relations stand amaz'd to see ibis Sad profanation ! THE INNOCENT MAN.

The man whose conscience feels no wound Is not alarm'd to hear the sound Of Satan's jarring strings ;

Pure innocence, like Noah's dove, Mounts on her wings to realms above, And joy and comfort brings.

At the reinterment of the empty coffins, a solemn religious service was held in the Congregational Meeting-house, a few months after the discovery, and a discourse was delivered by the parish minister, from the touching and appropriate text in John xx. 13 : " They say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou ? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him."

The title-page of the discourse is as follows:

"Interment of the dead, H dictate of natural affection, sanctioned by the word of God, and the examples of the good in every age. A Sermon delivered in Ipswich, Second Parish, July 23, 1818, on the occasion of Re Interring the Coffins which had been Robbed of their Contents. By ROBERT CROWELL, Minister of said Parish. Preached and Published at

1189

ESSEX.

the Particular Request of the Inhabitants of the Place. Andover : Printed by Flagg and Gould. 1818."

The pamphlet is an octavo, of forty pages ; and the subject indicated is ably and exhaustively treated.

The preface, which is here given in full, contains as concise and at the same time as circumstantial an account of the transaction as could be otherwise presented.

" ADVERTISEMENT.

"The following sermon was necessarily written in great haste, to meet the occasion for which it was designed, and without the most dis- tant view to its publication. In revising it for the press, therefore, it was found necessary to condense some parts of it, and to enlarge upon others ; but, in regard to the sentiments which pervaded the discourse, as it was delivered, no alterations, it is believed, have been made.

"The history of the occasion is briefly this : Some time in the course of the past winter, suspicions were excited, it should seem by no very definite circumstances, that the body of a young woman had been taken out of her grave, for anatomical purposes. These suspicions made such an impression upon several in the place, and particularly upon her parents and neighbors, that it was determined, in the Spring, to make an examination. An examination was accordingly made, and the painful discovery evinced that their suspicions were too well founded. Her body was gone ! and the melancholy tidings gave such a shock to all in the place, as was never before felt. Further examina- tione, which were made to ascertain, if practicable, the extent of the evil, but chiefly with a view of quieting the troubled minds of those, who had recently buried friends, if peradventure they might be there, only deepened and confirmed the distress. Before the examination was closed, it was ascertained that the bodies of not less than eight persons had been sacrilegiously stolen, viz : Mrs. Mary Millett, aged 35 ; Miss Sally An" drews, 26 ; Mr. William Burnham, 78; Mr. Elisha Story, 65 ; Mr. Samuel Burnham, 26 ; Isaac Allen, 10; Philip Harlow, 10; the eighth was not certainly known, but supposed to be Casar, a colored man, buried several years since. Thus, within the short space of five months, was the heavy draught of seven made upon the burying-ground of a coun- try village, containing little more than a thousand inhabitants. This number, including as it did young and old, male and female, parent and child, brother and sister, spread the unusual distress through a very extensive and respectable circle of relations and friends. Meetings of the inhabitants were held on the occasion, and resolutions passed, ex- pressing their abhorrence of the deed, and adopting measures to detect, if possible, and to bring to justice, the perpetrators of it ; and the shin of five hundred dollars, or more, was subscribed by individuals to carry these measures into effect. A vote was also passed authorizing the standing committee of the parish to inter the empty coffins, in a grave to be prepared for the purpose, and to request the minister of the parish to deliver a discourse snited to the occasion. The request was accord- ingly made, and the following is the discourse preached on that occa- sion."

From the following extracts the reader will obtain an accurate idea of the light in which the whole sub- ject was viewed, at the time and on the spot.

" It is presumed that all who hear of the graves of the dead being dis- turbed and their bodies drawn ont of them, must experience a degree of violence done to their own feelings, though the dead thus treated may have been strangers to them, and the scene remote from them. We, of course, except from this general sympathy those whose business it is to disturb tbe dead for filthy lucre'e sake, and those who eniploy them in this nuholy trattic. To whatever good purpose the latter may appro- priate these stolen bodies, they certainly partake of all the guilt of the former, if the maxim be true that the receiver is as bad as the thief. Nur onghit they to be screened from any of the odium which is attached to a stealth and merchandize of the dead ; since, if it were not for their pat- ronage and suggestion, none would be guilty of this outrage upon de- cency and humanity." Pagee 11, 12.

" It snrely cannot le our duty to inter our dead merely to give others the trouble of going in the night and stealing them away. Much less can it be the duty of a poor man to be at the expense of a funeral sol- emaity for the burial of his wife or children, merely that others may have the probt of eelling their bodies." Pages 27, 28.

" If a single soul ie hardened in sin by the practice of stealing dead bodies, the evil thus occasioned must infinitely outweigh all the good

which the science of Anatomy ever did or ever will do to the bodies of men." Page 31.

" It is far from being the only satisfaction we enjoy in the burial of our friends to lay them in the grave; it is another and equally great to know that they are resting there undisturbed ; to know that they have not been torn from their coffins tor moneyed and scientific speculation, and exposed to the rude gaze of unbearded youth." Pages 33, 34.

During the entire public solemnities an individual towards whom suspicion of having been concerned in the transactions had then begun to be directed, and who was afterwards adjudged in a court of law to pay a heavy fine and costs, sat among the audience and listened to the discourse. This was Dr. Thomas Sewall, the resident physician of the place ; whose usefulness here in that capacity was, of course, im- mediately at an end.

The next year he removed to Washington, D. C., where he lived to the age of 59 years, and became very eminent in his profession ; and where, in addition to his practice as physician, he discharged for several years, with distinguished ability, the duties of two professorships to which he had been appointed, in the Medical Department of Columbia College.

He was doubtless unsurpassed in this country or abroad, in proficiency in anatomy and surgery, if not also in clinics. His published and widely circulated lectures upon Phrenology, originally delivered before a class at the Medical College in Washington, illus- trated by his own examinations and measurements of the brain and skull, and showing the variable widths of the frontal sinuses, had the effect to modify some- what, so far at least as craniology was concerned, the views of some who had adopted the general conclu- sions of Gall and Sporzheim, and who still adhered to the theory that the brain is the organ of the mind.

Of surgical and anatomical science he was a de- votee; and it is said that the immediate cause of his death was blood-poisoning, which resulted from an accidental inoculation through a ent or abrasion upon one of his hands, while making an autopsy of the body of Hon. Isaac C. Bates, United States Senator from Massachusetts, who died suddenly in Washing- ton, in 1845.

It is probable that a very few persons only had any knowledge, either beforehand or during its progress, of this desecration of the village cemetery,-perhaps, no one besides those engaged directly in the labor of exhumation, pursuant to the direction of their em- ployer ; who, at that time, it is but just to say, had no connection with any church organization, nor had made any profession of religion. Years afterwards, at the National capital, he joined the Methodist church, and continued steadfast in his membership during the remainder of his life.

History does not originate circumstances nor oc- currences, but simply states them as they actually took place. It is, therefore, deemed eminently proper that this impartial and truthful account should be here given of one of the most notable of the events that have transpired in this place since its first settlement.

1190

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

The tradition of it, more or less minute in detail, has been and is continuously being transmitted from one generation to another of the resident population of the town and its vicinity. A permanent record, unlike mere oral narrative, can acquire no aceretions, through decades or centuries. Neque falsi dicere, nec veri reti- cere.

INCORPORATION OF CHEBACCO PARISH AS THE TOWN OF ESSEX, Chebacco was set off from Ipswich in 1819, and incorporated as the town of Essex by an act of the State Legislature of the 5th of February of that year, pursuant to a clause of which the new town paid thirty-one per cent. of the aggregate debt of the original town then due, which, after deducting the proportionate share of Chebacco in the public property of Ipswich, amounted to §3,000. The committee of the town of Essex, who, with a corres- ponding committee of the town of Ipswich, adjusted the details of the final settlement, were George C'hoate, William Cogswell, Jr., and Elias Andrews.

Population and Valuation Then and Now .- The pop- ulation in 1819, when thus set off as the new town, was 1107, including 21 paupers.

Population, according to United States decennial census for the year 1880, 1670,-a gain of 56 from 1570. Number of pauper inmates of the Alms-house in 1557, 13.

By the United States census for 1860, the popula- tion was 1701-the largest by any national census be- fore or since that year.

In ts30, the number was 1333; in 1840, 1432; in 1×70, 1614.

Valuation in 1819, 8248,813; valuation in 1887, $836,717.

Boundaries .- At one time a part of the parish or precinct of Chebacco bordered upon the town of Wenham. But that portion of its territory having been set off to Hamilton, the town of Essex is now bounded only by Ipswich on the North, Hamilton on the West, Manchester on the South, and Gloucester on the South and East.

Dimensions of Area .- The territorial surface of the town, as nearly as can be ascertained by measure- ments and estimates, comprises about 9000 acres; 7000 acres of which are divided into tillage, upland- mowing, fresh meadow, salt marsh, woodland and reals. The remaining 2000 acres are under water.

Organisation .- At the first town-meeting, the mod- "rator was finorge t'hoate, father of the late Dr. theo. Chonte, of Salem, and grandfather of Joseph HI. Choate, law-partner of U. S. Senator Evarts; Wm. " I'mrate, distinguished lawyer of New York city, for some time al S. District Judge; Dr. tien. C. S. Choate, formerly Sperundtendent of the Insane Asy- lum at Taunton, Mass., and proprietor as well as superinte ment of the private lunatic asylum, in New York State, at which florace Greeley died ; Charles F Chonte, President of the Old Colony Railroad Co. ; and Go. F Choute, Judge of Probate of Essex

County. The last named is a cousin of the four brothers previously enumerated. His father was William, brother to Dr. George.

First Town Officers .- Joseph Story, who served as a soldier throughout the entire Revolutionary War, was the first town clerk; George Choate, Jonathan Story, 4th, Elias Andrews, William Cogswell, and William Andrews, were chosen as the first selectmen, assessors and overseers of the poor; Nathan Choate was first town treasurer; and Rev. Robert Crowell and the selectmen were, by vote at the town meeting, desig- nated as the first school committee.

George Choate was chosen as the first representative of the new town to the State Legislature; in which body he had three times previously occupied a seat as one of the representatives from Ipswich.

Town Clerks .- Joseph Story, the first town clerk, served six years; Jonathan Story, 3d, nine years ; William Andrews, Jr., seven ; David Choate, four ; Aaron L. Burnham, thirteen ; O. H. P. Sargent, six ; John C. Choate, twenty-five; Noah Burnham, present incumbent.

POST-OFFICE .- The post-office was established in 1819, the year of the incorporation of the town. The first postmaster was Dudley Choate, appointed in 1819; the next, Amos Burnham, 1826; Enoch Low, 1832; Albert F. Low, 1854; Charles W. Procter, 1864; Daniel W. Bartlett, Sr., and Daniel W. Bart- lett, Jr., from 1868 to 1881; Leighton E. Perkins, 1881.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 54

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