USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Saugus > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscott, and Nahant, 1864-1890 > Part 13
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Swampscott > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscott, and Nahant, 1864-1890 > Part 13
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynnfield > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscott, and Nahant, 1864-1890 > Part 13
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Nahant > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscott, and Nahant, 1864-1890 > Part 13
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynn > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscott, and Nahant, 1864-1890 > Part 13
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CARNES, Rev. JOHN - minister, magistrate, and politician. 'Squire Carnes, as he was called, lived on Boston street ; and Carnes street, which was opened through land belonging to his estate, perpetuates his name. His dwelling was of wood, two stories in height, and stood where the last named street enters Boston street. A couple of enormous buttonwoods, looking as if reared for gate posts, stood in front. It was once a somewhat pretentious residence ; but in its last years was shabby, and presented anything but an inviting appearance. He died on the 26th of October 1802, aged 78. See Annals, 1802.
CHADWELL, THOMAS. The Chadwell family is one of the oldest in Lynn, and has always had prominent and worthy members. Thomas, the above-named, was here as early as 1630, and settled as a farmer in the section known as Breed's End. There was also a Richard Chadwell here, in 1636; but the next year he went off with the Sandwich settlers. See Annals, 1630.
Lieutenant Harris Chadwell of the Revolution was a descend- ant of Thomas. So also was the late William Chadwell, for many years deputy sheriff of the county ; an officer in many respects well qualified for the performance of his often disagreeable duties.
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Chadwell.
He was convivial in his habits, active and mirthful. After his retirement from the office of sheriff he was for a time ticket-master at the Central Depot ; and it was while he held this position that the depot safe was blown open and robbed, during a thunder storm, on the night of May 6, 1848. He was rather a strong political partisan ; took an active interest in town affairs ; and with many became unpopular by the ardor with which he op- posed the anti-masonic movement. He was a member of the craft, and quite as zealous as discreet. But he was far from being deficient in good points of character ; was companionable and unselfish ; and as an officer, willing to exercise a reasonable degree of forbearance.
A vein of eccentricity seems to have cropped out here and there in the line, in former years, though we never heard of its assuming an offensive character. We remember one of the family who some sixty-five years ago was a hard working man, laboring somewhat at rough farming and in winter, when the swamps were frozen, cutting and teaming wood. He was long. marked for his amusing vagaries of speech; especially for the curious discourses to his cattle as they jogged along their weary way. He would make the most extravagant promises to them as to the quality and amount of fodder they should receive in return for putting forth a little extra exertion. "Come, now, my friend, you off-ox, put in a little more of the tug and let us get home before sun-down, for it will be a dark night. You shall have a good supper of English hay ; we'll put off the old cow with salt hay rations ; come, another strong pull and we'll be over these hubbles ; and you, old horse, you know where I keep the corn and oats, and if you 'll get us home by supper time, you shall have your fill, if it takes ten bushels and a half. It is meeting night, you know, and I want to be in my place. Come, come, now let us try that quick step. We'll haul up at the Major's corner, a spell, and you can rest while I go in and get a little something warming ; your treat will come when we get home." With such discourse, uttered in a voice so loud that the passer-by might conclude that he thought his animals deaf, was the tedium of the way beguiled by the kindly teamster, he really appearing, by his earnestness, to fancy that his cattle fully understood his proposals and promises ; and what is quite as
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Chase.
remarkable they seemed to have some comprehension of his meaning and be willing to exert themselves to merit his favor. It was Bayard Taylor, if we rightly remember, who claimed that there are minds which can establish intelligent communication with lower animals. Perhaps there are, and that this Mr. Chad- well's was one of them.
CHASE, HEZEKIAH. Mr. Chase was for many years a well- known and highly respected resident ; was first president of the Nahant Bank, and long identified with the business enterprises of the day. His residence was on Western avenue, near the Summer street crossing ; and the grist, spice, and coffee mills, in that vicinity, so long known as Chase's mills, were owned by him, and from him took their name. His death, which occurred on the 26th of March, 1865, was occasioned by injuries received on being thrown down by a sudden jerk of the cars as they started from the West Lynn depot. His age was 72, and he was a native of Plaistow, N. H.
CHASE, JOHN. Mr. Chase, at the time of his decease, was one of the few remaining old-time shoemakers, and had little practical knowledge of the recent improvements in the mode of manufac- ture, as well as little taste for them. At the age of twelve, in accordance with the custom of the time, he finished his schooling and was put upon the shoemaker's seat. And upon that scat he worked for seventy years, using the same lap-stone and several of the same tools, for that long period. How many feet his labors must have helped to clothe during those many years, we need not pause to calculate. He was an intelligent, worthy man, active in politics, and among the early advocates of the abolition of slavery. For thirty years he was a member of the First Methodist church. The old seat on which he worked and some of his tools have been preserved as relics that will be appreciated by curious inquirers into the earlier history of the great manu- facture of New England. He died on the 2d of October, 1876, aged 83 years.
CHASE, Rev. STEPHEN - minister of the Lynnfield parish some twenty-four years. See Annals, 1755.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Cheever. Childs. Clapp. 129
CHEEVER, Rev. EDWARD-first minister of Saugus parish. See Annals, 1747.
CHILDS, AMARIAH - manufacturer of a famous kind of choco- late. His mill was on Saugus river, at the Boston street crossing, and his residence on Boston street, nearly opposite Bridge. He died January 21, 1846, aged 80. See Annals, 1846.
CLAPP, HENRY-known during the latter years of his life as the "King of the Bohemians." He made his appearance in Lynn, in or about 1847, and while here kept up a pretty lively agitation on some of the reformatory questions of the day. He was a man of undoubted ability and good education, terse and bold as a writer, and eloquent as a speaker ; but his utterances were often too reckless and extravagant to have the desired effect .. He was editor of the Pioneer, a weekly newspaper, of which Christopher Robinson, a well-known shoe-manufacturer was pro- prietor, and of whom Mr. Clapp was a sort of protege. In his. editorials were many striking and valuable ideas, but far too often there was a lurking venom or pungency of expression that overshot the mark and destroyed the good effect.
Mr. Clapp died in New York, early in 1875, and the newspa- pers here and abroad had much to say about his erratic character and career. It was he who said of Horace Greeley, that " he was a self-made man, and worshiped his maker." His literary efforts were chiefly confined to the newspapers, though the mag- azines were occasionally enriched by his articles. In the fifteenth volume of Harper's Magazine may be found a paper of his enti- tled " How I came to be Married," and in the sixteenth volume another, entitled " Love Experience of an Impressible Man." The latter volume also contains a poem of his entitled "My Illusions Spare," which is far above the average of magazine poetry, and may yet be garnered up as one of America's literary jewels.
The following, which appeared in a Boston publication soon after the decease of Mr. Clapp, furnishes a comprehensive glimpse: of him and the class to which he belonged.
With the death of Henry Clapp, long known as the "King of the Bohemians," fades the memory of one of the most peculiar cliques of roystering literary characters
9
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Clapp.
ever known. Not long ago Ada Clare, the "Queen of Bohemia," died a victim of that strange malady, hydrophobia, and the rest of the colony that once met at Pfaff's beer saloon, on Broadway, to enliven the midnight hour with songs and jokes and reckless repartee, are either dead or dispersed, or turned respectable. The most brilliant lights went out some years ago, when George Arnold and Fitz James ()'Brien died, and Clapp retired from the Bohemian throne. Others are still living, but the haunts that once knew them know them no more. There is Walt Whitman, a confirmed invalid ; " Doestick " still lives, but the unction of his humor has passed with the increasing obesity of his body ; Ned House is in Japan, connected with the educational department of the government ; and Willie Winter has subsided into a taciturn and sedate, though bright and vigorous critic. There were women in Bohe- mia besides Ada Clare. There was Jenny Danforth, who is dead, or in obscurity almost as complete as death ; Dora Shaw, who claimed the authorship of " Beautiful Snow," but could not maintain the doubtful honor ; and Mary Fox, still lively and sharp-witted, the "M. H. B." of the St. Louis Republican. But then Bohemia is completely clead, though there are Bohemians enough of a straggling sort in Gotham yet, God wot. But the Bohemia over which Clapp presided, the bright, witty and wicked circle of writers in the basement beer saloon, whose quips and cranks were as sparkling and as evanescent as the foam on their glasses, is a thing of the past. It required a peculiar genius to call together and keep together such a company, and its existence and its opportunity are not likely to occur again in the present generation.
The life of llenry Clapp was a strange one. He was born in Nantucket, and in his early life was a sailor. Afterwards he appeared as a temperance lecturer and an ardent advocate of the abolition of slavery, travelling extensively in the cause of reform. Ile was for some time in Paris, and after his return he made translations of some of the prominent socialistic works of Fourier. His first journalistic expe- rience was in editing an anti-slavery paper in Lynn, but he was best known as the founder (if the " Saturday Press," and " Vanity Fair," in New York. Both of these were tou bright and too impracticable to last. Many of the brightest of the Bohemi- ans were contributors to Vanity Fair, but all their wit could not keep it alive. Clapp afterwards became well known as "Figaro" of the Lander, a paper at one time owned and edited by Mayor Hall, and latterly he obtained a precarious livelihood by writing paragraphs for the Daily Graphic and sending occasional contributions to dramatic and musical journals from a New Jersey farm-house. Ilis talent was essentially that of the French Feuilletonistes, bright, keen and witty, but unsub- stantial and ephemeral. In character he was of the essence of Bohemia, reckless and witty, caring and thinking little of the serious concerns of life, but living as those who say, " Let us eat, drink and be merry, for to-morrow we die." That to-morrow of death has come fur Henry Clapp, and no one can have the heart to throw anything but the mantle of charity over his bier.
There would, perhaps, be little reason for introducing Mr. Clapp in this connection, were it not that he played so conspic- uous and sensational a part while here. He fraternized with the "Comeouters," though guiltless of the extremes that character- ized the conduct of some of the earlier ones, as noticed in our Annals, under date 1841. And it may be pardonable to add that the writer was well acquainted with him, and in common with
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Cobbet. Coffin. Collins.
others esteemed him highly for his generous and genial qualities. It was likewise our fortune, while a resident of New York, to very well know one or two of the other "Bohemians " named above. The fact is, that "clique of roystering literary char- acters " led a sort of dual lives - now in the society of the better class of literary workers, supplying, with amazing facility, elab- orate papers and high-toned critiques, and anon at some Pewter Mug rendezvous, bandying quibs and relating wild adventures. Their condition and appearance were attributable to utter impro- vidence. They could earn money, and some of them did get high prices for magazine articles and editorial assistance ; but what did they do with their earnings ?
The writer one day, during a later visit to the city, on passing down Fulton street met one of the "Bohemians " named in the foregoing extract, whom he had not seen for months, and the greeting was cordial. The meeting happened to be near a res- taurant and it was about noon. "Come, come," said he " now let us step right in here, and I'll order something for the encour- agement of the inner man ; and over the supply we'll have a talk." "But I can't," was the reply, for I am now on the way to a steamer, and cannot delay." "Well, then, good-by ; and per- haps," he added with his old air of mock gravity, "it is about as well that you declined my generous invitation, for six cents is the grand sum-total of my funds." But he forsook the Bohemian life, is yet living, and his fame as a writer is second to that of but few either here or in Europe.
COBBET, Rev. THOMAS- was settled over the Lynn church, in 1637, as colleague with Rev. Mr. Whiting. He was a marked character among the early New England divines. His autograph is attached to the Armitage Petition, page 106. Cobbet school, Franklin street, takes its name from him. See Annals, date 1656.
COFFIN, Dr. EDWARD L .- physician, scientist, and writer. He lived on Market street, and died March 31, 1845, aged 50. A biographical notice appears in 1865 edition of History of Lynn.
COLLINS, MICAJAH - minister of the Friends' society, and teacher of the Friends' school. He was born in Lynn, in 1764
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Cooke. Curtin. Davis.
and died in 1827. In the 1865 edition of the History of Lynn, appeared a biographical notice.
COOK, Rev. JOSEPH - for a short time minister of the First Church - a pungent preacher and popular lecturer in America and Europe. See Annals, 1871.
COOKE, Rev. PARSONS - minister of the First Church, twenty- one years ; a rigid Calvinist, and warm controversial preacher and writer - born in 1800, died in 1864. See Annals, 1864.
COOLIDGE, OLIVER B .- well-known in various public positions. He died June 6, 1874, aged 76. See Annals, 1874.
COWDRY, WILLIAM -whose autograph may be seen among those appended to the Armitage Petition, page 106, came here in 1630, but did not remain many years. He became one of the first settlers of Reading, and was very conspicuous there ; was a deacon of the church, a representative, selectman and town clerk from the beginning of the settlement till his death, in 1687, at the age of 85. He was born in 1602, and was a farmer.
CURTIN, ENOCH - a poet and prose writer. He lived in the eastern section of the town ; was born in 1794 and died in 1842. For biographical sketch, with poetic specimens, see 1865 edition of History of Lynn.
DAGYR, JOHN ADAM - famed throughout the province as a fashionable shoemaker. He died in the almshouse, in 1808. Sce Annals, 1750.
DAVIS, EDWARD S. - the eighth Mayor of Lynn. For Bio- graphical notice, with portrait, see Centennial Memorial.
Coward award, David.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Doak. Doolittle. Downing. 133
DEXTER, THOMAS-one of the most enterprising and noted of the early settlers. See Annals, 1630, et seq. The following represents his signature.
Examat Noches
DOAK, BENJAMIN F. Mr. Doak died at his residence, corner of Atlantic and Ocean streets, on the 8th of November, 1876, aged 50 years. He was a native of Lynn though of a Marble- head family, and after receiving a fair common school education, in early manhood began business in a small way as a shoe-man- ufacturer. By industry and shrewd management he soon attained a position among our first class business men. He was a con- spicuous and highly respected member of the First Universalist Society, and a much esteemed citizen and friend. At various times he filled positions of public trust, and on the day of his burial a number of large business houses were closed in token of respect for his memory. By will, he bequeathed "to the City of Lynn, the sum of ten thousand dollars to be invested by the City as a separate fund, the income thereof to be expended by said City for the benefit of its poor, in such manner as the City Council may direct." This bequest is what is now called " The Doak Fund." Mr. Doak was for some years known as Benjamin F. Doak, 2d, there being two others of the name, in the vicinity, his seniors.
DOOLITTLE, JOHN -a settler of some note; was one of the appraisers of the estate of Edward Holyoke. He removed to Boston, and was a constable in 1653. The Armitage Petition, page 106, bears his signature.
DOWNING, ELIJAH - an early and zealous Methodist ; an acting magistrate and one interested in town affairs. He was born in 1777 ; was a cabinet-maker; lived on North Common street, corner of Park ; died in 1838. See History of Lynn, 1865 edition, for a biographical notice.
DOWNING, Rev. JOSHUA WELLS. Mr. Downing was one of the most promising young men Lynn has produced, and by his early death she no doubt lost one who would have done much to
134 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Drapcr. Driver. Fay.
extend her fame. He was born here on the fifth of March, 1813, and was a son of Elijah Downing, named next above. At the age of seventeen he entered Brown University, and graduated in 1834. His original design was to adopt the legal profession as the business of his life ; but being brought to a deep sense of the greater dignity and importance of a profession that more nearly touched the higher concerns of men, he soon directed his attention to the ministry, and in June, 1835, was received into the New England Methodist Conference, and stationed at Ran- dolph, in Norfolk county. The next year he was appointed to the Salem charge, and in the short space of two years after, that is, in 1838, had attained such a reputation as to be placed in charge of one of the oldest and most opulent churches of the denomination in New England - the Bromfield Street Church, in Boston. And in that charge, secure in the affections of his people, and with an ever increasing reputation in the community at large, he remained till the time of his death, which occurred on the 15th of July, 1839. About one year before his death he married May Ann, a daughter of Daniel L. Mudge, who survived him ; but he left no children. His brother, the Rev. Elijah Hedding Downing, now a minister in the Protestant Episcopal Church, and who is a graduate of Bowdoin College, prepared a very sympathetic and interesting memorial volume, which was published in New York, in 1842. The sermons and addresses embodied in it evince a remarkably pure, well-trained, and car- nest mind, and are composed in a terse, vigorous, and attractive style.
DRAPER, ALONZO G. - a commander in the war of the Rebel- lion ; shot from his horse, apparently by accident, in Texas, September, 1865. See Annals, 1865.
DRIVER, ROBERT. Respectable descendants have sprung from this early settler, though not much is known of him. His auto- graph is on the Armitage Petition, page 106. He died in 1680, aged 87. See Annals, 1630.
FAY, RICHARD S .- owner of the beautiful Mineral Spring estate - (Lynnmere). He died June 6, 1865. See Annals, 1865.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Forman. Fuller. Gardner. 135
FITCH, ZACHARY, whose autograph is last on the Armitage Petition, had "30 and ten acres" allotted to him in the land distribution of 1638. He moved to Reading, in 1644, and became a deacon in the church there. Fitch's Hill, so called, was a part of his estate. Few of his descendants are now found here.
FLACG, Dr. JOHN - a highly esteemed physician and revolu- tionary patriot ; lived on Marion street ; born in 1743, died May 27, 1793. See Annals, 1793.
FLORA - a pious negro woman of touching history ; died in 1828, aged 113 years. See Annals, 1828.
FORMAN, EUGENE F .- editor of the Lynn Daily Bee. His death was occasioned by a singular and distressing accident, September 3, 1881. See Annals, 1881.
FULLER, JOSEPH - first Senator from Lynn, and first presi- dent of the first bank here-was born on Water Hill, March 29, 1772. See History of Lynn, 1865 edition, page 505.
FULLER, MARIA AUGUSTA - poetess and prose writer - was born in Lynn, Dec. 9, 1806, and died January 19, 1831. A bio- graphical notice, with specimens of her writing may be found in the 1865 edition of the History of Lynn. A fac-simile of her signature follows.
Maria of Fuller
GARDNER, Dr. JAMES-a physician of high standing, and much respected for his good judgment and benevolence. He died December 26, 1831, aged 69. His residence was on Boston street, near Bridge. See Annals, 1831.
GARDNER, JAMES H. - was born in Lynn: July 29, 1796, and died in Richmond, Va., September 10, 1877. He was a son of Dr. James Gardner, just named, and a grandson of Dr. Flagg, who occupied the " Billy Gray" house. He became a resident of Richmond in early life, and for many years carried on a large
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Gates. Gillow.
and successful business there, maintaining a character for integrity and liberality attained by few. The Richmond Despatch, in an obituary notice, said of him, " There was no man who was more worthily loved and respected, and no man whose life was more exemplary." He always entertained the highest regard for his native place, and until the infirmities of age overtook him, made an annual visit, encouraging her public enterprises and liberally bestowing in charity, from his large means, which, however, became sadly reduced by the calamities of the civil war, an occurrence which he deeply deplored. He was an active member of the Protestant Episcopal communion, and even as far back as 1819, when the first attempt was made to establish a church here he looked hopefully forward to the time when her benign influence would pervade the community ; was a strong and help- ing friend to St. Stephen's in her darkest hours, and happily lived to see her in comparative prosperity. A memorial window has been placed in the church at Richmond, where he worshiped, and in which he was a vestryman and Sunday school superin- dent many years.
GATES, ISAAC - a shrewd but eccentric lawyer. His office and residence were on Market street, that street then being chiefly occupied by residences. He died Nov. 9, 1852. See Annals, 1852.
GILLOW, JOHN. There were several Gillows here at an early period, but it does not appear that any of their descendants remain. The John whose autograph is to be seen on the Armi- tage Petition, page 106, was doubtless the shrewd individual who so successfully turned the tables on a pestilent fellow who sued him for the loss of a cow. The case occurred in 1638, and is thus related by Winthrop : " A remarkable providence appeared in a case which was tried at the last Court of Assistants. Divers neighbors of Lynn, by agreement kept their cattle by turns. It fell out to the turn of one Gillow to keep them, and as he was driving them forth another of these neighbors went along with him, and kept him so earnestly in talk, that his cattle strayed and gate in the corn. Then this other neighbor left him, and would not help him recover his cattle, but went and told another
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. Gould. Gray.
how he had kept Gillow in talk, that he might lose his cattle. The cattle getting into the Indian corn, eat so much ere they could be gotten out, that two of them fell sick of it, and one of them died presently ; and these two cows were that neighbor's who kept Gillow in talk. The man brings his action against Gillow for his cow (not knowing that he had witness of his speech;) but Gillow, producing witness, barred him of his action, and had good costs." Mr. Gillow died in 1673.
GOULD Dr. ABRAHAM - A skillful physician, of large practice. His residence was on Boston street, a furlong east of Tower Hill, and he died February 27, 1866, aged 58. See Annals, 1866.
GRAY, GEORGE- the Lynn Hermit -lived on Boston street, nearly opposite the entrance to Pine Grove Cemetery, and died February 28, 1848, aged 78. See Annals, 1848.
It was natural enough that many wonderful stories touching the career of such a mysterious personage as Mr. Gray should have gained currency. The writer had occasional interviews with him, and knew that he was well aware of the gossiping indulgencies of his neighbors. But he was shrewd enough never to admit or deny the truth of anything that was said about him. Among the most interesting incidents in his veritable or imagin- ary history was his alleged connection with the fate of the French Dauphin, Charles Louis, son of Louis XVI and Maria Antoinette. It is easy enough to see how in a fertile imagination such an alluring connection may have been suggested by the following facts : A number of years ago the Rev. Eleazer Williams, a respectable clergyman of the Protestant Episcopal Church, who had for a considerable period been laboring as a missionary among the St. Regis Indians visited Lynn. An article had about that time appeared in Putnam's Magazine, a periodical of high standing, presenting quite an array of evidence tending to show that this Mr. Williams was in truth the scion of royalty whose death history had all along informed us took place in 1795, through the cruel treatment of Simon, into whose relentless custody the revolutionary miscreants had resigned him. There were many, however, who did not feel assured that history, in this instance, spoke the exact truth.
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