History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 6

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1226

USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 6

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The President rode in a barouche with Mr. Van Buren at his side. The booming of artillery on Chapel Hill, overlooking the Concord, added to the eclat of the pageant. At the junction of Church. and Central Streets two fine hickory trees had been transplanted-a delicate compliment to Jackson's pet name, "Old Hickory.". Good Master Merrill, a stanch Jackson man, had brought out his boys in thick array, who, as the general passcd them, shouted (as they, perhaps, had been instructed to do) not "Hurrah!" but "Hurrah for Jackson!" "The pro- cession passed in review before the President, with drums beating, cannon booming, banners flying, hand- kerchiefs waving and nine times nine hearty chcers of welcome." But no part of the pageantry could be compared to the procession of the Yankee girls. They were over twenty-five hundred in number and marched four decp, all dressed in white, with parasols over their heads.

Z. E. Stone, Esq., whose interesting account of Jackson's visit I mainly follow, makes the following quotation from a letter of an old citiizen : " As Gen- eral Jackson rode through this line, hat in hand, there was an expression on his features hard to de- fine, partaking partly of surprise, partly of pride, and a good deal of gratification. Julius Caesar, Napolcon, Alexander, in their best estates, never bowed to 'two miles of girls' all dressed in white. It is quite doubtful whether either of them could have survived it. It was evident General Jackson did not know what to make of appearances at Lowell. He had probably imbibed his ideas of a Northern manufactur- ing town somewhat from the specches of Southern statesmen, and was prepared to mcet squalid wretch- edness, half concealed for the purposes of the occa- sion ; but when told that these fine blocks of build- ings (fresher then than now) were veritable board- ing-houses for the 'wretched' operatives in the fac- tories, with the evidence of his own eyes as to the condition of those operatives, he exhibited a good deal of enthusiasm, and in various ways expressed his gratification."

General Jackson visited the Print Works and one

HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

of the mills of the Merrimack Corporation, where all the machinery was in operation and the girls, in holiday attire, exhibited to him the process of manu- facturing cotton. Charles Dickens, in his "Notes for American Circulation," deems the visit of Jackson worthy of the following mention, which, however, does but little credit to the accuracy of the great writer : "It is said that on the occasion of the visit of General Jackson or General Harrison (I forget whichi, but it is not to the purpose) he walked through three miles and a half of these girls, all dressed out with parasols and silk stockings."

Major "Jack Downing's" account of the same occa- sion is almost as worthy of belief as that of Mr. Dickens. The major declared that at one time before this, when the general was exhausted with hand- shaking, he himself stepped forward and shook hands with the multitude in his stead. Taking courage from his success on that previous occasion, he ven- tured to do a little bowing to the handsome Lowell girls, whereupon the general pushed him aside and said : "None of that, major ; in the matter of shak- ing hands you do very well, but when it comes to sa- luting the girls I can manage that without your help." On the next morning, after breakfast, Jackson, with military promptness, at the appointed hour, took his seat in the carriage to start for Concord, New Hamp- shire, but Van Buren's seat by his side was vacant. " Where is Van Buren ?" said the President. On be- ing told thad he had not come from the breakfast table, he replied : "Well, I sha'n't wait for him. Drive on."

The question naturally arises, Can the Lowell mill- girls of to-day form a procession like that which greeted General Jackson more than fifty years ago? The emphatic answer is " No." Perhaps there is no better place than this to speak of the great change in the character of the female operatives in our mills during the first half-century of their existence.

During the first half of the present century the new settlements on the fertile prairics of the West called from the humble farms among the hills of New England very many of her most ambitious and enterprising sons. But New England's daughters, though born with a spirit equally ambitious and en- terprising, were compelled to remain in the old homesteads on the hillsides. Little money could they earn, though they had willing hands for labor. Here and there one could earn, at teaching a short summer school, a dollar a week and board. A poor pittance was paid for domestic service. Custom for- bade the Yankee girl to work, like the European woman, in the fields. But when the great manufac- turing enterprises were started in Lowell the services of these same Yankee girls, waiting on the hillsides for something for their ready hands to do, were eagerly sought and most highly prized. They were just the help most needed. They brought with them health, strength, patience, virtue and intelligence.

Well could the successful and wealthy manufacturer afford to pay generously such workmen as these. The buildings, the machinery, the boarding-houses, all were new. The grime of years had not yet come upon them. The humble country girl, who had rarely held a silver dollar in her hand, felt a pleasing pride at the end of every month upon receiving a sum which, in her childhood on the hills, she had never dreamed of earning. They had learned economy, and many thousands were saved to be carried back to their country homes. Many a mortgage which had long rested on the small farm of the parents was lifted by these noble and enterprising daughters. Many a young bride in the cottage on the hillside, after the service of a few years in the Lowell mills, was able to vie with the daughters of the wealthy around her in the elegance of her outfit and the rich- ness of her attire.

The shrewd managers of our mills strove hard and long to keep such, and only such, girls in their em- ploy. And so successful were they that one of them informs me that as late as 1846 "every mill-girl was a Yankee."

But gradually there came a change. Mills were multiplied ; Yankee help was sometimes hard to be found. In summer the mill-girl was fond of leaving her loom and taking a vacation on the breezy hills about her old home. Rival manufactories sprang up. The margin of profits thus grew small. To insure dividends every loom must be kept moving. At first operatives were sought in Nova Scotia to supply the increasing demand. These operatives proved very acceptable substitutes for the Yankees. But still greater numbers were needed, and then, very gradu- ally, Irish girls, and after them, Freuch girls from Canada, began to be employed. But different races do not always work well together, especially in cases in which there is supposed to exist a social ine- quality. And so it came to pass that as the foreign girl came, the native girl went.

But there is another still more efficient cause, per- haps, of the withdrawal of the Yankee girls from the mills. Within the last fifty years almost countless new avenues of labor and enterprise have been opened to American women. Almost innumerable sewing-machines demand the service of the nimble fingers of intelligent girls. As accountants in places of business, as telegraph operators, as saleswomen in the retail trade, as clerks of professional men, and in other positions too numerous to mention, the intelli- gent and educated girls and women of America are finding employments more agreeable to their tastes than can be found amidst the din and clatter of the mills.

In process of time, too, the grime and dust of age settle down over the once new and neat buildings and furniture, and render them less attractive than when the freshiness of early days was upon them. Morcover, it is doubtless truc that the second gene-

LOWELL.

ration of mill-owners cares less for the moral status of the operatives, and more, perhaps, for the divi- dends, than did their noble fathers who laid the foundations of these great enterprises. From all these causes it has come to pass that a class of opera- tives, somewhat inferior in culture and intelligence, now fills the place of the Yankee girls who welcomed the Hero of New Orleans in the streets of Lowell.

I am informed by a gentleman, who is intimately conversant with the subject, that at the present time about one-fourth only of the Lowell mill operatives are Yankee girls, whilst the other three-fourths con- sist in about equal numbers of French and Irish. But still the mills find in these girls skillful and efficient operatives. The Irish girls have many ex- cellent characteristics, and the French are said to be intelligent and quick to learn.

In October, 1833, the town of Lowell was honored by a visit from another illustrious man, the Hon. Henry Clay. In the preceding year Mr. Clay had been the Whig candidate for the Presidency, in oppo- sition to President Jackson, and, though defeated de- cidedly in the canvass, he had not lost the glory of his great name. If any American statesman, more than any other, was able to rouse in the hearts of his followers the sentiments of admiration and intense devotion, it was Henry Clay-the " gallant Harry of the West." The present generation can hardly understand this admiration, for they cannot behold his magnetic presence nor hear his eloquent voice. Mr. Clay was received with distinguished honor, and in the evening he addressed the citizens in the Town Hall.

But Kirk Boott, Lowell's first citizen, refused to share in any of the honors bestowed upon the distin- guished guest, because, though Mr. Clay had advo- cated the war against England of 1812, yet, in order to close the contest, he had been instrumental, as commissioner of the United States, in making a treaty of peace which surrendered the very objects for which the war was declared. Nor is Mr. Boott the first American who has felt the humiliation of the treaty of peace at Ghent.

The year 1833 was, to Lowell, one of peculiar ex- citement and interest. The great corporations were mostly now in full operation. The grime of age and use had not begun to gather on the fresh and elegant structures of the mills and of the city. The great experiment seemed flushed with success. The scene was novel to all the world. Strangers from other lands, like the Queen of Sheba, came to witness the sight. Lowell for the time was one of the seven wonders of the world. Other like cities had not yet arisen to divide the admiration and wonder of men. It was Loweil's youthful prime, when her admirers were most numerous and most ardent. At the present day, such have been the wonderful inventions of recent years, there is more to be admired than then, but the curiosity of men has been satisfied. Other great manufacturing cities have sprung up all around,

and Lowell has ceased to be the one city of that pe- culiar attraction which it once possessed. The gala day of General Jackson's visit will never return.

1834. The representatives to the General Court were : Samuel Howard, Kirk Boott, James Chandler, Osgood Dane, Jesse Phelps and O. M. Whipple. [There were in 1834 eleven vacancies. At that time it required a majority to elcct instead of a plurality as at the present timc.]

The selectmen were : Joshua Swan, Elisha Hunt- ington, Wm. Livingston, Jesse Fox, Benjamin Walker.

In this year Eliphalet Baker, Walter Farnsworth and George Hill, of Boston, having purchased of Mr. Park the flannel-mill in Belvidere, near Wamesit Falls, begin the manufacturing business under the name of the Belvidere Flannel Manufacturing Com- pany.

The Lowell Advertiser started, and Belvidere was annexed. On May 31, 1834, a steamboat, ninety fect long and twenty feet wide, was launched above Paw- tucket Falls to run on Merrimack River. It was owned by Joel Stone and J. P. Simpson, of Boston, and was called the " Herald." Mr. Stone was its first captain. It plied twice per day between Lowell and Nashua. On account of the shortness of the distance and other causcs the enterprise failed. The traveler, to gain so short a ride upon the water, did not care to shift his baggage from the stage-coach. However, Mr. Joseph Bradley continued to run the boat until the opening for travel of the Lowell & Nashua Railroad. This railroad was incorporated in 1835.

The celebrated David Crocket, the comic statesman of Tennessee, visited Lowell May 7, 1834. Hc was an ardent Whig, and about 100 young Whigs of Lowell gave him a banquet at the American House in the evening. He was greatly pleased with his reception and declared that he was dead in love with New England people.

If the object of history is to give to the reader an accurate and life-like view of the condition of a people, I can hardly fulfill my task in a better way than by quoting from the autobiography of this intelligent ob- server the following words : " I had heard so much of [Lowell] that I longed to see it. I wanted to see the power of machinery wielded by the keenest calcula- tions of human skill. We went down among the fac- tories. The dinner bells were ringing and the folks were pouring out of the houses like bees out of a gum. I looked at them as they passed, all well dressed, lively, and genteel in their appearance. I went in among the girls and talked with inany of them. Not one of them expressed herself as tired of her employ- ment. Some of them were very handsome. I could not help reflecting on the difference of condition bc- tween these females, thus employed, and that of other populous countries where the female character is de- graded to abject slavery."

Colonel Crocket served two years in Congress. Two

2.4

HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

years after visiting Lowell he fell in battle while fighting in the cause of Texas against Mexico.

In November, 1834, George Thompson, the distin- guished English philanthropist, eame to Lowell for the second time. On his first visit, in October of that year, he had spoken in the Appleton Street Church. Upon his second visit he was to deliver three anti-slavery addresses on three consecutive evenings, in the Town Hall, which was then in the second story of our pres- ent City Government Building.

Mr. Thompson had a great name already acquired in England. Mr. Z. E. Stone, whose account of Mr. Thompson's visit I follow, writes as follows : "He had been a leader in the struggle for emancipation in the West Indies ; and on the passage of the Aet of Emancipation was specially complimented in the House of Lords by Lord Brougham,' who said : 'I rise to take the erown of this most glorious victory and place it upon George Thompson.'

At the time of this visit to Lowell, some of the lead- ing eitizens, engaged in manufacturing, believed it would be prejudicial to the interests of our mills if their patrons in the South should learn that the people of Lowell were interfering with their rights as slave- holders. Others affected to believe that Mr. Thomp- son was an emissary of England, sent hither to dis- turb our peace and break down our institutions. On the day on which the last of his three lectures was to be given, a placard was posted in the streets from which I take the following words: 'Citizens of Lowell, arise! Will you suffer a question to be dis- eussed in Lowell which will endanger the safety of the Union ? Do you wish instruction from an English- man ? If you are free-born sons of America, meet, one and all, at the Town Hall this evening.'

"Mr. Thompson also received an anonymous letter in which the writer says : there is a plot ' to immerce him in a vat of indelable Ink,' and advises him to 'leave the country as soon as possible or it wil be shurely carried into opperration, and that to before you see the light of another son !'

" On previous evenings brick-bats had been hurled at Mr. Thompson through the windows, and he had been interrupted by eat-ealls and other offensive demonstrations. But on the coming evening it was evident more serious danger was impending. When the hour of assembling eame, au unwonted crowd gathered in the rear of the hall. It was a scene of great excitement and all things foreboded a coming storm. At this point the seleetmen of the town in- terfered and persuaded those in charge of the leetures to put off the meeting till the afternoon of the next day. The brave anti-slavery women of the audienee gathered about Mr. Thompson, and he escaped out into the darkness and found shelter in the hospitable home of Rev. Mr. Twining, pastor of the Appleton Street Church. And thus ended what came very near being a 'mob in Lowell.'"

The rapidly growing town now extends its bound-

aries. Not all of the city of Lowell is embraced in the territory of the village of East Chelmsford. The towns of Tewksbury and Dracut have each contrib- uted to our eity, lands, which afford some of the most attractive sites for many of the most elegant resi- denees of our citizens. The land in East Chelmsford was generally low and level, in some places even covered with swamps and dotted with ponds, but the parts which once belonged to Tewksbury and Dracut rise in hills from the banks of the Merrimack and. afford delightful views, not only of the rest of the city, but of the neighboring towns and of the lofty hills and mountains which lie far to the west and north.

BELVIDERE .- This part of the eity, once belonging to Tewksbury, is bounded on the west by the Concord and on the north by the Merrimack. The lowlands near the falls in the Coneord were once the habita- tion of the Pawtucket or Wamesit Indians. In the Concord in early days were four islands, the largest two of which are crossed by one in going from the Prescott Mills directly to High Street Church. It is interesting to know that the site of Belvidere was once the property of Margaret, widow of John Win- throp, earliest Governor of the Colony of Massachu- setts Bay. After the death of the Governor, iu 1649, the General Court granted to Margaret Winthrop, his widow, 3000 aeres of land, bounded on the west and north by the Coneord and Merrimack Rivers. This large traet evidently remained (wholly, or in part) in the hands of her deseendants for many years. For on February 12, 1691, Adam Winthrop, grandson of Margaret, gives by deed one-fifth (undi- vided) of these 3000 acres to Samuel Hnnt, from whom, I suppose, the falls next below Pawtucket Falls derive their name. In 1769 Timothy Brown purchased a part of the Winthrop estate and built upon it a large house, for many years a conspicuous and widely-known landmark of our city, known as the "Gedney House," or more familiarly as " The Old Yellow House." This house rose aloft with a eom- manding view, adorned, as it was, by a loug row of Lombardy poplars. For a long time in "ye olden days" it had been a noted inn, and its long halls had often resounded with music and the merry dance. Mrs. Abbott, wife of Judge J. G. Abbott, of Boston, who in her childhood lived in the house, thus de- scribes it : "The mansion house was beautifully situated at the confluence of the Merrimack and Con- eord Rivers. Standing at an elevation of forty feet above the water, it commanded a distant and lovely view of both the streams. Back of the house, on the opposite side of the Merrimack, rose Dracut heights, as if to shield the spot from the north winds. It was certainly a lovely old mansion."

This mansion, with about 200 acres of land adjoin- ing it, constituted what was long known as the "Gedney Estate," so named from a former owner. This estate, in 1816, was purchased by Judge St. Loe Livermore,

LOWELL.

the father of Mrs. Abbott, who, after being wearied of politics and the bustle of a city life, had lioped that on this quiet farm, far out in the country, he should at leugth find for his declining years a place of grateful repose. Little did he dream that within seven years he would look down from this quiet home upon one of the busiest scenes ever presented to the view in the history of human industry-the begin- nings of the great manufacturing enterprise of the future city of Lowell.

Judge Livermore was a man of marked ability, and "he had associated with men prominent in let- ters and in politics in this and other countries." His father had been a justice of the Supreme Court of New Hampshire, as well as member of the United States Senate, of which he was president pro tempore for several years ; while he had himself served three terms in the United States House of Representatives, and filled many other important offices. It was he who gave to his part of the city the name of " Belri- dere." He died Sept. 15, 1832, aged seventy years. The farm of Judge Livermore was sold in 1831 to Thomas and John Nesmith for $25,000. The Nesmith brothers had been successful traders in Derry, N. H., and they purchased the land for the purpose of di- viding it up into city lots to be sold as residences. They fully accomplished their purpose, and on this land now stand many of the most costly and elegant houses of the city. The Nesmiths both lived to good old age in the mansions on the Livermore farm, which they had erected for their declining years, Thomas living to the age of eighty-two years, and John to the age of seventy-six years.

The large farms lying next to that of Judge Liver- more and belonging to Zadoc Rogers and Captain Wm. Wyman, are now, in like manner, being divided into lots admirably adapted for elegant resi- dences, and it is safe to assert that no part of the city is more attractive and beautiful than Belvidere.

The annexation of Belvidere was for about five years -from 1829 to 1834-a subject of much acrimonious debate. Thetown of Tewksbury was not willing to sur- render the taxes of a village of so much wealth, while the people of Belvidere felt that they were virtually citizens of Lowell. Their business and their social relations allied them to Lowell. Accordingly, when summoned to attend town-meetings at the centre of Tewksbury, four or five miles away, they felt them- selves unfairly treated by being compelled, at great expense and loss of time, to meet with men with whom they had neither business relations nor social sympathies. They acted as they felt, and turned the town-meetings into ridicule. Mr. Geo. Hedrick, our aged fellow-citizen, who was one of them, gives us the following account of town-meeting days :

" We used to charter all the teams, hay-carts and other kind of vehicles, and go down and disturb the people of the town by our boisterous actions. As we neared the village a 'hurrah !' gave the warning of

our approach. We took extra pains to have a full turn-out, make all the trouble we could, and have for one day in the year a good time. At twelve o'clock we adjourned to Brown's tavern to dinner, and hot flip and other favorite beverages of those days were freely partaken of. We met again at two o'clock and kept up the turbulent proceedings until seven, and returned home well satisfied with our endeavors for the good of the town." On one occasion they actually carried a vote to hold the next town-meeting in the village of Belvidere. The old town at length relented, and the new village, as is usual in such cases, gained the victory. It was the mother against the daughter and the daughter had her way. Belvi- dere was annexed to Lowell May 29, 1834. Twice since that date, by legislative acts, the unwilling town has been compelled to surrender to the encroaching city some of the most valuable parts of its territory.

1835. The representatives to the General Court were : Kirk Boott, A. W. Buttrick, James Chandler, Wm. Davidson, Artemas Holden, John Mixer, Mat- thias Parkhurst, Alpheus Smith, Joseph Tyler, O. M. Whipple, Benjamin Walker, Wm. Wyman, and John A. Knowles. The selectmen were : Benjamin Walker, James Russell, Wm. Livingston, John Chase, Wm. N. Owen. This is the last of the ten years of the town- ship of Lowell. The repeated re-elections of Samuel A. Coburn, as town-clerk and of Artemus Holden, as treasurer, indicate the high esteem in which they were held. Joshua Swan's name also constantly recurs on the town records. He was often honored as moderator of town-meetings, representative to the General Court, and selectman of the town. He was subsequently a candidate for mayor.

Middlesex Mechanics' Building on Dutton Street was erected in 1835.

The Lowell Courier begins as a tri-weekly, publishcd Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

The Boott Cotton-Mills were incorporated in 1835 with a capital of $1,500,000.

Aug. 22, 1835, a meeting was held to denounce all agitations of the question of slavery. John Aiken, John P. Robinson, Elisha Bartlett, John Avery and Thomas Hopkinson were among the leading citizens who participated in the doings of this meeting. There was entertained in those days a fear of losing the trade of the South by allowing the impression to go forth that Lowell was a hot-bed of abolitionism, where intermeddling Englishmen, like George Thompson were allowed, unrebuked, to traduce the institutions of America.

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History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 6

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1226

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1226