USA > Massachusetts > Norfolk County > Needham > History of Needham, Massachusetts, 1711-1911 : including West Needham, now the town of Wellesley, to its separation from Needham in 1881, with some reference to its affairs to 1911 > Part 24
USA > Massachusetts > Norfolk County > Wellesley > History of Needham, Massachusetts, 1711-1911 : including West Needham, now the town of Wellesley, to its separation from Needham in 1881, with some reference to its affairs to 1911 > Part 24
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3II
THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
In 1813 the St. David Musical Society was formed "for the cultivation and promotion of genuine classical Church Musick", and included residents of fifteen towns. The three special meetings in each year were held at Framing- ham, and the Anniversary meeting on September 6, in the different towns in rotation, Needham being one of them.
MINISTERIAL LAND
DEDHAM RECORDS
The selectmen of Dedham called a town meeting for No- vember 2, 1710, on account of a school, and "as to an affair refering to the Inhabitants of the north part of this town." At a town meeting on November 13, in compliance with a recommendation of the General Court, notice of which was served on the selectmen "Laft Saturday about twelve of ye Clock", on October 31, 1710, "The Town haue by their vote freed the petitinors of the north part of our town from paying to our minifters Salary so Long as they shall haue an able minifter to preach amongst themSelves untill the generall Court at the Sefions thereof in may next". On February 12, 1710/II, a committee of five was appointed at a town meeting to report at the annual meeting "as to the affair of ye pititioners of the north part of this town". The report was accepted on March 12, 1710/11. On March 19, 1710/II, "This day it was propofed to the proprietors of this town to Grant to the petitioners of the north part of this town two parcells of land for publick use for the ministrey one parcell for a houfe Lot and another for a wood Lot the firft parcell abutteth north on Rofemary meadow & eaft and upon away coming from sd meadow toward the West [?] and South and upon Rofemary brook in part eaft. The other parcell is on the Eaft side of north hill abutting upon the way leading to rofemary meadow & Robert ffuller towerds the north containing about 20 acers. The proprietors in Anfwer to the pititioners doe Set apart and
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
referue and grant that the afore sd land pititioned for shall be granted to the pititioners to them and their -ers for ever for the miniftrey from one generation to another for eUer and not to be Sold nor alienated from the miniftrey foreuer but to remain for the publick use for the miniftrey on the north side of charles River." On May 14, 171I, a committee of two, Capt. Daniel Fisher and Capt. Samuel Guild, was appointed to appear before the General Court to answer the petition of the inhabitants of the North part. It has been said that the total area of this land was one hundred and thirty acres, but according to the deeds and plans there were about one hundred and twenty acres bounded by the present Parish Street, Central Avenue, Nehoiden and Rose- mary Streets, two acres on the west side of Central Avenue, opposite the westerly end of Parish Street, and twenty-one acres on the east side of North Hill. In all about one hun- dred and forty-three acres, including the burying-ground, which in 183I was only one acre. The minister of the First Parish Church had the use of a portion of this land as late as the time of the Rev. Mr. Ritchie, 1821-42, and at the division of the town into two parishes the whole of it was appropriated by the First Parish, although the Second Par- ish protested for a century. In 1803 the First Parish de- fended its minister in a suit brought by the Rev. Thomas Noyes, minister of the Church in the West Precinct, "for the said Palmers refusing to Relinquish one half of the Min- isterial Land lying in the East Parish".1 The control of this land by the First Parish was by no means unquestioned by the town, which leased portions of it in 1790 and con- tinued to do so for years. The various notes due to the town for the use of this land by individuals are prominent in the reports of the committee to reckon with the town treasurer subsequent to 1800. The McIntoshes were among
1 "A Manual for the Congregational Church in West Needham", 1859, calls attention to the alleged violation of trust by the First Parish in alienating the land and failing to devote it to the perpetual support of an Orthodox ministry.
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
the last, if not the last, to rent a part of the Ministerial land from the town, which land Enoch Fisk petitioned the town in 1801 to divide between the two parishes. In the meantime the First Parish voted on January 21, 1793, to sell part of "ye Ministeral lands", and a committee headed by Colonel McIntosh secured an Act of the General Court, February 24, 1795, authorizing them to sell sixty acres, subject to any rights that the Second Parish might have. The first sale under this Act was of ten acres in 1795, to Jeremiah Kingsbury, who built in 1805 the house that was the residence of the late Arthur Whitaker. Subsequent Acts of the General Court further enlarged the power of the First Parish to sell its lands, and in September, 1896, the site of the first three meeting-houses, with the land south and west, including the old Training Field, was sold to Frederick P. Glover, and in 1902 the sale of the cemetery and the land to the north of it completed the alienation of the Ministerial land. In 1830 Dea. Asa Kingsbury with William Ellis, both competent surveyors, made a plan of the Parish land, showing the sales to that year, but not including the tract on North Hill, or that adjoining Rose- mary Meadow. After the town ceased to interfere, the First Parish leased portions of its land for cultivation and pas- turage, and at times derived considerable sums from the sale of wood. There were many years when the minister did not avail of his privilege of using this land, or required only a part of it. In 1908 Miss Martha Anna Clarke pur- chased of the executor of Mr. Glover the site of the meeting- houses, the Training Field, and some land in front of the Nehoiden Block Lot, which is also a part of the Ministerial land. The following items from the town records illus- trate the customs of the past: On November 29, 1723, the town "Voted that their Should be fouer men Chosen to notifie the whole Town to Cut & Cart wood for ye Rd mr Townsend", and Captain Fisher, Joseph Boyden, Samuel Parker and Christopher Smith were chosen. At the March
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
meeting in 1725 Mr. Townsend offered to accept £io in lieu of wood, and on May 17 the town voted to give him £7. On March 29, 1728, Captain Fisher, Deacon Woodcock, James Kingsbery, Robert Fuller and Jeremiah Woodcock, Jr., were chosen by the town to run the lines "in the Ministry land". The lands of Deacon Woodcock and of James Kings- bery joined the "Ministry land" on the west, on North Hill. In June, 1731, John Fisher, Peter Edes and William Chub were designated to fence ten acres on this hill for Mr. Townsend's use "for His Cows & Other Creatures". A rate of £40 was voted, and the fence was to be done by August I, but there was delay, and discussion about it in several town meetings, and in 1732 another committee was chosen, but nothing was done. In May, 1738, Captain Cook, Jeremiah Woodcock, Joseph Haws, Peter Edes and Jona- than Smith were named to view a piece of land that Mr. Townsend wished to have fenced, and the meeting was adjourned for half an hour. When they came together to resume their legislative duties, the committee reported that it would cost £20 to fence ten acres, which was voted, and Captain Cook and Jeremiah Fisher were to expend it, the lumber to be obtained on the Ministerial land. In March, 1738/9, John Fisher, Esq., and Henry Dewing were to fence the land, and in July, 1741, the selectmen were in- structed that this ten-acre tract was "to be fenced in to De Jeremiah Woodcock". The following February the town chose Deacon Woodcock, Lieut. Thomas Metcalf and Jeremiah Woodcock, Jr., to run the line between the Min- isterial land and that of Samuel Daniell. On September 12, 1743, the town voted to pay Mr. Townsend £20 for fencing this land; as the town had been going to do it for twelve years, it is not strange that Mr. Townsend, who probably needed the pasture, finally did it himself. In 1755 the town refused to fence ten acres for a "pafter", but in 1761 Amos Fuller, Jr., Aaron Smith, Jr., and James Man were chosen to fence "a Part of the Miniftrey Land this
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
year", viz., the east side and the south end "with a Stone Wall this year", and a tax of £13, 6s., 8d. was voted for the purpose. In 1760 a committee was to renew the bounds around the "Towns Land", possibly the "School Land", but presumably the "Ministeral Land". In May, 1765, the town rejected a proposition to sell the Ministerial land, "Excepting Proper Places for the Meeting Houfe: Burying Place and Training Field". From time to time committees were chosen to renew the bounds around this land, and in 1766, or 1767, Deacon Hewins made a plan of it. For assisting Deacon Hewins, Nathaniel Fisher was granted fourteen shil- lings, Dea. John Fisher 7s., 6d. for three days' time, and Michael Metcalf four shillings. Amos Fuller, Jr., was paid three shillings "for some Entertainment" for the "Surveyor" and Lieutenant Day 16s., 6d. for assisting and paying Deacon Hewins in part, also for searching records and "for a Quarter of a Lamb he found for their Use when they were Planing Said Land". In March, 1768, a proposition to sell wood to pay for this plan was voted down.
BROOKLINE MINISTERS' WOOD LOT IN NEEDHAM
On March 5, 1759, Samuel White of Brookline conveyed to the selectmen of that town twenty acres of land on the north side of the Sherborn road in Needham, for a "minis- terial" wood lot. In 1805 it was called in the Brookline town records "the Church Lot in Needham", and it was assessed to the First Parish of Brookline in 1880, the year preceding the division of our town, and was then eighteen and one quarter acres.
CEMETERIES
The Needham Cemetery includes a portion of the land granted by the inhabitants of Dedham in 1710/1I for the support of the ministry on the north side of the Charles River. On December 4, 1711, the Town of Needham chose a committee consisting of the five selectmen and Jonathan
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
Gay, Jeremiah Woodcock, Thomas Metcalf and Eleazer Kingsbery to "Stake and Bound outt a pleace for the Buerr- ing of the dead of this town in". They selected the well- known place, where interments are said to have been made prior to 1711, the first that of a child in the winter season. The earliest date of a death, recorded on a stone, is Decem- ber 4, 17II, which is scratched on a rough field stone in memory of Edward Cook. Barely an acre of ground re- ceived nearly all of the dead of the town, until the space was exhausted, although only a fraction of the graves are marked by stones.
On May 20, 1728, the town designated "the Second Mon- day of June Next for to Clear the burrying place". On June 24, 1776, the town voted "That the Burying Place Should be Inlarged", and chose a committee of seven to attend to it, but it does not appear that any report was made, or any action taken, and in 1778 the First Parish assumed the responsibility for the burying-ground, and four years later voted to enlarge it.
In June, 1837, the Parish voted to allow Royal MeIn- tosh and Mrs. Rebeckah Newell and children to build tombs, but it does not appear that they availed of this permission. In 1839 the sexton was authorized to charge not less than fifty cents, or more than a dollar and a half, for the inter- ment of a person not of the Parish, the money received to be applied to keeping the gates and grounds in "repair". In 1842 it was voted "that our Burying Ground be free and accessible to any one living in the town or who may wish to bring their friends from out of any other town to be buried there". On April 10, 1843, Edgar K. Whitaker, Newell Smith, George Revere, the Rev. Mr. Kimball and Thomas Kingsbury were chosen to see what could be done to improve the appearance of the burying-ground, and they made an interesting report on June 26. They stated that on the 14th "a large gathering of the native inhabitants of the town resident and non-resident, with other friends met at
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
the Rev. M: Maynard's Meeting House and after religious services and addresses," "the company partook of the re- past prepared by the ladies near the Church". Ira Cleve- land of Dedham and Dr. John D. Fisher of Boston had accepted invitations to speak, and presumably did so. From this "Tea Party" the Charitable Sewing Society realized $155.17 for the burying-ground. At a meeting held by the women on June 19 they asked that four men be added to the committee "for improving the Burial Ground", and on the 26th William Stedman, Warren Dewing, John Mills and William Pierce became members of the committee, of which Mr. Kimball was the treasurer and Mr. Whitaker the secretary. In April, 1844, acting on the report of the committee, it was voted to enlarge the burying-ground, but not at the expense of the improvement fund, by including a strip of land "not to exceed in extent ten rods beyond the present bounds"; a similar vote was passed in November, 1846. The size of the burying-ground, about 1843, and prior to the addition of this new section, which included Mr. Whitaker's own lot, is indicated by the walls on the east and west. The tombs were on the western boundary until the forties. A row of trees indicates the course of an earlier eastern wall, and the present wall is twenty feet east of the former one. This "Committee on the Improve- ment of the Burying Ground" continued an annual one until 1870, when the Parish Committee was given full con- trol of the cemetery.
In 1862 a form for deeds to be given to the purchasers of lots was first considered, but it does not appear that such deeds were in use earlier than 1870, when the question of selling the cemetery was referred to a committee, as were several propositions as to deeds, regulations, etc. At that time it was voted to have a plan of the cemetery, but the elaborate volumes of plans, showing the location of each grave, were not in use till about 1895. After propositions to sell the cemetery had been familiar for years, James
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
Mackintosh and other prominent citizens formed an asso- ciation, which was incorporated in 1884 as the Needham Cemetery Association, but did not effect a purchase of the graveyard from the First Parish. In 1899 there was a new Act of Incorporation, with the result that on November 29, 1902, the Parish conveyed the cemetery to the Association for $3750. Five trustees with a treasurer are now in control, and many improvements have been made. John F. Mills, superintendent since 1883, has from the beginning of his administration managed the cemetery according to business principles and modern ideas, of which his predecessors were innocent. There have been conflicting statements as to what changes were made in 1846, when there was a general turn out of the inhabitants of the town to clear up and plough the burying-ground. It is reasonably certain that many stones were then lying about, and that others were taken up, and not put back correctly, and therefore no longer mark the last resting places of those they commemorate. The remains of the Rev. Jonathan Townsend and family are in the valley, near the road, and in a line with the grave- stone of Capt. Caleb Kingsbery, but prior to 1907 the stones were for many years on the hill, and several rods east of their proper locations. When the fine new wall was built in 1875, principally from a legacy of $300 received under the will of Mrs. Sarah Fuller, the line was straightened, and a number of graves were disturbed.1 Mrs. Fuller was the widow of Timothy S. Fuller, and died February 25, 1874, and in 1876 the Parish voted that her lot should have per- petual care, which it has since had. At the March meeting of the First Parish in 1871 it was voted to have the tombs closed, rounded and grassed over. There were then five
1 The bones from these graves were put into the bank. The writer has heard remarkable stories of the skeleton of a very tall man, found when the bank was dug into, and of an ancient coffin with three silver handles on each side. The burying-ground was doubtless encroached upon when an earlier wall was built. The granite stairs to the east of the Fuller monument, leading from the sidewalk, were taken away in 1875 when this new wall was made.
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
tombs. The Palmer-McIntosh tomb, built in 1803, was in a crumbling condition. It was broken in and largely re- moved, when some remains were placed in lots, but those of Colonel McIntosh and his son, Major Ebenezer, with their wives and members of their families are in the bank next to the Fuller Tomb. In 1909 James Mackintosh laid the foundation for a handsome monument, completed in 1910, and inscribed with the names of the Colonel and his wife, and of the Major and his wife. The Fuller tomb, perhaps the oldest, was elaborately rebuilt in 1872, but the Harris Tomb, constructed in 1812, and which joins the Fuller Tomb on the north, shared the fate of the McIntosh Tomb. The fourth tomb was the strongly built vault of Moses Gar- field & David Ayers, 1817, from which the mound was removed by Superintendent Mills without injury to the masonry. Lieutenant Garfield was given leave to construct this tomb in 1816.
The granite receiving tomb, and its duplicate in the yard of the Church in Wellesley, were built in 1854 by the town, under the direction of a committee consisting of the select- men and Sextons George Jennings and George E. Eaton. The work was done by William Jones, a skilful mason. Five ancient gravestones have disappeared since 1861, pre- sumably when the wall was built. The stones missing are those of Joseph Danels, the ancestor of a family prominent in Needham, who died in 1720, of Ester Smith, died 1724, aged 4 yrs., of Margret Wodcok, died 1727, of Nathaniel Tolman, died 1729, and of Israel Gill, died 1744, aged 3 yrs.1 The present gravestone of Nathaniel Tolman was formerly that of Mrs. Lucy S. Lyon, who died in 1833, and whose name was cut on a new monument in a lot in 1876, when the slate gravestone was abandoned. Subsequent to 1890 Mrs. Anna M. Tolman Pickford obtained this stone, had it skilfully re-cut in imitation of the lost slab, and erected where the grave of her kinsman Tolman is said to be. Mr.
1 The spelling of the names is verbatim from the missing stones.
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
Mills recovered twenty-four footstones from culverts in 1898, and all but one, possibly two, were restored to their proper locations. In the years 1904-07 the elaborate Greene Mausoleum was built by Mariette R. Greene, and cost, with the land, upward of $20,000.
On April 14, 1864, Lauren Kingsbury, Galen Orr and Abijah Greenwood were chosen a committee by the town to report on "enlarging the Burying Ground in the Centre of the Town", but there was no result, and in 1873 the selectmen urged the town to establish a new cemetery remote from population. In 1874 the question of establishing two cemeteries was referred to a committee consisting of Dr. Elbridge G. Leach, William R. Mills, Enos H. Tucker, L. Allen Kingsbury and Lewis Wight. The following March the committee reported that the town should buy of Jona- than Fuller the land which later became Woodlawn Ceme- tery, and add to it the land which the Wellesley Congrega- tional Church had acquired some years before for cemetery purposes, but had never used; these two parcels together would be thirty acres. For the East they advised purchas- ing the First Parish Cemetery, and adding to it the O'Neil and Morton properties, thus increasing the acreage of that cemetery from eighteen to forty acres. William R. Mills, a good representative of the old sentiments and traditions of the town, made an able minority report of eleven pages, reviewing the history of the burying-ground, and asserting that the town still owned it. He referred to the tender associations with the old yard, and urged the inhabitants of the East and West to be united in death if they could not be in life. Mr. Mills did not think the committee fairly made up, and questioned their judgment in advising the purchase of the Fuller land for the West, believing, if they must have a separate cemetery, that there was a large tract of more available land south of Wellesley Avenue. The town dismissed the whole matter, but ordered the reports printed.
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
FUNERALS
In the old days the bearers actually bore the remains to the burying-ground, often walking with their burden for miles, and it is perhaps not strange that stimulant was required. Later an open wagon painted black was used, and by 1802 the parishes appear to have owned "Herses", but in 1845 the town purchased two hearses for $230, and in 1867 two new "funeral cars" for $1300, thus for a time owning four hearses, until one of them was sold to Daniel Warren for $15. The committee to buy the "funeral cars" in 1867 consisted of James Mackintosh, Moses Winch and Sexton George E. Eaton, and in 1868 two new hearse- houses were built by the town. The one in the West cost $264.75, and was built by Hezekiah Fuller. One of the old hearse-houses was moved in 1874, and is now the tool- house of the Needham Cemetery. In the early seventies there was an old hearse kept in a shed at the east end of the line of horse sheds in the rear of the First Church. The town also owned the biers, which usually cost $10 each, and kept them in repair.
On January 29, 1717/8, the town voted "to provid a buerall Cloath", and in 1753 Timothy Newell was granted £3, IIs. "for Broad Cloth and Triming for a Poole or Grave Cloth", presumably the same referred to in the order of July 15, 1754, allowing John Brown 5s., 4d. "for Making up a Grave Cloth". In March, 1807, the First Parish voted to buy a "Burying cloath". On January 30, 1753, Dea. Josiah Newell was granted 9s., 3d. "for Six pair of Gloves for the funeral of Nicholas Mutter", and three years later seven pairs were required for the funeral of a man who had been a great expense to the town. In 1773 the town buried a French and Indian War veteran from the house of Michael Bacon, and the cost of the gloves was considerable.
The town paid for "Lining to Lay out" the poor, and in 1783 it cost four shillings for each sheet used for that pur-
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
pose, but in 1843 "grave Cloths" for a woman were valued at $1.65. In 1825 "cambrick" was used for "gownes" to lay out both men and women, but in 1799 three yards of India cotton, with tape and thread, had been used for the shroud of a poor woman.
There was no Church bell in town till 1811, and on March 30, 1812, the First Parish adopted elaborate regulations, prepared by the Rev. Mr. Palmer, for ringing the bell on various occasions, including the "passing bell" the morning after a person deceased. When the writer was a boy it was customary for Charles A. Hines, or Francis Asbury Burrill, to toll the Church bell as soon as a death was known, and the strokes were counted by many people who stopped to listen, as now when an alarm of fire is given. In the early seventies Sumner B. Mills had a long-haired hound named Butler, with a powerful voice, and whenever the bell tolled Butler stationed himself on the terrace in front of the Mills house, which was a short distance west of the Church, and in a most effective manner howled in unison with the bell, beginning and ceasing with each stroke. The tolling con- tinued for a long time when the decease of an aged person was thus announced. In the first half of the last century the town paid for tolling when one of the poor died. For many years "Frank" Burrill, referred to as tolling the bell, was one of the best known, most officious and omnipresent individuals in town. See sketch of him later in this volume.
In 1727 Robert Fuller was granted seven shillings for digging the grave of the first person assisted by the Town of Needham, and in 1753 Dea. Josiah Newell acted as undertaker. From 1756 to 1775 Theophilus Richardson, Moses Dewing and Josiah Lyon were the gravediggers, and 2s., 8d. appears to have been their regular charge for digging the grave of an adult. A short time before the war this was increased to 3s., 4d., and in 1774 Mr. Richardson was paid by the town 2s., 8d. for digging the grave for a child.
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THE HISTORY OF NEEDHAM
Amos Fuller was undertaker and gravedigger for twenty years, or more, his career extending into the last century. Elijah Ware dug graves in 1787, '88, and Epes Mansfield in 1794. In 1804 Luther Dana, the first sexton of the West Precinct, charged $2.50 for the grave of a woman, including "extra in diging away the snow &c", and seventy-five cents "for Liquor he paid for the people who afsisted in burying the said Mary". Until late in the nineteenth cen- tury no attempt was made to open graves in the cemetery in East Needham when the ground was frozen hard, and some winters the receiving tomb had many temporary oc- cupants. Charles A. Hines dug graves for thirty years, or more, between 1840 and 1880, and after his time Luther Kingsbury, a worthy and respected citizen, was long a familiar figure in the cemetery, serving as "first grave- digger". He was lame and bent, and appeared aged and feeble, but was absent from his work only four days prior to his death on May 4, 1904, and the grave of a child, made by an associate, alone intervened between the last one dug by Mr. Kingsbury and his own.
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