USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > South Boston > Illustrated history of South Boston > Part 11
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The late Captain Michael J. Driscoll was one of the well-known citizens of South Boston. Captain Dris- coll passed away May 31, 1900. In yachting and business circles and among his many associates he was held in high esteem. He was born on Broad street, in the Old Fort Hill dis- triet, September, 1833. He attended the old Boylston school on Washington street, a school that sent out into the world hundreds of boys, who afterwards made old Fort Hill famous because of their attain- ments. After leaving school he became interested in the yacht- ing and boating business. Cap- tain Driscoll was one of the pioneer excursion-boat owners of Boston. His fleet of boats, the "Welcome," " Surprise " and " Pleasure," were famous for the large parties they car- ried to the numerous pleas- ure resorts in Boston harbor. About 1875, he entered the liquor business. At the time of his demise, he conducted a large store on Atlantie avenne. Captain Driscoll became a resident of South Boston about 1869. He represented old Ward 5 in the City Council, in 1868, making an excellent representative of the district. Captain Driscoll's circle of friends was extremely large. His famous steam yacht " The Skylark " car- ried many pleasant parties down the harbor, the memories of which yet linger in the minds of those who were privileged to participate therein, and who still re- main among the living. He was a mem- ber of the South Boston Yacht Club,
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HISTORY OF SOUTH BOSTON.
the Charitable Irish Society, the Old Boylston School Association, the Order of Good Fellows, and the South Boston Citizens' Association.
HON. CHARLES T. GALLAGHER.
Gallagher, Charles Theodore, was born in South Boston, on Old Harbor street, next to the Hall J. How estate, where the Carney Hospital now stands, May 21, 1851. His father and mother, William and Emily Gallagher, had moved from Dorchester about 1847, and lived first on A street and then on Dorchester Heights, the father being a dealer in stoves and ranges on Broad- way, at the corner of Dor- chester avenue.
The subject of the sketch attended the Bigelow and the old Hawes schools. After a year and a half of the Hawes school, he attended the Lin- coln school for two weeks, and then, on account of change of lines, he attended the Bigelow school until he graduated in 1865, a year later than naturally ex- pected ; as in the spring of 1864 he enlisted as a drum- mer boy, before he attained the age of thirteen years, in . the first unattached company Massachusetts Infantry, known as the Lincoln Guards, formed in South Boston, be- ing the last call of troops in Massachusetts during the War of the Rebellion. He served about four months. After the war, he joined the Tenth Mas- sachusetts which afterwards became the First Massachusetts Volunteer Militia.
In 1865, he entered the English High school, where he organized the first drum corps for any public school battalion. lle continued intending to enter Harvard College, but ill health led him to enter mercantile pursuits, and he spent a year and a half or more in Canada, in the
pine woods. Coming back strengthened in mind and body, he continued his stud- ies under private instructors in the clas- sics and modern languages until 1873, then taking up the study of the first year's course in the Harvard Law School, when he entered the office of Hon. Ambrose A. Ranney, and continued his law course in Boston University Law School, from which he graduated with the degree of L.L.B. in 1875. He was admitted to
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BENJAMIN JAMES.
the bar in November of the same year, being admitted to the United States Su- preme Court at Washington in 1882. Hle received his degree of A.M. from Dartmouth College in 1894.
During his student days he removed to Broadway near Il street, where he re- mained with his parents until married in 1880 to Nellie W. Allen of Scituate, granddaughter of Rev. Morrill Allen. a
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noted preacher of Plymouth county, who preached a sermon on the day he was ninety years of age, at the old church at Pembroke. Immediately on his marriage he went to live at 26 Thomas Park, where he remained until 1898, when he removed to Roxbury at 346 Walnut avenue, corner of Ruthven street near Franklin Park. There are three children, Morrill Allen, Amy and Emily.
During his residence in South Boston
HON. CHARLES T. GALLAGHER.
he was always identified with its interests public and private.
In his early days he attended the Phil- lips church, corner of A street. After his marriage, he became trustee of the Broadway Unitarian and the Hawes Place churches under the John Hawes will.
For twelve years he represented Sonth Boston in the school committee, being
generally nominated by both political parties, during the last four years of which he was president of the Board. He also served in the State Senate in 1882, was afterwards twice nominated for Congress, declining the latter nomination on account of pressure of private business. He was for many years a director in the Mechanics National Bank, when it was located in South Boston; also a director in the Mattapan Deposit & Trust Co .; a trustee, and one of the In- vestment Committee of the South Boston Savings Bank ; was one of the founders of the Dahlgren Memorial Hall Association, being a member of Dahlgren Post 2, G. A. R. : one of the trustees of the John Hawes Fund, that noble charity that has done so much for South Boston, having special charge for several years of the admin- istration of the educational part of the fund; he is a member, and at one time was president, of the Hawes School Boys Association ; in 1878 79 he was master of St. Paul's Lodge, and has since then been a trustee of its funds ; he is a member also of St. Matthews Chapter and St. Omer Commandery, Knights Templar.
Outside of South Boston he has been a director in railroads, life associations, numerous corporations, and trustee of various estates, having had charge of the settlement of almost every large estate in South Boston since he entered into practice; at one time he was trustee under the will of Benjamin Franklin ; although as a law- yer he has had in addition an extensive court and corporation practice.
Ile is a member of the Bostonian So- ciety ; a life member of the Young Men's Christian Union ; he was in 1897 elected a trustee of Boston University : is a mem- ber of the executive Council of the Box
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ton Bar Association ; for more than twenty years one of the Commissioners of Trials, and for several years a director of the corporation of the Grand Lodge of Masons in Massachusetts. Besides other important offices in this order, in 1900 he was elected Grand Master of Masons for the State ; for several years a mem- ber of the Boston Art Club, he was in 1900 elected its president ; being a mem- ber of the Athletic. Exchange, Algonquin and University clubs, to- gether with other law and dining clubs in the city.
COL. J. PAYSON BRADLEY.
No citizen of South Bos- ton is more favorably known than Col. J. Payson Brad- ley. He is a son of Cap- tain Leverett, and Catherine (Frye) Bradley, and was born in Methuen, June 7. 1848, on a farm on the banks of the Merrimac occupied by his ancestors since the earliest settlement of that section. His great-grand- father, Enoch Bradley, was a soldier of the Revolution, and on his mother's side he is related to Colonel Frye, who commanded a regiment at Bunker Hill. His pater- nal grandfather was a cap- tain of dragoons and his father. a captain in the old sixth regiment, and later a captain of artillery in the civil war. Colonel Bradley was educated in his native city and in Lawrence, leav- ing the latter in 1861 to enlist as a drummer in the 14th Massa- chusetts volunteer infantry. His regi- ment was later changed to the Est Massachusetts Heavy Artillery, of which he became bugler. He proceeded with his battalion to Harper's Ferry and the Shenandoah valley. After the evacuation of Harper's Ferry and the battle of Gettysburg, the battalion returned to the regiment, which, acting as infantry, joined
General Grant's column at Washington. He served through the entire campaign from the terrible battle of the Wilderness, where his regiment lost 398 men in killed and wounded, to Spottsylvania, Cold Har- bor, Petersburg, Weldon railroad, etc., . until by permission of Generals Meade and Hancock, he was returned home ex- hausted and worn by exposure. He was honorably discharged just before the close of the war. In 1884 he was elected
COL. J. PAYSON BRADLEY.
president of the association of his regi- ment. After the war he prepared him- self for a draftsman and engineer. In 1886 he entered the employ of the Downer Kerosene Company of South Boston, and in 1880, became a member of the firm of Allen. Bradley & Company, which suc- ceeded the Downer Company. The firm became The Kehew-Bradley Company in 1894, with offices at 24 Purchase
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HISTORY OF SOUTH BOSTON.
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street. Soon after coming to South Bos- ton he married Emma Frances, daughter of Francis James, making his home at 499 Broadway. Four children have been born to them, Francis E., Fannie J., Mar- ion and Mildred. Ile has never held any elective office, although often urged by his friends. Joining the militia in 1873. he served in the artillery and cav- alry until discharged in 1877, as adju- tant and first lieutenant. The same year he joined the Ancient and Honorable
OLIVER B. STEBBINS.
Artillery Company, serving as sergeant of infantry in 1880, adjutant in 1888 and national color-bearer in 1896, during the visit of the company to England, being the first man to carry the American flag under arms, in the streets of London and into Windsor Castle before the Queen. In 1897 he was elected commander of the company, and the same year was ap- pointed assistant adjutant general and served three years with the rank of colo- nel on the staff of Governor Wolcott.
Colonel Bradley is a charter member of Dahlgren Post 2, G. A. R., and its third commander, and is a past member of the National Council of Administration. He has been an active worker for the erec- tion of the monument on Dorchester Heights, which through his vigilance has now been built, commemorating the erec- tion of the fortifications which caused the British to evacuate Boston, March 15, 1776. Colonel Bradley is president of the Dahlgren Memorial Hall Association, and officer of the Phillips Congrega- tional church, and a member of the Old Boston Congregational Club, Bostonian Society, American His- torical Society, Military Historical Society of Massachusetts, New Al- gonquin Club, Old Dorchester Club, and Columbia Lodge, F. A. M.
OLIVER BLISS STEBBINS.
This well-known citizen of South Boston represents the literary portion of this district ; and for many years he has held a leading position as a musical and dramatic critic. Mr. Stebbins was born in South Boston, December 22, 1833, the only son of the late Dr. John Bliss Stebbins, a prominent physician of South Bos- ton sixty years ago. His education was acquired in the public schools. Graduating from the Hawes Gram- mar school as the first Franklin medal scholar, he entered the Eng- lish high school, from which he also graduated with high honors. His school life completed he entered upon a mercantile career, but not finding that to his taste, soon aban- doned it for literature. He was yet young when he was elected a member of the Mat- tapan Literary Association, and soon rose to the position of secretary and director. Shortly after he became assistant editor of the " Mattapan Register," a weekly paper of South Boston. His prose and poetical contributions to this publication were widely read and copied. From 1867 to 1879 he held a responsible position in the Boston custom house. During these years, and later, his contributions to liter-
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ature, both historical and dramatic, were many. In the summer of 1898 Mr. Stebbins delivered three lectures, two of which were on Shakespeare's .. Macbeth," before the Playgoers Club of Boston. At various times he was correspondent of the " New York Musical Review," the " New York Dramatic News," and many daily papers. Later he filled the posi- tion of musical and dramatic critic on the staff of the . Boston Daily World."
Mr. Stebbins has a great liking for the study of American history, and is an authority on that interesting sub- ject. He is an enthusiastic student of history and the sciences and pos- sesses one of the largest libraries in South Boston, his collection of rare books and pictures being very valuable. Among the more promi- nent products of his pen are " A History of Dorchester Neck Dur- ing the Revolution," a history of the Hawes grammar school, and a biographical sketch of Gen. Will- iam II. Sumner. published by the New England Historical Genealogi- cal Society, of the latter of which he is a member. His contributions to volumes edited by others have been numerous. For several years Mr. Stebbins has been preparing matter for a history of South Boston. In 1899 he was president of the Old Hawes School Boys' Association of South Boston.
THE LATE CAPT. PETER PETERSON.
The late Capt. Peter Peterson, who up to the time of his regretted decease resided at 54 G street, was a gentleman of the old school and a val- ued resident of South Boston. Loving memories eling to his name. For forty years a resident, he was one whose happy disposition, dignified bearing and kind- heartedness to his fellow-man endeared him to all. Ile was born in Denmark in 1810, and died at his home in May. 1897. At the age of twenty he came to Boston and followed the sea. At the age of thirty- one he became master of a full-rigged ship. In 1833 he made a voyage to California
and return, bringing back a cargo of hides, called in those days California bank notes.
Hle rightly earned the title of the best "Cape Horner " on the deep. He made numerous voyages around the world, but in after years engaged in the East India and China trade. In 1846 he was mar- ried to Miss Katherine St. Leger, and she for many years accompanied the captain on his voyages around the world, making several trips. Beside being a careful
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THE LATE CAPTAIN PETER PETERSON.
skipper he possessed remarkable business ability and displayed great judgment in the disposal of his cargoes. It was dur- ing the civil war that he abandoned the sea. While in Melbourne, Australia, he found that he could not continue sailing under the American flag and he returned to this country, taking up his residence on ( street where he remained in private life until his death. He completed over fifty years of married life, thirty-six years of which were spent in his pleasant South
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HISTORY OF SOUTH BOSTON.
Boston home. He was ever found at his fireside with his excellent and devoted helpmeet, and many hours were spent re- lating his wide experiences of his travels in his clippers from one country to another to his large cirele of friends. During his life he was an attendant at St. Matthew's Episcopal Church. The name of Captain Peterson will long be associated with the memories of South Boston. He was a great giver to charity and knowing that he was pleasantly situated he had a kind remembrance for others who were not as well off as himself. All regretted his de- mise.
JOHN SOUTHER.
No man born in South Boston and still identified with its business interests has won greater distinction in life than Mr. John Souther whose portrait adorns the next page. He came into the world March 1, 1816. Heattended the old Hawes school the very first year it was opened. At the age of fourteen he became an apprentice at carpentering and pattern making for machinery. At the age of twenty-one he took a position at a new foundry in Ma- tanzas, Cuba, as draftsman and pattern inaker for sugar-mill machinery. Two years later he returned home with the in- tention of starting a shop to build sugar- mill machinery, but Mr. Hinckley of Boston, who was about starting the first locomotive works in New England per- suaded him to make a set of drawings and patterns for their first locomotive ; and for five years thereafter Mr. Souther remained with the Hinckley Locomotive Works, making every working drawing and pattern for the different classes of en- gines they made. In the early forties Mr. Souther established the first locomo- tive works in South Boston and manu- factured, during fifty years, a variety of machinery for carrying out the greatest national enterprises and public improve- ments of the nineteenth century.
These works have manufactured over eight hundred locomotive engines and steam shovels for road construction, and for operating these roads after they were completed. They have been used on railroads in every state and the Canadas,
from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans. The many hundred steam shovels they have built for railroad construction, have not only expedited the progress of work, but have cheapened its cost greatly.
From these same works was sent around Cape Horn, in 1849. the first loco- motive used in California on the first railroad, from Sacramento to Fulsom, where gold was first discovered. Twenty- four years later these works sent two more locomotives around Cape Horn to Cali- fornia and these locomotives took the first train from the Pacific Ocean with the governors, and the last railroad tie with golden spikes to make the connection at Ogden with the Union Pacific R.R. to take the first train through to the Atlantic.
For government, harbor, river and naval improvements the Souther works have turned out many great pieces of ma- chinery. The famous Souther dredging machines, designed by Mr. Souther and built under his direction, are known to the world over as the best. They are, and for a long time have been, used by the Rus- sian, English, Japanese and Egyptian as well as American governments. They have been used for work on the Suez, the Alexandria and the Nile and Panama canals ; and for railroad building and dock dredging at home and abroad. They stand preeminent among all classes of American machinery in foreign use.
It was this class of dredging machine that was used to carry out the city of Boston harbor and land improvements, begun in 1847, and continued to this day. Up to 1847 there had been but one steam- dredge used in our harbor -- the old style English endless chain bucket dredge, that could not dig the original hard-pan bottom and was only used to clean out the soft mud that floated in be- tween the wharves. At this time the city let out their first contract for the deepening of the South Bay between Harrison avenue and South Boston. All of the material was to be used to make land from Dover street to Roxbury, from Harrison avenue to the outside of Albany street. To do this work Mr. Souther de- signed and built the first single scoop dredge expressly for this South Bay
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HISTORY OF SOUTH BOSTON.
dredging, and a second machine for ele- vating this material to fill the lots to grade, sixteen feet above mean low water. All this was completed by these machines and done in one quarter of the time it could have been done by the former proc- ess used for making these fills.
The next city improvement was the Back Bay filling, begun in the early fifties. All of this filling, between Beacon and Washington streets, espe- cially from Dover street out to Roxbury, was filled with gravel from hills eleven miles out of the city, and material was all handled by the Souther steam shovels.
Further city improve- ment done with this ma- chinery, was the removal of Fort hill, fifty-four feet high, covering about seven acres, and with the material filling all the land from Commer- cial street out and including Atlantic avenue from India wharf north to Commercial wharf.
The last dredging plant put by Mr. Souther on city improvements, costing one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, was for deepening the main harbor from Fort Point Channel to City Point. The flats were dredged to make thirty-five feet at low tide, making anchorage ground for our large ocean steamers. The material was used to make the first twenty- five-acre lot for the state, and the adjoining fifty-acre lot for the Boston & Albany railroad com- pany, and later an adjoining hundred- acre state lot ; all of the different named lots have been filled with the Souther dredge and excavator machinery, which has added to and doubled the area of the city territory, which with the build- ings thereon has increased the city's permanent taxable property over two hundred million dollars.
Another branch of Mr. Souther's busi-
ness has been the making of sugar-mill machinery which he shipped annually, one hundred thousand dollars in value, to the Island of Cuba for sixteen years in succession, up to the War of the Rebellion, when the rebel privateers prevented further shipments. He also built the first steam sugar mill used on the Sandwich Islands and at San Domingo.
At the commencement of the War of
JOHN SOUTHER.
the Rebellion in 1861, the United States government sent the engineer in chief to John Souther's works to see if they had the large class of machinery adapted to make machinery for war vessels. He decided they had and urged Mr. Souther to prepare for government work. Every other class of work but the excavator and dredge was dropped and the works put machinery into eight war vessels during the following five years, and worked over
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HISTORY OF SOUTH BOSTON.
four hundred men on vessels, from a frig- ate and sloop of war to gunboats. They also built the hulls of two iron-elad moni- tors, and had to add to their buildings two ship houses and a boiler shop on Boston wharf, each 250 feet long, to build the two hulls and the twenty-four fifty-ton boilers to put in these vessels.
After completing the government con- tracts for war vessels the demand was such for harbor, river and railroad con- struction machinery that they have made a specialty of this branch of business up to 1899 when the works were destroyed a second time by the Old Colony rail- road crossing through their lots first on Foundry street, and the second time on Dorchester avenue. Their works were first established for twelve years on First street, A street and Granite street, occu- pying the square. When this was de- stroyed by fire, they moved to Foundry street and from there to Dorchester avenue.
Oneotherenterprise Mr. Southerstarted in 1852, outside of his works at South Boston, was a locomotive works at Rich- mond, Va., forthe southern trade. It was the only locomotive works in the slave states before or since the War of the Re- bellion. At the time there was no south- ern road that ran within forty miles of Washington, and Mr. Souther shipped his locomotives by vessels to Richmond.
There were two rolling mills at Rich- mond owned by General Anderson, a West Point graduate, who showed Mr. Souther his works, and the advantages that he could derive by manufacturing locomotives there, where the iron was made. He offered to put up buildings and furnish ample water power if Mr. Souther would stock the shop with tools and machinery for two hundred men, and would superintend starting the works the first year, and take a hundred experi- enced men from his Boston works. Ile further agreed for such service to give Mr. Souther a half interest in the busi- ness, and the offer was accepted. The works he called the Tredegar Locomotive Works. They turned out a mimber of locomotives the first year, while Mr. Souther spent half his time at each of his
works, passing between Richmond and Boston twenty-four times a year. After two years Mr. Souther sold out his inter- est to General Anderson. Later the War of the Rebellion broke out, the Con- federate government seized these works (they being the only works in the Confed- erate states) and made cannon, shot and shell and locomotives, employing three thousand men,
All the capital put in the Boston works was, from the start put in by Mr. Souther from his earnings as employee while at the Cuban foundry and the Hinkley works, with the exception of $500, put in by Mr. Lyman, his bookkeeper, for a consideration, which amount he drew out in six months. Mr. Souther retained the whole interest for ten years. Then after returning from the Richmond works he had the Globe Works Company incorpo- rated by a special act of the legislature, and three of his leading employees took a tenth of his stock, and when the govern- ment contracts were finished, he bought back the stock and again became sole owner.
To show the brevity of life of the pioneer iron works in South Boston and their operatives, one need only to look to South Boston, where, on Foundry street, five manufactories have all been swept away by railroad improvements. The Hinckley Locomotive Works at the South End, has gone and has given place to the new Electric Light and Power Com- pany's plant. Of the three hundred em- ployed at the Hinckley works when Mr. Souther left, there are but two now living besides himself. and they are Mr. John Daniels, who was foreman for fifty years of erecting engines and went out with the first locomotive, and Mr. George Bird of East Boston. And of their employees that went to Richmond from South Bos- ton, to start the locomotive works, there are only two left, Mr. George Miller, who was foreman of the iron finishing, and Mr. Richard Hewins, foreman of the brass finishing.
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