USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Professional and industrial history of Suffolk County, Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 61
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Of the life of Mr. Webster in Marshfield with his family, among his friends and neighbors, away from the shallowness and deceptions and insincerities of politicians and society members, the world knows little. Whatever he may have been thought elsewhere to be, there he was a true, simple, transparent, affectionate, tender-hearted man. No man ever lived in Marshfield who could say that Mr. Webster ever deceived him by word or deed, ever withheld the wisest and always gratuitous advice, ever tried to get the advantage in trade, ever indulged in or countenanced evil reports, ever as- sumed or recognized any superiority in himself or inferiority in others, ever indulged in condescension in the treatment of the most humble, ever failed to treat every man in every station of life as an equal. In this latter respect perhaps no man of mark was ever more distinguished. There have been great men who were called many-sided, who had a different point of contact for all, child's talk for the child, philosophical reflections for the learned, forced simplicity for the illiterate, strained effort for the scholar, something for every man, but all distinct and separate, having no relation to each other, but nothing stamping the individuality of the man. Mr. Webster was the same to all, to Lord Ashburton and Seth Peterson, to Henry Clay and John Tay- lor, to Tom Benton and Uncle Branch Pierce, dignified but simple, profound but clear, friendly but not familiar, easy but never vulgar, and in the room with all these different men together would have presented the same phase to all, as the statue or painting is the same under the eye of the scholar or artisan, and is equally under- stood and admired by both. His speeches illustrate his character in this respect. No child needs a dictionary while reading them. He never descends to a low level of language and thought that he may be the better understood. He knows that if the subject is clear to his own mind he can present it in the same language to all. It was the common remark of his neighbors that he treated them precisely as he would have
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treated a brother senator or a president, and the senator and president might with truth have said that he treated them as if they had been his neighbors.
His humor and considerateness are illustrated by the following incident. On one occasion, after returning from Washington, a man presented to him a bill for payment. "Why, Mr. N.," said Mr. Webster, " it seems to me I have paid that bill." Mr. N. protested that it had not been paid, and Mr. Webster told him that if he would call on a certain day he would settle with him. After he had gone Mr. Webster asked his son Fletcher to look over a mass of loose bills and receipts and see if he could find a receipt- ed bill. To the surprise of both not only one but two receipts were found, and the bill had already been paid twice. "We will put those bills there," said Mr. Webster, plac- ing them in a pigeon hole in his desk, "and when Mr. N. calls again we will have some fun with him." In due time Mr. N. called, just at the dinner hour, and Mr. Webster said. " Come, Mr. N., let us go in and have some dinner first and then we will talk business." To dinner they went, and a good one it was, and Mr. N. relished it keenly. After dinner they went out under the old elm, and Fletcher with them, and Mr. Webster soon began. . "Mr. N.," said he, "do you keep books?" "No," said Mr. N. "I thought so," said Mr. Webster. "Now I advise you to keep books. If you had kept books yon would have known that I had this receipted bill," (showing him one). Mr. N. was much surprised and considerably mortified to have been caught in such a mistake. " It is always a good plan to keep books," repeated Mr. Webster, showing him the second receipt. "Now, Mr. N., I will pay this bill just once more, but I promise you that I will not pay it the fourth time." Mr. Web- ster insisted on his taking the money, knowing him to be an honest man, intimating that perhaps receipted bills had been presented and left really unpaid, and offering him a glass of wine, pleasantly bade him good afternoon.
Of the avocations of hunting and fishing, no man was more fond, and he was never happier than with Messrs. Isaac L. and Thomas Hedge in the Plymouth woods, on a deer stand by some lonely road, or on the shore of one of Plymouth's countless ponds. He was not skillful with either rod or gun, but was such an admirer of nature that with one or the other in his hand he constructed many of those brilliant passages of oratory which wreathe and lend grace to his orations and speeches. Too often for an ac- complished sportsman, his reveries permitted the game of the forest to escape him unobserved, or the fish of the sea to nibble away his bait until some sentence or metaphor was complete in all its grandeur and beauty. On a maple tree standing by the shore of Billington Sea, the writer has seen the initials of his name rudely cut, the thoughtless work of one of those reveries in which no notice was taken of the coming deer until it leaped from the bank and ran knee-deep in water along the pebbly beach. On this occasion, however, his game was at a disadvantage, remain- ing long enough within range for him to raise his gun and secure the single trophy of his hunter's life. On one occasion within the knowledge of the writer of this sketch, on a November afternoon, at sunset, after an unsuccessful hunt with the Messrs. Hedge and George Churchill and Uncle Branch Pierce, nine miles from Plymouth and twenty miles from home, before mounting his wagon he stuck his knife into a tree and said, "At this tree, gentlemen, we meet at eight o'clock to- morrow morning." After forty miles of travel and a part of a night's sleep, he was on the spot at the appointed hour with his companions of the day before, The day, however, coming on chilly and wet, Mr. Webster, having something of a cold, thought
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it prudent to give up the hunt and await at the house of Mr. Pierce the issue of the sport. On the return of the party late in the forenoon, bearing a noble buck, they found him pacing the kitchen of Mrs. Pierce, repeating from memory some of the grand old lyric poems of Watts, while the old lady, with her breakfast dishes still unwashed, was listening in reverential silence. On another occasion, after his return to Marshfield from an unsuccessful hunt in the Plymouth woods, he told his son Fletcher to sit down and he would tell him about the hunt. " We reached Long Pond," said he, "at sunrise, and Unele Branch was ready for us with his two hounds. He fastened them to a tree and went in search of a track. He soon returned and said that he had found a noble fresh track. 'Now, Mr. Webster,' said Uncle Branch, ' I'm going to put you on the best stand in these 'ere woods; " and Long Pond Hill was where he put me. 'Now,' said he, 'Mr. Webster, you jest keep your eyes peeled and your ears skun and don't you let no deer get past you without a shot. Don't you mind whether you hear the dogs or not, for the old fellow may come even when the dogs are out of hearth.' I was put on my stand; it was a still morning, not a twig stirred, and I obeyed orders. Soon nine o'clock came, and then ten, and I ventured to walk a few steps and back, and soon it was eleven. I saw nothing and heard nothing, and twelve o'clock came. I repeated poetry and made speeches, and got hungry and ate a cracker, and one o'clock came, and no deer and no Uncle Branch. Two o'clock came, and three o'clock, and just then a song-sparrow perched on a tree near me and I took off my hat and made a bow and said 'Madam, accept my profoundest regards; you are the first living thing I have seen to-day.' Soon Uncle Branch came and said the hunt was up, that 'the dogs went out of hearth at nine o'clock and hadn't heard 'em since, by golly;' and here I am, Fletcher, as hungry as a cooper's cow."
Mr. Webster was a man of deep religious feeling. If there was anything with which he was more familiar than with the constitution of his country, it was the Bible. Few men studied it more carefully or could repeat more of its pas- sages with precision. It taught him to believe with all his heart in the existence of God and in a future life. He had formulated no creed, and he subscribed to none formulated by others. During the larger part of his mature life he attended the Unitarian church, and the Unitarian belief was undoubtedly more than any other in accord with his feelings and sentiments. For Dr. George Putnam and Dr. Samuel K. Lothrop, the latter of whom was for many years his pastor, he enter- tained the sincerest affection and respect. His second wife was a member of the Episcopal church, and though in Washington it was his custom to accompany her to her place of worship, he did not believe that the doctrine of the trinity could be sus- tained by the Scriptures. At home in Marshfield he invariably attended the orthodox church once on the Sabbath, and whoever or how many might be his guests, his carriage was at the door each Sabbath morning to carry himself and such others as might wish to accompany him to the neighboring place of worship. In the early morning, too, of the Sabbath day, his household, including guests, were summoned to his library, and there he spoke to them of the responsibilities and duties of life. One of the many portraits of him which have been engraved, represents him thus, sitting in profile, with his left hand hidden under his waistcoat, and his face wearing a more serious expression than that of his every-day life. On the 1st of April; 1852,
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while on his way to Plymouth to join the Messrs. Hedge on a fishing excursion to the trout brooks in the woods, with Seth Peterson as his companion and driver, on de- scending the hill near Smelt Brook, in that part of Kingston called Rocky Nook, the linchpin of his carriage broke, and he was thrown to the ground. He was carried into the house of Captain Melzar Whitten near by, and in the course of the day was removed to his home. The fall proved his death-blow. Though he partially re- covered, his elasticity and spirit had departed, and gradually failing health brought him by successive steps to his death-bed on the 24th of October, 1852. The last scene of his life was impressive and solemn. He had often during his sickness spoken of a future existence as a continuation of the present, and he was impressed with the possibility that on its threshold the departing spirit, while within the con- fines of earth, might look into the regions of the other world. As death came nearer to him, and he watched its approach, in a moment of apparent doubt whether he had reached or not the dividing line between time and eternity, and anxious to learn its precise indication, he opened his eyes and said, " I still live-tell me the point." Dr. Jeffries, standing by the bed, not understanding the remark, repeated the words of the Psalm, " Yea, though I walk through the shadow of death Iwill not fear." " No, doctor," said Mr. Webster, in a voice still strong and clear, "tell me the point ; tell me the point." These were the last words he uttered. On that beautiful Indian summer day he died, and on another as beautiful, his body, dressed in his favorite blue and buff, lay in its coffin under the noble elm which had so often sheltered him in life, and loving neighbors and distant friends bore him to his final rest.
WILLIAM GOODWIN RUSSELL, son of Thomas and Mary Ann (Goodwin) Russell, was born in Plymouth, Mass. November 18, 1821. His early education was received in the public schools of Plymouth, and fitting for college under the tuition of Hon. John Angier Shaw, of Bridgewater, he graduated at nearly the head of his class at Har- vard in 1840. After leaving college he taught for a time a young ladies' private school in Plymouth, and for a year the academy at Dracut, in which he was the successor of General B. F. Butler. Entering the law office of his brother-in-law, William Whiting, of Boston, he completed his law studies at the Harvard Law School, where he graduated in 1845, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar on the 25th of July in that year. After his admission he became at once associated with Mr. Whiting, and un- til the death of Mr. Whiting in 1873, the firm of Whiting & Russell occupied a lead- ing position at the Suffolk bar. In 1862, when Mr. Whiting was appointed solicitor of the War Department, the labors and responsibilities of the office were imposed on Mr. Russell, and during the three years of Mr. Whiting's service he bore them with untiring industry and brilliant success. On the death of Mr. Whiting he had so far advanced in his profession as to be one of its recognized leaders. At that time Charles Greeley Loring had retired from the bar, in 1857, and died in 1867; George Tyler Bigelow had resigned his seat as chief justice on the bench of the Supreme Ju- dicial Court, and retired from the profession by accepting the position of actuary of the Massachusetts Hospital Life Insurance Company; George Stillman Hillard had measurably withdrawn from practice by his occupancy from 1866 to 1870 of the office of United States district attorney; the career as a practitioner of Ebenezer Rock- wood Hoar had been repeatedly interrupted by his judicial labors on the bench of the Common Pleas Court from 1849 to 1855, on the bench of the Supreme Judicial Court
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from 1859 to 1869, as attorney-general of the United States in 1869-70, as a meniber of the Joint High Commission, which framed the treaty of Washington with Great Britain in 1871, and later as a member of Congress. Sidney Bartlett and Benjamin Robbins Curtis alone remained, having precedence of Mr. Russell in the legal ranks. Mr. Curtis died in 1874, and the advancing age of Mr. Bartlett entitled Mr. Russell to the claim of leadership, which the death of Mr. Bartlett in 1890 served only to con- firm. After the death of Mr. Whiting, Mr. Russell associated with himself George Putnam, son of the late Rev. Dr. George Putnam, of Roxbury, and since that time the firm of Russell & Putnam has been as well known as the former one of Whiting & Russell. It is worthy of note that the place of Mr. Bartlett, a Plymouth man, at the Suffolk bar should have been taken by Mr. Russell, also a native of that ancient town. This circumstance is relieved, however, of its singularity by the fact that Mr. Russell's father and Mr. Bartlett were first cousins, and that both Mr. Bartlett and Mr. Russell inherited from a common ancestor those mental traits, which, developed by education, go to make up a thorough lawyer. The writer remembers to have heard those of an earlier generation, who knew Samuel Jackson, of Plymouth, the grandfather of Mr. Bartlett, and the great-grandfather of Mr. Russell, speak of his cool discriminating judgment, and his judicial mind, which with less limited educational privileges would have given him high intellectual rank. To these traits, mingled with others coming down to him from Miles Standish, John Alden, and Richard War- ren, whose Pilgrim blood flows in his veins, there were added those of his sturdy Scotch great-grandfather, John Russell, a Greenock merchant, who came to New Eng- land about 1745, and settled in Plymouth. When Mr. Russell chose the profession of law for his life work, he determined to pursue its paths with faithful steps, and to resist every temptation to leave them for the alluring honors of public life. It is in- deed doubtful whether there has been at any time an elective office in the gift of the people which he would not have unhesitatingly refused to accept, and even judicial preferment, which may be considered the crowning glory of professional life, he has more than once refused, even when associated with the highest position in the gift of our State executive. Other positions, more nearly related to the duties of the private citizen, he has not felt at liberty to reject. As president of the Bar Association, the Social Law Library, and the Union Club; as overseer of Harvard College, and director of the Mount Vernon Bank, and the Massachusetts Hospital Life Insurance Company ; as vice-president of the Pilgrim Society ; and as either executor or trustee of various important estates, he has not wandered far a'field from the legitimate legal sphere to which he early dedicated himself. But, devoted as Mr. Russell was to the law, he has not permitted himself to be unobservant of affairs beyond the horizon of his pro- fession. As, in the observation of the writer, when in social life apparently absorbed in some special work or game, he has always kept an eye and an ear open for the .
conversation going on about him, so in his larger work and game of law, he has al- ways kept himself in touch with the world and familiar with the latest steps of its progress, whether in science, theology, ethics, literature or art. Now would it be doing justice to him to close even this meagre sketch, without some allusion to his lifelong love for the rod and line, and his skill in their use ? Beginning in his early boyhood to learn the habits and caprices of the fish, which abound in the sea and ponds adjacent to his native town, there are few holidays of the year, including his summer vacation, which do not find him either near the rocks at Manomet fishing for
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tantog or cod, or on one of the many ponds of Plymouth taking bass or trout. Mr. Russell married, October 6, 1847, Mary Ellen, daughter of Thomas and Lydia Coffin Hedge, of Plymouth, and having his legal residence in Boston, spends his summers in Plymouth. His only son, Thomas Russell, a member of the Suffolk bar, and re- ferred to elsewhere in this register, is a member from Ward 11 of Boston of the Leg- islature of 1893. Mr. Russell received from Harvard the degree of LL. D. in 1878.
PETER THACHER, son of Stephen and Harriet (Preble) Thacher, was born in Kenne- bunk, Me., October 14, 1810, and graduated at Bowdoin College in 1831. He studied law with William Pitt Preble and with Fessenden & De Blois in Portland, Me., and was admitted to the bar in Portland in April, 1836. He was appointed by Ashur Ware judge of the United States District Court for the Maine District, commissioner of bankruptcy under the act of 1842, and by Benjamin R. Curtis, judge of the United States Circuit Court, commissioner of the Circuit Court for the Maine District, and in 1867, on the nomination of Chief Justice Chase of the United States Supreme Court, he was appointed by Judge Edward Fox, of the District Court of Maine, register in bankruptcy for the Fifth Congressional District, which office he held until his resig- nation on his removal in 1871 to Newton, Mass., where he has since resided, having an office in Boston in connection with his son, under the firm name of Peter & Stephen Thacher. In 1876 he was chosen city solicitor of Newton and served until 1883. He was an overseer of Bowdoin College for many years, until his resignation in 1891. He married, April 26, 1841, Margaret Louisa, daughter of Barrett Potter, of Portland.
STEPHAN THACHER, Son of the above, was born in Machias, Me., November 14, 1846. He studied law with his father and at the Harvard Law School, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar July 7, 1871. He is in business with his father in Boston, and resides at Newton.
JAMES MONROE KEITH, son of Bethuel and Mary (Pearson) Keith, was born in Ran- dolph, Vt., April 15, 1819. He received his early education at the Randolph and Royalston Academies, and graduated at Brown University in 1845. He studied law with David A. Simmons, of Roxbury, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar June 3, 1848. He was a representative from Roxbury in 1851, president of the Roxbury Com- mon Council in 1854, and a member of the Boston Common Council in 1868-69. He was appointed district attorney for the district composed of Norfolk and Plymouth counties in 1855, and in 1856, after that office was made elective, he was chosen for a term of three years, but resigned in 1858. He is practicing in Boston, associated with his son, John W. Keith. He married in 1849 Adeline Wetherbee, of Boston; in 1856 Mary C. Richardson, of Boston ; and in 1863 Louisa J. Dyer, of Providence.
JOHN W. KEITH, Son of the above, was born in Roxbury, September 5, 1850, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar in June, 1874.
ALEXANDER BLISS was descended from Thomas Bliss, who was born in Balstone parish, Devonshire, England, about 1580, and coming to New England settled with his wife Margaret first in Braintree and afterwards in Hartford, Conn. Samuel, son of Thomas, born in England in 1624, married, November 10, 1644-5, Mary, daughter of John and Sarah (Heath) Leonard, of Springfield, Mass. Ebenezer, son of Samuel, born July 29, 1683, married in January, 1707, Mary, daughter of John and Mary Clark Gaylord. Jedediah, son of Ebenezer, born February 7, 1709, married July 2, 1753,
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Rachel, daughter of Joseph and Mary Sheldon, of Suffield, Conn., and second, August 19, 1748, Meriam, daughter of John and Abigail Hitchcock. Alexander, son of Jede- diah, born October 11, 1753, married, November 18, 1784, Margaret Warner, of Spring- field, and in 1790 Abigail Williams, of Roxbury. Alexander, the subject of this sketch, son of Alexander and Abigail, was born in Springfield, August 16, 1792, and graduated at Yale in 1812. He married, June 6, 1825, Elizabeth, daughter of Will- iam and Rebecca (Morton) Davis, of Plymouth, and died at Plymouth, July 15, 1827. His widow married in 1838 George Bancroft, the historian. Mr. Bliss studied law with Daniel Webster, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar July 2, 1816. ITe became at once a partner of Mr. Webster, and during Mr. Webster's prolonged absences in Washington managed his business.
JOSEPH A. WILLARD, son of Sidney and Elizabeth Anne Andrews Willard, was born in Cambridge, Mass., September 29, 1816. His father was librarian at Harvard from 1800 to 1805, and professor of Hebrew from 1807 to 1831. His grandfather, Joseph Willard, was president of Harvard from December 19, 1781, until his death, which occurred September 25, 1804, and a more remote ancestor was Simon Willard, of Salem, who was born in the county of Kent, England, and died in Charlestown, Mass., while holding court, April 24, 1676. His mother was a daughter of Asa Andrews, a lawyer of Ipswich, and a descendant from Anne Dudley, the wife of Governor Simon Bradstreet. Mr. Willard was edticated at Westford Academy and under the private instruction at various times of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry S. MeKean, Barzillai Frost and James Freeman Clarke. In the autumn of 1830, when nearly fitted for college, he went to sea before the mast and followed the sea in merchant vessels and men of war until 1838. After leaving the sea he resumed his studies with his father, who had then resigned his professorship and been into polit- ical life, serving at various times as representative, councillor, senator and mayor of Cambridge. In 1846 he entered the office of the clerk of the Common Pleas Court in Boston as an assistant, and in 1848 was appointed by Joseph Eveleth, the high sheriff of Suffolk county, one of his deputies. In 1855 he was appointed assistant clerk of the Superior Court of the county of Suffolk. While performing his duties in the clerk's office he pursued the study of law under the instruction of James A. Abbott and Marshall S. Chase, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar April 15, 1854. In 1859, when the present Superior Court superseded the old Common Pleas Court and the Superior Court of the County of Suffolk, he was appointed assistant clerk of the new court in Suffolk, and held that position until the death of Joseph Willard, the clerk in 1865. He was then appointed clerk to hold office until the next election, and by re- peated elections has continued in office to the present time, meeting with opposition at only two elections. The term for which he was last chosen will expire on the first Wednesday of January, 1897, at which date, if he lives, he will have served as clerk and assistant clerk more than fifty years. His continuance in office for so long a period with the approval of the votes of the people is sufficient evidence of his indus- try, intelligence and fidelity in the performance of his duties. He married in 1841, Penelope Cochran, daughter of Captain Peter and Penelope (Mitchell) Cochran, and great-granddaughter of Mary Faneuil, sister of Peter Fanueil, of Boston. His resi- dence is in Boston.
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WILFRED BOLSTER, son of Solomon A. and Sarah J. Bolster, was born in Roxbury, Mass., September 13, 1867, and graduated at Harvard in 1888. He studied law at the Harvard Law School, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar January 20, 1891.
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