USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Registers of probate for the county of Suffolk, Massachusetts, 1639-1799 > Part 11
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The house in Boston where Benjamin Kent lived for many years, first as tenant and afterward as owner, stood on the north side of King Street. now State Street, next to the corner of Wilson's Lane and directly opposite the Town House. It was of brick, and his next-door neighbor on the west was William Story, whose house was attacked during the Stamp Act riots, as has been before related (ante, p. 92). After Benjamin Kent's decease, his widow and daughters conveyed the house and land by deed dated May 26, 1793, executed at Halifax, to William Burley, of Boston, merchant.
When Devonshire Street was extended through Wilson's Lane in 1872, the
1 Senate Document, 156.
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" HALIFAX Nov' 9th 1784.
SIR,
After a tedious negociation & more Trouble than you can imagine, I have received seventy two books (I think Nº 13, being wanting) with a parcell of loose papers which are packed now in a box marked S.S.B. & also four boxes of papers which I have not seen having re- ceived them packed as they are now sent -- These M' Hutchinson who delivered them says, are all he has had of the Probate Records - The Office Seal he has not Delivered - You will be so good as to direct the receipt of them to be acknowledged & to pay to M' Tudor who is my attorney at Boston whatever you may think an adequate compensation for my trouble & the expence of Packing, Truckage &c paid here
I have the honor to be Your Excelleys Most Obed' Seryt BENJ" KENT."
He seems to have had the co-operation of Governor Parr, of -Nova Scotia, as appears from the next letter : 1 __
" HALIFAX 12th Novr 1784.
SIR
I should have done myself the honor of Answering your Excellency's letter long ere this, but delayed from day to day untill I could get the records of Probates out of M' Hutchinson's hands, he has at last de- livered them to M' Kent who forwards them to Bostou by this Con- veyance -. If any should be wanting, you will be pleased to inform me -
I have the honor to be, Sir Y' Excell's Most Obed' & most humble Servant
J. PARR. His Excellency Govr HANCOCK."
whole of the estate on the corner of Wilson's Lane and State Street and all but a strip about five feet wide of the Kent estate were included in the new street. Part of the new Devonshire Building now covers the site of the Story house and the narrow strip which was all that was left of the Kent estate.
(Authorities : Wyman's Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, II. 572; Hudson's History of Marlborough, 122-125; Life and Works of John Adams, II. 45, 75, 291 n., IX. 401; Record Book of the Suffolk Bar, 1 Proc. Mass. Hist. Soc., XIX. 147-159; Boston Town Records, VI. 97, 111; Sabine's Loyalists of the American Revolution, I. 600; Briggs's Kent Genealogies, 38 : Suffolk Deeds, Lib. 148, fol. 190, Lib. 178, fol. 137, Lib. 1115. fol. 184; Acadian Recorder of Halifax, N. S., February 21, 1902. There is a typographical error in the copy of the inscription on his tombstone, as printed in the Acadian Recorder. Benja- min Kent died October 22, 1788, as before stated.)
1 Senate Document, 156.
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The Massachusetts Archives contain also the petition 1 of Benjamin Kent for compensation for these services : -
" Commonwealth ) To the Honble the Senate & the Honble the of Massachusetts ) House of Representatives in General Court assembled at Boston Feb> 1785 -
Most humbly sheweth
Benjamin Kent of Boston in the County of Suffolk -
That by the Request of his Excellency the late Governor of this Commonwealth he took upon him the Care of procuring & transmit- ting certain Papers belonging to the Probate Office with the Records of the same, which were carried away by the late Judge Hutchinson on the Siege of Boston being raised in the Year 1776 from a full as- surance from his Excellency that all the Costs & expences arising therefrom should be punctually defrayed -
That Your Petitioner after many tedious conferences with M Hutch- inson now resident at Hallifax & his Excellency Governor Parr at last effected a Restoration of Seventy two Books of Record with all the Papers in the hands of the sd Hutchinson belonging to said Probate Office which were transmitted to his Excellency the late Governor Han- cock & as your Petitioner humbly conceives it to be a Govermental Charge he most earnestly requests Your Honors to grant him such Compensation as your Honors shall esteem just for his Trouble ser- vices & Expence as aforesaid
And Your Petitioner as in Duty bound
Shall ever pray -
BENJA KENT"
The bill 2 accompanying this petition is as follows : -
"The Commonwealth of Massachusetts
To Benja Kent. D:
1784 7 May )
To my Passage to Hallifax at the Request of his late Excelly Jolin Hancock Esq' to collect the Records of the Probate Office for the County of Suffolk carried away by the Enemy in the Month March 1776 To my Time & Attendance in soliciting for & procuring the above Records of Foster Hutchinson Esq! being 5 months @ 6.€ pr month
3 .. 12 . -
·30 .. -
30th Sep' -
1 Mass. Archives, House Document No. 1731.
2 Ibid., No. 1731.
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15 Dec!
To 4 large Boxes & packing the above Records therein & Truckage of the same from M' Hutchinson's to the Vessell in which they were - brought to Boston.
14: 16. -
£38 .. 8 ..-
BOSTON 25th June 1785
Errors excepted BENJA : KENT"
This bill, which seems to be a just and moderate one, was not readily collected, and the proverbial ingratitude of Republics was again exemplified by the action of the Committee of the Representatives.1 For the return of these priceless records and files, whose value can scarcely be computed in money, these Bœotian lawmakers purposed to award the munificent sum of £15 !!
Thus after an exile of nearly nine years, since that fateful day in March, 1776, when the fleet set sail for Halifax, the records and files of the Probate Court were returned to their proper place in the Brick Court House in Queen Street.
Ten years later, in 1794, Thomas Pemberton thus describes this Court House : 2 -
" It is a large handsome building of brick, three stories high, and has on the roof an octagon cupola. The lower floor is used partly for walking, and has on it the Probate office and the office of the County Register of Deeds."
Another new Court House 3 of stone was erected in 1810 on
1 On the petition of Benjamin Kent "setting forth that, att the Request of the Late Gouernor of the Commonwealth, he had been att sum Trouble and Expence in procuring and Conueying the Books and papers belongine to the probate office of the County of Sufolk -- Which ware Carried to Halifax - Tharfore - Resolued that the Treasurer of the Commonwelth be and hearby is ordered and Diracted to pay to the Said Benj: Kent the Sum of fifteen pounds in full Discharge of all accounts for his Service aforesaid." (Mass. Archives, House Document No. 1938 ; Report of Committee House of Representatives, June, 1785.)
Several of the volumes of the records in the Probate Office contain entries relating to the return of the books from Halifax. Vide inter al. LXXV. 43, 63 ; LXXVI. 250, 316, 645; LXXVIII, 161, 659, 664; LXXIX. 47, 195, 198 ; L.XXX. 282, 355, 356, 553, 554; LXXXII. 120.
2 1 Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., III. 253.
8 In the Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society (2 Proc. Mass. Hist. Soc., XIV. 97), and in the Introduction to Lib. XI. of Suffolk Deeds, I have given a description of these various Court Houses. As the Registry of Probate
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land between Court Street and School Street, and the Probate Office was thereupon removed to that building, where it occu- pied the lower floor of the western wing, the Registry of Deeds being on the lower story of the octagon centre.
When the Courts removed in 1836 from this stone Court House to the new stone Court House in Court Street - now called the Old Court House - the Probate Office and Registry of Deeds remained for a time in the former building.
But the petitions of the Judge of Probate and the Register of Deeds for a separate fire-proof building were finally granted, and July 1, 1839, the order 1 for its erection was passed.
This new building was of brick. It stood in Court Square, directly in the rear of the building of the Massachusetts His- torical Society on Tremont Street, and its southerly windows overlooked the King's Chapel Burial Ground.
The Probate Court occupied the lower floor, which was divided by the entry into two small rooms, one for the Judge - and one for the Register, while beyond a larger room, " con- trived a double debt to pay," served alike for an office where the records were kept and a court room where the sessions of the Probate Court were held.
Those who then had occasion to consult the Probate Records did well to choose carefully a time when the court had ad- journed for the day or was not in session.
For on a court day, especially if a case of unusual impor- tance, or one which had attracted much attention. was being heard, the court room was crowded, all the available space being taken up by Judge, Register, lawyers, clients, witnesses. and the general public. These monopolized not only all the space, but practically all the light, as the windows were on the side where the Judge sat, the record books being kept in cases on the dark side of the room, remote from the windows. In summer, when the trees in the King's Chapel Burial Ground were in full foliage, the light that filtered through their leaves was certainly dim if not religious.
Under such disadvantages the members of the bar were com- pelled to carry on their investigations in the Probate Office.
and Registry of Deeds, since the erection of the County Court House, have always been under the same roof, it is unnecessary to repeat what I have there said, and the reader is referred to that paper for a more detailed account of them.
1 City of Boston Records, Mayor and Aldermen, XVII. 218.
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It will seem hardly credible to the lawyer of to-day that. down to a time comparatively so recent as thirty years ago, such utterly inadequate accommodations were afforded his pre- decessors in a city of the size and importance of Boston.
But if the lawyer of to-day finds it difficult to believe that the office accommodations were so meagre, what will he say when he learns that in those days the court had no docket and had never had any; that the files were inaccessible and could not be consulted; and that the records had no index -or at least not anything deserving the name of index, the antiquated " alphabets " then in use being an aggravation rather than an assistance ! 1
But the condition of the files forms the weightiest count in the indictment of the system - or want of system - that then prevailed.
These original papers, many of which had never been re- corded, were tied in bundles and thrown up on top of the cases in which the record books were kept. There they re- mained, covered with dust, unseen by mortal eye, untouched by mortal hand, since the day when they were first so unceremoni- ously " skyed." In some of these packages papers having no relation to each other and separated in date by one hundred and fifty years were afterward found side by side.
This administrative chaos, too long submitted to in silence. at last aroused the lawyers and others who suffered most incon- venience from it. The result of their efforts was that the Judge and Register of Probate, May 18, 1868, and January 11. 1869, petitioned 2 the Board of Aldermen acting as County Commissioners for the County of Suffolk "for the classifica- tion and preservation of the Probate papers ": and the Com- mittee on County Accounts were authorized. June 8, 1869, to contract with some suitable person to arrange and classify the papers and indices in the Probate Office.
Judge Edwin Wright was selected to carry out this ouler. but after he had spent more than two years over the Probate papers, dissatisfaction was caused by the slow progress of the
1 On the petition, October 13, 1873, of the Judge of Probate, an order was finally passed, January 1, 1874, for a Classified Index to the Probate Records from 1638 to 1870 inclusive. (City Council Minutes, Board of Aldermen, A.D. 1873, pp. 418, 565, 567).
2 City of Boston Records, Mayor and Aldermen, XLVI. 492, and City Coun- cil Minutes, A.D. 1869, p. 5.
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work, and Daniel S. Gilchrist 1 was chosen to finish what had been begun.
This great undertaking was brought to its close in 1876. It effected a complete transformation in the Probate Office. Chaos gave place to order and system, and the vast mass of documents comprising the Suffolk Probate files and records became for the first time accessible to the investigator.2
1 2 Proc. Mass. Hist. Soc., XIV. 87, and Introduction to Liber XI., Suffolk Deeds.
2 The system by which all this has been accomplished certainly deserves a word of explanation here.
The contents of the Registry of Probate may be considered, for the purpose of this description, as divided into four classes, the Index, the Docket, the Records, and the Files.
The Index contains the names of all persons whose wills have been probated, or whose estates have been administered upon, nsing the word " administration" here in its broadest sense. This Index is not a mere "alphabet." It is adfmi- rably arranged according to Christian as well as surnames ; briefly sets forth the nature of che case (i.e. whether a testate or intestate estate, guardianship, trust, etc.) ; gives the year in which the proceedings were begun ; and points out the number under which the case is entered on the docket. Any name in it, from 1636 down to the present year, can be found in an instant, as readily as in a city directory.
Having thus by means of the Index ascertained the docket number, we turn to the Docket. This is an entry book, or chronological arrangement of cases. more than 120,000 in number, and gives us at a glance the title of all the papers filed or recorded in each case; the date of such filing ; and the volume and page of the record books where such of the instruments as have been recorded in extenso may be found.
The Records of the Court consist of upward of 800 large folio volumes, hav- ing, some of them, more than five hundred pages each. They contain in the words of the statute ( Revised Laws, Ch. 162, § 35) all " decrees and orders, all wills proved in the court, with the probate thereof, all letters testamentary and of administration, all warrants, returns, reports, accounts and bonds, and all other acts and proceedings required to be recorded by the rules of the court or by the order of the judge."
The Files include all the original papers, recorded or unrecorded, in each case. Every paper is marked with the number of the case, and all the papers in each case are placed by themselves in a stout envelope, which has stamped upon it the number of the case, its date, and the name of the party to whose estate it belongs. By this system it is possible to find in a moment, not only the record of every will, but the will itself, and every paper, however nnimportant, which has ever been filed in the Probate Office.
It depends, of course, on the nature of a case how many papers are filed in it. In large and complicated estates, where considerable sums of money are involved, especially where the property is held for many years in trust, the number is naturally greater than in the smaller and less important ones. It is not easy, therefore, to determine just how many documents the Probate Office contains, bnt, at the present rate of increase, there will soon be, in all probability, not far from a million of them. And yet any one of these million papers can be found in an instant, so admirable is the arrangement. It is in fact much simpler than
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The condition of the records during the Provincial period is shown by the petitions of Judge Hutchinson and John Payne, to which reference has already been made. Further evidence, if any is needed, is found in the fact that when Mr. Gilchrist's work was completed and the files were syste- matically arranged, thirty-two thousand seven hundred and five papers of a date prior to A.D. 1800 were found which had never been recorded, among them no fewer than two hundred and eighty wills. In six hundred and sixty-nine cases, prior to that date, which now appear on the dockets, not a single paper filed in those cases had ever been recorded, so that not even the names of the parties, or the fact that such persons ever lived, could have been known to one who consulted the records.1
The value of an examination of title to lands at a time when real property changed hands, by purchase, much less frequently than now, often remaining in the same family for generations. when the greater part of such an examination must necessarily have been made in the Probate Office, may be left to the startled conveyancer to determine.2
An enlargement of the Probate Office was made by the lease 3 to the City of Boston, January 1, 1873, of part of the this description of it, and should be seen in its actual working to be understood and appreciated.
This system, first introduced in the County of Suffolk, has since been adopted by other Registries of Probate. (Cf. New England Historical and Genealogical Register, XXXVIII. 131.)
1 Cf. Ibid. XXXIV. 45-48.
2 During the term of office of the present Register, Elijah George, and largely due to his efforts and zeal, many improvements have been made in the Probate Office. He has caused to be recopied several of the earlier volumes of the records, which were fast falling into decay, while the papers left unrecorded, by the neglect of his predecessors in office, are now at last, under his direction, being duly recorded.
But perhaps what is best appreciated by the general public is the printed index ; for the County of Suffolk is the first in this Commonwealth to provide the searcher of the probate records with a printed index to guide him in his investigations.
It is in three large quarto vohimes, printed in large, clear, and handsome type on paper made expressly for the purpose, and covers the period from 1636 to 1893 inclusive. It is a complete key to 94,757 cases shown on the docket.
The superiority of the printed page over the page written by hand is well exemplified by this Index. It is a foretaste of what is to come when, in the progress of the age, mannscript indices in all public offices shall give place to printed volumes. The advantages are obvious and need not be recited here.
3 City Council Minutes, A.D. 1871, pp. 212, 218, 221, A.D. 1872, pp. 46, 253, 254, 261; 2 Proc. Mass. Hist. Soc., III. 293, XI. 310.
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of the Massachusetts Historical Society. A new cquired, extending to Tremont Street on the lower building, then became the Probate Office, and the files of the court were there placed, while the old com that time, used exclusively as a court room
aditional accommodations gave temporary relief, but ; soon outgrown, and on the erection of the last new ouse in Pemberton Square, the Court and Registry of were, in September, 1893, removed to that structure.
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