USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Nahant > Some annals of Nahant, Massachusetts > Part 25
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great grandfather of the present owner of the same name, whose father, Samuel Hammond, married Dr. Warren's daughter. The present-day owner is well known for his interest in Nahant and for important work he has done on many town committees. His grandfather, Samuel Hammond, married Susannah, a daughter of Gardiner Greene, thus tying back to the Clarke and Copley ancestry elsewhere mentioned. Then there is the little cottage on the corner of Vernon and Cliff Streets occupied recently by Mrs. George B. Inches. This is an old building, moved there and remodelled into a house, and was the home of Cornelius Coolidge. This occu- pancy takes it back into the 1840's. Before that it was a barn on the Hood property across from the Whitney homestead. B. C. Clark, enthusiastic yachtsman, is mentioned elsewhere. His house was where Arthur Perry's house now stands, and the property was subsequently owned by Amos A. Lawrence, who bought it in 1864. This point came to be known as Clark's Point, perhaps to avoid the confusion of the use of its old name, Bass Rocks, with Bass Point. Amos A. Lawrence (1814-86), cousin of Abbott Lawrence, who owned the place across Nahant Road from the Public Library building, was the father of Bishop Lawrence, and the latter was much on Nahant as a boy and young man, living here in the summer season, for a short time after his marriage, in the Cunning- ham house, which was burned in 1896. Amos A. and Abbott Lawrence were sons, respectively, of two brothers, Amos and Abbott Lawrence, of an old firm of Boston merchants. This Clark's Point house has been rebuilt and remodelled so much that it has no resemblance to the original. Perry bought it in 1915 and at once made further extensive changes. Later he bought the Duncan house, and the Dwight house next to it. This latter house was built by Mrs. Thomas Dwight, mother of Dr. Thomas Dwight.
The Abbott Lawrence place, opposite the Public Library building, was owned by Stephen Codman, grandfather of Edward C. Codman, who built the large original building, and built the small cottage close to the corner of Wharf Street
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for his son. On Codman's death the place was bought by David Eckley, who made many improvements, but died before he used it. Then it was owned by James W. Paige (1792- 1868), who was the father of Mrs. Abbott Lawrence. Paige married a daughter of Stephen White of Salem. Daniel Webster's son married another daughter, and Webster was a frequent visitor to Nahant, up to the time of his death in 1852. A third daughter married John B. Joy, elsewhere mentioned. The David Sears house was sold to William Appleton, whose daughter married Amos A. Lawrence. Mrs. David Sears was a sister of Mrs. John Collins Warren. David Sears died in 1871 at the age of eighty-four. Appleton married a daughter of Dr. John Collins Warren. Another daughter was the wife of Thomas Dwight, father of Dr. Thomas Dwight. Appleton was a second cousin of Thomas G. Appleton, whose sister was Mrs. H. W. Longfellow. Another old home is known as the Fremont cottage, built by Edward B. Phillips of the same Phillips family that lived at Bass Point, and later sold to General John C. Fremont, whose wife was Jessie Benton Fre- mont. The former was known as the Pathfinder, for his explo- rations in the great West, then comparatively undeveloped. He was born in 1813 and died in 1890, and was an unsuccess- ful candidate for President in 1856. At that time his home was California. He was on Nahant irregularly, but his wife and daughter were more constant for a few years, and then the estate was sold to Frederic Tudor. This place seems to have included Nipper Stage Point and what is now known as Marjoram Hill. Wharf Street, at this end, was an old range road and was built through to the water in 1863. Marjoram Hill was bought by the town for a public ground or park in 1906, and is one of the improvements attributable to the zeal of George Abbot James, whose services to Nahant are mentioned elsewhere. This area had been used by the town for a few years previous, due to the courtesy of the Nahant Land Company, its owners.
It is interesting to look over these early Nahanters among the summer residents and see how they flocked here and how
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they were in so many cases closely related through inter- marriage. Some of this has been indicated, and here follows a little more of it. One may go back to John Singleton Copley, noted artist, and for whom Copley Square in Boston is named. His house was where the Somerset Club on Beacon Street in Boston now stands, and a bronze tablet affixed thereto tells about this. Copley's father, Richard Copley, came to Boston from England in 1736, and the noted son was born in 1737. The father died in 1737 and later the widow, Mary Singleton Copley, married Peter Pelham. There was a son, Henry Pelham, who was an engraver, now well known in name because of the Pelham Prints. In 1769 Copley married Susannah, daughter of Richard Clarke, and this was the Clarke, agent of the East India Company, to whom was con- signed the tea made famous by the Boston Tea Party. Both the Clarkes and the Copleys went to England, but a daughter of Copley, Elizabeth Clarke Copley, born in Boston in 1770, married Gardiner Greene and returned to Boston about 1800, going back to England again about 1840. This Madame Greene, as she was called, lived in the house on Cliff Street lately owned by Dr. Thomas Dwight. A daughter, Mary Copley Greene, married Joseph S. Amory in 1837, and one son was Charles Amory, who owned and occupied this Dwight place for many years. He was well known in Nahant. The Copley name connection was further perpetuated in a son, Copley Amory, while a daughter, Martha Babcock Amory, wrote a life of the famous artist ancestor.
Now consider the Amorys for a moment. Jonathan and John Amory were merchants in Boston. John Amory's daughter married John Lowell, and a son, John Amory Lowell, owned a house where now is the Lovering place on Vernon Street. This Lowell is a grandfather to President Lowell of Harvard University, the father of Mrs. Sprague, wife of Dr. Francis P. Sprague who lived in Nahant so many years, and great-grandfather of Ralph Lowell, a recent occupant of the Sprague house down near Swallows Cave. Another brother
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of John and Jonathan Amory, Thomas Amory, had sons Jonathan and Thomas Coffin Amory. The former has great- grandchildren known to Nahant. One is Robert Amory, who until recently lived on the corner of Prospect and High Streets, while another is the wife of Dr. Augustus Thorndike, son of Charles Thorndike, who for many years owned and occupied the Moering house on High Street. This descent is through a son, Joseph S. Amory, who married Mary Copley Greene, and Dr. Robert Amory, who married Marianne, a daughter of Amos A. Lawrence. Thomas C. Amory had a daughter Susan who married William H. Prescott the famous historian. Prescott's father, Judge Prescott, came to Nahant and built, in 1828, the house on Swallows Cave Road, later owned by Frederick W. Bradlee, but so enlarged and remodelled that it cannot be considered, today, a historic house. The Prescotts, father and son, lived together until the death of the elder in 1844. The historian's grandfather was Colonel Prescott, who commanded the American forces at the Battle of Bunker Hill. In 1853 this famous Nahanter bought in Lynn and summered there until his death in 1859, at the age of sixty-three. Several things were trying to him at Nahant. The strong light on the ocean affected his weak eyesight, but especially, perhaps, he begrudged the time he was obliged to give while submitting to lionizing. Nahant was at its height as a resort, and the great hotel and the landing wharf were both near by. This was too convenient and he was too gracious.
Then there is the Lawrence family. Besides what has already been written, there is the marriage of Katharine Bigelow Lawrence, sister of Abbott Lawrence and cousin of Amos A. Lawrence, to Augustus Lowell, father of Abbott Lawrence Lowell, President of Harvard University. Amos A. Lawrence, father of Bishop Lawrence, married Sarah, daughter of William Appleton, and it was her brother, William Appleton, who married Emily, a daughter of Dr. John Collins Warren. These Appletons came from Isaac Appleton of Ipswich (1704-94), who had a son Joseph, and three genera-
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tions named William, the latter being Dr. William Appleton, now a summer resident, and a native of Nahant. It is the latter's father, William Appleton, who married Emily Warren, and they had a daughter who married John S. C. Greene, getting back to the Copley connection again. Old Isaac had another son, Isaac, who was the grandfather of Thomas Gold Appleton and Mrs. H. W. Longfellow.
Then there is the Mifflin house and family. This house was owned by Samuel A. Eliot, father of Charles W. Eliot, long- time President of Harvard. It is said that President Eliot went to school from here to the "old stone schoolhouse." Samuel A. Eliot died in 1862. The house is one of the old ones of the town, reaching back into the 1820's. It was next owned by Dr. Charles Mifflin, who died in 1875, and whose wife was Mary Crowninshield, daughter of Benjamin Crown- inshield, elsewhere mentioned. A son, George H. Mifflin of the publishing house of Houghton Mifflin Company, was a later occupant well remembered by Nahanters. He died in 1921. A brother of Samuel A. Eliot was William H. Eliot, who lived on Vernon Street, prior to 1831, in a house early occupied by John Hubbard and later by Charles R. Green, whose wife was a Coolidge, often mentioned as a daughter of Cornelius Coolidge. This house was burned in 1896 and the place is now owned by Mrs. Elisha H. Williams. This Eliot was the promoter of the old Tremont House in Boston, where the Tremont Building now stands, said to be the foundation of the American hotel system. He died in 1832.
This brief consideration of a few of the old Nahant families of summer residents shows how these old Boston families are interrelated. Many other instances could be given, and some others are mentioned elsewhere. The group came mostly from old Boston families who made their money in shipping, at a time when ships from around the world brought novelties or items not in competition with any similar articles produced nearer home. Profits were large, men were able and energetic, far-sightedly capable of seeing possibilities beyond merely local trading. The newspapers of the time advertise the wares
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these merchants offered, as, for instance, in the "Columbian Centinel" for July 19, 1817:
Thos. C. Amory and Co. have for sale at No. 38 India Wharf 20 pipes, 46 hhds. and 28 qr. casks old Sicily Madeira wine on board Brig "Brothers" from Madeira: 12 hhds molasses, 7 hhds. sugar per "Shannon:" In store 50 hhds best retailing molasses.
Accumulating fortunes, these people were capable enough to keep them and increase them. The temper of the times was not vain show, nor the symptoms those illustrated by the young man who said he had ten dollars left, what should he spend it for. Means gives leisure and leisure helps to culture, though by no means a sure road to it. Hence these same people looked askance at those whose only claim to recognition was an ability to spend, and therefore came a feeling toward them exemplified by the nickname "Cold Roast Boston," said to have been applied to them by Thomas Gold Appleton, who was considered a wit of his time.
This chapter on old Nahant of the 50's, reaching backward and forward from that decade, may close with a letter of reminiscences written by Miss Emma F. Cary, a few years ago, to Mrs. Fred A. Wilson for the Nahant Woman's Club. Miss Cary was a sister of Mrs. Agassiz and Mrs. Felton. She sets the year 1851 as of the death of Thomas Handasyd Perkins, her grandfather, but this appears to be an error.
DEAR MRS. WILSON: - My first recollections of Nahant are of the sea, the sky and a hill covered with wild grass, bayberry bushes, and, each in its respective season, the wild rose and the golden rod.
It must have been in the year 1840, when I was seven years old, that I began to observe critically the charms of Nahant.
The house I lived in was built about the year 1823, by Thomas Handasyd Perkins, for the pleasure of his children and grand- children. The blocks of stone were brought from Weymouth in a vessel, where the workmen lived while they built the house; and good workmen they were, if one may judge by the sound condition of the house today. On the cliff above the Spouting Horn was a summer house, a little round temple in form. It was very pretty, but was destroyed by lightning long ago and never rebuilt.
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The nearest house to ours, going eastward, was Mr. Samuel Eliot's house, now owned by Mr. George Mifflin. Mr. Eliot parted with it, I think, about the year 1859. The beach we call Forty Steps was then and for many years called Eliot's beach. The Villa, lately occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Ellerton James, was built by Mr. Harry Cabot, who lived there in summer for the rest of his life. He was a man of fine presence and distinguished manners, and his wife was a marvel of beauty and grace. Of the houses that we know today there were already built at the time I am recalling: the Hammond house, the Russell house, the one owned by General Paine, and which was built by Mr. Samuel Cabot, the Inches cot- tage opposite the Union Church, and the cottage where Dr. Dwight lives. Mrs. Boyden's cottage stands on the ground where her grandfather, Mr. David Sears, lived. On the place where Mr. Dudley Fay lives there was originally a house called "the Nahant House." Ever since I can remember, the charming and hospitable house of Mr. and Mrs. George Peabody stood there, and the Nahant House is only a tradition to me.
Above Swallows Cave, and above the steamboat landing of that day were two houses famed for hospitality, - Judge Prescott's cottage and that of Dr. Edward Robbins.
Judge Prescott and Madam Prescott were the father and mother of the historian, who also lived there for some years. There was told of Madam Prescott a pretty story, showing her perfect tact and good manners. Two strangers mistook the house for an inn, a mistake often made at Nahant in those days. They came on to the piazza and asked for refreshments. The historian's mother ordered all that they asked for and they enjoyed their repast and the fine view in perfect content. When they prepared to pay for the meal their hostess said, "This is Judge Prescott's house and you are entirely welcome to any refreshment it has given you."
Dr. Robbins kept open house, like every one of his race that I have known. He had an only daughter who, after the death of her parents, founded the admirable hospital in Boston, known as the House of the Good Samaritan, and was its guiding spirit while she lived. The Doctor had two lovely wards, afterwards Mrs. William Wharton and Mrs. Edward Perkins. The house was always over- flowing with kindness and hospitality in the simple fashion of the day, - abundance without display.
East Point was entirely given up to the guests of Nahant Hotel, a gay throng of Bostonians, southerners, chiefly from the Carolinas and Virginia, and also Canadians, who came often to Nahant in those days. Mr. Chadwick, who afterwards built the stone house
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owned by Mr. Inches, came every summer to the hotel where his delightful family were the life and soul of the place.
The building was very pretty, built of stone with broad piazzas, and big parlors well suited for charades or tableaux or for dancing.
Of the dear old houses in the village I will not write, for there must be many records of these and of their interesting inmates.
Whitney's Hotel and Rice's Hotel were much frequented in those days by families who came for the summer, and by travellers who passed a day at Nahant for the sake of its famous fish dinners.
I remember that one of the joys of my childhood was to be taken by my mother to make visits in the village, to call on Mrs. Nabby Hood and Mrs. Jonathan Johnson, ending, perhaps, with the pur- chase of a Gibraltar or a Black Jack at Mr. Welcome Johnson's store, the only one that I remember at Nahant. Everything came from Lynn, - provisions of all kinds, medicines and dry goods, except the bountiful variety dispensed by Mr. Welcome Johnson.
Going westward there were not many summer cottages. The Codman family owned the large place now in the possession of Mr. John Lawrence. Mr. Codman cultivated the land successfully with flowers and fruit trees, and the house was substantially the same in appearance as it is today.
Mr. Samuel Perkins had a small cottage near the house where Mr. and Mrs. Edward Codman lately lived. His wife, an invalid, spent her summers there, leading a very retired life. Then came Mr. Tudor's place, now owned by the Nahant Club. It is quite unchanged in appearance except that the beautiful trees of today were then slender saplings, showing how wisely this fine agricul- turist planned his work.
I remember nothing beyond the present Club House until we came to "The Castle." This large house had formerly been an inn, but it was already owned by the Phillips family and passed from them to Dr. Reynolds.
I do not remember any names attached to the streets. There was "The Village," East Point, Bayley's Hill, etc., but no names of streets in those days, and naturally enough, because, with few exceptions, everybody lived on the main road.
To Mr. Frederick Tudor Nahant may be said to owe every tree it possesses, except the large willow trees, that justly make its pride.
Mr. Tudor, having succeeded in supplying tropical countries with ice, turned his genius to making strawberries and peaches grow at Nahant. He built garden walls of lattice-work so that the sea wind was filtered through to the delicate plants. He had beautiful fruit and every variety of flower. He planted everywhere the hardy
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balm of Gilead, and under its motherly shelter planted fruit trees whose shade we enjoy today. The forestry work added to Nahant of late years completed an enterprise begun apparently under insuperable difficulties.
Maolis Garden was a later undertaking of Mr. Tudor's. It gave a pleasant refuge to those who came to Nahant for the day, for it was in a beautiful situation, and all its appointments were well planned.
When I first remember the Union Church it must have been recently built, for I have heard my elders tell of Sunday services in the pretty stone schoolhouse in "the Lane."
The church was quite plain; a parallelogram in form, with pews, a pulpit, and a gallery for the choir. There was no organ; the leader gave the pitch with a tuning fork, and a well-trained quartette sang in excellent taste old-fashioned hymn tunes.
How well I remember the congregation! There was Dr. Robbins, his sturdy figure bent with rheumatism, and the long pew filled with his household and his guests; the ladies in the pretty cottage bonnets then in fashion, and diaphanous summer toilettes.
There was Mr. Tudor in blue frock coat and brass buttons, a striking personality with his aquiline face and silver hair. With him were his beautiful wife and handsome children.
Judge and Madam Prescott were a venerable pair, whom one looked at with deep respect.
But it would be giving a list of the inhabitants of Nahant if I named all the families in the congregation. They were a comely set, and it was a gathering of good friends and neighbors that it is pleasant to recall.
At the death of Thomas Handasyd Perkins in 1851 his estate at Nahant was divided. Thomas Graves Cary, on behalf of his wife, Mary Perkins, kept the stone house by the Spouting Horn, and part of the "ten-acre lot" where he built the house known as the Agassiz cottage. There was a square house in another part of Nahant, popularly known as "the butter box." This house was moved over to the ten-acre lot, and wing after wing was added to it, until it developed into the widespreading bungalow that stands there today. Mr. Cary built it for two of his daughters, Mrs. Cornelius Felton and Mrs. Louis Agassiz. Few houses can have given more happiness than this simple cottage; few can have harbored as many gay, joyous young people, and thoughtful elders.
Agassiz lived much in his laboratory, but he could sit among a throng of boys and girls laughing and talking as completely se- cluded in his own thoughts as if he were on the glacier of the Aar.
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His power of concentration seems to have no limit, but he could come out of this state of absorption and join in the merriment of the young people like a boy free from care and responsibility. The fishermen of Nahant were the Professor's stanch friends and allies, and the pick of their spoils was his, whether taken by net or line. They aided him, too, in dredging for the endless treasures of the deep. Then hour after hour passed uncounted in the laboratory while he examined his treasures with the microscope, delighted if any of the family came to share his enjoyment.
Twenty years Agassiz spent at Nahant, and the world seemed poorer to us all when he left for the last time.
Hoping that these notes may give you part of the information you asked for, I am
Faithfully yours, (Signed) EMMA FORBES CARY.
CHAPTER XX
TOWN DEPARTMENTS
IT has already been mentioned that the fire department was of little moment until 1870. The machine that John Q. Hammond pleaded for in a Lynn town meeting was undoubt- edly the old "Eagle," and its acquisition by Nahant is there- fore placed before 1850. Hammond came to Nahant about 1836, but was then only a boy, and doubtless it was in the 40's, and probably late 40's, that the "Eagle" was the Nahant fire department kit. This engine was a tank filled by buck- ets, with a "walking beam" pump that forced from this tank through the hose. The year 1870 town report records the formation of the Dexter No. 1 Engine Company, so that no doubt the record for that year, of the purchase of a fire engine for $1,800, was for this machine. This Dexter Engine Com- pany seems to have had, or assumed, authority to organize, assess members, choose uniforms, name the engine, and do many other things not now reckoned a part of company pro- cedure. They evidently aimed to be a club, and at one meet- ing it was voted that each member be assessed one book, to make a library. At other times assessments were laid for a fund, most of which was superseded by the Fireman's Relief Association. At one meeting they voted to call the engine the "Nahanter," but reconsidered the matter. In fact, reconsiderations of actions were very frequent, showing much argument. The uniform was a red shirt, black trousers, and a fireman's hat and belt. This they voted to pay for them- selves, but subsequently induced the town to provide reim- bursement for hats and belts. These items of the uniform were elaborate, with the name of the engine in raised letters of white leather. Parades and musters seem to have loomed
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large in their considerations. The "Dexter" was a "walking beam" machine also, but had suction hose to draw water from wells and reservoirs. During the next ten years or so nine reservoirs were built to catch street drainage and provide a water supply for fire purposes. In at least one case, at the foot of Winter Street on Willow Road, a hydrant was placed, connected to the reservoir up on Nahant Road, the down-hill grade giving the necessary service.
In 1869 three extinguishers were bought, of a hand type, and some ladders and buckets. In 1870 the little old engine house was painted and therefore seems to have been still in use. The first Board of Engineers, chosen in 1870, was Edward J. Johnson, Worthen Gove and Welcome Johnson. In 1873 the ladder truck was bought, also more extinguishers. In 1875 the old "Eagle" received minor repairs, showing she was not then relegated to the scrap heap. In 1876 comes the first annual report of the fire engineers, and this tells of the "Dexter No. 1" fire company with fifty men, paid $10 each and $1 additional for each monthly meeting attended; and of the "Relief Hook and Ladder Company" with extinguish- ers and fourteen men. They recommend the purchase of a large extinguisher, and say that, with two men, it will put out a fire quicker than the Dexter. In 1877 the Babcock extin- guisher was bought, and a third company was thus added to the list. There were also two hose carriages, practically hose reels, which carried additional material.
In 1878 the "truck house" was built on town land on Nahant Road near High Street. A hose tower was added to this in 1890 and a wing for a meeting room in 1896. The building was torn down in 1919, when the police station was moved over near its site. The engineer's report for 1880 gives a detailed list of the equipment in charge of each of the three companies, two of which were then in the Town Hall, and the hook and ladder truck was in the "truck house." The engi- neers in two or three reports stated that the men, all call men, were so accustomed to the bell on the church tower that it did not awaken them when rung for a fire. In 1885 a bell
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