USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > Springfield > Springfield, 1636-1886 : history of town and city, including an account of the quarter-millennial celebration at Springfield, Mass., May 25 and 26, 1886 > Part 30
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55
These post-riders formed a graphic feature of the day, running, as they did, from the "Gazette " office up and down the valley, and both east and west. They were in straits in 1782, because they were com- pelled to pay weekly for their papers, and were unable to secure sub- scription money from their customers promptly. One post-rider, named Rumreil, covered a route from Northfield to Hartford. The printers themselves were often in trouble, owing to the arrears of the subscribers. Here is one advertisement in 1782 : " Those gentlemen who engaged to pay for their papers in grain are once more earnestly requested to make immediate payment, as the printers are in much want of that article." Babcock and Haswell published a number of local books, among them two sermons by Mr. Breck, one delivered at the funeral of David Parsons and one at the ordination of David Parsons, Jr., of Amherst.
Mr. Babcock - his name was Elisha - took the whole paper in 1784, but before the year closed Brooks & Russell were the publish- ers. The paper edited itself. It was soon moved to the Great Ferry, its name changed to the " Hampshire Herald," and the proprietors
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SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1SS6.
were Stebbins & Russell. Their store was enlarged so as to in- clude drugs, hollow ware, and West India goods.
The Great Ferry had another paper in 1788, the " Herald " having been discontinued. It was the " Hampshire Chronicle," published by John Russell, then Russell & Webster, and then Weld & Thomas, the latter removing the establishment opposite the court-house. E. W. Weld, of this firm, bought the " Chronicle " in 1790, and soon changed the name to "The Hampshire and Berkshire Chronicle." "The Federal Spy " was started in 1793 by James R. Hutchins, and was bought by Francis Stebbins in 1796, and so passed to Timothy Ashley in 1799.
Joseph Williams, who was military store-keeper at the arsenal, lived on the Colton place, State street, which Dr. Charles Pynchon secured in 1781 after a lawsuit with Colton. Williams married Pynchon's daughter, and thus secured the property, which was sub- sequently bought by Jonathan Dwight, Jr. Mrs. Williams's sister, Mrs. Lyman, wife of Congressman Lyman, owned much of the property on both sides of North Main street. Samuel Lyman was a Yale graduate, a member of the Legislature in 1786, State senator in 1790, and sat in the fourth, fifth, and sixth congresses, but finally resigned on account of failing health. Captain Emery married Mrs. Williams's daughter, and built on the west side a house, which formed a part of the old American House, and later the Russell House. Dea- con Williston made cocked hats in Ferry lane, and our friend Zebina Stebbins enlarged his business by weaving duck and linen checks. Edward Boylston, wheelwright, also lived on the lane. Nathaniel Brewer, son of Rev. Daniel Brewer, who lived on Ferry lane, was a stone-cutter. He died in 1796, at the advanced age of eighty-five. His son, Dr. Chauncey Brewer, studied with Dr. Charles Pynchon after graduating at Yale, and succeeded to Pynchon's practice after his death. The latter was one of the incorporators of the Massachu- setts Medical Society, of which Dr. Brewer was admitted a fellow in 1785. Nathaniel Brewer's mother (wife of Rev. Daniel Brewer) was a daughter of Nathaniel Chauncey, son of Charles Chauncey, the
.
346
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
second president of Harvard College. And it may be here remarked that our city of homes was once, after a fashion, the mother of college presidents. President Burr, of Princeton, President Holyoke, of Harvard, President Hitchcock, of Amherst, Presidents Day and Dwight, of Yale, President Colton, of Carlisle, Dr. William Harris, of Columbia, Dr. Thomas R. Pynchon, of Trinity, and Dr. A. L. Chapin, of Beloit, came from Springfield stock. The physical devel- opment which Amherst College has made rather a specialty of late years may well have been dne to the efforts of the genial Dr. Edward Hitchcock, whose ancestral relative, Dea. John Hitchcock, born in North Main street in 1722, and the first deacon of the first South Wilbraham church, was physically the most remarkable man of his day. He never met a man who could " lick " him. Says Dr. A. Booth, in the course of some exceedingly interesting reminiscences of Spring- field that appeared in the " New England Homestead " some years ago : " The day Deacon Hitchcock was seventy years old he remarked to his wife that when he was first married he was wont to amuse her by taking down his hat with his toes, and added, 'I wonder if I could do it now.' Thereupon he jumped from the floor, took off the hat with his toes, came down on his feet like a cat, hung up the hat on the nail, turned to the table, asked a blessing, and ate of the repast then ready." This bit of information came from Oliver B. Morris, who remembered seeing the old deacon, with his white locks, sturdy form, and face strong with the imprint of a muscular Chris- tianity.
Dr. Joel Marble bought the Chicopee bank corner of Moses Bliss at the close of the Revolution. The doctor subsequently drowned himself while insane in a well back of the Parsons tavern. The corner property passed down by purchase to Dr. Dix, of Worcester, and in 1790 to Daniel Lombard, Jr., who kept a store on the corner, as well as the post-office. James Byers secured the property in this century, and built the three brick buildings still standing.
The old Gaol tavern was partly on the Union house site (Bliss
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SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
street), the log jail being in the rear. William Colton kept the tavern until the early part of the present century. The old building is now on Central street (between Main and Maple). Col. Thomas Dwight, the son of Josiah, lived in the Dwight residence (Howard street) ; he is remembered as a man of culture and dignity. He married a daughter of Colonel Worthington, and was the father-in- law of Maj. Charles Howard. Colonel Dwight was a federalist of the strictest sort. He was gradnated from Harvard in 1778, was in the Legislature in 1794, and in the State Senate for 1796 to 1803, when he was elected to Congress. But there was too much Virginia politics for him down there, and he declined a reelection.
Margaret street is named after Widow Margaret Bliss, mother of Samuel Bliss, who died in 1720, and who is said to have built the Loring house in South Main street. Renben Bliss, who died in 1806, at an advanced age, lived on the east side of lower Main street, and had as a neighbor Capt. Joseph Ferre. Joseph Dwight built what was subsequently turned into the United States Hotel, and he kept a
distillery just south of it (D. A. Bush's place) .
The potash and
pearlash works of J. J. Dwight were at Wilbraham. Charles Ferre built on Maple street (Lombard Dale's) on 1661, and until about this time (1783) the road ran along the brow of the hill to the dingle (Rnmrill's house). Dr. Charles Brewer lived on Maple street, and the road was sometimes called the road to Charles Brewer's ; the prison lot, it will be remembered, was nearer the road to Boston (Judge Henry Morris's place). Samuel Babcock owned the paper- mill in 1786, where was manufactured newspaper, writing, cartridge, and wrapping paper.
As the century closed we find these men in business : Daniel Lombard, corner Meeting-House lane, dry goods and groceries ; William Sheldon, south of the court-house, dry goods and groceries ; Eleazer Williams, dry goods and groceries ; Charles Sheldon, dry goods and groceries ; John Padley, " taylor and habit-maker," two doors south of the post-office ; and John Lloyd, leather-dresser.
348
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
Marcus Marble's drug-store was opposite the court-house. In 1792 he moved to the present site of H. & J. Brewer. Over Marble's store was a young ladies' school in 1793. As early as 1790 James Byers & Co. sold iron hollow-ware, potash kettles, and bought old cast-iron.
These rambling notes have been made in utter disregard of any order of time or situation. We have gossipped as a stranger would have done who dropped in at the old Dwight store, and was led by curiosity to learn of the village, and its ways and walks.
We now return to passing events. The selectmen of 1779 were Ensign Phineas Chapin, Capt. Thomas Stebbins, Capt. Daniel Burt, William Pynchon, Jr., and Thomas Williston. In 1782, when the Ely riots occurred, Hancock was governor, and John Bliss one of the Hampshire senators. The Fourth of July of that year was celebrated in Springfield by the flying of the Union flag at the "Continental works" on the hill. Thirteen guns were fired at noon, and fireworks in the evening. These early patriotic celebrations were accompanied by banquets and speeches. We are told " the gentlemen of the town assembled, and partook of a cold collation at the Continental works on the hill, when a number of patriotic toasts were drank." In Oc- tober 18 of that year thirteen "beautiful rockets " were sent up in memory of the capture of Cornwallis. There was a dinner, and many toasts were drunk. The celebration on December 13, 1783, over the treaty of peace was the occasion for a repetition of these features.
Gov. John Hancock and Mrs Hancock, with Madam Jefferson, passed through the town in 1787, which must have challenged more of the circumstance of place and distinction. In December, 1782, a number of American prisoners passed through Springfield from Canada, where they had been held for several years. There were general felicitations and recounting of experiences.
We find a change in 1796, when Stephen Pynchon delivered the Fourth of July address, which was followed by a dinner. A place upon the hustings for the American eagle to spread was thus well
349
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
laid here. The changes in the personnel of the town-meeting were somewhat marked toward the close of the century. Jolin Hooker be- came moderator in 1795, and the selectmen were Wilham Pynchon, Jonathan Dwight, Renben Bliss, Phineas Chapin, and Thomas Dwight.
In those early days the floating of timber down the river was quite a business, which was managed very much as the common fields were. Men secured from the authorities the monopoly of this trade. Thus we see in the spring of 1783 Timothy Bush, Moody Freeman, and John Ely forbidding persons marketing timber without a license. A possible explanation of this is indicated by an advertisement in the " Massachusetts Gazette."
Simon Parkhurst and seven others assert that whereas a small meeting of the proprietors of the timber trade in Connecticut river, at Landlord Brewster's; March 4, 1783, chose Dr. Page, Alexander Plumley, and Samuel Wells to " collect and dispose of said timber," they, the said Parkhurst et al., forbid said committee from so doing.
There is little of note in this period about the schools. In 1795 the town was divided into nine school districts, and all teachers were ordered to report the number of scholars. An English school was ordered for the Centre, to accommodate such scholars as the select- men thought not admissible to the grammar school. The total schol- ars in Springfield proved to be five hundred and ninety-three. The special committee on schools, in view of this, said : " It therefore is a matter of no small consequence that the liberal provision granted for the support of schools should be so appropriated as to produce the greatest benefit."
In March, 1787, after the collapse of the Shays rebellion, Captain Stebbins was placed at the head of a committee to hire constables, the bid for such service being raised from £5 to £15, and two and one- half per cent. of the State tax. Ebenezer Bliss was finally seenred as one of the constables, and Moses Chapin another, the latter prob-
350
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1SS6.
ably for the Chicopee part of the town. The next year it was pro- posed to put the office of constable up at anction, but finally Ebenezer Bliss took it another year, and William Chapin, Jr., took the place of Moses Chapin.
In December, 1788, there were more warrants of distress ordered against constables, although things were in a better condition than before the insurgent rebellion. There was a brisk business done in the abatement of taxes during these years, and the feeling was becoming general that these readjustments were the beginnings of better days. No less than fifty-three such tax abatements were ordered in 1790. Three years later the office of collector of the first parish was " sold at Vendue to the lowest bidder," and Jonathan Dwight secured it for £10. The Chicopee parish was given to Roswell Chapin for £3 10s. Dwight, by the way, was a selectman and town auditor.
Samuel Lyman was sent up to the General Court after the collapse of the Shays rebellion, and was reelected next year. William Pynchon was chosen as delegate to the famous convention in January, 1788, at Boston.
There was a general easting up of accounts in 1789, and William Pynchon's books were found to stand as follows : -
The town of Springfield in Account with Wm Pynchon Esqr Treasurer
Dr. To sundry payments as pr Treasurers account from 1781 to this time
3456: 2: 5:1
To moneys outstanding in the hands of the Constables viz :
Sam" Leonard due to the former Treas' ded for the year 1774, 50: 4: 5:
Semuel Stebbins for Moses Harris rates in 1776 58:15: 0:1
46:12: 4:3 Alexander Bliss
1782
Sam" Munn on Execution 2 9 6 1 do on note 19 410 21:14: 4: 1
Ezra Stebbins by mortgage 128:12: 7:2
57:17: 5: Joseph Chapin by do.
Collected of do. by John Morgan on Ex" July 1787 8: 2: 0:
351
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
1784
Luther Hitchcock
0: 7:10:3
Ebenezer Warriner Jona Beamont ded in the hands of M Chapin
28: 6: 4:
1786
John Colton L 35 4: 10 do on note L 114 8
36 19 6
Aaron Morgan by mortgage
32: 0: 2:2
1787 John Pynchon L 33: 11: 4: 3 do by note 3: 5 John Frink
36:16: 4:3
1788 Ebenezer Bliss Moses Chapin
22: 0: 9:3
1789 Ebenezer Bliss L 207: 3:9:2
212: 14: 0:2
do for 2 notes 5: 10:3:2 Wm Chapin
33: 4: 9:3
L 4306: 11: 3:3
Cr.
By several rates as p Assessors Certificates from 1781 to 178- Inclusively 3363: 19: 0:3
By monies received by Treasurer from 1871 to this time 532:17: 2:3
By balance due to the former treasurer as pr Adjustment Novr 27 1780 141:17: 5:1
By three notes of Sam" Munn
19: 4:10
By one note of John Cotton 1:14: 8:
By one do of John Pynchon 3: 5: 0
By two do of Ebenezer Bliss
5:10: 3
4068: 8: 5:3
Balance due town treasr
238: 2:10
4306: 11: 3:3
In 1792 the Legislature incorporated a company to build locks and canals on the Connecticut river, John Worthington heading the list of stockholders. Northampton was strongly represented on the list. Benjamin Prescott, of Northampton, engineer, was soon at work on the canal at South Hadley. The engineering difficulties were not in- significant, considering that it was the pioneer project of canaling in New England. But the scarcity of money was more of an item of
7:15 11
43: 6:10 3
24:17:10:1
352
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
discouragement. In 1793 the power to assess the stock resulted in a complication, which ended in the sending of an agent to Holland and the securing of a Dutch loan. The company was divided in 1794, the Montague falls being largely under the control of Northi- ampton men, though Jonathan Dwight retained an interest in it. The original company having thus the lower falls in hand soon built a canal in the rocks, and started a dam to raise the river level at the upper end of the canal. The consequent overflowing of the North- ampton meadows gave rise to a prosecution of the company, and a portion of the dam was torn down, - all but the oblique section. The Dutch capitalists retreated from the enterprise thoroughly frightened, but the faith of the local projectors enabled them to turn a comfortable penny. In 1802 they were authorized to raise more money by means of a lottery, and soon began to deepen the canal several feet, which was completed in 1805. Thus did the lands about the falls, granted in the latter part of the seventeenth century to John Pynchon, attain an importance in the first part of the nineteenth century beyond the emoluments of the fishing business.
The demoralization attending the wars was plain enough. Burglary and horse-stealing, from 1787, or for ten years, was very common here, and, of course, deserters and bounty-jumpers had their way. In 1782 two young men of the town - Gresham Brown, Jr., and Elias Swan - were induced to enlist at Worcester under false names, in order to secure the $60 bounty. They were detected, but were let off with a published card full of humble contrition, and the payment of $20 " smart money," to be used for advertising for deserters. Capt. Seth Banister, of the 4th Massachusetts (Colonel Shepard), was recruiting-officer stationed at Springfield. He was charged at one time with withholding the pay of recruits in order to keep them from deserting. The ground for this was the ordering of only a part of the pay of recruits in certain cases, the money being deposited with the soldier's immediate officer. Troops on furlough were ordered to assemble in Springfield, June 10, 1783, probably to be paid off and
353
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
be mustered out. Notice was given a year later that the commissioner's office at Springfield was soon to be removed from Springfield, and all holding certificates from commissaries, quartermasters, or forage- masters, for services performed before January 17, 1782, to present them for settlement. During that year, Maj. J. Williams, with sixty soldiers from West Point, reached Springfield, as guard to the maga- zine on " Continental hill."
A great sensation was caused in May, 1782, when a woman enlisted in Springfield, as Samuel Smith, dressed as a man. She failed to get mustered, or to receive the $60 bounty, and was locked up. She was discovered by the " want of a beard and the redundance of some other matters." William Jones, a passer of counterfeit State certifi- cates, broke jail about this time, and, in fact, there were so many crimes against property, that at the close of the year (1782) a society was formed for the pursuit and conviction of thieves ; but this did not prevent a descent upon Zenas Parsons about a year later, much plate and other valuables being secured.
The times were now ripe for the beginnings of those activities which we may term modern. Still another age was approaching, with change in dress, change in religious belief, change in political ideas, and change in business methods. In a word, the day of pounds, shillings, and pence was about gone, and the rule of dollars and cents had begun.
CHAPTER XVI.
1800-1821.
The United States Armory. - David Ames. - Roswell Lee. - "Toddy Lane."- The Dwight Store again. - Other Buildings of Interest. - Incorporation of Hampden County. - Fight over the Offices. - The Embargo Troubles. - The Hartford Con- vention. - The Character of George Bliss, First. - Town Acts. - William Ely. - Town Officers for ISOS. - Bridges over the Connecticut. - Visit of President Monroe. -- Population. - The Springfield Bank. - Springfield Fraternities. - The Old Academy. - Samuel Osgood. - Baptists and Methodists. - Rev. W. B. O. Peabody. - New Congregational Meeting-House and Court-House.
WHEN the proposal to establish here a federal arsenal was made, public opinion was divided. If West Springfield had made any effort the armory would probably have been established there ; but the ma- jority on the west side, like the minority here, feared the moral effect of drawing in the soldier element, which would make up the bulk of the armorers. There was quite a flutter caused in 1792 by a colony of laborers, with their families, who settled here ; but a meeting of the selectmen and sundry visitations of the two town constables, with writs of warning to depart in fifteen days, restored the equilibrium. It was this kind of invasion that the community feared.
Brookfield and Hartford had both been thought of as proper places for a government storehouse. Stores could be sent down the river from here, but the town could not be reached by a hostile flotilla. A re- solve of the Continental Congress, recommending Massachusetts to build a magazine at Brookfield, was passed as early as December, 1776 ; but both General Knox and General Washington changed their minds, and six months later the Springfield training-ground had been selected. The ground was first leased to the government, and the proper deeds passed in 1795 and 1801. Land was bought for the lower water-
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356
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
shops in 1793 and 1798. The date associated with the Springfield Armory is 1794, when Congress passed a bill establishing a United States armory here.
The appearance of the hill at that time was not especially formi- dable in a military sense. There was a powder magazine (Magazine street), made of brick, with an arched roof of briek about three feet thick. This magazine was blown up by Major Ingersoll in 1846. There were two red wooden storehouses built in 1782, and there were some soldiers' barracks, and an old dwelling-house, where John Bryant, the store-keeper, lived. Buildings had already been put up at the lower water-shops. The upper water-shops were built in 1809, upon the site of a powder-mill that had exploded that year. This made it possible to abandon handwork for water-power in forging, boring, and grinding.
The first musket was made by the United States here, in 1795, under David Ames, the first superintendent, and Robert Orr, master ar- morer. Forty men were employed at first. It is stated that the first gun-lock was filed by Alexander Crawford, after a struggle of three days, Richard Beebe stocking it by hand. Among the first armorers may be mentioned Abijah Hendricks, Azariel Warner, Elisha Tobey, Jacob Perkins, Joseph Hopkins, Joseph Lombard, John Stebbins (father of John B. Stebbins, of Crescent Hill), Jason Mills, Jonathan Warner, Thomas Dale, and Zenas White. The armory turned out two hundred and forty-five muskets the first year, less than one for each working day ; and the product increased until the civil war, when a daily capacity of one thousand was reached, which was the yearly capacity at the opening of the century. Armorers were exempted from jury and military duty after 1800.
David Ames was succeeded in the superintendency of the armory by Joseph Morgan in 1802, and after him came Benjamin Prescott (1805), Henry Lechler (1813), Benjamin Prescott (1815), and Lieut .- Col. Roswell Lee (1815). David Ames was born in Springfield, and beside his record as a federal officer on the hill stands his
357
SPRINGFIELD, 1636-1886.
notable enterprise of paper manufacturing. It was he who took up the loose lines of this industry, and developed it in a way to hold the paper supremaey of the county here. Benjamin Prescott built the north shops, burned in 1824, as well as the west arsenal. It was due to Prescott's efforts that Walnut street was opened through the pine forest then standing. The title to the main part of Federal square was secured from the town in 1812. Jedediah Lord kept a tavern on the south-west corner in 1809. Prescott was more of a mechanic and man of business than an executive officer, and Colonel Lee found enough administrative reform work to do. Lee was a six-footer, dignified and placid in demeanor. Old armorers exhibited great respect and affection for Colonel Lee, while his administration was recognized by armory experts as able and aggressive. Lee removed the blockhouse and red storehouses to the " eastern square," rebuilt the north shop burned in 1824, and put up the east arsenal and south shop, as well as the middle arsenal, that faces Olivet church. Lee lived on the site of the present large arsenal.
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