Standard history of Essex county, Massachusetts, embracing a history of the county from its first settlement to the present time, with a history and description of its towns and cities. The Most historic county of America., Part 118

Author: Tracy, Cyrus M. (Cyrus Mason), 1824-1891, et al. Edited by H. Wheatland
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Boston, C. F. Jewett
Number of Pages: 450

USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Standard history of Essex county, Massachusetts, embracing a history of the county from its first settlement to the present time, with a history and description of its towns and cities. The Most historic county of America. > Part 118

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In 1805, William Lloyd Garrison was born, with his heritage in brains, not gold. A hard boyhood had he, if such a lad, depending upon himself from the start, ever knows a boyhood ; brief and poor his schooling to his thirteenth year, when he was apprenticed at the office of the " Herald " newspaper, where his career was so marked by industry, study, readiness in his type-setting and in writing for the press, that his master, at his majority, was willing to aid him in the establishment of the " Free Press," of which he became editor. From the first, as ever since, his writings showed good taste, a judi- cious choice of language, vigor of mind, and a brilliant imagination. His prose is classic ; his poetry, beautiful ; and both are ever in sym- pathy with truth, freedom, and right. His earliest papers were over the signature " Aristides," and the ancient Greek was undoubtedly his youthful model. It was with that character before his mind that the boy felt his way towards the position he eventually reached, where the justice of his canse was universally acknowledged.

At twenty-one, Mr. Garrison commenced journalism in this town, and his effort failed. Afterwards he was at Boston, Bennington, Vi., and Baltimore. He advocated temperance, when everybody drank spirituous liquors ; peace, when the heroes of two wars filled the streets ; and anti-slavery, when nowhere was the colored man, by the law, the gospel, or the usages of society, the equal of the white man : and it is not surprising that he was a failure ; scarcely yet might such a one succeed. In Baltimore, he attacked Francis Todd, a wealthy New- buryport citizen, for allowing his ship to carry slaves to New Orleans for sale : and the courts adjudged him guilty of libel, and sentenced him to fine and costs, for which he went to jail ; and civilly in personal damages, to pay one thousand dollars, which execution Mr. Todd never attempted to enforce. His fines and costs were paid by Arthur Tappan, of New York ; and so he regained his liberty just as Heury Clay, a slave-holding congressman from Kentucky, had arranged to donate the money. Daniel Webster also sympathized with Mr. Gar- rison, regarding the verdict as an infraction of the liberty of the press.

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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

Returning to Boston, Mr. Garrison, aided by Isaac Knapp of this town, a practical printer, in 1831, established the " Liberator" news- paper, which he continued as long as there was a slave in the United States. For two years, one room served them for dining-hall, bed- room, and printing office ; and their only assistant was a negro boy. Garrison's life was threatened ; the governor of Georgia offered a re- ward of five thousand dollars, on his conviction in that State, tempt- ing his kidnapping ; and Church and State denounced him. In 1832, the New England Anti-Slavery Society was formed, Garrison, Knapp, Joshua Coffin, and John G. Whittier, being one-third of its members, - all in this immediate vicinity. Soon after, Mr. Garrison visited Eng- land, where Wilberforce and Brougham welcomed him, and George Thompson, afterwards member of Parliament, came over to assist in the battle for freedom. The struggle waxed hot; mob after mob rioted ; buildings were burned ; men whipped and branded, impris- oned and put to death : but constantly the cause gained. Garrison over all the tumult shouted, "I will not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard." Finally, in 1861, came the storm of war, when, as John Quincy Adams had predicted, the shackles were knocked from four millions of colored people as a war measure. Then all eyes turned to him who in the cause of emancipation had won immortal honors ; and that name Liberator, which yesterday was despised, re- ceived the applause of the country and the world. The towns which had mobbed him invited him to receptions ; the churches which had barred him out threw open their gates to let him in; Newburyport, which had obliged him to speak out-doors, held jubilee for her son ; Boston, which had sent him to an infidel club-room, ran out to meet him ; Philadelphia, which burned the roof over his head, besought him with extended arms to come back; Washington, with President, Cabinet, and Congress, wove garlands for his crowning ; England invited him to her shores, and ran down into the ocean surf to greet his landing : and who most had opposed, fastest hastened to contribute to the grand contribution of many thousands, as a testimo- nial for what he had done for mankind. Now, past his threescore and ten, he reposes on his laurels ; and the story of what he did and dared for those in bonds, as bound with them, will be repeated to all generations, till earth has no slave and humanity is free.

William Bartlet we take from many as the representative of the Newburyport merchants. He was born in 1748 - half a generation before the town was incorporated - and lived to 1841, or ninety-three years, so that his life covered the whole duration of Newburyport to his death. A strong, sturdy man was he, serene of free, with a brow furrowed with years of thought and labor: he looked, as his fortune at that day seemed, unapproachable. He was of an old stock -- from the Bartlets at the spring, near Moulton Hill, at the extreme west of the city, where the lanrels grew and the great pines cast their shadows on the river. They are a square-headed, industrious, accumu- lating people, tanners and shoemakers originally ; and he was one of the shoemakers ; the lapstone was the foundation of a fortune which he pursued so eagerly thart in his boyhood he ran from the shop to his meals that no time might go to waste, and worked extra hours that his aecumulation might begin before his majority. At twenty- one he invested his small savings in a vessel just starting on a pros- perous voyage. Fortune smiled upon her favorite son in his early morning. He was one of the seventeen men who, in 1776, captured the English ship "Friends," off the bar, -a whole boat's crew under Capt. Offin Boardman, receiving $1,000 as his prize money, material aid for his mercantile venture.

But, though William Bartlet was very saving and careful, he was not small or mean. There was a nobility to his conceptions, his financial operations, and also to his douations. His operations were on a large scale. There was no timidity of action. When he had formed an opinion and would risk at all, he was ready to invest twice as much as anybody else ; and when he would give he would head the list. He wanted to know that everything was fast and strong and sure ; for that was his nature -he was so himself; but his commercial transactions were as broad as the oceans which his ships sailed ; with Europe, North and South, from Sweden and Russia down to Naples and Sicily ; with the Indies, East and West ; with America, on all its shores. We call to mind his voyages, when he piled up a million pounds of coffee at Antwerp at once ; when he ran shipload upon shipload of tallow from the Baltic to the Thames ; when hemp

and iron and pepper and sugar, filled the warehouses upon his wharf till they would hold no more; and so he went on, in the main prospering, till his wealth must have reached a million and more, at a period when few other men in Massachusetts were valued so much, and it is doubtful if at that time a large fortune was possessed by Girard at Philadelphia ; and John Jacob Astor at New York could show no more, for there were few millionaires in the last century.

Mr. Bartlet not only accumulated money, but he encouraged every- body else to do it. He never threw one cent away ; he never expended a dollar for what was useless; and he would not assist the idle, dis- sipated, or extravagant. He detested all such. It was the real man he wanted - one who could think and do, and dare and save; and such never asked employment or help in vain. Even when they failed, if he had faith in them, they could depend upon him to try again ; and many were the men uplifted by his strong hand.

Nor was it to maritime affairs that he confined himself. He was in advance of his day in manufactures. It was he who started the first woollen and the first cotton mill at Byfield ; it was he who encouraged the small manufactures when machinery was scarce and steam-power unused ; and later his was the enterprise which built our cotton factories. He looked up the river to inquire why its channel should be choked ; he looked out upon the sea to suggest the path of com- meree ; and whatever would assist the town he cheerfully aided.

In his politics, Mr. Bartlet was a Hamilton Federalist, firm, set, and determined ; and in his religion he was Orthodox, rigidly so. He contributed liberally to the churches, and to the religious move- ments of the day. He heard Whitefield preach, and for the good it did him raised the marble cenotaph now in the Old South to his mem- ory. He contributed to the founding of the Andover Seminary, and ever after answered all calls for help. The trustees reported that he was "its most generous and long-continued benefactor." Possibly it might have been said, that he "gave more than they all." His donations were large, and his benefactions many ; and to his ehil- dren and grandchildren he left more than any other citizen. He was great in his business, just in his action, generous where he thought the person or the cause deserving. The good he did lives after hint.

Jacob Perkins, born in Newburyport in 1766, without many oppor- tunities for instruction, apprenticed to a goldsmith at twelve, was the best mechanic and greatest inventor of his day. His fame and his works became European as much as American. In England he was called the " American Inventor." When only twenty-one he was employed by the United States government in the minting of copper coin when dic-making was a new art, when experienced mechanies had failed to do it. At twenty-four he invented his machine for ent- ting and heading nails by a single operation, the importance of which it is easy to conceive. This led to business operations in nail-making, which, instead of yielding a fortune, reduced him to bankruptcy and poverty. Shortly after, he invented a check-plate to prevent the counterfeiting of bank-bills, which was a perfect success. The Legis- lature by law made Perkins's stereotype plate the only legal plate on which bank-bills could be printed for this Commonwealth ; and while other States suffered from counterfeiting, this State was entirely exempt from that evil. He was employed by the United States Bank and by the Bank of England, and did much work for France. This was the most remunerative of all his inventions.

The most valuable of his discoveries was the compressibility of water, which led to the invention of the bathometer, an instrument for measuring the depth of water; and the pleometer, to give the velocity of a vessel through the water. Very many were the inventions and improvements which came from his fruitful brain.

Mr. Perkins left town for a residence in Philadelphia in 1816 ; that being the best field for his operations on this continent, and especially on account of his work on bank-bill plates ; and from that he went to London, seeking a still broader field. He died in London in 1849, at the age of eighty-four. He never enriched himself by the fruits of his labors. Others reaped the fields that he ploughed and sowed. His mission was to invent, not to accumulate. His residence here was on Fruit Street; and the building where he spent wearisome days in toil is still standing. His long life, however, was happy to himself as well as useful to others; for it filled the measure of his happiness, as every new invention brought a joyful seuse of triumph.

NORTH ANDOVER.

The territory now within the limits of North Andover was the first- settled portion of the old town of Andover previous to April 7, 1855, and was known as the "North Parish" of Andover. It was incor- porated as a town on that date, with the bounds fixed by the General Court, as follows : -

Be it enaeted by the Senate and House of Representatives, in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows :

SECTION 1. All that part of the town of Andover, in the County of Essex, which lies northerly and easterly of the following line, viz. : Beginning on the easterly bank of the Shawsheen River, at a stake at the bend in said river, a few rods westerly of the bridge, where it is crossed by the Salem turnpike: thence sontherly, on the line divid- ing the North and South parishes of said Andover, to a stake and stones by the road, and near the house of Benjamin Rogers ; thence sontherly, on the said parish line, to a stake and stones at the point where the said parish line crosses the Salem road, cast of the house of widow Betsy Jenkins; thence across said Salem road, on said parish line, to the town line of North Reading, - is hereby incorporated into a separate town by the name of North Andover. And the inhabitants of said town of North Andover are herchy invested with all the powers and privileges, and shall be subject to all the duties and requisitions, to which other towns are entitled and subjected by the con- stitution and laws of this Commonwealth. [Approved by the Governor, April 7, 1855.

It is a long and narrow town, about seven miles long and three miles wide, and is bounded as follows : On the north-east, by Bradford and Boxford ; on the south-east, by Middleton and North Reading ; on the south-west, by Andover ; on the north-west, by the Shawsheen and the Merrimac rivers, which separate it from Lawrence and Me- thuen ; and it contains about 15,394 acres of land, much the larger portion of which is divided into farms, which are well cultivated, the soil for the most part being very fertile.

Any one who wishes to view the beauties of nature in its best forms needs to visit the heights of this village on a fine summer afternoon, and then he will find that what an eminent traveller said of the same, in 1810, is true of to-day. Dr. Dwight writes thus : "North Andover is a beautiful piece of ground. Its surface is gently undulating, and its soil in an eminent degree fertile. The meadows are numerous, large, and of the first quality. The groves, charmingly interspersed, are tall and thrifty. The landscape everywhere varied, neat, and cheerful, is also everywhere rich."

"Upon the whole, Andover is one of the best farming towns in Eastern Massachusetts."

The town is well watered by the "Great Pond," or " Lake Coehice- wick," in the north-cast part of the town, a large and clear basin of fresh water, containing about 650 acres, whose waters flow through a brook of the same name, supplying the mills with power, and passing ont into the Merrimac. This pond is well stocked with fish ; and several years since, previous to the mill obstructions, alewives were taken in large quantities, and supplied large numbers of the inhabitants, and also furnished a revenue to the town.

The Merrimac borders on the north-west boundary ; also the Shaw- sheen on the west line, between this town and Lawrence, whose waters empty into the Meirimac, about a mile below the old " Andover Bridge," and about sixty rods above the month of the "Cochicewick."

" Rose Meadow Brook," a small brook in Pond District, flows north- erly into Great Pond, near the month of which is a saw-mill. All of these streams flow to the north, and are tributaries to the winding Merrimac, through which their waters pass to the ocean.

" Boston Brook " is a considerable stream, in the south part of the town, passing through Middleton and Topsfield, emptying into Ipswich River, and so on to the ocean.

" Musquito Brook," or " Fish Brook," is situated in the easterly part of the town, and flows through Boxford.

The town is divided into six school districts. The most northerly is " River District," bordering on the Merrimae ; next is " Morrimac District," including the mills known as "Sutton's Mills"; then the "C'entre District," including the village. To the east of the Centre is " Pond District"; south of Pond District is " Kimball District"; south of the Centre District, and in the south part of the town, is " Farnham District." There are fourteen good publie schools in these several localities, including the " lligh School," which is kept in a new and elegant building, erected in 1867.

There is also a Public Library in the town, containing ahont 2,000 volumes, having a yearly circulation of 27,000, besides a library con- neeted with each of the churches in the village, containing about 2,000 volumes, and having a yearly circulation of about 10.000.

It has four churches, the " Evangelical Church of North Andover"; one Unitarian, known as the "First Church"; one Methodist Epis- copal church, and one Roman Catholic church.

The public buildings are good. The new and elegant High School Building, used for the purpose of a high school, as well as for town- meetings, cost nearly $25,000, $10,000 of which was given by Col. Theron Johnson, for whom the school is named, and $5,000 given by Moses T. Stevens, Esq., in honor of whom the large hall was named " Stevens Hall." On the top of this building, which is built of brick, is a tower, in which is a clock, that may be seen for a long distance. There is also a large brick building for the grammar school near the Sutton's Mill village, as well as several smaller ones in the town.

There is also one steam fire-engine near these works, called the " Eben Sutton Steam Fire-Engine." At the centre is a hand-engine, called "Cochicewick."

The Boston and Maine Railroad accommodates the northerly portion of the town. The Essex Branch of the Eastern Railroad passes through the eastern and northern portion, and has several stations along the line within its limits.

There are two post-offices - one at the Centre Village, the other at North Andover Depot. Horse cars connect the village of Methuen and the mills at the north portion of the town, passing through the city of Lawrence every half hour.

Franklin Academy. - Several years since there stood a neat build- ing, erected by subscription, near the residence of the late Mr. Na- thaniel Stevens, which was devoted to school purposes, the origin of which may be seen in the following Act of incorporation : -

An Act directing the use and appropriation of part of the money arising from the sale of the common and other lands of the proprietors of the town of Andover, and for other purposes therein named.

Be it enacted by the Senate and Honse of Representatives, in General Conrt assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows :

That the Treasurer of the Proprietors of the Township of Andover, and his successor in said office, shall pay over and deliver one-half of all the monies and estates which now is, or hereafter may be, in his hands as such Treasurer, unto the Rev. William Symines, the Rev. Dr. Thomas Barnard, Nathaniel Lovejoy, Esq .. Dr. Thomas Kittridge, Rev. Peter Eaton, Isaac Osgood, Esq., Dr. George Osgood, Dea. John Adams, Dea. Ben- jamin Farının, Mr. Ebenezer Stevens, who are hereby appointed and constituted trus- ters thereof, and whose duty it shall be, and they are hereby anthorized to lay ont, expend, and appropriate the income and interest thereof, to the instruction of youth of both sexes, in reading, writing, and arithmetic, in the Free School, which is already established and erected in the North Parish of said Andover, in such manner as the said Trustees may think most conducive to the public good. [June 18, 1801.

On the twenty-first day of June, 1803, the Legislature changed the name of the free school to "Franklin Academy." The school was conducted with success. In 1827 the female department was removed to another building. The classical school was first taught by Mr. Simeon Putnam, and was deservedly popular, and had a reputation for thorough instruction and moral discipline. The Rev. Cyrus Pierce became associated with Mr. Putnam, and its reputation was of the highest order. The school, after several changes in the teach- ers, was abandoned several years since, and the building was removed to the old " Bradstreet " farm, and is now devoted to other purposes.

Statistical. - According to the census of 1875, there were in the town 108 farms, 308 farm-houses, and 160 farmers. The present population is 2,981, of whom 1,463 are males, and 1,518 are females, all divided into 618 families, occupying 574 houses. The valuation of the town in 1877 was $2,095,494 : real estate $1, 522,924, personal estate $572,570, rate of taxation twelve dollars per thousand.

Population of the town at different dates: 1855, 2,218; 1860, 2,343; 1865, 2,622; 1870, 2.549; 1875, 2,981.

Ecclesiastical and Parochial. - Church worship, in the original town of Andover, was commenced at the village now known as North Andover; it being then the north part of the old town, and quite near the first settlement. A meeting-house was built near the old

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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

burying-ground, and a minister was settled as early as 1645. From that time till 1709, people came from every section of the town to at- tend worship, and were a harmonious, peaceable, and prosperous com- munity. In the year 1707, the subject of a new and larger building was discussed. When the location was to be decided upon, the people were much divided, and, not being able to agree among themselves, an application to the General Court was made to decide for them. This resulted in the formation of a new society in the south part of the town, who erected a house of worship, and have been successful. The original society continued to prosper, and in the year 1711 built a new meeting-house near where the present one stands. Of the first building but little information can be found.

The North Parish voted October, 1710, "To build a new meeting- house fifty feet long, forty-five feet wide, and twenty-four feet between joints."

In the latter part of the year 1711, the building was completed and oceupied.

Oct. 17, 1752, the parish voted to build a new meeting-house and raise £400. In June, 1753, the house was raised, and in October fol- lowing £300 more were raised towards the meeting-house. The pews were sold Jan. 1, 1754, for £667 15s. 8d. Hon. William Phil- lips, of Boston, gave them a bell for the new church in March, 1755.

March 9, 1797, " Voted to build a hearse." It was built by Mr. Bott, of Salem, said to have been the first in the county, if not in the State.

In 1807, the bell broke, and a new one was purchased weighing 1,200 pounds.

April 14, 1817, "The parish voted to purchase of Mr. Jonathan Stevens one and one-quarter acres of land for a burying-ground."

March, 1822, " Voted that the Parish Committee put stoves in the meeting-house."

The following gifts to the church have been made by different per- sons. Benjamin Stevens, Esq., gave one silver tankard; in 1740, Mrs. Mary Aslebee gave a tankard ; Timothy Osgood, Ebenezer Os- good, and a widow gave each a silver fankard ; and Mrs. Elizabeth Abbott gave one by her will; in 1761, Capt. Timothy Johnson gave a tankard ; in 1765, Benjamin Barker gave a silver flagon; in 1801, Capt. Peter Osgood gave a silver flagon.

In 1790, Mrs. Catherine Powell, wife of William Powel', Esq., of Boston, presented a Bible for the use of the pulpit; in 1755, Capt. Nathaniel Frye presented a bell to the parish ; and 1761, Mr. Benjamin Barker gave a clock for the new meeting-house.

The present church was erected in 1835, and cost about $11,000, and is the only church in the centre village of the town.

In contrasting the condition of things as they existed in the early settlement with the present neat and quiet community at the village of to-day, one can hardly imagine the change that has taken place. At that day there were friendly Indians residing in their midst, with whom they had no difficulty. But up and down the country there were roaming savages, enough to keep the settlers ever on their gnard and the fathers wide awake. It was not till after the war of King Philip that they experienced much trouble. Then it became necessary to fortify their homes, and erect garrison-houses for their protection. The farmers took their firearms into their fields when at work, and also to and from the church. Sentinels were placed at the doors during the services, and the men sat near the same, ready for any sudden alarm. The history of those days is well described in MeFingal's lines : -

"For once, for fear of Indian beating, Our grandsires bore their guns to meeting ; Each man egnipped, on Sunday morn, With psalm-book, shot, and powder-horn ; And looked in form, as all must grant, Like the ancient true church militant ; Or fierce, like modern deep divines, Who fight with quills, like porcupines."

The Evangelical Church of North Andover was organized, Sept. 3, 1834, and consisted of thirty-one members ; seven males, and twenty- four females. The first house of worship was dedicated on the day of organization.

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Standard history of Essex county, Massachusetts, embracing a history of the county from its first settlement to the present time, with a history and description of its towns and cities. The Most historic county of America., Part 118

Author: Tracy, Cyrus M. (Cyrus Mason), 1824-1891, et al. Edited by H. Wheatland Publication date: 1878 Publisher: Boston, C. F. Jewett Number of Pages: 450

Author: Tracy, Cyrus M. (Cyrus Mason), 1824-1891, et al. Edited by H. Wheatland
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Boston, C. F. Jewett
Number of Pages: 450