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 137

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 137

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).

Salem at this crisis showed the same patriotic spirit which she has always exhibited when the country in its need and distress has called on her for assistance. The merchants and mariners of Salem turned their vessels into men of war, equipped them with cannon, manned them with gallant seamen, and sent them out to meet Great Britain on the deep. During this contest there were equipped and sent out from this port at least 158 vessels, manned by several thousand brave sailors from Salem. They mounted more than 2,000 guns, carrying on an average twelve or fourteen each. The number of prizes taken by Salem armed vessels during the Revolution was about 445. About fifty-four of the privateers and letters-of-marque were captured. Among the gallant officers who commanded the privateers of Salem, were Jonathan Haraden, Thomas Benson, John Carnes, Benjamin Crowninshield, John Derby, John Felt, Simon Forrester, William Gray, Thomas Perkins, S. Tucker, and Joseph Waters.

Jonathan Haraden. - The daring deeds performed by these men deserve a more extended notice than history accords them. A type of the character of Salem commanders may be found in Jonathan Haraden. He was one of the bravest officers and best seamen who sailed from Salem in the Revolution. His desperate aetions and won- derful triumphs, his consummate courage and serene intrepidity, entitle him to a place in history by the side of Paul Jones and Deca- tur, and Farragut and Cushing. The equal of these in bravery and daring, his memory should be cherished as one of the dauntless heroes of the Revolution. He was born in Gloucester, and died in Salem, in 1803, in his fifty-ninth year. He came to Salem when a boy. Soon after hostilities commenced between Great Britain and her Colonies, Captain Haraden was appointed a lieutenant in the "Tyrannicide," Capt. Fiske, of Salem, which vessel captured a royal cutter, bound from Halifax to New York. Lieut. Haraden soon rose to the post of captain, and took command of the " Gen. Pickering," a Salem ship of 180 tons, carrying fourteen six pounders and a crew of forty-tive men and boys. In this ship he sailed from Salem in the spring of 1780, with a cargo of sugar for Bilboa, then a famous resort for Ameri- can privateers. Ou his passage, May 29, 1780, he was attacked by a British cutter of twenty guns, and beat her off after a contest of about

389

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

two hours. Upon entering the Bay of Biscay, he fell in with a Brit- ish privateer of twenty-two guns and sixty men. Having approached in the night, unobserved, he ran alongside and commanded her through his trumpet to strike to an American frigate or he would sink her. The privateer struck her flag, and the captain, when he came on board the " Pickering," was mortified to think he had submitted to such inferior force. Mr. John Carnes, of Salem, was put in charge of the prize.

As the vessels approached Bilboa they met a sail coming out, which the captured captain said was the " Achilles," a privateer from Lon- don, of forty-two guns and 140 men, and added that he knew her force. Capt. Haraden coolly replied, " I shan't run from her." The British ship first retook the prize and placed a crew on board, and, night coming on, deferred her attack on Capt. Haraden till morning. As the day dawned, June 4, 1780, the " Achilles " bore down upon the " Pickering," and Capt. Haraden placed his vessel in condition for action. After a desperate contest of about three hours' duration, the British ship was obliged to seek safety in flight, notwithstanding her greatly superior force. Capt. Haraden gave chase, but the " Achilles " was light, outsailed the " Pickering," and escaped. He then returned, coolly recaptured his prize, and carried her in safety into Bilboa.

The battle was fought so near the Spanish coast that an immense concourse of spectators, amounting, as was supposed, to nearly one hundred thousand, assembled along the shore, in boats, and on the hill-sides, during the action, and before Capt. Haraden with his prize had been at anchor half an hour, one could walk a mile from his ship by stepping from one boat to another. So great was the admiration with which the battle and victory were witnessed that when the captain landed he was surrounded by this vast throng of strangers and borne in triumph into the city, where he was wel- comed with public and unbounded honors. The late venerable Robert Cowan, who was with him, in this action, said that the " Gen. Pickering" in comparison with her antagonist, " looked like a long-boat by the side of a ship," and "that he fought with a determination that seemed superhuman," and that although in the most exposed positions, " where the shot flew around him in thou- sands, he was all the while as calm and steady as amidst a shower of snow-flakes." Space will not permit the recital of the numer- ous other conflicts, sometimes against great odds, in which this intrepid commander engaged. During the war he captured more than a thousand guns from the ships of the enemy. Amid the din of battle he was calm and cool and self-possessed. The more deadly the strife, the more imminent the peril, the more terrific the scene, the more perfect seemed his self-command and serene intrepidity. He was a hero among heroes and his name should live in honored and affectionate remembrance.

The armed ships of Salem performed valiant service to the country ; they intercepted the transports and supply-ships sent from New England and Nova Scotia to the troops in "Boston and New York. They resorted to the French islands for munitions of war, and cap- tured the ships engaged in the sugar trade. They cruised in the Bay of Biscay, in the English and Irish channels; raised the rate of insurance on British ships to twenty-three per cent., and compelled England to employ most of her navy in convoying merchantmen ; and, although a large number were captured, they rarely yielded to an equal force.

Salem Privateers in the War of 1812 .- When this country was once more engaged in a war with Great Britain in 1812, Salem again did her part in harassing the commerce of the enemy. She sent ont forty privateers, with an aggregate tonnage of 3,405 tons, mounting 189 cannon, and manned by 2,142 men. Some of these privateers were very successful in capturing prizes from the enemy. The schooner "Fame," of Salem, was a fishing-boat of thirty tons, and carried two guns and thirty men. She received her commission July 1, 1812, at noon, sailed in the afternoon, and sent the first prize into Salen. Robert Brookhouse, Jr., was one of her commanders. The sloop "Jefferson," a pleasure-boat of fourteen tons, belonging to George Crowninshield, sailed the same day as the "Fame," and sent the second prize into Salem. She carried only one gun, and twenty men. The ship " America," of Salem, was the fastest=sailing vessel afloat during the war of 1812, and the most fortunate. She was of 350 tons burden, and carried twenty guns and 150 men, She made four cruises, commanded on the first by Joseph Ropes, and on the third and fourth by James Chever, Jr. She arrived in Salem from her third cruise with fifty prisoners on board, having taken twelve prizes. She captured, in her first three cruises, twenty-six prizes,

and the property taken and safely got into port amounted to about $1,100,000.

The brig " Grand Turk" was one of the finest vessels of her class in the United States. She was fortunate as a cruiser, and as famous for her good qualities as the "America." She was of 310 tons bur- den, carried eighteen guns and 150 men, and was commanded by Holten J. Breed. She arrived at Salem Nov. 17, 1815, after a second cruise of 103 days, with forty-four of her original crew (the rest being on board her prizes) and fifty prisoners. She captured seven or eight vessels, one with an invoice of £30,000 sterling. She had on board goods to the value of $20,000.

The schooner "Helen" was a merchant vessel, loaned by her owners, the Messrs. White and J. J. Knapp, for the purpose of capturing the English privateer " Liverpool Packet," which for months had rendered herself a terror to all vessels entering the bay. Her cruising-ground was in the vicinity of Cape Cod, although once she was scen inside Half-Way Rock, Capt. John Upton originated the project of fitting out the " Helen," and going to capture the "Liver- pool Packet." He spoke to others about it on the morning of Nov. 12, 1812, and the "Helen" was got ready, and seventy volunteers raised, in about four hours. Before the next morning she was at sea. Those who started the expedition formed a procession, pre- ceded by the American flag, and by James McCarthy with his drum, and Henry Hubon with his fife, marched through the streets of Salem, led off by Capt. James Fairfield. Before night, on the day the ex- pedition was first talked of, the vessel was prepared with stores, ammunition, and cannon, and at nine o'clock that night she was off Naugus Head. They found the English vessel they sought had sailed the previous day for St. John, and thus the object of their expedition failed.

The other armed vessels were more or less fortunate ; but even a list of them would take more room in these columns than can be spared, and the curious reader must turn for a fuller account to other sources of information .*

CHAPTER VI.

SKETCH OF THE MANUFACTURING AND BUSINESS INTERESTS OF SALEM.

Proceeding from the commercial to the business interests of Salem, the manufacture and trade in leather first demands consideration, as by far the largest single interest.

The Leather Interest .- A brief retrospect of the foundation and growth of this business may be interesting. The exact date of the beginning of the manufacture of leather in Salem is not attainable, neither are any very definite facts regarding the location of the first tanning and currying shops. The common, and the territory east- ward of it, previous to 1800, was a more or less swampy locality, and on the north and east sides of it had been located, for many ycars, a number of tanneries. Within a dozen years, evidences of the location of tan-yards have been found in digging to lay sewers in the lower end of Forrester Street. The business finally located on the North River, and extended up towards Peabody, along the line of the water-course, and this valley is to-day the greatest tanning dis- trict in the country. The trade hereabouts suffered a decline about forty years ago ; but during the last thirty years it has grown rapidly, and all attempts to divert it to other places have failed to check its increase in this its original habitat. Salem is as famous for its tan- neries as Lynn is for its shoe-shops.

In 1639 Philemon Dickerson was granted land "to make tan pits and to dress goat skins and hides." Afterwards tanners were occa- sionally mentioned, and in 1642 " Ould Thomas Eabourne " was " prosecuted " for " wronging the country by insufficient tanning." For the offence he was "admonished" and fined a small sum. The same year the General Court passed an order " that no person using the feat and mistery " of currier, butcher, or shoemaker, " shall exer- cise the feat or mistery of a tanner." It seems to have been not un- common in those days for families to tan their own leather and make their own shoes. For this purpose they used a trough hollowed out of a pine log. The hides were cut into strips of a suitable width for the soles of shoes, and alternated in the trough with layers of oak

* For an account of the privateers belonging to Salem during the war of 1812, con- sult the article prepared by William Leavitt in the Historical Collection of the Essex Institute, Vol. II., page 57.

390

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

bark pounded up with a mallet. Lime being searce, ashes were fre- quently used to remove the hair from the hides.

In a century after the first beginnings, or in 1750, an old Quaker preacher in Danvers, named Joseph Southwick, had so far improved the method as to grind the bark with a circular stone moved around by a horse. This was the first bark-mill. Another and much greater advance in the art of tanning was made in the carly part of this cen- tury, when steam and water-power were brought into nse in the more laborious parts of the process. This, together with some improve- ments in the methods of working, led to a great improvement in the business.

There were four tanneries in 1768; eight in 1791; seven in 1801; twelve in 1811; thirteen in 1821; twenty-three in 1831; twenty-four in 1836 ; eighteen in 1840. In 1836 there were tanned 68,677 hides ; the value of leather tanned and curried was $398,897; hands em- ployed, 194; capital used, $299,170. In 1844 there were forty-one tanneries, employing 280 hands ; value of leather tanned and curried, $642,671; capital invested, $401,668. In 1850 there were thirty- four tanners, the same number of eurriers, fifteen who followed both trades, and two leather and morocco dressers and colorers,-total, eighty-five. Then 550 hands were employed in the business, and the value of the leather tanned and curried was $869,047.70. It has been found extremely difficult to obtain even an estimate of the aver- age business for the last five years, as a fair statement to go into his- tory; but careful investigation and consultation with leading man- ufacturers and dealers places the figures at the following estimate : capital employed, $1,250,000 ; annual production, $4,000,000; num- ber of men employed, about 1,000. Most of the eapital employed is home capital, and the Salem banks discount a large proportion of all the " leather paper " passed in the transaction of this great business.

Cotton Manufacture. - The next industry in order of importance is the manufacture of cotton cloth, carried on by the Nanikeng Steam Cotton Company, which was incorporated April 5, 1839, with a capi- tal of $200,000. The first mill ereeted was completed in 1847, the capital stock having been meanwhile increased to $780,000. It was then the largest and best appointed mill in the United States. The building was 400 feet long by 60 feet wide, contained 32,768 mule spindles, and 643 looms, and its weekly production was 94,000 yards of cloth, weighing 22,000 pounds, made from No. 30 yarn, 72 pieks to the inch.

The mill was snecessful from the start; and, after twelve years of uninterrupted prosperity, the capital stock was increased to $1.200,- 000, and a second mill, 428 feet long by 64 feet wide, containing 35,000 spindles and 700 looms, was built, and successfully operated in connection with the first mill.

In 1865 the eapital stoek was further increased to $1,500,000, and a third mill built. This building is 189 feet long and 95 feet wide, and contains 15,000 spindles, and 350 looms. The three mills at this time (1878) contain 90,000 spindles and 1,900 looms, driven by two pair of Corliss steam-engines, of 2,000 horse-power in the aggre- gate. The mills employ 1,200 operatives, and consume 11,500 bales of eotton per annum, in the production of 14,700,000 yards of eloth, weighing 4,730,000 pounds, and varying from 28 to 108 inches in width.

Boots and Shoes. - The manufacture of boots and shoes is an industry of considerable importance in Salem. There are about forty establishments, employing over 600 hands. The eapital invested is about $130),000, and the annual production is over $600,000.

The Forest River Lead Company was incorporated in 1846. It manufactures white and sheet lead, its capacity for the former being 1,000 tons annually. Its works are on Forest River, on the road to Marblehead.

The Salem Lead Company was incorporated Feb. 7, 1868. Its manufactures are white lead and lead pipe, the capacity for white lead being 1,500 tons per annum. Its works are on Saunders Street.

The Salem Gas-Light Company was organized in April, 1850. Its works are at the foot of Northey Street, though premises have been secured and a large "holder " built on the " Pierce and Waite Lot," Bridge Street. The stores were first lighted with gas Dee. 17, 1850, and the street-lamps Dec. 25, 1850.

The Salem Laboratory Company manufactures varions chemicals ; the Salem and South Dunvers Oil Company manufactures kerosene oil, or, more literally, refines petroleum ; the Seccoml Oil Manufac- turing Company manufactures lubricating and currier's oil.

Car Manufacture. - The Salem Car Company was formed in 1863, for the manufacture of horse-cars. Not meeting with the necessary degree of suceess, the works, on Bridge Street, were sold to Mr. John

Kinsman, who closed ont the stock on hand, then built a few railway passenger-cars, and in turn soll the works to the Eastern Railroad. The shops are still continued for the manufacture and repairing of ears for this corporation.

Jute Mills. - The India Manufacturing Company, and the Bengal Bagging Company were thriving concerns, manufacturing jute bag- ging material in large quantities, and finding for it a ready market. The trade in this class of goods diminished, and less business is done now than formerly, though both mills are run by private parties.

Miscellaneous Business. - In 1864 or 1865, a factory was built on Bridge Street, for the manufacture of Charles W. Felt's type-setting and justifying machine ; but the invention did not prove a success, and the works were sold. For a time they were occupied by a machine- shop, manufacturing the Hicks Engine. The Atlantic Car Company was organized in 1872, and a factory for the manufacture of railroad passenger coaches and freight cars, built on Broadway. The depres- sion in business the following year caused a suspension of business, which has never been revived. The works are now occupied in the manufacture of furniture. The Salem Foundry and Machine-Shop, and the Salem Shade-Roller Company are now doing a fair business under individual management. Numerons small manufacturing occu- pations and trades employ a great number of people, and a large aggregate capital is employed, with reasonable financial results. The State Censns of 1875 gives the number of manufacturing establish- ments in Salem as 550; the capital employed as $4,230,008 ; the value of manufactured goods and work done as $8,512,693, and the number of persons employed as 4,045. These are all considered reasonably low figures.

Railroads. - The business of the Eastern Railroad in Salem is to be counted by the hundreds of thousands yearly. The receipts annu- ally from the passenger business are about $150.000; and the freight department contributes about $250,000 yearly to the income of the road .* Nineteen passenger trains now leave Salem for Boston daily (except Sunday-two on Sunday), against five or six when the road was opened, in August, 1838. The depot in those days was a small wooden structure, very insignificant compared with the commodious granite and brick one of to-day. When the tunnel was built in 1839, and the road opened to Newburyport in 1840, the business of Salem received a fresh impetus : and from that day to this the Eastern Rail- road has contributed much to the substantial prosperity of the eity ; the branches to Marblehead, Gloucester, Lawrence, and Sonth Reading (now Wakefield), all adding new outlets and inlets for trade. The Lowell road has also done its share ; and with its tracks and those of the Lawrence Branch of the Eastern road, extending to tide-water at Phillips wharf and Pennsylvania Pier, Salem has had unlimited railroad facilities for transporting coal and merchandise to the inland cities of Lowell and Lawrence. With these iron bands extending in a'l directions, Salem has been favored with railroad facilities hardly surpassed by any city, however fortunate in its railroad accommoda- tions.

Coal Business. - For many years Phillips Wharf was the scene of an immense coal trade ; but since the buikling of Pennsylvania Pier by the Philadelphia & Reading Coal and Iron Company, in 1873, the business has been divided, the latter wharf taking a large proportion of it. This pier is built further out into the harbor than any other in the city ; and the large iron steamers of the Philadelphia & Reading company land there about 90,000 tons of coal annually, for transpor- tation into the interior, - mainly to Lowell. The " coal pockets " here have a capacity of 8,000 tons. At Phillips Wharf, the Wilkesbarre company lands its coal for transportation to the manufacturing cities inland.

Express and Freight Business. - With the advent of the railroad came the express and freighting business, Mr. David Merritt, Sr., being the founder. This has grown to immense proportions ; and J. H. Moulton, and. David Merritt, Jr., to-day do a thriving and enter- prising business in the freighting and express lines, while Savory & . Co's Express, founded by the late Benjamin Savory, a driver of the old Boston Stage Company, and numerous smaller parcel expresses, are doing a large business.

Banks. - The business interests of the city are accommodated by the establishment here of seven National Banks; and two savings banks serve as depositories for the earnings of the working people.

The Essex Bank, the first bank established in Salem, began busi- ness July 2, 1792, with a capital of about $300,000. It occupied the building on Central Street used for the Custom House for a series

* These figures do not represent the earnings of the station, but the gross amount of business transacted.

391

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

of years. Central Street was then known as " Bank Street." The Essex Bank was incorporated June 18, 1799, when it was allowed a capital of $400,000. It expired in 1819, although its affairs were not fully wound up until 1822.

The Salem Bank, now the " Salem National," was incorporated March 8, 1803, with a capital of $200,000. This was increased Feb. 8, 1823, to $250,000 ; reduced Feb. 14, 1859, to $187,500; restored April 1, 1865, to $200,000; inereased Feb. 12, 1873, to the present amount, $300,000. Its presidents have been Benjamin Pickman, 1803 ; Joseph Peabody, 1814 ; George Peabody, 1833 ; Benjamin Mer- rill, 1842; George Peabody, 1847; William C. Endicott, 1858; Augustus Story, 1875. Its cashiers : Jonathan Hodges, 1803; John Moriarty, 1810; Charles M. Endicott, 1835 ; George D. Phippen, 1858. The bank was originally located in a brick building on the south side of Essex Street, next west of the Benjamin Pickman es- tate, nearly opposite St. Peter's Street. It stood in from the street. The bank adopted the national system in 1864; and removed to its present location, Holyoke building, November, 1866.

The Merchants' Bank was organized in 1811, and incorporated June 26th of that year, with a capital of $200,000; which was afterwards increased to $400,000, and redneed in 1845 to its present figure $200- 000. The first banking rooms were in the Union building, on the corner of Union and Essex streets. Afterwards the bank occupied rooms in the Bowker building, and in 1855 removed to its present lo- eation in the Asiatic building. Its presidents have been Benj. W. Crowninshield, Joseph Story, John W. Treadwell, and Benjamin H. Silsbee. Its cashiers, John Saunders, John W. Treadwell, Francis H. Silsbee, Benj. H. Sillsbec, and Nathl. B. Perkins. It became a National Bank Jan. 19, 1865.

The Commercial (now First National) Bank was organized April 19, 1819, with a capital of $300,000. This was reduced to $200,000 in 1830, and restored in 1851. It has always occupied its present quarters in the Central Street bank-building. Its presidents have been Willard Peele and William Sutton; cashiers, N. L. Rogers, Z. F. Silsbee, and E. H. Payson. The bank entered the national sys- tem, as the First National Bank, in June, 1864.

The Exchange Bank was incorporated Jan. 31, 1823, with a capital of $300,000 ; which was afterwards reduced to its present amount, - $200,000. The bank commeneed business at No. 172 Essex Street, on the site of William Gray's garden, next below the Essex House ; and continued there until it was removed to its location in the First Church building, Dec. 8, 1864. It originally faced Essex Street, but now occupies the opposite corner of the building on Washington Street ; its presidents have been Gideon Tucker, John Webster, Henry L. Williams. Its cashiers, John Chadwick, Joseph H. Webb. It adopted the national system, Feb. 18, 1865.

The Asiatic Bank was incorporated June 12, 1824, with a capital of $200,000. It commeneed business in July, 1824, with a capital of $315,000, in the old bank-building on Central Street. From thenee it removed to the East India Marine building ; and from there to the Asiatic building, on Washington Street, in 1855. Its presidents have been Joseph S. Cabot and Leonard B. Harrington. Its cashier, Mr. William H. Foster, has been fifty-three years in the bank's employ, fifty of which as cashier. There is but one older bank officer in the United States. The Asiatic became a National Bank Feb. 1, 1865.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

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 137

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