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 149
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The next settler on Indian Hill, if not the earliest there, was Hannaniah Ordway, the son of James, a Welshman, the first of the name in America, whose wife was Ann Emery, who lived to his nine-
ty-third year. His house was a garrison house, and he was the only man who ever killed an Indian in the town. He saw, one evening, an Indian creeping by the gates that led to' his house, and fired at the spot. He found no Indian there ; but a gun, and powder-horn filled with rum, which had been shot from a belt fastened around his body. A few days later, the dead body of an Indian was found in the woods, who, from the wounds, was evidently the one Mr. Ordway fired at. Ever since, the farm has been known as the Garrison place, and the gun and the powder-horn are still in the possession of the Ordways. The farm is now owned - the part where the garrison-house stood - by George J. L. Colby. The age of Mr. Ordway is noticeable, but several persons in that immediate neighborhood have lived to be very old. Samuel Poore-one of the Maj. Poore's ancestors - died at eighty-six. Several in the Sawyer family, who live on the east side of Indian Hill, have lived beyond ninety ; and it is doubtful if better health and longer life are enjoyed on this continent than on the hills of West Newbury.
Still further to the West rises Crane-neck, where lived, as early as anybody, Ensign Enoch Little, who married Elizabeth Worth, and whose descendants hold his lands now. He died in 1766, in his eighty- first year. About the same time came James Smith, who died in 1757, at sixty-two. He was the great-great grandfather of the pres- ent James Smith, who lives in the original Smith mansion, built in 1707, at more than fourscore years, and his sister, Mrs. Maj. David Emery, is living at Newburyport, in her ninety-third year. Those two, Little and Smith, owned most of Crane-neck, now divided to many farms. About the same time, Dr. Matthew Adams, the first physician of West Newbury, who was of the same family with the presidents, John and John Quincy Adams, lived on the estate now belonging to Judge Bradley, of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, who is one of his descendants. These were the settlers of Crane- neck proper. Among the families residing here in the last century were two in the same house, named respectively Yell and Louder ; and the house was known as the Yell-Louder house.
The above were the important points of settlement, and the names of some of the carly families.
In 1794, the question of dividing the town of Newbury having been discussed, it was voted to set off the three westerly parishes into a . separate town ; but that was reconsidered, and the question passed for final action to 1819, when what is now West Newbury was set off and named Parsons, in honor of the chief justice whose fame filled all the courts, where he was known as the "giant of the law." From some cause the name was changed, and from the old West Parish we have West Newbury, with a population in 1820 of 1,279. In 1850 that had increased to 1,746; and, in 1860, the highest point was reached,-2,201. To 1870 there was a decline to 2,006: native Americans, 1,690 ; foreign born, 316 : eleven were colored. Probably the population has not increased since.
The town is bounded north and north-westerly by the Merrimac River, which separates it from Amesbury, Merrimac, and Haverhill ; east and south-east, by Newburyport and Newbury ; south-west by Groveland. It is connected with Haverhill by the Rocks Bridge, which spans the Merrimac, being nearly a thousand feet long, sus- tained by four piers. It has three streams: Indian River and the Artichoke, which flow into the Merrimac ; and Beaver Brook, which flows south into the Parker.
CHAPTER II.
ITS INDUSTRIES - FARMING - MANUFACTURES.
West Newbury is essentially a farming town, and has ever been. It has no great water-power, and has no railroads connecting it with centres of trade and commerce ; but almost every acre of its land is capable of cultivation. Nason's "Gazetteer" says it has 128 farms ; and the census of 1840 returned only 190 acres of land unimproved, and only 279 acres of woodland. There are some 4,000 acres of pas- turage ; 1,100 acres of fresh meadows; and 2,500 acres to English grass and tillage. There is no place where more enterprise and intel- ligence direct agriculture. The town has taken the lead in the prize exhibitions at the county fairs, and in addition to ordinary farming the people devote themselves to specialties suited to the demands of the times. A quarter of a century since it was noted for the produc- tion of apples ; now it excels in strawberry culture. Its production
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of milk, eggs, and poultry, is large. For a half century it has had well-established nurseries, that of T. C. Thurlow being known all over New England. It supplies the markets with early vegetables ; and one farm, where the Gardners for five generations have culti- vated. is largely devoted to plants and flowers, for which the Massa- chusetts Horticultural Society has awarded many premiums. It has the oldest Farmer's Club in the county, which holds weekly meetings through the winter, and gives annual exhibitions that com- pare favorably with those of the county. The leading member, and for eight years the president, of this club, Hon. Haydn Brown, is one of the chief citizens, and active in all the improvements de- manded.
Not entirely, however, is the town agricultural. It was the first place in the country in the manufacture of combs ; and has, since 1759, been one of the leading centres of that industry. Then we find Enoch Noyes, a self-taught mechanic, without instruction. and in the rudest way, making buttons and coarse combs of horn. He straight- ened the horns by steaming then over his kitchen fire and pressing them in a cleft log, opening it with wedges and allowing it to spring together. All the labor was done by hand. This continued to 1778, when he was assisted by William Cloud, a Hessian deserter from Burgoyne's army, who had been a comb-maker in Germany, and was a skilful mechanic. Enoch Noves was himself of an inventive genius, and together they made tools which greatly facilitated the business. The workers increased till. by 1835. there were more than thirty comb shops in the town ; some using horse-power, and others. foot lathes. Before that date persons had gone to Leominster, and the business had been extended to Lancaster and other towns; but it originated in West Newbury, and the machinery has been largely in- vented there. The foremost man in improving machinery was David E. Noyes. the grandson of Enoch. the original comb-maker ; who was not only a superior mechanic, but had the advantages of some years working in Philadelphia, and at Monte Video. S. A., and of travel- ling in England and on the continent of Europe. He invented a ma- chine for twining, or cutting the teeth, which was very valuable ; and for years he was the most important man in comb-making in America. In 1844, the firm of S. C. Noyes & Co. took the lead. and have kept it to this day. They set up the first steam-engine used in the town, made many improvements in machinery, and have now the most per- feet factory in New England. Only one other factory, that of H. G. & T. M. Chase. is in operation ; but those two, with eighty hands and their new machines, produce more goods in two months than could all the small shops of forty years ago in the whole year. They have in- vested capital $175,000, and their annual production, at the taking of the last census, was $110,000 per annum.
The manufacturing of shoes for sale in Boston, Philadelphia, and further south, was early established here. The settlers on Crane-neck, from whom sprang the Littles, -Joseph and Benjamin, - founders of Georgetown, and the Bartletts, of Bartlett Hill, were largely in the business, and with the latter served Thomas Peabody, father of the London banker, whose mother was granddaughter of the Rev. William Johnson, and daughter of Joseph and Mary Little.
The chief manufacturers to-day are T. S. Ruddock and James Dur- gin & Son. The total capital employed in the business is $70,000; number of hands, 250, of whom fifty-nine are females ; value of goods produced, $250,000.
The carriage business also began here very early, the first "ehase " in the Commonwealth being made in this town, in 1779. The business was introduced by James Burgess ; and the chief manufacturers here and at Bellville in the last century were the Greenleafs, Joseph Ridge- way, Robert Dodge, and Samuel Rogers. Some of the young men, not finding the encouragement they desired, crossed the Merrimac, and commeneed the trade in Amesbury, where it has now grown to sneh proportions in Salisbury, Amesbury, and Merrimac, that the yearly sales exceed $2,000,000.
In all, West Newbury has twenty-five different manufacturing es- tablishments, using six steam-engines, requiring a capital of $152,000 ; employing 397 persons, of whom 324 are men; and giving a yearly production of goods valued at $425,000.
CHAPTER III.
MILITARY.
Old Newbury has ever been patriotic, and made a good record in the various wars of the Colonies and the Republic, in which West New- bury, as a component part, previous to its separation, sustained her full share. It is not necessary to repeat.
Soon after the incorporation, a company of infantry was raised, of which the command was successively held by Capts. Bailey, Otis Little, Joseph Goodrich, and Hanson Ordway. It belonged to the regiment of which Col. Samuel Tenney, of this town, was commander, who was succeeded by Col. Daniel Moulton, of West Newbury. About the same time a company of cavalry was organized under Capt. Uriah Bailey, attached to a regiment of which Col. Moses Newell was commander. The company was subsequently commanded by Thomas Chase, John Pearson, Joseph Little ; and Capt. Bailey was promoted to be colonel of the regiment.
The First Battalion of Rifles, raised and commanded by Maj. Ben : Perley Poore, in which Amos Poor and M. P. Stanwood were cap- tains, was organized in 1852. Maj. Poore was the first in the coun- try to tender his services to the president on the breaking out of the Rebellion. He was subsequently chosen mijor of the 8th Regiment, and served under the first call for troops. Many of the members of that Rifle Battalion were also promoted during the war. Gen. Frankle, Lieut. Col. Stanwood, and Maj. Isaac Boyd, of the 19th Regiment, - a brave and noble soldier, who, after fighting through the whole Rebellion, was killed by almost the last gun fired before Rich- mond. We may mention also Capt. Dow, of the Mozarts ; Capt. M. B. Merrill, and Surgeon Ambrose, who first donned their uniforms in the Rifles.
During the Rebellion, West Newbury acted with much patriotism, and failed not in any duty. At the first meeting to act upon matters relating to the war, held April 29, 1861, the town voted $10,000 as a war emergency fund ; also to pay each member of the Rifle company belonging to West Newbury, ten dollars a month when in active service, and ten dollars a month to each of their families ; and $150 were then appropriated for uniforins.
In July, 1862, it was voted to pay three years' volunteers $150 each. August 15th, the same bounty was voted to nine months' men ; and August 30th that bonnty was doubled ; and so it proceeded to the end, when the whole number of men furnished was 267, or thirty-four over all demands ; and twelve were commissioned officers. The total war expenditures, exclusive of State aid, was $36,240 ; and there was expended for the families of volunteers $21,058, which was reimbursed by the State. This was done by a population of only 2.088, and on a valuation of less than a million. The town did much for the union and freedom of the country : it had the ability to do more, if called upon ; it had the will to do all.
CHAPTER IV.
CHURCHES.
First Parish. - May 31, 1693, the selectmen of Newbury sent a petition to the General Court stating that a long difference had existed between the people of Newbury and the west end of the town about ealling a minister ; that the West End people had called Mr. Edward Tomson to preach to them without acquainting the minister, church, or town with their proceedings, and that the town had declared by vote that they were against his coming, or any other, until the church and town were agreed ; yet he presumed to preach, notwithstanding they had called him to account, to the great disturbance of the peace, &c. To this petition the West End people replied, asking the gov- ernor and council to pity and help them, to ease them of a heavy burden of travel on God's day, under which some had groaned for thirty years. They were three hundred in number; few had horses ; some were old, and some were sickly, and if they could get down to the old meeting-house it was impossible it should receive them, so that many would lie ont of doors, "the house is so little." They further say that under the liberty granted by James the Second, they had erected one house at their own cost and charge, and the governor had granted them protection from paying to the old meeting-house,
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
but had since countermanded it. They close with expressing the opinion that "our neighbors would be glad to see us quite tired out," and begging the court to establish peace among them. In 1695 the town voted to allow the West End folks to choose a minister for themselves, " only Mr. Tomson excepted," they being determined to the last that the West End people should not have the minister of their choice.
In 1698 a church was gathered at Pipe-stave Hill, in a meeting- house built two years previous, and Samuel Belcher was ordained the minister. He was born in Ipswich, 1638, and graduated at Harvard, 1659. He had previously preached at the Isles of Shoals, but was dismissed on account of his age, he being past sixty at the time of his settlement in West Newbury. Ile died in 1715.
A year previous to Mr. Belcher's death, John Tufts was ordained. He was born in Medford, graduated at Harvard in 1708. He preached twenty-four years, when he was dismissed by a council called on com- plaint of some disaffected women of the parish. Mr. Tufts was the author of the first singing-book used in the colony, previous to the publication of which many churches had but two or three tunes, and less than a dozen in all, York, Windsor, and Martyrs, being the best known. It was in criticising this book that a divine wrote, "Truly, I have a great jealousy that if we once begin to sing by rule, the next thing will be to pray by rule, and preach by rule, and then cometh Popery."
The next minister was Thomas Barnard. He was born in Boston, 1716, graduated at Harvard, 1732, ordained, 1739, and dismissed at his own request, 1751, as his relations with his people had become un- pleasant on account of his alleged heresy. He subsequently became a lawyer, and represented Newbury in the General Court, in 1755. The same year he returned to his former profession, and was settled over a church in Salem. He died in 1776.
True Kimball was the next pastor. He was born in Plaistow, N. H., 1757, graduated at Harvard, 1778, was ordained 1782, and dismissed 1797. He afterwards became a Universalist, and was expelled from the church. He died 1816.
Samuel Lamb was next ordained. He was born in Salem, N. Y., and died there in 1832. His settlement was of ten years' duration.
Ebenezer Hubbard, of Marblehead, was ordained 1809, and dis- missed 1811.
Gilbert T. Williams, of New Jersey, graduate of Dartmouth, was installed 1814; dismissed 1821.
Henry C. Wright, of Sharon, Conn., was settled 1826, and dis- missed 1833. He became an abolitionist, a peace advocate, and pub- lished some works on those topics.
Mr. Ober, of Beverly, graduate of Amherst, was settled 1834; dis- missed 1835.
Henry A. Woodman was settled 1842, immediately after the dedi- cation of the new church. He was dismissed on account of ill-health, 1844.
Horatio Merrill, born in Maine, graduated at Dartmouth, was settled 1845 ; dismissed 1847.
Charles Dickenson, graduated at Harvard, installed Mar. 5, 1857; dismissed April 17, 1857.
During the succeeding twenty years, over twenty ministers have supplied the pulpit ; but the parish has been without the will to sustain the church, though wealthy, and it has been assisted by the Essex North Association.
In 1729 the upper part of the West Parish agreed to build a church, and petitioned the General Court to divide the parish into two pre- cincts, the inhabitants of the entire parish embracing one hundred and eighty-three families. The church was organized in 1731, as the Fourth Church, Newbury, with forty-six members. The first minis- ter was William Johnson, born in Newburyport in 1706, graduated at Harvard in 1727, ordained in 1731, and died in 1772. During his ministry, two hundred and seventy-four members were added to the church. He was an able and efficient pastor.
'The second minister was David Toppan, D. D. He was born in Manchester in 1752, graduated at Harvard in 1771, and ordained in 1774. He was an able preacher, and published more sermons, it is said, than all the other ministers in the county. In 1792 he was elected to the Hollis Professorship at Harvard, and was the last orthodox minister to fill that chair.
The third pastor was Leonard Woods, D. D., who was born in Princeton, Mass., in 1774, the year that his predecessor was settled. He graduated at Harvard in 1796, with the highest honors ; his Bach- elor's and Master's orations being published, and highly applauded by the reviewers. He was settled in 1798, his salary being $400 and
eight cords of wood, with the privilege of paying his parents a visit twice a year. In 1808 he was appointed Professor of Theology at Andover, on the opening of the seminary. He was made doctor of divinity by Dartmouth and the College of New Jersey, in 1810. IIc was a man of versatile talents and attainments, and in his professor- ship won a wide and enviable reputation.
In 1816 a new meeting-house was built, and John Kirby, of Mid- dletown, Coun., a graduate of Union College, settled. Two years later he went South for his health, and was lost by shipwreck off the coast of North Carolina.
Elijah Demond, a native of Rutland, Mass., and graduate of Dart- mouth and Andover, was ordained in 1821. There was a strong opposition to his settlement, and he was dismissed in 1826. He was subsequently settled over several other churches.
Paul Couch, a graduate of Dartmouth, 1823, was ordained, 1827 ; dismissed, 1828. He was an earnest advocate of temperance, and au eloquent sermon on that subject caused a marked change in the social habits of the people. Like his immediate predecessor, he had several subsequent settlements.
J. Q. A. Edgell, of Westminster, Vt., graduate of Vermont Uni- versity and Andover Theological Seminary, was ordained in 1832, and preached with good acceptance for twenty-one years, when he was dismissed, and was appointed secretary of the Society for Pro- moting Collegiate and Theological Education at the West. He was one of the sharpest and most logical preachers the parish ever had.
Davis Foster, of Hanover, N. H., graduate of Dartmouth and Andover, was ordained in 1855, and resigned in . 1867.
Seneca Keller, of Madison, N. Y., was installed in 1872, and dis- missed in 1878, and the Rev. M. A. Doherty immediately succeeded, and is preaching to much acceptance.
In 1857, the meeting-house was moved to the Main Road, and re- modelled, at a cost of sixteen thousand dollars.
The Quakers have had a meeting-house near Turkey Hill for some fifty years. Previously they met in a house on High Street, New- buryport ; and their grave-yard, located on Washington Street, is now known by a single stone, with an inscription denoting its former use. As Turkey Hill was more convenient, they built a neat house there ; and not far distant is their place of burial. The congregation is com- posed of about thirty-five persons. There are two families in New- buryport, one or two in Newbury, and the others are in the first parish.
The Baptists have a small church, of recent date, with a pretty little meeting-house on the Main Road, in the second parish ; but they are without rapid growth, and depend now upon a ministry long settled.
The Roman Catholics have purchased a site, and are about building a church in the upper parish, close to the Congregational meeting- house. They have rapidly increased in the past few years, and now constitute about one-quarter of the people.
There are Episcopalians, Unitarians, Universalists, and others, in the town, who worship in Newburyport or Haverhill; and many more-including a large number who are of the Materialistic school- without any church connections.
CHAPTER V.
SCHOOLS - EDUCATION.
Professional teachers would call the schools poor, -good of the class, - as common schools with some attempts to teach the higher branches ; but the education of the people has been good always, far better than in the average of towns even of higher pretensions. The people sprang chiefly from our old Puritan stock, and, inheriting the customs of the fathers, have regarded it a personal duty to oversee the instruction of the children, and when they have needed teaching, beyond the connnon schools, most have been able to send their sons and daughters to the academies ; and the town has also been well represented in the colleges, showing not only a large number of graduates, but those, too, who have been known in after life.
Additional to its schools, it has the instruction of lyceum lectures, debates in the Farmer's Club, reading of a well-selected public library, and of the public library of Newburyport, whenever it will. It would be difficult to find a community where the men are more intelligent, or women more cultivated.
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
This also appears : West Newbury has given to the world educa- tionists of the highest class ; and it happened, at one time, that from this small town were Felton, president of Harvard ; Woods, president of Andover Seminary ; and Woods, president of Bowdoin. These were the leading men of three of our most learned New England institutions, men worthy of individual notice, as are others like Prof. Toppan and Mr. Bailey, of whom we give brief sketches.
Leonard Woods, D. D., was one of the most celebrated Orthodox theologians of his day. He was pastor of the Upper Parish, and his papers in the "Panoplist," on Calvinism, gave him a wide reputation as a controversialist. When Andover Seminary was founded, he was appointed professor of theology, which office he held from 1808 to 1846. He was one of the originators of the American Board of Foreign Missions, and of the American Tract Society, and the first Temperance Society. His published works include "Letters to Unitarians," " Lectures on Inspiration," " Reply to Dr. Ware," " Lee- tures on Infant Baptism," " Memoirs of American Missionaries," " Doctrine of Perfection," " Reply to Mahan," "Lectures on Church Government," "History of Andover Seminary," and other writings, a portion of which are published in five volumes:
Leonard Woods, Jr., was son of Dr. Woods, graduated at Union College in 1827; was, for some quarter of a century, president of Bowdoin College, and author of many theological writings, which he contributed to the "Literary and Theological Review," of which he was editor, and the "Biblical Repository." He is the translator of " Knapp's Theology," and compiler of the " Documentary History of Maine." As a sound scholar, he is much esteemed.
Cornelius Conway Felton, LL.D., eminent as a scholar and author, was born in 1807, in a house below Pipe-stave Hill, still standing in a dilapidated condition. He graduated at Harvard, in 1827, and then and there became Latin tutor for two years, and subsequently
Greek tutor. He was appointed professor of Greek, in 1832, and was elected president of the university, in 1860. IIe was the most celebrated Greek scholar the country has ever produced, and his works in the direction of his. favorite study have been numerous and of standard value. They embrace The Greek Reader, Homer, with. English notes, Aristophanes' Clouds, The Panegyricus of Isocrates, Agamemnon of Æschylus, Greek Historians, Modern Greek Writers, Greek and Roman Metres, and Lowell Lectures on Greece. But his literary efforts were not confined to his professor's chair. He trans- lated Menzel's German Literature, was one of the editors of Ancient Literature and Art, and co-editor with Longfellow of the Poets and Poetry of Europe. He was author of the Life of Gen. Eaton, and contributor to the "New American Cylopedia," the "North American Review," " Christian Examiner," " Boston Courier," and other peri- odicals. He was a member of the Massachusetts board of educa- tion, regent of the Smithsonian Institute, and member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences. He died in 1862.
David Toppan, D.D., the last Orthodox Hollis professor at Ha- vard, had preceded Felton from West Newbury. He was a disti' guished scholar and divine, and held the professorship from 1792 + his death, in 1803. He published several volumes of sermons, ar was author of a work on Jewish antiquities.
Still another noted teacher from West Newbury was Ebene? Bailey, well known as the author of Bailey's Algebra, the first te :..- book that popularized that science and adapted it to the comprehen- sion of pupils of the common schools. He took the first step in the direction of an advanced education for girls, and was the founder of the first female high school. He was the principal of the Young Ladies' High School, Boston, the author of the Young Ladies' Class Book and other educational works. He was also a poet of consider- able note.
ALBERT J. WRIGHT, PRINTER, 79 MILK STREET (CORNER OF FEDERAL), BOSTON.
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