USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts. 1630-1880, Vol. II > Part 60
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has been copied in Wells, ii. A copy of the painting was made about the same time by J. Mitchell, and from this copy a mezzotint engrav- ing by Samuel Okey was issued at Newport in 1775. Both the Boston and London editions of the Impartial History of the War in Amer- ica, a few years later, had other heads of Adaıns. The statue of Adams now in Adams Square (a duplicate of one in the Capitol at Washington) follows this Copley picture. A smaller picture by Copley, 16 by 12 inches, in the artist's later manner, hangs in Memorial Hall, Cambridge, and is here followed. In 1795, when Adams
439
LIFE. IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
The appearance which Boston in the middle of the eighteenth century presented to a visitor was one of thrift and substantial prosperity. It had much the air of some of the best country towns in England.1 The marginal lines had not materially changed, as Price's plan of 1743 shows; and the territory of the little peninsula sufficed, with but slight changes, until the new movement in life began early in the present cen- tury. The population had increased chiefly by process of natural laws, unaided by any extensive immigration or influx from the country. When the small-pox broke out in 1722, it was estimated that the town contained about twelve thousand inhabitants.
Twenty years later, in 1742, there were about eighteen thousand, and the number scarcely exceeded twenty thousand in 1760. This sta- tionary character of the population aided no doubt in the preservation of local characteristics. In the valu- · ation of 1742 there were reported to be one thousand seven hundred and nineteen houses, and one hundred and sixty-six warehouses; twelve hundred of the population were widows, a thousand of them being set down as poor; and there were Barthor Green one thousand five hundred and fourteen negroes in town.2 Peter Faneuil had just presented Faneuil Hall to the town; and there were standing, besides the Town House Elliot and Province House, ten meeting- houses of the prevailing faith, three SIGNATURES TO A PETITION FOR PAVING THE edifices of the Church of England, SOUTH END.3 a French, a Quaker, and one Irish or Presbyterian meeting-house. There was a work-house and an alms-house, a granary and four school-houses. The streets were open and spacious, - at least, Burnaby thought so, -
Thomas Walk on John Clough Caleb Eddy
was governor, a likeness of him was painted by John Johnson, which was burned up not many years ago. Graham made a mezzotint from it in 1797, and from this the likeness in Wells's Life, iii., is reproduced. - ED.]
1 Burnaby's Travels through the Middle Set- tlements in North America, p. 134. Burnaby's visit was made just before the great fire of 1760.
2 For these figures see A Summary, Historical and Political, of the First Planting, Progressive Improvements, and Present State of the British Settlements in North America, by William Doug-
lass, M.D. London : 1755, vol. i., p. 531. [It is fair to observe regarding Douglass and his book, that unless corroborated his opinions hardly pass unchallenged by investigators, and his statements are very often in need of other evidence. - ED.]
3 [Various petitions are on the files of the City Clerk's office, praying the selectmen for the paving of different streets and ways. The above is dated 1714, and shows the names of some of the leading townsmen of that section. They asked that the highway from Deacon Eliot's to the new lane by Mr. Ipses might be paved. - ED.]
440
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
and well paved. The harbor was busy with shipping, and Long Wharf stretched out nearly half a mile, with a row of warehouses on its north side, and a battery planted at its terminus upon the water. Just how the town appeared to a stranger in 1740 may be seen from the animated account given by a Mr. Bennett, who wrote a history of New England, with a nar- rative of his travels, - a work which has remained in manuscript, though . portions have been copied into the Proceedings of the Massachusetts His- torical Society.1 He says : -
"At the entrance of the bay there are several rocks of great magnitude, the tops of which appeared considerably above the surface of the water at the time of our passing by them. There are also about a dozen little islands all in view as we ap- proach the town, some of which are as fine farms as any in the whole country. This town has a good natural security, in my opinion ; for there is great plenty of rocks and shoals, which are not easy to be avoided by strangers to the coasts ; and there is but one safe channel to approach the harbor, and that so narrow that three ships can hardly sail through abreast ; but within the harbor there is room enough for five hundred sail to lie at an anchor.
"The entrance to the [inner] harbor is defended by a strong Castle, which they call Fort William, on which there are mounted a hundred guns, twenty of which lie on a platform level with the water, to prevent an enemy passing the Castle, - which is a quarry surrounded by a covered way, joined with two lines of communication to the main battery. This battery is situated so near the channel, that all ships going up to town must sail within musket-shot of it. ... About two leagues distant from the Castle, on a rock, stands an exceeding fine light-house,2 at which there is a guard con- stantly attending to prevent surprise ; from whence they make signals to the Castle when any ships come in sight, whether friend or foe. ... When a signal is made from off the lighthouse to the Castle of the approach of an enemy, if there be more than four or five ships, then the Castle thereupon gives a signal to the town ; and those of the town alarm the country by firing of a beacon. And for that purpose they have a very famous one on the northwest side of the town, erected on a hill, much like unto that in Greenwich Park, on which Flamstead House stands.
" At the bottom of the bay there is a fine wharf about half a mile in length, on the north side of which are built many warehouses for the storing of merchants' goods ; this they call the Long Wharf, to distinguish it from others of lesser note. And to this wharf ships of the greatest burthen come up so close as to unload their cargo with- out the assistance of boats. From the end of the Long Wharf, which lies east from the town, the buildings rise gradually with an easy ascent westward about a mile. There are a great many good houses and several fine streets, little inferior to some of our best in London, the principal of which is King's Street ; it runs upon a line from the end of the Long Wharf about a quarter of a mile, and at the upper end of it stands the Town House or Guild Hall, where the Governor meets the Council and
1 January meeting, 1861. ing old and infirm, he was succeeded in 1733 by Robert Ball, who petitioned to have the light-
2 The one, I suppose, which the Legisla- ture, in 1715, ordered erected on Beacon Island. [The Boston News-Letter, Sept. 17, 1716, records that the lighthouse at the en- trance of the harbor was first lighted, Sept. 14. John Hayes was the first keeper of it; but be- it as late as 1745 .- ED.]
Robert Balle
house and the dwelling repaired. He still kept
441
LIFE IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
House of Representatives ; and the several courts of Justice are held there also. And there are likewise walks for the merchants, where they meet every day at one o'clock, in imitation of the Exchange at London, which they call by the name of Royal Exchange too, round which there are several booksellers' shops ; and there are four or five printing-houses, which have full employment in printing and reprinting books, of one sort or other, that are brought from England and other parts of Europe.
" This town was not built after any regular plan, but has been enlarged from time to time as the inhabitants increased ; and is now, from north to south, something more than two miles in length, and in the widest part about one mile and a half in breadth. . . . There are sixty streets, forty-one lanes, and eighteen alleys, besides squares, courts, etc. The streets are well paved and lying upon a descent. The town is, for the generality, as dry and clean as any I ever remember to have seen. When we were upon the sea, that part of the town which lies about the harbor ap- peared to us in the form of a crescent, or half-moon ; and the country, rising grad- ually from it, afforded us a pleasant prospect of the neighboring fields and woods."
There was as yet no bridge connecting the peninsula with the main, and the Charlestown Ferry was a busy place. Great complaint had been made of the remissness of the men in charge of it, so that in 1710 an act was passed pro- Sam Hudson viding that there should be "three sufficient suitable boats and appurtenances, with able, sober persons to row in them, kept for the transportation of persons and horses " John Jolly FERRYMEN IN 1691.1 over the ferry, - one of which was always to be in passage and the others waiting at the opposite shores, each ready to put out as soon as the third boat should come alongside. The three boats were "to continue plying from side to side with all industry and diligence, daily (except on the Lord's Day, and then to pass no oftener than necessity shall require)," from sunrise until eight or nine at night, according as it was winter or summer.2 For travel within the town itself there was abundant provision. Douglass, in quoting from the valuation of 1742, mentions four hundred and eighteen horses; and an act passed June 25, 1744; provided that coaches, chariots, four-wheeled chaises, calashes, and chairs should be taxed for the repair of Boston Neck, but that the carriages of the Governor and settled ministers should be exempt. Bennett's testimony on this point is explicit and inter- esting : -
1 [There is a chapter on the early ferries in W. W. Wheildon's Curiosities of History. Bos- ton, 1880, p. 27. - ED ]
2 [The regularly established ferries did not prevent occasional other service of this kind, and sometimes to good purposes. John Erving be- came an eminent Boston merchant (he was born in 1693), and the Hon. Robert C. Winthrop VOL. II .- 56.,
said of him in 1845, "a few dollars earned on a Commencement Day, by ferrying passengers over Charles River, shipped to Lisbon in the shape of fish, and from thence to London in the shape of fruit, and from thence brought home to be reinvested in fish, laid the foundations of the largest fortune of the day." Sabine, American Loyalists, i. 406. - ED.]
442
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
"There are several families in Boston that keep a coach and pair of horses, and some few drive with four horses ; but for chaises and saddle-horses, considering the bulk of the place, they outdo London. They have some nimble, lively horses for the coach, but not any of that beautiful black breed so common in London. Their sad- dle-horses all pace naturally, and are generally counted surefooted ; but they are not kept in that fine order as in England.1 The common draught-horses used in carts about the town are very small and poor, and seldom have their fill of anything but labor.2 The country carts and wagons are generally drawn by oxen, from two to six, according to the distance of place, or burden they are laden with. . .. Their roads, though they have no turnpikes, are exceeding good in summer ; and it is safe travelling night or day, for they have no highway robbers to interrupt them.8 It is pleasant riding through the woods ; and the country is pleasantly interspersed with farm- houses, cottages, and some few gentlemen's seats between the towns."
Communication between Boston and the other colonies, as well as with England, was under more or less regulation. A regular postmaster was ap- pointed as early as 1677, by the Council ; and the postoffice, in 1704, was the natural place of publication for the first journal, the Boston News-Letter. The postmaster, John Campbell, was the publisher, and in 1710 he was regu- larly appointed under the Act of Parliament which had established a General Postoffice in North America. Revenue was in part the object of the enact- ment. The rate of postage upon letters from England was a shilling for single letters, and so remained until after the middle of this century. There was a running account however at the office, for we find regular advertise- ments in the News-Letter to such effect as this: -
" Monday, the 14th of December last, being quarter-day for paying the postage of letters at the postoffice in Boston, notice is hereby given to such as have not already paid, that without fail they should do it on Monday or Tuesday morning next, the fourth and fifth dayes of this instant January, between the hours of eight and twelve, as they desire to be credited for the future." 4
Something of the primitive manners may be inferred from the announce- ment of the postoffice hours : -
" These are to give notice to all persons concerned, that the postoffice in Boston is opened every Monday morning from the middle of March to the middle of Sep-
1 In 1728 there were so many dogs in Bos- ton that the butchers were excessively annoyed by them; and an order was passed that no per- son should keep any dog in Boston above ten inches in height! Boston Town Records, July I, 1728.
2 [Drake, Landmarks, p. 177, thinks that an order of the town defining the length of trucks (18 feet), passed as early as 1720, indicates the use even then of those cumbrous vehicles, the memory of which is now confined to those of middle and later life. - ED.]
8 But earlier there were other perils even
upon such short journeys as from Boston to Roxbury. In the News-Letter for Feb. 1, 1713, we read : "On Friday night one Bacon, of Rox- bury, going home in his slade with three horses, was bewilder'd in the dark, himself found dead with the cold, next morning, one of the horses drowned in the Marsh, the other two not yet heard of." [There are in the Historical Society's Cabinet the papers of an inquest on an Indian woman drowned on the flats on Boston Neck, by reason of the ice breaking under her. Miscella- neous Papers, ii. 58. -- ED.]
+ Boston News-Letter, Jan. 4, 1713.
443
LIFE IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
tember, at seven of the clock, to deliver out all letters that do come by the post till twelve a'clock ; from twelve to two a'clock, being dinner-time, no office kept; and from two a'clock in the afternoon to six a-clock the office will be open to take in all letters to go by the Southern and Western post, and none to be taken in after that hour, excepting for the Eastern post till seven at night." 1
There was not apparently very rigid discipline in the postoffice. The postmaster complains in his paper that people were in the habit of going on board vessels when they came into port and taking possession of letters, with the promise to deliver them to the proper persons. He reminds them that by Act of Parliament all masters of vessels, or passengers, having letters are to deliver them only to the postmaster or his deputy, and to receive a penny for each letter so delivered; " and for the benefit and advantage of mer- chants and others it's thought very proper for all masters (as it has been usual) to make a fair alphabetical list of the names and number of letters in his bagg, which list hung up at the office-door would soon resolve any person if they had any letters by such a ship."2 The first published list of letters uncalled for appeared, according to Drake,3 in the News-Letter for Jan. 30, 1755, and contained 351 names.
Unquestionably the chief impression made then by Boston on a stranger was its great activity as a trading-town, and, in connection with that, its large ship-building interests. In these respects it led all the settlements of the British-American colonies ; yet when Sam Adams, after leaving college, en- gaged in business with his father, he heard a great deal of the narrow policy of British legislation which had already begun to tell on Boston commerce and ship-building.4 A fanciful derivation at one time connected the word caucus, which first appeared about 1724, with the political meetings attended by Sam Adams's father, and composed chiefly of ship-building mechanics or calkers at the North End. The enterprise, which had been opened by John Winthrop's " Blessing of the Bay," had been enlarged and had become the great industry of the town. On Price's plan one may count sixteen ship-yards, and there were no doubt other less important ones. In 1738, according to Burke,5 there were built at Boston forty-one topsail vessels of 6,324 tons in all; in 1743 the number had fallen off to thirty; in 1746 there were but twenty, and in 1749 the number was reduced to fifteen, making but 2,450 tons of shipping.6 The connection between the ship-building and
I Boston News-Letter, May 24, 1714. [Andros, in his time, had planned a post to Connecticut once a month, and each three weeks in sum- mer; but in 1711 mails were running regularly east and west from Boston, and once a week a carrier went to Plymouth. - ED ]
2 Ibid., April 11, 1715.
8 History of Boston, p. 636.
4 [In 1698 Bellomont had classed the ships belonging to Boston: One hundred to three hundred tons, 25; one hundred and under, 38; brigantines, 50; ketches, 13; sloops, 67 ; in all,
194 vessels. "I believe I may venture to say there are more good vessels " says that governor, "belonging to the town of Boston than to all Scotland and Ireland." - ED.]
5 Account of the European Settlements in America, ii. 183.
6 [In the Gleaner Articles of N. I. Bowditch, Nos. 16, 17, and 51, there are some data about the Boston ropewalks of this century. He says (No. 22) that "fourteen ropewalks in Boston were probably spinning all at once for a period of at least sixty years."-ED.]
444
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
commerce of the town is pointed out by the same writer, who describes the method of the merchants : -
" The business of ship-building is one of the most considerable which Boston or the other seaport towns in New England carry on. Ships are sometimes built here upon commission, but frequently the merchants of New England have them con- structed on their own account, and loading them with the produce of the colony, - naval stores, fish, and fish-oil principally, - they send them out upon a trading voyage to Spain, Portugal, or the Mediterranean ; where, having disposed of their cargo, they make what advantage they can by freight, until such time as they can sell the vessel herself to advantage, which they seldom fail to do in a reasonable time. They receive the value of the vessel, as well as of the freight of the goods which from time to time they carried, and of the cargo with which they sailed originally, in bills of exchange upon London ; for, as the people of New England have no commodity to return for the value of above a hundred thousand pounds, which they take in various sorts of goods from England, but some naval stores, - and those in no great quantities, -they are obliged to keep the balance somewhat even by this circuitous commerce, which, though not carried on with Great Britain, nor with British vessels, yet centres in its profits, where all the money which the colonies can make in any manner must centre at last." 1
From Christmas, 1747, to Christmas, 1748,2 five hundred and forty vessels cleared from the port of Boston, and four hundred and thirty entered ; and these numbers did not include coasting and fishing vessels, of at least an equal number. Burke, calls the New England people the Dutch of America, for they were carriers for all the colonies of North America and the West Indies, and even for some parts of Europe. The proportionate size of the vessels may be inferred from the accounts of the Boston Naval Office on foreign voyages, where, from Michaelmas, 1747, to Michaelmas, 1748, four hundred and ninety-one vessels cleared, of which fifty-one were ships, forty- four snows, fifty-four brigs, two hundred and forty-nine sloops, and ninety- three schooners.3
1 Account of the European Settlements in America, ii. 175.
2 [For the purposes of a comparison with a period fifty years earlier, the reader may find, if he is curious, in the Massachusetts Archives, "Com- mercial," i., lists of the clearances from Boston, during a part of the inter-charter period, 1686-88. The names of a few of the vessels and command- ers of most frequent occurrence follow. They are all given as belonging to Boston, unless otherwise designated : -
Ketch " Amity," John Bonner ; ketch "Mary and Elizabeth," of Charlestown, Nathaniel Cary ; ship "James," Job Prince ; sloop "Swan," John Nelson ; ketch " Abigail," Andrew Eliot; ketch " Mary," Jonathan Balston; bark " Lidia," Ben- jamin Guilham; ship "Society," ninety tons, four guns, ten men, Thomas Fayerweather ; ship "Nevis Merchant," Timothy Clarke ; ship " Swallow," John Eldridge ; brig "Silvanus," of Charlestown, Bartholomew Green; ship "Dol- phin," John Foy; ketch "Lark," John Walley ;
ketch " Samuel," Giles Fifield ; ketch " Friend- ship," thirty tons, six men, Thomas Winsor ; ship " Swan," Andrew Belcher ; brigantine "Sup- ply," John Hunt ; ship " Rebecca," John Hobby ; ketch "George," Andrew Eliot; brigantine "Blessing," of Charlestown, Bartholomew Green; pink "Endeavor " Simon Eyre; bark " Tryal " Barrakah Arnold; ship " Friendship," one hun- dred tons, fourteen guns, John Ware; sloop " Providence," John Rainsford.
There are other lists of clearances in this same volume, 1701-14. See notice of the re- turns for a part of the time of the Naval Office, in the British State-Paper Office, as cited by Pal- frey, iii. 566. - ED.]
8 Douglass, i. 538. It was now about thirty- four years after the invention of the name "schooner." [See Babson, History of Gloucester, p. 251, for the usual story of the origin of the name. A bystander at the launch of one ex- claimed, " How she schoons !" and the name grew out of it. - ED.]
445
LIFE IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
Trong Greene Jam! Seaking
C: Tilden John Gooch 2
Jos ª Quincy
The Faucher Ralph Imman John Dennis
John Kong
Benj busting
U
To Gunter
Sam Hewes thom Hancock George Holmes
Job Sonis r
To Hell
John Steel. Samuel Wells.
Jos Rufsel
JohnWendell Jacob Wondelly
AUTOGRAPHS OF BOSTON MERCHANTS OF THE MIDDLE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.
446
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
John Avery ThoGreene P
Ja Boutnauy
thomas Oxnard
John Spooner Joseph Lee Mineas Mackey Edi Hinslong
Jonathan Brinna
Jon Jones
Sam Margis Nich Gasts Fon
John Boylston copa
Beny Faneuil Jane Freeman James Bowdoin
Hary Quincy
AUTOGRAPHS OF BOSTON MERCHANTS OF THE MIDDLE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.
447
LIFE IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
The ships that sailed out from Boston harbor carried beef, pork, fish, lumber, and oil; and from the West Indies brought rice, pitch, spices, logwood, rum, and sugar. They brought good rum from the West Indies, and the best refined sugar from London; but for ordinary consumption New England rum and sugar served, and a brisk business was carried on at Boston in distilling. Burke says: -
" The quantity of spirits which they distil in Boston from the molasses they bring in from all parts of the West Indies is as surprising as the cheap rate at which they vend it, which is under two shillings a gallon ; with this they supply almost all the consump- tion of our colonies in North America, the Indian trade there, the vast demands of their own and the Newfoundland fisheries, and, in great measure, those of the African trade ; but they are more famous for the quantity and cheapness than for the excel- lency of their rum." 1
There are eight still-houses marked on Price's plan, divided between the Mill Pond and the wharves near the foot of Essex Street.2
The importance of the commercial and manufacturing interests of Bos- ton at this time is illustrated further by two interesting papers preserved in the Town Records, under dates of Jan. 1, 1735, and March 16, 1742, - the latter reiterating and adding to the statements and arguments of the former, both representing the check to prosperity which the town had received, and calling upon the General Court to take into account the con- sideration urged in apportioning Boston's share of the provincial expenses. The statement of 1742 declares : -
" The greatest advantage this town reaped from that trade [to London] was by ship-building, which employed most of our tradesmen. But that is now reduced so that whereas in 1735 orders might arrive for building forty sail of ships, there has been as yet but orders for two, by which means the most advantageous branch of trade to our mother country, being lessened to so great a degree, must necessarily oblige a great many of our useful tradesmen to leave the town, as many have already done ; so that this town will suffer exceedingly for want of that branch of trade being properly supported, and thereby rendered much less able to support a large tax, than from the decline of all the other branches of trade together, by reason that that branch employed more men than all the rest."
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