USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts. 1630-1880, Vol. II > Part 66
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tasket, to show them the strength of the fort and the five men-of-war. They spread all their finery to set out their ships." At a later day, Oct. 22, 1722, the New England Courant records : "Last week one of the chiefs of the Mohawks, lately Come to town, died at the Royal Exchange Tavern in King Street, and was magnificently interred on Friday night last. A drawn sword lay on the Coffin, and the pall was supported by six Captains of the Militia. The gentlemen of the Council followed next the corpse, and then the Justices of the town and the Commis- sion officers of the Militia. At last followed four Indians, the two hindmost with each a pappoos at her back."-ED.]
2 " Monday, Nov. 9 [1685]. This day, about 6 or 7 at night, a Male Infant, pin'd up in a sorry cloth, is laid upon the Balk of Shaw the Tobacco-man. Great Search made to-night and next day to find the Mother. So far as I can hear, this is the first Child that ever was in such a manner exposed in Boston." - Sewall's Diary, i. 103.
487
LIFE IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
demnation excited extraordinary sympathy. He was every Sabbath carried through the streets with chains about his ankles and handcuffed, in custody of the Sheriff's officers and constables, to some public meeting, attended by an innumerable company of boys, women, and men." 1
One method of dealing with offenders against honesty appears in an item in the Boston News-Letter for March 30, 1713 : -
" On Wednesday last, while the General Court was sitting here, a Bonfire was made in King Street, below the Town House, of a parcel of Shingles (upwards of eight thousand out of ten thousand) found defective by the Surveyors both as to length and breadth prescribed by the Law, which Shingles were rather chips than Shingles ; and to prevent the like for the future, both makers and sellers of Shingles had best conform to the Law and prevent any more such Bonfires."
In the interest, too, of dumb animals there was an act passed, Oct. 25, 1692, providing that calves, sheep, and lambs, brought alive to market, should be driven or carried in carts, sleds, panniers, or boats, and not other- wise; that is, not slung by the sides of horses.
The prominence of religion in Boston affairs had its illustration in the reception given to Whitefield upon his several visits. He did not come to Boston or go to any of the northern towns on his first visit to America, but his fame was well spread when he appeared a couple of years later, in the autumn of 1740. His labors in Philadelphia especially had excited much interest in Boston, and he was invited here chiefly at the instance of the Rev. Dr. Colman. Whitefield's Journal gives an animated account of his reception in Boston, and citations from it will be found in Dr. Mckenzie's chapter in the present volume.
When he returned for a second visit, in the winter of 1744-45, a great part of his time was taken up in controversy, and at least thirty pamphlets appeared in the war of words which followed. Chauncy preached against him, and published with energy, while Prince and others defended him.2 But the crowds continued to follow him, and the interest of the people consoled him for any coolness in the preachers. He writes at this time : --
"Well is it at present that there are 'Lords Brethren ;' for, finding some of their pastors, without cause, shy of me, they have passed votes of invitation for me to preach in their pulpits ; and sometime ago prevailed upon me to set up a lecture at six in the morning. Not expecting a very great auditory, I opened a lecture in one of the smallest meeting-houses, upon these words : 'And they came early in the morning to hear him.' How was I disappointed ! Such great numbers flocked to hear that I was obliged to make use of two of their largest places of worship, where I believe sel- dom less than two or three thousand hearers assembled. . .. One morning the crowd was so great that I was obliged to go in at the window." 8
1 Sargent, Dealings with the Dead, ii. 630, 631.
2 See one sharp series of brief notes between Chauncy and Prince in 4 Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., ii. 238, 239. See also Timothy Cutler's letter in
Nichols's Illustrations of Literature, iv. 303, copied in Tyerman, ii. 124. Other references will be found in Tyerman.
8 Tyerman, ii. 145, 146.
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THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
Again, at another visit, in October, 1754, he writes: "Thousands waited for, and thousands attended on, the word preached. At the Old North, at seven in the morning, we generally have seven thousand hearers, and many cannot come in."
The commotion over Whitefield showed the people ready to be stirred on religious themes. Some of his figures, indeed, will hardly bear scrutiny when one considers the actual population of Boston and neighborhood; but there is little need to demonstrate the theological susceptibility of the popu- lace. If there were, one might draw some proof from the circumstances attending the installation of Rev. Peter Thacher over the New North Church in 1720, as related by Sargent in his Dealings with the Dead.1
We have before noted the treatment of pirates, and the keen suscepti- bility of Boston to anything which interfered with her commerce. The evils from this source had scarcely disappeared before the agitation of war brought a double evil in perils from French cruisers, and even greater peril from British press-gangs. In Boston town-meeting, March 11, 1746, a com- mittee, previously appointed to draw up a petition relating to grievances by warrants of impressment, made a report which presented considerations affecting the welfare of Boston rather than the rights of individuals. The petition of the Boston inhabitants says : -
" They have cheerfully complied with all the injunctions of Government, altho' their taxes, which are daily increasing, are a burden under which they are almost ready to succumb ; but this notwithstanding, as also the present melancholy stagnation of trade and commerce, which is like to be continued during the war. Yet your peti- tioners have lately been distressed by no less than three several warrants for impressing seamen, which (altho' we apprehend 'em to be illegal) have been executed in an oppressive manner before unknown to Englishmen, and attended with tragical conse- quences ; by which means the numbers of seamen impressed for his Majesty's ships, and those who have fled to the neighboring governments for protection from impress- ment, added to those who went in the sea service to Cape Breton, amount to more than three thousand."
The effect was to diminish the trade of Boston and greatly to increase both trade and privateering in the Southern colonies, which had no hand in the war, yet reaped all the advantage. The report containing the petition was signed, among others, by Captain Samuel Adams, and was accepted ; but a fortnight later it was reconsidered as containing expressions which seemed to reflect upon the Governor and Council. The town disavowed any disrespect.
In November, 1747, occurred the Knowles riot, when Commodore Knowles, who had lost many seamen by desertion, sent his boats up to town from Nantasket where he lay, very early in the morning, and not only seized as many seamen as possible, but swooped down on the wharves and carried off landsmen and carpenters' apprentices. A mob collected in King Street
1 See vol. i. pp. 126, 127.
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LIFE IN BOSTON IN THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
below the Town House, where the General Court was sitting, and flung stones and brickbats into the council chamber. The Governor in vain tried to quell the tumult, and was compelled to retire to Castle William. The militia refused to answer the call of the Government, and a vast town meet- ing was held to consider the affair. The formal action of the town was spirited and dignified : ---
" It being represented that the town had been charged, or the generality of the inhabitants, with abetting or encouraging the late tumultuous, riotous assembly which insulted his Excellency the Governor and the other branches of the Legislature, and committed many other heinous offences -
" Resolved, as the unanimous opinion of the town in this large meeting of the inhabitants, that the said riotous, tumultuous assembly consisted of foreign seamen, servants, negroes, and other persons of mean and vile condition ; that this town have the utmost abhorrence of such illegal criminal proceedings, and will to their utmost discountenance and suppress the same, and will at the same time encourage by all ways and means whatsoever any of their inhabitants in making a regular orderly appli- cation to the proper powers for redressing all and every grievance which the town is under from the impressing of their inhabitants on board His Majesty's ships of war, which may have occasioned the said tumultuous, disorderly assembling." 1
The Commodore was finally compelled to release the men he had im- pressed, and the militia conducted the Governor back to his house with great pomp and ceremony.2
There were certainly men among the townsmen of Boston who were not easily suppressed in their opinions by the weight of government. It had long been the custom for the people of Boston in town-meeting assembled to draw up instructions to their representatives to the General Court; and there are few more pregnant passages in the records than one which gives the action of a long and animated town-meeting held in 1744, when a committee, of which again Captain Samuel Adams was a member, brought in a draft of instructions which were to be given to the representatives, who happened now to be Thomas Cushing, Timothy Prout, Thomas Hutchinson, and Andrew Oliver. The composition of the delegation, as well as the dis- cussion which followed the report, disclose the struggle which had already begun in the political life. The committee, consisting of Ezekiel Lewis, Samuel Welles, James Allen, Samuel Adams, and Abiel Walley, brought in a report in four paragraphs, which was read, and then discussed and voted upon, paragraph by paragraph. The first, which called for a longer time in the distribution of the expenses of the war, was accepted. The second, which looked to a more even adjustment of taxes, was also accepted; but the final sentence, which reads as follows, was amended by the omission of the words enclosed in brackets : -
"We cannot suppose, because in some extraordinary times, when a Party spirit has run high, there have been some abuses of our liberties and privileges, that therefore
2 Holmes, Annals, ii. 34. [More extended accounts of this riot will be found in Snow's
1 Boston Town Records, Nov. 20, 1747. Boston, 238 ; in Bryant and Gay's United States, iii. 218. See also N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., 1874, p. 462. - ED.]
VOL. II. - 62.
490
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
we should in a servile manner give them all up, [and have our bread and water measured out to us by those who Riot in Luxury and Wantonness on our Sweat and Toil, and be told, perhaps, by them that we are too happy because we are not reduced to eat grass with the Cattle."]
The third paragraph, calling for the abatement of taxes, was accepted, but the fourth and final one was wholly rejected :-
"We further expect, as you regard the good of Town or Country, that you will be very watchful, and do all in your power that none who have a visible temptation to prostitute the public interest and treasure to serve their own may be improved or have opportunity given them for it ; we also desire you carefully to avoid men who, from a mean and servile complaisance to those in power, would compliment away our estates and liberties, nor let these despicable Fools, from the supple and contemptible figure they make, be thought below your care or notice. Remember that great mis- chief may arise from the deceitful cringing and fawning of the Spaniel, as well as from the Polluted and rapacious jaws of the mastiff." 1
These be parlous words, and it is seen that the town forbore to present them as instructions to its representatives. But in the spirit which penned them in committee and defended them in stormy debate may be read the rising temper of the town. The field of men's energies had been shifted. The town-meeting was still the arena of debate in the community, but the questions which were discussed there were widening. It was no longer the welfare of the local churches which engaged the men in town and State; it was the autonomy of a community which was soon to be pitted against a great empire. In that change were involved wide differences in morals, manners, and the whole course of civic life.
1 Boston Town Records, Sept. 25, 1744.
[Note. - The Bennett MS. quoted in this chapter is a bound quarto volume of 270 pages, preserved among the Sparks manuscripts, in Harvard College Library, having been given to Mr. Sparks by William Vaughan, at London, Dec. 2, 1840. It bears the following introduc-
tion : " To Mr. Samuel Savile, of Currier's Hall, London, Attorney-at-law : Dear friend, - I here present you with an abstracted Historical Ac- count of that part of America called New Eng- land; to which I have added the History of our voiage thereto, Anno Domini, 1740." - ED.]
CHAPTER XVII.
TOPOGRAPHY AND LANDMARKS OF THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
BY EDWIN L. BYNNER.
TN the half century which elapsed between its settlement and the loss of the Colony charter Boston had grown, from a feeble scattering of tents and log-cabins huddled about the town-dock, to a flourishing town of four or five thousand inhabitants, with three churches, several comely public buildings, as many fine private residences, an excellent public school, with an infant college not far off, and ample fortifications.
This growth will be found remarkable upon a very slight consideration of the obstacles under which it took place, - the danger and difficulties of ocean traffic, the terrible severity of the early winters, the frequent ravages of fire and pestilence, the French and Indian wars,1 and always and every- where the contemptuous neglect or the obstructive jealousy of the home . government.
With the beginning of the eighteenth century it may be said that, having weathered the perils of infancy, Boston had just fairly entered upon its grow- ing period. The barriers of bigotry were at length broken down, the liberal provisions of the new charter welcomed all the world, but Papists, to citizen- ship, and the next quarter of a century accordingly is marked by a more rapid growth, - the population having increased from four or five thousand in 1684 to eighteen thousand in 1710.
In the absence of definite authority we are left to surmise the exact population of the town at the beginning of the Provincial period. From the report of Edward Randolph, although written some years previously and highly colored to serve his insidious purpose, we get, however, some sug- gestive estimates upon this and other matters of interest. He says: "There are men able to bear armes [in the colony] between 30 and 40,000, and in
1 Palfrey, quoting Governor Hutchinson, as- of Pokanoket." Within that time he (Governor cribes the slow growth of the Massachusetts Province "to the wars which, with only two short intermissions, had been going on through the forty years since the outbreak under Philip
Hutchinson) calculates that five or six thousand 'of the youth of the country had perished by the enemy or the distempers contracted in the ser- vice. Palfrey, History of New England, i. 303.
492
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
the town of Boston is computed about 4,000," - which Hutchinson justly calls an extravagant computation. Twenty years afterward, in 1698, the Rev. Cotton Mather, in his sermon at the Boston lecture, gives a more moderate estimate: "In one twelvemonth about One Thousand of our Neighbours have one way or another been carried unto their long Home, and yet we are after all many more than Seven Thousand souls of us at this hour living on the Spot."
Taking other parts of Randolph's report with an equal grain of salt, they are not without value and interest. " The town," he says, " contains about 2,000 houses, most built with tymber and covered with shingles of cedar, as are most of the houses in the country ; some few are brick buildings and . covered with tyles." He adds further : "There are about 30 merchants that are esteemed worth from ten to twenty thousand pounds; most have considerable estates and very great trades, and are an industrious and thriv- ing people. There are no servants but upon hired wages, except some few who serve four years for the charge of being transported thither by their masters; and not above 200 slaves in the colony, and those are brought from Guinea and Madagascar."
Unmistakable indications of the town's growth in the first quarter of the new century may be found in the number of public buildings erected. Besides seven churches, - King's Chapel, Brattle Street, the Old Quaker, the New North, the New South, the New Brick, and Christ Church, -and three new schools, - the Free Writing School on Cornhill, the school at the South End, and the writing-school in Love Lane, - there were built the Bridewell and Workhouse on Park Street, the Manufactory House, Long Wharf, the Mill Bridge, Master Cheever's house, - a public undertaking, - and the Powder-house on the Common; besides all which, the ferries to Chelsea and Charlestown were improved, and the fortifications on Fort Hill built and repaired.
Of public buildings of another character the list seems largely dispro- portionate to any conceivable need. The number of inns, taverns, and houses of public entertainment in this little Puritan town of four or five thousand inhabitants in 1684 may well astonish the ingenuous reader who judges of old-time conviviality by the stern tenor of the laws in other re- spects. As early as 1680 it was provided by the General Court that "the persons annually licensed after the first day of October next shall not exceed -i.e. in Boston - sixe wine tauernes, ten innholders, and eight retaylers for. wine and strong licquors out of doores."
That this was by no means a lavish provision of the legislature is proved by an extract from the records four years afterward, in the last days of the colony, when it was provided that there might be " five or sixe more pub- licke houses in Boston, the selectmen of the towne of Boston yearely approving of the persons as meet and fit for ye employment."
That these inns were at all times the objects of jealous surveillance by the authorities is shown by the fact that at first officers were authorized to
493
TOPOGRAPHY, ETC., OF THE PROVINCIAL PERIOD.
take note of all hangers-on and loungers, inquire their business, and interfere to prevent any over-indulgence in good cheer. Later, an act of the legis- lature required the selectmen in each town to cause to be posted up in all public houses within the town "a list of the names of all persons reputed drunkards or common tipplers," while the innkeeper furnishing them with the liquor was subjected to a fine.1 The story of the ingenuous French- man described by the Abbé Robin, who ventured to indulge himself in a little practice upon the violin on the Sabbath-day, although in the retire- ment of his own room at the inn, and the prompt interference of the indignant neighbors, will be remembered as a case in point; while more amusing still, as an extreme instance of the watchful care of the elders in this regard, is the solemn farce described by Sewall when he went, with several others, to " Treat with Brother Wing about his Setting a Room in his House for a man to shew Tricks in. He saith, seeing 'tis offensive he will remedy it. It seems the Room is fitted with Seats. I read what Dr. Ames saith of Callings, and spake as I could from this Principle, that the Man's Practice was unlawfull, and therefore Capt. Wing could not law- fully give him an accomodation for it. Sung the 90 Ps., from the 12th v. to the end. Broke up." 2
But the growth of a town is gradual and mysterious, and no more to be marked from day to day than that of a plant or animal; and so for the first dozen years and more of the new period Boston presented an appear- ance little differing from that given in the last days of the colony; there were, to be sure, a few hundreds more people, a few score more buildings, a few dozen more streets; but Long Wharf was not yet built, the cows still held undivided possession of the Tramount; Deacon Colbron's field was away at the outer end of the town; and incautious or tipsy people were occasionally lost in traversing the wilderness of the Neck.
During the ten years succeeding the great fire of 1676 various laws were made with reference to streets and buildings, which undoubtedly resulted in great improvements in the outward aspect of the town. We learn from the records of the colony that "at a meeting of the Council, Dec. 28, 1676, upon complaint of Boston selectmen about [want of ?] straightness of the streets, an order was passed that no man should rebuild upon the burnt dis- trict until the next meeting of the General Court." At the next meeting of the selectmen of Boston the above order was read, and the selectmen staked out the streets and declared that any man might rebuild, with their consent, who would observe their directions as to the new lines, making the streets broader and straighter. The action of the selectmen was approved by the Court, which ordered satisfaction for damages done in widening, etc. Three years later attention was directed to building materials, and it was enacted that -
1 Massachusetts Laws. [See further on inns and taverns in Mr. Scudder's chapter in this volume ; and the position of some of the prin- cipal ones, as well as the names of successive
keepers of them, are pointed out in the Introduc- tion, also in the present volume. - ED.] 2 Sewall's Diary, i. 196. [See Introduction, p. xxiii. - ED.]
494
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
"This Court hauing a sence of the great ruines in Boston by fire, and hazard still of the same by reason of the joyning and neereness of their buildings, for prevention of damage and losse thereby, for future doe order and enact that henceforth no dwelling house in Boston shall be errected and sett vp except of stone or bricke, and couered with slate or tyle, on penalty of forfeiting double the value of such buildings, vnless by allowance and liberty obteyned otheruise from the magistrates, comissioners, and selectmen of Boston or major parte of them."
The next year this was suspended on account of the inability of the people to build in brick and stone, but it was soon afterward re-enacted with a penalty of one hundred pounds.1 Ideas of solidity and elegance were evidently early associated with buildings of brick. Palfrey, in his re- marks upon early architecture, says : -
" Frame houses with brick chimneys, and lathed and plastered within, very soon superseded in common use the rude shelters which had at first sufficed. Nor were there wanting mansions of more pretensions at the early time. When Coddington went from Boston to found his colony, he had already built there a brick house which, when old, he still remembered as a token of his departed magnificence." 2
So, it is said, Sir William Phips used to tell his wife that -
" He should yet be Captain of a King's Ship; that he should come to have the Command of better men than he was now accounted himself; and that he should be the Owner of a Fair Brick House in the Green Lane of North Boston, and that, it may be, this would not be all that the Providence of God would bring him to." 8
There are several descriptions of the town nearly contemporaneous with the beginning of the Provincial period, from widely different sources, which, however, agree in the main.
The visit of Jasper Dankers and his comrade in 1680 has already been referred to. They wrote a Journal of their American experiences, includ- ing their visit to Boston; their narrative is somewhat dull, but in many respects interesting as coming from an entirely impartial source. Of the town they say : -
" The city is quite large, constituting about twelve companies. It has three churches, or meeting-houses, as they call them. All the houses are made of thin, small cedar shingles nailed against frames, and then filled in with brick and other stuff ; and so are their churches. For this reason these towns are so liable to fires, - as have 1 already happened several times ; and the wonder to me is that the whole city has not been burnt down, so light and dry are the materials. There is a large dock in front of it, constructed of wooden piers, where the large ships go to be careened and rigged ; the smaller vessels all come up to the city. .. . Upon the point of the bay on the left hand there is a block-house, along which a piece of water runs, called the Milk ditch."
1 [The law of 1692, with a petition of the in- habitants of Boston in 1696 asking that it may be repealed, and a note of the additional act passed in 1699, will be found in the N. E. Hist.
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