USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts, 1630-1880, Vol. III > Part 77
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1 [See Colonel Wilder's chapter, in Vol. IV. - ED.]
597
DORCHESTER IN THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.
was $65,606.99. In the work of relief among the soldiers, the churches of Dorchester did a noble service. The Benevolent Society of the First Parish was organized Nov. 8, 1861, largely for this object. This society alone during the war sent to the soldiers provisions and supplies worth from fifteen to twenty thousand dollars. The other churches did similar work, and to- gether must have furnished a like amount. On Sunday, Aug. 31, 1862, when the news of the result of the second battle of Bull Run reached Dor- chester, all the parishes in town dispensed with religious services in the afternoon, and applied themselves to picking lint, making bandages, and packing clothes, wine, jellies, and other refreshments for the sick and wounded. The First Parish alone sent off twenty-one cases the next day. The amount contributed by societies and private individuals for the relief of soldiers and seamen during the war exceeded the sum of $50,000.
The number of Dorchester citizens who perished in the war was one hundred. This does not include the number of men from other towns who were sent as recruits to fill up the Dorchester companies, or those who served in the navy. A large number of these were killed or died in rebel prisons, or were never heard from.
In previous chapters we have noticed the fluctuation in the Dorchester boundary. While the soul of the town was never diminished, there was from time to time an atrophy of the body. A slice was lost here and a slice there, until the original territory was very much diminished. Until 1793 Dorchester, as has been said, was a part of Suffolk County, and thus practi- cally joined to Boston in all judicial matters; but more than fifty years before this time an agitation was begun for a separation from Boston, the complaint being made that the people who had business at the courts in the city were long detained, to the great expense of time and money. The town, therefore, voted, in 1743, that it was desirous that the country town- meeting be separated from Boston, and erected into a district and county by itself. In 1784 this vote was re-affirmed. When the separation was finally made, in 1793, public opinion seems to have altered, and the change met with much opposition. The town presented a memorial to the Legisla- ture protesting against the division of the county of Suffolk, and praying that Dorchester might be re-annexed thereto. The reasons for the opposi- tion were the cost of additional buildings, and the great advantages attend- ing the transaction of business in the metropolis, as the new shire town was in a place inconvenient for the memorialists. The opposition, however, was not successful; but the centrifugal force which threw off Dorchester, with neighboring towns, into a new county, did not save it from the centripetal movement which was gradually to draw the whole town back again, not only into Suffolk County, but within the corporate limits of Boston itself. Hungry Boston did not swallow Dorchester at one bite, - it took three meals to do it. It began in 1803, by nibbling at Dorchester Neck, now known as South Boston. Boston was steadily growing and becoming more
598
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
crowded. Dorchester Neck, which could easily be connected by a bridge, seemed to afford the needed relief. Most of the residents of Dorchester Neck were in favor of the annexation. They were far removed from the centre of the town, and the building of the bridge to Boston promised them many advantages. Dorchester was willing to have the bridge built, but voted against the annexation. A committee was appointed to present a remonstrance to the Legislature. The committee presented the lament- able fact that, since the incorporation of Dorchester, " the towns of Milton, Stoughton, and others had been set off from it, so that the remainder was only ten miles in length, and contained little more than seven thousand acres of land."
But a joint committee of both Houses reported in favor of the annexa- tion, without compensation to Dorchester. At a town-meeting, where the action of the legislative committee was detailed, one of the Dorchester committee stated that $6,000 might be obtained provided the town would not oppose the project; but the town was obstinate, and voted not to accept the $6,000 on the conditions offered. The bill passed the Legisla- ture March 6, 1804; and Dorchester lost the money and the territory too.
In 1836 the inhabitants of Little Neck, Washington Village, petitioned to be joined to Boston. They were four miles from the town house, and upwards of a mile from any school, and represented that they were wholly debarred from school privileges for several successive days in each month by the tide-water being permitted. to overflow the public road. The town of Dorchester opposed the annexation. The committee of the General Court reported against it, because Boston would incur great expense in lay- ing out the streets across the salt marsh; but the matter was only delayed, for Washington Village was finally annexed to Boston May 21, 1855.
It took but ten or twelve years for Boston to digest this last slice of ter- ritory, and then it was hungry for more. The sister town of Roxbury was the first victim. Her annexation to Boston in 1868, far from meeting the growing wants of Boston, only indicated that the annexation of Dorchester was but a question of time. In 1867 the subject was more or less agi- tated by the citizens of Dorchester themselves, who brought the matter be- fore the Boston city government, and secured the appointment of a board of commissioners to confer with commissioners appointed by the town. The commission was unable to agree, but expressed the opinion that it might become desirable to annex a portion of the town of Dorchester, “ in order to complete the elaborate system of drainage and harbor improve- ment devised for the benefit of Boston." No immediate action followed, but a year later the matter was taken up, - this time from the Boston side ; and by order of the common council, passed Dec. 22, 1868, the mayor was requested to appoint a commission of three discreet and intelligent persons carefully to examine the subject in all its financial, industrial, and sanitary relations, and to report the result of their doings to the city coun- cil. The final report of this commission presented many interesting facts
599
DORCHESTER IN THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.
which serve to show the condition of Dorchester on the eve of the annex- ation.1
While Dorchester from 1657 had steadily lost in territory through re- division of its boundaries, there was a great gain in wealth and population. The population of Dorchester in 1855 was 8,340; in 1865, 10,707, - an in- crcase of 2,377 in ten years ; a gain of 28-50% 1'00 per cent. The magnitude which town affairs had assumed is also seen by the annual appropriations at town-meetings. Notwithstanding the much greater geographical extent of the original town, its early expenses seem small enough when compared with those for 1869, -a few months before the vote on annexation was taken.2 The result of the city commissioners' examination was a unanimous report for annexation, based on "the necessity for a part, and the desirable- ness of the whole, of the territory for the present and prospective wants of the city, and the highly favorable financial, industrial, and sanitary condition of the town." The commissioners noted the " strong feeling of attachment to the name of the town and its history and traditions " which was mani- fested, and thought that, by the annexation of the whole territory, Dorches- ter might continue to retain her boundary and local history as a precinct of the city.
In May, 1869, the subject came up before the Legislature. The mayor and city council urged the annexation. The town of Dorchester was repre- sented by a committee of eighteen gentlemen, who presented a petition signed by between eight and nine hundred citizens. The matter came to a hearing before the joint committee on towns. There was no organized opposition from Dorchester, but the measure was opposed by the Norfolk County Commissioners. As a result of these hearings a majority of the committee reported in favor of i nnexation, and presented the draft of a bill for that purpose. A minority report urged that the annexation would be of no commercial advantage to Boston, and that it would be of no benefit to Dor- chester. "Her town ; ffairs," they said, " appear to be well managed; her
1 Its number of inhabitants was estimaled at twelve thousand.
Dwelling-houses, May 1, 1868.
1,830
Ratable polis 2,918
Legal voters .
3,100
Churches
13
Fire department 10,000
Highways 25,000
Volunteer companies
Town officers
6,000
Cemeteries
1,500
Instalments and interest
17,000
Interest in anticipation of taxes 5,000
Abatement of taxes
4,000
Lighting streets
6,000
Police and watch
8,000
Incidental expenses
10,000
Removal of engine-house No. 3
2,000
Widening of Hancock Street
5,000
Cash on hand Feb. 1, 1869
» Mioot
4,000
Due from State and for takes . $11,092.41
„, Adams
6,000
„, Bird
3,000
Actual debt .
$36,607.59
Valuation of town property
237,182.26
2 The appropriations for that year were as follows :-
For Schools . $54,000
Poor in alms-hoose 5,000
Poor out of alms-house 3,500
Insane at hospital . 2,000
School-houses, of the larger class
7
smaller class
3
One steam fire-engine, and several hand-engines
Scholars
2,000
Acres of land
4,532
Valuation for 1868 :-
Real estate
$9,291,200
Personal 6,035,100
The financial condition of the town was as follows : -
Town debt $147,700.00
Total $188,050
600
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
roads are in good condition; her schools are among the best in the Com- monwealth: and we fail to see that there is anything in her local affairs which cannot be as well provided for by the town as by Boston, and with as great economy." The Legislature accepted the majority report, and passed an act annexing the town, provided that a majority of legal voters in Boston and in Dorchester were in favor of it. A special election was held simultaneously in both places, on June 22, 1869. The whole number of votes cast in Dorchester was 1,654. There were 928 for annexation and 726 against, - a majority of 202. According to the provisions of the act, the annexation took place on the first Monday in January (3d), 1870.
The last town-meeting was held Dec. 28, 1869, when the reports of the selectmen were received, and a vote of thanks tendered to all the town officers. And thus the town-mecting, which Dorchester was the first of the New England settlements to establish, ceased to be held in the parent town ; but only when the town itself had no longer an existence. By this act of annexation the area of Boston, which with the annexation of Roxbury amounted to 5,370 acres, was nearly doubled, - Dorchester adding 4,532 acres. If we add the area which Boston acquired by annexing South Boston and Washington Village, 900 acres, the total acreage she obtained from Dorchester was 5,432.
It is now ten years since the annexation, covering a period of long busi- ness depression, unfavorable to rapid growth; but the results of the union with Boston are plainly visible. Houses are now springing up on hill and plain. Here and there a long block of brick buildings disturbs with its uniformity the picturesque variety of rural architecture, and reminds the old resident of the spread of the city limits. The work of cutting new streets, extending the sewers and water-pipes, and improving the roads goes steadily on. The stranger to-day who wishes to see how Boston is growing as a place of residence must inspect the Dorchester district. One hundred and seventy-five buildings were erected here in 1880, the greater number of these being dwelling-houses. By the latest census returns, we find that the Dorchester District, as it was before the ward division, has a population of twenty thousand, - an increase of eight thousand in ten years.
Amid all the changes which have been made and those which are still making, there is one spot in the town where the colonial, the provincial, and the national periods are all blended in the associations of the tablets which mark the resting-places of the dead. The old burying-ground is sacredly preserved. New and beautiful cemeteries have been added in other parts of the town, yet here, where the dust of the ancient settlers is gathered together, the iron gate is still open for the funeral cortége.
S. J. Barrow
CHAPTER XVIII.
BRIGHTON IN THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.
BY FRANCIS S. DRAKE.
A CENTURY ago, Brighton, not yet incorporated as a town, nor known throughout the land as the great cattle-mart of New England, was simply a precinct or ecclesiastical parish of Cambridge, the shire-town of Middlesex County. It was then a thinly-settled farming village, having a single meeting-house and two school-houses, its sixty dwelling houses con- taining a population of about four hundred souls. When, in 1805, its incor- poration as a town was proposed, little opposition was made, public opinion as to the justice and expediency of the measure having for some time stead- ily gained ground. What rendered the step all the casier was the fact that common cause was made with Brighton by the Second Parish, which also desired a separation from Cambridge. A petition, signed by all the well- known voters of the precinct, presented in a forcible manner many of the reasons which had brought about its separation as a parish, and which were equally applicable at the present juncture. The action of the town was as follows : -
" Cambridge, South Precinct, Feb. 17, 1806.
" At a meeting of the freeholders and other inhabitants on the south side of Charles River, legally warned and assembled, after choosing Mr. Jonathan Winship, moderator, the following votes were passed : First, to petition the honorable General Court to be set off as a town ; Second, to choose a committee to wait on the honorable General Court with the petition ; Third, that Mr. Samuel Wyllis Pomeroy, Mr. Gorham Parsons, Stephen Dana, Esq., Mr. Thomas English, Mr. Daniel Bowen, compose this committee. " Attest : HENRY DANA, Precinct Clerk."
By an Act of the Legislature, dated Feb. 24, 1807, the town of Brighton was formally incorporated. The town of West Cambridge, or Menotomy, the Second Parish, was incorporated in the same month, and by the separa- tion of the two Cambridge lost a large portion of her territory. Brighton received another instalment of the mother town by annexation, Jan. 27, 1816.
VOL. 111. - 76.
602
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
At the first town-meeting, held May 9, 1807, Henry Dana was chosen town clerk, and Nathaniel Champney, treasurer. Dudley Hardy, Jonathan Livermore, Thomas Gardner (son of the coloncl), Benjamin Hill, and Na- thaniel Champney were appointed selectmen. Stephen Dana was soon afterward chosen representative to the General Court, and the sum of two thousand dollars was appropriated to defray town charges. Mr. Dana, the first town-clerk, served ten years and until his death. Of his successors, Captain Joseph Warren served eighteen years, and William Warren twenty- two years; the latter's son, William Wirt Warren, succeeded him; and he in turn was followed by a brother, Webster F. Warren. Of the early town treasurers, Nathaniel Champney, the first, served twenty years and until his death, and was succeeded by Deacon Thaddeus Baldwin. Henry Heath Larnard served from 1833 to 1869.1
Cambridge Street, an important thoroughfare, was opened in 1808, from Winship's store to the Brookline road (Harvard Street). At a very large and full meeting, held September 12, President Jefferson was memorialized relative to the Embargo law. In 1818 an almshouse was purchased by the town, which, however, seems to have had very few inmates. It contained but one resident pauper at the date of annexation. The old church, after its removal in 1809, continued in use as a town hall until the building of a new and more commodious edifice, dedicated Dec. 30, 1841. Its corner- stone had been laid on the 2d of August previous. Upon annexation in 1874, when town-meetings and town discussions were to give way forever to quiet ward-room elections of city officers, the town hall was appropriated for police purposes and its main hall fitted up as a municipal court-room for the district.
In June, 1825, General Lafayette visited Brighton, and was hospitably entertained by the citizens at the hotel on the corner of Washington and Cambridge streets. This building, which in early times had been the man- sion-house of the Winship family, was at that time occupied by Mr. Samuel Dudley. The school children were arranged in two lines, between which the General, accompanied by his son, George Washington Lafayette, passed. Some of those children still remember that bright June day, and fondly cherish the recollection of the kiss bestowed upon them by the gallant Frenchman. A lady who saw him at this time says: " The appearance of Lafayette, with his coat thrown back, his ugly, benevolent, kind, old French face, with the high reddish-brown wig, and the small, beaming eyes, is indelibly fixed in my memory."
On the occasion of Henry Clay's visit to the town in October, 1833, a bountiful collation was spread in the large dining-hall of the recently erected Cattle Fair Hotel. Mr. Clay is said to have recognized in the yards some of his fine steers, which, as it was before the day of railroads, had made the tedious journey from Ashland, Kentucky, on foot. In the following year
1 The town acknowledged its appreciation of
on his retirement from office, with a massive silver his long and faithful services by presenting him, pitcher, bearing an appropriate inscription.
603
BRIGHTON IN THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.
the Boston and Worcester, now the Boston and Albany, Railroad was opened.1
On Feb. 24, 1857, half a century of the town's existence was completed, during which it had gained materially in population and in wealth. The day was joyfully celebrated by the glad peal of church bells at sunrise and sunset, by the discharge of cannon, and by brilliant fireworks in the evening. One citizen only, Mr. Edward Sparhawk, was living who had voted for the town's incorporation fifty years before. He was a descendant of Nathaniel Sparhawk, one of the earliest emigrant settlers of Cambridge, and died Sept. 3, 1867, in his ninety-seventh year.
At a town-meeting, May 3, 1861, called for the purpose of raising a vol- unteer company for the war of the Rebellion which had just begun, two thousand dollars was appropriated to uniform and equip said company, and twenty dollars was also voted to each private when called into active service. July 15, 1862, the town voted to pay one hundred and twenty-five dollars bounty for each volunteer to make up its quota of forty men; the five thousand dollars required, to be raised by a tax on property, poll-tax pay- ers to contribute such sums as they saw fit. The town's quota was filled in three months .. October 21, it was voted to pay each nine months' vol- unteer one hundred dollars, and the town treasurer was authorized to borrow the money. November 26, one thousand two hundred dollars was appro- priated by the town to furnish the town's quota under the President's new call. Though not represented in the army by any distinct organization, Brighton furnished three hundred and sixty-five men to aid in suppressing the Rebellion, - a surplus of five over the number required. Fifteen were commissioned officers. The amount of money expended by the town, ex- clusive of State aid, was seventy-eight thousand and fifty dollars.
The act of incorporation required the town to keep open and support, as she had heretofore done, the bridge over Charles River. This subject, as well as that of the fisheries of the river, - once a matter of considerable pecuniary interest, - was from time to time discussed and acted upon by the town-meeting. By an Act of the Legislature, passed March 11, 1862, the city of Cambridge and the town of Brighton were " authorized and re- quired to rebuild the great bridge over Charles River," the expense to be borne "in proportion to the respective valuations of said city and town; " and it was provided that a draw not less than thirty-two feet wide should be constructed " at an equal distance from each abutment," that "the opening in the middle of said draw " should be the dividing line between Cambridge and Brighton at that point, and that thereafter each corporation should maintain its half part of the whole structure at its own expense. This, with all her other public obligations, was assumed by the city of Boston upon annexation.
After a municipal existence of sixty-seven years, the annexation of Brighton to Boston was effected, Jan. 5, 1874, the Act of the Legislature
1 [See Mr. C. F. Adams's chapter on Canals and Railroads. - ED.]
604
THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
authorizing it, dated May 21, 1873, having been accepted by the city and town, Oct. 8, 1873. To produce this result, the town in January, 1872, memorialized the Legislature for annexation, and its petition was unani- mously sustained by a commission appointed by the city to examine and report thereon. To the city the advantages of annexation were to be found in the protection of public health by inspection and supervision of her meat supply, and by organizing under one head a general system of sewerage, in concert of action in projecting improvements of mutual benefit, and in the acquisition of territory for houses . at a moderate cost. The needs of Brighton were a more plentiful supply of water, a better system of streets and drainage as well as protection from fire, and better police and health regulations. These desirable ends either have been, or are in a fair way of being, satisfactorily accomplished.1
We have elsewhere recorded the gathering of the First Church here in 1780, -some thirty persons in all, including a few from Newton, Menotomy, and Brookline, having thus associated themselves together for religious worship. The present church edifice occupies very nearly the site of the original building of 1744, which stood in front of it, a little to the west. It was begun Sept. 21, 1808, and completed for dedication, June 22, 1809. The old church was then moved to a spot -opposite the site of the town house, its lower story converted into two school-rooms, and its upper story into a town hall. Rev. John Foster, D.D., its first pastor, was born in Western, now Warren, Massachusetts, April 19, 1763; graduated at Dart- mouth College in 1783; resigned his pastorate here, Oct. 31, 1827, at the close of its forty-third year, and died Sept. 16, 1829. Mr. Foster was a scholarly and kindly man, a good talker, and dwelt more upon the practical than the theoretical side of religion. He resided for a long time in the old parsonage still standing at the foot of Rockland Street. A monument in the ancient burying-ground on Market Street bears an inscription from the pen of the Rev. Dr. Francis, of Watertown, testifying to his piety, fidelity, and usefulness. In 1785 he married Hannah, daughter of Grant Webster. Mrs. Foster was the author of The Coquette, or History of Elisa Wharton, one of the earliest of American novels. Two of her daughters, Mrs. Cush- ing and Mrs. Cheney, are well-known writers.2 This church is, in sentiment, Congregational Unitarian.
Of the seven churches now in Brighton, the next in order is the Evan- gelical Congregational church, gathered April 4, 1827. Its first house, dedicated Sept. 13, 1827, was removed in June, 1867, to give place to the new edifice on the same site. Services were held in the old house till November 3, and on December 20 the society worshipped in the vestry of
1 [See Mr. Bugbee's chapter, "Under the Mayors," in the present volume. - ED.]
2 Dr. Foster's. successors are named in Dr. Peabody's chapter; one of them, Frederic A.
Whitney, son of the Rev. Peter Whitney, was born at Quincy, Massachusetts, Sept. 13, 1812; graduated at Harvard College, 1833; ordained Feb. 21, 1844, and died Oct. 21, 1880.
605
BRIGHTON IN THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.
their new church. Its corner-stone had been laid Aug. 13, 1867, and the church was dedicated May 14, 1868.1
Third in the order of time is the Roman Catholic Church. Prior to the building of its first house on Bennett Street in May, 1856, services had been held in private halls by the Rev. J. M. Finotti, minister in charge. This house was destroyed by fire, Dec. 7, 1862. A new building of wood on the same site proving insufficient for the wants of the society, the corner-stone of the large stone edifice on the northwest corner of Market and Arlington streets was laid Sept. 22, 1872. It is not yet completed, but services are held in its vestry by Rev. P. J. Rogers, minister in charge. Saint Columb- kille, as this church is named, is one of the largest and most imposing churches of the order.2
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