The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts. 1630-1880, Vol. IV, Part 5

Author: Winsor, Justin, 1831-1897, ed; Jewett, C. F. (Clarence F.), publisher
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Boston : Osgood
Number of Pages: 760

USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts. 1630-1880, Vol. IV > Part 5

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Now Harrison Avenue. The name was changed soon after the death of President Har- rison.

$ The agreement of owners to build no struc- ture less than ten feet from the line of the street was probably the first instance of a restriction

THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON:

One of the most striking features of old Boston was the mill-pond at the north end of the town. Like so many other landmarks of the original peninsula it has disappeared completely. The proprietors of the mills and adjoining lands obtained an act of incorporation from the General Court in March, 1804, as the Boston Mill Corporation ; and proceeded at once to belie their name by obtaining from the town the right to cut down Beacon Hill, and to use the material in filling up the pond, agreeing to give for this privilege one eighth of all the land filled in twenty years. The process was a slow one, and twenty-five years elapsed before it was finished. Blackstone Street, which follows the line of the mill-creek, through which at one time boats and small vessels could pass from the harbor to Charles River, was not laid out until 1833. All the stations of the railroads leading out of the city in a northerly direction -the Fitchburg, Lowell, Eastern, and Maine railroads - stand upon land filled by the Mill Corporation. It should be added that Copp's Hill was also drawn upon and mutilated for the purpose of this im- provement, in 1806 and subsequent years; and Pemberton Hill was also transferred to the mill-pond. The area filled was about seventy acres, of which fifty acres were available for building purposes.1

The event which more than any other determined the future of Boston, and which ultimately led to a complete change in its physical conformation, was the act of the General Court, in 1814, granting a charter to the Boston and Roxbury Mill Corporation. The projector of this, as it was justly described at the time, " gigantic enterprise " was Mr. Uriah Cotting, who deserves the title given to him by Mr. Bowditch in the " Gleaner " papers, of Chief Benefactor of Boston. At this day we can look back upon the building of the Mill-Dam and see that the train of consequences which have followed its construction have alone made it possible for Boston to become a great city. The importance of the subject is a sufficient excuse for treat- ing it at length, and- disregarding for the time all other improvements - for bringing the history of the Mill-Dam and the Back Bay down to the present time.

When the charter was granted, there was but an expanse of water and salt marsh from the foot of the Common to the uplands in Brookline. The only communication between the two towns was by way of Roxbury and the Neck. There was ample room in Boston for all the population then residing here, and nothing seemed to be more unlikely than that there would ever come a time when all the land which could be reclaimed from the Charles River basin would be eagerly sought after for building purposes. Nothing was further from Mr. Cotting's plans than to bring about such a result. The improvement which led to the changes we see to-day was undertaken solely from commercial motives. The Mill Corporation was authorized to build a dam from the end of Beacon Street, at Charles Street, to Sewall's

upon real estate in Boston which had in view the symmetry and appearance of a street when fully built upon. Later restrictions have concerned the size and materials of buildings.

1 [The condition of this territory, as filled in but not built upon, is shown in a view from the dome of the State House, in 1826, in Snow's Bos- ton, P. 316. - ED.]

TABLE

N RIFERRENCE

A Dam in form : Pond of Charles River.

County Rend

L Canal, miting fiat water with Borpell's Creek.

D) Dans to preserfe the War of Barrell's Creek,

Lagal fromm Barth's Creek to arlestown Millpend,

Charleunvs Mu-Pied

Maddieses Card.

Present Read In the Powder Hea

Contemplated Fond to dittos

Pop'ı Tarım

REMARKS

The Blue representa Water.

The Yellow, Hash Land.

The Red Lines, Streets and Reads,

The contemplated Improvements are designated by two

Acoloura compe ted, thus, Black with Red represent )o.

Poard Dams afd Honds. Black with Blue, Cans's'

The Res Doued Lunes represent the Aqueduct

ami's Creek

Road to Prisma Aml

le Bride

Read

BRIGHTON.

We .: B-alua Bridgs

Cambridge Surret

₹ 380 Arca

Charles Street

Comma

Repevalis

Bey Ir Son Street

Nembury Street Freos Siger

BROOKLI

Contemplated Rond

RESERVOIR

Watertowe Road

Worcester TEL

Roxbury Stress

ROXBURY.

Rela

SCALE Eighty Rots, or ent Queen of a Mile to Do Jach.

OF THOSE PARTS OF

Watere and Flats siljacent, which are immediately or remotely connected wwb the contemplated danga of ererting For 7. ICAL 717 This Vint Design, in the Wide Range of its Utility, wilt undoubtedly exceed soy Undertaking hitherto accomplished in the Quarter of the

Printed and coloured Typographically, by BanJamie Dianpoan, m his new constructed LETTER. PHESS.

Jamaica Pood

Berten, Frituary, 1016 THIS PLAN b probably the Frarr aves Purvey in a similar manner, as the common Printing Prive cunont be thun applied. Gepriemon doutons of having works printed in Colours, elles Plan, or other Drstringa, cus be accommodated, at the Balance-Factory, Where appropriate Designs und Engravinge can be bandeamely cascomed.

THE BACK BAY AND MILLDAM.

DORCHESTER.

M Louiseation of the us

Medford Terapile

Newburyport. Tpa

CHARLESTOWN.

CAMBRIDGE.

Street

Direrett Surert

New Rond over Brighton Bridge

BOSTON.

SuEyil Street

SOUTH BOSTON

elboul Terera

Rozbery Cama!

TOPOGRAPHY, ETC., OF THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.

Point in Brookline; and a cross-dam from Gravelly Point in Roxbury to the main dam. It was empowered to make a roadway of each dam, and to levy tolls for the use of it; also to build a road from the western end of the main dam to the Punch-bowl Tavern in Brookline. It had authority to con- fine tide water within the area bounded by the Mill-Dam and the uplands, and to build mills to be run by the water-power so created, or to lease the water-power.1

The original proposition of Mr. Cotting and his associates was to con- struct such a dam for the use of tide-water on the other side of the town, and to overflow the South Boston Flats. The Back Bay project was, like many a subsequent scheme, sprung upon the Legislature in the last days of the session, and the bill was passed by the House of Representatives when there were less than fifty, out of more than five hundred, members present.2 But in spite of opposition the charter was granted, the bill having been signed by Governor Strong on the last day of the session. The enterprise was a stupendous one for those days.3 The work of construction was be- gun under the direction of Mr. Cotting, but he did not live 4 to see it com- pleted, and Colonel Loammi Baldwin succeeded him as engineer. The Mill- Dam was finished in the early summer of 1821, and opened for travel 5 on

1 [The annexed plan has been reproduced from a copy belonging to Dr. John C. Warren of Boston (there is another in the Mass. Hist. Soc. Library), measuring 1414 × 1834 inches, and four colors were used in printing it, - blue for water, now appearing like a tea-green ; yel- low for marsh, now a light brown; red for the roads ; and black for the lettering, etc. The scale is "eighty rods, or one quarter of a mile, to an inch." It is called " PLAN OF THOSE PARTS OF BOSTON AND ITS VICINITY with its Waters and Flats adjacent, which are immediately or re- motely connected with the contemplated design of PERPETUAL TIDE-MILLS. This Vast Design, in the Wide Range of its Utility, will un- doubtedly exceed any Undertaking hitherto ac- complished in this Quarter of the World. Printed and coloured Typographically by BEN- JAMIN DEARBORN, in his new-constructed LETTER-PRESS. THIS PLAN is probably the FIRST EVER PRINTED in a similar. manner, as the Common Printing Press cannot be thus applied. Gentlemen desirous of having works printed in Colours, either Plans or other Draw- ings, can be accommodated at the Balance-Fac- tory, where appropriate Design and Engravings can be handsomely executed. Boston, February, 1814." The line of the Jamaica Plain aque- duct is traced on it. In the heliotype the yellow is the darkest tint, the blue is the medium tint, representing the water. See also Drake's Town of Roxbury, p. 345. - ED.]

2 A protest was addressed to the citizens through the convenient medium of the news- VOL. IV. - 5.

papers. A communication in the Daily Adver- tiser of June 10, 1814, signed "Beacon Street," be- gins as follows : "Citizens of Boston ! Have you ever visited the Mall ; have you ever inhaled the Western breeze, fragrant with perfume, refresh- ing every sense and invigorating every nerve ? What think you of converting the beautiful sheet of water which skirts the Common into an empty mud-basin, reeking with filth, abhorrent to the smell, and disgusting to the eye? By every god of sea, lake, or fountain, it is incredible." Al- though it was many years before the prophecy was verified, it was at last true enough ; and it was because the Back Bay became such a nui- sance as to be no longer endurable, that the im- provement was rendered possible.

3 It is related that on the day the books for subscription to the stock were opened, the street was blocked by the throng of persons eager to make an investment, so strong was their faith in Mr. Cotting's project. One determined person is said to have gained access to the room, where the signatures were received, by way of the win- dow, and thereby to have incurred the ill-will of those whom he had outwitted. Yet the corpo- ration did not pay a dividend for forty years.

4 He died in 1819 of rapid consumption.

5 " The road over the Boston and Roxbury Mill-Dam was opened for passengers for the first time yesterday morning, when a cavalcade of one hundred citizens and upwards, headed by General Sumner and Major Dean, passed over. ... General Sumner in a pertinent address took occasion to advert to the magnitude of the un-

THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.

July 2, of that year, without great ceremony. Mills were erected in pro- cess of time to use the water-power which had been created. In 1824 the mixed character of the business of the corporation led to a division of it. The Boston Water-Power Company was chartered for the purpose of pur- chasing and holding any part of the water-power owned by the Mill Corpo- ration, or any land contiguous thereto. The new company was organized by the stockholders of the old, and at the beginning each shareholder had an equal proportional interest in each. The actual transfer of property to the Water-Power Company did not take place until 1832, when that corpora- tion took possession of the city mills, of the entire water-power, and of all lands lying south of the main dam. The Boston and Roxbury Mill Corpo- ration retained the roads and all property north of the dam. Meantime a controversy had arisen between the Mill Corporation, the city of Boston, and other owners of uplands bordering on the basin, involving the extent of the right of flowage by the company, and the right of owners of marshes covered by the tide at high water to fill in their land and thus exclude the flowage. It was terminated by a compromise in 1826. A boundary line was established, - the Mill Corporation relinquishing the right of flowage above it, and the land-owners giving to the company all the lands below the line as far as their rights extended. Some owners declining to ac- cept the compromise, a suit at law was brought, and the rights of the Mill Corporation were fully established by the decision of the Supreme Court in 1832. The compromise with the city, as will presently be seen, placed Boston at a disadvantage in pressing its claim to a share of the Back Bay lands when the grand scheme of filling them was about to be undertaken.

The Boston & Providence, and the Boston & Worcester Railroad com- panies were both incorporated in 1831. The line of each road was laid out across the water basins of the Water-Power Company. It was foreseen that the construction of these roads would largely diminish the area to be flowed for mill purposes, and there was a depreciation of one half in the stock of both the Mill Corporation and the Water-Power Company in consequence. These corporations endeavored to prevent encroachment. Having received a legislative grant of privileges for public purposes, they refused to admit that those privileges could be taken away even for other public purposes ; but in 1839 the contending parties came to an agreement which secured to the railroad companies all they desired. The concession to owners of the right to fill their lowlands, and the crossing of the territory by the railway lines were of the nature of direct injuries to the interests of the Water-Power Company for the purposes indicated by its title, and served to transform it

dertaking the completion of which they were met to celebrate. . .. He reverted to the position of Boston thirty-four years ago when there was only one passage from the peninsula to the main. " It was then,' he said, 'our town resembled a hand, but it was a closed one. It is now

open and well spread. Charlestown, Cambridge, South Boston, and Craigie's Bridges have added each a finger, and lately our enterprising citizens have joined the firm and substantial thumb over which we now ride.'" - Boston Daily Advertiser, July 3, 1821.

TOPOGRAPHY, ETC., OF THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.

into a land company, and to render inevitable, on sanitary grounds, the filling-in of the whole space.

In 1849 there was an elaborate report to the city council on the question of drainage, the mayor and aldermen, as a Board of Health, having declared the condition of the Back Bay " to be one of nuisance, offensive and injuri- ous to the large and increasing population residing upon it." The abomi- nably filthy state in which it was, - an open cesspool, receiving the sewage of a large community, - together with the claims made to the land and to jurisdiction over it by the cities of Boston and Roxbury, by owners of the shores, and by the Water-Power Company, attracted the attention of the State authorities. A commission was appointed, consisting of Simon Green- leaf, Joel Giles, and Ezra Lincoln, by whom the whole subject in all its bearings was thoroughly considered. In their final report, made in 1852, after an able review of the whole history of the Back Bay and of the vested rights established, and after showing the amount of filling already donc, the uncontested conveyance of lands by the corporations both north and south of the Mill-Dam, and the building which had already taken place upon these lands, the commissioners suggested that the following principles should be sanctioned by the Legislature : ---

I. The corporations should be permitted to hold and use their property for land purposes, and abandon their business as mill and water-power owners. 2. All filling within the tide-water basin should be done with clean gravel. 3. Provision should be made for perfect drainage. 4. The streets to be laid out on the made-land should be wide and ample. 5. The Mill-Dam, or Western Avenue, and all other roads within the territory, should eventually be made free highways. 6. The filling should be done in · such a manner that the scouring force of the water should not be diminished, and the harbor not be injured. 7. The flats north of the Mill-Dam should be included in the improvement. 8. The receiving basin should be filled up and laid out, and so dis- posed of as "to secure for it a healthy and thrifty population, and, by inherent and permanent causes, forever to prevent this territory from becoming the abode of filth and disease." 9. All this should be done by authority and under the direction of the State.

The commissioners also discussed at length the question of riparian rights, coming to a conclusion which the General Court during the same ycar (1852) adopted, when, by a solemn declaratory act, it asserted the right and title of the Commonwealth as owner of all flats "lying below the ordinary line of riparian ownership." The General Court also adopted so much of the commissioners' system as was necessary to be acted upon at the time. A resolve was passed appointing commissioners to determine the respective rights of the parties claiming an interest in the flats, and to secure those of the State; which commissioners were empowered to sell or exchange the lands owned by the Commonwealth, and were instructed to devise a plan for filling and laying out the new lands. The corporations were, as the former commission had advised, authorized to change the purpose of their associations from mill to land holding and dealing. The new commissioners

THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.

set about their work with diligence. They made an agreement with the Boston and Roxbury Mill Corporation by which the title of the company to the lands north of the Mill-Dam, claimed by it, was confirmed uncondition- ally, and the corporation came under an obligation to make all its toll-roads free to public travel in a specified time. A contract was made with the Boston Water-Power Company in which a line of division running from the uplands westward was substituted for the line representing the limit of riparian ownership. Thus the Commonwealth became possessed of all the unfilled lands north of an east and west line starting near the present station of the Providence Railroad, and south of the Mill-Dam, while the Water- Power Company took the rest of the flats.

The city of Boston was not a party to be so easily managed as were these corporations. The history of municipal obstruction to an enterprise which was to be of such vast benefit to the city is one of the least creditable chapters in the record of Boston. The commissioners first proposed to the city to extend Boylston Street to the cross-dam (Parker Street), and to lay out a street at a right angle with the Mill-Dam, from that road to Tremont Street. The space enclosed by Beacon, Boylston, and the new street was to be given to the city, on condition that the city should fill its own land, build one half the surrounding streets, add the land to the Public Garden, and engage that it should never be built upon. The land so proposed to be given was about half a million square feet. The offer was rejected. Another, nearly similar to it, was made in 1853, and was also rejected. At this time, as before, there was a strong party in the city council in favor of selling the · land of the Public Garden as it then was. An elaborate report was made sustaining the legality of such a sale and advocating the measure on eco- nomical grounds; but it was more than hinted in public and private that the controlling reason in favor of such a disposition of the land was not economy but selfishness. Many of the city fathers were mechanics, who saw a chance for good building-jobs in case the land were sold.

In 1854 a third proposition was made to the city, which the council intimated it would accept if the State would convey to the city the land lying westward of the Public Garden, - about three and a half million square feet. Of course the commissioners would not listen to this condition. In their report to the Legislature they expressed their minds pretty freely as to the course of the city government. Touching the assumption by that government that it ought to own the lands to be reclaimed, they showed very clearly that the city had long before expressly resigned and made over to the Water-Power Company all the rights it possessed over these flats. In fact, a large part of the very land to which the city of Boston laid claim was actually within the municipal limits of Roxbury. With the intention of disposing completely of the city's assumption, the commissioners wrote: " The city of Boston is not now the owner of any lands or flats in the Back Bay, nor does it possess any proprietary or municipal right in or over the waters or flats of the Back Bay that can in any way limit or control the

TOPOGRAPHY, ETC., OF THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.

power of the Commonwealth or of its assigns, touching the mode of filling up, laying out, draining, or occupying its lands and flats in the Back Bay." 1 Another argument employed by the city fathers was somewhat sarcastically answered thus: " It may be true that the city would be able to use that valu- able property with very great advantage to the municipal treasury ; but the Commonwealth is quite as able to use it for the benefit of the State treas- ury." And in reference to the assumption by the city that it would be best able to judge how the territory should properly be drained, the com- missioners say: "The city has used and now uses the Back Bay as a cesspool."

A fourth report was made to the General Court in 1856. The city had proceeded, in disregard of the commissioners' plan for laying out the new lands, to sell its own land already filled; and this land had been built upon in such a way that some of the proposed new streets were out of the ques- tion. At the same time the city persisted in its refusal to come to terms with the commissioners, or rather neglected to take any action in regard to the matter. The time for beginning the work had come, however, and after renewed effort by the commissioners an agreement was reached in December, 1856, a few months before the work was actually begun, be- tween the State, the city, and the Water-Power Company, and by a formal vote of the citizens the Public Garden was forever devoted to park pur- poses, and the city council was forbidden to erect upon it, or to allow to be erected, any building except a City Hall, or such structures as would be appropriate in a public pleasure-ground.2 Under the law as it then existed, no appropriation having been made for the expense of filling the flats, the commissioners asked for authority to make contracts for filling, to sell the land as fast as it was made, and to use the proceeds in continuing the work. This authority was granted in 1857. Private individuals advanced money to the contractor, Mr. Munson; the land filled was promptly sold; and the State was never called upon to advance a dollar.

It had been a long struggle.3 The practicability of such extensive filling had been called seriously in question. The desirableness of the land when filled was doubted by many. The city of Boston, by its government, had played a part of obstruction and of arrogance. The city of Roxbury had disputed the jurisdiction over a major part of the flats, with Boston; but through it all there were many men whose faith in the enterprise never faltered, and who pressed it upon the public attention with dogged per- severance. They long ago had their reward in the brilliant success of the scheme; and many of them were wise enough early to become large pur- chasers of the filled land, which they afterward sold at a handsome advance.

1 The city council was advised to the same effect by Mr. Peleg W. Chandler, the city solic- itor during a part of the time when this contro- versy was going on. Mr. Chandler was one of the earliest and most persistent advocates of the Back Bay improvement.

2 [See further on the history of the Public Garden in Colonel Wilder's chapter in the pres- ent volume on "The Horticulture of Boston and Vicinity."- Ed.]

00 [See Mr. Bugbee's chapter in Vol. III .- ED.]

THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.

The filling has been going on for more than twenty years, and is now nearly completed. A few acres only of " the beautiful sheet of water" which once skirted the Common are now covered by the tide, and every day sees that little area diminished. The improvement has given to Boston its West End, its fashionable quarter, and has put millions of dollars in the State treasury.

East Boston, now one of the most important divisions of the city, was, only half a century ago, a barren and almost treeless island, having upon it but a single farm-house,1 and being inhabited but by a single family. The improvement of Noddle's Island had long been a favorite project of General William H. Sumner, and its accomplishment was due very largely to his sagacity and persistence. His mother was a part owner of the island; and as early as the death of his father in 1799, although he was then only nine- teen years of age, he conceived plans for improving the estate. He made an unsuccessful attempt to secure the location of the turnpike road from Boston to Salem by way of Noddle's Island; and made a pilgrimage to Washington in 1801 to obtain a reversal of the decision to locate the Navy Yard, then about to be established at Charlestown. Although he failed also in this plan he did not despair, and lived to see the fulfilment of his boy's dream of a city on the then barren island. Five years after his mother's death, in 1810, a division of the estate by lot gave the share in Noddle's Island to one of his sisters, greatly to his disappointment. Although he acted as agent for this sister, and had still much at heart the object of improving the island, it was many years before the opportunity came to set energetically about carrying through the enterprise to completion.

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

The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts. 1630-1880, Vol. IV, Part 5

Author: Winsor, Justin, 1831-1897, ed; Jewett, C. F. (Clarence F.), publisher Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Boston : Osgood Number of Pages: 760

Author: Winsor, Justin, 1831-1897, ed; Jewett, C. F. (Clarence F.), publisher
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Boston : Osgood
Number of Pages: 760