Illustrated history of Kennebec County, Maine; 1625-1892, Part 30

Author: Kingsbury, Henry D; Deyo, Simeon L., ed
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: New York, Blake
Number of Pages: 1790

USA > Maine > Kennebec County > Illustrated history of Kennebec County, Maine; 1625-1892 > Part 30

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).

During his long editorial career Mr. Morrell was regarded as among the ablest newspaper writers in the state; and his innate hu- mor and waggishness (a prominent trait of the Morrells of this gen- eration) served him in good stead as a paragrapher, there being but few who could equal him in this difficult form of composition. In the discussion of topics of the time he wielded a ready and intelligent pen. He could be very sarcastic when he chose and sympathetic when he thought the occasion required it.

Though retired from the active duties of the newspaper office, whenever he now takes up the pen he handles it with all his old-time facility and vigor. His education is varied, and he is able to write instructively upon a great variety of topics. He has ever been a close student of nature in all her varied forms. He is something of a botanist, an intelligent mineralogist, and in several other departments of natural history he is well versed. He has been a champion of tem- perance from his boyhood, and no man in Maine has written more or better upon this subject. He joined the Sons of Temperance October 8, 1845, and is now the senior member of the order. He was for nine- teen years grand scribe of Maine-the longest recorded service in that office. In 1862 he joined the National Division.

For many years he was librarian, treasurer and collector of the old Mechanics' Association of Gardiner, which later became the Gar- diner Public Library, of which he has been a director from the start; and his labors in behalf of the institution have been very valuable to the city. His latest literary work will be found in the initial chapter of this volume. Honest, open-handed and open-hearted, a hater of all forms of hypocrisy, of an intensely sympathetic nature, and an unos- tentatious friend of the needy, Mr. Morrell commands the love, ad- miration and respect of all who know him.

Henry A. Morrell, now of Pittsfield, Me., but a native of Gardiner (see page 658), is a versatile and interesting newspaper correspondent. He is well known under the pseudonym of "Juniper," the signature

H. K. Morrill.

263

LITERATURE AND LITERARY PEOPLE.

he gave to a very readable series of articles in the Gardiner Home Jour- nal, which he wrote while making an extended tour through the woods of Maine, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. His brother, William Morrell, of Gardiner, has more than a local reputation as one of the most witty writers in Maine.

Dora May Morrell, of Gardiner, mentioned at page 658, after a very successful career as a teacher, devoted herself entirely to her pen. She is considered a very able and entertaining writer of short sketches, and for the past year has been literary editor of the Massachusetts Ploughman, of Boston.

By far the most elaborate, careful and valuable volume of local history that has been written by any author of Kennebec county, is Hon. James W. North's History of Augusta, issued from the press of Sprague, Owen & Nash. This remarkable work is a monument to its author that will outlast any of stone or bronze that might be erected to his memory. It is a most accurate, painstaking and minute record of the persons and events, the customs and manners, the sayings and doings of the long procession of years from the earliest settlement on the Kennebec down to the year 1870, when the volume was published. The infinite care, labor and anxiety attendant upon the undertaking can be approximately appreciated only by the student who thought- fully peruses its 990 teeming pages. It is filled with curious, as well as historical information, confined not only to the locality of Augusta itself, but extending far to the north, south and west of that historic spot. Interesting as literature, and valuable as history, it is destined to perpetuate its author's name through generations to come.

Captain Charles E. Nash, of Augusta, publisher of the Maine Farmers' Almanac, is a careful, concise writer. His style may fairly be judged from his Indians of the Kennebec, which appears as Chapter II. of this volume. Except while editing newspapers (see page 239), he has not made writing his business, but cultivates as a pastime liis love for historical research.

Emma Huntington Nason, of Augusta, a daughter of Samuel W. Huntington, of Hallowell, is a well known contributor to some of the best periodicals. At an early age she gave evidence of literary talent, and soon after leaving school she published anonymously several short poems and stories in the Portland Transcript. The first article appearing under her own name was written in 1874 and was published in the Atlantic Monthly. This poem, The Tower, attracted general at- tention. It was followed by other poems of acknowledged merit and numerous ballads and stories for children, which have since made their author familiarly known to the readers of our higher class of juvenile literature. In 1888 D. Lothrop Company issued her first pub- lished volume'-White Sails, a collection of poems and ballads for young people. This book, which her publishers issued as a Christmas

264

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

publication, was elegantly illustrated by some of the ablest artists. It was well received, and is now one of their leading publications. It contains several ballads which have been widely reprinted. Among them The Bravest Boy in Town, The Mission Teaparty, and Off for Boy- land have found their way into various collections for declamation and recitation. At the dedication of the Hallowell Library in her native city, March 9, 1880, she read an original poem, which was pub- lished in a souvenir volume by Hoyt, Fogg & Donham, of Portland. The work of her pen, already before the public, gives brilliant promise for her literary future.

Howard Owen, the well-known editor, author and lecturer, was born in Brunswick, Me., in 1835. He was educated in the public schools and learned the printer's trade in the offices of the Lewiston Journal and Brunswick Telegraph. At Brunswick he printed and edited the first youth's temperance paper ever published in Maine. He has written a number of poems, one, Wanted to be an Editor, ap- pearing, in 1888, in The Poets of Maine; and he was the originator and author of Biographical Sketches of Members of the Senate and House of Representatives of Maine. He has been in the lecture field for many years, giving numerous lectures, most of them in a humorous vein. He has also delivered quite a number of Memorial Day orations. In 1879 Colby University conferred on Mr. Owen the degree of A.M. The preceding chapter in this volume is by Mr. Owen.

Rev. A. L. Park, many years pastor of the Congregational church of Gardiner, but now of Lafonia, Cal., has had much correspondence in Maine papers.

A bright and favorite writer of juvenile stories and humorous sketches is Manley H. Pike, of Augusta, son of Hon. Daniel T. Pike. The period of his literary production covers now but about seven years. He has contributed to Golden Days, but now writes solely for the Youth's Companion, so far as juvenile tales are concerned. In humorous writing he has been a constant contributor to Puck, and his sketches which have appeared in that periodical are now to be issued in book form by the publishers of Puck. Mr. Pike has also at times contributed humorous matter to Life, Harper's Bazar, Harper's Monthly and the Century.

By vote of the Maine Historical Society in November, 1862, John A. Poor was appointed to deliver a eulogy upon the character and a memoir of the life and public services of Hon. Reuel Williams, of Augusta, then just deceased. This memoir, ably and elegantly writ- ten, was read at a special meeting of the Historical Society in Au- gusta in February, 1863, and in the following year was published by H. O. Houghton & Co. for private circulation.

A series of twenty nine interesting historical sketches, by W. Har- rison Parlin, that first made their appearance in The Banner, published

265

LITERATURE AND LITERARY PEOPLE.

in East Winthrop, were afterward, at the urgent request of many friends, incorporated into book form, and issued, in 1891, under the title, Reminiscences of East Winthrop.

Heaven Our Home: the Christian Doctrine of the Resurrection, by Rev. George W. Quinby, was issued in 1876 from the Gospel Banner office, Augusta. Mr. Quinby also edited a volume of Sermons and Prayers by Fifteen Universalist Clergymen, 350 pp., 12mo., published by S. H. Colesworthy.

Among the published works of Prof. Charles F. Richardson, a na- tive of Hallowell, are: A Primer of American Literature and The Col- lege Book, 1878, and a volume of religious poems, The Cross, 1879.

Dr. Joseph Ricker, of Augusta, a graduate of Colby, and in point of service the oldest member of the university's board of trustees, was born in 1814. An extract from a Commencement Ode from his pen ap- pears in The Poets of Mainc.

Daniel Robinson, a resident of West Gardiner from 1812 to 1864, was a school teacher and a man of unusual intellectual gifts. Astron- omy was his favorite study, and at an early age he was considered an adept in the science. He was the editor of several standard school books, but his widest reputation rests upon his connection with the Maine Farmers' Almanac (founded by Rev. Moses Springer, of Gardi- ner, in 1818), of which Mr. Robinson was editor from 1821 to 1864. He died in 1866, in his ninetieth year.

The Star of Bethlehem and Dreaming are two poems by Edward L. Rideout, who was born in Benton in 1841 and now resides in Read- field. Mr. Rideout is a contributor to several periodicals.

Mrs. Salvina R. Reed, the daughter of Josiah Richardson, of Mon- mouth, was for many years one of Maine's popular verse writers. She married Daniel Reed, the son of one of the early settlers of Lewis- ton. She now resides in Auburn.

Laura E. Richards, whose work as a writer covers, as yet, but little more than a decade, was first known to her readers by her book, Five Mice in a Mouse-Trap, published by Estes & Lauriat in 1880. In My Nursery, the Toto Books and others which followed have now a fixed place with popular publications for children. Among her books not designed for juvenile readers, but often portraying the ever fasci- nating child character, are: Captain January, perhaps the best known of this class; Qucen Hildegarde and Hildegarde's Holiday, the latter pub- lished in 1891. Mrs. Richards has resided in Gardiner since her mar- riage with Henry Richards, of that city. Her father was Dr. Samuel G. Howe, the philanthropist; her mother, Julia Ward Howe, the author and poet.

Some very pleasing poetical sketches have been written by Dr. A. T. Schuman, of Gardiner. His prose writings are also marked by grace of diction and fine literary insight.

266

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

A well-known writer of books, and an editor of the Youth's Com- panion, is Edward Stanwood, a native of Augusta.

Rev. Albion W. Small (noticed at page 99), late president of Colby University. is author of the following works: The Bulletin of the French Revolution, published in 1887; The Growth of American Nationality, 1888; The Dynamics of Social Progress, 1889; Introduction to the History of European Civilization, 1889; and Introduction to the Science of Sociology, 1890.

Rev. David N. Sheldon, president of Waterville College from 1843 to 1853, was the author of a volume of sermons, Sin and Redemption, published by a New York house in 1856. At the time of the compila- tion of these sermons Mr. Sheldon was a Baptist, but some years after his resignation of the college presidency he associated himself with the Unitarian church.

Major. A. R. Small, of Oakland, is the author of The Sixteenth Maine Regiment in the War of the Rebellion, a book of 323 pages. Of this his- tory General James A. Hall says: "The faithfulness with which you have produced the record, and the completeness of the tabulations, give the work a value not often found in such productions. The bio- graphical allusions, the personal reminiscences, and the delineations of camp, march, bivouac and battle are so correctly drawn that I pre- dict for it the highest place among regimental histories." Major Small is also a veteran and valued newspaper correspondent and the author of an exhaustive History of Messalonskec Lodge, of West Water- ville, Me., from its organization to the year 1870.

Miss Caroline D. Swan, of Gardiner, is known to discriminating readers as a valued contributor to standard newspapers and maga- zines. The productions of her pen sometimes take the form of prose, but oftener of poetry, among the latter being The Fire-Fly's Song and Sca Fogs, which have been extensively copied.

Our national hymn, America, and the missionary hymn, The Morn- ing Light is Breaking, were written by Samuel Francis Smith, pastor of the First Baptist Church at Waterville from 1834 to 1842.

Nathaniel F. Sawyer, at one time a resident of Gardiner, was a writer of great originality, both of prose and poetry. He died of con- sumption in 1845.

A young author of Augusta, who died in 1882, was Arthur M. Stacy. From the age of fourteen he was a contributor to various papers and juvenile magazines. A volume of his verses, The Miser's Dream and Other Poems, and a story in book form, Edward Earle, a Romance, have been published.

Captain Henry Sewall, of Augusta, an officer in the revolutionary army, left a remarkably interesting diary, in manuscript, of the stir- ring events of 1776-1783. It was published in the Historical Magazine August, 1871.

267

LITERATURE AND LITERARY PEOPLE.

The History of Winthrop, 1764-1855, was written by Rev. David Thurston, a graduate of Hanover and pastor of the Winthrop Con- gregational Church from 1807 to 1854. It was published by Brown Thurston, of Portland, in 1855. Mr. Thurston was also the author of Letters from a Father to his Son an Apprentice and other pamphlets of moral tone.

Rev. Daniel Tappan, born in 1798, and at one time pastor of the Congregational church at Winthrop, was the author of several poems and numerous addresses.

Rev. Benjamin Tappan, D.D., for many years pastor of the South Parish church, of Augusta, was a ready writer, though plain in style. He died in 1863, at the age of seventy-five, leaving a number of pub- lished volumes of sermons on a variety of practical themes.

The chapter on The Town of Fayette in this work is from the pen of George Underwood, of Fayette. Mr. Underwood is also an occa- sional contributor to several newspapers.

The literary work of Dr. Benjamin Vaughan, LL.D., of Hallowell, author of numerous articles on surgery, and a well-known writer on agriculture, is referred to at length in the chapter on Agriculture and Live Stock, page 191.

Mental Beauty, and other poems of a devotional nature, were written by Richard H. Vose, for many years a resident of Augusta.

Miss Kate Vannah, of Gardiner, has for a series of years thrown some of the impressions she has received from people and events into that omnipresent mirror of the times-the modern newspaper. Her writings seem to be the irrepressible overflow of mental activity. Her ideas take the mould of prose or poetry, as best adapted to their expression, with equal facility. She has published one volume of poems-Verscs-and another is ready for the press. With marked musical talent and careful training she has found an inviting field in composing and publishing songs.

At the death of the gifted Rev. Sylvester Judd, Robert C.Waterston, a native of Kennebunk, was called to Augusta to take charge of the vacant pastorate. He was author of a number of fine hymns and poems, and memoirs of Charles Sprague, George Sumner, William Cullen Bryant and George B. Emerson.

Some spirited anti-slavery poems were, in years gone by, written for the Maine Farmer by Mrs. Thankful P. N. Williamson, of Augusta. She was born in 1819.

During Prof. W. F. Watson's senior year at Colby University he published a volume of miscellaneous and college poems entitled The Children of the Sun.

William E. S. Whitman, the well-known "Toby Candor " of the Boston Journal, besides having been the regular correspondent of sev-

268

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

eral daily papers, has written Maine in the War and several other books. He was the only son of Dr. C. S. Whitman, of Gardiner.

Judge Henry S. Webster, of Gardiner, in addition to widely recog- nized professional and business qualifications, has also a distinct liter- ary reputation as an earnest student and thinker and as a strong and accomplished writer. The public know him chiefly in the prose col- umns of various newspapers, but his friends know that the finest coin- age of his heart and brain come through the mint of verse.

Samuel Wood, of Winthrop, a valued contributor to the Maine Farmer, is mentioned in the chapter on Agriculture and Live Stock, page 192.

At the age of sixteen Julia May Williamson, of Augusta, published a volume of her poems for circulation among her friends; and a sec- ond volume, published in 1878, was well received. A third volume, recently issued, is entitled Star of Hope and Other Songs. Miss Wil- liamson is in her twenty-third year; her nom de guerre is "Lura Bell."

In 1813 a book was published by J. C. Washburn, of China, under the following explanatory title: "The Parish Harmony, or Fairfax Collection of Musick, containing a Concise Introduction to the grounds of Musick, and a variety of Psalm Tunes suitable to be used in Divine Service, together with Anthems, by Japheth Coombs Washburn."

Nathan Weston, a former chief justice of the supreme court of Maine, and long an honored resident of Augusta, was the author of an eloquent oration in 1854, at the centennial celebration of the erec- tion of Fort Western. It was published by William H. Simpson, Au- gusta.

In 1887 S. H. Whitney, of Vassalboro, published a cursory sketch of 122 pages, entitled Early History of Kennebec Valley.

Oscar E. Young, of Fayette, is the author of a book of poems and is also a contributor to the columns of the Chicago Sun.

CHAPTER XII.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.

BY RUFUS M. JONES, Principal of Oak Grove Seminary,

David Sands .- First Meeting .- George Fox .- Vassalboro Meeting .- Oak Grove Seminary .- China Monthly Meeting .- Fairfield Quarterly Meeting .- Litch- field Preparative .- Winthrop Preparative .- Manchester Preparative .- Sid- ney Preparative.

N O man is more intimately and essentially connected, by his life and labors, with the rise and growth of the Society of Friends in Ken- nebec county than David Sands, a Friend minister from Cornwall, Orange county, N. Y. In the year 1775 David Sands, then thirty years of age and nine years a member of the Society of Friends, came to New England to attend the yearly meeting at Newport, R. I. Again in 1777, he felt called to more extended labors throughout the towns and villages of New England, and he came with a minute from his own meeting for that service. In his journal we find the following passage:

" We had many meetings, although passing through a wilderness country. I trust they were to the encouragement of many seeking minds. We were invited to the house of Remington Hobbie; he re- ceived us kindly, and we had two meetings at his house, one on First day, where were many of the town's people; this place is called Vas- salborough, on the Kennebec River; and another in the evening at a Friend's house. These meetings were much to my comfort, feeling the overshadowing of our Divine Master. We next proceeded up the river for two days, through great fatigue and suffering, having to travel part of the way on foot, to a Friend's house, who received us kindly, there being no other Friend's house within forty-five miles. We had a meeting among a poor people, newly settled, but to our mutual comfort and satisfaction, witnessing the Divine Presence to be underneath for our support."

This is the first of his four visits to the towns of Kennebec county, and this account shows the true state of this region at the time. The country was only just beginning to be settled. If there were any Friends, there was not more than one family in a settlement. Each visit of David Sands was attended with striking success, showing that he possessed peculiar gifts and ability for missionary work among these Maine pioneers. Hardly a meeting was begun in the county a

270

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

century ago which did not owe almost the possibility of its existence more or less directly to his influence, and a very large number of the prominent Friends in these early meetings were convinced by his preaching or through his personal efforts. It would be safe to say that the position Friends have held here and the work they have been able to do, is in great measure owing to the zeal and faithfulness of this true and devoted Christian apostle. Nearly twenty years from his first visit he made a final journey through the county, of which he wrote:

"I proceeded towards the eastward on horseback * on our ** course toward Kennebec, where we arrived 5th month, 9th. 1795, and found things greatly altered since my first visit, there being now a pretty large monthly meeting where there was not a Friend's face to be seen when I first visited the country; but rather a hard, warlike people, addicted to many vices, but now a solid good behaved body of Friends."*

The first meeting for worship established by the Society of Friends in this county was at Vassalboro, on the east side of the Kennebec river, in the year 1780. Members of this society were among the pioneer settlers of the towns of China and Vassalboro, and as the set- tlers increased many embraced the peculiar views of the so-called Quakers. These early Friends were men and women of great strength of character; their lives were their strongest arguments in favor of the views which they promulgated and, though few in number, they at once made their influence felt. They lacked the broad culture of the schools and colleges, nor had they gained the intellectual skill which long study gives; but they had keen judgment, prompt decision, unwavering faith in God, and they looked constantly to him for guid- ance. The solitary life in their new homes, where the forests were just yielding to give place to fields and pastures, was well suited to this people, and they were in many respects peculiarly adapted for the only kind of life possible in this county in the last quarter of the last century. For a better understanding of these Friends themselves, their fitness for their condition and surroundings, and their influence espec- ially on the early life of this county, it will be necessary to take a hasty glance at the rise and growth of the society, and to consider the character of its founder, George Fox, for he is the proper exponent of Quakerism.

He was born in 1625, and began his active career in about the year 1649, closing his eventful life, with those words of triumph, "I am clear,'I am clear," in the year 1690. For centuries the truths declared to men among the hills of Judea had been unknown to the people; the signification of the Incarnation was completely lost to them, symbols

*This Journal [New York: Collins & Bro., 259 Pearl street] is highly inter- esting not only to Friends but to all who love to read the simple record of a good man's life.

271

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.

were taken for the things symbolized, mechanical performances took the place of vital communion with a loving Father as revealed by the Son; but the rise of modern Protestantism, and the fear- ful struggles of the century which followed Luther's first protests belong to general history. The unrest which was so noticeable in the first half of the sixteenth century goes to show that the people were not yet satisfied with the religious condition of the country any more than with the political. Numerous characters and various societies came forward at this time, each with its own peculiar con- ception of the relation which exists between this world and the next; between the human creature and the Creator.

The feeling that outward signs of religion are empty and that the relation between God and man is in the highest degree a personal matter came, at a very early age, with great force, into the heart of George Fox. He had sat on the knee of a mother who came from the stock of martyrs, and he inherited a fearlessness which never left him when the "voice within " bade him stand in his place. His father, who was the " Righteous Christer," taught him by his life and words that there is no crown on earth or in Heaven to be compared with a " crown of righteousness." He possessed a tender but strong nature which could be satisfied by what was genuine alone. Let us see by looking a little farther at the experience of George Fox what being a " Quaker "* means.

He went to keep sheep for a shoemaker, and his work as shoe- maker and shepherd combined went on until he was twenty, and might have continued through his life, had not He who appeared to Saul on his way to Damascus, appeared no less certainly, though dif- ferently, to him. Carlyle says: " Perhaps the most remarkable inci- dent in modern history is not the Diet of Worms, still less the battle of Austerlitz, Waterloo, Peterloo, or any other battle; but George Fox's making himself a suit of leather. This man, the first of the Quakers, and by trade a shoemaker, was one of those to whom, under ruder or purer forms, the Divine idea of the Universe is pleased to manifest itself, and across all the hulls of ignorance and earthly degradation, shine through in unspeakable awefulness, unspeakable beauty in their souls; who therefore are rightly accounted Prophets, God-possessed, or even God's, as in some periods it has chanced.'

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.

Illustrated history of Kennebec County, Maine; 1625-1892, Part 30

Author: Kingsbury, Henry D; Deyo, Simeon L., ed Publication date: 1892 Publisher: New York, Blake Number of Pages: 1790

Author: Kingsbury, Henry D; Deyo, Simeon L., ed
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: New York, Blake
Number of Pages: 1790