USA > Maine > Androscoggin County > Livermore > Notes, historical, descriptive, and personal, of Livermore, in Androscoggin (formerly in Oxford) county, Maine > Part 3
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While on board ship at the latter place Mr. Chase saw John Adams. Mr. Adams was on the quarter deck in his morning gown, and was accompanied by his son, John Quincy Adams, then a boy ten or twelve years old.
Chase was of the crew of the Alliance, Captain Landais. His ac-
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count of the engagement between the Bon Homme Richard, etc., and the Serapis and Countess of Scarborough agrees in the main with that given by Mr. Cooper, but differs in some respects. He will not allow that the Alliance deserved all the left-handed compli- ments paid to her by Cooper. According to Chase's account it was the Alliance and not the Pallas that disabled the Countess of Scar- borough; that it was in consequence of the broadsides from the Al- liance that she struck ; that the Pallas, coming up, rendered valuable assistance and was left in charge of the prize while the Alliance went to the aid of Jones; and here, Mr. Chase says, she rendered good service, not to the enemy, as Mr. Cooper would have it, but to Jones. When Jones sailed alongside of the Serapis her commander hailed him, inquiring, " Who are you ?" Jones made no answer and the question was repeated, accompanied by the threat, "Tell me or I will fire into you." "I will tell you when I get a little nearer," roared Jones, in a voice that almost drowned the thunder of a dis- charge of broadsides which took place at that moment.
Chase was afterwards under Jones several months and became quite well acquainted with him. He was a man of mechanical inge- nuity and an excellent worker in wood, and while at Mill Prison had beguiled many a weary hour in whittling out some very curious wooden ladles, one of which Jones happened to see after he came to command the Alliance, and it pleased him so much that he gave Chase half a guinea for it for a punch ladle. He then employed him as a cabin joiner. While Chase was in this service he saw a great deal of Jones and had the vanity to believe that he was quite a favorite. Mr. Chase represents that Jones was liked by his own crew, but not so much by that of the Alliance. The crew of the Alliance were greatly attached to one of their lieutenants, a Mr. Barclay, of Boston, with whom Jones had a falling out. Jones, says Mr. Chase, was a stern man, brave and impetuous; a good man when the crew did well, the devil when they did not. He wanted things in their proper time and way and place, and would have them so. He had a voice like a cannon, but which in ordinary conversa- tion was "rather thick and grnm." He was of light complexion and something below the medium stature."
Mr. Chase's children were as follows : Thomas Chase, jr., b. Feb. 22, 1782, who was a colonel of militia, delegate to the constitutional convention in 1819, and representative from Livermore in the legis-
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lature from 1820 to 1827. Thomas Chase, 3d, formerly a lawyer in Farmington, now a resident of Washington, D. C., father of Mrs. Elizabeth Akers Allen (Florence Percy), is his son. Lura, b. March 11, 1784, married Samuel Livermore. Lathrop, b. March 22, 1787; was a physician and settled in Vassalboro. James, b. Nov. 16, 1789, married Anna Pitts, both of whom are now living in this town. Rebecca, who married Tristram Tilton, was b. Sept. 20, 1792. Olive and Lydia (twins), b. Nov. 8, 1795. Olive was unmarried, and Lydia married Asa Barton. Lucy, who married Charles Benjamin, was b. Sept. 14, 1801, and d. November, 1844.
CAPT. TRISTRAM CHASE, a brother of Thomas, was a ship master. He settled on the westerly side of Long Pond, not far from his brother Sarson. He was lost at sea about the beginning of the cen- tury. His widow married Col. Jesse Stone. He left several chil- dren, of whom Charles T., now living, has been for many years a successful trader in Dixfield. A daughter, Betsey, married Nathaniel Benjamin. Abby, another daughter, married Charles Barrell.
SYLVESTER NORTON, who moved from Edgarton, Martha's Vine- yard, in 1789, with his sons, Ransom, James, and Zebulon, was a shoemaker, and will be referred to hereafter. He died Aug. 8, 1841, in the eighty-fifth year of his life.
RANSOM NORTON lived near the corner, and was first a deacon in the Baptist Church and afterwards a clergyman. He died Oct. 25, 1834, aged seventy-two. Susannah, his wife, died March 2, 1830. His sons, Jones, Jethro, and Charles, settled in the northerly part of the town. Jones and Jethro afterwards went to Massachusetts and died there. A son of the latter, Eugene L., has been Mayor of Charlestown and a member of the Senate of Massachusetts. He is a successful business man. John, another son, was a colonel in the civil war.
JAMES NORTON settled in the westerly part of the town, where he resided till his death in 1841. His sons were Moses, Ira, Tristram, and James; the daughters were Prudence, Patty, Lydia, Lucy, and Olive. He was one of the "four partners," so called.
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ZEBULON NORTON, the youngest son of Sylvester, took up the farm situated on the road from North Livermore to the Falls, about three-quarters of a mile from the former place, upon which he re- sided till his death in October, 1865, at the age of eighty-eight years. He married, first, Hannah, daughter of Dea. Pelatiah Gibbs, and afterwards Mary Merritt. He had twelve children, of whom nine are now (1874) living, viz .: Sylvester, b. June 12, 1804; Mary, b. April 5, 1810, now living at Dexter, Me., the widow of George, son of the late Capt. Alpheus Kendall ; David, b. Aug. 25, 1812, a prominent citizen of Oldtown ; Herman, b. Feb. 18, 1814, who resides in Quincy, Illinois ; Sewall, b. Sept. 19, 1817, and lives on the "old farm ;" Jane, b. July 14, 1822, the wife of E. C. Brett, Esq., of Bangor, Clerk of the Judicial Courts for Penobscot County; Lydia, b. Aug. 10, 1824, who married Henry Bond Bradford, of Livermore ; Ellen C., b. Aug. 2, 1828, who married John R. Brett, and lives in San Francisco; Hannah E., b. Dec. 1, 1837, wife of John Hathaway, who lives in Quincy, Cal.
Mr. Norton was a selectman for many years, and was a man of strict integrity and great firmness of character; a man who could not only say " no" when duty or principle required, but who was not easily moved from his opinions. Once at a school meeting when his brother Ransom pleaded earnestly for the use of the school-house for the purpose of holding a religious meeting, and besought the voters to be accommodating and not stubborn and set up their own wills against their neighbors, "Uncle Zeb," as he was familiarly called, replied, " I had rather have my own will than anybody else's will, and so had you, brother Ransom." The point against " brother Ransom," who was not unlike "Uncle Zeb" in the firmness with which he held his opinions, was thought to be peculiarly well taken.
SAMUEL HILLMAN moved to Livermore in 1788, at the age of nineteen. He was one of the "four partners," so called, Sylvanus Boardman, Ransom and James Norton being the others. He mar- ried Jane Norton, sister of Ransom and James, and became a Meth- odist preacher. He died in Monmouth, Kennebec County, at the age of eighty years. He had seven children, of whom the Rev. A. P. Hillman, of Cape Elizabeth, is one. A younger brother, MosEs, settled in Livermore, on the Intervale, in 1817, where he died Dec. 17, 1823. Tristram Hillman, Esq., for whom Hillman's Ferry is
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named, and who has held many municipal offices in town, is son of the last named.
SAMUEL SAWIN was born in Watertown May 8, 1762, was a sol- dier in the Revolution, married April 18, 1792, Martha Mason. He settled in Livermore about 1788. He lived near Mr. Thomas Cool- edge, senior, and like him was a grower of fine fruit. He frequented the Portland market for many years. He married for a second wife Sarah Webb, of Portland. His younger brother, ABIJAH, born Jan. 15, 1764, married Prudence Adams Feb. 25, 1788, and settled in Livermore, not far from Samuel. Besides Samuel Sawin, jr., who resides at the Corner, none of the children of Samuel or Abijah are now in Livermore.
ISAAC LOVEWELL removed from Weston, Mass., and was in Liver- more before 1790. He purchased of Samuel Whiting the large farm on the northerly side of the hill known as Lovewell's (or Waters') hill on the old highway, and had one of the largest orchards, and with it one of the best cider mills, in town. He amassed a very considerable property for a new settlement, by farming, loaning money, and "putting out " neat stock and sheep to "double in four years." He was a member of the Baptist Church and one of its most liberal benefactors, contributing generously to its support while living, and leaving it a handsome bequest at his death. He became quite deaf while comparatively a young man. He considered the State law in respect to the collection of debts as unreasonably prej- udicial to the creditor, and greatly inferior to the "old Monartch laws," as he called the laws of the province. Though regarded by many as hard in his dealings, he did, under the constraint, it may be, of the good counsellor who drew his will, an act of justice such as men of kindlier fame have in similar cases omitted to do, in making adequate provision for the support, through life, of an old servant who, though of feeble intellect and ungraceful person, had been faithful and devoted to him and his family.
HENRY BOND, of Watertown, was born Jan. 14, 1762. He was a son of Col. William Bond, who was a lieutenant colonel and acted as colonel in the battle of Bunker Hill, and was colonel of the twen- ty-fifth regiment in the Continental army. He went with it in 1776
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to New York, and thence to Canada. He died Aug. 31, 1776, la- mented as an able officer and true patriot. His son Henry, the sub- ject of this notice, then fourteen years old, accompanied him to New York and Canada, and was with him at his decease. In June, 1790, the son moved to Livermore, where he had previously purchased land and half of the first grist and saw-mills erected in the town. He was a deacon of the first church, and the second school-master in the town. The first school-house in Livermore was built a short distance north of his mills (before mentioned as having been erected by Dea. Livermore). He married Hannah Stearns May 21, 1789, and died March 27, 1796, leaving two children, a son and a daugh-
ter. Henry, the son, was born in Watertown, March 21, 1790, grad- uated at Dartmouth College in 1813, in which he was afterwards a tutor for nearly two years. He was educated as a physician, and re- ceived the degree of M. D. in 1817. He settled first at Concord, N. H., and then moved to Philadelphia, where he resided, devoted to his profession-in which he became distinguished-till his death in May, 1859. He was never married. He was author of " Geneal- ogies of the Families and Descendants of the. early settlers of Watertown, Mass., including Waltham and Weston, to which is ap- pended the early history of the town," published in 1855, a volume of near 1100 pages, the copyright of which he gave to the N. E. Genealogical and Historical Society. Hannah, the daughter, born in Livermore April 15, 1794, married William Dewey, of Augusta, Me., and died Nov. 24, 1827. The widow of Mr. Bond married, for a second husband, Zebedee Rose, of Livermore.
*THOMAS COOLIDGE moved from Cambridge, Mass., to Livermore in June, 1790, and had a large farm and excellent orchard of grafted fruit in the westerly part of the town. He died in 1834 at the age of eighty. His widow, Lucy (Wyeth) Coolidge, died Oct. 16, 1850, at the great age of ninety-six years and eight months. He had nine children. Jonas, the eldest, lived in Boston; his daughter Eliza- beth married Hon. Peter Harvey. Daniel was one of the most wealthy and successful farmers in the town; was a captain of caval-
*The ancestor of the Coolidges of Watertown was John Coolidge, who was admitted a free- man May 25, 1636, and was a selectman many times between 1636 and 1677; was a representa- tive in 1658, and was often employed in witnessing wills, taking inventories, and settling estates. Mr. Somerby says " the Coolidge family seem to have been settled in Cambridge, England, from a very remote period."-Bond's Genealogies.
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ry. Major Elisha Coolidge, of Jay, is his son. Cornelius settled in Dexter, Me., where he had a fine farm. Thomas was a farmer who grew much choice fruit. He died in Livermore June 25, 1846. Elisha went to Solon, Somerset County, when a young man, and became a trader, amassing a large fortune. Hepzibah, the only sur- vivor (1874) of this family, married Alden Chandler, and lives in Oxford, Me. Betsey married Artemas Learned, a trader in Liver- more, who moved to Hallowell and became a merchant and after- wards a banker.
JOSEPH COOLIDGE and family migrated from Waltham in June, 1790, in company with his relative, Thomas Coolidge. He took up a farm near the line of Livermore in the part of Jay that is now Canton, but his associations were largely in the former town, where several of his children settled. His father was killed, as Bond says, in the battle of Lexington, April 19, 1775 (but it was probably dur- ing the retreat from Concord), and he was himself a soldier in the war of the Revolution, having been a member (1780) of the four- teenth regiment of the Continental army. The privations which were frequently the lot of the early settlers of this neighborhood were illustrated in the experience of Mr. Coolidge. He relates that the year he moved into Jay there was a scarcity of provisions and, in consequence, much suffering. His family was at one time desti- tute of food, and he went (believing it to be the only place where he could find any ) to Dea. Livermore's. The deacon told him that he had no corn, and that the best he could do for him was to furnish him with a horse to ride to the Kennebec, where it was understood corn might be purchased, and with money to pay for it. Thus armed, Mr. Coolidge set out for the down-east Egypt. Returning, with his corn on the horse's back, he reached the Androscoggin River late at night, but the boat was on the west side, and the ferry- man lived (at Dea. Livermore's) so far away that he could not raise him. At this moment a heavy shower came up, and Mr. Coolidge, tying his horse and removing the corn from his back, peeled a hem- lock tree, placed the bark over the corn, plunged into the river, swam it, found the boat, crossed with it, took his horse and corn aboard, recrossed the river, and proceeded on to his home, which he reached at two o'clock in the morning. Arrived at home wet and hungry-for he had eaten little since the previous morning-he
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aroused his wife, and she made him a "Johnny cake," which he said was the sweetest food he ever ate.
WILLIAM COOLIDGE, son of William, of Waltham, born in that town Jan. 28, 1777, married in 1799 Mary, daughter of Major Jona- than Hale, of Sutton, settled in Livermore, was the first captain of the first company of militia therein, was a school-master and farmer, and lived on the farm afterwards owned and occupied by Amos Edes. He moved away about 1808. He was a relative of Thomas and Joseph.
JONATHAN GODING, born in Waltham Feb. 25, 1762, married Ruth Sargent, and moved to Livermore in 1790, and had a farm north of the Corner, where he planted a nursery and introduced many choice varieties of apples and pears. His children were Peter, who lived in Jay, Jonas and Spencer, who became farmers in Livermore, Han- nah and Benjamin Myrick.
ABIJAH, JOHN, and ABEL MONROE, brothers, moved from Lincoln, Mass., about 1790, and settled in Livermore.
ABIJAH MONROE was the first innkeeper in town, and his house was near what was known as Sanders' Corner. He died in 1823. He kept an excellent tavern, which travelers (of whom there were many in those days upon what was the great highway leading from Portland to Farmington), feeling sure of good fare, would lay their plans to reach whenever they could do so without too great an ef- fort. For years it was quite an exchange for the townspeople. The first four lawyers who successively practiced in the town lived with Mr. Monroe and had their office in his house. The neighbors and townsfolk would repair there to see one another, learn the news, relate what had happened, renew the past, revive the scenes and re- call the events and sayings of the war-in which many of them had been actors-
While jokes much stronger than their flip went round,
though the flip was by no means intended for weak heads. Owing to failure in health Mr. Monroe lost the power of easy locomotion, and so was accustomed to sit in his large arm-chair in the public room from morning till night, reading when there was no company
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some book, generally the Bible, with which he became so familiar as to be able to quote from any part of it with an accuracy that was scarcely less than marvellous. He delighted in theological discus- sion and allowed no opportunity for it to escape unimproved. He had a tilt with the Rev. Jabez Woodman, A. M., a Baptist clergy man of New Gloucester, which lasted from dinner to the small hours of the next day, and ended in the conversion of Mr. Wood- man to Mr. Monroe's way of thinking. He had not equal success with the Rev. Dr. Payson, by whom a discussion, which had sprung up between them, was rather abruptly terminated, leaving the good doctor minus a dinner, and the publican's money-till unreplenished by the coin of the great preacher.
Rev. Paul Coffin, in the record of a "missionary tour" in 1798, makes this entry : " Aug. 30th. . . Invited by the wife of Abijah Monroe to put up with them for the night. He had just sprung his net on six dozen pigeons and took them all. To take a whole flock is a common thing with him. Aug. 31st. . . Returned to Mon- roe's and put up for the night. He and his wife are sensible and agreeable."
Mr. Coffin was in Livermore again in 1800 and put up with Mon- roe, with whom he seems to have had quite an entertaining religious colloquy at the expense of the Baptists, who were multiplying in the town.
JOHN MONROE was a farmer and died in Livermore April 2, 1856, at the age of ninety-two years. Mary, his widow, died Nov. 1, 1861, at the age of ninety-four. His son John, a successful teacher in early life, and a member of the legislature in 1861, was a resident of the town until his death in 1873. Allen, his second son, lives in Milo, Piscataquis County, and the youngest son, Abijah, is a resi- dent of Richmond. Va. His daughter, Luda, married Rev. Caleb Fuller, a Methodist clergyman. She died many years ago. A daughter of Mrs. Fuller married Hon. E. K. Boyle, a prominent lawyer of Belfast.
ABEL MONROE, born May 14, 1769, died June 24, 1861. He mar- ried Martha Bixby, of Keene, N. H., and for a second wife Salome Hinds, of Livermore. The Hon. Joseph S. Monroe (recently de- ceased), Senator and Judge of Probate for Piscataquis County, was
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his son. His oldest daughter, Patty, married Maj. Isaac Strickland, of Livermore, and died in 1873. Julia, the second daughter, mar- ried Elias T. Aldrich. She has been dead many years. Mary, the third daughter, lives in Keene, N. H., and Lucy, the youngest daughter, in Boston. Isaac, the oldest son, was drowned in Bart- lett's Pond about 1820; the second son, Nathan, has been dead more than forty years.
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SYLVANUS BOARDMAN, who was a native of Martha's Vineyard, came to Livermore with Mr. Hillman and the Nortons. He was an able minister of the Baptist denomination, of whom more will be said hereafter.
EPHRAIM CHILD was born in Waltham July 26, 1760. He came to Livermore about 1794, and settled on the farm where his son Abijah lives. His first wife was Lydia Livermore, a sister of Lieut. Samuel Benjamin's wife. His second wife was Herrick. Mr. Child died in 1825.
BENJAMIN PARK lived near Abijah Monroe's and was the father- in-law of Mr. Monroe. He died in 1825, at the age of ninety-two years.
LIEUT. SAMUEL FOSTER was a soldier in the Revolutionary war and died in 1825. He lived on the east side of the river.
SAMUEL ATWOOD, the first captain of the company of cavalry or- ganized in Livermore in 1809, was born in Dighton, Mass., and set- tled first at Brettun's Mills abont 1795, and then in the westerly part of the town. He was an active, intelligent man, and was often employed as a town officer. Among his children were Captain Hezekiah Atwood, a prosperous farmer of Livermore, now recently deceased; Ephraim Atwood and Lorenzo Atwood, who removed to Buckfield, where they were engaged in trade for many years. Sam- uel, another son, moved to Lexington, Somerset County. A daugh- ter, Hepzibah, married Artemas Cole; of Buckfield.
RICHARD MERRITT was a native of London and an employee in a large mercantile firm engaged in the American trade. He had seen
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Boston merchants in London and became interested in their coun- try, and when he decided to emigrate to America brought from the London house a letter of commendation saying that he could be trusted with "untold gold." He married, in 1795, Mercy Coolidge, sister of Joseph Coolidge, who settled in Jay in 1790, and followed Mr. C. to that town in a few years; but he soon removed to Liver- more, where he lived until his death in 1826. His widow died in 1840, aged eighty-six. He was in person a small man and of quaint manners. He had known in England, he said, men "who heard in their ears, understood in their elbows, and carried their brains in their shoes."
HENRY GREVY, a Hessian, after the close of the Revolutionary war, in which he had been a soldier in the British army, came to Livermore and settled on a farm east of Lieut. Benjamin's, about a mile from the river, and where he lived until his decease. He had two daughters who are now living in Bangor. He was a prudent, saving man and instructed his family to " eat their bread and smell of their cheese."
EBENEZER PITTS, born in Taunton, Mass., in 1757, moved to Liv- ermore from Ward, Mass., in 1791, and entered upon and occupied till his death in April, 1831, a farm near the Corner, the same now occupied by his grand-son, Ebenezer Pitts. His wife was Mary Ellis, of Raynham. He was a good citizen. His son, Philip, and his daughters, Anna, who married James Chase, and Prudence, who married David Reed, settled in Livermore. Philip married Dinah, daughter of Sylvester Norton. He died in 1828.
MAJOR JOSEPH MILLS was a half brother of Lieut. Samuel Benja- min and followed him to Livermore in a few years after the latter came here. He took up the farm afterwards owned by Capt. Samu- el Atwood. When he sold this farm to Capt. Atwood he bought and moved onto the farm on' Butter Hill, now owned by Daniel Briggs. He sold this place more than half a century ago and went to Pennsylvania. He had several children, and was a prosperous farmer.
LIEUT. ELIJAH WELLINGTON, from Lincoln, Mass., settled at a
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very early date on the east side of the river in Livermore. Elijah, who is now living, Nathan, who had the old farm, and Elbridge, a Universalist clergyman of Alton, Me. (recently deceased), and Phebe, who married Col. Billy Benjamin, were his children.
AMOS LIVERMORE, who married, first, Hannah Sanderson, and afterwards Eunice Luce, and after her death her sister, Phebe Luce, and was a brother of the wives of Samuel Benjamin and Ephraim Child, was born in Waltham, June 3, 1765, and died Sept. 15, 1826. He came to Livermore in 1795, and first lived on the farm afterwards owned by Spencer Godding. He had several children, of whom one only, Eunice, the widow of Richard Merrill, is now living in this town. Her home is on the Intervale.
DANIEL HOLMAN emigrated from Worcester County before 1793, and made a farm about a mile southwesterly from the Corner, which his son, Abner, afterwards owned and occupied. He was one of the seventeen original members of the first Baptist church in Livermore.
HASTINGS STRICKLAND, born in Nottingham, N. H., Aug. 17, 1768, moved to Livermore in 1795. He was the son of the Rev. John Strickland, of Turner, a graduate of Yale College, and his wife was Sally Perley, daughter of the Rev. Samuel Perley, of Gray. She was born June 14, 1774. He had a large farm, with an exten- sive orchard and a cider mill, on the main road, about half a mile south of Monroe's tavern. Paul Coffin visited him in 1797. He says : "Rev. Strickland kept Sabbath with us; baptized Isaac, child of Hastings Strickland, and Sally." Mr. Strickland died March 9, 1829, and his widow Aug. 11, 1842. His children were John, Isaac, Samuel P., Hastings, and Lee. John, b. Sept. 10, 1794, d. in Liver- more Jan. 22, 1867. He was a successful farmer and frequently a town officer. Lysander Strickland, of Bangor, and Lyman Strick- land, of Houlton, are his sons. Isaac, b. Dec. 17, 1796, resides at Livermore village and is a wealthy and prominent man in the town; was major of a battalion of cavalry, and for two years a State sena- tor. Samuel P., b. June 25, 1801, has been a major-general in the State militia, a member of the executive council, and of both branches of the legislature. He resides in Bangor. Hastings was b. May 16, 1803. He was a major of cavalry, sheriff of Penobscot 4
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