HISTORICAL RECORD.
August 3.—Pemberton Square was chosen as the site for the new Suffolk County Court House.
On August 3 was celebrated at Middletown, Conn., the centenary of the first Episcopal ordination held in this country. "The clergy met their Bishop at Middletown on Aug. 2, 1785, and after a formal acknowledgment of their Bishop on the part of the clergy, he held an ordination of three candidates from Connecticut—Philo Shelton, Ashbel Baldwin and Henry Vandyck—and one from Maryland, Colin Fergusun." There was a large attendance of clergymen from various parts of New England.
August 5.—The Washburn Library, erected by the surviving members of the Washburn family, was dedicated at Livermore, Maine. Among the guests present were ex-vice President Hannibal Hamlin, Senator Frye, Mr. E.B. Haskell of the Boston Herald, and Hon. E.B. Washburn, of Illinois who delivered the address. Over a thousand people attended the services.
August 6.—Death of the Hon. John Batchelder, a well known citizen of Lynn, Mass, at the age of eighty. He was a native of Topsfield, Mass., but went to Lynn when a young man. He taught school in Ward 5 for thirty years previous to 1855, and was elected to the Massachusetts senate that year. He was also in the same year elected city clerk and collector of taxes. He was re-elected to the senate in 1856 and 1857. He was the first treasurer of the Lynn Five Cents Savings Bank. He afterward taught the Ward 6 Grammar School, and held that position ten years, and then became a member of the school board. The last office held by him was that of postmaster, being appointed by President Grant in 1869.
At a meeting of the Battle Monument Association, held at Bennington, Vt., on the 12th of August, there were present Governor Pingree, who presided, Senators Evarts and Morrill, Professor Perry of Yale College, Lieutenant Governor Ormsbee of Brandon, and other gentlemen. The report of the special committee was read, and a resolution passed accepting the design of J.P. Rinn, of Boston for a Battle Monument. A committee was then appointed to report the details to the President of the United States and the governors of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, which action will entitle the Association to receive the appropriations made by Congress and the Legislatures of these states for the monument. The fund now amounts to $80,000.
On August 12th, General Henry Kemble Oliver died in Salem, Mass., at the advanced age of eighty-five years. He was born in Beverly, Mass., Nov. 24, 1800, a son of Rev. Daniel Oliver and Elizabeth Kemble; was educated in the Boston Latin School, and Harvard College (for two years) and was graduated from Dartmouth College. After his graduation, he settled in Salem, and as Principal of the High and Latin Schools, and also of a private school, he was virtually at the head of the educational interests of the town for a quarter of a century. In 1848, he moved to Lawrence, Mass., to become agent of the Atlantic Mills. While living in Lawrence, he was appointed superintendent of schools, and in recognition of his services the "Oliver Grammar School" was founded.
At an early day General Oliver became interested in military affairs as an officer of the Salem Light Infantry and in 1844 he was made Adjutant General of the Commonwealth, by Gov. Briggs, and held this office for four years. During the war he served with great satisfaction as Treasurer of the Commonwealth, and performed the most arduous duties in a very faithful and acceptable manner. From 1869 to 1873 he was chief of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and ever after that became interested in reducing the hours of labor in factories and in the limitation of factory work by children. From 1876 to 1880 he was mayor of Salem, and displayed almost the same vivacity and energy in discharging the duties of this office, as an octogenarian, that he had shown in his youth. He was master of the theory and history of music, a good bass singer, a good organist, and the author of several popular compositions. Of these "Federal Street" seems likely to become permanent in musical literature. In his youth he sang in the Park street church in Boston and for many years he led the choir of the North church in Salem. "Oliver's Collection of Church Music" is one of the results of his labors in this direction. In conjunction with Dr. Tuckerman he published the "National Lyre." He was a member of the old Handel and Hayden Society and the Salem Glee Club, both famous musical organizations of his early days. In 1825 General Oliver married Sally, daughter of Captain Samuel Cook, by whom he had two sons and five daughters, as follows: Colonel S.C. Oliver, Dr. H.K. Oliver, Jr., Sarah Elizabeth, who married Mr. Bartlett of Lawrence, and who died about four years ago, Emily Kemble, who is the wife of Colonel Andrews, U.S.A., Mary Evans Oliver, who has been the faithful attendant of the general in his declining years, and Ellen Wendell, who married Augustus Cheever of North Andover.
August 13.—Boxford, Mass. celebrated its bi-centennial. Among the addresses was one by Sidney Perley, author of the "History of Boxford from 1635 to 1880," who spoke particularly on the formative period of the history of Boxford, alluding to the fact that Boxford was a frontier in 1635 and was then a wilderness and the fighting ground of the Agawam and Tarantive Indians.
August 19.—Third annual meeting of the American Boynton Association held in Worcester, Mass. The Secretary said that he had been able to trace over three hundred families back to William and John Boynton, who settled in Rowley, Mass., in 1638. They came from Yorkshire, England, and the family there is traced back through thirty generations, to 1067, when their estate was confirmed to them by William, the Conqueror. It was reported that work is being pushed in the preparation of the family memorial to be published.
August 19.—Centennial of Heath, Franklin County, Mass, incorporated February 14, 1785. The celebration had been postponed to August for the sake of convenience. About 2,500 people attended the exercises. The principal addresses were by John H. Thompson, Esq., of Chicago, and Rev. C.E. Dickinson of Marietta, Ohio.
In describing these the Springfield Republican said of the town:—
"In 1832 the population was 1300, but by the census just taken the town shows but 568 inhabitants. This decadence is attributable to emigration and the railroads. Its wealth has consisted chiefly in the men and women who have here been reared and educated for lives of usefulness. Indeed few towns of equal population have sent out so many who have honored themselves and their native town as Heath. Its Puritan characteristics have lingered like a sweet fragrance, and their influences are still felt. From this little hamlet have gone out into other fields a member of Congress, two judges, ten lawyers, thirteen ministers, twenty-nine physicians and many teachers; twenty-three natives have been college graduates, and thirty-eight, not natives have also been collegians. If the women have not occupied as public position as the men, they have been no less useful. Forty-five have graduated from various seminaries and several have become well known missionaries and teachers. It was in this town, too, that Dr. Holland spent his early life."
August 19.—Twelfth annual gathering of the Needham family, descendants of John Needham, who built the Needham homestead at the cross-roads known as Needham's Corner on the Lynnfield road at South Peabody, Mass. John Needham was famous in his day and generation as the builder of the solid old stone jail in Salem in 1813, the same massive structure which has just been remodeled. Back of him in the time of the Puritans, there were George Needham and his three brothers and a sister, who came to Salem very early in its infancy, and whose lineal descendants scattered all over New England, John Needham died in 1831 at the age of seventy-three. At the family gathering six generations were represented, and a large number of the branches of the family as well—the Needhams, the Newhalls, the Browns, the Stones, the Nourses, the Galencias and others.
August 26.—Centennial celebration of Rowe, Franklin County, Mass. Like Heath, the town was incorporated in February, 1785. The historical address was by Hon. Silas Bullard of Menasha, Wis.
W.T. Spear has just finished a history of North Adams which he has spent a long time in compiling. He has written the history of the town from the time of its settlement in 1749 to the present time, and says he has gleaned many facts from old town records which have never been published. He will publish his work in small book form and sell it at fifty cents a copy.
F. Wally Perkins, a topographical engineer in the employ of the United States coast and geographical service, is making a geographical survey of the Connecticut river from South Deerfield to its mouth. Part of the expense of this survey is borne by the government and the rest by the state, the object being to locate certain topographical and geological features in the valley.
It has not been definitely stated where in Boston the proposed statue of William Loyd Garrison will be placed, but it will either be in West Chester Park or Commonwealth avenue, with a preference for the latter. The city engineer is now engaged in making plans for the pedestal, which is to be of hammered Quincy granite, about ten feet in height. In the statue Mr. Garrison is represented sitting in an easy chair apparently at peace with all the world, the great struggle in which he was a prominent figure having been brought to an end. Beneath the chair lies a file of the Liberator, which suggests the iron will of the man in his conflict with slavery, and the strength of his purpose is further shown in the following inscription on the side of the pedestal "I am in earnest; I will not equivocate; I will not excuse; I will not retire a single inch; I will be heard."
The General Court has a double survival in the State Legislature and the town meeting. And the most curious part of this survival is that the Legislature of this State still retains some judicial functions. It is, we believe, the only State where this is the case. The Legislature of Massachusetts retains the name of the General Court, but contents itself with purely legislative work while our own Legislature is still Supreme Court in equity. This has descended to it as an inheritance from the General Court of colonial times.—New Haven (Conn.)News.
From the annual report of Major C.W. Raymond on the improvement of rivers and harbors in Massachusetts it appears that the cost of the improvement of Newburyport harbor during the year was $31,560, and $9,868 remains available. The object of the improvement is to create, at the outer bar, a permanent channel one thousand feet in width, with a least depth of seventeen feet at low water. The amount required for the completion of the project is $205,000, provided the entire sum is appropriated for the next fiscal year. It is proposed to expend the money in the rapid completion of the jetties already under construction.
The proceedings of the Bostonian Society at its annual meeting in January, 1885, have just been published in pamphlet form. It embraces much valuable data. The illustrations consist of a fine heliotype view of the Old State House, from the east end, the home of the Society; and a copy of its well-devised seal, in the heraldic coloring. The experiment of a cheap pamphlet giving a summary historical sketch of the Old State House has been successful, and another similar publication is contemplated.
Rebecca Nourse, who was the first person hanged as a witch at Salem, in 1692, notwithstanding her repeated affirmation of her innocence, has just had a monument erected by her descendants. On one side of it is the legend concerning her, and on the other these lines of the poet Whittier:—
"O Christian martyr, who for truth could die,
When all about thee owned the hideous lie.
The world, redeemed from superstition's sway,
Is breathing freer for thy sake to-day."
In his address at the unveiling of Ward's statue of "The Pilgrim," erected in Central Park, New York, by the New England Society in the city of New York, Mr. George William Curtis said:—
"Holding that the true rule of religious faith and worship was written in the Bible, and that every man must read and judge for himself, the Puritan conceived the church as a body of independent seekers and interpreters of the truth, dispensing with priests and priestly orders and functions; organizing itself and calling no man master."