Plymouth memories of an octogenarian

by William T. Davis

CHAPTER XXVI.

I trust that I may be pardoned if I speak of my brother, Charles G. Davis, of whose early life, though only two years have elapsed since his death, most of my readers know little or nothing. The son of William Davis, Jr., and Joanna (White) Davis, he was born May 30, 1820, in the house now known as the Plymouth Rock House on Cole’s Hill. After receiving a common school education in Plymouth, he was fitted for college, under the direction of Hon. John A. Shaw of Bridgewater, and graduated at Harvard in 1840. He studied law in the office of Jacob H. Loud of Plymouth, at the Harvard Law school, and in the office of Hubbard and Watts in Boston, and was admitted to the bar in Plymouth at the August term of the Common Pleas Court in 1842, establishing himself in practice in Boston, where he remained until 1853. During his nine years residence in Boston, he was at various times in partnership with William H. Whitman, George P. Sanger and Seth Webb. In 1848 he was one of the prominent organizers of the Free Soil Party, and was a delegate to the Buffalo Convention, which nominated Martin Van Buren for President, and Charles Francis Adams for Vice President.

In 1851 he was tried before Benjamin F. Hallet, U. S. Commissioner, for complicity in the rescue of Shadrach, a fugitive slave. The charge was that as he was entering the court room, Shadrach was going out, and that he held the door in such a way as to make the escape effectual. Though he was acquitted, I never knew how much or how little, if at all, he aided the negro in his flight. In 1853 Mr. Davis was a member of the state constitutional convention, and in that year changed his residence to Plymouth, and building a house, established there his permanent home. In 1856 he was appointed a member of the State Board of Agriculture, and in the same year chosen President of the Plymouth County Agricultural Society, retaining the latter office until 1876. In 1859 he was chosen an overseer of Harvard University. In 1861 he was appointed by Gov. Andrew on a commission to propose a plan for a State Agricultural College, and after the establishment of that institution, served as one of its trustees many years. In 1862 he represented his town in the General Court, and in the same year was appointed under the U. S. Revenue law assessor for the first District, holding that office until 1869. In 1874 he was appointed Judge of the 3d District Court, and remained on the bench until his death. He loved his native town, and was always recognized as a public spirited man, who would make a liberal response to every call aiming at its welfare. He built Davis building in 1854, the brick block at the corner of Railroad avenue in 1870, and was for many years the largest individual holder of real estate in the town. He married November 19, 1845, Hannah Stevenson, daughter of Col. John B. Thomas and Mary (LeBaron) Thomas, and has two children living, Joanna, wife of Richard H. Morgan, and Charles S. Davis, a graduate at Harvard in 1880, and now practicing law in Plymouth.

As thirty-seven years have elapsed since the death of Robert B. Hall, I am inclined to think that three-quarters of my readers know no more concerning him than that his widow was until her recent death a much respected resident in Plymouth. Mr. Hall was the son of Charles and Catherine Hall, and was born in Boston, January 12, 1812. He had not as far as I know a collegiate education, but prepared for the Congregational ministry at the Yale Divinity school. After leaving the school he spent two years in Europe, where he gratified his taste not only by literary pursuits, but also by the study of art in its various forms. He served also during his absence as an agent of the American Anti-Slavery Society. In 1837, soon after his return, he was settled over the Third Society in Plymouth, whose place of worship was on Pleasant street, opposite Training Green. In that year he delivered an address before the Pilgrim Society on the anniversary of the Landing of the Pilgrims, and in 1839 on the same occasion an address before the Third church. In 1841 he delivered an address at the dedication of Oak Grove cemetery.

In 1840, largely through his influence, the present church on the north side of Town Square was built under the name of the Church of the Pilgrimage, and a new society was formed called the Society of the Pilgrimage.

In 1844 Mr. Hall became Episcopalian in faith, and at his house on the 15th of November in that year, the present Episcopal Society was formed, and on the 3d of October, 1846, the church on Russell street was consecrated with Theodore W. Snow, rector, who had been chosen on the 13th of the previous April. At about that time Mr. Hall was called to St. James’ Episcopal church in Roxbury, where he remained several years. In 1849 he returned to Plymouth, where he preached for a time in the Robinson church, and soon after built the house on the corner of Lothrop Place, which he made his home until his death. In 1855 he joined the Know Nothing movement, and was chosen State Senator, and in 1856 he was chosen by the Know Nothings, member of Congress. In 1858 on the termination of the Know Nothing party, he was sent back to Congress by the Republicans, thus serving two terms in Washington. After his retirement from public life he devoted himself to literary pursuits, and in 1864 delivered the oration at the dedication of the Masonic building in Boston on the corner of Tremont and Boylston streets.

Mr. Hall married in 1841 Abby Mitchell, daughter of Nathaniel Morton Davis, and died April 15, 1868.

I suppose that few of my readers know that Jonathan Walker, the man with the branded hand, ever lived in Plymouth. About fifty years ago, or perhaps a little earlier, he lived in the house now standing in what is called the Nook at the head waters of Hobb’s Hole brook. I do not remember to have ever seen him, but I recall the time when he was complained of for shingling his house on the Sabbath. He was born in Harvard, Mass., March 22, 1799, and at the age of seventeen went to sea. When quite young he assisted Benjamin Lundy in colonizing slaves in Mexico, and for a time lived with his family in Florida. In 1844 he assisted four slaves to escape by water, but was overtaken and captured with his companions by a Revenue Cutter, which was sent in pursuit. He was carried to Pensacola, and after trial for his offense was sentenced to stand one hour in the pillory, to pay a fine of one hundred and fifty dollars, and be branded on the hand with the letters S. S., signifying slave stealer. It is creditable to Southern humanity that a blacksmith refused to heat the instrument of torture. He remained in prison eleven months in default of payment of the fine, and was then by the aid of Northern friends released. After his release he delivered lectures in various Northern towns, and then settled down in Plymouth. In 1863 he bought a farm in Lake Harbor, Michigan, and carried on the business of raising fruit until his death, April 30, 1875. He left behind him in Plymouth a son John, whom I knew very well, and whom it fell to me once to aid during a pecuniary embarrassment. His father had neglected his education, but he was a noble fellow in whose presence I always felt that I was in the presence of a man.

I think he was one of not more than twenty men whose personality during my long life has impressed me. He always called me William, and I always called him John. I would have trusted to him my life in any emergency, for I knew that he would have risked his own to save the life of a fellow man. He held a commission as pilot for some years, and in appearance an ideal pilot he was. With his broad Scotch face, almost buried in hair and whiskers, it was easy to imagine him in his tarpaulin and oil clothes beating his pilot lugger up channel in a heavy sea. About eight years ago he went to Michigan to live with a sister on a farm which his father had occupied, and a few months ago I heard of his death.

I have spoken of Joseph Bartlett, who lived on the corner of Court street and Court square, but there was another Joseph Bartlett of whom probably few of my readers have ever heard. He was a man of diversified talents, of diversified traits of character, and led a diversified life. He was author, poet, orator, lecturer, lawyer, merchant, gambler, prisoner for debt, and generally an adventurer. He was son of Sylvanus and Martha (Wait) Bartlett, and was born in Plymouth in 1761. His father was a well to do merchant, who owned real estate in the neighborhood of the present junction of High and Russell streets. He had a sister, Sophia, who married Benjamin Drew, the father of our late deceased friend, Benjamin Drew, and I have always supposed that our friend inherited his brilliant talents from his mother’s side of the house. Mr. Bartlett graduated at Harvard in 1782, and studied law in Salem, and was recommended to be sworn as attorney in 1788. Soon after the close of the revolution he went to England, and in London, attracted by his eccentricities and wit much attention. One evening at the theatre during the performance of a play in which American soldiers were caricatured as cobblers, tailors and tinkers, he stood up in the pit and called for cheers for the army of cobblers, tailors and tinkers who had defeated the British. The interference so far from being resented, was taken in good part, and the young Londoners took him into their companionship and invited him to the clubs where he was for a time made much of. He afterwards fell into gambling habits, and finally was imprisoned for debt. He wrote a play, and from the proceeds of its sale obtained a release, after which for a short time he appeared on the stage. After his return home he opened a law office in Woburn, and painted it black, calling it “the coffin” to attract notice. He afterwards removed to Cambridge, and in 1799 delivered a poem before the Harvard Phi Beta Kappa Society on “Physiognomy,” in which some of his allusions, like the following, were believed to be personal:

“First on the list observe that woman’s form,

Who looks a very monster in a storm.

Her skinny lips, her pointed nose behold,

And say if nature’s marked her for a scold;

Observe her chin, her every feature trace,

And see the fury trembling in her face;

By nature made to mar the joys of life;

And damn that man who has her for a wife.”

In 1823 he delivered a Fourth of July oration in Boston, and recited a poem entitled, “The New Vicar of Bray.” At one time in his varied career he was a member of the Maine legislature, and at another had a law office in Portsmouth, N. H. In 1823 he published a collection of “Aphorisms on men, manners, principles and things,” and also an essay on “The blessings of poverty,” prefaced by the following lines:

I tell thee Poverty that you and I

Have friendly met together;

Thou art the soul of minstrelsy

In every kind of weather.

Through all life’s journey thou hast not

From me an hour departed;

Thou never hast my track forgot,

Which proves thee most true hearted.

I have two letters from Mr. Bartlett to my grandfather, William Davis, soliciting aid, and one to my grandfather from President Kirkland of Harvard University, inclosing thirteen dollars contributed by a few Cambridge gentlemen with the request that he would use it for Mr. Bartlett’s benefit. He married Anna May, daughter of Thomas Witherell of Plymouth, and died in Boston, October 21, 1827.

Of Perez Morton, a Plymouth man, and one of the most distinguished members of the Massachusetts bar in the latter part of the eighteenth century, and the first half of the nineteenth, probably few of my Plymouth readers have ever heard. He was son of Joseph and Amiah (Bullock) Morton of Plymouth, and was born October 22, 1750. He graduated at Harvard in 1771, and was recommended to be sworn as attorney in 1774. In 1786 he was made a Barrister, and on the 7th of September, 1810, he was appointed Attorney General. At the time of the appointment of Mr. Morton as Attorney General, the office of Solicitor General was occupied by Daniel Davis, who had been appointed January 20, 1802, under an act passed March 4, 1800, reviving the office which had been discontinued for a time after the revolution. In 1821 it having been the general feeling for some time that the two offices were unnecessary, the legislature, while unwilling on account of the respect entertained for their incumbents, to abolish either, passed an act providing “that whenever the office of Attorney General or Solicitor General shall become vacant by death, resignation or otherwise, the salary annexed to the office, which shall first so become vacant as aforesaid, shall thenceforth cease and determine.” As neither death nor resignation occurred, an act was passed March 14, 1832, to take effect June 1, abolishing both offices and establishing the office of Attorney General for the Commonwealth. On the 31st of May, therefore, 1832, Mr. Morton went out of office, and James T. Austin was appointed under the new law, Attorney General of the Commonwealth. Sarah Morton, the wife of Perez, was an authoress of some repute. She wrote a book entitled, “The power of Sympathy,” a copy of which is in the library of the Pilgrim Society, which is claimed to have been the first American novel. Mr. Morton died in Boston, October 14, 1837.

I cannot pass by Court Square without a notice of Mrs. Nicolson’s boarding house, which stood many years on the north side of the Square. Thomas Nicholson, son of James, came into possession of the house after the death of his father in 1772. He married for a second wife about 1790, Hannah, daughter of John Otis, and sister of Mrs. Grace Heyman Goddard, already noticed as the mother of Mrs. Abraham Jackson. Thomas Nicolson was a shipmaster, and I believe was for some time before his death in the United States Revenue Service, and died on the island of Gaudaloupe, February 9, 1798.

He was also during the revolution commander of the privateer sloop America, carrying six swivels and seventy men, owned by William Watson, Ephraim Spooner and others. Capt. Nicolson had by his first wife Sarah Mayhew, nine children: Sarah, 1771; Hannah, 1773; Polly, 1775; Elizabeth, 1777; Lucy Mayhew, 1778; Nancy, 1780; Thomas, 1782; James, 1784, and Anna. Of these Hannah married John Morong; Polly married John Allen of Salem, and Anna married John D. Wilson of Salem. Lucy Mayhew died in Boston, January 21, 1858. By his second wife, Hannah Otis, he had Samuel, 1791, who married Sarah Brinley, and died in Boston, January 6, 1866; Hannah Otis, 1793, who married William Spooner; Daniel, 1796, who died March 6, 1815; Caroline, 1798, who married Edward Miller of Quincy.

The estate when Capt. Nicolson died extended from the present yard of Mr. Hedge to the line of Mr. Bittinger, and consisted of the main house and a range of outbuildings which included a woodshed, chaise house, ice house and barn, with a large garden in the rear. After Capt. Nicolson’s death, but precisely when I do not know, Mrs. Nicolson fitted up her house as an inn, and called it the Old Colony House. The Pilgrim House was the stage house, and Mrs. Nicolson’s house was the lawyer’s house. The judges, however, sought private lodgings, and I remember that Chief Justice Shaw always occupied a front parlor in the house opposite Court square, which was the residence of Ichabod Shaw, where the Methodist church now stands. Among the regular boarders in the Old Colony House whom I remember were Samuel Davis, Ebenezer G. Parker, cashier of the Old Colony Bank, Gustavus Gilbert, attorney, Eliab Ward, student at law, Isaac N. Stoddard and Hiram Fuller, teachers. During the sessions of the court it was the gathering place of the lawyers who, without railroad conveniences, made a week of it under Mrs. Nicolson’s roof. There might be found Charles J. Holmes of Rochester, Seth Miller of Wareham, Zachariah Eddy of Middleboro, Williams Latham of Bridgewater, William Baylies and Austin Packard of West Bridgewater, Welcome Young of East Bridgewater, Kilborn Whitman of Pembroke, and Ebenezer Gay of Hingham. To these were sometimes added James T. Austin, Attorney General, Franklin Dexter and Rufus Choate. Timothy Coffin of New Bedford generally attended the Plymouth court, and was sought for in many cases on one side or the other to make the argument to the jury. If he could find anybody to play a game of cards he would play nearly all night, and come into court in the morning looking as fresh as a rose. The house was a rambling one with sleeping rooms arranged in such a way that it was difficult to find them. There was one in particular through which it was necessary for the occupants of the other rooms to pass. This room was assigned on one occasion to Mr. Choate, whose habit it was to retire early. In the morning when he appeared at the breakfast table and was asked how he had slept, he answered, “Very well, I thank you, considering I slept in the highway.” As the lawyers sat by the fire in the evening, Mr. Eddy in a dressing gown, and Mr. Latham securing a seat near the spittoon, occasionally some one would say, “Packard, are we there?” To understand this question, a story must be told. In the early days of the Old Colony Railroad, just after what was called the Abington branch was built, the lawyers I have named met at Bridgewater to take the train for Abington to meet the last train to Plymouth to attend the usual session of the court. When the branch train reached East Bridgewater, Packard, who thought he knew all about the road, jumped up and said, “Warl guntlemen, here we ar,” and they all got out to find the train going on, and themselves in a dreary station, on a cold and dark November night, seventeen miles from Plymouth. There was only one thing to do, to hire an omnibus, which they promptly did, and they reached their destination about half past ten, cold, hungry and cross. Hence the inquiry, “Packard, are we there?” All the gentlemen named are dead, and were doubtless met by Packard on the further shore with “Warl gentlemen, here we ar.” I hope he has not landed them at the wrong station.

In 1836 Mrs. Nicolson gave up the public house, and moved to Boston to live with her daughter, Mrs. Miller, and died in that city, June 22, 1844. The Old Colony House was kept afterwards by Zaben Olney and William Randall, and after a further occupation as a private residence by Moses Bates and Theodore Drew, was sold in 1835 to Mary Howard Russell and taken down.

On the south side of Court square on the corner of School street, there lived until 1839 a worthy old man, who for some years was stone blind. He was Joseph Barnes, the great-grandfather of our townsman, bearing the same name. He carried, extended out in front of him, a staff about eight feet long, with which he tapped the sidewalk constantly, and directed his steps without any other guide or support. It was his privilege to live in days when bicycles, automobiles and trolley cars had not been invented to endanger the lives of even the far-seeing and wary. As I remember him he walked alone through the various streets of the town, and if occasional aid became necessary in avoiding some new obstruction, both old and young were ready to lend it. His wife kept a little candy shop, if so it may be called, in the front room on the east side of the front door, and there children who thought it too far to go to Nancy and Eliza’s shop on Market street, patronized her. It was a queer kind of a shop, showing as its only furniture a bed and chairs, and looking glass and table. Under the bed three or four spice boxes were placed in a row, containing in tempting neatness assortments of candy comprising the usual twisted parti-colored sticks, and kisses and Salem Gibraltars. How these last received their name, and why their manufacture should have been confined to Salem, I never knew, but there they were made, and there they are made today, and if any of my young readers never saw them, they had better induce their grocer to send for some and keep them in stock. Their makers are welcome to this gratuitous advertisement. Mr. Barnes died January 28, 1839, and the house in which he lived was occupied some years by Nathaniel Cobb Lanman, and finally removed to Lothrop street, when Court square was widened in 1857.