JOSEPH LOVERING.[23]
Respecting Mr. Lovering's connection with the Tea Party, Mr. George W. Allan, of West Canton Street, Boston, now eighty-two years of age, relates that about the year 1835, he frequently conversed with that gentlemen, who told him that on the evening of December 16, 1773, when he was fifteen years of age, he held the light in Crane's carpenter's shop, while he and others, fifteen in number, disguised themselves preparatory to throwing the tea into Boston harbor. He also said that some two hundred persons joined them on their way to the wharf, where the tea-ships lay. Mr. George H. Allan, the son of George W. Allan, received a similar statement from Mr. Lovering, a short time before the latter's death, which occurred June 13, 1848, at the age of eighty-nine years and nine months.
Mr. Lovering appears to have been the youngest person connected with this affair, of whom we have any knowledge. His boyish curiosity led him to accompany the party to the scene of operations at Griffin's wharf, and on the following morning he was closely questioned and severely reprimanded by his parents, for being out after nine o'clock at night, as they were strict in their requirement that he should be in bed at that hour.
His son, Mr. N.P. Lovering, now seventy-seven years of age, resides in Boston, and is treasurer of the Connecticut and Passumpsic River Railroad Company. To this gentleman, and to his grand-daughter, Mrs. C.D. Bradlee, Boston, we are under obligation for the copy of a photograph from Mr. Lovering's oil-painting of his father.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Was born in Boston, 1706; died in Philadelphia, in 1790, and was buried in Christ Churchyard. A small marble slab, level with the ground, marks the spot. "No monumental display for me," was his request as expressed in his will.
Some years before his death he wrote his own epitaph. His usefulness to his country during the Revolutionary period will warrant us in giving it place in our "Tea Leaves:"
A.O.C.
The body of
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, PRINTER,
Like the cover of an old book,
its contents torn out,
And stript of its lettering and gilding,
Lies here, food for worms.
Yet the work itself shall not be lost,
For it will (as he believed) appear once more
in a new
and a more beautiful edition
corrected and amended
by the Author.