5. John Lowell, son of Ebenezer and Elizabeth [Shailer] Lowell, was born in Boston, 14 March, 1703/4. He was graduated from Harvard in 1721, and married Sarah, daughter of Noah and Sarah [Turell] Champney, 23 December, 1725. On 19 January, 1726, he was ordained pastor of the Third Parish in Newbury, which became the First Parish in Newburyport, when under that name the part of Newbury up to that time designated the Waterside was set off as a separate township in 1764. Mrs. Lowell died in 1756, and the Rev. John Lowell married again in 1758 Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Cutts, Jr., and widow of the Rev. Joseph Whipple. The Rev. John Lowell died in Newburyport, 15 May, 1767.
6. John, son of John and Sarah [Champney] Lowell, was born in Newbury, 17 June, 1743. He took his bachelor’s degree at Harvard in 1760, and under the arrangement of those days, which recorded the members of a class in order of social dignity, he was seventh in a class of twenty-seven. He studied law in Boston with Oxenbridge Thacher [H. U. 1698], and was admitted to practice in 1763. He returned to his native town and at once became prominent in public affairs. In 1767 he drew up a report upon a letter from the selectmen of Boston concerning the measures to be taken to frustrate the encroachments of Great Britain. He served for several years as one of the selectmen of Newburyport, and in May, 1776, was one of the five representatives of the town in the General Court. He removed to Boston in 1777, and the next year was chosen a representative to the General Court from Boston. In 1779 he was elected a member of the convention for framing the constitution of the State. In 1781 he was chosen a delegate to the Continental Congress. In 1782 he was appointed by Congress one of the three judges of the newly created Admiralty court of appeals. In 1784 he was one of the commissioners to establish the boundary line between Massachusetts and New York. On the adoption of the constitution of the United States, President Washington appointed him Judge of the U. S. District Court in Massachusetts. In 1801 he was appointed Chief Justice of the Circuit Court for the first circuit, under the new organization of the judiciary.
He married, in 1767, Sarah, daughter of Stephen and Elizabeth [Cabot] Higginson, and had by her three children, Anna Cabot, John, and Sarah Champney. His wife, Sarah, died 5 May, 1772, and he married again, 31 May, 1774, Susanna, daughter of Francis and Mary [Fitch] Cabot, by whom he had two children, Francis Cabot, founder of the factory system in Lowell, and Susanna. His second wife, Susanna, died 30 March, 1777, and he married a third time Rebecca, daughter of James and Katharine [Graves] Russell, of Charlestown, and widow of James Tyng, of Dunstable, Mass. By her he had four children, Rebecca Russell, Charles, Elizabeth Cutts, and Mary. He died in Roxbury, Mass., 6 May, 1802.
He was for eighteen years a member of the corporation of Harvard College, and was one of the founders of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His son, the Rev. Charles Lowell, stated: “My father introduced into the Bill of Rights the clause by which slavery was abolished in Massachusetts. My father advocated its adoption in the convention, and when it was adopted, exclaimed: ‘Now there is no longer slavery in Massachusetts; it is abolished and I will render my services as a lawyer gratis to any slave suing for his freedom if it is withheld from him,’ or words to that effect.”
7. Charles Lowell, son of John and Rebecca [Russell] Lowell, was born in Boston, 15 August, 1782. He was graduated from Harvard College in 1800, travelled in Europe 1802-1805, and on his return to Boston was made pastor of the West Congregational Church in that town, and remained its pastor, either active or emeritus, till he died. He was married, 2 October, 1806, to Harriet Brackett, daughter of Keith and Mary [Traill] Spence. He was elected a member of the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1815, and was its recording Secretary from 1818 to 1833, and corresponding Secretary from 1833 to 1849. He was stricken with partial paralysis in the autumn of 1851, and died 20 January, 1861.
The children of Charles and Harriet Traill [Spence] Lowell, were
1. Charles Russell, born 30 October, 1807; he married Anna Cabot Jackson, 18 April, 1832, and died 23 June, 1870; their children were
i. Anna Cabot Jackson, married to Dr. Henry Elisha Woodbury.
ii. Charles Russell, Jr., commissioned Brigadier General, who died 20 October, 1864, from wounds received at the battle of Cedar Creek.
iii. Harriet, married to George Putnam.