Hiram Fuller was born in Halifax, Mass., at a date unknown by me, but probably about 1807. I remember hearing him say that the first time he ever came to Plymouth he rode on a charcoal cart. He opened a private school in Plymouth in 1832, keeping it at various times in Robbin’s Hall on Middle street or Paine’s hall, as it was later called, and in Old Colony Hall in the rear of the present market of C. B. Harlow. He went from Plymouth to Providence about 1835 or 1836, where he taught school for a time, and afterwards opened a bookstore. He went from Providence to New York, where he became associated with N. P. Willis and George P. Morris in the editorship of the New Mirror and Home Journal, retaining his connections with those papers during a period of fourteen years. Under the name of Belle Brittan he published a volume of brilliant letters, and devoted much of his time to miscellaneous literary labors. When the Civil War came on his sympathies were enlisted in behalf of the South, and finding New York an uncongenial residence, went to England, where he remained until his death. At one time he had an editorial connection in London, with a newspaper called the Cosmopolitan, but I have reason to believe that the issue of the war and the consequent loss of English interest in the Confederate cause, left him stranded and reduced in a foreign land.
In 1855 the anniversary of the Landing was celebrated on the 22nd of December, on which occasion Hon. Wm. H. Seward of Auburn, N. Y., delivered an oration in the First Church. The incident which I remember more distinctly than any other in connection with the oration, was Mr. Seward’s lighting a cigar the moment the benediction was pronounced as he stood on a raised platform in front of the pulpit. He was a confirmed smoker, and like too many other confirmed smokers of our day had little regard for the time and place for the indulgence of his habit. The dinner was prepared by J. B. Smith of Boston in Davis Hall, and Richard Warren, president of the Pilgrim Society, presided. The speakers were: Mr. Seward, Hon. George S. Boutwell, Rev. John S. Barry, Wendell Phillips, Rev. Thomas D. Worrell of London, Rev. Dr. George W. Briggs and Hon. B. F. Butler of New York. The last named gentleman sharing with the Massachusetts General a distinguished name, was born in Kinderhook, N. Y., Dec. 15, 1795, and on his admission to the bar became in 1817 partner of Martin Van Buren. He was Attorney General of the United States, under Andrew Jackson, from 1831 to 1834, acting secretary of war under Van Buren, and from 1838 to 1841, U. S. District Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He died in Paris, France, Nov. 8, 1858.
William Henry Seward, the orator of the day, was born in Florida, N. Y., May 16, 1801, and graduated at Union college in 1820. He was admitted to the bar in 1822, and settled in Auburn, and in 1830 was chosen State Senator on the anti-masonic ticket. In 1838 he was chosen Governor, and re-elected in 1840, and in 1849 was chosen U. S. Senator. In 1861 he was appointed by President Lincoln secretary of state, and continued in office until the close of President Johnson’s term. He died in Auburn, October 10, 1872.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
In 1859, the necessary arrangements having been concluded for beginning work on the canopy over the Rock and on the National Monument, it was decided by the Pilgrim Society to lay at once the corner stones of those structures with suitable ceremonies. The anniversary of the embarkation was again selected for celebrating the event, but as the first of August would fall on Monday, it was thought best to have the celebration on Tuesday, the second. The following committee of arrangements was appointed, by whom I was again appointed Chief Marshal, Richard Warren, Timothy Gordon, Wm. T. Davis, Samuel H. Doten, Charles O. Churchill and George G. Dyer. A committee on the ball was appointed, consisting of Edward W. Russell, Edward B. Hayden, Charles C. Doten of Plymouth, Austin C. Cushman of New Bedford, and Wm. S. Huntington of North Bridgewater. The chief marshal appointed as aids, Admiral P. Stone, Wm. Atwood, Samuel H. Doten, Charles Raymond, Leavitt Finney, John H. Harlow of Plymouth, James H. Beal of Boston, James Bates of East Bridgewater. He also appointed twenty-eight assistant marshals from Plymouth, and ten from other places.
The committee decided on the following plan for the celebration: The laying of the cornerstone of the canopy by the Masonic order; a procession; the laying of the cornerstone of the National Monument with Masonic ceremonies; a dinner provided by J. B. Smith of Boston in a tent, capable of holding twenty-five hundred persons, pitched in the field below the present store of Wm. Burn’s, now occupied by three dwelling houses, owned by Mr. Emery; fireworks, and a ball in the evening in Davis Hall. At ten o’clock a Masonic procession was formed on Main street, consisting of the Massachusetts, Boston and DeMoley encampments of Knights Templar, under command of John T. Heard, and marched to the Rock, where addresses were made by President Warren and Mr. Heard, and a hymn was sung, composed by John Shepard. At half past eleven the grand procession, whose various divisions had been forming while the ceremony at the Rock was going on, started from the headquarters of the chief marshal near the Samoset House, and proceeded through Court, Main, Market, High, Summer, Pleasant, Green, Sandwich, Market, Leyden, Water, North, Court and Cushman streets to Monument hill. The procession marched in the following order: Mounted police, Boston brigade band, Standish Guards, New Bedford City Guards, Braintree Light Infantry, So. Abington Infantry, New Bedford brass band, chief marshal and aids mounted, president of the Pilgrim Society and invited guests, St. Paul’s lodge of South Boston, lodge of Cambridge, Liberty lodge of New Bedford, Star of the East lodge of New Bedford, King Solomon lodge of Charlestown, Boston brass band, Washington lodge of Roxbury, the Plymouth lodge, Plymouth brass band, Royal Arch chapter of New Bedford, Boston encampment of Knights Templar, Royal Arch Chapter of South Abington, South Abington band, DeMoley encampment, Grand lodge of Massachusetts, American brass band, Odd Fellows, New England Society of New York, Massachusetts Historical Society, American Antiquarian Society, Historic Genealogical Society, Cape Cod Association, Finney’s band, Plymouth Fire Department, Campello Engine company, North Bridgewater band, and six groups on flats representing the Landing, Indians, advance of civilization, the thirty-three states, different nations, and the marine interests of Plymouth.
After addresses at the monument by President Warren, and the ceremony of laying the cornerstone, conducted by the Grandmaster, John T. Heard, the invited guests were escorted to the dining tent, where Rev. Edward H. Hall, pastor of the First Church asked a blessing. Besides the president the speakers were, Gov. Banks, Salmon P. Chase, Wm. Maxwell Evarts, Gov. Buckingham of Conn., John P. Hale, Francis P. Bair, Jr., Anson Burlingame, Gov. Kent of Maine, George Sumner and Rev. Mr. Waddington of Southwark, London. I have room for notices of only a few of these speakers. Nathaniel Prentiss Banks, born in Waltham, Mass., January 30, 1816, was a boy in a factory, editor of a local paper, representative in 1849, speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, 1851 and 1853, chairman of the Massachusetts constitutional convention, 1853, member of congress, 1853 to 1857, and speaker of the National House of Representatives from 1855 to 1857. He was chosen governor in 1857, serving three years; after which he was chosen president of the Illinois Central railroad, made Major General in 1861, serving until 1864, again member of Congress from 1865 to 1877, excepting one year, when he was a member of the Massachusetts Senate, and finally United States Marshal in Boston in 1879. He died in Waltham, Sept. 1, 1894.
Salmon P. Chase was born in Cornish, N. H., January 13, 1808, and graduated at Dartmouth in 1826. He taught school in Washington, where he was admitted to the bar in 1830. He was later Senator, Secretary of the Treasury, and Chief Justice of the U. S. Supreme Court, and died in New York, May 7, 1873.
William Maxwell Evarts was born in Boston in Feb., 1818, and graduated at Yale in 1837. He studied law at Cambridge and settled in New York, and was counsel for President Johnson on his impeachment trial. Attorney General under Grant in 1868, Secretary of State under Hayes, and later U. S. Senator. He died in New York, Feb. 28, 1901.
Edward Kent was born in Concord, N. H., January 8, 1902, and settled as a lawyer in Bangor in 1825. In 1827 he was made chief justice of the Court of Sessions for Penobscot County, in 1829 was chosen Mayor of Bangor, and was Governor from 1838 to 1840. He was made U. S. Consul at Rio by President Taylor, and in 1859 Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. He died in Bangor, May 19, 1877.