Plymouth memories of an octogenarian

by William T. Davis

I remember the occupants of the building north of the engine house as far back as 1828. On the 9th of July in that year, I was playing on the sloping cellar door, while the funeral procession of Henry Warren was forming in front of the next house. The house in question was occupied on the north side by David Turner, and on the south side down stairs by Mrs. Grace (Hayman) Goddard, and her sister, Abigail Otis, and up stairs on the south side by Betsey Morton Jackson, and her sister, Maria Torrey Jackson, daughters of Woodworth Jackson. Betsey Morton Jackson died June 10, 1827, and her sister Maria became one of the family of my grandmother, after her removal to Boston, and died in Boston, May 18, 1856.

David Turner was a son of David and Deborah (Lothrop) Turner, and married in 1793 Lydia Washburn. I remember him well with his military walk and bearing. His pew was in the northwest corner of the old church, and I can see him now entering by the north door and marching up to his seat with a soldierly air and step.

Mrs. Goddard and Miss Otis were daughters of John and Hannah (Churchill) Otis of Plymouth. Grace Hayman married in 1796 John Goddard, a surgeon in the United States Navy, who while serving on board the sloop of war Boston, died at Gibraltar, June 15, 1802, at the age of thirty-two years. She had two daughters: Harriet Otis, born in 1797, who married Abraham Jackson, and Mary, who married Arthur French of Boston. Mrs. Goddard, as long as I knew her, kept a little store in the southerly corner room now occupied by a furniture store, which was once the law office of James Otis, the patriot, and died February 8, 1851, and her sister Abigail died February 11, 1857.

Not many years after the death of David Turner, his part of the house was occupied some years by James Thurber, who came to Plymouth in 1832, and conducted until his death, the Old Colony Memorial. That paper, under his management, had able contributions to its columns, and held a high position among the country newspapers of the state. Mr. Thurber was an ardent Whig, and during the political campaigns of the period, exerted a potent influence on the voters of Plymouth county. I knew him well, and from the time when as a boy I assisted on Friday evenings in folding newspapers in his office, until his death I enjoyed his friendship. He married in 1831 Elizabeth, daughter of Asa Danforth of Taunton, and sister of Allen Danforth of Plymouth, and had Elizabeth 1832, and in 1839 James Danforth, Treasurer of the Plymouth Savings Bank. He moved into the house in question from the house where he had lived some years on the corner of Leyden and Market streets. Mr. Thurber died May 20, 1857. Among the tenants of the house in later times were Wm. H. Spear, John Perkins, John Morissey and Mrs. Thomas Atwood, and the stores have been occupied by Keith and Cooper, pharmacists, J. W. Cooper, pharmacist, the Loring pharmacy, by Baumgartner, James B. Collingwood & Sons, and W. N. Snow, all furniture dealers.

On the south side of the dwelling house on the corner of North street, was a yard with a chaise house and stable in its rear. In 1839 Allen Danforth bought the yard and outbuildings and built the house now occupied by the post office in which he lived until his death.

He was a son of Asa and Deborah (Thayer) Danforth of Taunton, where he was born, January 18, 1796, and married December 30, 1818, Lydia Presbry, daughter of William Seaver of that town. In 1821 he established in Taunton the Old Colony Reporter, edited by Jacob Chapin, the first number of which was issued April 4, in that year. In the spring of 1822 he came to Plymouth and established the Old Colony Memorial, the first number of which was issued to two hundred and twenty-three subscribers, May 4, in that year. In its early years the Memorial occupied a chamber in Market street, over the store of Antipas Brigham. In 1836 he gave up the management of the paper to his brother-in-law, James Thurber, the printing office being then located on Main street.

The Plymouth Institution for Savings, whose name was changed in 1847 to the Plymouth Savings Bank, and with which Mr. Danforth was for forty-three years identified, was incorporated June 11, 1828, and on the 25th of July Barnabas Hedge was chosen President, and Benjamin Marston Watson, Treasurer. On the first of August, 1829, the same officers were chosen, but Mr. Watson declining, Mr. Danforth was chosen in his place. The place of business of the bank was at first in the Plymouth Bank on Court street, and as its annual meetings were held in various places, sometimes at the Plymouth Bank, sometimes in the reading room, and again at the Old Colony Bank—it is difficult to locate for some years its actual resting place. I am quite sure, however, that for a time its office was in the room on Main street, in which John S. Hayward had kept a store where H. H. Cole is now in business.

The Old Colony Insurance Company was incorporated March 6, 1835, with a capital of $50,000, and organized with Jacob Covington, president, and Mr. Danforth secretary, and shared an office with the savings institution. On the 2d of June, 1841, the institution for savings jointly with the Plymouth Bank, the Old Colony Bank, and the Old Colony Insurance Company, bought of Thomas and William Jackson a vacant lot on Main street, and erected a building into which those institutions moved in 1842. Mr. Danforth retired from the office of secretary of the Insurance Company in 1853, and subsequently its charter was surrendered.

At the time of the establishment of the Savings Bank, such institutions were comparatively new and general confidence in their soundness had not been established. Facilities for reaching Plymouth were imperfect, and consequently the early growth of the bank was slow. The custom of hoarding, however, was soon abandoned, and the integrity of Mr. Danforth, and his discreet management of the Bank soon attracted a rapidly increasing business. Its deposits, which at the end of five years, had only reached one hundred thousand dollars, amounted according to the last statement made by Mr. Danforth in December, 1871, to $1,759,189.97, while since that time about three-quarters of a million have been added.

Mr. Danforth was a man possessing traits of character which fitted him for the responsible position in which he was placed. He was eminently a man of a judicial mind, and if he had been bred to the law he would have been a leader at the bar, or a distinguished judge. No statute or decision touching financial matters escaped his notice, while court reports, recent or old, relating to banks and banking, were familiar to him. During his life he devoted himself to the welfare of the institution under his care, neither seeking office nor accepting it, except twice as representative, and twice as a member of the board of selectmen. While repeatedly solicited to act as executor or administrator or trustee, he was only in few exceptional cases willing to assume their distracting responsibilities. Mr. Danforth’s death was a sad one. He was taken with smallpox, and before many of his fellow citizens were aware of his sickness, he died May 28, 1872. Death came near the midnight hour, and before morning he was buried, unattended, except by those who were immune. A funeral service was held in the Unitarian church, Sunday, June 2, and a fitting tribute was then paid to his memory.