On the opposite side of Spring Hill there was until 1890 a building
with a front on Summer street, but there was a tenement on its
easterly end which must be considered in connection with Market
street. This tenement in my youth was occupied by Clement Bates, a
native of Hanover, who came to Plymouth and married Irene Sanger,
daughter of Thomas Burgess, the keeper of the Plymouth lighthouse,
who, because he always wore a red thrum cap, was called Red Cap
Burgess. He married in 1824 Betsey Burgess, a sister of his first
wife. He was a caulker, and graver by trade, and in 1831 was chosen
sexton by the town, whose duty it was to conduct funerals, take
care of the town house, and ring the town bell at such hours,
morning, noon and night, as were specified by the town. After his
relinquishment of the management of funerals, which had been taken
up by private undertakers, he told me that he had buried thirty-two
hundred and fifty persons. He performed the other duties of his
office until his death, July 13, 1885. It is an interesting fact
that after so long a period of business dealings with the material
bodies of the dead he became a confirmed believer in the doctrines of
Spiritualism.
In my early youth a wooden building standing on the north corner
of Market and Summer streets, was occupied as a store by Bridgham
Russell, until he was appointed postmaster in 1832. Mr. Russell was
the son of Jonathan and Rebecca (Turner) Russell of Barnstable, and
was born in 1793. He married in 1822 Betsey, daughter of Jeremiah
Farris of Barnstable, and died March 29, 1840. He was the second
Captain of the Standish Guards, succeeding Captain Coomer Weston.
The store which Mr. Russell had occupied, was taken down in 1832,
and replaced by the present brick building, which was occupied by
Alexander G. Nye, and for many years by Samuel and Thomas Branch
Sherman. Samuel Sherman was Town Treasurer from 1835 to 1856,
serving one year after I entered, for the first time, the office of
selectman, and died October 20, 1857.
The next building was occupied as long ago as I can remember by
Osmore Jenkins, who kept a jeweller’s store as early as 1830, and
after leaving Plymouth became distinguished in his profession. He was
born in Mt. Vernon, N. H., September 4, 1815, and died in Melrose,
Mass., December 19, 1904. Mr. Jenkins was succeeded by Wm. Morey,
who occupied the store many years in making and selling boots and
shoes. In those days, especially in winter, it was the universal
custom to wear boots, the common close legged boots, in contra
distinction to the top boots worn with small clothes. In 1831, when
I was nine years old, Mr. Morey made my first pair, and if school
hours had not interfered I think I should have watched every stitch
and peg in their construction. These boots, now little worn, were
first introduced into the peninsular army by the Duke of Wellington,
and are to this day in England called Wellingtons. Why Congress
boots, which have largely taken their place, should be so called,
is somewhat strange, as similar laced boots have been for many
generations worn in Ireland under the name of high-lows and brogans.
Wm. Morey had seven sons, William, born in 1813, John Edwards, 1815,
Thos., 1817, Cornelius, 1820, Charles, 1825, Edwin, 1827, and Henry,
1833. Of these Edwin lives in Boston, a successful and well known
merchant; Thomas was in 1899 the head of a thriving printing house
in Greenfield, and of John Edwards I know nothing, while William,
Charles and Henry have been dead some years, and Cornelius died in
infancy.
The building extending from the Morey building to High street, was
in my youth divided into two tenements. The southerly part was owned
and occupied by Samuel Talbot, who bought it in 1826. Mr. Talbot,
son of George Talbot of Milton, was born in that town in 1791, and
came to Plymouth about 1820. In 1825 he formed a partnership with
John Calderwood Holmes in the bakery business in the building in
Summer street now occupied by the Misses Rich. Mr. Holmes died May
17, 1826, and Mr. Talbot became associated with George Churchill
in the business. I have often seen the room, now a parlor, full of
sea biscuit, waiting to be packed in casks and placed on board the
whalemen. I remember, too, the two wheeled green baker’s cart with
America Rogers driving, and the round, warm biscuit which he left at
our house nearly every morning, the size and color of which varied
with the price and quality of flour. Mr. Churchill was a man of
humor, and in speaking one day of the readiness of Plymouth people
to catch at new ideas he said, “Yes, Plymouth people will swallow
anything. I know that by experience, for I have stuffed them with
poor bread a good many years.” Nevertheless, those warm biscuits were
good, but America Rogers’ buns and election cakes were better. Mr.
Talbot died September 28, 1883. The northerly part of the building
was owned and occupied in my boyhood by John Kempton, a caulker and
graver by trade, as a dwelling house and store.
The building on the northerly corner of High street, recently owned
by Chas. T. Holmes, was in 1832 the property and home of Samuel
Robbins, and later of his son-in-law Robert Cowen. Until June 25,
1870, its southerly end extended about eight feet south of the
general line of High street, but on that date the projection was
taken by the town and the street line straightened. This projection
was occupied in 1831, and later by Albert Leach as a shoemaker’s
shop, and still later by Eleazer H. Barnes as a candy shop. Outside
of the northerly end of the building, was a covered stairway and
passage leading to a store in the rear of the main building in which
Mr. Robbins kept a store until his death, which occurred July 27,
1838, at the age of eighty-six. It must have been about 1830 that he
dislocated his thigh. At that time the means of reducing dislocations
were crude, and I remember hearing in the street the terrible groans
of the old gentleman while under the hands of the Boston surgeon, who
had been sent for to manage the case.
The next building, which belongs to the estate of the late Charles
T. Holmes, was occupied as long ago as I can remember on the front
by Wm. Brown for the post office on the street floor, while he held
the office of postmaster from 1822 to 1832, after which it was
occupied by Edward Hathaway for a harness store, and finally by
Amasa and Charles T. Holmes. The cellar under the post office was
occupied at various times by Henry Flanders, who died May 8, 1835,
and later, by James Barnes and others as an oyster shop. In 1829 H.
H. Rolfe taught a private school in the room over the post office,
and in 1832, Cephas Geovani Thompson, a portrait painter, and native
of Middleboro, occupied for a time the same room where he painted
portraits of Rev. Dr. Kendall, Capt. Nathaniel Russell and my mother.
His son of the same name, was a highly esteemed portrait painter in
Boston many years. The Old Colony Hall, a part of the estate in the
rear of the main building, was through my youth occupied for various
purposes. The Universalist Society after its formation, held services
there from 1822 to 1826, when their church was built on Carver
street. In 1833 Hiram Fuller taught a private school in the Hall, and
many times in my boyhood I attended lectures and exhibitions there,
among which were those of Harrington, the ventriloquist. At a later
period the hall and the upper part of the main building were occupied
by Stephen P. and Joseph P. Brown for a furniture shop and show room.
William Brown, above mentioned, died May 9, 1845.
In speaking of Main street in an early chapter I referred to the
physical changes which it had undergone within my memory. I propose
now to say something about the occupants of its houses. As far back
as I can remember the building on the corner of Main and Leyden
streets contained a store in the lower story on Main street, a large
room or hall on the corner over the store, and a tenement with an
entrance on Leyden street. The store was occupied as early as 1825
as a hardware store by James and Ephraim Spooner, who dissolved
partnership in 1832, Ephraim continuing in the business. In 1839
John Washburn and William Rider Drew were established in the store
in the same business. In 1846 Messrs. Washburn and Drew separated,
the former taking a store on the west side of the street, and the
latter establishing himself as has been stated in the building on
Leyden street, which had been occupied by Steward and Alderman, and
Alderman and Gooding. The store after Washburn & Drew left it was
divided into two and the corner one was occupied at various times by
Benjamin Swift in the watch and clock business, and Edward W. Atwood.
The other was occupied by Edward Hathaway and Edward Bartlett,
Reuben Peterson and Rich and Weston’s express. At a later time both
stores were occupied by Weston’s express succeeded by their present
occupant, the New York and Boston Despatch Express.
It is worthy of notice as showing one of the steps in the progress of
the temperance movement that the Plymouth Temperance Society in 1825
placed in the hands of Ephraim Spooner a quantity of intoxicating
liquors to be by him given without charge to persons presenting
the written prescription of a physician. Mr. Spooner was appointed
postmaster in 1840, and again in 1842, after an interval of one year,
during which Joseph Lucas held the office. He died April 10, 1887.
The large room over the store was occupied as a school room in 1831
and 1832 by George Partridge Bradford, who taught a mixed school of
boys and girls, of whom I was one, and by Wm. Whiting, also, as a
school room in 1833. It was later used by private teachers, and often
as political campaign headquarters. The tenement was in those days
occupied by Oliver Wood, the father of the late Oliver T. and Isaac
L. Wood.
Mr. Bradford was the son of Gamaliel Bradford of Boston, and
graduated at Harvard in 1825. He prepared for the ministry, but
never sought a settlement, devoting himself to the profession of
a teacher. Concord was frequently his home, and he possessed that
mental temperament which made him a congenial companion of Emerson
and Alcott. He died in Cambridge in 1890 at the age of 80.
Mr. Whiting graduated at Harvard in 1833, and while preparing himself
for the bar taught a school in Plymouth, and, like the teachers who
had preceded him, George Washington Hosmer, William Parsons Lunt,
William H. Lord, Isaac N. Stoddard, Nathaniel Bradstreet, Benjamin
Shurtleff, Horace H. Rolfe and Josiah Moore, married a Plymouth wife.
Charles Field another teacher, died while his marriage engagement
to a Plymouth lady was pending. Mr. Whiting married Lydia Cushing,
daughter of Thomas Russell, and became a distinguished leader at
the Boston bar. Miss Rose S. Whiting of Plymouth is his daughter.
During the Civil war he was for a time the solicitor of the War
Department, and published a very able paper on “War Powers under the
Constitution,” which was taken as a guide in many doubtful questions
arising during the war. He died at his home in Roxbury, June 29, 1873.
The next one story building was occupied as far back as my memory
goes by Thomas May as a shoe store. He occupied it until 1845, when
Henry Howard Robbins took the store and occupied it as a hat store,
and was succeeded by Harrison Finney, who occupied it many years for
the sale of shoe kit and findings, until his death, July 27, 1878.
Mr. Robbins died December 19, 1872.
The next store now occupied by Benjamin L. Bramhall, was before
1830 occupied by Ezra Collier, who kept a bookstore and circulating
library. In 1829 he formed a partnership with William Sampson
Bartlett, under the firm name of Collier and Bartlett, which was
dissolved the next year. Mr. Collier came to Plymouth about 1820,
and married in 1823 Mary, daughter of Thomas and Mehitable (Shaw)
Atwood, and I think removed from town after the dissolution of his
partnership.
Mr. Bartlett continued the business in the same store until 1840,
when he moved into the store built by him now occupied by Finney’s
pharmacy in the building owned by Dr. Benjamin Hubbard. Anthony Morse
succeeded Mr. Bartlett, and occupied it for a grocery store. It was
later occupied by Benjamin Bramhall for a short time, and by William
L. Battles for a year, when it was again occupied by Mr. Bramhall,
who was succeeded by his son, Benjamin L., its present occupant.
Benjamin Bramhall died August 15, 1882.
The next store was occupied by Thomas and George Adams as a hat store
from 1828 until the dissolution of their partnership in 1830. Thomas
Adams continued the business until 1832, when he gave up business,
and not long after was employed as a salesman in the hat store of
Rhodes on the corner of Washington and Court streets in Boston. He
was a son of Thomas and Mercy (Savery) Adams, and married Eunice
H. Bugbee of Pomfret, Vermont. He was not open to the charge of
promoting race suicide as the following record of his children shows,
to wit: Mary E., born in 1832; Thomas H., 1834; Frederick E. and
Frank W., twins, 1836; Luther B. and Ellen, twins, 1837; Miranda B.,
1839; Harriet E., 1841; James O. and another twin, 1841; David B.,
1845; Walter S. and another twin, 1848, Adelaide V., 1849.
George Adams, brother of Thomas, removed to Boston, and became
the well known and successful founder of the Boston directory. He
returned to Plymouth in 1846, and occupied the old store. He married
in 1829 Hannah Sturtevant, daughter of Ephraim Harlow, and had
George W., 1830, who married Mary Holland of Boston; Hannah, 1832,
who married Dr. Edward A. Spooner of Philadelphia; Sarah S., 1840,
and Theodore Parker, 1845, who married Ellen B., daughter of Joseph
Cushman. He died October 4, 1865, at the age of fifty-eight.
In 1835 Henry Howard Robbins moved his hatter’s business to this
store, and it was later occupied by John Perkins & Reuben Peterson,
hatters, Weston & Atwood, clothiers, and Wm. F. Peterson and others.
My first recollection of the OLD COLONY MEMORIAL was when it was
located in one or both rooms over the two stores just mentioned.
James Thurber was then the publisher, and Benjamin Drew was one of
the type setters. The paper was ready for the press by seven o’clock
every Friday evening, and T remember well how much I enjoyed as a
boy the permission to go to the office after supper and help fold
the papers. The machine used in printing was the old Washington hand
press which, tended by two men, could print one side at the rate of
two or three hundred in an hour. Today a Hoe press is furnished with
a roll of paper more than four miles long, and will print fifteen
thousand complete newspapers in an hour.
The next store was in 1834, occupied by James G. Gleason as a
barber’s shop, to which was attached a small room for the sale of
soda and ice cream. Up to 1828 the barber shop of Jonathan Tufts,
which stood on Church street, where the office of Jason W. Mixter,
now stands, was the gathering place where the gossips of the town
exchanged their news of the latest scandal. His shop had been for
many years the place of deposit for curiosities which shipmasters
collected in various parts of the world. Both the gossip and the
curiosities were inherited by the Gleason shop, and finally descended
to the shop of Isaac B. Rich and John T. Hall, Mr. Gleason’s
successors.
Sometimes practical jokes were played in the shop more entertaining
to the lookers on than to the victims. One of the habitues was
William Bradford, a manufacturer of cotton bats, a man of humor,
always ready to play a part in any prank. One day while Mr. Bradford
was in the shop, Mr. Gleason went out on an errand and a countryman
came in to be shaved. Bradford with a wink at the crowd said, “All
right sir, your turn next, sit right down.” He gave the man a
bountiful lather, and pulling off the towel said to him, “This is all
we do in this department, you will have to go into the next shop
to get your shave. When you go in don’t mind the old fellow in the
front room, for he is a queer chap, a little off in his head, but go
right through into the back room where they do the shaving.” Daniel
Gale, the tailor, occupied the next shop, using the front room for
cutting out work, and the back room for the sewing women. Mr. Gale
was astonished, and so were the women, but when the angry countryman
returned, Bradford had left, and Gleason had to bear the brunt of
his mischief. Mr. Hall occupied the store until he purchased the Dr.
Warren house on the west side of Main street, which he occupied until
his death, September 21, 1885. Among those who have since occupied
the store were, Mrs. Mary F. Campbell and Frederick L. Holmes.