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.
The Warren house on the corner of North street was occupied as long
ago as I can remember by Henry Warren, the son of James Warren, of
the revolution, whose wife was Mercy Otis, sister of James Otis, and
who lived in the house in question. Mr. Warren was born in 1764, and
married in 1791 Mary, daughter of Pelham and Joanna (White) Winslow.
He was the collector of the port from 1803 to 1820, and died July 6,
1828. He had two daughters and seven sons. Of these James died young,
and Mary Ann died unmarried. Marcia married in 1813, John Torrey,
and was the mother of Henry Warren Torrey, late professor of history
at Harvard. Winslow, born in 1795, graduated at Harvard in 1813, and
fitting himself for the practice of medicine settled in Plymouth,
where as early as 1831 he became a partner of Dr. Nathan Hayward. His
office was for some years at the corner of North street, and there
in 1832 I was examined by him as chairman of the School Committee
for admission into the High School. He married in January, 1835,
Margaret, daughter of Dr. Zacheus and Hannah (Jackson) Bartlett, and
after the death of Dr. Bartlett, which occurred December 25, 1835, he
moved into his office and occupied it until his death, June 10, 1870.
Dr. Warren was not only learned and skillful in his profession, but
was also a man of mental culture, familiar with the world’s affairs,
and decided in his opinions on the great questions of the day; a man
of moral culture, conscientious to the last degree; a man of social
culture, a true gentleman. Pelham Winslow Warren, born in 1797,
graduated at Harvard in 1815, and from 1822 to 1831 was the clerk
of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, holding also in 1829
the office of collector of the port of Plymouth, and living in the
Warren house. During the last few years of his residence in Plymouth
he was the superintendent of the Sunday school in the old church.
The general lessons given by him I remember well. They were not mere
platitudes, such as are often addressed to children, but interesting
and instructive in language adapted to young minds on the handiwork
of God in sea, earth and sky. Under his ministrations I became for
the first time conscious of a power to think. When the Railroad Bank
in Lowell was incorporated he was appointed its cashier, and lived
some years in that city. When he retired from the Bank he removed to
Boston, and engaged in the banking and brokerage business until his
death. He married at Clark’s Island in 1825, Jeanette, daughter of
John and Lucia (Watson) Taylor, and died in Boston, October 6, 1848.
Charles Henry Warren, born September 29, 1798, graduated at Harvard
in 1817. He studied law with Joshua Thomas of Plymouth and Levi
Lincoln of Worcester, and settled in New Bedford first as a partner
of Lemuel Williams, and later of Thomas Dawes Eliot, and from 1832
to 1839 was District Attorney for the five southern counties of
Massachusetts. In 1839 he was appointed Judge of the Common Pleas
Court, continuing on the bench until 1844, when he removed to Boston
and associated himself with the law firm of Fiske and Rand, composed
of Augustus H. Fiske and Benjamin Rand. He appeared as counsel for
the defendant in the memorable trial of Rev. Joy H. Fairchild,
charged with adultery, and secured his acquittal. Experiencing
premonitions of heart disease he abandoned practice, and in 1846 was
chosen president of the Boston and Providence railroad, remaining
in office until 1867. He was president of the Massachusetts Senate
in 1851, and president of the Pilgrim Society from 1845 to 1852. He
married Abby, daughter of Barnabas and Eunice Dennie (Burr) Hedge
of Plymouth, and died in Plymouth, June 29, 1874. As no monument or
stone marks the place of his burial, I think it proper to say that
the bodies of both himself and wife were deposited in the Warren
tomb.
Richard Warren was born in 1805, and in early manhood embarked in
business in Boston and failed, settling with his creditors for a
percentage on their claims. He afterwards removed to New York, where
he engaged successfully in an auction commission business, confined
chiefly to cargo sales of teas, sugar, coffee and other importations.
As soon as his recuperated financial condition warranted, he
discharged principal and interest the old indebtedness from which he
had been formally released. He was president of the Pilgrim Society
from 1852 to 1861, and the two great celebrations of the anniversary
of the embarkation of the Pilgrims on Monday, the first of August,
1853, and Tuesday, the second of August, 1859, owe their inspiration
largely to him. He married first Angelina, daughter of Dr. Wm. Pitt
Greenwood of Boston, and sister of Rev. Francis Wm. Pitt Greenwood of
King’s Chapel, and second, Susan Gore of Boston, and died in Boston,
April 12, 1875.
George Warren, born in 1807, in early manhood made several voyages as
supercargo in the Havana and Russia trade. The ship Harvest belonging
to Barnabas Hedge, in which I think he sailed when bound with sugar,
to Russia, would put into Plymouth to obtain a clean bill of health
before completing her voyage. He afterwards went to New York and
formed a partnership with Ebenezer Crocker, a native of Barnstable,
under the firm name of Crocker & Warren. The firm owned the following
ships: Alert and Talisman, commanded by Capt. Gamaliel Thomas of
Plymouth; Queen of the East, commanded by Capt. Truman Bartlett,
Jr., of Plymouth; Raven, commanded by Capt. Bursley of Barnstable;
Archer, commanded by Capt. Henry, and the Skylark, commanded by Capt.
Bursley. Capt. Thomas made seven voyages to Calcutta and California
in their employ, and Mr. Warren told me once that his accounts were
always so complete and accurate that he could settle with him a nine
months’ Calcutta voyage in fifteen minutes. In the great fire which
occurred in New York, December 23 and 24, 1835, which burned six
hundred and seventy-four houses between lower Broadway and the East
River, Crocker & Warren had five hundred bags of saltpetre stored
in a warehouse burned, and the cause of repeated explosions which
occurred, was for a time a mystery, leading to the often repeated
question—will saltpetre explode? It was finally determined that while
saltpetre alone is not explosive, the carbon furnished by the burned
bags formed an explosive mixture. He married Elizabeth, daughter
of Barnabas and Eunice Dennie (Burr) Hedge, and died in New York,
November 20, 1866.
Edward J. Warren, born in 1809, was in business in New York many
years, a part of the time associated with his brother Richard. Of
ready wit and quick eye, and with a familiarity with prices he was
one of the most attractive and efficient salesmen in New York. He
married Mary, daughter of Wm. G. Coffin, the official head for many
years of the Massachusetts land office, and died in New York April
27, 1872.
Soon after Henry Warren died, Madam Warren removed to Boston and
lived some years on Allston street, but later returned to Plymouth
and occupied successively until her death, the house on Middle
street, next to Mr. Beaman’s undertaking rooms, and the house on Main
street, where the new bank building stands. In 1833 Dr. Isaac LeBaron
moved into the Warren house, and in 1836 occupied the apothecary’s
shop, which Dr. Warren had vacated. I not only remember the gilded
pestle and mortar over his door, but also the sugar baker’s molasses,
which he kept in stock furnished to him by the father or brother of
his wife, who owned a sugar refinery in Leverett street, Boston.
Almost as dark colored as tar, and nearly hard enough to cut with a
knife, it was like the witch’s gruel, “thick and slab,” and those who
now eat buckwheat cakes with honey or syrup, have little idea how
good they were eaten with that sugar baker’s molasses. Dr. LeBaron
died January 29, 1849.
At various times the Warren house was occupied by Mrs. Wm. Spooner,
the family of Capt. Wm. Bartlett, and in still later times by the
Young Men’s Literary Institute, the Public Library, the Custom House,
and stores of Wm. Babb, John Churchill, Pratt & Hedge, James C.
Bates, Davis and Whiting, N. M. Davis, Edgar Seavey, Allen Holmes and
Edward Baker and Allen T. Holmes. Among the transient residents were
Mrs. Ann Boutelle, widow of Dr. Caleb Boutelle, and her daughter Anne
Lincoln, boarding with one of the permanent families in the house.
The south front chamber is hallowed in my memory, for there on the
5th of December, 1835, Anne Lincoln Boutelle, one of my playmates and
schoolmates, died in consumption, one too sweet and pure and frail
to tread the rough paths of life. I saw her a day or two before she
died, with a little table by her bed side laden with gifts of fruit
and flowers, which loving friends had sent, and to which I added my
own. I never go into the printing office, which includes the chamber
in which she died, without recalling her saintly face, her saintly
voice, and her saintly spirit, joyous at the thought of journeying
home. A memorial of her life and character was published, written by
Mary Ann Stevenson, a niece of Mrs. Judge Joshua Thomas, a copy of
which if one can be found, I am anxious to obtain.
The Odd Fellows’ lot on the corner of Main street and Town Square,
included as long ago as I can remember the sites of two houses,
one on Main street and one on the square. In this chapter only the
occupants of the former will be considered. In 1829 there were two
stores on the lower floor facing Main street, and two tenements
above. The store on the corner was occupied by Salisbury Jackson, who
removed in 1835 to a store, which he had fitted up in his house on
the south side of Leyden street. He was succeeded by Joseph Cushman,
who has been already noticed.
Mr. Cushman was succeeded by J. M. Perry, agent, and Mr. Perry by
Henry Orson Steward and Eleazer C. Sherman in the grain business.
Mr. Steward, who previously was a member of the firm of Steward and
Alderman, carrying on a dry goods store on Leyden street, came to
Plymouth from Connecticut, and married Bethiah, daughter of Samuel
West and Lois (Thomas) Bagnall. He finally removed from Plymouth,
and after a second marriage, died in Framingham. Mr. Sherman later
carried on the business alone, removing to a store at the head of
Hedge’s wharf, where he remained as long as he continued business in
Plymouth. He later became a wholesale dealer, receiving in Plymouth
and Boston constant shipments of corn, which were sold in the various
markets of the state. He was President of the Old Colony Bank for
a time, a member of the executive council, and finally, until his
death, President of the Commonwealth National Bank in Boston. He was
a son of Levi and Lydia (Crocker) Sherman of Carver, and was born
in 1817. He married first Louisa Jane Gurney of North Bridgewater,
now Brockton, and second in 1878 Mary L. (Perkins) Thayer, widow of
Edward D. Thayer of Boston, and died in Boston.
Mr. Sherman was succeeded by Thomas Loring, who occupied the store
many years. Mr. Loring was son of Ezekiel and Lydia (Sherman) Loring
of Plympton, and married Lucy, daughter of Jonathan Parker of
Plympton, and died in Boston a few years ago.
The next store was occupied at various times by Bridgham Russell,
Jeremiah Farris, Benjamin Hathaway, Henry Howard Robbins, Edward
Bartlett, Reuben Peterson, Lewis Peterson, and Wm. F. Peterson.
Mr. Russell has already been referred to. Mr. Farris was a son of
Jeremiah and Lydia (Eldridge) Farris of Barnstable, and was born in
that town in 1810. He married in 1832 Mary, daughter of Nathaniel and
Betsey (Woodward) Carver of Plymouth, and settled in Plymouth. He
first formed a partnership in the dry goods business with Benjamin
Hathaway, and after the partnership was dissolved Mr. Hathaway
continued in business, and added the business of making neck stocks.
Not long after Mr. Farris joined with Oliver Edes in the manufacture
of rivets in North Marshfield, and Plymouth, and finally established
the Plymouth Mills, which is still in active business as a
corporation under the management of his son-in-law, Wm. P. Stoddard.
Mr. Farris was the sixth captain of the Standish Guards. Mr. Hathaway
afterwards continued the stock business in other locations, and the
first time I ever saw Chief Justice Albert Mason, he was at a bench
in Mr. Hathaway’s shop cutting out material for stocks. Nothing
in the career of Mr. Mason as artisan, lawyer, soldier and Judge,
impressed me as much as his resolve while working at his bench to
change the current of his life. The flow of the tide never specially
impresses me, but when I see the buoys change their slant from East
to West, I begin to wonder.
Mr. Mason was the son of Albert T. and Arlina (Orcutt) Mason, and
was born in Middleboro, Mass., Nov. 7, 1836. He came to Plymouth
in 1853, and after working a short time in Mr. Hathaway’s stock
factory, he studied law in Plymouth with Edward L. Sherman, and was
admitted to the Plymouth bar Feb. 15, 1860. In July, 1862, I was
requested to raise two companies to be attached to the 38th Regiment,
and recommend their officers, and in accordance with that request
I raised Companies D and G, and recommended Mr. Mason for the post
of second lieutenant of Company D. He was duly commissioned, and
afterwards promoted to be first lieutenant, Captain and Assistant
Brigade Quartermaster. At the close of the war he resumed practice
in Plymouth, and in 1874, removing to Brookline, was appointed by
Governor Washburn a member of the Board of Harbor Commissioners.
In 1879 he was appointed a member of the Board of Harbor and Land
Commissioners by Governor Talbot; Judge of the Superior Court
by Governor Long in 1882, and Chief Justice in 1890 by Governor
Brackett. He married November 25, 1857, Lydia F., daughter of Nathan
and Experience (Finney) Whiting of Plymouth. In 1893 he received from
Dartmouth the degree of LL. D., and died in Brookline January 2, 1906.
Henry Howard Robbins was the son of Rufus and Margaret (Howard)
Robbins, and was born in Plymouth in 1811. He was a hatter by
trade, and at various times occupied other stores on Main street.
My first recollection of him was as a member of the old Plymouth
Band, organized soon after 1830. The members of the band, according
to my recollection, were Bradford Barnes, leader, clarinet; William
Atwood, trombone; John Atwood, serpent; Eleazer H. Barnes, cornopean;
James M. Bradford, bassoon; Samuel H. Doten, clarinet; John N. Drew,
trombone; Nathaniel D. Drew, bugle; Edward Hathaway, bass drum;
Albert Leach, bugle; Thomas Long, fife; Seth Morton, snare drum;
Edmund Robbins, orphicleide; Henry Howard Robbins, clarinet; Albert
Finney, bugle, and Ellis Rogers, bass drum.
The orphicleide, one of the instruments above mentioned, had a
short career, and has not only gone out of use, but also almost
out of memory. I have been unable to find any one besides myself
who remembers it. The proprietor of the music store in Plymouth
never heard of it. No one in the store of John C. Haynes & Co.,
of Boston, remembers it, and the leader of the band in Cambridge
on Commencement Day told me that he had no recollection of it. I
remember it distinctly, a brass instrument about three feet long and
six inches in its largest diameter, and with a curved mouthpiece,
resembling somewhat that of the bassoon. The snare drum, which in its
oblong form stood the test of four hundred years, has since my youth
degenerated into the present instrument, which resembles in shape
and size a generous Herkimer county cheese. The trombone, probably
the ancient sackbut, has held its own, and is the oldest musical
instrument now in use. Mr. Robbins married Mercy Morton, daughter of
John Eddy, and died December 19, 1872.
Reuben Peterson was the son of Elijah and Abigail (Whittemore)
Peterson of Duxbury, and was born in that town about 1788, and
married in 1812 Mary, daughter of Benjamin White of Hanover. He was a
hatter by trade, and he, as well as his son Lewis, who died October
5, 1878, and grandson, William F., now living, are remembered by my
readers.
Edward Bartlett was a harness maker, and occupied this as well as
other stores. He was the son of Stephen and Polly (Nye) Bartlett, and
was born in Plymouth. He married Betsey Beal of Kingston, and died
within the memory of many readers.
Mr. Hathaway above-mentioned, retiring from active business, became
a director of the Plymouth National Bank and devoted himself to the
care of his ample property. He married in 1828 Hannah, daughter of
William Nye of Plymouth, and second in 1857, Sally Barnes, daughter
of George W. Virgin, and died July 15, 1880.
In my early youth the second story was occupied by Mrs. Francis
Leonard Maynard and Dr. Hervey N. Preston. Mrs. Maynard, the daughter
of Major William and Anna (Barnes) Jackson, was born in Plymouth in
1789, and married February 5, 1821, Samuel Maynard. She occupied
the whole front of two rooms on Main street, and one room on the
northerly side of the building separated from the other two by a
narrow entry to which access was had by an outside flight of stairs
leading from Main street. The corner room on the square she occupied
as a schoolroom, in which she taught boys and girls from about six
to ten years of age. I was one of her pupils, and must have entered
the school as early as 1828, because I remember seeing the engines
go by on their way to the fire which burned the anchor works in that
year. Among my fellow pupils I can recall Jane Elizabeth Bartlett,
daughter of James Bartlett, who married Thatcher R. Raymond; Mary
Holbrook, daughter of Jacob Covington, who married George H. Bates
of Brooklyn, N. Y., and her sister Martha, Betsey Foster Ripley,
daughter of Deacon Wm. Putnam and Elizabeth Foster (Morton) Ripley,
Priscilla and Barnabas Hedge, children of Isaac L. Hedge, and
Francis L. and George Maynard, children of the teacher. Mrs. Maynard
was at that time a widow and an ideal schoolmistress. She was an
accomplished lady, and taught not only the ordinary branches of a
school education, but also sewing and, above all, good manners. I
carried away from her school as evidence of my industry and skill
a section of a patchwork bed quilt, and I trust also some of the
fruits of her lessons in deportment. I may incidentally say that the
wife of Rev. Dr. Mann of Trinity church in Boston is a grandchild of
Mrs. Bates, one of the pupils above mentioned. I think that Lucy Ann
Jackson, a granddaughter of Benjamin Crandon, was also a pupil, and
much the oldest girl in the school, who is now remembered because
I recall the dinners she brought to eat at the noon recess. Mrs.
Maynard’s daughter Frances married a lawyer in St. Louis, and her
son disappeared from my memory soon after my schoolboy days. The
chief punishment in the school was standing in the corner wearing a
foolscap, and one girl who was exemplary and conscientious in after
life, scarcely passed a day without suffering this punishment.
The chambers in the westerly end of the house occupied by Dr.
Preston, were reached by a door with a projecting porch on the
southerly side of the building eight or ten feet from the town tree,
which stood on what is now the gutter in the square. The stairway
from the outside door led to a broad hall above which separated the
school room from Dr. Preston’s sitting room. These two rooms had
broad folding doors which were used when the building was a hotel,
and called after its owner, the Witherell tavern. John Howland,
who died in Newport not many years ago at the age of 97, said in
his diary, “that at the Pilgrim celebration, December 2, 1803, the
dinner was held in a large old house, in which the partitions in the
chambers had been removed to make room for the tables.” He doubtless
took it for granted that what were really doorways were openings made
for the occasion. I remember well the folding doors. Dr. Preston came
to Plymouth in 1829. He was the son of Amariah and Hannah (Reed)
Preston, and was born in Bedford, Mass., June 21, 1806. He married
a Miss Sargent, and practiced in Plymouth until his death, which
occurred in Boston July 14, 1837.
The later occupants of the second story were Thomas Loring, Augustus
Deming, Lydia Keyes, who died June 30, 1873, at the age of 75 years,
and Jacob Howland, who died June 3, 1876, at the age of 82 years.
The building in question stood ten feet or more back from the
southerly line of the lot, while the building above it on the square,
came out to the sidewalk. When Odd Fellows’ Hall was built the open
space was built upon. About 1850 Mr. Isaac Brewster, representing
the owners of the lot, erected a two story building in the yard on
its northeast corner, which was occupied below for many years by Wm.
Bishop, as early as 1845, as the Old Colony bookstore, and later by
Charles C. Doten, and above by William Davis as a lawyer’s office,
and by Benjamin Whiting and Wm. S. Robbins, photographers. In 1876
it was moved to a lot on Market street, below the bake house, where
it now stands. Odd Fellows’ building had three rooms on Main street.
That in the corner was occupied many years by the post office. The
next was occupied by Stevens M. Burbank, H. N. P. Hubbard, and
Hathaway and Sampson, and the third by Z. F. Leach, H. W. Dick,
Alfred S. Burbank and Hatch & Shaw. The building was destroyed by
fire January 10, 1904.