F 73 .B631 Copy 1 t^tacfistoiie jiSojiiton'jQt Jftvst £n))«tittant ^ ^ sEcoNii Eiiirii):< ihomis Cb-^J^vrv AmoTK WILLIAM BLACKSTONE iJoflton's jfivst Kntiisftltattt •m? Copyright, 1877. RocKWKLL & Churchill, Boston. Rockwell & CbuToblll, Printers. 39 Aicb Street. Boston. TO E|)e ©Itr ^outi) Jlcctmg Hoxise : ONE OF THE FEW REMAINING MONUMKNTS OF OUR PROVINCIAL PERIOD, OF KVENTS AND MEN THAT HELPED TO ESTABLISH OUR NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE AND FREE INSTITU- TIONS, THIS TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY OF William Blackstone, THE EARLIEST INHABITANT OF BOSTON, WHO ALSO LOVED LIBERTY, CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS, IS BcspcctfuUg Detii'catctJ, ■ESTO PEriPETUA." Wh/T is Kf Y/I( of BLACKSTOf(E. For several j-ears previous to the first settlement of Boston, in September, 1630, William Blackstone, its earliest European inhabitant, occupied bj himself what formed for long after- wards the principal part of it, the peninsula know^n as Shawmut. This originally comprised an area of about eight hundred acres, since more than doubled by accessions from the sea, the whole with much besides annexed to our city from the country round about, now crowded with pop- ulation. Blackstone, a man of learning, an ordained min- ister of the Church of England, and, consequently, a graduate of one of its universities, unwilling to conform to ecclesiastical requirements which his conscience disapproved, had come to America " to get from under the power of the lords bishops." Here he dwelt, solitary and alone, raising his apples and roses, and reading his books, of which he had a plentiful supply. His solitude was unpleasantly disturbed in the summer of 1630 by the arrival at Charlestown, across the river, of Win- throp and his company, under their patent of March 4, 1629. Their lives in peril from disease engendered by exposure and privation, and aggravated by the impurity of the water, he generously invited them over to share with him the more salubrious spot he inhabited, and which abounded in springs. Cheerfully yielding up to them the greater part of his possessions, he was contented himself to retain fifty acres adjacent to the spot whereon stood his house. Our story intimates how it chanced that, a few j-ears afterwards, " find- ing he had fallen under the power of the lords brethren," he surrendered this lot and all his other rights within the then narrow neck of land connedling the peninsula with Roxbury, WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. excepting six acres. He received six shillings from each householder, and, in some instances, larger sums in volun- tary contributions, for this release. It has been said that he disclaimed any other title but that of first discoverer and occu- pant, but this release shows that the colonists considered his title to some extent, at least, valid or equitable. In 1623, the Council of New England had patented to Robert Gorges ten miles along the north-east shore of Massachusetts Bay, by thirty inland, with all islands, not previously granted, within three miles of the main land. Walford, at Charles- town ; Maverick, on what is now East Boston ; Thompson, who died in 1628, on the island that still bears his name ; Blackstone, at Shawmut, are supposed to have held under this patent, and been pioneers of a projedled plantation. Sir Ferdinando Gorges had received large grants from the Council farther north. Interested in the speedy colonization of the country, he caused his son Robert to surrender his patent, and another issued, vesting in Winthrop and his associates what it covered, with the rest of Massachusetts, outside the limits of Plymouth, to the western sea. John Blackstone, a member of Parliament, appears to have taken an adtive interest in the affairs of the infant plantations. As one of a parliamentary committee, in 1642, he invited Cotton, Hooker, and Davenport to come over for consultation upon the general condition of the realm. As one of the Council, he joined in a power to William Blackstone to deliver seisin under one of its patents. No consanguinity is known between John and William ; but their bearing the same name justifies the conjedlure that such existed ; that our^ first settler did ac5l- ually possess claims entitled to compensation for their relin- quishment; and that John's position in the Council may have led William to take up his residence in New England, when constrained by conscience to abandon the Church. Whereabouts, precisely, on the peninsula was his dwell- ing-place has long puzzled our historians. Some of the ear- lier authorities speak of his residing on Blackstone's Point, on WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. J Cambridge Bay, opposite the mouth of Charles River. It seems not to have occurred to Shaw, Snow, Drake, and Shurt- leff that his name might attach at that period to all Shawmut ; and, regarding Barton's Point as what was intended, they located his house variously on Poplar or Cambridge streets or a mile away in the vicinity of Charlestown Bridge. The publication of Odlin's deposition, dated June lo, 1684, ^^' corded with Suffolk Deeds, 26-84, ^^ to Blackstone's release, discouraged the hope that further information might be gleaned by examination of these ancient volumes. The cor- respondence in area of the lot reserved by Blackstone, or assigned to him in 1631, and that appropriated soon after his surrender as a common and training-field, and of his six acres to part of that conveyed by Copley to Harrison G. Otis and Jonathan Mason, in 1796, long since led the present writer to the conclusion that our beautiful Common was no other than his park and pasture ; that his orchard lay close by, and was substantially the same laid down as Bannister's gardens, on Burgiss' map of 1728, and that his house stood on the ground bounded by Beacon, Walnut, and Spruce streets, near to which latter street the sea then ebbed and flowed. Under the impression that his connedlion with our early history was too interesting an episode not to be kept in mind, the subjeiSt shaped itself into the present form; and whilst thus engaged, another effort was made to procure, if possible, such additional light as the Suffolk Registry afforded. No conveyance is there believed to be recorded of the six-acre lot from Blackstone, none to Copley, and the earliest is that of the Bracketts to Williams and Vial in 1676, from whom, in 1709, it passed to Thomas Bannister. From his heirs, by foreclosure of mortgages or other process of law, and deed not recorded, it eventually came to Copley before 1770. The deposition taken in 1711 of Mrs. Ann Pollard, the first of Winthrop's company, as mentioned in the text, to leap ashore upon the peninsula, and who lived till 1725, when she had reached the age of 105, states that Blackstone sold WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. his homestead to Richard Pepjs, who built a house on the land, of which her husband was the tenant, and possibly Pepys maj have occupied another himself on the property. When Copley conveyed, in 1796, two then ancient houses stood upon his estate, in one of which he painted many of his admirable portraits, and there his distinguished son, Lord Chancellor Lyndhurst, was born. The area then adtually passing came nearer to twenty acres in all, the ordinance of 1647 giving proprietors of the upland one hundred rods below high-water mark. Pepys may have gone home at the restoration of the mon- archy, or earlier. We do not know that he was not the same Richard Pepys, cousin of Samuel, the entertaining diarist, and the Irish judge of 1664, from whom Lord Cottenham, chancellor in 1836-41, and a successor of Lyndhurst, de- scended. It would be agreeable to trace, in addition to these associations of great legal luminaries with the spot, yet another of the kind, and discover that our Blackstone was of the same family as his namesake. Sir William, the dis- tinguished commentator on the Laws of England, whose volumes never grow old and are ever pleaeant to read, and who was born in London, son of Charles, in 1723, and died in 1780. The son of our William had sons, one of whom, a lieutenant, fell at the siege of Louisburg, in 1746. The only promising clue to the parentage and birthplace of our first inhabitant is a power, in 1653, of Sarah Blackstone (Suffolk Deeds) to collect money advanced, in which she is described as of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and which mentions the name of Stevenson, that of the first husband of Blackstone's wife. In 1638 the authorities granted Blackstone fifteen acres at Muddy Brook, now Brookline, then a partof the town of Boston. He may have continued a freeman and possibly not have sold his estate, but it is generally presumed that he left with his cattle and books for Rehoboth in the spring of 1635. In a house he called Study Hall, a few rods from the river now bearing his name, on the declivity of what he called WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. Study Hill, about sixty feet in elevation, he resided the rest of his days. Miantonimo, nephew of Canonicus, king of the Narragansetts, Ocamsequin or Massasoit, king of Wampa- noags, were his friends, as also their sons Canonchet and king Philip, and his influence may have averted, during his life, the calamity of Indian hostilities which broke out soon after his death. That event took place May 26, 1675, when he had reached the age of fourscore. He occasionally visited Boston and Providence, andpreached in the latter place, and at Boston, in 1659, before Gov. Endi- cott, married Mrs. Sarah Stevenson, widow of John, who died in June, 1673. His only child, John, sold the two hundred acres at Rehoboth, in 1693, to the Whipples, Avho very recently owned them. The house, barns, and books — nearly two hun- dred in number, quartos and folios, and some Latin — were burnt by the Indians in 1676, one of their few vidlories having been gained not far from Study Hill. In the conflagration of his house perished his manuscript volumes and other papers, very possibly of great interest. His grave, near the site of his dwelling, may be still marked by stones at the head and foot; but he should have appropriate monuments raised to his memory both there and here. If to be deplored that our first inhabitant did not leave his own monuments in word and deed, if his life coursed on and left no waif behind it, there is much in his character and career for respedlful admiration. Conscientious, noble, and gener- ous, his intellectual pursuits, love of nature, cultivation of the earth, and subjedlion of the lords of the pasture to his bidding, his courage and faith strike sympathetic chords. Nor should his preference of seclusion to the busy world be condemned without remembering what that world was which he abandoned. A self-complacent, perfidious tyrant on the throne, besotted with indulgence, merciless from impunity, robbing his subjects to enrich favorites that imprisoned or beheaded, or worse, at their will or his own ; a people that tamely submitted ; a Church of rite and dogma without Christi- lO WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. anity, — from this seething caldron of corruption emerged later the furies of retribution ; and minister, primate, and another king, his son, quite as arbitrary, went to the block. No marvel that the howl of the wild beast of the forest and the jell of the savage lost their terrors ; or that the good seed separated from the chaff and came here to plant. The recluse, grown sensitive to rude contadl with his kind, strove in vain to con- quer his repugnance and become as other men. He neglected no opportunity to do them service, but valued too highly his own independence to submit to their didlation. Circum- stance and Providence had circumscribed his paths, and he had not the motive and, perhaps, not the strength to open others for himself. WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. |IGH on an eminence he stood, His thoughts beyond the sea, For he had left his native land That he might here be free, — Free from the thrall of unjust laws, Far from a despot king. Prelates whose haughty will would all To like subjection bring. Too true and honest to accept What conscience disapproved, Its dictates he obeyed, and left All that at home he loved. If his from all the world to choose. Surely no lovelier spot Than where our three-hilled city stands To dwell, all else forgot. The sylvan scene around, beneath. He claimed it as his own, Nor cared, while Providence prote6ls, That he was there alone. Not quite alone ; the curling smoke — Near hills like smoke in hue — Marked where a noble sachem dwelt, He found both kind and true. 12 WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. Save him, and one across the bay, One, whose island home lay near, He lived a solitary man. No kindred soul to cheer. Nor had he need ; his well-stored mind. Books rich with precious lore, His sea-girt home of hill and dale, He asked from Heaven no more. Whatever worth his while to know, Or Old World could impart, In college cloisters he had learned, — A priest of guileless heart. In times when every rank, degree, Appropriate garments wore, His priestly garb made plain to sight The sacred name he bore. From Merrymount or Plymouth Rock Did saint or sinner stray. He gave them of his frugal meal. And sped them on their way. The mocker stayed his ribald jest ; The Indian bowed his head ; All recognized the man of God, Who shared with him his bread. Years came and went, his chief delight To watch the seasons change. To fish or fowl along the shore. The neighboring hillsides range ; Cull cress and herb, and mark the Spring WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. I 3 Her measured mazes tread, Mayflower, violet, eglantine, Each morn new odor shed ; Roses from home, that cherished ties Kept in perennial bloom, Carols awakening memories Which living forms assume. He roamed the woods, and tracked the deer Through winter's drift of snow. Or on its crust, on snow-shoes glides With every pulse aglow ; Now mid the summer moonbeams floats Upon the waters wide That washed up to his cottage door. With each returning tide. His trees in spring perfume the breeze, In autumn yield their fruit ; If no Eve there with him to share No serpent bruised his foot, His Eden ground requites his toll, Each moderate want supplies ; With grateful heart received what sent, Nor craved what God denies. When frosty days the night closed in He sought his sheltered nook. Beside the blazing logs to muse. Or con his favorite book. Little he dreamed that Copley's brush, 14 WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. Where stood his humble cot, Should one day magic works create, Not to be soon forgot. Yet still perchance, as lulled the storm, The stirring tones he hears Of Lyndhurst, matchless in debate, Thrice chief among his peers ; Nor only famous for his birth, His eye prophetic scanned A throng of men since known to fame, Whose homes stood close at hand : Otis, of honeyed eloquence ; Channing, from heaven astray ; Prescott, of lucid narrative ; Motley and Phillips play ; And merchant princes, bold and wise, Warm heart and liberal hand. Who gathered hai"vests from the seas To enrich their native land. Might one but tell their honored names, Refinement, culture, worth. What brighter spot than his own home To illuminate the earth ? And, as the flickering embers cast Strange shadows on his walls. The dreamer saw those walls expand Into palatial halls, Where golden youth, whose thrifty sires Worked that their sons might play. With merry laugh and pleasant chat WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. I 5 Beguile the hours away. He saw before their windows spread A paradise of shade, Where lake and turf cooed lovingly And gleaming fountains played. And all around, in myriad forms, A glorious city grown, Of thrice a hundred thousand souls. Whose fame through earth is known ; With freedom, faith, and cultui'e blest To bloom till time grows old, — The fairest rose that decks our orb Were half its marvels told. Perhaps the lifted clouds disclosed Much that to us is dim, — ■ A future much more wondrous still Than what is now to him. Yet not alone glad themes like these Possessed his busy thought. Which, wandering back in fancy, traced What all such marvels wrought. A nation angry with its king Who would a tyrant be ; That gory head, the bloody axe ; Sure now they must be free. Ah, no ! not yet the lesson taught, Not yet is earned the prize, They first must learn to rule themselves, Be honest, just, and wise. Not Cromwell, with his gloomy rule, 1 6 WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. Nor Stuarts, gay or trist, Orange nor Brunswick, cared to know For subje6ls thrones exist. Not all of Marlborough's vi^loi'Ies, Laurels by land or sea. Could make a people truly great, Unless both good and free. Not all her glowing page reveals, Her statesmanship has won. Science or art can glorious make With half her work undone. Though every realm between the poles To her in homage vies, In virtue, happiness broadcast, Alone true grandeur lies. Time crumbles down the keep and fane Its onward progress stop ; The generations, grown more wise. Each reign some shackle drop. Till knowledge, its inheritance. And law divine, supreme, Our father-land the Eden be. Pictured in Blackstone's dream. All that can chance flits by in dreams, As Ariel round the earth ; But limbs grown chill admonishing, Fresh fagots heap the hearth. And as the genial flame again The cheerful room illumes, WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. I J A sense of comfort came once more, And he his theme resumes. Now, in the "Mayflower" cabin grouped, The Pilgrims sign the deed, Which, basing rule on equal rights, Of freedom sowed the seed. Through tribulations dire, that seed, Like winter grain, they sow, As nations ripen to receive, The earth to overgrow. He sees how other men, like him. Grown weary of their kind, Home, friends, and country all forsake, In other lands to find. Many for whom no cover laid, At Nature's table there. With wife and child, and all they have, Hard hand and heart to dare. He sees the swiftly speeding bark. Fleets wing their westward flight. Till where the beast or savage roamed They gather in their might. Indians in vain provoke their wrath, Frenchmen in vain contend. Their armies Louisburg reduce Or Abi-aham's Heights ascend. France yields the realm she cannot hold ; And prostrate every foe, 1 8 WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. They claim their honest rights as men, For freedom strike the blow. What need repeat that honored roll, Who fought on field or flood, Who, sage in council as in war. Sealed their brave faith in blood ? 'Tis not alone the deathless names That glory's meed deserve ; Theirs, though obscure, who nobly fell. Angels above preserve. No prouder heirloom for their race Than in such struggle die, Which gave a mighty nation birth, First-born of Liberty. And as imagination paints Its spread from sea to sea, — Cities and states of wondrous growth ; Four million slaves set free, — That little cot seemed all too small To cage so bold a wing ; He issued forth into the night. To hark the seraphs sing, Where stars on stars, in lustrous blaze, Decked the high arch above. And, gazing on their circling orbs, How could he doubt God's love, Or to his power a limit fix, Or to his will to bless } WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. 1 9 He knew that he was infinite, And his law happiness. Cahii and subdued, at peace with Heaven, Sweet sleep his being fills ; And sunshine, when he oped his door, Purpled the snow-clad hills. Thus glided by the peaceful life, He hoped might never change, When rumors came across the sea, Tidings of purport strange. Ten years had passed since "Mayflower" brought The Pilgrims to the shore ; And now, with many a sister bark. They bring a thousand more ; Of generous nurture, brave, devout, Women of high degree, From homes of ease and affluence, A goodly company. Beyond the stream, where Warren fell. Rose spacious home for all ; And long, before the corn grew ripe, They gathered in its hall. Unused to hardship, sorrowing For friends the seas divide. They droop and sicken, one by one ; Even their physician died. Grim Death appalled some frighted souls. To some a welcome guest. The wise to Providence resigned, 20 WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. However sore distressed. Their barks but scanty food supplied ; Untilled as yet the fields ; And soon to fevered lips the spring No more refreshment yields. It was a sorry sight to see, To make one's heart to bleed ; How could a Christian man unmoved Regard such urgent need ? His springs and brooks in copious streams With crystal waters welled ; He gave them all they wished and more, — Naught but his farm withheld. Yet all he had suffered from his kind, He could not quite forget ; Too dearly loved his solitude To lose without regret. We found him, when our tale began, Where now our golden dome Sheds lustre on our little world, On many a happy home. The hill, then loftier far than now, Looked out upon the sea. Which in the setting sunbeams glowed In molten brilliancy. And as he gazed, sad memories stole Of all his days before ; Of many a grief to wring his heart, And disappointment sore. When left to nature and himself. WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. 21 Life had been pleased content ; But every fibre of his soul The world had wrenched and rent. He placed implicit trust in Heaven, And, striving to do right, Solace, all unexpe<5led, came, As follows day the night. If dread presentiments of ill Perplex his troubled soul. He fearlessly submits his will To that supreme control. Which, thus far on his pilgrimage His never-failing guide, Will not forget him or forsake. Whatever chance betide. His heart still yearned to be at home ; Familiar faces see ; And all he left for conscience' sake In lands beyond the sea. That sea, as set the pa'rting sun, The gathering darkness shrouds. Whilst western skies its lingering beam Heaps high with gorgeous clouds. Rose, blue, or emerald, every tint Of gold or flower or gem Mingled or gleamed with opal change Alp, throne, or diadem. It was a glorious spe<5tacle. And, as entranced the view, The omen he accepts as sent 22 WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. His courage to renew. With swelling heart and radiant face He marked their splendors die ; His homeward path the evening star Beaconing from twilight sky. When once resolved, he, wavering not, His invitation gave. Which to that haggard crowd appeared Like rescue from the grave. They waste no time, but speedily Their preparations make, And, 'ere the harvest moon has waned, Their way across they take. The first that leaped ashore lived on Near a hundred years to tell, — Her wrinkled front on canvas shows What that long life befel. Not all could come, — some quite too ill To move from '^here they were ; Bold men explored the higher streams. Or settled Dorchester ; And Salstonstall to Watertown, Dudley to Cambridge guide, — The sires to countless multitudes An honest source of pride. But Winthrop came, and hosts whose names Descendants bear to-day ; Johnson, whose loved remains they bring, WILLIAM BLACKS TONE. 23 And funeral honors pay ; Wilson, their pastor, best of guides Through thorny paths to steer, Who cast the hated vestments off To keep his conscience clear ; Grave men, in sober garb arrayed, Matrons, both wise and good, Young men, of manly form and port, And fairest maidenhood. Near where they land, arid friends they left. Some habitations reared, But what of splendor graced the place Has long since disappeared. The marts of trade and squalid want Now occupy the ground. Where Mathers, Hutchinsons, Revere, Once shed their lustre round. And fashion, wandering farther west, Affe6ls that region gay. Where Boston's sole inhabitant Passed many a happy day. Their choicest lot they gave to him, In hearts and councils first ; Its wholesome waters flow to-day As when they quenched his thirst. At equal distance from its gates. The beacon and the fort, The country roused against the foe, Prote] Seventeen vessels came in May and June, chiefly to Salem, whence a large part of the colonists moved to Charlestown. A large house had been ere(5ted there for their accommodation on the Square. It was afterwards used for a tavern, and burnt on the day of the battle of Bunker Hill. Dr. Gager died on the 22d,and Isaac Johnson, ^vhose wife was Arbella, daughter of the Earl of Lincoln, on the 30th of September. Johnson was buried in the Chapel burying-ground, part of his own lot. WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. 35 Xorth Square ■was till recent days the centre of many handsome residences — Hutchinson's and Sir Henry Frankland's being the most costly and mem- orable. [Pa^e 23.] The lot assigned to Winthrop was nearly identical with that owned by the Old South Congregation before their recent removal to Dart:nouth street. It extended from Spring lane to Milk street, from AVashington to the lane once known as JollilTe's, now Sewall place. The house credled by Winthrop stood on the north, or Spring lane side, of the property. It was used for a century as the parsonage, and burnt during the siege of Boston by British soldiers, in 1775, for fuel. [P«^