Chapter 8

Colonel of the Massachusetts regiment of artillery in the Continental line of the Revolutionary army, was born in Milton, Mass., 7th December, 1744, and died in Whiting, Maine, 21st August, 1805. His education was scanty. In 1759, when only fifteen years of age, his father, Abijah was drafted as a soldier in the French war. John offered to go in his father's stead, and was laughed at on account of his youth. Nevertheless, the boy went and proved himself a brave lad, saving the life of a lame fellow-soldier, who had fallen when pursued by a party of Indians, at St. John's. He came to Boston in early life, married, and established himself in business as a house carpenter,--his house and shop being in Tremont Street, opposite Hollis. He assisted Major Paddock in setting out the elm trees on the Tremont Street mall, about the year 1765. These trees were old acquaintances of Crane's, having, like him, been transplanted from Milton. Naturally enough, in one of his ardent temperament, he at once identified himself with the active Sons of Liberty. One of the famous tea party, his career came near being permanently ended by the fall of a derrick, used in hoisting out the tea, which, falling upon him, knocked him senseless. His comrades, supposing him killed, bore him to a neighboring carpenter's shop, and secreted the body under a pile of shavings. They afterwards took him to his home, where good nursing and a strong constitution, soon brought him round. The late Colonel Joseph Lovering, who lived opposite to Crane, used to relate that he held the light on that memorable evening, while Crane, and other young men, his neighbors, disguised themselves for the occasion. House building and other branches of industry having been paralyzed by the "Boston Port Bill," Crane, with his partner, Ebenezer Stevens, (also one of the tea party,) went to Providence, R.I., where they followed their business with success, until the war broke out. Both had been members of Paddock's artillery company, a corps famous for having furnished a large number of valuable officers to that arm of the service in the Revolutionary army, among whom may be named John Crane, Ebenezer Stevens, William Perkins, Henry Burbeck, John Lillie, and David Bryant. Crane had been commissioned by Governor Wanton, captain-lieutenant of the train of artillery of the colony of Rhode Island, December 12, 1774, (barely one year after the destruction of the tea,) and immediately after receiving the news of the battle of Lexington, he was made captain of the train attached to the Rhode Island "Army of Observation," commanded by General Nathaniel Greene. Crane's command, "all well accoutred, with four excellent field-pieces marched, in the latter part of May, to join the American army near Boston. They made a very military appearance, and are, without exception, as complete a body of men as any in the king's dominions." Stevens was a lieutenant in this company. Possessing a remarkably keen vision, Crane was exceedingly skilful as an artillerist, a talent he had frequent opportunities to display during the siege of Boston. Early in the morning of July 8, 1775, Majors Tupper and Crane, with a number of volunteers, attacked the British advance guard at Brown's House, on Boston Neck, (near the corner of Newton Street and Blackstone Square,) routed them, and burned two houses. This was regarded as a brave and well-executed affair, and is noteworthy as being the only hostile encounter that has ever taken place in the old limits of Boston. During the siege he was stationed at the Roxbury line, and was engaged in several skirmishes on the islands in the harbor. Commissioned major of Knox's regiment, January 1, 1776, he accompanied the army to New York, and while cannonading a British frigate which was passing his batteries at Corlaers Hook, was severely wounded by a cannon ball, which carried off a part of his foot, disabling him for several months, and finally causing his death--the wound having closed. He raised in Massachusetts, in 1777, the 3d regiment of Continental artillery, which he commanded till the war ended, when he was brevetted a brigadier-general, (October 10, 1783,) his commission as colonel dating from January 1, 1777. This corps, officered chiefly from those who had been trained under Paddock, Gridley and Knox, was not exceeded in discipline, valor, and usefulness by any in the service. It was principally employed with the main army, and was an essential auxiliary in the most important operations. Portions of it were also with Sullivan in the Rhode Island campaign, with Gates at Saratoga, and in the heroic defence of Red Bank, on the Delaware. After the peace, Crane formed a partnership with Colonel Lemuel Trescott, in the lumber business, in Passamaquoddy, Maine, in which they were unsuccessful. The connection was soon dissolved, and Crane finally settled in Whiting, Washington County, Maine, where he had a grant of two hundred acres of land, for his Revolutionary services, from the legislature of Massachusetts. Colonel Crane was five feet eight inches in height, stout and thick set. He possessed great energy, resolution and courage, and at critical moments was perfectly cool. In 1790, he was commissioned judge of the Court of Common Pleas, by Governor Hancock. While at the lines on Boston Neck, Crane aimed a ball at a house near his own, belonging to Rev. Dr. Byles, the Tory, but succeeded only in knocking the ridge pole from his own dwelling. He became a Freemason in 1781, joining an army lodge at West Point, and was also a member of the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati. Colonel Crane, in 1767, married Mehitabel Wheeler, believed to have been a sister of Captain Josiah Wheeler, a member of the tea party. His three daughters married three sons of Colonel John Allan, who, with his Indian allies, rendered valuable service to the patriot cause in protecting throughout the Revolutionary war, the exposed north-eastern frontier. William Allan, who married Alice Crane, was the grandfather of George H. Allan, of Boston, from whom many of the above facts have been derived, and who has made extensive collections relative to the Allan and Crane families.

MAJOR ROBERT DAVIS,

Merchant, importer of groceries, wines and liquors, did business at No. 1 Cornhill, and resided in Orange Street. He was the son of Joshua and Sarah (Pierpont) Davis, and was born 24th January, 1747. He was a Son of Liberty, and as an officer in Crafts's artillery regiment, took part in the expulsion of the British fleet from Boston harbor, ultimately attaining the rank of major. Member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company in 1786. His brothers, Caleb and Amasa, were also prominent Revolutionary characters,--the latter having been forty years quartermaster-general of Massachusetts. Robert Davis became a member of St. Andrew's Lodge of Freemasons in 1777, and died in November, 1798. His daughter, Clarissa, widow of William Ely, was living in Hartford in 1873, at the age of eighty-two.

EDWARD DOLBEAR

Was a fellow-apprentice, and afterwards a partner with Henry Purkitt, in the business of a cooper, in South Street. His residence was near Dr. Eliot's Meeting House, where he died, in April, 1796.

CAPTAIN JOSEPH EATON

Was an eccentric and excitable, but patriotic citizen, a hatter by trade. He claimed to have hauled down the first British colors at the outset of the Revolution, and to have loaded a cannon in State Street to prevent the regulars from landing, in 1774. He was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company; was an ardent democrat, and late in life wore a cocked hat, and styled himself "general."

JOSEPH EAYRES

Was one of the volunteer guard on the "Dartmouth" on the night of November 30, 1773. He was a housewright in Essex Street, in 1789.

---- ECKLEY,

A barber, was informed against for his participation in the destruction of the tea, and committed to prison. The Sons of Liberty supported him while in confinement, and also provided for his family. He was finally liberated, and the person who informed against him was tarred and feathered, and paraded through the town with labels on his breast and back bearing his name, and the word "informer" in large letters.

WILLIAM ETHERIDGE,

Who was a mason, while engaged in throwing the tea overboard, was recognized by his apprentice, Samuel Sprague.

SAMUEL FENNO,

A housewright, was born in Boston, in 1745, and died in 1806. He lived in a large wooden house on Tremont Street, near Hollis Street, and was a near neighbor of Crane, Lovering and the Bradlees. He was a man of unusual reticence, but noted for courage and patriotism. From 1773 till his death, he kept a vow never to drink tea. In 1797 he married Mary, the sister of Joseph Hiller, the first collector of the port of Salem, and was the father of Captain John Fenno, a pioneer in the China trade.

CAPTAIN SAMUEL FOSTER,

Of Roxbury, was a sergeant in Captain Moses Whiting's minute company, at Lexington, and as a captain in Greaton's regiment, served at Ticonderoga, and in other campaigns of the Revolutionary war.

NATHANIEL FROTHINGHAM,

A coachmaker, at No. 5 West Street, died January 22, 1825; aged seventy-nine.

JOHN GAMMELL

Was of Scotch descent, his father bearing the same name, having come to Boston about the year 1740. The son was born in Boston, in 1749, and died there in 1827. His trade was that of a carpenter, in which capacity he served seven years in the construction department of the Revolutionary army. He was a participant in the Stamp Act riots, and in the destruction of the tea, and in his later years used to describe the latter affair, with great minuteness, in the presence of his family, and on the anniversary of the day would act over again the part he then performed. He married Margaret Urann, by whom he had fifteen children. As the initials J and T were in old times interchangeable, there is no doubt but this is the person mentioned in the list of 1835.

Communicated by Prof. Wm. Gammell, of Brown University, and Rev. Sereno Dwight Gammell, of Wellington, O., grandsons of John Gammell.

SAMUEL GORE,

Born in Boston, February 6, 1751; died November 16, 1831. Captain John Gore, his father, a lieutenant in the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company, in 1753, had, by industry, acquired considerable wealth. Being a Tory, he left Boston with the British army in 1776, but afterwards returned. Samuel followed his father's trade, that of a painter, in Court Street, at the corner of Gore's Alley, (Brattle Street,) but, unlike him, was an ardent patriot. He was one of the party of young men who, at noon-day, and under the eyes of the British guard, carried off and secreted the cannon from the gun-house that stood opposite the mall at the corner of West Street. His companions in this daring feat were Nathaniel Balch, James Brewer, Moses Grant, Jeremiah Gridley and ----Whiston. Mr. Gore was one of those who established the glass-works in Essex Street, a speculation by which he unfortunately lost all the accumulations of many years of untiring industry. He was a member of the Masonic Lodge of St. Andrew, in 1778, and was the first treasurer of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. Governor Christopher Gore was a younger brother. He was a man of superior intelligence, kindness of heart, and courtesy of manner.

MOSES GRANT,

Son of Samuel, and father of Deacon Moses Grant, was born in Boston, March 13, 1743; died December 22, 1817. He was an upholsterer, on Union Street, and his son, Moses, was a partner with him until his death. He was an ardent patriot; was one of the volunteer guard on the "Dartmouth," on the night of November 29, 1773; was one of those who seized and carried off the cannon from the gun-house, on West Street, and one of the renowned "tea party." Member of the company of cadets, and a deacon of Brattle Street church.

NATHANIEL GREENE

Was in 1789 register of deeds, at 42 Cornhill. He was an ardent Son of Liberty, and was present at the public celebration in Dorchester, where three hundred of them gathered, August 14, 1769.

SAMUEL HAMMOND,

One of the tea party, died at Wadsborough, Vt., January 4, 1842; aged ninety-three. In 1774, he began a settlement near Otter Creek, N.Y., but the hostility of the Indians drove him to Vermont, and he fixed his residence at Wadsborough. He was an industrious farmer, and an active patriot.

WILLIAM HENDLEY,

A Revolutionary pensioner, formerly of Roxbury, died at Waldoborough, Me., in February, 1830; aged eighty-two. He was a mason, on Newbury Street, Boston, in 1796.

GEORGE ROBERT TWELVES HEWES,

Born in Boston, September 5, 1742, died at Richfield, Otsego County, N.Y., November 5, 1840, at the great age of ninety-eight. His education was scanty; farming, fishing, and shoemaking being his chief occupations. Excitable and patriotic, he took part in numerous ante-Revolutionary disturbances in Boston, and engaged in the naval, and afterwards in the military, service of his country during the war. His residence was at the Bulls Head, an old house that stood on the north-east corner of Congress and Water Streets. The most detailed account we have of the destruction of the tea in Boston, was given by him, in "Traits of the Tea Party," by B.B. Thatcher, published in New York, in 1835. An oil portrait of Hewes is in the possession of his grandson, Mr. Henry Hewes, of West Medford, Mass.

JOHN HICKS,

Born in Cambridge, May 23, 1725, was one of the earliest martyrs to the cause of American liberty, having been killed by the British on their retreat from Lexington, April 19, 1775. John, his son, was a printer, and became in 1773, a partner with Nathaniel Mills, in the publication of the "Post Boy," a Tory sheet.

SAMUEL HOBBS,

Born in Lincoln, Mass., in 1750, died at Sturbridge, Mass., in May, 1823. While in the employ of Simeon Pratt, a tanner, of Roxbury, he aided in throwing the tea overboard, and afterwards said that chests of Bohea, weighing three hundred and sixty pounds, were rather heavy to lift. He settled in Sturbridge, as a farmer, also carrying on his trade of tanner and currier. By his wife, Lucy Munroe, of Lexington, he had four children.

JOHN HOOTON,

An apprentice, while at work on the tea, saw a person who looked like a countryman, coming up with a small boat to the ship's side, evidently intending to secure a cargo for his own use. He, and three or four other "North Enders," as full of spirit as himself, being directed to dislodge the interloper, jumped over and beat the canoe from under him "in the twinkling of an eye." Hooton was an oarmaker, at Hooton's wharf, Fish Street, in 1789. In 1806, he was a wood-wharfinger, on North Street, residing in Prince Street. In 1838, his residence was in Chelsea, Mass.

SAMUEL HOWARD,

A Boston shipwright, resided at the "Mansion House," as it was called, which stood on the site of the Mariner's Church, North Square. He died here in January, 1797, at the age of forty-five, and was buried in Copp's Hill. His wife, Anna Lillie, the sister of Major John Lillie, of the Revolutionary army, died in North Andover, in 1804. Two of our well-known fellow citizens, Henry Lillie Pierce and Edward L. Pierce, are grandsons of Major Lillie. Theophilus Lillie, the Tory trader, who was mobbed during the tea excitement, was Major Lillie's uncle. Caroline, the youngest child of Samuel and Anna Lillie Howard, born October 3, 1794, married Rev. Samuel Gilman, D.D., of Charleston, S.C. She is still living, at the age of ninety, and resides at Tiverton, R.I., with a daughter Mrs. Bowen.

EDWARD C. HOWE,

Ropemaker, died in September, 1821, aged seventy-nine. E.C. Howe & Son (Joseph) dissolved partnership August 1, 1800. Howe's rope-walk was one of seven, on the west side of Pearl Street, all of which were burnt in July, 1794.

JONATHAN HUNNEWELL,

The son of Richard, followed his father's trade, of a mason. He was born in Boston, May 19, 1759; died in April, 1842. He was several times a selectman of Boston, and member of both branches of the legislature; was connected with many benevolent institutions, and was for nine years president of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. He was one of the principal agents in the establishment of the glass-works, in Boston and Chelmsford, and its failure, in 1822, made him a poor man. For many years he had a country residence at Newton, which was the seat of a generous hospitality. The latter part of his life was passed in seclusion, at Roxbury, where, in 1800, he married the widow Theoda Davis. Jonathan, his brother, and Richard, his father, were also in the tea party.

RICHARD HUNNEWELL,

A mason, member of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, died in October, 1805. He resided in Essex Street; was an active Son of Liberty, and was one of the volunteer guard on the "Dartmouth," on the night of November 30, 1773. His two sons, fourteen and sixteen years of age, were with him at the throwing overboard of the tea.

THOMAS HUNSTABLE,

Was born in 1753. He lived for many years on Brighton Street, and was a Freemason.

COLONEL ABRAHAM HUNT,

Was born in Braintree, Mass., June 2, 1748; died December 5, 1793. He was apprenticed, in 1763, to Edmund Quincy, who kept a wine-store, and was afterwards connected with him in the trade. In 1789, his place of business was in Middle (Hanover) Street, and his residence on Federal Street. He served as lieutenant and adjutant at the siege of Boston; was in the Ticonderoga campaign, remaining some years in the service, which he quitted with the rank of captain. June 24, 1781, he was agent for the privateer "Buccaneer," Captain Hoysted Hacker. For a time he was inspector of the ports of Boston and Charlestown. In 1777, he became a member of St. Andrew's Lodge of Freemasons. October 15, 1771, he married Mary St. Leger. His orderly books for June and July, 1775, are in the possession of his grandson, ---- Urann, Esq.

DANIEL INGERSOLL,

Housewright, formerly of Boston, died in Keene, N.H., October 17, 1829, aged seventy-nine. He was a member of St. Andrew's Lodge, in 1782.

DAVID KINNISON,

The last of the tea party, born in Old Kingston, near Portsmouth, Maine, November 17, 1736; died in Chicago, February 24, 1852; aged one hundred and fifteen years. Up to the Revolution he was a farmer, at Lebanon, whence, with a few comrades, members of a political club, he went to Boston, with the express purpose of destroying the tea. He was in active service during the war, participating in many battles, and was a prisoner among the Indians at its close. He was a farmer, at Wells, Maine, when the war of 1812 broke out, and was in the battles at Sackett's Harbor and Williamsburg, and in the latter was badly wounded in the hand, by a grape-shot. He afterwards lived at Lyme, and at Sackett's Harbor, N.Y., and in July, 1845, went to Chicago. At Lyme, while felling a tree, he was struck down by a limb, which fractured his skull, broke his collar bone, and two of his ribs. While engaged in discharging a cannon, at a training at Sackett's Harbor, both legs were broken and badly shattered. Up to 1848 he had always made something by his labor, and was the father of twenty-two children. He learned to read when past sixty. A daughter, who survived in 1848, was made acquainted in that year with her father's existence, by the publication of Mr. Lossing's "Field Book of the Revolution." Hastening to him, she smoothed the patriarch's pillow in his passage to the grave.

JOSEPH LEE,

Merchant, on Long Wharf, afterwards at 9 Doane Street, was a member of Massachusetts Lodge of Freemasons, in 1773, and died February 6, 1831; aged eighty-six.

AMOS LINCOLN,

Born in Hingham, Mass., March 17, 1753, died at Quincy, Mass., January 15, 1829. He was apprenticed to a Mr. Crafts, at the North End, who, on the evening of December 16, 1773, secretly procured for him an Indian disguise, dressed him in his own chamber,--darkening his face to the required tint,--and then, dropping on his knees, prayed most fervently that he might be protected in the enterprise in which he was engaged. Joining Stark's New Hampshire regiment, he was in the battle of Bunker Hill; was afterwards a captain in Craft's artillery regiment, and was at one time in charge of the castle, in Boston harbor. When Shays' insurrection broke out, he assisted in its suppression. He was a housewright of much skill. The wood-work of the State House was under his charge, and evinces the grace and beauty of his workmanship. He married a daughter of Paul Revere. His grandson, Frederick W. Lincoln, has been mayor of Boston. He joined St. Andrew's Lodge of Freemasons, in 1777. Governor Levi Lincoln, of Massachusetts, and Governor Enoch Lincoln, of Maine, were nephews of Captain Amos Lincoln.

MATTHEW LORING

Was a cordwainer, on Devonshire Street, residing on Brattle Street. He died November 7, 1829; aged seventy-nine.

THOMAS MACHIN

Was born in Staffordshire, England, 20th March, 1744; was employed by Brindley in canal construction, and in 1772 came to America, and settled in Boston. He was wounded at Bunker Hill, while acting as lieutenant of artillery; 18th January, 1776, was commissioned second lieutenant in Col. Knox's artillery regiment, and was employed from April to June in that year in laying out the fortifications for the defence of the town and harbor of Boston; from July, 1776, to 1781, he was employed in constructing the fortifications which were to render the Hudson impassable to British vessels. In October, 1777, when Forts Montgomery and Clinton were taken by the British, Captain Machin was wounded by a musket-ball, which entered his breast and passed out under his right shoulder. In April, 1779, he accompanied Colonel Van Schaick's expedition against the Onondagas, of which he kept a journal, and in June joined Sullivan's expedition to the Genesee Valley, as engineer. A map of this expedition, executed by him, was in the possession of his son, Captain Thomas Machin. In the fall of 1781, he aided in laying out the works of the American army, then besieging Yorktown. In 1783, he began a settlement at New Grange, Ulster County, and in the following year erected several mills at the Great Pond, a few miles west of Newburgh. March 12, 1793, he was commissioned a captain, to take rank as such from 21st August, 1780. In January, 1797, he removed to Montgomery County, N.Y., where he practised surveying, and where he died, at his residence in Charleston, a part of the old town of Mohawk, 3d April, 1816; Member of Army Lodge, West Point, 1782.

ARCHIBALD MACNEIL,

Died in Scituate, Mass., February 1, 1840; aged ninety.

CAPTAIN MACKINTOSH