F 
 
 
 A D D K E S S 
 
 DELIVEKKD AT THE 
 
 TWO-HUNDREDTH AiifflRSART 
 
 INCORPORATION 
 
 TOWN OF MILTON, 
 
 JUNE nth, 1862. 
 
 By JAMES M. BOBBINS 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 DELIVEBED BEFORE THE 
 
 INHABITANTS OF THE TOWN OF MILTON, 
 
 200th ANNIVERSARY 
 
 INCORPORATION OF THE TOWN, 
 
 JUNE nth, 1863. 
 
 By Ji3IES M. ROBBINS. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 DAVID CLAPP, PRINTER 334 WASHINGTON ST. 
 
 1862. 
 
 Hr\^ 
 
\ 
 
 
 Senrce nnkBoWft 
 
Milton, April 26, 1862. 
 Hon. JAMES M. ROBBINS. 
 
 Dear Sir : 
 
 The Citizens of Milton, at their Town Meeting held at the Town 
 House, April 21st, passed the following vote, viz. : — 
 
 "That a Committee of five be appointed to take such measures as may- 
 be necessary to celebrate, in an appropriate manner, the bi-centennial anni- 
 versary of the incorporation of the town of Milton, on the 11th day of 
 June next. That the Committee be mstructed to invite the Hon. James ^M. 
 Robbins to deliver an address upon the occasion." 
 
 In accordance with this vote, the following named gentlemen were 
 appointed on the Committee, viz. : Josiah Babcock, Elijah Tucker, Jason 
 W. Houghton, Charles Taylor and Charles M. S. Churchill. On the 24th 
 they met at the house of Charles Taylor, to make the necessary arrangements, 
 and there instructed the undersigned to forward to you a copy of the above 
 vote of the town of Milton. I now have the honor of obeying their hi- 
 structions. In doing so, allow me to express the wish that the invitation 
 will be accepted by one so familiar with, and so able to narrate the history 
 of Milton. 
 
 Very respectfully, yoiir obed't servant, 
 
 CHARLES M. S. CHURCHILL, 
 
 Secyretary of the Committee, 
 
 M. S. CHURCHILL, Esq. 
 
 Seo'etary of the Committee of the 
 Town of Milton. 
 
 Milton, April 30, 1862. 
 
 Dear Sir : 
 
 Your note, inclosing the vote of the Town in relation to the 
 approaching Anniversary of the Incorporation, is received. I am duly 
 sensible of the honor conferred on me in this vote, and regret that my 
 qualifications for the performance of the duties which the occasion imposes, 
 are not more adequate than I believe them to be. Still, I shaU not shrink 
 from the service, and will endeavor to be prepared on the day you name. 
 
 With respect, your obed't servant, 
 
 JAMES M. ROBBINS. 
 
Milton, June 17, 1862. 
 Hon. J. M. HOBBINS. 
 
 Dear Sir : 
 
 The Committee of Arrangements tender you their thanks for 
 your interesting and instructive Address, on the 11th inst., and request 
 a copy of the same for publication and distribution through the town. 
 
 Yours respectfully, 
 
 C. M. S. CHURCHILL, 
 
 Secretary.- 
 
 Milton, June 20, 1862. 
 C. M. S. CHURCHILL, Esq. 
 
 Secretary of the Town Committee. 
 Dear Sir : 
 
 I cheerfully furnish a copy of the Address prepared at the 
 invitation of the Town of Milton, for the celebration of the two-hmidredth 
 Anniversary of the Incorporation. I have filled out slight biographical 
 notices of certain persons, which would have trespassed too much upon 
 the time of the audience in delivery. 
 
 I avail myself of this occasion to express my thanks to the Town, for 
 th(jir indulgent hearing on that day. 
 
 With respect, your friend, 
 
 J. M. ROBBINS. 
 
ORDER OF EXERCISES 
 
 At the Celebration of the 200th Anniversary of the IncorPO' 
 
 RATION OF THE ToWN OF MiLTON, JUNE 11th, 1862. 
 
 I.— VOLUNTARY ON THE ORGAN. 
 
 II.— ANTHEM. 
 
 O be joj-ful in the Lord, all ye lands ; serTe the Lord with gladness, and 
 come before His presence with a song. 
 
 Be ye sure that the Lord He is God ; it is He that hath made us, and 
 not we oxirselves ; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture. 
 
 O go your way into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts 
 with praise ; be thankful unto Him, and speak good of His name. 
 
 For the Lord is gracious, His mercy is everlasting; and His truth en- 
 dureth from generation to generation. 
 
 Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost. 
 
 As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. 
 
 Amen, 
 
 III.— PRAYER, by Rev. John H. Morison. 
 
 IV.— BI-CENTENNIAL HYMN, by Mrs. S. D. Whitney. 
 
 [Air : Auld Lang Si/ne.] 
 
 1. O'er way'posts of two hundred years, 4. When but the herald hues of morn 
 
 Along a living line, Hope's blazon might combine ; 
 
 Thought flashes l>ack, through smiles and tears, Our Flag of Stars was yet unborn 
 
 To days of Auld Lang Syne. In days of Auld Lang Syne. 
 
 To days of Auld Lang Syne, my friends. In days of Auld Lang Syne, my friends, 
 
 To daj"s of Auld Lang Syne ; In days of Auld Lang Syne ; 
 
 Thought flashes back, through smiles and tears. Our Flag of Stars was yet unborn 
 
 To days of Auld Lang Syne. In days of Auld Lang Syne. 
 
 2. When o'er a realm of embryo might 
 Great summers came to shine, 
 
 And searched a wilderness to light 
 The homes of Auld Lang Syne. 
 
 The homes of Auld Lang Syne, my friends. 
 The homes of Auld Lang Syne ; 
 
 And searched a wilderness to light 
 The homes of Auld Lang Syne. 
 
 3. When all our leagues of level rail 
 Lay waiting in the mine, 
 
 And hardy huntsmen trod the trail. 
 
 In days of Auld Lang Syne. 
 In days of Auld Lang Syne, my friends, 
 
 In days of Auld Lang Syne ; 
 When hardy huntsmen trod the trail. 
 
 In days of Auld Lang Syne. 
 
 5. Small need those pilgrim heroes had 
 Of Freedom's outer sign ; 
 
 Her mighty heart beat high and glad 
 In breasts of Auld Lang Syne ! 
 
 In breasts of Auld Lang Syne, my friends, 
 In breasts of Auld Lang Syne ; 
 
 Her mighty heart beat high and glad 
 In breasts of Auld Lang Syne. 
 
 6. We trace the centuries' double span, 
 We measure their design. 
 
 And grasp the greatness that began 
 
 Far back In Auld Lang Syne. 
 Far back in Auld Lang Syne, my friends. 
 
 Far back in Auld Lang Syne ; 
 We grasp the greatness that began 
 
 Far back in Auld Lang Syne. 
 
Vi ORDER OP EXERCISES. 
 
 7. Where hands are strong and hearts are true, S. And still, with souls like those of yore, 
 
 Still speeds the work divine ; Steadfast through storm and shine, 
 
 To-day is grand with deeds to do, God bless us, as He blessed before 
 
 As days of Auld Lang Syne. The men of Auld Lang Syne ! 
 
 As days of Auld Lang Syne, my friends, The men of Auld Lang Syne, my friends, 
 
 As days of Auld Lang Syne ; The men of Auld I>ang Syne ; 
 
 To-day is grand with deeds to do, God bless us, as he blessed before 
 
 As days of Auld Lang Syne. The men of Auld Lang Syne ! 
 
 v.— ADDRESS, by Hon. James M. Robbing 
 VI.— HYMN. 
 
 [Air : America.] 
 
 1. My country .' 'tis of thee, 2. My native country, thee t 
 
 Sweet laud of Uberty ! Land of the noble free ! 
 
 Of thee I sing. Thy name X love. 
 
 Land where my fathers died, I love thy rocks and rills. 
 
 Land of the Pilgrim's pride, Thy woods and templed hills ^ 
 
 Irom every mountain side, My heart with rapture thrills 
 
 Let freedom ring. Like that above. 
 
 3. Our Fathers' God, to Thee, 
 Author of liberty ! 
 
 To Thee we sing. 
 Long may our land be bright 
 With freedom's holy light ; 
 Protect us by thy might, 
 
 Great God, Om- King ! 
 
 VII.— BENEDICTION, by Rev. Albert K. Teele. 
 
 [JoSiAH Babcock, Chairman of the Committee, iutrodaced 
 the speaker as follows : — 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen : In behalf of the Committee of 
 Arrangements, I have the pleasure of introducing to you a 
 gentleman, whom the County and Town have delighted to 
 honor, as did they his father and grand-father — the Hon, 
 James M. Robbins, who will now address you.] 
 
ADDRESS. 
 
 It is a time-honored usage of all civilized people, 
 to commemorate leading events of their past history ; 
 and we have come here to-day to celebrate the com- 
 mencement of the corporate existence of our ancient 
 town, which began its independent and honorable 
 career two centuries ago at this time — and also to 
 do honor to the memory of the fathers, whose 
 wisdom and far-reaching sagacity laid out the 
 courses which have guided much of their posterity 
 in the paths of industry and rational life during 
 this long lapse of time. 
 
 The small self-acting communities which we call 
 townships, into which our whole territory is divided, 
 are, in fact, a Massachusetts invention, which sub- 
 sequently spread throughout New England and 
 many of the Middle and Western States of the 
 Union, and in the territorial divisions have been 
 adopted by the Federal Government in laying out 
 the public lands. It is difficult for us, who have 
 )\ever known any other form, to appreciate the wide- 
 spread benefits Avhich have resulted from this simple 
 institution, which has continued with very trifling 
 
8 
 
 amendments from the beginning. As an instrument 
 for the support and development of all the elements 
 of civilization, nothing equals it. Where else, out- 
 side of the circle controlled by this form of govern- 
 ment, are the great institutions of religion and 
 education so effectually guarded and supported ? 
 Where are the highways so good, and where are the 
 victims of helpless poverty and old age so well pro- 
 vided for, as they are found within the regions which 
 have adopted this system? Other countries have 
 made arrangements for all these interests in some 
 form or other, and favored individuals everywhere 
 may enjoy the benefits of religious instruction, and 
 acquire knowledge and distinction in every branch 
 of science ; but the universality with which every 
 individual of every condition of life among us, 
 through the means of our tovtm governments, ac- 
 quu'es the rudiments of education, and enjoys the 
 quiet security of life and property, has stamped the 
 character of the inhabitants of New England as 
 distinguished for intelligence and self-reliance, I 
 may say, beyond the population of any other portion 
 of Christendom. Certain orders and instructions of 
 the Massachusetts Company throw some light upon 
 this matter. Matthew Cradock, a rich London mer- 
 chant, the Governor and principal director of the 
 Association known as the Company of the London 
 Plantations in Massachusetts Bay, which obtained 
 the fii-st charter of the Colony, instructs their agent, 
 Capt. Endicott, in these words; "After laying out 
 a town plot, let no man presume to build his house 
 without the pale ;" and this rule is so rigidly enforced, 
 
that the Dorchester plantation ordered that "no man 
 shall build his house more than half a mile from the 
 Meeting-house." The main purpose of these orders 
 was to provide religious instruction and support for 
 public worship. The predominance of the religious 
 clement is every where apparent. 
 
 The founders of the Colony had a full appreciation 
 of the value of compact communities. Gov. Cradock 
 writes again, "The burnt child dreads the fire ; our 
 countrymen have suffered in Virginia by their too much 
 confidence " — alluding to the disasters which had befal- 
 len that Colony. The Virginia Colony preceded the 
 settlement of Massachusetts, twenty years, and their 
 experience was used as a beacon to guide our ad- 
 venturers. The early historians of Virginia inform 
 us that their Colony was called into existence by the 
 success of the Spanish operations in the gold and 
 silver mines in Mexico and Peru, and no especial 
 forethought towards the establishment of a well- 
 regulated society seems to have been exercised in 
 the first movements. The Government of the Col- 
 ony, residing in London, sent over a deputy Governor 
 with the first company of settlers, consisting " of 
 broken tradesmen, unruly sparks packed off" by their 
 friends to escape worse destinies at home, poor gen- 
 tlemen, rakes, libertines, footmen, and others more 
 fitted to spoil a Commonwealth than to maintain 
 one."* These persons, incapable of labor, were soon 
 occupied in quarrellmg among themselves, and in 
 cheating the Indians in the fur trade, &c. The 
 
 * Stith's History of Vii-ginia. 
 
10 
 
 Company continued sending out more emigrants, 
 including many convicted felons, making a penal 
 Colony of it ; and to supply wives for the emigrants, 
 sent out a great number of unmarried women, who 
 were sold at 160 lbs. tobacco each, to pay the ex- 
 penses of transportation. The plantations were 
 scattered in a straggling manner, wherever a choice 
 vein of land presented itself — the farther from 
 neighbors the better. A preconcerted Indian mas- 
 sacre destroyed four hundred Europeans. The re- 
 sult of all this was that, after a lapse of twelve 
 years, their corn was still sent from England ; and 
 after an expenditure of £100,000, and many thou- 
 sand emigrants had been sent, only six hundred 
 Europeans could be found. 
 
 This picture was constantly before the Massachu- 
 setts Company, and served greatly to shape their 
 course. The town governments were not produced 
 by any legislation, but grew into use through the 
 practical good sense of the early settlers, and Salem 
 and Dorchester had chosen men to regulate those 
 plantations, some years before any general law on 
 the subject existed. Many of the laws of Massa- 
 chusetts had their origin in the rules and orders 
 adopted in the plantations, before the colonial legis- 
 lature acted upon them ; all the leading features of 
 the school law appear on the records of Dorchester, 
 some years before the general law was enacted. 
 
 I mention the case of Virginia, because it ac- 
 counts for many of the first movements of our Colo- 
 nial Government. The fur trade was made a mo- 
 nopoly of the Colony, and the trade with the Indians 
 
11 
 
 confined to certain confidential persons appointed 
 and licensed by the authorities. To sell a house 
 and land was prohibited, unless the purchaser was 
 first approved of by the inhabitants of the plantation. 
 After the pains taken to investigate the character of 
 all emigrants before they embarked, if any libertine 
 should be discovered, he was to be sent back. Again, 
 no idle drone is to be permitted mthin our borders. 
 All these regulations are to be found in the early 
 records, and the benefits resulting from these arbi- 
 trary laws are not entirely obliterated to this day. 
 
 If Virginia and Carolina had been laid out into 
 toA^aiships and small sections, and divided among 
 settlers, as was Massachusetts, no African slavery 
 would ever have existed in North America ; — but 
 giving whole counties and duchies to the Culpeppers, 
 the Calverts, the Fairfaxes and the Warwicks, pro- 
 duced the same results here, that similar causes have 
 produced m other countries — serfdom in Russia, 
 feudalism in Germany, and Negro-slavery here. 
 These great land-holders could find no laborers 
 among the wretched emigrants already described, and 
 the Earl of Warwick fitted out a piratical craft to 
 rob the Spanish slavers in the tropics, to supply the 
 deficiency — the first introduction of the African race 
 upon this Continent. 
 
 For six years after the arrival in Massachusetts 
 Bay of Governor Winthrop, with the Charter, in 1630, 
 and the great accompanying emigration connected 
 with this movement, all the territory comprised with- 
 in the present borders of Milton remained a part of 
 the undivided lands of the Colony, and during this 
 
12 
 
 period three gentlemen, who were doubtless mem- 
 bers or stock-holders of the Company before they 
 left England — Israel Stoughton, John Glover, and 
 William Hutchinson — selected a part of the land 
 dividends to which they were entitled, within our 
 limits. They were probably attracted by certain 
 natural advantages which belonged to the locality ; 
 the water-falls in the river, the convenience for ship 
 building offered by the tide waters, an abundant sup- 
 ply of ship timber, and, above all, the fertility of 
 much of the land. Stoughton and Glover were 
 prominent men in the Dorchester plantation, and, as 
 the pioneers of civilization upon our soil, deserve 
 some notice on this occasion. 
 
 Mr. Stoughton selected 160 acres of land con- 
 nected with the lower falls, including nearly the 
 whole of Milton Hill, and the front on the river to 
 the bend, where the ship yard of Mr. Biiggs was 
 located. Nearly all this property continued in him 
 and his heirs for more than twenty years, when it 
 was sold to John Gill, in 1656. Col. Stoughton's 
 character and career are too well known to need 
 repetition here. He was an active, public-spuited 
 man, of the true Cromwellian type, engaged in every 
 movement for the benefit of the Colony, resisting 
 the conspiracies of the Indians, founding the College, 
 and during the twelve years of his residence in 
 Dorchester, the whole time occupying an important 
 place as Deputy or Councillor in the Government, 
 or commanding the forces in the Indian wars m 
 Connecticut and Ehode Island. In 1644 he left 
 his family and embarked for England, where he died 
 
18 
 
 the following year, the Colonel of a Parliamentary 
 regiment engaged in the great revolution of that day. 
 
 Mr. Glover selected a lot directly south of Milton 
 Hill, of 180 acres, on the flat fronting on the north- 
 west by the brook, and south-east on the centre line 
 of the tawn, where he laid out a farm, and after the 
 annexation of our territory to Dorchester, built a 
 house near where the brook reaches the road by Mr. 
 Davis's. This farm was occupied many years by 
 his agent or tenant, Nicholas Wood, until it was sold 
 in 1654 by the heirs to Eobert Vose. Mr. Glover, 
 besides employing himself much in commerce, was 
 often Representative for Dorchester, and many years 
 Assistant or Councillor. Capt. Johnson describes 
 him as a plain, sincere, godly man, strong for the 
 truth, and of good abilities. His name is frequently 
 mentioned as attending the meetings of the Company 
 in London, before the emigration. He left several 
 sons, and his posterity is numerous in New England 
 now. 
 
 Mr. William Hutchinson belonged to the Lincoln- 
 shire Company, who came with Rev. Mr. Cotton and 
 settled at Boston. Mt. AVoUaston or Braintree was 
 early ceded to the town of Boston, with a view of 
 supplying the inhabitants of the penmsula with such 
 lands as they might desire. Mr. H. laid out a large 
 tract, doubtless supposing it to be within the Bram- 
 tree line, but when a survey was made in laying out 
 the towns of Bramtree and Dorchester, a large part 
 of Hutchinson's lot was found to fall within the line 
 of the latter town ; in fact, included the whole east 
 corner of the town of Milton, besides a large tract 
 
14 
 
 within the Braiiitree line. The title, however, was 
 confirmed to him, including all the land east of Gul- 
 liver's brook to the present Quincy line, and was 
 sold in 1656 by his son Capt. Edward Hutchinson, 
 to Anthony Gulliver, Stephen Kinsley and Henry 
 Crane. 
 
 Mr. Hutchinson's career in Massachusetts was 
 very soon terminated through the proceedings insti- 
 tuted by the Colony and Clergy against his wife, 
 Ann Hutchinson, upon the charge of heresy, of 
 which she and some of her adherents were convicted, 
 by a synod held at Cambridge, and banished from 
 the Colony. They went to Narraganset, with many 
 of the best people of Massachusetts, and purchased 
 the Island of Aquitnet (now Rhode Island), and laid 
 the foundation of another Colony. Strange incon- 
 sistency in the founders of Massachusetts, who had 
 just quit their native land to avoid the persecutions 
 of the English Hierarchy, to establish here a rule 
 more despotic than they had just left in Europe. 
 Their treatment of Eoger Williams and Ann Hutch- 
 inson showed greater extravagances than any of the 
 acts of Archbishop Laud. But we must not forget 
 that these were the errors of an age, just emerging 
 through the Reformation from the Roman yoke, and 
 the spirit of intolerance which had pervaded the 
 whole Christian world for many centuries, was in 
 some degree entailed upon succeeding generations — 
 and that the energy with which our Colonists maintain- 
 ed the rigors of the Calvinistic faith was only one 
 phase of a character, which inculcated strict life, 
 industrious habits, the education of children, and all 
 
15 
 
 the virtues which have sustained their descendants 
 down to the present day. The Reformation did not 
 explode all the barbarities of the middle ages. Twen- 
 ty Avomen were hanged in Salem for witchcraft, one 
 hundred and fifty years after Martin Luther was in 
 his grave. Our good friend and neighbor, Chief 
 Justice Stoughton, charged the Juries in favor of 
 the convictions. 
 
 Edward, the son of William Hutchinson, soon 
 returned to Boston, and spent a long life, as a most 
 active and useful citizen in Massachusetts, and Avas 
 finally killed in the service of the Colony at Brook- 
 field, in Philip's war, 1676, in command of a cavalry 
 corps. His posterity made a figure for four genera- 
 tions, in almost every post, civil and military, in the 
 Colony. Governor Hutchinson, his great grand-son, 
 long connected with our town, will be named in due 
 coui'se. 
 
 In 1636, the town of Dorchester obtained a grant 
 of nearly the whole territory now comprising the 
 town of Milton, which was the first of a liberal 
 series of grants made by the Colony to that important 
 town. This movement was the signal for the com- 
 mencement of the actual occupation and settlement 
 of Milton, and the twenty-five years which passed, 
 during the connection with Dorchester, until the in- 
 dependent establishment of the toAvn, sufficed to col- 
 lect about thirty families, with which our separate ca- 
 reer began. It was usual, in occupying new territory at 
 that time, to obtain a release of the Indian title from 
 then- chiefs; and accordmgly in October, 1636, the 
 Neponset Sagamore Cutshamoquin, for twenty-eight 
 
16 
 
 fathoms of wampum conveys, for the use of the 
 Dorchester phxntation, all the land south of Ne- 
 pouset to the Blue Hills, to Richard CoUicot (town 
 corporations not then created), reserving certain 
 lands which he had heretofore given to CoUicot for 
 himself. Mr. Collicot's name appears among the 
 early inhabitants of Dorchester, and he is mentioned 
 as a licensed fur dealer, which occupation seems to 
 have brought him early into intimate relations with 
 the native Indians. He obtained a lot of 120 acres 
 at Unquety (doubtless the Pratt farm), and built 
 there a house, perhaps the first dwelling in the town. 
 He seems to have been a most active and useful man 
 — Selectman and De^^uty for the town of Dorchester, 
 officer of the Artillery Company, member of the 
 Synod at Cambridge ; at one time trading with the 
 settlements in Mame, now aiding Governor Endicott 
 in the Narraganset war, then assisting the apostle 
 Elliot in collecting the Indians for religious service 
 at the falls — an energetic, ubiquitous man, whose 
 permanent residence it is difficult to fix, but his 
 connection with our settlement is traced during fifty 
 years. He was trustee of oui* meeting-house fund 
 in 1664. He died at Boston, 1686. 
 
 John Holman procured a grant of 110 acres ad- 
 joining Collicot (the Howe farm), and settled there 
 very early, and the property remained in his family 
 nearly a century. The Stoughton and Hutchinson 
 lots occupied all the north-east front of the to^vn, 
 excepting the space between Gulliver's brook and a 
 line crossing the road near the Swift house, which 
 space was divided into three lots, fronting on the 
 
17 
 
 marshes: — the first or north lot, of one hundred and 
 twenty acres, occupied by WilUani Daniels, who 
 built his house near the Foye mansion ;* the second, 
 of sixty acres, laid out by Nehemiah Bourne, a Lon- 
 don ship-carpenter, living at Boston, who never oc- 
 cupied it, but returned to England with Stoughton, 
 and became a Major in his regiment ; the third lot, 
 of fourteen acres, fronting on Gulliver's creek, laid 
 out for Bray Wilkins, a Dorchester man, who was 
 licensed in 1638 to keep a ferry across Neponset, to 
 facilitate the intercourse between Boston and Mount 
 Wollaston before the roads were made. 
 
 The Massachusetts Colony was at this time much 
 favored by CromAvell, for their early sympathy and 
 co-operation in the revolution — while all the other 
 Colonies, adhering to the Stewarts, were punished 
 with restrictions and embarrassments. An exemp- 
 tion from duties, and free trade with all the world, 
 was permitted to Massachusetts, and this stimulated 
 the business of ship-building. Several persons of 
 this calling took up their residence here, in the east 
 part of the town, such as William Salisbury, Anthony 
 Newton, Walter Morey and others. It is probable 
 they were occupied in building small vessels of 30 
 or 49 tons, called shallops, much used about the bay, 
 in fishing and coasting trade, and they undoubtedly 
 used the head of the tide on Gulliver's creek, where 
 
 * On September 24th, 1653, at a meeting of the Commissioners of the 
 United Colonies, holden at Boston, recorded — "Having learned that the 
 Avife of William Daniels hath, for three years past, bestowed much of her 
 time in teaching several Indians to read, think tit to allow her £12 for the 
 time past ; and to encourage her to continue the same course, that more of the 
 Indians may be taught by her, think tit to allow her £3 more beforehand, 
 towards another year." 
 3 
 
18 
 
 the town still owns the landing, as such craft could 
 easily be floated out at spring tides, and that location 
 was more convenient to get the timber than the 
 banks of the river. The residence of these persons 
 was mainly in that vicinity. 
 
 At this period the principal occupants of the 
 place were located in the eastern section of the town, 
 and the latter part of the time they were exempted 
 from contributing to the support of the Dorchester 
 church, by reason of having provided themselves 
 with religious instruction, in conjunction with some 
 persons from Braintree ; no record exists of their 
 place of worship, or who taught them. It is proba- 
 ble that Stephen Kinsley — who was ordained with 
 much formality as a ruling elder at Braintree, in 1653, 
 and had moved on to the Hutchinson purchase — 
 first officiated in that place, which was the only pub- 
 lic service held in the town, until the erection of the 
 first Meeting-house in 1671, built on the land set 
 apart and appropriated to that purpose by Robert 
 Vose, on a part of his farm (near Mr. Barnard's). 
 Mr. Kinsley had been an inhabitant and Representa- 
 tive of Braintree, several years before he moved here, 
 and he was the first Representative of Milton. The 
 petition for incorporation was drawn by him, and is 
 among the archives of the State, signed by himself, 
 Robert Vose and John Gill, as a Committee of the 
 inhabitants. The principal argument used was the 
 necessity of providing legally for public worship. 
 
 " The elders continued to be consulted in every 
 affair of importance, as long as the charter continued. 
 The share they had in temporal affairs added to the 
 
19 
 
 weight they had acquired from their spiritual em- 
 ployments, and they were in high esteem."* 
 
 There were a few scattered farms in other parts of 
 the town. Samuel Wadsworth, a young man, son 
 of a Plymouth pilgrim, moved here from Duxbuiy, 
 and selected a large lot running from the centre of 
 the town, to the south-east line, a mile or more 
 from any other inhabitant, and this lot is still, in 
 part, occupied by his descendants. John Fenno, of 
 Dorchester, occupied a lot- near the burying-ground. 
 Robert Badcock occupied a large lot between the 
 river and the brook, next to Mr. Vose. All the west 
 portion of the town was run out into lots, about 1650, 
 and divided among the inhabitants of Dorchester, 
 magistrates and ministers receiving large lots, and 
 persons of less note, small strips, a mile long and 
 hardly wide enough to build a corn-barn upon. Of 
 these, the Brush Hill lots were first occupied, but 
 there is no sufficient evidence of the presence of in- 
 habitants there before the incorporation. 
 
 The main landing place on the river was origi- 
 nally designed by Mr. Stoughton to have been fixed 
 where Mr. Briggs's ship yard was located, but was 
 changed to its present site, near the falls, on petition 
 of John Gill, in 1658. Four hundred acres of land 
 in the centre of the to-vvn was laid out for the bene- 
 fit of the Dorchester church, in 1659 — afterwards 
 divided with the Milton church. 
 
 The Neponset tribe of Indians were removed from 
 thek proximity to our settlement in 1656, and placed 
 on a large tract of land at Punkapog, granted to 
 
 * Hutchinson, Vol. UL, p. 181. 
 
20 
 
 tliem by the town of Dorchester, at the urgent soUci- 
 tation of Mr. Ehot, who regarded the movement as 
 essential to theh welfare. 
 
 I will now advert to another subject which seems 
 to belong to this period, and which by some may be 
 considered too uncertain to merit a place in our his- 
 tory. A certain locality within our present borders 
 has long been known, without any data as to the 
 origin of the name, as Scotch Woods. The expla- 
 nation I am about to offer is unsupported by any 
 record, and is entirely conjectural with myself. In 
 1643, John Winthrop, Jr. came from England, and 
 brought £1000 worth of stock and divers w^orkmen 
 to begin an iron work. He had formed in England 
 a company for this purpose. The General Court of 
 Massachusetts encouraged the enterprise, by granting 
 a monopoly for twenty-one years, freedom from taxes 
 and trainings of the laborers, and a very liberal grant 
 of the Colonial lands to be made when the works 
 were completed. The town of Boston was greatly 
 interested in the undertaking, and the location of 
 the works at Braintree was encouraged by a grant 
 of three thousand acres of land, still belonging to 
 Boston, at that place. This tract is the same land 
 which was purchased seventy years afterwards, in 
 1711, by Manasseh Tucker, Samuel Miller and John 
 Wads worth of Milton, and divided by the Court be- 
 tween Braintree and Milton at that time. The fifteen 
 hundred acres attached to our jurisdiction forms the 
 present Scotch Woods settlement. In 1651, two of 
 the largest stock-holders of this Iron Company, re- 
 siding in London, viz., John Beex and Robert Hich, 
 
21 
 
 chartered a large ship, bound to Jamaica, to touch 
 at Boston and land there 272 Scotch prisoners, taken 
 from a lot of 8000 prisoners captured by Cromwell, 
 September 3, 1650, at the battle 6f Dunbar. The 
 ship arrived at Boston in May, 1651, and landed the 
 prisoners, consigned to the agent of the Iron Works, 
 and their names arc all recorded in the Boston 
 records. 
 
 In July, of the same year, the Rev. John Cotton 
 wrote a letter to Cromwell, as follows : — " The Scots 
 w^hom God delivered into your hands at Dunbar, and 
 whereof sundry were sent hither, we have been de- 
 sirous to make their yoke easy. Such as were sick 
 of the scurvy or other diseases have not wanted 
 physic and chirurgy. They have not been sold for 
 slaves to perpetual servitude, but for six or eight 
 years, as we do our own, and he that bought the 
 most of them, I believe, buildeth houses for them, 
 for every four an house, layeth some acres of land 
 thereto, which he givetli them as their own, requir- 
 ing three days in the week to work for him (by turns), 
 and four days for themselves, and promiseth as soon 
 as they can repay him the money he laid out for 
 them, he will set them at liberty." 
 
 I infer from these circumstances, that Beex and 
 Rich, for themselves or the Company, thinking to 
 get some income from their land, which without 
 laborers was unproductive and inconvertible, em- 
 barked in this speculation, and the mode of dispos- 
 ing of the prisoners mentioned by Cotton, was only 
 a form necessary to satisfy the public mind in the 
 matter, and the men were employed on this land be- 
 
22 
 
 longing to the freighters of the ship in the way 
 described in this letter; and thus originated the 
 name, Scotch Woods, ever since attached to the 
 spot. This supposition is confirmed by an act of the 
 General Court, A. D. 1652, ordering that all Scotch- 
 men and Negroes shall train — -referring, doubtless, 
 to their fii'st law exempting the laborers of the Iron 
 Company from this duty. These persons may have 
 been employed in cutting wood, or collecting bog 
 ore for the Iron Company.* The result of this ope- 
 ration was, that after a large outlay of capital, it 
 was found that every pound of iron made, cost more 
 than two pounds imported from Europe ; the Compa- 
 ny failed, the Sheriff seized their effects, and their 
 laborers were dispersed and mixed up with the 
 general population of the country. The land was 
 probably a conditional grant, and reverted to the 
 town of Boston, from which corporation our towns- 
 men bought it. 
 
 The records of the town for nearly eight years 
 from the begmning are missing, excepting that of a 
 few births. Two years after the organization, Rob- 
 ert Vose made a deed of eight acres of land, for a 
 Meeting-house and other ministerial purposes, to 
 eighteen trustees, probably every church member or 
 freeman in the town.f No church organization was 
 formed here till 1678, but the principal inhabitants 
 were members of the Dorchester and Braintree 
 
 * Governor Bradstreet -writes, twenty years later, that some of tlie Dun- 
 bar prisoners were still in bondage. 
 
 t Robert Vose, John Gill, Richard Collicot, Anthony Gulliver, William 
 Daniels, Robert Redman, Anthony Newton, William Salisbury, Stephen 
 Kinsley, Samuel Wadsworth, James Houg-liton, Johii Femio, Henry Crane, 
 David Homes, Robert Tucker, Robert liadcock, Thomas Vose, Thomas Swift. 
 
23 
 
 churches. Of these eighteen persons, eight have 
 descendants still among us, and these families have 
 inhabited the town during its whole existence, viz. : 
 Robert Vose, Samuel Wadsworth, Anthony Gulliver, 
 Robert Badcock, Thomas Swift, George Sumner, 
 Robert Tucker and Hem-y Crane. The first tax list 
 on record, of fifty-nine persons, is dated 1674, and 
 the name of only one of our present families, Teague 
 Crehore, is added to the above list of trustees in the 
 interval from 1664 to 1674. Many of the lots in the 
 western part of the town were soon occupied, espe- 
 cially at Brush Hill. 
 
 George Sumner, whose father, William Sumner, 
 of Dorchester, had drawn one of the large lots in 
 that locality, occupied the same in 1662, and it still 
 remains among his descendants in part. 
 
 Robert Tucker, who had resided more than twen- 
 ty years at Weymouth, came and purchased several 
 adjoining lots. He brought a family of four sons 
 and three daughters ; his oldest son 22 years of age. 
 
 Thomas Swift, son of T. Swift, of Dorchester, 
 married the only daughter of Mr. Vose, and is sup- 
 posed to have occupied a part of the Glover farm, 
 conveyed to him by his father-in-law. 
 
 Ten years passed from the date of the incorpora- 
 tion before a new Meeting-house was built, the small 
 accommodation for worship in the eastern part of the 
 town being made to suffice. Mr. Joseph Emerson 
 officiated as the fii'st minister for several years, under 
 adverse circumstances part of the time. Great diffi- 
 culty existed in the currency. The whole town, and 
 a part of the adjoining town of Braintree, with all 
 
24 
 
 their zeal for religious instruction, could not raise 
 £53, or $17o, per annum, the stipulated salary. Mr. 
 Emerson, who at first was passed about from one 
 parishioner to another, made shift to live without em- 
 barrassment, but venturing to marry the daughter of 
 the E,ev. Edward Bulkly, of Concord, and establish 
 a house of his own, "the country pay," as it was 
 called, in which he received most of his dues, com- 
 pelled him to open a running account with every man 
 in the parish. Misunderstandings ensued, rendering 
 his position disagreeable, and he accepted an invita- 
 tion to settle at Mendon, and left the town in 1669. 
 
 He w^as succeeded by the Rev. Thomas Mighill, 
 of Rowley, a graduate of Harvard College 1663, 
 wdio continued here for eight years, till 1677. Dur- 
 ing his term of service, in 1672, the new Meeting- 
 house on the Vose lot, near the centre of the town, 
 was built. This was a great effort, and many entries 
 in the records relate to measures bearing on the 
 subject. The principal resource seems to have been 
 the timber and wood on the church lands, cut and 
 hauled to the town landing by the parishioners. 
 Twenty-two cords of wood w^ere cut and sold to pay 
 for clothes for the minister. Mr. Mighill was urged 
 to settle permanently, but left here and accepted a 
 settlement at Scituate. 
 
 In 1678, x\pril 2J:th, a church for Milton was con- 
 stituted in the Meeting-house at Dorchester, by the 
 assistance of the elders and delegates from the 
 churches of Boston, Weymouth, Braintree and Ded- 
 ham. Governor Leverett attended, but the rain and 
 snow prevented many of the magistrates from being 
 
25 
 
 present. ]Mr. Allen made the prayer, Mr. Flint 
 preached, a confession of faith was repeated by the 
 Dorchester Elder, unto which they all consented. 
 Twelve brethren entered into the covenant. Mr. 
 Torrey, of Weymouth, gave the right hand of fellow- 
 ship), and Mr. Mather made the concluding prayer. 
 
 At this time, Rev. Samuel Mann, who had been 
 driven from his parish at Wrentham by the Indian 
 war, was engaged to preach here, and continued 
 about two years, when his people collected again and 
 he returned to them. 
 
 Some other occurrences, simultaneous with this 
 period, which affected the whole Colony, as well as 
 our town, deserve mention. 
 
 We had grown up into a vigorous community in 
 a space of thirty-five years, not by the fostering care 
 of the mother country, but by her neglect and en- 
 grossing engagements elsewhere, although it must 
 be confessed we did receive some encouragement 
 from the partiality of Master Oliver. Now, in 1660, 
 all this is over ; the King is restored again, and 
 some active enemies of Massachusetts in England 
 enter sundry complaints against us, and make the 
 charge of various violations of the charter. The 
 King appointed four Commissioners, armed with full 
 power to come over and examine all grievances and 
 correct all abuses. We had coined money without 
 authority, encroaching on the King's privilege, we 
 had prohibited the exercise of all forms of worship 
 except our own, especially that of the English Chm-ch, 
 and would not allow the privileges of citizenship 
 except to professors of a certain creed ; and then we 
 
26 
 
 had sheltered certain regicides, who had compassed 
 the death of the King's father ; and had committed 
 various other misdemeanors. 
 
 The arrival of these Commissioners caused much 
 anxiety, and all the skill and diplomacy of our wisest 
 men were used to parry these charges. Finally, by 
 giving up the matter of church membership as a 
 qualification of voters, promising to make no more 
 Pine Tree Shillings, and making a sham effort to 
 arrest the regicides, the Commissioners went home, 
 and the Colony retained for a time longer the Char- 
 ter. This result, so earnestly hoped for, was aided, 
 greatly, by sundry ship-loads of masts, and other 
 presents to the King. The great benefit to the Col- 
 ony was the extension of the right of sufixage, which 
 till then had been confined to a small part of the 
 community ; and the consent of the Colony to tole- 
 rate in future the service of the English Church, had 
 the beneficial eff"ect of so far liberalizing the Colonial 
 Government, that no farther prosecutions against 
 other sects as heretical were enforced. The extreme 
 rigor which characterized the first years of the Colo- 
 ny were in some degree mitigated when our town 
 commenced its corporate existence. 
 
 Now commences a great struggle, which threatens 
 the very existence of the Colony — Philip's Indian 
 War. Philip, a name given by the English to the 
 second son of Massasoit, the Sachem of the Pokano- 
 ket Indians, with whom the Plymouth Pilgrims en- 
 tertained such friendly relations, was now at the 
 head of the tribe living at Mount Hope — a restless, 
 ambitious person, and possessed of much ability. 
 
27 
 
 He entertained the opinion that the English would 
 soon control the whole country and destroy the 
 native population, and conceived the idea that by 
 the united action of all the native tribes, they might 
 be resisted or driven away. He cautiously enlisted 
 the co-operation of most of the other tribes of New 
 England in his plan. The matter was communicated 
 to the authorities by one of Mr. Eliot's praying In- 
 dians of Natick. 
 
 All New England was aroused. The Indians had 
 acquired great skill in the use of fire-arms, and the 
 number of fighting men among them was supposed 
 to be superior to those of the whites. Philip appear- 
 ed with a large force near Swanzey. But the hope 
 of detaching some of the tribes from the alliance in- 
 duced the Government to send Capt. Edward Hutch- 
 inson with a company of horse to Brookfield, to ne- 
 gotiate with the Nipmug tribe. Hutchinson had a 
 farm at Marlboro', and was personally known to the 
 chiefs of this tribe, and they designated him as a 
 person they Avould treat with. By appointment, he, 
 with a part of his men, went to meet them in a wood 
 or swamp, where a large body of Indians were con- 
 cealed. Hutchinson and sixteen of his men were 
 shot, mostly dead. He was carried down to Marl- 
 boro', and died a day or two after. 
 
 This settled the character of the struggle, and a 
 war of extermination began, Avhich lasted fourteen 
 months, during which almost every man hi New 
 England capable of bearmg arms was called into 
 service. The Indians appeared m force in every di- 
 rection — in the Old Colony at Scituate, Plymouth 
 
28 
 
 and Rehoboth ; on Connecticut River at Nortliamp- 
 ton and Siiringfield ; in Middlesex at Groton and 
 Sudbury ; also in Rhode Island, Connecticut and 
 Maine. Milton being more sheltered than many 
 other toAvns, became the refuge of several families 
 from more exposed places, some of whom are still 
 here by their descendants. Edward Adams came from 
 Medfield, Roger Sumner and Ralph Houghton from 
 Lancaster, and Thomas Davenport from Casco Bay. 
 
 The Neponset Indians at Punkapog did not appear 
 to belong to the conspiracy ; but, to make matters 
 sure, the men of the tribe were all placed under the 
 command of Quarter Master Thomas Swift, and re- 
 moved fii'st to Long Island in Boston Harbor, and 
 afterwards brought up to Milton. Major Gookin, m 
 his Indian History, says that Mr. Eliot and himself 
 met every other week, in the winter of 1676, among 
 the Punkapog Indians, who were brought from Long 
 Island and placed near Brush Hill in Milton, under 
 the care of Quarter Master Swift. They came up 
 late from the Island, yet they planted some ground 
 procured for them by Major Swift, and they got 
 some little corn. Their wives and children were 
 there with them. 
 
 The great interest to Milton in this affair arose 
 from the death of Capt. Wads worth, and several 
 young men belonging to the town. Samuel Wads- 
 worth, already mentioned as an early inhabitant, soon 
 after his arrival married Miss Abigail Lindall, of 
 Duxbury, and spent most of his adult life here. He 
 was an active, intelligent person, named in the Dor- 
 chester Records before the incorporation of Milton. 
 
29 
 
 was always occupied with the affairs of the planta- 
 tion and the town, zealous in church matters and the 
 military organization, frequently chosen Selectman 
 and Representative, and also a Justice to settle small 
 causes. In the war of 1675 — 6, he was appointed 
 Captain of a company raised in this vicinity, partly 
 in Milton, to serve the Colony. John Sharpe, of 
 Brookline, was his Lieutenant. In April, 1676, he 
 was ordered to move with his company to Marlboro', 
 to relieve Capt. Brocklebank, of Rowley, supposed 
 to be in peril at that place. Wadsworth and his 
 company arrived safe and unmolested. On the 21st 
 of April, news came to him that the Indians were 
 burning the houses at Sudbuiy, the adjoining town. 
 Wadsworth started with his company of eighty men 
 to meet the foe. Seeing a few Indians, he pursued 
 them into a swamp, when suddenly, from all direc- 
 tions, emerged a cloud of savages, greatly outnum- 
 bering his force. He secured a retreat to a neighbor- 
 ing hill, which he successfully defended four hours, 
 Avith the loss of five men only. His ammunition 
 was expended. The Indians set fire to the wood, 
 when an attempt was made by the troops to force 
 their way through the savage horde, and Wadsworth, 
 Sharpe, Brocklebank and sixty-five men met their 
 death. Fifteen only escaped to tell the tale. The 
 names of his Milton companions are not preserved. 
 Capt. Wadsworth left five sons, all of whom were 
 respectable men. His youngest son, Benjamin, be- 
 came President of Harvard College, and erected a 
 monument to his father, at Sudbury, which was re- 
 newed about ten years since, by the State. 
 
80 
 
 The war ended in August, 1676, with the death of 
 Phihp, by the hand of one of his own men. The 
 Indians liad previously met defeat in every direction. 
 Some of the leaders were executed at Boston ; many 
 prisoners vs^ere sent to the West India Islands and 
 sold as slaves ; and those who escaped, fled to tribes 
 in the West. No formidable attack from the natives 
 ever disturbed the Colony agam, except as allies of 
 our French neighbors in Canada, or instigated by 
 them. 
 
 The year 1682 closed the career of tw^o of the 
 oldest inhabitants, Egbert Vose and Robert Tucker,* 
 both over eighty years. Mr. Vose is not mentioned 
 in the Dorchester Records until about the time of his 
 purchase of the Glover farm in 1654— -he was then 
 past middle life, and his three children already of 
 adult age. I have no means of knowing his an- 
 tecedents. His whole career here exhibits him as 
 a public-spirited man, who had brought up his chil- 
 dren with care, and who spared no efforts to establish 
 our community upon the surest foundation. Mr. 
 Tucker had been residing in Weymouth, and all his 
 large family were doubtless born in that place. He 
 came to Milton about the time of the incorporation, 
 and purchased several of the lots laid out and drawn 
 by the inhabitants of Dorchester at Brush Hill. He 
 w^as selected by Mr. Vose as one of the Trustees of 
 
 * Robert Tucker was at Weymouth about the time that town was incor- 
 porated, in 1635, and is believed to have accompanied a certain Association 
 which came to NeAV England about that time Avith the Rev. !Mr. Hull, from 
 the town of Weymouth, in Dorsetshire, giving that name to Wessagusset. 
 This conjecture is strengthened by the fact that several prominent families 
 of the name of Tucker are inhabitants of that County. John Tucker, a 
 resident of Weymouth, represented the borough of WejTuouth and Melcom 
 Regis hi Parliament, twenty years in sviccesaion, previous to our Revolution. 
 
31 
 
 tlie cliurcli lot, was Selectman and Representative; 
 also Recorder of the town. He was held in much 
 esteem by his neighbors. He left a large family of 
 four sons and four daughters, and his character and 
 education during a long period exercised an impor- 
 tant influence here. His hand-writing indicates a 
 gentleman familiar with the pen. 
 
 In 1680 the town was provided with a respectable 
 house of public worship, and a regularly organized 
 Church, but a permanent teacher was needed to 
 guide the religious sentiment of the people. An 
 over-ruling Providence seems to have directed their 
 choice in the selection of the Rev. Peter Thatcher, 
 whose eminent qualifications were especially fitted 
 to the wants of the place. Fifty years later, Cotton 
 Mather says of him — " The precious flock at Milton 
 obtained this gift of our ascended Saviour." ]\Ir. 
 Thatcher's character and accomplishments entitled 
 him to an extensive influence in this community, and 
 he enjoyed it for nearly half a century. He was the 
 son of Rev Thomas Thatcher, the first minister of 
 the Old South Church in Boston, who had previously 
 been settled at Weymouth, where he resided at the 
 birth of his son in 1651. He moved to Boston in 
 1664, where the subject of this notice was fitted for 
 College. He graduated at Harvard m 1671, in the 
 class with Chief Justice Sewall. He had been dis- 
 tinguished in College for scholarship, and his services 
 were secured by the Institution as a tutor for a con- 
 siderable time after he graduated. On leaving the 
 service of the College, he went to England, and there 
 pursued his theological studies. The clerical pro- 
 
32 
 
 fession had been followed by his ancestors for two 
 generations at least. His grandfather was an emi- 
 nent preacher at Old Saruni. While in Europe, he 
 made great acquisitions in various departments of 
 science, and that of medicine engaged his attention 
 so far, that, during his whole life, his opinion was 
 much sought for in that way. On his return from 
 England, and before accepting any invitation to set- 
 tle, he married (1677) Theodora Oxenbridge, the 
 daughter of the minister of the First Church in 
 Boston. He accepted a unanimous invitation from 
 the Church at Milton, where he was ordained, Sep- 
 tember, 1681. His pastorate here continued nearly 
 forty-seven years, fully appreciated by his parish, and 
 much esteemed throughout the Colony. His death, 
 wdiich occurred in November, 1727, was commemo- 
 rated by a sermon of Cotton Mather's, said to be the 
 last he ever preached, and also an ode composed by 
 his classmate, Eev. John Danforth, of Dorchester. 
 He was a philologist, studied, among others, the In- 
 dian language, and frequently went to Punkapog to 
 teach the Indians. His first wife died in 1697, at 
 the age of thirty-eight, leaving three sons and a 
 daughter, and in 1699 he married Mrs. Susan Bailey, 
 widow of Rev. John Bailey, of Boston. His young- 
 est son, Thomas, died here in 1721. Theodora, his 
 only daughter, married Jonathan Gulliver, of Milton. 
 Oxenbridge and Peter graduated at Harvard Col- 
 lege, and will be named in due course. 
 
 Several sermons of Mr. Thatcher are in print — 
 Election Sermon, 1711 ; on Mr. Mann's death, 1719 ; 
 and others. 
 
33 
 
 Among the numerous services lie rendered here, 
 was the preparation of eight young men, natives 
 of the town, for Harvard College, six of whom 
 were educated for the ministry, all became valuable 
 persons, and some of them distinguished. 
 
 In 1690, two sons of the town received their de- 
 grees at Harvard; viz., Benjamin Wads worth and 
 Joseph Belcher. 
 
 Be^^jamin Wadsworth, youngest son of Capt. 
 Samuel Wadsworth, was born at Milton in 1669, 
 graduated at Harvard in 1690, studied for the minis- 
 try, settled at the First Church in Boston in 1696, 
 and, after a pastoral service of thirty years, was 
 elected to preside over his Alma Mater at Cam- 
 bridge — a place which he filled with great accept- 
 ance twelve years, till his death, in 1737. His 
 character is portrayed in a sermon by Rev. Thomas 
 Foxcroft, and also more at length by Eev. William 
 Emerson. Dr. Chauncy speaks of him as "a man 
 of good learnmg, most pious, humble and prudent, 
 and an excellent, plain, pathetical preacher." His 
 death occurred at Cambridge. He left a widow, but 
 no children.* 
 
 Joseph Belcher, son of Joseph and Rebecca (Gill) 
 Belcher, was born at Milton in 1668. He inherited 
 a large property from his grandfather, John Gill, 
 when he was fifteen years of age, was educated for 
 the ministry, ordained and settled at Dedham in 1693, 
 
 * JoHX Wads%\'oe.th, son of Deacon John and Elizabeth Wadsworth, 
 of Milton, born in 1703, graduated at Harvard College in 1723, studied for 
 the ministry, and was ordained at Canterbui-y, Conn., Sept. 3d, 1729. He 
 married Abigail Sproat, of Middleborough, separated from his parish, and 
 returned to Milton in 1742, which was his principal residence iintil his 
 death, in 1766. He officiated in several other places professionally. 
 5 
 
34 
 
 where he officiated thirty years with much satisfaction, 
 and died in 1723. His family of two sons and three 
 daughters returned to Milton, and for a time occu- 
 pied their paternal estate at Milton Hill (the Hutch- 
 inson property). The eldest son, Joseph, graduated 
 at College in 1717, lived here in 1734, and was 
 Selectman of the town. Their property at Milton 
 Hill was sold about 1740, to Thomas Hutchmson, 
 and the residue of the Stoughton purchase, being 
 the village property, was sold to Jeremiah Smith in 
 1741. The family left the town at that time. 
 
 Cotton Mather preached Mr. Belcher's funeral 
 sermon. He calls him " a tree of righteousness, who 
 had all the fruits of the Holy Spuit growing upon 
 him. Among the articles of his i^iety was conspi- 
 cuous, well-governed speech and the management of 
 the tongue, with which he prevented what the ancients 
 considered as making half the sins of our lives ; a 
 gentlemanly temper and carriage, with a sweetness 
 of disposition which was a varnish upon these vir- 
 tues and added more lustre unto them." As a 
 preacher, he was greatly admired and followed. 
 
 OxENBRiDGE Thatcher, the oldcst son of Rev. 
 Peter Thatcher, was born at Milton, in 1681, educa- 
 ted for College by his father, entered at Harvard 
 before the age of fourteen, and graduated in 1698. 
 He is said to have studied for the ministry, and after 
 preaching a few times changed his calling and en- 
 gaged in trade at Boston, where he lived some twen- 
 ty-five years, and was occasionally Representative of 
 that town. After his father's death he returned to 
 Milton, and occupied his place on Thatcher's plain 
 
35 
 
 some forty years. He represented Milton occasionally, 
 and died here in 1772, at the advanced age of nine- 
 ty-one years. He is better known as the father of 
 an eminent son, Oxenbridge Thatcher, the distin- 
 guished lawyer and patriot, who died at Boston in 
 1767, at the early age of forty-five years. 
 
 John Swift was the oldest son of Deacon Thomas 
 Swift. He was born here in 1679, graduated at 
 Harvard in 1697, and was settled as minister at 
 Framingham, where he died, after a long service, 
 in 1745. 
 
 Mr. Peter Thatcher, the second son of our min- 
 ister, was born in 1688, graduated at Harvard College 
 in 1706, and after studying the clerical profession 
 was ordained and settled at Middleborough in 1709, 
 and continued there thirty-five years, until his death, 
 in 1744. Eev. Thomas Prince, of the Old South 
 Church, published his life, as an example of zeal 
 and success as a revival preacher. 
 
 Dr. Ebenezer Miller was the second son of 
 Samuel Miller. He was born at Milton Hill in 1703, 
 was prepared for College by Mr. Thatcher, and 
 graduated at Harvard in 1722. He commenced the 
 study of Divinity at once, and soon manifested a bias 
 for the Episcopal form of worship. A few gentle- 
 men at Braintree, with similar tendencies, proposed 
 to establish a Church there, having assiu'ances of 
 aid from England for the furtherance of this project. 
 For this purpose, Mr. Miller was encouraged to 
 proceed to England and procure Episcopal ordina- 
 tion (no Episcopal organization existing here). He 
 was ordained by the Bishop of London as Deacon 
 
36 
 
 and Priest, received the degrees of Master of Arts 
 from the University of Oxford in 1727 and Doctor of 
 Theology in 1747, and was appointed Missionary to 
 Braintree, by the Society for the Pro^^agation of the 
 Gospel in Foreign Parts. He returned, and forth- 
 with entered upon his duties, and continued there 
 until his death, thirty-six years afterwards. Many 
 persons of that persuasion in the neighboring towns 
 attended his ministrations. I believe he was the 
 first native of the Puritan Colony, authorized to 
 preach under the Episcopal form. 
 
 The Miller family are supposed to have emigrated 
 early from Dorchester to Kehoboth, and during the 
 Indian War, in 1676, to have left the latter place. 
 
 Mr. Samuel Miller first appeard in Milton about 
 1688, possibly led hither by the attractions of Miss 
 Eebecca Belcher, with a nice jointui'e of sixty acres 
 of land on Milton Hill, all of which became his on 
 his marriage in 1690. He built his house on the lot 
 at that time (the house stood where Mr. Dudley's 
 residence now is, and was taken clown some fifty 
 years ago), and there his numerous family were 
 born. He was afterwards, in 1711, one of the 
 Scotch Woods purchasers, and his eldest son. Col. 
 Samuel Miller, built his house there at an early day, 
 and the property continued m the family until the 
 Revolution, when, in 1776, Stephen Miller, of the 
 third generation, a much respected inhabitant of our 
 town, joined the Poyalist party and emigrated to the 
 Province of New Brunswick, where he lived more 
 than forty years, and died in 1817, aged ninety-one. 
 He left numerous descendants, who are still among 
 
37 
 
 the most respectable inhabitants of that Province. 
 His house was the one now owned by Dr. Pahncr. 
 
 AUusion has already been made to the acquisition 
 of the Blue Hill lands in 1711, by the purchase, from 
 the town of Boston, of 3000 acres formerly granted 
 to the Iron Company, and which reverted to that 
 town from breach of condition. The grantees were 
 Manasseh Tucker, Samuel Miller and John Wads- 
 worth, all of jMilton. The Court refused to annex 
 the whole purchase to Milton, but decreed that it 
 should be divided as to jurisdiction between the 
 towns of Braintree and Milton, 1500 acres to each. 
 
 In addition to the foregoing, a large tract of land 
 (doubtless a part of the new grant made to Dorches- 
 ter in 1637), containing, perhaps, 1000 acres, bound- 
 ed on the south-east by the Blue Hill river, and north- 
 west by the old Milton line, was passed into our 
 limits by consent of the town of Dorchester. This 
 latter piece contains Houghton s pond, and all the 
 lands within our borders above the stone monument 
 near the late Thomas Hunt's house. 
 
 By these acquisitions, in 1712 — 13, the area of 
 the town was extended about 2500 acres, nearly one 
 thhd of its present surface. The Blue Hill purchas- 
 ers sold a portion of their lands before a division 
 took place, reserving, however, a large part of the 
 best of it for their own posterity. Deacon Manasseh, 
 the youngest son of Robert Tucker, was about fifty- 
 seven years of age at the time of the purchase, and 
 continued to reside at the old homestead at Brush 
 Hill till his death, in 1743, aged eighty-nine years. 
 But his eldest son, Capt. Samuel, then about twenty- 
 
38 
 
 six years old, laid out a farm and moved very soon 
 to the new pm'chase. The same was done by young 
 Samuel Miller, as already related, and one of Deacon 
 Wads worth's sons occupied the lot next adjoining 
 the old Wadsworth property. The remainder was 
 soon sold to other persons, and has ever since 
 formed an important section of the town.* 
 
 During the latter part of Mr. Thatcher's life, an 
 unimportant subject caused much strife in the town, 
 if we may judge from the records. It was agreed 
 by all that a new meeting-house of larger propor- 
 tions must be constructed, and the point at issue 
 was the locality of the new structure. Many town- 
 meetings were holden, and decided votes were passed 
 on this subject for seven years, but all proceedings 
 w^ere delayed or frustrated by protests of the minori- 
 ty. The inhabitants of the east section were a 
 majority, but occasionally a vote for removing far- 
 ther west from the locality, on the Vose farm, would 
 prevail ; and the year after Mr. Thatcher's death, by 
 aid of the General Court, it was built on the road 
 in front of the present church, three eighths of a 
 mile west of the old spot — a building 50 by 40, 28 
 feet high, with a belfry. 
 
 Mr. Thatcher, who died in November, 1627, aged 
 77 years, besides witnessing the success of his 
 efforts in advancing many of the sons of the town 
 in the paths of distinction and success, also attended 
 the departure of all the fomiders of the town, most 
 of them at a very ripe age — Anthony Gulliver, 87; 
 
 * In 1702, Governor Stoughton bequeathed, by will, to the town of 
 iNlilton, the " poor man's lot," of forty acres, where our poor house is 
 situated. 
 
S9 
 
 Henry Crane, 85 ; Thomas Swift, 82 ; Eobert Vose, 
 82 ; Eobert Tucker, 80 ; George Sumner, 80. All 
 these famihes have ever smce been remarkable for 
 longevity. The simple lives of the fathers, from 
 Avhom their posterity inherited strong bodies, have 
 been models of industry to many generations of their 
 descendants, scattered over the continent. 
 
 We have now, 1730, reached a new era in our 
 history — the ordination of another minister, the build- 
 ing of a new meeting-house, and a considerable 
 accession to our taxable property by the settlement 
 among us of sundry persons of wealth and importance 
 from the neighboring town of Boston. 
 
 The Rev. John Taylor, after preaching several 
 months, was invited to settle here, and was ordained 
 on the 13th of November, 1728. Mr. Foxcroft, of 
 the Old South Church, Boston, preached the ordina- 
 tion sermon, which is in print. 
 
 Mr. Taylor was born in Boston, in 1704, and was 
 the son of Mr. John Taylor, who came to Boston 
 from Wales in the latter part of the seventeenth 
 century. Mr. Taylor, the elder, married Ann Wins- 
 low, the daughter of Edward Wmslow, of the Filgrim 
 family. (She survived her son, and died in Milton 
 in 1773, at the advanced age of 95 years.) Shortly 
 after the bhth of the Eev. Mr. Taylor, his parents 
 moved to the Island of Jamaica, where they had four 
 more children ; viz., Col. William Taylor, w^hose 
 descendants are still with us, and three daughters. 
 Mr. Taylor, the father, died in Jamaica, and his 
 widow, with her young family, returned to her native 
 
40 
 
 country. She educated her son John at Harvard 
 College, where he graduated in 1721, in the class 
 with Dr. Charles Chauncy, with whom he kept up 
 an intimate friendship until his death. Two years 
 after his settlement here, he married Elizabeth, the 
 daughter of Rev. Xathaniel Eogers, of Portsmouth, 
 N. H. They had three sons and one daughter. 
 Mrs. Taylor died in 1735, at the early age of twenty- 
 seven years, and some years afterwards Mr. Taylor 
 married the sister of his first wife, Miss Dorothy 
 Eogers, who survived her husband. Mr. T. left three 
 sons and one daughter, Mrs. Ann Oilman, of Exeter. 
 Mr. Taylor died here in 1750, at the age of -16 
 years. Dr. Chauncy writes the following sketch of 
 him, to Dr. Stiles: — "Mr. John Taylor, of Milton, 
 and I, were playmates when little boys, went to 
 school together, were classmates at College, and all 
 along until his death in close friendship with each 
 other. He w^as an agreeable, pleasant companion, 
 and a friend that might be depended upon. His 
 diffidence of himself and modesty of temper, re- 
 strained him from preaching much from home, and 
 produced in him a settled determination that nothmg 
 of his should appear in the world. Upon his dying 
 bed, he left his papers with me, wdth this positive 
 charge, that I would take the first opportunity after 
 he was dead to commit them to the flames, which I 
 accordingly did. He was rather an agreeable than 
 a great man, rather pretty and delicate in his senti- 
 ments and expressions, than strong and nervous. 
 His head was clear, though not the strongest. Eew 
 were more universally beloved while they lived, and 
 
41 
 
 lamented when dead among those of then- acquaint- 
 ance."* The bh'ths of his children, as recorded in 
 the Milton records, are — John, born in 1731 ; Na- 
 thaniel, born in 1734 ; William, born in 1735 ; and 
 Ann, his only daughter, born in 1732, married 
 Nicholas Gilman, of Exeter, State Treasurer of New 
 Hampshire, parents of Gov. John Taylor Gilman, 
 Nicholas Gilman of the U. S. Senate from 1805 to 
 1814, and Nathaniel Gilman of the Senate of New 
 Hampshke. He built the house adjoining the meet- 
 ing-house lot — now occupied by his relatives — soon 
 after his settlement, the town voting to furnish the 
 timber from the chiu'ch lands. 
 
 The new inhabitants referred to at this time, were 
 the Governor of the Province, Jonathan Belcher ; 
 the Provincial Treasurer, Mr. Foye ; Col. Joseph 
 Gooch, James Smith, Thomas Hutchinson, and 
 others. I presume this movement was caused in a 
 great degree by the uncertain condition of the Mas- 
 sachusetts currency, Avhicli rendered real estate invest- 
 ments desirable for capitalists. The Indian wars, 
 and more particularly the wars with our French 
 neighbors, who possessed the present British Pro- 
 vinces of Nova Scotia and Canada, wars precipitated 
 upon the New England Colonies by the complications 
 of European politics, rather than any direct cause of 
 quarrel between the contending parties, had involved 
 the Province in great indebtedness, which was fol- 
 lowed by the usual expedients of paper promises. 
 The precious metals had entirely vanished, and the 
 
 * Rev. Mr. T. Thatcher speaks of him as " remarkable for his high rank 
 in the republic of letters, for his uniform Yirtues, and elegant social manners." 
 
42 
 
 whole currency consisted of Provincial Bills, for 
 which no redemption was provided. Within ten 
 years, ending with 1728, their value had fallen one 
 half, and a jDrospect of further depreciation was in 
 full view. None of these parties continue among 
 us by their posterity, at the present day, but their 
 improvements are still visible, and there presence 
 here added value to property, gave additional im- 
 portance to our community, and they require a slight 
 notice on this occasion. 
 
 Jonathan Belcher, the son of Andrew Belcher, 
 a rich merchant of Boston, was born there in 
 1681. He was educated with care, and graduated 
 at Harvard College in 1699. An exemplary youth, 
 and the chief hope of his father, after leaving Col- 
 lege he travelled abroad, and spent six years in 
 visiting various parts of Europe, and during this 
 time made the acquaintance of a young Hanoverian 
 Prince, who afterwards became King of England as 
 George XL ; a circumstance which influenced Bel- 
 cher's subsequent fortunes.* He came home, and 
 busied himself in his father's mercantile operations. 
 In 1706 he married the daughter of William Part- 
 ridge, Lieut. Governor of the Provinces of Massa- 
 chusetts and New Hampshire, who then resided at 
 Piscataqua, now Portsmouth. The newspapers con- 
 tained a long description of the wedding. His father 
 died in 1717, having been many years member of the 
 Council, and Jonathan is immediately chosen to 
 fill his place, inherits his fortune, and invests largely 
 
 * At this time he formed an intimacy with Dr. Isaac Watts, the poet, 
 with whom ho kept up a continued correspondence till the death of the 
 latter in 1748. 
 
43 
 
 in lands in Western Massachusetts and Connecticut. 
 About the year 1727, he purchased a considerable 
 landed property here of Thomas Holman and Samuel 
 Kinsley (the present Rowe estate}. Soon after this 
 he was sent to England, as agent of the Province, to 
 adjust several important matters. In his absence 
 occurred the death of Gov. Burnet, at Boston, and 
 Belcher being in London, obtained the appointment 
 of Governor of Massachusetts, and arrived at Boston 
 with his Commission in 1730.* His administration 
 continued eleven years, and needs no comment, as it 
 is a part of the Provincial history. He soon began 
 his improvements here, built his house, and laid out 
 his grounds, much under the supervision of Col. 
 Samuel Swift, second son of Deacon Thomas Swift. 
 His style of living differed very much from the 
 ordinary mode of life here. His official position 
 and fortune justified the maintenance of a large 
 retinue of servants and equipages, and entertainmg 
 much company from abroad.^ His public duties pre- 
 vented him from spending much time here, and the 
 management of his property devolved mainly upon 
 his son Andrew. 
 
 * Gov. Belcher seems to have had no dislike to a little parade, although 
 he is usually described as a very humble christian gentleman. He came 
 from England in the Blandford Frigate, his expected arrival having previous- 
 ly been announced, and great preparations made at Boston for his reception. 
 !Dr. Isaac Watts, the poet, an intimate friend of Belcher, wrote an ode of 
 some ten verses on the occasion, which was printed in the News-letter. I 
 recollect two lines of them which I saw in a ncAvspaper many years ago. 
 
 t In May, 1710, Governor Belcher's servant ran away, and was thus ad- 
 vertised : — 
 
 " The Governour's Negro Juba having absented himself, it is desii-ed who- 
 ever may find him would convey him home. — He had on when he went 
 away, a Gold laced Hat, a Cinnamon coloured Coat, with large flat brass 
 Buttons, and cuffed with red Cloth, a dark coloured Waste-coat edged with 
 a worsted Lace, leather Breeches, yarn Stockings, a pair of trimmed Pumps, 
 with a very large pair of flowered Brass Buckles." 
 
44 
 
 Governor Belcher was removed from his office in 
 1741, principally by the influence of a powerful 
 party, known as the Land Bank projectors, whose 
 schemes he opposed. He was afterwards appointed 
 Governor of New Jersey, where he died, in 1756, 
 after a service of ten or twelve years. He was the 
 founder and promoter of Princeton University in that 
 State, and President Burr preached his funeral ser- 
 mon, wherein his virtues are highly exalted, and his 
 valuable services in relation to the institution fully 
 stated. His son Andrew continued in occupation of 
 the family property in Milton many years, and often 
 represented the town in the Legislature ; he died here 
 in 1771.f In 1776 the Belcher house was burnt. It 
 was then occupied by the two Mrs. Belchers — the 
 Governor's widow, an elderly lady, and Andrew's wid- 
 ow, much younger — ^both without children. They took 
 refuge during the winter with their friend, Mrs. Forbes, 
 then living at Brush Hill. Madam B. died soon 
 after, and the younger lady returned to England. 
 The estate then passed into the hands of John 
 Howe, Esq., a large capitalist of Boston. 
 
 Mr. William Foye bought his property here of 
 the Daniels family, in 1728, and built the mansion 
 now owned and occupied by Mr. Littlefield. He 
 was a native of Boston, son of a Huguenot French- 
 man, was about 50 years of age when he came here, 
 and had before employed himself in commerce. 
 About this time he was elected Treasurer of the 
 
 * His second son, Jonathan, graduated at Harvard College in 1728, 
 Avent to England and studied law at the Temple, resided some years in 
 England, and afterwards served as Governor and Chief Justice of Nova 
 Scotia, where he died in 1776. 
 
45 
 
 Province, and filled that station during part of Gov. 
 Belcher's term. He died here about 1759, at an 
 advanced age, leaving a widow and daughter, both 
 of whom lived to a great age ; also a son William, 
 noticed among the College graduates. The daughter, 
 Miss Elizabeth Foye, died here in 1807, in her 90th 
 year. Dr. Samuel Gardiner, who practised physic 
 here before the Revolution, married Mr. Foye's 
 grand-daughter. Miss Mary Cooper. 
 
 Col. Joseph Gooch came to Milton, from Braintree, 
 about the year 1740. He bought land of the Miller 
 family, built the Churchill house on Milton Hill, and 
 lived here some thirty years. The best account of 
 him I have seen is in the diary of President John 
 Adams (no friend of Gooch, certainly), being part 
 of a letter written to Jonathan Mason. "Joseph 
 Gooch," he WTites, " a native, I believe, of Boston, 
 had a considerable property, and w^as reputed to be 
 very rich. He had been educated at the Temple, 
 in England, and returned to Boston to practise law, 
 but had very little success. He had been a man of 
 pleasure, and bore the indelible marks of it on his 
 face to the grave. He was extremely ambitious, 
 and the Be v. Mr. Niles, of Braintree, who w-as w^ell 
 acquainted with him, told me he was the most pas- 
 sionate man he ever knew. Not succeedins: much 
 at the bar in Boston, he had recourse to religion, to 
 assist him ; he joined the Old South Chiu'ch, to avail 
 himself of the influence of the sisterhood and set 
 up for Bepresentative of the town of Boston, but 
 failed; and disappomted of his hopes in law and poli- 
 tics, he renounced the city, came up to Braintree, hired 
 
46 
 
 a house, turned cliurchman, and set himself to mtrigu- 
 ing for promotion, both in military and civil depart- 
 ments. He interceded with the favorites of Gov. 
 Shirley, in this place, to procure him the commission 
 of Colonel in the Regiment of Militia, and an elec- 
 tion for Representative of the town in the General 
 Court, He promised to build a steeple to their 
 church at his own expense. Assiduous importunity 
 Avas employed with the Governor to procure him the 
 command of the Regiment, but this could not be 
 obtained without cashiering the Colonel then in pos- 
 session. Col. John Quincy had been in public life 
 from his early youth, had been nearly twenty years 
 Speaker of the House, and many years member of 
 the Council, and was avS much esteemed and respect- 
 ed as any man in the Province. He was not only an 
 experienced and venerated Statesman, but a man of 
 letters, taste, and sense. Gov. Shuiey was prevailed 
 on, with great difficulty, to perform the operation of 
 dismissing so faithful a servant of the public, and 
 adopting one of so equivocal a character, and he 
 said, some years afterwards, that nothing he had 
 ever done in his administration had given him so 
 much pain as removing so venerable a magistrate 
 and officer as Col. Quincy. But the Church party 
 had insisted upon it so peremptorily, that he could not 
 avoid it — probably he dreaded their remonstrances 
 to the Archbishop of Canterbury. These facts 
 w^ere current at the time Gooch was appointed Colo- 
 nel, and Quincy dismissed. 
 
 " The next thing to be done was to remodel the 
 subordinate officers in the Regiment. Application 
 
47 
 
 was made to all the officers in that part of the Eegi- 
 ment, Avhich lies within the three parishes of the 
 ancient town of Braintree, to see if they would ac- 
 cept commissions under Col. G., and agree to vote 
 for him as Representative of the town. The then 
 present officers were men among the most respecta- 
 ble inhabitants in point of property, iinderstanding, 
 and character. They rejected the proposition with 
 scorn. An entire new set were appointed. It was 
 at this time that the corrupt practice of treating at 
 elections was introduced. Gooch, under the influ- 
 ence of all this machinery, obtained an election as 
 Kepresentative, but the next year he was turned out, 
 which so enraged him, that he left Braintree, re- 
 nounced the church, refused to build the steeple, 
 built him a house on Milton Hill, and there passed 
 the remainder of his days." 
 
 Thomas Hutchinson, the last Provincial Governor 
 of Massachusetts, was long an inhabitant of Milton, 
 and until the political storm which preceded the Re- 
 volution began, was held in great esteem by all his 
 neighbors and friends here. He was the son of Col. 
 Thomas Hutchinson, a rich merchant of Boston, of 
 great liberality and public spirit, and many years of 
 the Council. Thomas, 2d, was born in 1711, was 
 carefully educated, and graduated at Harvard in 1727. 
 At first he employed himself in mercantile business, 
 but soon wearied of this pursuit, and betook himself 
 to the study of law and politics. He was first chosen 
 a member of the House of Representatives in the 
 year 1737, and Selectman of Boston in 1738. 
 About this time, 1739, his father died, leaving him 
 
48 
 
 an ample property. He had married Miss Margaret 
 Sandford, of Newport, the year before. In 1740 
 he was employed to go to England upon public 
 business relating to our currency. He continued to 
 represent the town of Boston in the House nine 
 years, during three of which he filled the Speaker s 
 chair. He was distinguished for eloquence and in- 
 dustry in the House, and soon acquired extensive 
 influence. He was chosen into the Council in 1750, 
 and became Judge of Probate for Suffolk County. 
 In 1760 he was appointed Chief Justice of the Colo- 
 ny and Lieutenant Governor. Gov. Bernard left the 
 Colony in 1769, and the duties of Governor then de- 
 volved upon Mr. H. He received the commission 
 of Governor the following year, and held this office 
 until 1774, when he embarked for England, leaving 
 his native land forever. 
 
 He purchased, in 1743, of Joseph Belcher's heirs, 
 100 acres of land on Milton Hill, and built the house 
 now occupied by the Eussell family, and resided 
 there a large part of the time for thirty years. He 
 was very fond of rural pursuits, especially gardening, 
 and, being active in his habits, was often seen help- 
 ing his gardener in removmg plants and grafting 
 trees, and his social habits led him into friendly re- 
 lations Avith most of the inhabitants. After the 
 mob invaded his house in Boston, in 1765, he spent 
 most of his time here. 
 
 The greatest service Gov. Hutchinson rendered to 
 the public, was in writing the History of Massachu- 
 setts, which is the most reliable source of information 
 on that subject existing, and will perpetuate his 
 
49 
 
 name long after his political errors have been forgot- 
 ten. He had many active enemies among the lead- 
 ers of the Revolution, who were never weary of 
 representing his errors, and not seldom in amplifying 
 them. He certainly staked everything on the losing 
 side, was exiled from his native land, and his large 
 property Avas confiscated. He died at Brompton, 
 near London, before the war ended, aged 69 years, 
 and his numerous posterity are still living in England. 
 His life was exemplary, and his private character 
 unimpeachable. 
 
 Among his personal efi"ects, confiscated and taken 
 from his house on Milton Hill, which were conveyed 
 to Col. Taylor's barn and sold publicly, were found 
 a large mass of his private letters and papers, Avhich 
 were sold by the finder to the State of Massachusetts, 
 for £50, and now are bound in several large folio 
 volumes at the State House (said to have been dis- 
 covered by the purchaser of some feather beds, in 
 which they were concealed). 
 
 Gov. Hutchinson w^as accused of grasping and 
 monopolizing public offices ; but his nomination as 
 Chief Justice was made at the solicitation of most 
 of the prominent lawyers of the Province, and his 
 judicial career was highly successful, as he had, it was 
 said, a remarkable power in clearly stating cases to 
 the Juiies ; and he actually refused, for some time, 
 the commission of Governor, on account of the ap- 
 proaching troubles, and finally yielded to the solici- 
 tations of the ministry, who kept the place vacant, 
 waiting his decision. I have a letter written by him 
 from England, three years after he left here, wherein 
 
 7 
 
50 
 
 he says — "I have advantages here beyond most of 
 the Americans, but I prefer nataJe solum to all other, 
 and yet hope I may settle peaceably again at Unquety 
 Hill. I hope to live to see not only my Milton neigh- 
 bors, but the people of the Province in general, 
 convinced that I have ever sincerely aimed at then* 
 true interest, &c." 
 
 James Smith bought, in 173 J:, of the heirs of 
 Samuel Trescott, George Sumner and others, several 
 tracts of land at Brush Hill, adjoining the Dorches- 
 ter Church lands, and built his house (the same now 
 occupied by J. M. Kobbins), and made many expen- 
 sive improvements. Smith was a large capitalist of 
 Boston, at that time about 46 years of age, and had 
 made great additions to his fortune by the business 
 of refining sugar. His sugar house stood next be- 
 low Brattle-street Church, in Boston, and was the 
 building occupied by Dalrymple's regiment in 1769 
 and 1770, known in history as Smith's or Murray's 
 barracks, whence Capt. Preston's company proceeded 
 to State Street at the massacre of March 5th. He 
 lived at Brush Hill most of the time for thirty-five 
 years. He had no children. His wife, who survived 
 him, was Miss Elizabeth Murray, a Scotch lady of 
 the Philiphaugh family in Selkirkshire. He died in 
 1769. Drake, in his history of Boston, has the fol- 
 lowing notice : — " On the 3d of August, Mr. James 
 Smith died at his seat at Brush Hill, Milton, at the 
 age of 81 ; had been many years a sugar refiner in 
 Boston, and his remains were brought into town and 
 buried from the house of James Murray, Esq., in 
 Queen Street." In the Boston Gazette of Feb. -Ith, 
 
51 
 
 1769, is the following: — "Last Thursday was mar- 
 ried at Brush Hill (seat of James Smith, Esq.), in 
 Milton, Rev. Jno. Forbes, of St. Augustine, to Miss 
 Dolly Murray, daughter of Hon. James Murray, 
 Esq., of Boston." Mr. Murray was the brother of 
 Mrs. Smith, and resided some thirty years in Caro- 
 lina, as a planter, and was a member of the Council 
 of that Province. In 1765, having lost his wife and 
 several children, he moved to Boston with his two 
 surviving daughters, afterwards Mrs, Forbes and 
 Mrs. E. H. E-obbius. Murray became executor to 
 Smith's will. Mr. Smith gave his whole property 
 to his widow, who married Mr. Ralph Inman, of 
 Cambridge, m 1771, on which occasion she gave her 
 Milton property to her two nieces. 
 
 OxENBRiDGE Thatcher, Jr., who lias already been 
 alluded to, in speaking of his father, merits further 
 notice. Born at Milton in 1720, he graduated at 
 Harvard College in 1738, and studied law with Jere- 
 miah Gridley, Attorney General of the Province ; 
 established himself at Boston, and rose to distinction 
 in his profession very soon. He was gentle in his 
 manners, but very eloquent. He soon enlisted in 
 politics, and was one of the early movers in the 
 Revolutionary struggle, although his life ended 
 before his views were realized. Mr. Adams, in de- 
 scribing the great case of AVrits of Assistance, 
 against the application of which Otis and Thatcher 
 were engaged in 1761, says, "Then and there was 
 the first scene of the first act of opposition to the arbi- 
 trary claims of Great Britain. Then and there the 
 
52 
 
 child Independence was born." Thatcher died of 
 consumption, in 1765, at the early age of 45 years. 
 
 Samuel Swift, second son of Col. Samuel Swift, 
 of Milton, was born here in 1715, graduated at 
 Cambridge in 1735, and many years practised law 
 in Boston. President Adams speaks of him often 
 in his diary. He says, in 1766, "Spent the evening 
 at Sam. Adams's very socially with brother Swift." 
 Again, in 1812, in a letter to William AVirt, wdio 
 was writing the life of Patrick Henry, he says, 
 " Among the illustrious men who were agents in the 
 Revolution, must be remembered the name of Samuel 
 Swift." He died at Boston in 1775, I believe 
 unmarried. 
 
 Nathaniel Tucker, youngest son of Capt. Samu- 
 el Tucker of Scotch Woods, was born there in 1725, 
 and graduated at Harvard in 1744. He studied for 
 the ministry, and settled in New Jersey, where he 
 married, and very early died, in 1748. He had a 
 posthumous son Nathaniel, born in 1748, who with 
 his mother came to Massachusetts not long after. 
 The widow became the wife of Samuel Davenport, 
 of this town, and the son married a Miss Dalton, of 
 Boston, and was the father of Richard D. and 
 Nathaniel Tucker. He died here in 1776. 
 
 Seth Adams, the son of Edward Adams, Jr., was 
 born here in 1713, graduated at Harvard in 1733, 
 and died at his father's house in 1736, aged 23 years. 
 
 William Foye, Jr., son of Treasurer Foye, born 
 at Boston in 1716, was graduated at Harvard in 1735, 
 went to Nova Scotia before his father's death, where 
 his relative, Jonathan Belcher, afterwards Chief 
 
53 
 
 Justice, was settled. He became Colonel of Militia, 
 and Provost Marshal of Halifax, which office he 
 held twenty-two years. He died there in 1771. 
 
 Joseph Gooch, the only son of Col. Gooch, was 
 born in 1728, and graduated in 1747. After his 
 father's death, Dr. Pierce says, he moved to Vermont, 
 where he devoted his life to agricultural pursuits, 
 and died there in 1811, aged 83. 
 
 Benjamin Pratt was born of humble parents, and 
 after attaining adult age, by an accident lost his leg, 
 which circumstance occasioned an entire chang-e in 
 his career. He applied himself to study, entered 
 College at an advanced standing, and graduated in 
 1737. Hobert Auchmuty, the eminent judge and 
 admiralty lawyer, befriended him, instructed him in 
 his profession, and gave him his daughter in mar- 
 riage. He soon rose to eminence, and took the fii'st 
 rank in his profession. He figured in law and poli- 
 tics about twenty years in Massachusetts. John 
 Adams, in describing the Court before whom was 
 argued the case of " Writs of Assistance," by Otis 
 and Thatcher, thus describes Pratt : — " In a corner 
 of the room must be placed wit, sense, imagination, 
 genius, pathos, reason, prudence, eloquence, learn- 
 ing, science and immense reading, hung by the 
 shoulders on two crutches, covered with a cloth 
 great-coat, in the person of Mr. Prat." He was 
 nominated Chief Justice of New York, where his 
 consummate ability secured him the esteem of all 
 parties. He died there in 1763, aged 54. In 1755, 
 he purchased 150 acres of land at Milton Hill, and 
 erected the house recently taken down by JSIr. Brooks. 
 
54 
 
 His short and busy life left little time to enjoy his 
 Milton property. His only child, Isabella, married 
 Samuel Welles, of Boston, whose family held the 
 property some seventy years. 
 
 Mr. Taylor's death occurred in January, 1750, at 
 the age of 46 years ; and the whole of that year 
 was employed by the people of Milton in listening 
 to a great variety of candidates with a view to select- 
 ing his successor. On the 31st day of December, 
 the Eev. Nathaniel Robbins, a young man of 24 
 years, was chosen by the church and congregation. 
 The vote stood, 70 to 2 ; settlement, £1,000 old 
 tenor, equal to §500, and a salary of £500, or §250, 
 per annum, and twenty-five cords of wood. The or- 
 dination occurred on the 13th of February following, 
 with very considerable formality ; several of the 
 neighboring houses were used by the town for the 
 entertainment of the numerous delegations which 
 attended. The E,ev. Samuel Cook, of West Cam- 
 bridge, preached the sermon, which is in print. 
 Kev. Samuel Niles, of Braintree, gave the charge, 
 and Rev. John Bailey the right hand of fellowship. 
 
 Ilev. Nathaniel Robbins was the second of seven 
 sons of Thomas Robbins, of West Cambridge, where 
 he was born in 1726, and where he spent his early 
 youth and was fitted for College. He graduated at 
 Harvard in 1747, and availing himself of the ad- 
 vantages then as now furnished by that vicinity, he 
 completed his theological studies there, mainly di- 
 rected, I think, by the Rev. Samuel Cooke, of his 
 native parish. As already mentioned, he commenced 
 
55 
 
 his clerical career at Milton early in 1751, where 
 he continued a long and harmonious course of minis- 
 terial duty, covering nearly forty-five years — the best 
 evidence of the faithful discharge of his duties which 
 can be offered. He is said to have been a kind, 
 self-forgetting man, very active when he could be of 
 service to others, of very reliable judgment in the 
 ordinary affairs of life, which added much to the in- 
 fluence which his position as spiritual guide of the 
 parish naturally gave him. He was a respectable 
 preacher, without being distinguished as a learned 
 theologian, indulged very little in polemical discus- 
 sions, and preserved friendly relations with his breth- 
 ren in the ministry. Some of his sermons on public 
 occasions are in print — one preached at the ordina- 
 tion of Dr. Peter Thatcher, at Maiden, 1771 ; at the 
 ordination of Rev. Benjamin AVadsworth, at Dan- 
 vers, 1772 ; -the election sermon of 1772. Mr. bob- 
 bins was elected by the town to attend the Conven- 
 tion which adopted the Federal Constitution, in 1788,. 
 which he supported. His sympathies were given to 
 the Revolutionary struggle ; two of his brothers 
 were in Capt. Parker's company at Lexington, on 
 the 19th of April. He purchased, in 1752, of An- 
 thony Gulliver, a tract of land where he soon after 
 erected his house (the present Amory house), and 
 by subsequent purchases he acquired a considerable 
 farm. In 1757, he married Elizabeth, daughter of 
 Edward Hutchinson, of Boston, uncle of Gov. T. 
 Hutchinson, who for many years officiated as Judge 
 of Probate for Suffolk County, and thirty years as 
 Treasurer of the College. 
 
66 
 
 Mr. Robbins had two sons and a daughter. The 
 latter died in 1786, unmarried, at 25 years of age. 
 His youngest son, Nathaniel Johnson, died in 1799, 
 a graduate of Harvard College 1784; his eldest, 
 Edward Hutchinson, well known to many of the 
 present generation, died in 1829, aged 72. The 
 wife of Mr. R. died in 1793, at the age of 62. 
 
 The Rev. Mr. Robbins terminated his earthly pil- 
 grimage on the 19th day of May, 1795, aged 69, and 
 his death was commemorated by a funeral discourse, 
 preached by his old pupil and life-long friend, Thomas 
 Thatcher, of Dedham, which is in print.* 
 
 * The folloAving extract is from the Sermon alluded to : — 
 
 " "When Ave speak of his publick perfonnauccs, we assert that they were 
 such, as would produce the most salutary effects on a general audience. 
 He studied the holy scriptures, and made them the rule of his faith and 
 practice. He refused to call any man master on earth, or to sacrifice truth to 
 prevailing opinions, however conducive to popularity, to consideration and 
 consequence. Such candor and liberal principles were the more deserving 
 of praise, since, in the first periods of his ministry, such a spirit and tem- 
 per were not common. His stability preserved this Church from those divi- 
 sions and separation, arising from the fumes of enthusiasm and a fanatick 
 spirit, which in those days too much prevailed, and ruined some of the 
 most respectable christian societies in the land. His manner of preaching 
 was plain and pathetick ; he appeared to have a dislike to a florid style, to 
 false ornaments, and to affectation of literature. Agreeable to the senti- 
 ments of St. Paul, who considered the j^o'njj of words as inconsistent with 
 the majesty of things, that the doctrines of the gospel and its precepts were of 
 themselves sublime, and needed not to be embellished with human elo- 
 quence. 
 
 " In prayer he was remarkable for copiousness and facility of expression, 
 and at funerals in particular, he was admired for a variety of pathetick sen- 
 timents, pertuient to every person immediately concerned, and to each inci- 
 dent that occurred. In general we may remark of his pulpit talents, that 
 though his natural genius was rather adapted to active than contemjjlative 
 life ; yet he obtained a degree of reputation and popularity, both in his 
 own and m other societies, far beyond mediocrity. 
 
 " He was possessed of a large share of sagacity and penetration ; he had 
 a very accurate acquaintance with human nature ; this enabled him, even 
 though he lived much in retirement, to make just and pertinent observations 
 on men and things, and besides, qualified him for the other parts of his pas- 
 toral office. He was remarkable for his wisdom and address in conciliating 
 13rivate disputes ; the salutary use of these principles was evident Lu two 
 effects. The first in securing peace and good neighborhood at home, by the 
 unbounded confidence they reposed in his honor and integrity ; the other 
 was in ecclesiastical councils in the vicinity, where he has by wise, prudent 
 
57 
 
 In the summer of 1769, Rev. George AVhitefield 
 preached at Milton, to the largest assembly ever con- 
 vened m the town. A person present, mformed me 
 that Mr. W. stood upon a stagmg erected outside of 
 the windows, so great w-as the crowd. 
 
 During the two years succeeding the death of Mr. 
 Eobbins, the parish was occupied in listening to various 
 candidates, but no choice was made until the latter 
 part of 1797, when the town united in an invitation 
 to Rev. Joseph McKean, a young gentleman of twen- 
 ty-one years, of superior abilities, wdio accepted the 
 call, and w\as ordained in November, 1797. Mr. 
 McKean was the son of William McKean, a Scotch 
 gentleman who came to this country a few years be- 
 fore the Revolution, and at the time of the birth 
 of his son, in 1776, w\as a resident of Ipswich, Es- 
 
 and judiciouf? advice, tcrmmated the most obstinate disputes, when he had 
 to manage men of the most refractory tempers — and yet was happy in re- 
 conciling contending interests, where there scarcely appeared a rational 
 prospect of success. Neither should we omit, in addition to his conciliat- 
 ing manners, his suavity of temper and candor towards all men. No ab- 
 sent character could be mentioned in his presence with censure, without his 
 offering an apology : He carried his amiable quality so far, that, even when, 
 those were mentioned who were blasted and flagitious, it was his custom to 
 suggest an extenuation, if possible. If such charity will cover a multitude 
 of the'sins of others, ought it not to veil every fault in the character of him 
 who possesses it? 
 
 "United to his social qualities he had a pleasing talent for conversation. 
 This rendered his occasional visits and interviews highly agreeable, and 
 conveyed a brilliancy to the circle he was Avith. But still, this facetious 
 tui-n was united with the dignity and authoritj^ of the christian pastor. 
 
 " He was equally worthy of praise for his attention to those pastoral du- 
 ties of visiting the sick, and comforting the afflicted. The chambers of the 
 dying, the bereaved and the disconsolate — the habitation of the poor de- 
 cayed friend, can all testify how much his feeling heart was struck with 
 every form of calamity, and he was ready to sooth the wounded spirit with 
 the consolations of religion. It would be highly blameable in me to omit 
 the patronage and attention which he showed to young gentlemen who 
 were natives of this place, when pursuing their studies at the University. 
 I should be ungrateful if I omitted the numerous civilities I received from 
 him at that period of life, which together with his judicious and prudent 
 advice, rendered the loss of my parents the less sensibly felt." 
 8 
 
58 
 
 sex County, whence he removed to Boston, at the 
 peace of 1783. The son is said to have indicated 
 in his childhood uncommon powers, was entered 
 early in the public schools at Boston, and at the age 
 of 11 years was placed with Dr. Pemberton, at An- 
 dover, who prepared him for College, where he was 
 admitted in 1790. He sustained a high rank through 
 his academical career, was distinguished in mathe- 
 matics, and graduated in 1794:. He taught school 
 at Ipswich, and also in the Academy at Berwick, for 
 two or three years, during which period he found 
 time to pursue his theological studies, directed by 
 Dr. Joseph Dana, and also Dr. John Elliot, of Bos- 
 ton. He was approved by the Boston Association 
 in 1797, but a short time before he began to preach 
 at Milton. He was studious in his habits, with a 
 fine command of language, a natural eloquence, and 
 much esteemed as a preacher. Great hopes were 
 entertained, that a long and useful career of pastoral 
 duty was in reserve for him. The town erected a 
 house upon the church lands for him in 1798 (now 
 Mrs. Gile's house), and in the year after, 1799, he 
 married Miss Swasey, of Ipswich. A growing repu- 
 tation abroad, and an increasing attachment in his 
 parish, marked the early years of his ministry, when 
 a dangerous illness prostrated his strength, and his 
 physician advised him to relinquish his parochial 
 duties for a time. A pulmonary disease ensued, and 
 he deemed it proper to ask a dismission, which was 
 granted with great reluctance by his attached friends 
 here in October, 1804. After leaving Milton, he 
 travelled in mild climates, and renovated his health 
 
59 
 
 greatly, and was invited to settle in Boston, but was 
 advised not to engage in regular preaching, although, 
 he frequently officiated temporarily in the desk. He 
 employed himself in teaching in Boston for a time, 
 and, after repeated invitations, he accepted a Pro- 
 fessorship at Harvard College, where he employed 
 himself some ten years, to the great satisfaction and 
 benefit of the public. His health again failed him, 
 and he visited Havana, where he ended his life in 
 1818, at the early age of 42 years. 
 
 The period we are now treating of, the latter half 
 of the 18th century, was a very eventful era of Mas- 
 sachusetts history, and the occurrences of that time 
 essentially affected this town. It embraced the seven 
 years' war, known with us as the old French war, 
 ending in the treaty of Paris in 1763. Then fol- 
 lowed the long agitation preceding the Revolution, 
 which ended by the occurrence at Lexington, the 
 Fort Sumter of the Revolution ; then the long and 
 bloody struggle which ended at the treaty of Ver- 
 sailles in 1783, acknowledging the National Inde- 
 pendence — followed by the period of exhaustion of 
 five years, which preceded the adoption of the Con- 
 stitution, when we finally took rank in the great 
 family of civilized nations. During this period of 
 thirty years, the town added nothing to its material 
 wealth, and very little to its population — the whole 
 increase not exceeding 100 persons. There were 
 also other causes for the stationary condition of the 
 town. The Province, which had from the beginning 
 held large tracts of unoccupied lands in the western. 
 
60 
 
 counties of Worcester, Ilampsliire and Berkshire, 
 made large grants to soldiers, and to the heirs of 
 those fallen in the Indian and French wars, and also 
 large sales to speculators. These regions were filled 
 up by men from the eastern towns. The aggregate 
 population of the Province showed a respectable in- 
 crease, but not the eastern section. A frightful draft 
 was made upon our population by the wars with the 
 French. Massachusetts was regarded by England 
 as a sort of Switzerland, where men Avere raised to 
 fight the battles of others. Levies of 5,000 or 6,000 
 soldiers upon a small population of 200,000, occur- 
 red every few years. Every one of the old families 
 of this town will find some of their members among 
 the victims of these struggles. When Gov. Ber- 
 nard called for a levy of 6,000 men to accompany 
 Lord Howe to Ticonderoga in 1758, a country Re- 
 presentative is reported to have made this short 
 speech : — " Whenever an Englishman has his toe 
 trodden on in France, Massachusetts must send half 
 a dozen regiments to Canada to avenge the insult. 
 I am heartily sick of this thing." On the same oc- 
 casion a Committee of the House reported : — " The 
 whole world knows the benefits derived to Great 
 Britain from the loyalty of the Colonies, and from 
 the efforts of this Province in particular, which, for 
 more than a century past, has been wading in blood 
 and laden with the expenses of repelling the com- 
 mon enemy, without which efi"orts Great Britain at 
 this day would have had no Colonies to defend." No 
 coercion was requisite ; more men off'ered on this 
 occasion than were called for — Major Stephen Mil- 
 
61 
 
 ler, and others of this town, among the number. 
 The expedition was so popular that the Province of 
 Massachusetts erected a very costly marble monu- 
 ment in Westminster Abbey, to Lord Howe, killed 
 on the occasion. Massachusetts had also sent troops 
 to the Spanish Main wdth Admiral Vernon, in 1741, 
 to capture the city of Carthagena, and also with the 
 Earl of Albemarle to Cuba, to capture the city of 
 Havana, in 1762. 
 
 The French war ends, and the whole domination 
 of France is swept from this continent. The Bri- 
 tish Colonies have now a little time to attend to their 
 own concerns. Some few persons thought that the 
 vigor exhibited by the Colonies in the recent strug- 
 gle, showed that the child had attained adult age, 
 and might set up for himself It was not altogether 
 the small stamp tax upon deeds and bills of ex- 
 change, nor three pence a pound duty on tea, that 
 occasioned the discontent. There were deeper causes 
 than these at work, although they furnished our ora- 
 tors with fine materials for agitation. A long list of 
 grievances was embodied in the famous Suffolk Reso- 
 lutions, adopted in a County Convention holden at 
 Milton, in the house of Daniel Vose, Sept. 9, 1774, 
 said to have been drawn up by Dr. Joseph Warren. 
 
 The affair of Lexington, in April, 1775, put an 
 end to oratory, arguments and resolutions ; action is 
 the word, and men and money are called for. Men 
 enough are forthcoming, and the Provincial Trea- 
 surer can furnish paper promises without stint. Jo- 
 seph Vose was chosen Colonel of this District mili- 
 tia regiment, in November, 1774. On the 27tli of 
 
62 
 
 May, 1775, after the affair at Lexington, Col. Vose 
 collects, in Milton and Dorchester, a posse of fifty or 
 sixty men, rushes down the harbor and burns 
 the Light-House, destroying all the hay at Nantasket 
 and on the islands, much to the annoyance of Gen. 
 Gage, who, besides twelve regiments of soldiers, had 
 some thousands of horses to feed in the town, en- 
 tirely surrounded by Provincial troops. 
 
 Col. Vose was soon appointed Lieut. Colonel in 
 the 25th (Greaton's) regiment, employed in the siege 
 of Boston, till the evacuation of the town in March, 
 1776. He was then ordered to Canada, under Gen. 
 Thomas, where the year was passed. In the spring 
 of 1777, his regiment joined Washington's army in 
 New Jersey. Col. Vose returned home sick, in 
 charge of the Surgeon's mate, and after some weeks, 
 having entirely recovered, returned to the army and 
 was promoted to Colonel of the regiment. The 
 young doctor stays behind, sends in his resignation, 
 and is found here sixty-five years afterwards in the 
 person of our old friend Dr. Amos Holbrook.* 
 
 * The following faithful sketch of Dr. Holbrook, who died June 17th» 
 1842, -was written by the late Dr. T. W. Harris, the learned entomologist, 
 of Cambridge. It belongs appropriately in our record. 
 
 " Nearly seventy years of the long and useful life of this eminent physi- 
 cian were spent in the practice of the medical profession. Dr. Holbrook 
 entered upon his career with but little previous preparation ; but he made 
 up for the want of the advantages of education in youth, not only by expe- 
 rience and skill acquired while he was a Surgeon in the continental army, 
 and by an extensive practice in Milton and the vicinity, but by a remarka- 
 ble devotion to the study of his profession, early begun and continued to 
 the last year of his life. By this course of self-teaching, he acquired a de- 
 servedly high reputation, and was honored and respected both at home 
 and abroad. 
 
 " lie was born in the town of Bellinghara, in this State, on the 23d of Janu- 
 ary, 1754. At an early age he began the study of medicine, under the 
 direction of his maternal uncle. Dr. Metcalf, of Franklin, and subsequently 
 pursued it, for a short time, in Providence. In August, 1775, he jomed 
 the army, at Cambridge, in the capacity of surgeon's mate to tlie regiment 
 
63 
 
 Col. Vose served faithfully all the war, was pre- 
 sent at the siege of Yorktown and the surrender of 
 Cornwallis, October, 1781, and in the corps of La- 
 fayette, who WTites to AVashington in commendation 
 of Col. Vose's services on this occasion. After the 
 
 commanded by Col. John Grcaton. Having passed a satisfactory examina- 
 tion, in March, 1776, he received a commission as Surgeon in the same 
 regiment, and soon afterwards accompanied it to New York, and embarked 
 for Albany, with the troops destined to reinforce those that were engaged 
 in the expedition to Quebec. The imsuccessful issue of the campaign in 
 Canada compelled them, alter reaching the mouth of the Sorcl, to retreat to 
 Ticonderoga, where they remained from June till late in the autumn, suffer- 
 ing severely in the mean time from the want of proper si\pplies and from 
 the ravages of the small-pox. In December, they descended the North 
 River to New Windsor, and, on their arrival there, the troops under Col. 
 Greaton returned home, their term of service having exjiircd. Dr. Holbrook 
 was then transferred to Col. Joseph Vose's regiment, which he followed into 
 New Jersey, where they had frequejit skirmishes with the enemy. Having 
 passed the winter at head quarters in Morristown, he was obliged, in ]\Iarch, 
 1777, to apply for a discharge, in consequence of ill health, and returned to 
 Jlassachusctts. Immediately afterwards he went to ililton, where he was 
 induced to establish himself, by the advice of Col. Vose and other officers 
 belonging to the same town, with whom he had become acquainted in the 
 army. A severe attack of fever and ague, contracted probably in his pre- 
 vious campaign, led him, towards the end of the summer, to try the benefit 
 of a sea voyage ; and having obtained a situation as Surgeon in a letter of 
 marque, commanded by Captain Truxton, he sailed ior the coast of Europe, 
 visited France, where, bemg detained several months in port, he spent his 
 time in seeing practice in the hospitals, and in improving himself in the 
 knowledge of his profession ; and returned to !Milton, after an absence of 
 rather less than a year, in perfect health. 
 
 " Soon after his return, Dr. Holbrook succeeded in establishing tempora- 
 ry hospitals for the reception of patients inoculated with the small-pox ; 
 and by this means became known to the people of the town. Prepossessing 
 in appearance, pleasing in his manners, possessed of great bodily activity, 
 and ardent and indefatigable in attention to business and in the pursuit of 
 knowledge, he soon found himself well establii^hed in a practice, which 
 gradualljr and constantly increased from year to year. He was, indeed, 
 eminently acceptable as a physician. His very presence in the sick chamber 
 and the soothing kindness of his address seemed to give hope to his patients, 
 and inspired conlidence in their friends ; while his assiduous attentions to 
 the sick of all ages and conditions, and his spnpathy with the afflicted, al- 
 leviated suffering and afforded consolation when the resources of art failed 
 to arrest the progress and fatal termination of disease. He was always 
 prompt to answer every call, and much of his time was spent in gratuitous 
 services. 
 
 " Though his disinterested benevolence and indifference to pecuniary 
 compensation prevented Dr. Holbrook from accumulating wealth, he was 
 rich in the blessings of the poor, who, but for his timely help, were ready 
 to perish, and abundantly shared in the happiness which he so liberally be- 
 stowed. He took a very active part in promoting public vaccinations, 
 though attended with considerable pecuniary sacrifice to himself ; and the 
 
64 
 
 peace, he returned home, exchanged the sword for 
 the ploughshare, and spent the long evenrng of his 
 life upon his native farm. 
 
 Col. V. had three brothers in the army. His 
 younger brother, Elijah, attained the rank of Lieut. 
 
 town of Milton, where he resided, was the first in a corporate capacity to 
 extend the benefits of vaccination to its inliabitants, three hundred and 
 thirty-seven of whom, of all ages, from two months to upwards of seventy 
 years, more than a fourth jaart of the whole population, being vaccina- 
 ted by Dr. Holbrook in the year 1808. TM'elve of these persons were 
 subsequently tested by himself with small-pox inoculation, and in due 
 time were discharged, after successfully resisting the infection. For many 
 years in succession he continued these public vaccmations in Milton, and 
 kept a record of the names of those persons who passed through the disease 
 satisfactorily. His benevolent exertions in this cause, and his general repu- 
 tation, procured him, in the year 1811, the honor of an electioir as foreign 
 member of the Medical Society of London, and of the Literary and Philo- 
 sophical Society of Preston, in England. And here it may be proper to 
 state that he was, for many years, a Councillor in the Massachusetts iledical 
 Society, and also filled for some time the office of its Vice I'residjiit ; and 
 in the year 1813 he received the honorary degree of Doctor in Medicine at 
 Harvard University. 
 
 "Blessed with a vigorous constitution. Dr. Holbrook was enabled, Avith 
 little intermission, to endure all the toils, by day and by night, of a labori- 
 ous profession, till he was nearl}' eighty years old ; after reaching this ad- 
 vanced age, and till within a few months of his decease, though his strength 
 was much impaired by repeated and alarming attacks of sickness, and he 
 suffered daily from an incurable organic disease, he continued to yield to 
 the solicitations of patients who required his services. 
 
 " He always took much pleasure in the cultivation of the soil, and filled 
 his grounds with a choice variety of fruit trees and shrubs. Even after he 
 had passed the grand climacteric of life he continued yearly to set out, Avith 
 his own hands, a great number of trees and vines, and lived to enjoy the 
 fruits of many of them. His professional services, the urbanity of his man- 
 ners, and his high moral worth, procured him the esteem, the respect and 
 the veneration of a wide circle of relatives and friends, whom he delighted 
 to receive in his hospituble mansion. Lideed, he was richly endowed with 
 the power both of giving and receiving happiness, and enjoyed the atten- 
 tions and the society of his friends to the last days of his protracted life. 
 For several months he had been conscious of an increasing difficulty in res- 
 piration, especially on exertion ; but it was not till near the end of Decem- 
 ber last, that this became alarming to his family. The nature of his disease 
 was now apparent to others, as it had been to himself, and luider it he gra- 
 dually wasted away. He occasionally took exercise in the open air, and 
 on the very day before his decease he was able to ride out, and to tender an 
 office of kindness to a young and suffering friend. His faculties, with 
 scarcely diminished vigor, remained with him to the last moment, when, 
 without a struggle, he expired. 
 
 " The departure of this venerable patriot, good citizen, skilful physician, 
 and warm-hearted friend, has left a Avide void in the place he so long and 
 .so honorably filled in public and in private estimation." 
 
65 
 
 Colonel, and served during the war with credit. 
 Moses and Bill were also employed in responsible 
 stations. Tliese gentlemen were all known to the 
 elder members of the present community. 
 
 The military spirit of Col. Vose has been revived 
 in the two succeeding generations of his family. 
 Col. JosiAH H. VosE, his youngest son, entered the 
 U. S. Army before the war of 1812, and after a cre- 
 ditable military career of thirty-four years, died in 
 command of his regiment at New Orleans, in 184:5, 
 at the age of 61 years. Edwin Vose Sumner, son of 
 Elisha and Nancy (Vose) Sumner, grandson of Col. 
 Joseph Vose, is the present Major General, who 
 commands an army corps on the Potomac, next in 
 command toMcClellan; was born in 1796, spent 
 his early youth in Milton, entered the army in 1819, 
 and has just completed forty-three years of active 
 military life, having probably seen more duty on the 
 frontiers than any officer living. He rendered bril- 
 liant service as a cavalry officer in Mexico, and was 
 sent by Government, in 1853-4, to visit all parts of 
 Europe to collect military knowledge. His histori- 
 cal page will doubtless be much extended in the 
 present struggle. 
 
 Job Sumner, son of Seth Sumner, of Brush Hill, 
 was an under graduate of Harvard College in 1775. 
 When the operations of the University were disturb- 
 ed by the presence of Washington's army, at Cam- 
 bridge, he laid aside his books and procured a Lieu- 
 tenant's commission in Col. Bond's regiment, and 
 remained in the army through the war. He had 
 attained the rank of Major at the peace, and conti- 
 
66 
 
 niicd in the military service of the General Govern- 
 ment until his death in 1794, which took place 
 on board a packet ship from Charleston to New 
 York, where he was buried with much ceremony by 
 the Freemasons, of which fraternity he was a pro- 
 minent member, and also of the Cincinnati Society. 
 A fine marble monument to his memory may be 
 seen in Trinity Church-yard, Broadway, New York. 
 He was grandfather of the present Senator Charles 
 Sumner. 
 
 The whole number of persons in the town subject 
 to military duty was less than 200, but the full quota 
 of men was furnished during the whole w^ar, and 
 sometimes more. After the peace, the matter of a 
 new Meeting-house came up again, and, after much 
 discussion, this present building was erected, and 
 occupied Jan. 1st, 1788 — at a cost of £1700. The 
 pews sold for £1400, about ^1000 less than the 
 whole cost. The buildmg was formally dedicated, 
 the minister furnished with a new horse-hak wig 
 and black gown, and in the spring every man in the 
 Parish brings a young elm tree and plants it in ik^ 
 yard. The three Dutch elms before the door were 
 brought from Brush Hill. The old Meeting-house, 
 standing on the road, was pulled down after the new 
 building was occupied. 
 
 Seventeen young men belonging to the town gra- 
 duated at Harvard College, dm-ing the last fifty years 
 of the eighteenth century. They all became re- 
 spectable men, and some of them distinguished. 
 
67 
 
 John Miller, son of Samuel Miller, Jr. and Ee- 
 becca (Minot) Miller, of Milton, born at Milton in 
 1733, graduated at Harvard College in 1752, or- 
 dained minister of Brunswick, Maine, 1762. He 
 died on a visit to Boston, Jan. 25, 1789, travelling 
 for his health. 
 
 Benjamin Wadsworth, son of Deacon Benjamin 
 Wadsworth, of Milton, was born in 1750. He 
 graduated at Harvard College in 1769, settled at 
 Danvers in 1772, died in 1826, aged 76; was in the 
 ministry fifty-four years. He published a sermon 
 preached at the ordination of J. Badcock in 1783 ; 
 two Thanksgiving sermons, 1795 and '96 ; dedication 
 sermon, 1807. His onlv dausfhter married Hon. 
 John Ruggles, of Milton. 
 
 Peter Thatcher, the oldest son of Oxenbridge 
 Thatcher, Jr., was born at Milton in 1752. His 
 father resided generally in Boston, where his son 
 went to school, was prepared for College by Master 
 John Lovell, and was entered at the University in 
 1765, the year of his father's death. He was dili- 
 gent in his studies, and had the clerical profession 
 continually in view. He was ordained at Maiden 
 before twenty years of age. Rev. N. Robbins 
 preached the ordination sermon in 1770, which was 
 published. Mr. T. was much admired as a preacher, 
 possessing a sonorous voice, natural oratory, and 
 great fluency in prayer ; Whitefield called him the 
 young Elijah. He was a rigid Calvinist. Persons 
 of that persuasion were eager to spread his fame, 
 whilst others of different opinions indulged in censure. 
 In the latter part of his life he was very moderate 
 
68 
 
 and charitable towards all good men. He was very 
 ardent on the patriotic side during the Revolution, 
 and delivered a political address March 5th, 1775, 
 at Watertown, which is in print. He was sent from 
 Maiden to the Convention to form the State Consti- 
 tution in 1780, was installed minister of Brattle Street 
 Church, Boston, m 1785, received the degree of 
 Doctor from the University of Edinburgh, and was 
 one of the founders of the Historical Society. He 
 was attacked by pulmonary disease, and died in 
 1802 in Georgia, whither he went for his health. 
 
 William Sandford Hutchinson, son of Gov. T. 
 Hutchinson, was born at Milton, June 30th, 1752. 
 He graduated at Harvard College in 1770, and died 
 at Brompton, in England, February 26th, 1780, aged 
 27 1-2 years. 
 
 JosiAH Badcock, son of Nathan Badcock, was 
 born at Milton in 1752 ; graduated at Harvard in 
 1772 ; settled at Andover, N. H. Ordination in 1 783 ; 
 sermon by Rev. B. Wadsworth. Died in 1831. He 
 retired from the desk, twenty years before his death, 
 and lived quietly upon his farm. 
 
 Samuel Henshaw, son of Samuel, Jr., and Wait- 
 still Henshaw, was born at Milton in 1744 ; gra- 
 duated at Harvard College, 1773; married Sarah, 
 daughter of Nathaniel Swift, 1777. His Avife died 
 in 1781, and he subsequently married a daughter of 
 the Rev. John Hunt, of the Old South Church. 
 Mr. H. studied for the ministry at first, but relin- 
 quished that calling, and removed to Northampton 
 about the close of the Revolution, and filled the 
 office of Judge of Probate for Hampshire County 
 
69 
 
 many years, until liis death in 1809. He was a 
 member, from jNIilton, of the Convention which form- 
 ed the Constitution of Massachusetts in 1779 and '80. 
 Edward Hutchinson Robbins, eldest son of Rev. 
 Nathaniel Robbins, was born at Milton, Feb. 19, 
 1758, where he passed his childhood. He was 
 benefited by the instructions of Dr. Jeremy Belknap, 
 who taught school at Milton two years after leaving 
 College. He was partially fitted for College by Dr. 
 Lemuel Hayward, who also kept a grammar school 
 some time at Milton. He entered College in 1771, 
 in his 14th year, and fmished his collegiate course 
 respectably in 1775 — occupying a room with his 
 townsman, Thomas Thatcher, afterwards minister of 
 Dedham, with whom he continued an intimacy until 
 the death of the latter in 1813. The last year of 
 his college life was somewhat interrupted by the 
 affairs at Lexington and Charlestown, After leaving 
 College, he kept a school at Dorchester for a year. 
 In 1776 he entered the office of John Sprague, Esq., 
 of Lancaster, and commenced the study of the law. 
 He remained a year at Lancaster, and in 1777 re- 
 moved to Bridgewater, and continued his studies with 
 Oakes Angier, then a distinguished practitioner. In 
 1779 he was admitted to the bar, and commenced 
 practice at Milton. He was the same year elected 
 to represent his native town in the Convention Avhich 
 formed the Constitution of Massachusetts. He was 
 the youngest member of this body, which contained 
 nearly all the prominent men of the State, many of 
 whom were his friends through much of his after 
 life. He continued the practice of law at Miltou 
 
70 
 
 till 1785, during four years of which time he repre- 
 sented the town in the Legislature. He enjoyed the 
 confidence of the community, and his professional 
 business increased so much that he removed his office 
 to Boston, where all the Courts of law for this sec- 
 tion were then held. In November, 1785, he mar- 
 ried Miss Elizabeth Murray, who had been a resi- 
 dent of Milton for some years previously, and pur- 
 chased the Gooch estate at Milton Hill, where he 
 resided nearly twenty years, till he removed to Brush 
 Hill in 1805, Avhich became his residence for the 
 remainder of his life. His habits were active, and 
 he began to weary of the confinement of professional 
 life, and soon employed himself much with other 
 pursuits. He was among the early purchasers of the 
 Commonwealth's lands in Maine, and was much oc- 
 picd in settling and improving the lands, a subject 
 of great interest to him all his life. In 1792, he 
 was again chosen to represent the town of Milton 
 in the Legislature, and continued to be re-elected 
 ten years in succession, in nine of which he occupied 
 the Speaker's chair. How well he performed the 
 duties and sustained the honor of that station, is too 
 well known to need any mention. His extraordi- 
 nary exercise of memory and promptness in recol- 
 lecting the i)ersons and character of the members 
 in the duties of appointment, his knowledge of par- 
 liamentary rules and the local interests of the Com- 
 monwealth, became proverbial, and were a great 
 facility to the public business. During this period, 
 much of his time was employed in other public du- 
 ties. He was ouc of the Commissioners for building 
 
71 
 
 the State House, also the State Prison. In 1796, 
 he was elected by the Plouse to the U. S. Senate, 
 but the County of Essex urged the necessity of a 
 practical merchant for the place, and the Senate 
 made choice of Mr. Goodhue, a merchant of Salem, 
 whereupon Mr. R. at once withdrew his name. In 
 1802 he was induced to accept the nomination of 
 Lieutenant Governor with Gov. Strong, with whom 
 he had been much acquainted before. He was 
 elected, and continued to fill the duties of this office 
 till 1807, when the democratic party came into 
 power. He was frequently employed in the service 
 of the State in responsible places, such as member 
 of the Board of War in 1812, Commissioner for 
 treating with the Eastern Indians, and for the ma- 
 nagement of Eastern lands, and filled the place of 
 Judge of Probate for Norfolk County some se^'enteen 
 or eighteen years. He never sought public office, 
 and never occupied any place of profit, but was often 
 selected for places requiring judgment and integrity 
 by the appointing power. He inherited a competent 
 property, and faithfully executed many responsible 
 trusts, but left no wealth behind. He belonged to 
 the Federal school in politics, but was no zealous 
 partizan — firm in opinion, prudent in action — en- 
 dowed with strong love of the human race — never 
 weary of serving others, and rather negligent of his 
 own interests. Greatly esteemed by a very wide cir- 
 cle of friends, his opinion was much sought for and 
 valued, and was always at the command of csery 
 one. His fine colloquial powers and social disposi- 
 tion rendered his society very attractive. He was 
 
72 
 
 the zealous friend of religion and education, long 
 a member of the Milton Church and of various asso- 
 ciations for the diflFusion of gospel truths. To his 
 personal efforts was mainly due the establishment of 
 the Academy in his native town. In his domestic 
 relations, the cheerful kindness of his nature was 
 especially conspicuous. His death, which occurred 
 Dec. 29, 1829, at the age of 72, was greatly lament- 
 ed by his friends and neighbors. 
 
 E.UFUS Badcock, son of George and Ruth Badcock, 
 born at Milton in 1755 ; graduated at Harvard Col- 
 lege in 1775. His death occurred in a Southern 
 State, where he was employed in teaching, in 1793. 
 
 Thomas Thatcher, son of Oxenbridge Thatcher, 
 was born at Milton in 1757, and graduated at Cam- 
 bridge in 1775. He was settled at West Dedham, and 
 died in 1813, aged 56. He was an eccentric man, 
 of studious habits, unmarried, lived a retired life 
 within his own parish, and was somewhat occupied 
 in teaching. Many students were sent to him from 
 the College. He printed several sermons : — one on 
 the death of Rev. N. Robbins ; one at the dedication 
 of the Milton Academy ; a Christmas sermon in 
 1797, in the Episcopal church in Dedham ; and also a 
 discourse before the Humane Society at Boston, June, 
 1800. He was a member of the State Convention 
 to discuss the U. S. Constitution. He and his col- 
 league Fisher Ames represented Dedham. This 
 instrument, now regarded as the sheet anchor of 
 our liberties, balanced in a state of uncertainty in 
 the Convention many weeks, and finally, in a House 
 of 355, was adopted by the small majority of nine- 
 
73 
 
 teen votes only. Mr. Thatcher made a very effective 
 speech near the close, terminating in these words •— 
 " It has been hinted in this House, that there exists 
 a combination of the rich and the learned to estab- 
 lish and support an arbitrary form of government. 
 ±arbeit from me to retort so unchristian a sug- 
 gestion. I am conscious of no motive which guides 
 me ni this great and solemn question, but what I 
 could justify to my own heart, both on the bed of 
 death and before the tribunal of Omnipotence I 
 am a poor man. I have the feelings of a poor man. 
 it there are honors and emoluments in this proposed 
 Coustitution, I shall, by my profession and circum- 
 stances m life, be forever excluded from them It 
 IS my wish and prayer, that m the solemn verdict 
 we are very soon to pronounce, we may be directed 
 to that measure which will be for the glory, freedom 
 and felicity of my country. I shall trouble this 
 House no farther, than by sincerely expressing the 
 wish that the people, in this their day, may know 
 the thmgs which belong to theii' peace." 
 
 Jesse Tucker, son of Jeremiah Tucker and his 
 wife Mary (Wadsworth) Tucker, was born at Milton 
 ml/o8; graduated at Harvard College 1778, and 
 studied medicine with his kinsman, Dr. John AVarren 
 He served with Capt. Manly as a Sui-geon in a public 
 armed ship, was attacked by fever on the cruise, and 
 pnt on shore at Newfoundland, where he died in 
 December, 1779. 
 
 Jeremiah S. Boies, son of Capt. James Boies, of 
 Milton, born m 1762, graduated at Harvard College 
 
 10 & 
 
74 
 
 1783 ; was occupied in his fathers business of 
 paper making ; married Miss Hannah Clark in 
 1785. His father died in 1798, aged 96, and be- 
 queathed a handsome estate to his son. Mr. B. 
 became one of the earliest cotton manufacturers of 
 Massachusetts, having originated the Company at 
 Dorchester, which successfully conducted this busi- 
 ness for more than forty years. Mr. B. died at 
 Boston in 1851, aged 89 years. 
 
 Nathaniel Johnson Robbins, second son of Rev. 
 Nathaniel Robbins, was born at Milton in 1776, 
 and graduated at Harvard College in 1784. He oc- 
 cupied his short life in commercial pursuits, travelling 
 much abroad, and died at Milton in 1799, aged 33, 
 from the effects of a liver disease, contracted in the 
 British West Indies. He was an agreeable, social 
 person, and left a lasting impression upon the memo- 
 ry of many of his cotemporaries, some of whom 
 survived him 40 or 50 years. 
 
 John Murray Forbes was the son of Rev. John 
 Forbes, a Scotch clergyman who was stationed at 
 St. Augustine while the Colony of Florida was in 
 possession of the British Government. Mr. F., the 
 father, was married at Milton, in 1769, to Miss Do- 
 rothy Murray, the daughter of James Miu'ray, Esq. 
 J. Murray Forbes was born at St. Augustine, and 
 came to Milton with his mother in 1773 ; was fitted 
 for College by Dr. Samuel Kendall, of Weston ; gra- 
 duated in 1787, in the class with John Q. Adams and 
 James Lloyd ; studied law with John Sprague, of 
 Lancaster, and Pliny Merrick, of Brookfield, and 
 
75 
 
 began his professional career at Nortlifield in 1791. 
 Afterwards he moved to Boston, and, associated with 
 C. P. Phelps, practised law in 1794 and '95. He was 
 employed to go to France on business in 1796, and 
 spent most of his life abroad ; received the appoint- 
 ment of Consul to Hamburg, 1801 — Charge d' Af- 
 faires at Copenhagen, 1810 — Minister to Buenos 
 Ayres, 1820, and remained there till his death in 
 1831. He died unmarried. He was a gentleman 
 of fine qualities, and his protracted residence in 
 foreign countries was held a great privation by nu- 
 merous friends at home, 
 
 SoLOxMON VosE, son of Col. Joseph Vose, was born 
 at Milton in 1768, and graduated at Harvard College 
 in 1787 ; studied law with Hon. Levi Lincoln, of 
 "Worcester, and commenced practice at Northfield, 
 Franklm County, which town he frequently repre- 
 sented in the State Legislature ; and in 1805 he 
 removed to Augusta, Maine, where he died, much 
 respected, in 1809. 
 
 Roger Vose, son of Robert Vose, of Milton, born 
 in 1763, and graduated at Harvard College in 1790; 
 studied law, and settled at Walpole, N. H., wdiere 
 he w^as in practice many years. He served two 
 terms as member of Congress from that District 
 His death occurred in 1841, when 78 years of age. 
 
 Charles Pinckney Sumner, son of Job Sumner, 
 was born at Milton in 1776, graduated at Harvard 
 in 1796, studied law% and practised his profession in 
 Boston many years. He served 15 or 20 years as 
 Sheriff of the County of Suffolk, and died in 1839, 
 
76 
 
 aged 63. He delivered an eulogy upon the death of 
 Washington, at Milton, 
 published by the town. 
 
 Washington, at Milton, Feb. 22, 1800, which was 
 
 The adoption of the U. S. Constitution, in 1788, 
 occasioned the funding of the State debts, the resto- 
 ration of credit, the revival of trade, and our town 
 participated in the increasing prosperity of the State. 
 A long and successful career then commenced, and 
 has continued for seventy-three years, with slight in- 
 terruptions, until the commencement of our present 
 difficulties, which possibly may be intended as a 
 wholesome check upon the pride and extravagance 
 which proceed from a long exemption from reverses. 
 
 I shall not enter upon the events of the present 
 century, w^hich have scarcely ripened into history, as 
 many living witnesses of the occurrences of this 
 period are still among us. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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