“Command of a vessel without arms, and with but one eye”

Aside from having several children, what did Sylvanus Lowell do after being so badly injured at the Marblehead smallpox hospital in 1773?

First he returned to the maritime business, as shown by this advertisement from the 23 Mar 1774 Essex Journal, published in Newburyport:

For NEWFOUNDLAND,
THE Schooner ROSE, JACOB LOWELL, master, now lying at Marquand’s wharf, will sail by the first of April.—For Freight or Passage apply to Robert Jenkins, or Silvanus Lowell.
Newbury Port, March 21st, 1774.

Shortly after that, Parliament closed the port of Boston to most trade from outside Massachusetts, thus making secondary ports like Newburyport more important for about a year.

But then the war began, and sailing out of any Massachusetts port put ships at risk for being seized by the Royal Navy. At the same time, the province needed military supplies, and there was money to be made in privateering.

Sylvanus Lowell, despite his injuries, went back to sea. As the Newburyport Herald copied from the Saco Democrat in 1830:

No better evidence of his enterprising spirit is watnng, than the fact of his obtaining command of a vessel without arms, and with but one eye. It is said he was enabled to do much of his own writing, by screwing a pen into the hook attached to his arm.

In February 1777, the Massachusetts board of war commissioned Lowell to sail to St. Eustatia to trade for salt and these goods:

500 Effective Fire Arms, fit for Soldiers, with Bayonets —
500 Soldiers Blankets —
50 Barrels Gun-powder —
200 ps Ravens Duck or Tent Cloth —
300 lb Twine —
25 Casks 20d Nails —
30 do 10d do
15 do 4 do
If the above Articles are not to be got, bring the proceeds in Russia Duck, Cordage from 4½ Inches downwards, Coarse Checks & Linnens —

He commanded a crew of at least nine men. The captain was back by July, when he bought a house in Newbury for his growing family.

In 1779 Lowell became captain of a privateering brig listed as the Porgee (also Porgee and Pauga), with a letter of marque from New Hampshire. Though descendants recalled it as “a large war-ship,” the American War of Independence at Sea website says it carried only four guns and eleven men.

Nonetheless, the Porgee managed to capture a ship called the Lively, as shown by a legal notice in the 17 July 1780 Boston Gazette. AWIatsea.com says the ship then received a Massachusetts letter of marque and went out under another captain.

In 1781 Capt. Lowell invested in a privateering sloop named the Betsey, and reportedly he commanded other privateers himself. According to his 1830 obituary:

About 3 days before Peace was concluded, he was captured by the British; but by the time they reached the shore, this news was received, and he was liberated and sent home.

After this, he followed the sea 7 years, as master of a vessel out of Newburyport, in the employ of Tristram Dalton.

Dalton had backed many privateers during the war, including the Betsey.

Levi Mills of Newburyport sailed under Capt. Lowell to Richmond on the “good ship Diana” one winter in the mid-1780s. According to an item about Mills’s journal published by the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, this tobacco-buying trip meant navigating the ice and shoals of the James River.

In 1791, as I wrote yesterday, Lowell’s second wife Elizabeth died. By the end of the year he married a third wife, also named Elizabeth. It also appears that the captain’s remaining eye started to fail around this time, eventually leaving him totally blind.

Lowell “quit the sea,” sold that Newbury house, and moved his whole blended family up to Maine, where some of his siblings had already settled. His stepdaughter Fannie later described the part of Biddeford where they made their new home as “then a wilderness.”

I’m not sure how Sylvanus Lowell supported his family after that, but reportedly the children grew up “in comfort.” In Biddeford the captain was “greatly esteemed.” Around 1825 Lowell “was visited with a severe shock of the numb palsy,” and he died on 21 July 1830, aged 86. His third wife survived him for another nine years.

The Families of Sylvanus Lowell

Looking at the vital records from various Massachusetts towns helps to fill in the details of the life of Sylvanus Lowell, the ship’s captain maimed by a cannon in December 1773.

But those records also show some gaps and mysteries.

The vital records of Amesbury show the future mariner born to Moses and Francis (usually spelled Frances) Lowell on 2 May 1746. His name was apparently spelled as “Salvenas,” which looks more like church Latin than classical. He had siblings named Sarah, Thomas, Moses, Affea, Daniel, and Willebe (Willoughby). Their mother died when Sylvanus was two.

The vital records of Bradford say that on 2 Aug 1770 “Silvanus Lowell of Amesbury” married Hannah Hopkinson, daughter of Ens. Solomon Hopkinson of Bradford. That marriage is also noted, without an exact date, in the Amesbury records.

The Bradford records add that Hannah Lowell died on 20 Sept 1771, or possibly 26 September, “in her 26th year.” Thus, Sylvanus Lowell quickly became a widower.

There’s no child listed of that marriage in Amesbury or Bradford. However, the Bradford records are notably sparse if you weren’t named Kimball. The next sign of the family appears in the vital records of Newburyport, which say that Hannah Lowell, daughter of Sylvanus and Hannah, was baptized there on 20 June 1775. Was this a daughter of the captain’s first marriage, baptized at about age four? There’s no answer.

Likewise, I’ve found no answer about Sylvanus Lowell’s second marriage to a woman named Elisabeth. She pops up in the Newburyport records as mother of several children by him:

• Elisabeth, baptized 6 Oct 1776 and buried 3 Sept 1777.
• Elisabeth, baptized 12 Apr 1778.
• Harrison, baptized 30 Jan 1780, probably died young.
• Sylvanus, baptized 12 Aug 1781.
• Sally, baptized 2 Feb 1783.
• Thomas, baptized 11 Sept 1785 and buried 3 Sept 1786.

Newburyport also recorded the baptism of Harrison Lowell, son of Capt. Sylvanus and Elisabeth, on 29 Jan 1799. This may be the Maine legislator Harrison Lowell whose gravestone (shown above) gives his birthdate as 3 July 1791—though, again, that baptism would have been delayed.

Even more mysteriously, on 9 Mar 1791, Newburyport’s Essex Journal reported: “Died, Mrs. Lowell, wife of Capt. Silvanus Lowell of this town.” The vital records say that Elizabeth Lowell was buried that day. Obviously, she couldn’t have given birth to a son in July. Maybe the second Harrison was actually born in 1789 or 1790, and both the baptismal record and gravestone are off?

On 10 Oct 1791, just a few months after being widowed for the second time, Capt. Sylvanus Lowell married a widow about thirty-six years old named Elizabeth (McCard) Barriere or Berryer. She had a daughter, Fannie, from her first marriage.

I haven’t found any sign of Sylvanus having children by his second wife named Elizabeth. Each brought young children to the marriage to raise. Several of those children grew up, married, and had long lives. Both parents lived into their eighties.

This genealogical data shows Capt. Sylvanus Lowell having a fairly typical life for a New England patriarch of his time. Looking just at his three marriages and possibly eight children over more than a decade, one wouldn’t know that he’d come close to dying and lost significant portions of his body just before the Revolutionary War.

TOMORROW: What did you do in the war, Papa?

“Of these injuries he was confined some time”

You may have noticed that the two newspaper articles I’ve quoted about Sylvanus Lowell’s injuries and recovery didn’t state his full name.

The Boston and Newburyport newspaper printers referred to him only as “Captain Lowell” of Newburyport, trusting readers to know who that was if they really deserved to know.

Last fall I decided to fill in that missing name by looking for other sources mentioning such an unusual accident.

Not only did I luck out in finding references to the captain, but his given name turned out to be Sylvanus. There were other Sylvanus Lowells in New England during his lifetime, of course, but the combination was rare enough to track him further.

Among the sources that named Capt. Lowell are:

• Delmar R. Lowell, The Historic Genealogy of the Lowells in America (1899): “Capt. Sylvanus…On ‘Cat Island,’ in Boston Harbor, he lost his two arms and one eye while firing a cannon.”
• Biographical Sketches of Representative Citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (1901): “Captain Sylvanus Lowell, who shortly before his marriage lost both his arms by the accidental discharge of a cannon, the right one being taken off just below the elbow, and the left just above it, and also lost the sight of one eye.”
• John J. Currier, paper delivered to the Historical Society of Old Newbury (1911): “Sylvanus Lowell…was a sea captain, and while firing a salute on one of the islands in Boston harbor had the misfortune to injure both arms so that amputation was necessary, and at the same time lost the sight of one eye.”

The earliest source to provide a full name, and also more detail about the injury (not necessarily more accurate), was the captain’s obituary in the 7 Aug 1830 Newburyport Herald:

In 1773, he, with many others, were at Cat Island, in Boston harbor [sic], to be inoculated for the Small Pox—the physicians directed that two cannon should be taken to the Island for their amusement and recreation.—

Capt. L. was engaged in loading one of these, and while ramming down the cartridge, the piece went off—his left arm was blown off above the elbow, and his right just above the wrist; the right of one eye was entirely destroyed, and he was otherwise injured.

Of these injuries he was confined some time.

As you can tell from the date of that obituary, Capt. Lowell lived more than fifty-five years after his accident, even though most people felt he would die soon after.

But what sort of life did Lowell have, given his lack of hands and damaged sight? He had been a ship’s captain before, but how did he make his living afterward?

TOMORROW: Plus, a war broke out about a year later.

(Contrary to what those quoted sources say, Cat Island wasn’t in Boston harbor but off the coast of Marblehead. It’s legally part of Salem. In the 1850s the Salem Steamboat Company developed a seaside resort on the island. Because some of the investors were from the city of Lowell, they renamed their property Lowell Island. Thus, for several decades the site of Capt. Lowell’s injury shared his name. The resort didn’t last, though. The place is now home to a day camp and officially called Children’s Island. Presumably there are no working cannon for the children’s “amusement and recreation.”)

“His left arm was blown off and never found”

Last month I left ship’s captain Sylvanus Lowell lying near death at the smallpox hospital in Marblehead harbor in early December 1773.

Lowell had gone to that island hospital for inoculation. But then he loaded the island’s cannon for some sort of celebration, and it had exploded, severely injuring his neck, one eye, and both arms.

I paused to fill in the background of the doctor treating patients at that hospital, Hall Jackson, and his career in amputations.

That drew me into how Dr. Jackson volunteered as a military surgeon for the New Hampshire regiments at the siege of Boston, and how he got into a feud with Dr. Benjamin Church, Jr., over whose hospitals were healthier.

And then I hit the Sestercentennial of the mobbing of John Malcolm in Boston, so I had to cover that significant incident.

Meanwhile, fans of Capt. Lowell must have been on tenterhooks, wondering what would become of him.

Good news! The next status report on the patient appeared in the Essex Journal, published in Newburyport, on 26 Jan 1774:

Capt. Lowell of this town, whom we some time ago mentioned to have been terribly wounded by the discharge of a cannon at the Essex Hospital, having recovered, the cure merits notice, and does great honour to the physician who has the care of the Hospital.--

He had been inoculated but twelve days, and the small-pox was just making its appearance, when the accident happened, by which his left arm was blown off and never found, and the remaining part was amputated within four inches of his shoulder: The right hand and part of the arm were torn to pieces; and this arm was amputated just below the elbow:

The large vessels of the neck, the windpipe and the lower jawbone, from the chin to the ear, laid quite bare; and three of the upper fore teeth broken off with a piece of the jaw: The coats of the right eye pierced and its humours discharged, and the bone between the eye and the nose broken through; the other eye greatly hurt, the whole skin of the face and breast much hurt, and several shivers of bones driven into the cheeks in different places:

Besides this, he also had a wound four inches long in the inside of his thigh, which was so filled with powder that it was not discovered ’till several days after the accident.

Notwithstanding, in the short space of thirty-seven days he is so far recovered as to need no further care of a Surgeon.

Lowell remained on the island until 16 January. On that day the Marblehead mariner Ashley Bowen wrote in his journal:

This day some snow. Came from Cat Island Captain Lowell. Ditto Jackson desired him not to snowball anybody.

I’m not sure whether to read “Ditto Jackson” as “Jackson also came from the island” or as “Doctor Jackson.” That has a bearing on who made the very dark joke of telling a man with no hands left not to throw snowballs.

As Lowell returned home, there was rising fear among Marbleheaders that the hospital’s security was too lax to keep infectious clothing and people away from the larger community. That anxiety came on top of resentment at the hospital pricing inoculation out of reach of most ordinary people. For more on that controversy, see Andrew Wehrman’s “The Siege of ‘Castle Pox’” in the New England Quarterly.

The night after the Essex Journal ran its article praising the skills of “the physician who has the care of the Hospital,” a score of locals went onto Cat Island and burned that hospital to the ground.

TOMORROW: What was left for Capt. Lowell.

(The picture above, courtesy of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, is Ashley Bowen’s rendering of Cat Island “Ware the Pestt House Was arected for Enocolation for Small Pox in the Year 1773.”)

“Doctor HALL JACKSON has had the Care of this Lad”

Yesterday we left sea captain Sylvanus Lowell near death after he was caught at the wrong end of a cannon on Cat Island in Marblehead’s harbor.

Fortunately for Lowell, that island had become a smallpox inoculation hospital, and a surgeon was nearby: Dr. Hall Jackson (1739–1797, shown here).

Jackson had trained under his father, Dr. Clement Jackson, and then in London. He normally practiced in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, but traveled to the Boston area to inoculate people.

Jackson also presented himself as an expert on amputations. The 26 Feb 1768 New-Hampshire Gazette reported that he had just cut off both legs of “a young Lad of 17 Years of Age, belonging to Hampton,” who had suffered frostbite “in crossing Winnipiscokee Pond.” A week later, the same newspaper assured readers that boy was “in a fine Way of Recovery.”

The same 3 March issue then reported another case:

The Servant Boy of Mr. Gibbs…ran away from his Master, and secreted himself on board a Vessel in the Harbour in order to go off, but she not sailing so soon as was expected, he lay on board three Days & Nights, the Weather being extremly cold, he froze in such a Manner that he lost Part of both Feet immediately;

about a Week after he was seiz’d with those terrible Symptoms the Lock’d Jaw, and convulsive Cramp, he lay near three Weeks stiff and immoveable, no Force that could be apply’d would bend one Joint of his Body, nor could the Edge of the thinest Knife be forced between his Teeth:

the Nerves and Tendons of the remaining Parts of one Foot being bare, with violent and almost constant Spasms in the same Leg, it was tho’t adviseable to take it off, which gave him immediate Relief; his bad Symptoms are gone off, and he is so far recovered as to astonish every one who has seen him.———

We hear this Lad took in eighteen Days one Ounce two Drams of solid Opium, besides a large Quantity of Musk, notwithstanding which, he did not sleep one Hour in twenty-four during the whole Time.

Again, Dr. Hall Jackson cared for that boy and performed the amputations.

The Countway Library at Harvard Medical School has a letter Jackson wrote in 1771 to the father of a boy named Andrew Card, recommending that the boy’s leg be removed because of “several holes in his knee which discharge, and cause great pain.”

Andrew was actually under the care of another Portsmouth physician, Dr. Joshua Brackett (1733–1802), but Jackson offered his and his father’s surgical services free of charge. He wrote: “I believe that you would much rather trust your child under such an operation, to those, who have perform’d it fifty times, than to one who is altogether unused to the Business.” (He also asked the Cards to keep his offer secret from Brackett out of collegial courtesy.)

In the early 1770s, newspapers reported on surgeries by Dr. Hall Jackson to restore people’s sight. He felt compelled to advertise in the 13 Apr 1772 Boston Gazette that he only performed surgery on “the Cataract and contracted Iris.” Nonetheless, ocular experience was helpful in treating Capt. Lowell, who had also suffered injuries to the eye.

TOMORROW: Dr. Jackson and the New Hampshire troops.

“We have not yet heard of his being dead…”

In late 1773 and early 1774, Marblehead and surrounding towns were concerned and then convulsed with the new private smallpox hospital on Cat Island.

I haven’t written anything about the Essex Hospital because of:

• other events at that time, like the destruction of certain tea in Boston harbor.
• other events at this time, which kept me too busy to tackle more series.
• a thorough discussion of the whole episode by Andrew Wehrman in his New England Quarterly article “The Siege of ‘Castle Pox’” and his book The Contagion of Liberty.

I like to add to stories and not just repeat them at length if they’ve been told well recently. So check out The Contagion of Liberty for the short, scorching life of the Marblehead smallpox hospital.

But I did ferret out details of one anecdote tangential to that story. It starts with this article in the 7 Dec 1773 Essex Gazette, published in Salem:

Last Saturday Capt. ——— Lowell of Newbury-Port, a Patient at the Essex-Hospital, in charging a Cannon, (a Four Pounder) just after its being fired, and not properly sponged, the Cartridge took Fire while he was ramming it down: By which unhappy Accident both his Arms were blown almost to Pieces, one Hand entirely carried away with the Rammer; one Eye lost, and the other very much hurt, if not ruined; and the Skin and Flesh so tore away from below his Chin, and towards one Side of his Neck, as to lay his Wind-Pipe almost bare.

As the Accident happened near the Hospital, he was immediately carried in, and Doctor [Hall] Jackson proceeded to the Amputation of both Arms, one just above, and the other below the Elbow. We have not yet heard of his being dead, but it was thought he could not live long.

An eighteenth-century cannon has to be sponged out with a thick cloth on the end of a pole after every firing, as shown above, to ensure that there are no burning embers left inside the tube.

Furthermore, during that sponging someone has to keep his thumb over the touchhole, or the person pulling out the sponge risks can suck in more air through the back of the cannon and feed those embers.

Having all embers extinguished is especially important if a person wants to fire the cannon again, inserting another cartridge of gunpowder into the tube.

If any powder catches fire and explodes while someone is working at the mouth of the tube, the person can suffer exactly the same injury that Capt. Lowell did: having his arms blown off.

My addition to this story so far is that the unfortunate captain’s first name was Sylvanus.

TOMORROW: The patient’s prognosis.