Zannieri and Martello on Paul Revere in Concord, 25 Feb.

On Tuesday, 25 February, the Concord Museum will host a lecture on “Paul Revere: The Man, the Myth, the Legacy.”

This presentation will be delivered jointly by:

• Nina Zannieri, Executive Director of the Paul Revere Memorial Association, which operates the Paul Revere House in the North End of Boston.
• Robert Martello, Professor of the History of Science and Technology at Olin College of Engineering and author of Midnight Ride, Industrial Dawn: Paul Revere and the Growth of American Enterprise.

Revere is, of course, best known for his ride on 18–19 Apr 1775, spreading word of the British army march. He did indeed do that, but his prominence in American culture derives from Henry W. Longfellow turning him into a legend in 1861. The Paul Revere House has to help visitors sort out the history from the myth.

Because the history is even more interesting, if not as poetic. Before the war Revere was a political activist, among the most prominent from the mechanics class. Afterwards, he was a leader in Massachusetts’s business community and an early factory owner, the portion of his life that Prof. Martello studies.

This situation produces a paradox: Revere deserves to be remembered and studied in American history. But he’s a household name for actions that he did only part of, and which may not have been that crucial in history.

For an example on a smaller scale, generations of American schoolchildren have heard Longfellow’s lines:

It was two by the village clock,
When he came to the bridge in Concord town.

But Revere never made it to Concord on 19 April, much less to the North Bridge. He did, however, visit the town in the preceding week, carrying news that helped James Barrett decide to move the cannon and other ordnance on his farm farther away from Boston, and that stymied the British operation.

This event is scheduled to start at 7 P.M. It is free for Concord Museum members (though those seats might be sold out) and $10 for others. But it’s free to anyone who wants to tune in online.

Dr. Johnson, Miss M’Queen, and a “book of science”

At the Scilicet blog, James Fox wrote about a gift from Dr. Samuel Johnson:

In 1773, during their now famous tour of the Western Isles of Scotland, Samuel Johnson and James Boswell made a pit stop at a settlement called Aonach in Glen Moriston, near Inverness. As Johnson later recalled, a girl who served them tea ‘engaged me so much’ that he decided to give her a present. Having only what he could source in Inverness to hand, the gift was a copy of the highly popular maths textbook, Cocker’s Arithmetick.

Despite Boswell’s surprise, Johnson justified his giving of a practical gift. ‘When you have read through a book of entertainment’, he said, ‘you know it, and it can do no more for you; but a book of science is inexhaustible’. . . .

On the surface, Cocker’s Arithmetick was hardly riveting stuff. It taught the basics of arithmetic – addition, subtraction, multiplication and division – presented as a set of ‘rules’ to be memorised with many worked examples that began with very basic problems that became increasinging difficult. Yet its popularity is remarkable by any standards. Written by Edward Cocker, a London-based teacher of writing and arithmetic, the book was first published posthumously in 1678. It was then reissued continually for decades after, not only in London, but also Dublin, Edinburgh and Glasgow. Its final edition appeared over a century later, in 1787, and by my own (conservative) estimate, it saw at least seventy editions. . . .

Chapters on commercial arithmetic skills in the second half of the text hinted at its target audience: aspiring businesspeople. It was this facet of Cocker’s appeal that ensured its enormous popularity. The book appeared at just the moment when the currency of arithmetic was exploding thanks to rising literacy and the emergence of a society oriented around commerce, consumerism and sociability. Buying Cocker’s Arithmetick represented a ticket to this new world.

Fox’s article is framed around Boswell’s report that “Several ladies” later found this gift laughable. He concludes that those women laughed because it had become almost cliché to recommend this “humble textbook.”

I suspect at least part of that laughter came from how the scholar had given this book to “a young woman,” as opposed to an ambitious young man. Even a young woman who “had been a year at Inverness, and learnt reading and writing, sewing, knotting, working lace, and pastry”?

Plus, there’s the class issue. Johnson and Boswell were visiting “a village…of three huts, one of which is distinguished by a chimney.” Fortunately for them, the owner of that one hut with a chimney, a man named M’Queen, accommodated them for the night.

M’Queen’s daughter was the young woman who served these visitors. Johnson later described her as “not inelegant either in mien or dress”; “Her conversation, like her appearance, was gentle and pleasing.” He insisted that in Highlander society she was a “gentlewoman.” But clearly he and Boswell (perhaps especially Boswell) were surprised by some of the family’s claim to gentility:

There were some books here: a Treatise against Drunkenness, translated from the French; a volume of the Spectator; a volume of Prideaux’s Connection, and Cyrus’s Travels. M’Queen said he had more volumes; and his pride seemed to be much piqued that we were surprised at his having books.

Dr. Johnson himself would protest that the Scilicet article’s phrase “Having only what he could source in Inverness to hand” might be misleading. He didn’t pop down to the Inverness shops to find the best available book to give as a present. Instead, the men had already passed through Inverness, and Johnson had bought Cocker’s Arithmetic for his own reading. Then when he wanted to give Miss M’Queen a present, “I presented her with a book which I happened to have about me.”

To Boswell, it was “singular” that Johnson “should happen to have Cocker’s Arithmetick.” That prompted the scholar’s observation that “if you are to have but one book with you upon a Journey, let it be a book of science.” His remark about exhausting “a book of entertainment” wasn’t a comment on what a young woman like Miss M’Queen would most benefit from; it was a comment on what kept his own interest.

“The workmen all pack’d up their tools and left the barracks”

In late September 1774, as described by the Boston merchant John Andrews yesterday, towns neighboring Boston put pressure on their own citizens and on Bostonians to stop helping the British army build barracks.

As commander of all the British army in North American, Gov. Thomas Gage had faced that problem before back in 1768. Then the royal government had ended up renting buildings from willing owners and turning them into barracks. But in 1774 there were more regiments to house, and even more on the way.

Gage asked Boston’s selectmen to forestall what would amount to a labor strike. They replied that they actually wanted the troops grouped in barracks, but they had no power over rural towns’ policies.

The next day, 26 September, Andrews reported that Gage approached John Hancock directly. Since Hancock was one of the selectmen, he might already met with the general. Hancock was also the chair of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, and thus might have had leverage with other towns, but Gage officially refused to recognize that extralegal body. Furthermore, at the start of August, the governor had dismissed Hancock as commander of the Company of Cadets, so coming to the man for a favor was quite a concession.

Andrews wrote:

Sometime this day the Governor had a conference with Col: Hancock, requesting him to use his influence with the Committee to re-consider their vote respecting the barracks.

The Colonel observ’d to him that he had taken every possible measure to distress us: that notwithstanding it was the Solicitor’s opinion that the [Boston Port] Act could be construed to prevent goods, &ca., being transported within ye. bounds of the harbour, yet he had not suffered it to he done, and the Ships of War had seiz’d whatever had been attempted to be transported in that manner.

He likewise told him that he had been threat’ned, and apprehended his person was in danger, as it had been gave out by some of his people that he deserv’d to he hang’d: upon which the Governor told him he might have a guard, if he chose it, to attend him night and day. You will naturally conclude that he declin’d accepting.

The work stoppage took hold the next day:

At four o’clock yesterday afternoon, the workmen all pack’d up their tools and left the barracks, frames, &ca.; so that I am apprehensive we in the town will feel ill effects of it, as it has been given out that the troops will force quarters next month, if barracks are not provided for ’em: neither should I blame them for so doing, as the nights are so cold already, that it’s impossible for ’em to sleep comfortable under their slight canvas tents. And as to empty houses, now since we have got so many [Loyalist] refugees among us, there is not half sufficient to hold what troops we have got already here.

After the carpenters had left off work, the General sent Col. Robinson [actually James Robertson] and Major [William] Sheriff to Mr. Hancock, to let him know if they would proceed with the barracks, he could suffer any thing to be transported within the limits of the harbour, under the sanction of King’s stores—but all would not avail; as they very justly suppos’d, that after the work was compleated he would withdraw the indulgence, as he deems it, though in justice it not be prevented at all.

They have got the Carpenters from the Ships of War, and have sent an arm’d Schooner to Halifax for all the Artificers they can procure from there. It’s possible they may be as averse to coming as the Yorkers.

New York’s Patriots had already voted not to cooperate with the British army in Boston, a move that reportedly inspired the rural towns’ decision.

On 29 September, the merchant reported:

In the course of a day or two past, the Roxbury people have burnt several load of straw that was bringing in here, which has enrag’d the soldiers to such a degree, that I am in continual apprehension we shall soon experience another fifth of March, which God forbid!

In those same days, Andrews described how the Royal Artillery, Boston’s Patriot leaders, and ordinary people were all maneuvering over the mortars, cannon, and other ordnance in the inventory of hardware merchant Joseph Scott. Meanwhile, other artillery pieces were being seized by one side or the other (the focus of my book, The Road to Concord). Andrews was not alone in fearing that violence could break out any day.

“For the workmen here to go on with building barracks”

Like Richard Lechmere, quoted yesterday, the merchant John Andrews watched the conflict over housing the king’s troops in Boston in the fall of 1774.

Unlike Lechmere, Andrews leaned a little toward the Whigs. He, too, had protested the Boston committee of correspondence’s actions earlier in the year, but in a more mild way. He supported resistance against the Crown—as long as it didn’t threaten his business or his health.

In writing to his relative in Philadelphia on 25 September, Andrews emphasized how the people of Boston weren’t making life easy for the soldiers. He didn’t want people in other colonies to get the idea that Bostonians weren’t worthy of their support.

The example of our worthy brethren of New York, in not letting their vessels for Government service, as well as that their Carpenters would not engage in any work for ’em, has induc’d the country people to think seriously whether they were right in supplying with timber, joice, and Straw for the Barracks here.

They accordingly met and determin’d in ye. negative; sent committees to the severall contractors to let them know if they supply’d any further they would incur the resentment of the whole country; and at the same time signified to our committee of correspondence that they did not think it eligible for the workmen here to go on with building barracks or preparing houses for the reception of the troops, as we might possibly, by persisting, not only incur blame from our sister colonies, but essentially affect the union now subsisting between town and country; which circumstance caus’d the Committee to get together Saturday P.M., when they pass’d a vote, that it was not prudent for ye. workmen to go on with ye. frames, &ca., nor in any shape to contribute towards the accommodation of the soldiery, as they might themselves give offence to their country brethren.

The purport of which coming to the Governor [Thomas Gage], he sent his compliments to the Select men, and beg’d their attendance at six o’clock this evening, when he requested of them that they would not take any measures to prevent the workmen from going on with the barracks.

They reply’d it was not in their power to influence the country, and it lay principally with them whether the workmen should proceed or not: that they themselves were dispos’d to have the barracks go on, as they conceiv’d it much more for the benefit of the town (if the Soldiery must be here) to have them kept together, rather than to be scatter’d over the town, as in that case it would be a very difficult matter to keep them in order.

The Governor seem’d a great deal worried about ye. affair, and am told that in the course of the conversation he express’d himself thus—“Good G—d! for G—d’s sake, Gentlemen! they have got two months work to do, and the Soldiers ought to he in barracks in one. Do consider, Gentlemen!”—Thus the tables are in some measure turn’d. Formerly they solicited the Governor, but now it seems he solicits them.

As Andrews pointed out, that discussion happened on a Sunday, when Bostonians weren’t supposed to do any business unless it was really urgent.

TOMORROW: Trying to strike a bargain.

Picking at the Martha Washington Dress Quilt

In the Colonial Revival period, many Americans came forward with relics of the Revolution passed down in their families or discovered in attics.

And some of those were even authentic.

Others, however, were not. I retold the saga of a reputed Thomas Oliver portrait here, for example.

Among items donated to the Bostonian Society in its early decades, I’m skeptical about the machine-woven “Sons of Liberty flag.”

I worked with Dave Ingram on a report about a powder horn ascribed to Richard Gridley; we determined it was almost certainly a Colonial Revival–era creation.

The Old South Meeting House also became a public institution at that time and began receiving donations. In the 1890s one important supporter, Mary Hemenway, gave Old South “a quilt made from fragments of Martha Washington’s dresses,” as Lori Fidler, Associate Director of Collections at Revolutionary Spaces, recently described in this article.

That’s just the sort of object that Americans oohed and aahed over breathlessly during the Colonial Revival. From the Age of Homespun! Touched by the great Washingtons themselves! But how reliable is its lore?

We know the quilt came to Hemenway from Fannie Washington Finch, an actual great-grandniece of George Washington. Her story:

Fannie was born Frances Louisa Augusta Washington in Virginia in 1828. Her mother, Henrietta Spotswood, was the granddaughter of George Washington’s half-brother, Augustine, Jr., while her father, Bushrod, was the grandson of George’s brother, John Augustine. Fannie’s grandmother, Jane Washington, had made the quilt out of scraps she received directly from Martha.

We also know from Finch’s letters in 1884–1886 that she was selling heirlooms from Mount Vernon, including this quilt, because of her “pecuniary condition.” In other words, she needed money.

There are also intriguing details about the quilt itself:

In 1979, a textile curator at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts examined the quilt, finding the silk pieces to be expensive English-made loom-woven fabrics, consistent with textiles worn by wealthy women of the 1700s. He mentioned that the designs represented a range of time periods, with larger floral patterns from the mid-18th century and tiny blossoms from the late 1700s. . . .

In May 2024,…[Zara] Anishanslin noted that a fabric used in the quilt appeared to be an Anna Maria Garthwaite design. Garthwaite was a female silk designer who lived and worked in the Spitalfields area of London in the mid-1700s.

Thus, Finch might have had a motive to concoct a connection between this quilt and Martha Washington—but the artifact itself really does contain the fabrics a wealthy British-American woman in the mid- to late 1700s would have owned.

Furthermore, Fidler reports, “In her writings, Martha Washington mentions cutting up her garments and distributing pieces to family members and friends as mementos.” Finch couldn’t have inserted that into the historical record.

So on this item, I’m inclined to accept the lore.

“Revisiting the American Revolution” Lecture Series in Hingham

The Hingham Historical Society is hosting a series of seven lectures from September through April 2025 on the theme of “Revisiting the American Revolution.”

I’m honored to be one of those speakers, and a bit humbled to see the others in the lineup.

15 September
1774: The Long Year of Revolution
Mary Beth Norton

Norton is the Mary Donlon Alger Professor of American History Emerita at Cornell University, where she taught from 1971 to 2018. She has written seven books about early American history, including Liberty’s Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of American Women, 1750-1800 and In the Devil’s Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692. She was a coauthor of A People and A Nation, one of the leading U.S. history textbooks. Her most recent work, the basis for this talk, won the 2021 George Washington Prize.

27 October
Making Thirteen Clocks Strike as One: Race, Fear, and the American Founding
Robert Parkinson

Parkinson is Professor of History at Binghamton University. He is the author of The Common Cause: Creating Race and Nation in the American Revolution, and most recently, Heart of American Darkness: Bewilderment and Horror on the Early Frontier.

17 November
The Spies in Henry Barnes’s House
J.L. Bell

Bell is the author of The Road to Concord: How Four Stolen Cannon Ignited the Revolutionary War, a National Park Service report on Gen. George Washington in Cambridge, and numerous articles. He maintains the Boston 1775 website, offering daily postings of history, analysis, and unabashed gossip about the American Revolution in New England.

8 December
From Hingham to Yorktown: The Military Campaigns of General Benjamin Lincoln
Robert Allison

Allison is a professor of history at Suffolk University. His books include a biography of American naval hero Stephen Decatur, and short books on the history of Boston and the American Revolution, and an edition of The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Two of his classes, “Before 1776: Life in Colonial America,” and “The Age of Benjamin Franklin” are available from The Great Courses. As chair of Revolution 250, a consortium of organizations planning Revolutionary commemorations in Massachusetts, he hosts its weekly podcast, and he is president of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts.

26 January 2025
Hingham’s Revolutionary Canteens
Joel Bohy

Bohy is the director of Historic Arms & Militaria at Bruneau and Co. Auctioneers and a frequent appraiser of Arms & Militaria on the PBS series Antiques Roadshow. His is also an active member of several societies of collectors and historians, an instructor for Advanced Metal Detecting for the Archeologist, and an advisory board member of American Veterans Archaeological Recovery. Growing up in Concord, Massachusetts, helped lead to Bohy’s passion for historic arms & militaria, conflict archaeology, and artifacts like Hingham’s historic Revolutionary War canteens.

9 March
How to Radicalize a Moderate: John Hancock and the Outbreak of the Revolutionary War
Brooke Barbier

Barbier is a public historian with a Ph.D. in American History from Boston College. She is the author of King Hancock: The Radical Influence of a Moderate Founding Father and Boston in the American Revolution: A Town Versus an Empire. Because she believes beer makes history even better, she founded Ye Olde Tavern Tours in 2013, a popular guided outing along Boston’s renowned Freedom Trail.

6 April
The Declaration of Independence: A Guide for Our Times
Danielle Allen

Allen is James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University and Director of the Allen Lab for Democracy Renovation at Harvard Kennedy School’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation. She is a professor of political philosophy, ethics, and public policy. She is also a seasoned nonprofit leader, democracy advocate, tech ethicist, distinguished author, and mom. Her many books include the widely acclaimed Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality, and she writes a column on constitutional democracy for the Washington Post.

All these talks will take place live beginning at 3:00 P.M. on a Saturday at the Hingham Heritage Museum, and also be streamed online. The society is now selling subscriptions to the entire series for prices ranging from $175 for someone who’s already a member to $675 for someone who wants to become a society Steward. The subscription price for non-members is $200, or about $29 apiece.

“Redcoats & Rebels” in Sturbridge, 3–4 Aug.

New England’s largest Revolutionary War reenactment will take place this weekend, 3-4 August, at Old Sturbridge Village.

“Redcoats & Rebels” has been an annual event for many years now, attracting large crowds of participants and spectators. The museum village therefore asks people to obtain tickets before showing up. (Members can reserve their slots.)

The event promises:

hundreds of costumed Revolutionary War reenactors, both soldiers and civilians, encamped on the Village Common.

Visitors can explore our exhibits and galleries, watch demonstrations, and talk with our costumed historians about everyday life in early New England. In addition, visitors can tour the camps, witness recreated skirmishes and battles, see special presentations, chat with guest craftspeople, and enjoy fife and drum music.

The Village will open to visitors from 9:30 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. each day, and visitors can “mingle with the troops” until 8:00 P.M. on Saturday.

For a little more information, including the food available on the weekend, go to this page.

Tea with Gen. Gage in Salem This Week

In June 1774, 250 years ago, Salem suddenly became more important.

Parliament’s Boston Port Bill took effect on 1 June, and the harbor of Salem and Marblehead became Massachusetts’s largest port open to trade from outside the colony. The Customs office moved there.

Also, Gov. Thomas Gage adjourned the Massachusetts General Court from Boston to Salem, following orders from London. That move didn’t require a new law since the royal governor already had the power to convene the legislature where he chose. That didn’t stop most of the new session being taken up with complaints about being in Salem.

When Gage moved to the region, renting a house in nearby Danvers, he also brought a contingent of British soldiers. There doesn’t appear to have been as much friction between those troops and the locals as in Boston in 1768–1770, but the town governments still raised concerns.

This week the city’s historical organizations are commemorating that period with some public events.

Thursday, 13 June, 7:00 P.M.
Tea’s Party: From Boston to Salem and Back Again
Salem Armory Regional Visitor Center

James R. Fichter speaks about how, despite the so-called Boston Tea Party of 1773, large shipments of tea from the East India Company were sold in North America. The survival of the Boston tea shaped Massachusetts politics in 1774, impeded efforts to reimburse the company for its losses, and hinted at the enduring conflict between consumer demand and political boycotts.

That tension was not confined to Boston. As Gen. Gage and the colonial government relocated to Salem in the summer of 1774, Essex County residents found committing to a boycott just as difficult as Bostonians had.

Fichter is Associate Professor in Global and Area Studies at the University of Hong Kong. He is the author of So Great a Profit: How the East Indies Transformed Anglo-American Capitalism and Tea: Consumption, Politics, and Revolution, 1773–1776.

This event is free. For directions, visit this page.

Saturday & Sunday, 15–16 June, 10 A.M. to 4 P.M.
Governor Gage Comes to Salem
Derby Wharf, Salem

The British army will encamp on the waterfront, with some of New England’s finest living history practitioners portraying soldiers, officers, legislators, and the Loyalist and Patriot citizens of Salem. Over the weekend, visitors can meet people from many walks of life: shoeblacks, teachers, merchants, tavern-keepers, midwives, and more. Activities to be reenacted include military drill, camp cooking, placing ads in a newspaper, and political debate at the tavern.

Here is the full schedule of events.

Sunday, 16 June, 9:00 A.M.
Join the Royal Governor at Church
St. Peter’s Church, Salem

Gen. Gage attended the local Anglican Church when he was in America. In Salem, that meant St. Peter’s, which will recreate an eighteenth-century service with the general occupying the same pew that he used in 1774.

Summer Saturdays at the Paul Revere House

The Paul Revere House has a special program included with admission on every Saturday afternoon this summer. Unless otherwise stated, all these events run 1:00 to 3:00 P.M.

25 May
Colonial Dance Tunes and Love Songs from Al Petty & Deirdre Sweeney.

1 June
Colonial Weaving Demonstration by fiber artist Zoe Lawson.

8 June, 1:00, 1:45, 2:30 P.M.
Meet Harriet, Daughter of Paul Revere: Diane Lent portrays one of Paul Revere’s sixteen children, reminiscing about her father and growing up in the North End.

15 June
Patriot Fife and Drum concert by David Vose and Sue Walko.

22 June, 1:00, 1:45, 2:30 P.M.
Meet Loyalist Tea Consignee Joshua Winslow: Father of young chronicler Anna Green Winslow, Winslow was named one of the East India Company’s tea consignees. After watching one protest, he retreated to a family home in Marshfield. Meet him today, as portrayed by Michael Lepage, on a rare venture into Boston before he was forced into exile.

29 June
Hammered Dulcimer played by award-winning musician Dave Neiman.

6 July
Colonial Dance Tunes and Love Songs from Al Petty & Deirdre Sweeney.

13 July
Patriot Fife and Drum concert by David Vose and Sue Walko.

20 July
Hammered Dulcimer played by award-winning musician Dave Neiman.

27 July, 1:00, 1:45, 2:30 P.M.
John Adams: The Colossus of Independence: The lawyer discusses his beginnings in Braintree through his days as delegate to the Continental Congress and diplomat. As portrayed by Michael Lepage, hear how he longs to be home with his wife and children. 

3 August, 1:00, 1:45, 2:30 P.M.
The Many Rides of Paul Revere: The silversmith traveled far from home many times as a courier for the Boston Patriots, including a May 1774 trip to New York and Philadelphia bearing news of the Boston Port Bill. Learn about these trips as Michael Lepage portrays the home owner.

10 August
The Tailor’s Craft: Clothing historian Henry Cooke takes on the role of an early Boston tailor. 

17 August
Hammered Dulcimer played by award-winning musician Dave Neiman.

24 August
Patriot Fife and Drum concert by David Vose and Sue Walko.

31 August, 1:00, 1:45, 2:30 P.M.
Meet Harriet, Daughter of Paul Revere: Diane Lent portrays one of Paul Revere’s 16 children, reminiscing about her father and growing up in the historic North End.

Elijah Sanderson of Lexington and Salem

Elijah Sanderson has appeared on Boston 1775 several times, but usually as a source on other people’s experiences of the April 19 battle.

Several years back, Donna Seger highlighted Sanderson’s memories of that day and his subsequent career on her Streets of Salem site.

In 1775 Sanderson signed off on a brief account of his experience for the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. But he had much more to say in Elias Phinney’s History of the Battle of Lexington, on the Morning of the 19th of April, 1775, published in 1825.

Seger wrote:

Phinney took oral histories from participants who were still alive, published in the form of sworn affidavits in the book’s appendix, and the very first account was that of Elijah Sanderson, who was at the end of a long career as one of Salem’s most successful cabinetmakers. Sanderson’s testimony was given just weeks before his death in early 1825, and published not only in Phinney’s account but also in the regional newspapers that year, when historical consciousness of the importance of the Battles of Lexington and Concord seems quite well-developed.

Elijah Sanderson and his younger brother Jacob were among the most prolific and consequential cabinetmakers of Salem, who spread the city’s craftsmanship and style far beyond New England through an expansive export trade in alliance with their partner Josiah Austin and several prominent merchants and shipowners.

That’s the same Josiah Austin quoted in this document describing how he moved ammunition out of Concord. Since that account seems incredible, perhaps Austin was spurred to invent his tale after hearing his partners talk about their presence at Lexington. Or perhaps someone else thought that if one Salem cabinetmaker was in the thick of the fight, another could be inserted into that action as well.

…in 1775 the Sanderson brothers were living in Lexington, in the home of their elder brother Samuel…on the main road from Boston. . . . relatively late on the evening of the 18th Elijah noted the passing of a party of British officers “all dressed in blue wrappers”. He decided to discern what was up, so made his way to John Buckman’s tavern where an older gentleman encouraged him to “ascertain the object” of these officers, so he did so, on a borrowed horse in the company of two other comrades. . . .

Elijah’s party was stopped by nine British officers a few miles down the road in Lincoln, and they were detained and examined, along with two other “prisoners”, a one-handed pedlar named Allen and Col. Paul Revere. After “as many question as a Yankee could” ask, the entire party mounted and made their way to Lexington, where [fellow detainee John] Loring observed “The bell’s a ringing, and the town’s alarmed, and you’re all dead men” but [the officers] let them go, after cutting the bridle and girth of Elijah’s horse.

We hear no more of Revere, but Elijah made his way to the tavern in Lexington and there promptly fell asleep! Yes, he fell asleep in the middle of the opening act of the American Revolution.

But then came the drums signalling that the British column was in sight. To follow Sanderson through what happened next, visit Streets of Salem.

(The picture above is a secretary bookcase from the Sanderson brothers’ shop, now the property of the U.S. Department of State.)

James Smither, Engraver of Philadelphia

The 18 Apr 1768 Pennsylvania Chronicle included this advertisement:

James Smither, Engraver,
At the first house in Third Street, from the Cross Keys, Corner of Chestnut-Street, Philadelphia,
PERFORMS all manner of ENGRAVING in Gold, Silver, Copper, Steel, and all other Metals—Coats of Arms, and Seals, done in the neatest Manner. Likewise cuts Stamps, Brands, and metal Cuts for Printers, and ornamental Tools for Bookbinders. He also ornaments Guns and Pistols, both engraving and inlaying Silver, at the most REASONABLE RATES.

Smither had come from Britain, where he reportedly worked for a while in the Tower of London engraving guns for the government.

In January 1769, Smither proposed to start a drawing school for “young gentlemen and ladies.”

Meanwhile, he was also doing a wide range of engraving jobs, including:

• book plates, bill heads, and illustrations for the printer Robert Bell.
• a portrait of John Dickinson during his fame as the author of the Farmer’s Letters (shown above).
• a map of “the CITY and LIBERTIES of PHILADELPHIA,” advertised by John Reed in 1773.
• currency for the colony of Pennsylvania in 1772.
• this hot water urn made by silversmith Robert Humphrey in 1774, presented to Charles Thomson in thanks for his services to the First Continental Congress.

In October 1775, the colony was at war, and it needed to print more money. Pennsylvania hired Smither to engrave another series of notes, issued through April 1776.

In the fall of 1777, the British army took Philadelphia.

By May 1778, Smither was engraving the tickets for the Meschianza, Maj. John André’s elaborate ball and theatrical tournament for army officers and wealthy Loyalists.

But that may not have been the only job James Smither did for the royal authorities in Philadelphia. On 11 April, Thomas Paine wrote to Henry Laurens, then president of the Second Continental Congress, about counterfeiters. He made this proposal:

As Forgery is a Sin against all men alike and reprobated by all Civil Nations. Query, would it not be right to require of General [William] Howe, the Persons of Smithers and others in Philadelphia suspected of this Crime; and if he or any other Commander, continues to conceal or protect them in such practices, that in such case the Congress will Consider the Crime as the Act of the Commander in Chief.

The idea that the Congress could ask Gen. Howe to hand over anyone suspected of forging Continental or state notes was ludicrous, but no one ever said Thomas Paine wasn’t visionary.

On 18 June, the British army pulled out of Philadelphia, heading across New Jersey back to New York. James Smither probably went with them. In 1778 the Pennsylvania council put him on a long list of people who had “willingly aided and assisted the enemies of this state,” and at the end of the war it seized his property.

TOMORROW: Meeting Maj. Donkin.

The Politics of Francis Shaw

As I discussed yesterday, despite how Josiah Quincy characterized the situation in his biography of Samuel Shaw, the Shaw family was not forced to host British marine officers under the Quartering Act.

Rather, in all likelihood, the merchant Francis Shaw (1721–1784) chose to rent rooms to Maj. John Pitcairn, Lt. John Ragg, and perhaps other men.

We don’t have enough sources about Francis Shaw to know what his motivations might have been: money, a sense of obligation or deference to the military, a wish to mollify the royal authorities?

Shaw wasn’t a Loyalist. He didn’t sign either of the addresses to the royal governors in 1774, nor leave town at the evacuation in 1776. In preceding years, he hadn’t stood up to complain about any of the Whigs’ measures.

Nor, however, was Francis Shaw an active Patriot. He had joined the Boston Society for Encouraging Trade and Commerce back in the early 1760s. That was an early chamber of commerce, speaking for the merchant community, and it opposed the Sugar Act and what its members saw as overeager enforcement of that law. In 1770 the Boston town meeting added Shaw’s name to a committee to promote non-importation, particularly by not selling tea.

But other than those moments, the name of Francis Shaw doesn’t appear in connection with Whig politics. He didn’t dine with the Sons of Liberty in 1769. He wasn’t on the committee to promote the Continental Association of 1774. (He may have been a member of the St. Andrew’s Lodge of Freemasons, meaning he knew some Whig leaders, but wasn’t forward in supporting them. Or that Freemason might have been Francis Shaw, Jr.)

The town meeting elected Shaw as a fireward in the North End in 1772. The North End Caucus endorsed his reelection the next year, and he kept at that job until 1784. Boston thanked him for his long service a few months before he died. But that was an apolitical job.

My impression is that Francis Shaw chose to stay out of the larger debate. His son Samuel, in contrast, was fervent for the Patriot cause in 1775. We can see hints of that difference in the anecdote about Samuel getting into an argument with Lt. Ragg, quoted back here.

Francis Shaw had chosen to host British marine officers. The anecdote suggests he didn’t speak out against Ragg calling Americans “cowards and rebels” and then apparently moving toward a duel with twenty-year-old Samuel. The father didn’t, for instance, demand that his tenant leave his son alone—or if he did, it didn’t become part of the family lore. It was up to Maj. Pitcairn to calm matters.

Furthermore, I think the evidence suggests Francis Shaw told his son not to join the Continental Army. Only on his twenty-first birthday, when he was no longer legally under his father’s control, did Samuel leave Boston and seek a commission in the artillery regiment.

Once that happened, letters show that Francis Shaw supported his son, financially and otherwise. After the siege, the merchant served on Boston committees to collect taxes and record citizens’ military service. He may have invested a bit in privateers (or this could have been a man of the same name from Salem). In sum, Francis Shaw became a Patriot, even if he didn’t start out as one.

COMING UP: Lt. Ragg’s war.

(The picture above, courtesy of Old North, shows a sampler made by twelve-year-old Lydia Dickman in 1735. Nine years later she married Francis Shaw. They had one child together, but Lydia died in 1746 and her son the following year. Francis Shaw remarried and had more children, including Samuel. The sampler is now in the collection of the National Museum of American History.)

Getting Inside the New England Primer

The American Antiquarian Society’s Past Is Present blog recently shared Mitchel Gundrum’s essay on New England Primers, the region’s standard reading textbook for many decades.

Gundrum was at the A.A.S. as a Conservation Intern, having trained in book binding and restoration at the San Francisco Center for the Book, the North Bennet Street School, and West Dean College. His essay analyzed those schoolbooks as physical objects.

New England Primers were little books printed in huge numbers. Gundrum noted two ways the sample of surviving copies differs from the larger body of books from the period.

First, “Of the 269 primers surveyed at the American Antiquarian Society, 105 were bound in scaleboard, 97 in paper wrappers, and 32 in paper-based boards.” And what does “scaleboard” mean?

scaleboard binding [is] a distinctly early American structure which deserves exploration in its own right. Scaleboard bindings are unique in their use of thin (1–3 mm) wooden cover boards nearly two hundred years after the uptake of paper-based paste- and pulpboard in the West. The lack of a developed papermaking industry in the American colonies, the expense of importing paper products from Europe, and the wealth of natural forest resources in the New World made scaleboard economically preferable in the Colonies, but the practice persisted for a variety of reasons through the 1840s.

Perhaps a high proportion of Primers were bound with wood was because customers expected those books to stand up to rougher handling than usual, carried from home to school and back day after day, pawed over by little fingers, perhaps passed down from one sibling to the next.

During his work, Gundrum noticed something else distinctive:

While fully colored and sprinkled edges are fairly common for 18th century bindings, the bands of red, blue, green, or brownish black ink found on several bindings are unique in both appearance and the fact that they are apparently exclusive to the NEP. When I first noticed this decoration during a survey at the Library of Congress, I was ready to write it off as personalization by a previous owner. After gathering more data, however, we’ve found 75 examples of this decoration on imprints spanning 100 years, 7 states, and 20 cities.

Edge decoration is important because these books were produced at minimal cost and maximum efficiency: the extra time and expense required to decorate these books must have had some financial justification. Was the bright decoration a form of advertising for the NEP, meant to catch the eye of children or parents? A nationalist attempt to distinguish the new American product from English imprints with similar content?

Because so many printers produced copies of the New England Primer, with customers expecting pretty much the same content, they might have competed on the basis of such decorative details.

Some Museum Programs for School Vacation Week

Some of greater Boston’s Revolutionary sites have announced special programming for next week, which is a public school vacation in Massachusetts.

Thanks to support from the Highland Street Foundation, the Paul Revere House in the North End will be free to visit on Tuesday, 20 February.

On the two days that follow, the site is offering a drop-in family activity called “Share Your Love of the Written Word,” inspired by vintage postcards from its collection. Participating is free with admission. Regular admission is $6 for adults, $5.50 for seniors and college students, $1.00 for children 5-17, and free for members and North End residents.

Nearby, the Old North Church and Historic Site is usually closed to the public during the winter, but it will be open 17–24 February from 11:00 A.M. (12:30 P.M. on Sunday) to 5:00 P.M. Admission tickets, which costs $5 per person, include a self-guided tour of the church’s sanctuary, the current exhibit, and answers from the education staff. For $5 more one can enjoy a self-guided tour of the historic crypt and an audio guide.

Outside the city, the Concord Museum is promising unspecified “special family activities” on Monday, Thursday, and Friday, according to its calendar. That week is also the last chance to see the museum’s exhibit “Interwoven: Women’s Lives Written in Thread.” On Friday, 23 February, educator and reenactor Michelle Gabrielson will present the work of quilting a petticoat.

The Lexington Historical Society’s historic taverns will host special programs for kids of different ages on “Lighting the Way” and “Science and Medicine” during the vacation week. For more details, including the registration cost, visit its events page.

The Hive Symposium, 17–18 Feb.

On the weekend of 17–18 February, Minute Man National Historical Park will host its annual symposium for living history interpreters, The Hive.

Cosponsoring organizations include the Friends of Minute Man, Revolution 250, Freedom’s Way National Heritage Area, and the Massachusetts Army National Guard, which will host the gathering.

Though this series of presentations and workshops is designed primarily for people who participate in the park’s colonial reenactments, including the Battle of Lexington and Concord, they offer valuable information for anyone interested in local Revolutionary history.

The schedule of presentations includes:

Overview of the Minute Man 250 Thematic Framework with Park Rangers Jim Hollister and Jarrad Fuoss: The 250th anniversary of the American Revolution is well underway! The staff at Minute Man have developed an interpretive framework that carry our program through the next several years.

1774: The Empire Strikes Back, and Resistance Becomes Revolution with Prof. Bob Allison of Suffolk University: Parliament responded to Boston’s destroying the tea by closing the port and suspending the 1691 charter. The people of Massachusetts would no longer have control over their municipal governments. Instead of silencing the local resistance, these moves brought the other colonies into an alliance with Massachusetts to begin a revolution against Parliament's authority. Find out what went wrong for the Empire in 1774.

By His Excellency’s Command: General Gage, the British Army and the People of Salem in 1774 with Dr. Emily Murphy: In June of 1774 the newly appointed royal governor of Massachusetts, Gen. Thomas Gage, was eager to escape the political turbulence of Boston. Therefore, he took the drastic step of removing himself and the provincial legislature to the seemingly calmer waters of Salem. Two regiments of British regulars came with him. That summer the people of Salem came into direct contact with a display of royal power on a scale they had never before experienced. What was the social and political landscape of the town like in 1774? How did the people deal with their new neighbors?

Lives of the Embattled Farmers: The Towns of Lexington, Lincoln and Concord in 1775, a panel discussion with Alex Cain, Don Hafner, and Bob Gross: The towns of Lexington, Lincoln and Concord were farming communities. Many of the families who called these towns home had been there for multiple generations. In this panel discussion we will look at the social and economic dynamics of these three towns, their similarities and their differences.

Practical, often hands-on workshops will cover these topics:

• “Techniques for Informal Visitor Engagement” with Park Ranger Jarrad Fuoss
• “Too Clean!: Incorporating Appropriate Levels of Garment Distress into Your Historical Impression” with Adam Hodges-LeCaire
• “A Pressing Matter: Media Literacy & 18th Century Newspapers” with Michele Gabrielson
• “Women’s Hair Styles and Cosmetics” with Renee Walker-Tuttle
• “Men’s Hair Styles” with Neils Hobbs and Sean Considine
• “‘Fitted with the Greatest Exactness’: The Material Culture of Appearance of the 18th-Century British Soldier” with Sean Considine and Niels Hobbs
• “Pinning Gowns & Filling Pockets: How to Wear Women’s Clothing Well & Have Fun Pulling from Your Pockets!” with Ruth Hodges

Plus, the program includes time for sewing circles, infantry drill, consultation on kit, and lunchtime conversations.

The 2024 spring season at Minute Man will includes some events about the crucial year of 1774 in addition to the traditional Patriots Day battle reenactment. That event will be practice for the Sestercentennial in 2025, which may very well be insane.

Register to attend the 2024 Hive symposium through the Friends of Minute Man Park.

Sorting Out Details about William Hendley

On 23 Feb 1830, the Rhode-Island American reported this death:

In Waldoborough, (Me) Mr William Hendley, formerly of Roxbury, Mass. aged 82. He was a revolutionary pensioner, and present at the destruction of the Tea in Boston Harbour.

That report may have come from another newspaper closer to Maine. The same sentence appeared in several other American newspapers afterwards.

According to the 11 Nov 1814 Dedham Gazette, Mary Hendley, wife of William, had died in Roxbury at age 63. The veteran was then in his seventies. He might have moved north to Maine to live with children or relatives.

The U.S. Revolutionary War Pension database turns up only one William Hendley from Massachusetts. His application stated that he had enlisted as a private soldier on 24 Mar 1777 at Stoughton in the 7th Massachusetts Regiment and served for three years under Col. Ichabod Alden and Col. John Brooks. His first company commander was Capt. William Patrick, killed at Cobleskill, New York. In 1780 Hendley was discharged at West Point as a corporal.

Hendley’s file offers almost no other information except that in 1820 he identified himself as a “Mariner,” and that he made his application at the court in Boston.

Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors, based on state records, lists a William Hendley/Hendly with the same service details. It also lists other soldiers with the same or similar names from Boston and Scituate.

When William Hendley of Waldoborough died, American newspapers were starting to lift the curtain on who had destroyed the East India Company tea in December 1773. Editors had kept the secret until the 1820s, especially inside Boston itself. But as time passed, and veterans passed on, the old custom faded. Unfortunately, Hendley died too early for anyone to interview him in depth about the Tea Party and what role he’d played.

The 1835 book Traits of the Tea Party even included an appendix of men who had participated in the event, the first such list published. William Hendley was on it, possibly because of the newspaper death notice.

Decades later, Francis Drake sought to profile all the men and boys at the Boston Tea Party in his book Tea Leaves (1884). About Hendley he wrote:

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

The first sentence was based on the obituary, the second on the 1796 Boston directory, which listed:

Henly, William, mason, Sweetser’s buildings, Newbury Street.

However, it’s quite possible that William Henly, Boston mason, wasn’t William Hendley, Roxbury mariner who would die in Maine. The 14 June 1804 Boston Gazette reported that “Mr. William Henly, aged 44,” had died in town “after a lingering illness.” The mason might have been one of the other veterans listed in Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors; if so, he didn’t live long enough to apply for a pension.

Furthermore, at some point Drake’s entry about Hendley was misread. He was changed from a mason to a Freemason.

Thus, on looking at the earliest sources of information about this man, I sort out:

• William Hendley, “present” at the Tea Party, soldier in the Continental Army for three years, lived in Roxbury, applied for a U.S. pension, moved to Maine, and died in 1830.
• William Henly, possibly in the army, mason in Boston in 1796, possibly died in 1804.
• “William Hendley, mason,” an amalgam of these two men and later fictitiously a Freemason.

“His hat and clothes were covered with tea dust”

The Rev. Dr. John Prince (1751–1836, shown here) had an unusual path to the pulpit, and an unusual sideline afterward.

He was apprenticed and trained as a tinsmith and pewterer in Boston before entering Harvard at age twenty-one, several years older than a typical undergraduate of the time. After college and a master’s degree, Prince became a minister for Salem’s First Meeting.

Prince’s early practical training allowed him to become an expert on scientific instruments in the early republic. He invented, produced, evaluated, brokered, and repaired apparatus for several institutions, including his alma mater.

Back while he was an undergraduate, Prince was a close witness of the Boston Tea Party and its aftermath. He preserved his recollections of the event in a letter published in the Salem Gazette on 24 Sept 1833:

Mr. Editor,—There is a mistake in the Salem Mercury of last Wednesday, where, in speaking of the tea, it is said “there is a venerable Clergyman in Salem who took a part in the tea frolic, and assisted in emptying the chests into the sea”—

As there is but one clergyman now in Salem, who was a boy old enough to have assisted in the destruction of the tea at that time, viz. Dec. 16, 1773, it is evident who is meant by the “venerable Clergyman,” and he sends you this note to correct the mistake, and inform you that he was only a quiescent spectator of the transaction, and had no hand in destroying the tea. He stood upon the quarter deck of the vessel, leaning over the rail which crossed the deck, while the persons, disguised as Indians, were unloading her, and could plainly see what was doing, though it was principally in the evening.

Two men stood at the hatchway on the main deck, with axes in their hands, and as the chests were hoisted out of the hold they knocked off the tops and emptied the tea into the dock, and threw the chests after it. The tide was out, and the tea was piled up on the flats by the side of the ship as high as her gunwales.

The boy, as the Clergyman is called, was then more than 22 years old, and was not “an apprentice at that time.” He crossed the vessel’s deck in going on shore, and so much of the tea was scattered on it as to be over his shoes, which he found full when he got home; and his hat and clothes were covered with tea dust as a miller is with meal in his mill.

He went on to the wharf the next morning, where a great concourse of people was assembled to view what had been done the night before, (by the Mohawk Indians, it was said). Amongst the people assembled was the old British Admiral, ([John] Montague) who looked with astonishment on the scene of devastation, and said, the Devil is in this people, for they pay no more respect to an act of the British parliament, which can make England tremble, than to an old newspaper, and then went off of the wharf.

In the morning after the tea was thrown overboard the ebb tide carried most of it away, and the empty chests were seen floating down the harbor on the Dorchester shore in a line, extending to the castle. The business of destruction of the tea was conducted without any tumult or great noise; nor was any damage done to the vessel, or to any other effects whatever. The writer of the above knew several of the Indians who did the patriotic work.

Although the Salem Gazette didn’t print Prince’s name with this letter, the Gloucester Telegraph reprinted it on 28 September and blew his anonymity. Prince wrote several more reminiscences of the Revolutionary period for the Salem Gazette, their authorship not confirmed until his death notice.

This 1833 letter put Adm. Montagu at Griffin’s Wharf while complaining about the locals on the morning of 17 Dec 1773, as I discussed yesterday.

As part of its program to mark the graves of seemingly all known, suspected, rumored, or claimed Tea Party participants, the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum has included Prince as an “honorary participant.” I think that’s more than fair, given that he was actually on board one of the ships and would surely have faced criminal charges if there had been a royal police force to break up the action.

Peering into a Prison in 1799

Richard Brunton (1749–1832) came to America to fight for his king as a grenadier in the 38th Regiment. That lasted until 1779, when he deserted.

As Deborah M. Child relates in her biography, Soldier, Engraver, Forger, Brunton struggled to make an honest living in New England with his talent and training as an engraver.

One product he kept coming back to was family registers and other genealogical forms. Another was counterfeit currency.

In 1799 the state of Connecticut sent Brunton to the Old New-Gate Prison in East Granby for forging coins. To pay his accompanying fine, he made art, including a portrait of Gov. Jonathan Trumbull, a seal of the state arms, and a picture of Old New-Gate itself.

That prison, also known as the Simsbury Mines, was notorious as a place where the state held Loyalists underground during the Revolutionary War. However, in 1790 the state took over the property and rebuilt it according to a modern philosophy of criminal punishment, based on locking people up for years doing labor instead of physically punishing or hanging them. Brunton depicted the place he came to know during his two-year sentence. 

The Boston Rare Maps page for this print says:

The view suggests that coopering (barrel making) was a major activity for prisoners, as two figures can be seen at upper right engaged in the task, while another at the bottom seems to be bringing a completed barrel to a shed.

Also visible are what appear to be two African-American figures carrying buckets can be seen in the view; these figures, which are completely blackened, stand out conspicuously from the others in the view. It is documented that enslaved African-Americans worked in the copper mine that had earlier operated in the location of the prison. Whether African-American were also engaged at the prison as well is a question for further research raised by this work.

Although the engraving contains an image of a prisoner receiving the lash, as a state prison Newgate followed a relatively humane approach for the period; a prisoner could be given no more than 10 lashes, and there was a limit on time served there. Participation in labor was required of all prisoners, and in addition to coopering they also engaged in nail making, blacksmithing, wagon and plow manufacture, shoe making, basket weaving and machining.

After being released, Brunton went back to Boston, where he was arrested for counterfeiting again in 1807. He served more years in a Massachusetts state prison and finally lived out his life in Groton.

The copperplate for Brunton’s Old New-Gate image survived until about 1870, when a few more prints were made. Only a handful of copies survive, and it’s impossible to tell whether they came from the initial run or the reprint decades after the artist died.

The example shown above was recently acquired by the John Carter Brown Library in Rhode Island. Other prints are at the Connecticut Historical Society and the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Watching Flax Grow in New Hampshire

For the last several months Kimberly Alexander and her classes at the University of New Hampshire have been exploring a staple crop of colonial New England: flax.

Following a student’s suggestion, the team started growing flax (as well as cotton, rye, and indigo) in partnership with the university’s Sustainable Agriculture program.

Further steps will include harvesting, stooking, retting, breaking, scutching, and hackling the flax to make enough fibers to spin into linen thread and possibly weave into cloth.

As those unfamiliar terms suggest, flax requires its own processes, dictated by the plant’s needs and traits. The stalks have to be dried, soaked just right, dried again, and then knocked around to leave only the useful long fibers.

In colonial America that work was usually left to women, children, and enslaved workers. The only detail I can remember from past reading is that young farmworkers tending flax were trained to walk backwards so that their toes wouldn‘t catch and yank up the stalks.

The project has its own blog with such content as:

• an interview with Shirley Walker, sharing lessons from processing flax for the Canterbury Shaker Village and the New Hampshire Farm Museum.
• a survey of mentions of flax in the diary of farmer Matthew Patten (1719–1795).
• an examination of linen garments belonging to the Stratham Historical Society.

As the university’s article on the program says, this project is expected to run through next spring. The big question will be how much useable fiber all that effort will produce.

Local Archeology for Local Historians in Charlestown and Medford

On Thursday, October 26, folks have a choice between two events on local archeology north of the Charles.

At 6:00 P.M., the City of Boston Archaeology Program, Boston’s Commemoration Commission, and the National Park Service will hold a “public listening event” at the Bunker Hill Museum, asking what people want to know about that battlefield and the destruction of Charlestown.

Co-sponsored by the Charlestown Historical Society and Charlestown Preservation Society, this session will feature Joe Bagley and the City Archaeology Program team, Genesis Pimentel of the Commemoration Commission, and Meg Watters Wilkes of the National Park Service. They will discuss previous archeological work around the battle and how new technology and methods might reveal more.

Folks can help the presenters prepare, or participate in the ongoing discussion, by filling out this form asking about interests in the battle.

At 7:00 P.M. the Medford Historical Commission will host “History Beneath Our Feet: The Archaeology of Thomas Brooks Park” at the Medford Public Library.

This event description says:

Located in West Medford, the wooded and grassy parcel is an important reminder of Native Americans, northern slavery and the Brooks family. The Public Archaeology Laboratory, Inc. and the Commission will share artifacts which were excavated by volunteers from the recent archaeological dig and talk about how these tiny fragments provide greater insight into the people who inhabited the landscape.

Thomas Brooks owned that land in the mid-1700s, and he also owned a man named Pomp, who around 1765 built a decorative brick wall that’s preserved in the park. The area was recently restored, as described on the historical commission’s website, and part of that work was the new study.

(The photo above, courtesy of the Medford Historical Commission, shows one of the bricks from Pomp’s wall, preserving the impressions of the fingers of the person who made it.)