GROTON HISTORICAL SERIES. No. XVII. AN OLD HOUSE, AND SOME OF ITS OCCUPANTS. TUNES CALLED "GROTON.” JOHN BULKLEY'S DEATH. DR. WM. DOUGLASS'S SUMMARY. THE SOUTH MILITARY COMPANY. A PROVINCIAL NOTE-FORGER. COMMODORE BAINBRIDGE AND THE LAKIN FARM. MISS CLARISSA BUTLER. REVOLUTIONARY SOLDIERS. THE INDIAN ATTACK OF JULY 27, 1694. GROTON, MASS. GROTON, MASSACHUSETTS, 1886. HISTORICAL SERIES, No. XVII. AN OLD HOUSE, AND SOME OF ITS DURING the summer of 1876 there was printed for private circulation a book entitled "Journal of a Tour to Niagara Falls in the year 1805," by Timothy Bigelow. (Boston: octavo, pp. xx, 121.) It is an interesting volume, with an introduction by Abbott Lawrence, a grandson of Mr. Bigelow. The writer of the Journal was a distinguished lawyer, living in Groton at the time, and he tells how he set out from Boston, on July 8, 1805, with four companions, and travelled through the interior of the State of New York, then almost a wilderness, but now teeming with thrifty towns and cities. The party returned by the way of Montreal, having been absent just six weeks and having travelled 1355 miles during the trip. Mr. Bigelow makes the following entry near the end of the Journal: To Batchelder's in New Ipswich [New Hampshire], a very good house, to sleep, ten miles. We arrived here between four and five o'clock; and, as we were now within twenty miles of Groton, we had sufficient time to have gone there this afternoon. But this was the place established for the stage to stop at over night; and, as the horses were tired, we could not persuade the driver to proceed. Not being able to procure any other conveyance, we submitted to the necessity of passing the night here. Sunday, August 18th. Regularly, the stage does not go from this place till Monday morning; but, impatient of being longer detained here, we prevailed on the driver for some additional fare to proceed with us this morning, and we arrived at my house in Groton in convenient season to dine. Here we adjusted our money concerns, which we effected with great facility, in consequence of the simple method which we had adopted at first. This was no other than to take an account of the sum which each one had, deducting from that the sum each now had left, and adding all the balances together gave the whole expense, and enabled us to complete a settlement in a few minutes. The expense to each one was short of one hundred and seventy dollars (pages 120, 121). Timothy Bigelow was the eldest son of Timothy and Anna (Andrews) Bigelow, and born at Worcester, on April 30, 1767. He was fitted for Harvard College under the tuition of Benjamin Lincoln and of the celebrated Samuel Dexter, then a law-student at Worcester. He graduated with high rank at Cambridge in the class of 1786, and entered at once upon the study of his profession, in the office of Levi Lincoln, the elder. Admitted to the bar in the year 1789, he began the practice of law at Groton, living in the house then occupied by Mrs. Converse Richardson, where he also had his office. The dwelling was situated on the south side of what is now Elm Street, near the corner of Pleasant Street, though it was moved away in the autumn of 1860, to a lot near the head of the old Jenkins road, recently discontinued. It is said that he sat in his office six weeks without taking a fee, and then he received a pistareen! He was married on September 3, 1791, to Lucy, daughter of Dr. Oliver and Lydia (Baldwin) Prescott, who was born on March 13, 1771. After his marriage he removed to the house standing, until the summer of 1875, between Governor Boutwell's dwelling and Mr. Graves's. Mr. Bigelow soon acquired a wide reputation and a large practice, by no means confined to Middlesex County. Many young men came to Groton, in order to study law under his tuition, and not a few of them afterward became eminent in their profession. Among them were the following: John Harris, Judge of the Supreme 1 Mr. Bigelow's father died at Worcester on March 31, 1790, aged 50 years; his mother died at Groton on August 2, 1809, aged 69, and lies buried in the Lawrence lot at the Groton Cemetery. } Court of New Hampshire; Thomas Rice, of Winslow, Maine, Member of Congress; John Locke, of Ashby, Member of Congress; Joseph Locke, Judge of the Police Court of Lowell for thirteen years; John Leighton Tuttle; Asahel Stearns, University Professor of Law in the Harvard Law School; John Varnum, of Haverhill, Member of Congress; Loammi Baldwin, who afterward became a distinguished civil engineer; John Park Little, of Gorham, Maine; Tyler Bigelow, of Watertown; Luther Lawrence, of Groton, and afterward of Lowell, where he died as Mayor of the city April 17, 1839; John Stuart and Augustus Peabody, both of the Suffolk Bar; and Abraham Moore, of Groton. Mr. Bigelow took an active part in politics, and for many years was a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, chosen first by the town of Groton, and afterward the town of Medford, where he was then living. During eleven years at different times, he was Speaker of this branch of the Legislature, the longest term of service in that capacity ever held by one person. Amid the engrossing duties of his profession Mr. Bigelow found time for occasional literary work. While living at Groton he delivered the Oration before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Cambridge, July 21, 1796; a Funeral Oration. on Samuel Dana, at one time minister of Groton, before the Benevolent Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, at Amherst, New Hampshire, April 4, 1798; and a Eulogy on Washington before the Columbian Lodge of Masons, at Boston, February 11, 1800, -all which addresses have been printed. In the year 1806 he removed to Medford, where he died on May 18, 1821. The house at Groton, in which Mr. Bigelow lived after his marriage, was built probably before the Revolution, and moved from its old site during the summer of 1875, when it was made into two dwellings, now standing on the southerly side of Court Street, near its western end, though one is around the corner. It was known to the present generation as the Dr. Amos Bancroft house; and I remember distinctly, as a boy more than forty years ago, that it took fire very early one |