"You know the rest. In the books you have readHow the British regulars fired and fled—How the farmers gave them ball for ball,From behind each fence and farmyard wall,Chasing the redcoats down the lane,Then crossing the fields to emerge againUnder the trees at the turn of the road,And only pausing to fire and load."So through the night rode Paul Revere;And so through the night went his cry of alarmTo every Middlesex village and farm——A cry of defiance and not of fear,A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,And a word that shall echo for evermore!For, borne on the night wind of the past,Through all our history, to the last,The people will waken and listen to hearThe hurrying hoof beats of that steed,And the midnight message of Paul Revere."[6]
"You know the rest. In the books you have readHow the British regulars fired and fled—How the farmers gave them ball for ball,From behind each fence and farmyard wall,Chasing the redcoats down the lane,Then crossing the fields to emerge againUnder the trees at the turn of the road,And only pausing to fire and load.
"So through the night rode Paul Revere;And so through the night went his cry of alarmTo every Middlesex village and farm——A cry of defiance and not of fear,A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,And a word that shall echo for evermore!For, borne on the night wind of the past,Through all our history, to the last,The people will waken and listen to hearThe hurrying hoof beats of that steed,And the midnight message of Paul Revere."[6]
The Dorothy Q. of our present interest is not the little maiden of Holmes's charming poem—
"Grandmother's mother; her age I guess,Thirteen summers, or something less;Girlish bust, but womanly air;Smooth, square forehead with uprolled hair,Lips that lover has never kissed;Taper fingers and slender wrist;Hanging sleeves of stiff brocade;So they painted the little maid.On her hand a parrot greenSits unmoving and broods serene."
"Grandmother's mother; her age I guess,Thirteen summers, or something less;Girlish bust, but womanly air;Smooth, square forehead with uprolled hair,Lips that lover has never kissed;Taper fingers and slender wrist;Hanging sleeves of stiff brocade;So they painted the little maid.On her hand a parrot greenSits unmoving and broods serene."
but her niece, the Dorothy Q. whom John Hancock loved, and was visiting at Lexington, when Paul Revere warned him of the redcoats' approach. This Dorothy happened to be staying just then with the Reverend Jonas Clark, under the protection of Madam Lydia Hancock, the governor's aunt. And it was to meet her, his fiancée, that Hancock went, on the eve of the 19th of April, to the house made famous by his visit.
CLARK HOUSE, LEXINGTON, MASS.CLARK HOUSE, LEXINGTON, MASS.
One imaginative writer has sketched for us the notable group gathered that April night about the time-honoured hearthstone in the modest Lexington parsonage: "The last rays of the setting sun have left the dampness of the meadows to gather about the home; and each guest and family occupant has gladly taken seats within the house, while Mrs. Jonas Clark has closed the shutters, added a new forelog, and fanned the embers to a cheerful flame. The young couple whom Madam Hancock has studiously brought together exchange sympathetic glances as they takepart in the conversation. The hours wear away, and the candles are snuffed again and again. Then the guests retire, not, to be sure, without apprehensions of approaching trouble, but with little thought that the king's strong arm of military authority is already extended toward their very roof."[7]
Early the next morning, as we know, the lovers were forced to part in great haste. And for a time John Hancock and his companion, Samuel Adams, remained in seclusion, that they might not be seized by General Gage, who was bent on their arrest, and intended to have them sent to England for trial.
The first word we are able to find concerning Hancock's whereabouts during the interim between his escape from Lexington, and his arrival at the ContinentalCongress, appointed to convene at Philadelphia, May 10, 1775, is contained in a long letter to Miss Quincy. This letter, which gives a rather elaborate account of the dangers and triumphs of the patriot's journey, concludes: "Pray let me hear from you by every Post. God bless you, my dear girl, and believe me most Sincerely, Yours most Affectionately, John Hancock."
A month later, June 10, 1775, we find the charming Dorothy Q., now the guest at Fairfield, Connecticut, of Thaddeus Burr, receiving this letter from her lover:
"My Dear Dolly:—I am almost prevail'd on to think that my letters to my Aunt & you are not read, for I cannot obtain a reply, I have ask'd million questions & not an answer to one, I beg'd you to letme know what things my Aunt wanted & you and many other matters I wanted to know but not one word in answer. I Really Take it extreme unkind, pray, my dear, use not so much Ceremony & Reservedness, why can't you use freedom in writing, be not afraid of me, I want long Letters. I am glad the little things I sent you were agreeable. Why did you not write me of the top of the Umbrella. I am sorry it was spoiled, but I will send you another by my Express which will go in a few days. How did my Aunt like her gown, & let me know if the Stockings suited her; she had better send a pattern shoe & stocking, I warrant I will suit her.... I Beg, my dear Dolly, you will write me often and long Letters, I will forgive the past if you will mend in future. Do ask my Aunt to make me up and send mea Watch String, and do you make up another and send me, I wear them out fast. I want some little thing of your doing. Remember me to all my Friends with you, as if named. I am Call'd upon and must obey.
"I have sent you by Doctor Church in a paper Box Directed to you, the following things, for your acceptance, & which I do insist you wear, if you do not I shall think the Donor is the objection:
2 pair white silk}4 pair white thread}}which stockings}which stockings1 pair black satin1 pair Calem Co.}Shoes, the other,}Shall be sent when done.1 very pretty light hat1 neat airy summer Cloak1 neat airy summer Cloak2 caps1 Fann
"I wish these may please you, I shall be gratified if they do, pray write me, I will attend to all your Commands.
"Adieu, my dear Girl, and believe me with great Esteem & affection,
"Yours without reserve,"John Hancock."[8]
DOROTHY Q. HOUSE, QUINCY, MASS.DOROTHY Q. HOUSE, QUINCY, MASS.
It is interesting to know that while Miss Quincy was a guest in Fairfield, Aaron Burr, the nephew of her host, came to the house, and that his magnetic influence soon had an effect upon the beautiful young lady. But watchful Aunt Lydia prevented the charmer from thwarting the Hancock family plans, and on the 28th day of the following August there was a great wedding at Fairfield. John Hancock, president of the Continental Congress, and Miss Dorothy Quincy were joined in marriage in style befitting the family situations.
The noted couple went at once to Philadelphia, where the patriot lived at intervals during the remainder of the session. Mrs. Hancock seems to have been much of the time in Boston, however, and occasionally, in the course of the next few years, we catch delightful glimpses through her husband's letters of his great affection for her, and for their little one.
Under date of Philadelphia, March 10, 1777, we read: "I shall make out as well as I can, but I assure you, my Dear Soul, I long to have you here, & I know you will be as expeditious as you can in coming. When I part from you again it must be a very extraordinary occasion. I have sent everywhere to get a gold or silver rattle for the child with a coral to send, but cannot get one. I will have one if possible on your coming. I have sent a sash for her & two little papers of pins for you. If you do not want them you can give them away.
"... May every blessing of an Indulgent Providence attend you. I most sincerely wish you a good journey & hope I shall soon have the happiness of seeing you with the utmost affection and Love. My dear Dolly, I am yours forever,
"John Hancock."
After two years and a half of enforced absence, the President of the Continental Congress returned home to that beautiful house on Beacon Street, which was unfortunately destroyed in 1863, to make room for a more modern building. Here the united couple lived very happily with their two children, Lydia and Washington.
Judging by descriptions that have come down to us, and by the World's Fair reproduction of the Hancock House, their mansion must have been a very sumptuous one. It was built of stone, after the mannerfavoured by Bostonians who could afford it, with massive walls, and a balcony projecting over the entrance door, upon which a large second-story window opened. Braintree stone ornamented the corners and window-places, and the tiled roof was surrounded by a balustrade. From the roof, dormer windows provided a beautiful view of the surrounding country. The grounds were enclosed by a low stone wall, on which was placed a light wooden fence. The house itself was a little distance back from the street, and the approach was by means of a dozen stone steps and a carefully paved walk.
At the right of the entrance was a reception-room of spacious dimensions, provided with furniture of bird's-eye maple, covered with rich damask. Out of this opened the dining-room, sixty feet in length, in which Hancock was wont to entertain.Opposite was a smaller apartment, the usual dining-room of the family. Next adjoining were the china-room and offices, while behind were to be found the coach-house and barn of the estate.
The family drawing-room, its lofty walls covered with crimson paper, was at the left of the entrance. The upper and lower halls of the house were hung with pictures of game and with hunting scenes. The furniture, wall-papers and draperies throughout the house had been imported from England by Thomas Hancock, and expressed the height of luxury for that day. Passing through the hall, a flight of steps led to a small summer-house in the garden, near Mount Vernon Street, and here the grounds were laid out in ornamental box-bordered beds like those still to be seen in the beautiful Washington home on the Potomac. A highly interesting cornerof the garden was that given over to the group of mulberry-trees, which had been imported from England by Thomas Hancock, the uncle of John, he being, with others of his time, immensely interested in the culture of the silkworm.
Of this beautiful home Dorothy Quincy showed herself well fitted to be mistress, and through her native grace and dignity admirably performed her part at the reception of D'Estaing, Lafayette, Washington, Brissot, Lords Stanley and Wortley, and other noted guests.
On October 8, 1793, Hancock died, at the age of fifty-six years. The last recorded letter penned in his letter volume was to Captain James Scott, his lifelong friend. And it was to this Captain Scott that our Dorothy Q. gave her hand in a second marriage three years later. She outlived her second husband many years,residing at the end of her life on Federal Street in Boston. When turned of seventy she had a lithe, handsome figure, a pair of laughing eyes, and fine yellow ringlets in which scarcely a gray hair could be seen. And although for the second time a widow, she was as sprightly as a girl of sixteen. In her advanced years, Madam Scott received another call from Lafayette, and those who witnessed the hearty interview say that the once youthful chevalier and the unrivalled belle met as if only a summer had passed since their social intercourse during the perils of the Revolution.
The most beautiful example of wifely devotion to be found in the annals connected with the war of the Revolution is that afforded by the story of the lovely Baroness Riedesel, whose husband was deputed to serve at the head of the German mercenaries allied to the king's troops, and who was herself, with the baron and her children, made prisoner of war after the battle of Saratoga.
Riedesel was a gallant soldier, and his wife a fair and fascinating young woman at this time. They had not been long married when the war in America broke out,and the wife's love for her husband was such as to impel her to dare all the hardships of the journey and join him in the foreign land. Her letters and journal, which give a lively and vivid account of the perils of this undertaking, and of the pleasures and difficulties that she experienced after she had succeeded in reaching her dear spouse, supply what is perhaps the most interesting human document of those long years of war.
The baroness landed on the American continent at Quebec, and travelled amid great hardships to Chambly, where her husband was stationed. For two days only they were together. After that she returned with her children to Three Rivers. Soon, however, came the orders to march down into the enemy's country.
The description of this journey as the baroness has given it to us makes, indeed,moving reading. Once a frightful cannonade was directed against the house in which the women and the wounded had taken refuge. In the cellar of this place Madam Riedesel and her children passed the entire night. It was in this cellar, indeed, that the little family lived during the long period of waiting that preceded the capitulation made necessary by Burgoyne's inexcusable delay near Saratoga. Later the Riedesels were most hospitably entertained at Saratoga by General Schuyler, his wife and daughters, of whom the baroness never fails to speak in her journal with the utmost affection.
The journey from Albany to Boston was full of incident and hardship, but of it the plucky wife writes only: "In the midst of all my trials God so supported me that I lost neither my frolicsomeness nor my spirits...." The contrast between the station of the Americans and of the Germans who were their prisoners, is strikingly brought out in this passage of the diary: "Some of the American generals who were in charge of us on the march to Boston were shoemakers; and upon our halting days they made boots for our officers, and also mended nicely the shoes of our soldiers. They set a great value upon our money coinage, which with them was scarce. One of our officers had worn his boots entirely into shreds. He saw that an American general had on a good pair, and said to him, jestingly, 'I will gladly give you a guinea for them.' Immediately the general alighted from his horse, took the guinea, gave up his boots, put on the badly-worn ones of the officer, and again mounted his horse."
The journey was at length successfully accomplished, however, and in Massachusetts the baroness was on the whole very well treated, it would seem.
"We remained three weeks in wretched quarters at Winter Hill," she writes, "until they transferred us to Cambridge, where they lodged us in one of the most beautiful houses of the place, which had formerly been built by the wealth of the royalists. Never had I chanced upon any such agreeable situation. Seven families, who were connected with each other partly by the ties of relationship and partly by affection, had here farms, gardens, and magnificent houses, and not far off plantations of fruit. The owners of these were in the habit of meeting each other in the afternoon, now at the house of one, and now at another, and making themselves merry with music and the dance—living in prosperity united and happy, until, alas! this ruinous war severed them, and leftall their houses desolate except two, the proprietors of which were also soon obliged to flee....
"None of our gentlemen were allowed to go into Boston. Curiosity and desire urged me, however, to pay a visit, to Madam Carter, the daughter of General Schuyler, and I dined at her house several times. The city throughout is pretty, but inhabited by violent patriots, and full of wicked people. The women especially were so shameless, that they regarded me with repugnance, and even spit at me when I passed by them. Madam Carter was as gentle and good as her parents, but her husband was wicked and treacherous. She came often to visit us, and also dined at our house with the other generals. We sought to show them by every means our gratitude. They seemed also to have much friendship for us; and yet at the sametime this miserable Carter, when the English General Howe had burned many hamlets and small towns, made the horrible proposition to the Americans to chop off the heads of our generals, salt them down in small barrels, and send over to the English one of these barrels for every hamlet or little town burned down. But this barbarous suggestion fortunately was not adopted.
"... I saw here that nothing is more terrible than a civil war. Almost every family was disunited.... On the third of June, 1778, I gave a ball and supper in celebration of the birthday of my husband. I had invited to it all the generals and officers. The Carters also were there. General Burgoyne sent an excuse after he had made us wait until eight o'clock in the evening. He invariably excused himself on various pretences from coming to seeus until his departure for England, when he came and made me a great many apologies, but to which I made no other answer than that I should be extremely sorry if he had gone out of his way on our account. We danced considerably, and our cook prepared us a magnificent supper of more than eighty covers. Moreover, our courtyard and garden were illuminated. As the birthday of the King of England came upon the following day, which was the fourth, it was resolved that we would not separate until his health had been drank; which was done with the most hearty attachment to his person and his interests.
"Never, I believe, has 'God Save the King,' been drunk with more enthusiasm or more genuine good will. Even both my oldest little daughters were there, having stayed up to see the illumination. All eyes were full of tears; and it seemed asif every one present was proud to have the spirit to venture to this in the midst of our enemies. Even the Carters could not shut their hearts against us. As soon as the company separated, we perceived that the whole house was surrounded by Americans, who, having seen so many people go into the house, and having noticed also the illumination, suspected that we were planning a mutiny, and if the slightest disturbance had arisen it would have cost us dear....
"The Americans," says the baroness, further on, "when they desire to collect their troops together, place burning torches of pitch upon the hilltops, at which signal every one hastens to the rendezvous. We were once witnesses of this when General Howe attempted a landing at Boston in order to rescue the captive troops. They learned of this plan, as usual, long beforehand, and opened barrels of pitch, whereupon for three or four successive days a large number of people without shoes and stockings, and with guns on their backs, were seen hastily coming from all directions, by which means so many people came together so soon that it would have been a very difficult thing to effect a landing.
"We lived very happily and contented in Cambridge, and were therefore well pleased at remaining there during the captivity of our troops. As winter approached, however, we were ordered to Virginia [because of the difficulty of providing provisions], and in the month of November, 1778, set out.
"My husband, fortunately, found a pretty English wagon, and bought it for me, so that as before I was enabled to travel comfortably. My little Gustavahad entreated one of my husband's adjutants, Captain Edmonston, not to leave us on the way. The confiding manner of the child touched him and he gave his promise and faithfully kept it. I travelled always with the army and often over almost impassable roads....
"I had always provisions with me, but carried them in a second small wagon. As this could not go as fast as we, I was often in want of everything. Once when we were passing a town called Hertford [Hartford, Connecticut], we made a halt, which, by the by, happened every fourth day. We there met General Lafayette, whom my husband invited to dinner, as otherwise he would have been unable to find anything to eat. This placed me in rather an awkward dilemma as I knew that he loved a good dinner. Finally, however, I managed to glean from whatprovisions I had on hand enough to make him a very respectable meal. He was so polite and agreeable that he pleased us all very much. He had many Americans in his train, though, who were ready to leap out of their skins for vexation at hearing us speak constantly in French. Perhaps they feared, on seeing us on such a friendly footing with him, that we would be able to alienate him from their cause, or that he would confide things to us that we ought not to know.
"Lafayette spoke much of England, and of the kindness of the king in having had all objects of interest shown to him. I could not keep myself from asking him how he could find it in his heart to accept so many marks of kindness from the king when he was on the point of departing in order to fight against him. Upon this observation of mine he appeared somewhatashamed, and answered me: 'It is true that such a thought passed through my mind one day, when the king offered to show me his fleet. I answered that I hoped to see it some day, and then quietly retired, in order to escape from the embarrassment of being obliged to decline, point blank, the offer, should it be repeated.'"
The baroness's own meeting with the king soon after her return to England, in the autumn of 1780, when the prisoners were exchanged, is thus entertainingly described: "One day when we were yet seated at table, the queen's first lady of honour, my Lady Howard, sent us a message to the effect that her Majesty would receive us at six o'clock that afternoon. As my court dress was not yet ready, and I had nothing with me proper to wear, I sent my apologies for not going at that time, which I again repeated when we hadthe honour of being presented to their Majesties, who were both present at the reception. The queen, however, as did also the king, received us with extraordinary graciousness, and replied to my excuses by saying, 'We do not look at the dress of those persons we are glad to see.'
"They were surrounded by the princesses, their daughters. We seated ourselves before the chimney-fire,—the queen, the princesses, the first lady of honour, and myself,—forming a half-circle, my husband, with the king, standing in the centre close to the fire. Tea and cakes were then passed round. I sat between the queen and one of the princesses, and was obliged to go over a great part of my adventures. Her majesty said to me very graciously, 'I have followed you everywhere, and have often inquired after you; and I have always heard withdelight that you were well, contented, and beloved by every one.' I happened to have at this time a shocking cough. Observing this, the Princess Sophia went herself and brought me a jelly made of black currants, which she represented as a particularly good remedy, and forced me to accept a jar full.
"About nine o'clock in the evening the Prince of Wales came in. His youngest sisters flocked around him, and he embraced them and danced them around. In short, the royal family had such a peculiar gift for removing all restraint that one could readily imagine himself to be in a cheerful family circle of his own station in life. We remained with them until ten o'clock, and the king conversed much with my husband about America in German, which he spoke exceedingly well."
From England the baroness proceeded (in 1783), to her home in Brunswick, where she was joyfully received, and where, after her husband's triumph, they enjoyed together respite from war for a period of four years. In 1794, General Riedesel was appointed commandant of the city of Brunswick, where he died in 1800. The baroness survived him eight years, passing away in Berlin, March 29, 1808, at the age of sixty-two. She rests beside her beloved consort in the family vaultat Lauterbach.
RIEDESEL HOUSE, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.RIEDESEL HOUSE, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.
Her Cambridge residence, which formerly stood at the corner of Sparks Street, on Brattle, among the beautiful lindens so often mentioned in the "journal," has recently been remodelled and removed to the next lot but one from its original site. It now looks as in the picture, and is numbered 149 Brattle Street. A little street at the right has been appropriatelynamed Riedesel Avenue. Yet even in history-loving Cambridge there is little familiarity with the career of the baron and his charming lady, and there are few persons who have read the entertaining journal, written in German a century and a quarter ago by this clever and devoted wife.
Very few old houses retain at the present time so large a share of the dignity and picturesqueness originally theirs, as does the homestead whose chief interest for us lies in the fact that it was the Revolutionary prison of Doctor Benjamin Church, the first-discovered traitor to the American cause. This house is on Brattle Street, at the corner of Hawthorn. Built about 1700, it came early into the possession of Jonathan Belcher, who afterward became Sir Jonathan, and from 1730 till 1741 wasgovernor of Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Colonel John Vassall the elder was the next owner of the house, acquiring it in 1736, and somewhat later conveying it, with its adjoining estate of seven acres, to his brother, Major Henry, an officer in the militia, who died under its roof in 1769.
Major Henry Vassall had married Penelope, sister of Isaac Royall, the proprietor of the beautiful place at Medford, but upon the beginning of hostilities, this sprightly widow abandoned her spacious home in such haste that she carried along with her, according to tradition, a young companion whom she had not time to restore to her friends! Such of her property as could be used by the colony forces was given in charge of Colonel Stark, while the rest was allowed to pass into Boston. The barns and roomy outbuildings were used for the storage of the colony forage.
HOUSE WHERE DOCTOR CHURCH WAS CONFINED, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.HOUSE WHERE DOCTOR CHURCH WAS CONFINED, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.
It is highly probable that the Widow Vassall's house at once became the American hospital, and that it was the residence, as it was certainly the prison, of Doctor Benjamin Church. Church had been placed at the head of an army hospital for the accommodation of twenty thousand men, and till this time had seemed a brave and zealous compatriot of Warren and the other leading men of the time. Soon after his appointment, he was, however, detected in secret correspondence with Gage. He had entrusted to a woman of his acquaintance a letter written in cipher to be forwarded to the British commander. This letter was found upon the girl, she was taken to headquarters, and there the contents of the fatal message were deciphered and the defection of DoctorChurch established. When questioned by Washington he appeared utterly confounded, and made no attempt to vindicate himself.
The letter itself did not contain any intelligence of importance, but the discovery that one, until then so high in the esteem of his countrymen, was engaged in a clandestine correspondence with the enemy was deemed sufficient evidence of guilt. Church was therefore arrested at once, and confined in a chamber looking upon Brattle Street. Some of his leisure, while here imprisoned, he employed in cutting on the door of a closet:
There the marks still remain, their significance having after a half century been interpreted by a lady of the house to whomthey had long been familiar, but who had lacked any clue to their origin until, in the course of a private investigation, she determined beyond a doubt their relation to Church. The chamber has two windows in the north front, and two overlooking the area on the south.
Church's fall was the more terrible because from a height. He was a member of a very distinguished family, and he had been afforded in his youth all the best opportunities of the day. In 1754 he was graduated at Harvard, and after studying with Doctor Pynchon rose to considerable eminence as a physician and particularly as a surgeon. Besides talents and genius of a sort, he was endowed with a rare poetic fancy, many of his verses being full of daintiness as well as of a very pretty wit. He was, however, somewhat extravagant in his habits, and about 1768 hadbuilt himself an elegant country house near Boston. It was to sustain this, it is believed, that he sold himself to the king's cause.
To all appearance, however, Church was up to the very hour of his detection one of the leading patriots of the time. He had been chosen to deliver the oration in the Old South Meeting-House on March 5, 1773, and he there pronounced a stirring discourse, which has still power to thrill the reader, upon the massacre the day celebrates, and the love of liberty which inspired the patriots' revolt on that memorable occasion. Yet two years earlier, as we have since discovered from a letter of Governor Hutchinson, he had been anonymously employing his venal pen in the service of the government!
In 1774, when he was a member of the Provincial Congress, he was first suspectedof communication with Gage, and of receiving a reward for his treachery. Paul Revere has written concerning this: "In the fall of '74 and the winter of '75 I was one of upwards of thirty, chiefly mechanics, who formed themselves into a committee for the purpose of watching the movements of the British soldiers and gaining every intelligence of the Tories. We held our meetings at the Green Dragon Tavern. This committee were astonished to find all their secrets known to General Gage, although every time they met every member swore not to reveal any of their transactions except to Hancock, Adams, Warren, Otis, Church, and one or two others."
The traitor, of course, proved to be Doctor Church. One of his students who kept his books and knew of his money embarrassment first mistrusted him. Onlytreachery, he felt, could account for his master's sudden acquisition of some hundreds of new British guineas.
The doctor was called before a council of war consisting of all the major-generals and brigadiers of the army, beside the adjutant-general, Washington himself presiding. This tribunal decided that Church's acts had been criminal, but remanded him for the decision of the General Court, of which he was a member. He was taken in a chaise, escorted by General Gates and a guard of twenty men, to the music of fife and drum, to Watertown meeting-house, where the court sat. "The galleries," says an old writer, "were thronged with people of all ranks. The bar was placed in the middle of the broad aisle, and the doctor arraigned." His defence at the trial was very ingenious and able:—that the fatal letter was designedfor his brother, but that since it was not sent he had communicated no intelligence; that there was nothing in the letter but notorious facts; that his exaggerations of the American force could only be designed to favour the cause of his country; and that his object was purely patriotic. He added, in a burst of sounding though unconvincing oratory: "The warmest bosom here does not flame with a brighter zeal for the security, happiness, and liberties of America than mine."
These eloquent professions did not avail him, however. He was adjudged guilty, and expelled from the House of Representatives of Massachusetts. By order of the General Congress, he was condemned to close confinement in Norwich jail in Connecticut, "and debarred from the use of pen, ink, and paper," but his health failing, he was allowed (in 1776) to leavethe country. He sailed for the West Indies,—and the vessel that bore him was never afterward heard from.
Some people in Church's time, as well as our own, have been disposed to doubt the man's treachery, but Paul Revere was firmly convinced that the doctor was in the pay of General Gage. Revere's statement runs in part as follows:
"The same day I met Doctor Warren. He was president of the Committee of Safety. He engaged me as a messenger to do the out-of-doors business for that committee; which gave me an opportunity of being frequently with them. The Friday evening after, about sunset, I was sitting with some or near all that committee in their room, which was at Mr. Hastings's house in Cambridge. Doctor Church all at once started up. 'DoctorWarren,' said he, 'I am determined to go into Boston to-morrow.' (It set them all a-staring.) Doctor Warren replied, 'Are you serious, Doctor Church? They will hang you if they catch you in Boston.' He replied, 'I am serious, and am determined to go at all adventures.' After a considerable conversation, Doctor Warren said, 'If you are determined, let us make some business for you.' They agreed that he should go to get medicine for their and our wounded officers."
Naturally, Paul Revere, who was an ardent patriot as well as an exceedingly straightforward man, had little sympathy with Church's weakness, but to-day as one looks at the initials scratched by the prisoner on the door of his cell, one's heart expands with pity for the man, and one wonders long and long whether the vesselon which he sailed was really lost, or whether he escaped on it to foreign shores, there to expiate as best he could his sin against himself and his country.
In the life of Colonel James Swan, as in that of Doctor Benjamin Church, money was the root of all evil. Swan was almost a fool because of his pig-headedness in financial adversity, and Church was ever a knave, plausible even when proved guilty. Yet both fell from the same cause, utter inability to keep money and avoid debt.
Colonel Swan's history reads very like a romance. He was born in Fifeshire, Scotland, in 1754, and came to America in 1765. He found employment in Boston, and devoted all his spare time to books. While a clerk of eighteen, in acounting-house near Faneuil Hall, he published a work on the African slave trade, entitled, "A Discussion of Great Britain and Her Colonies from the Slave Trade," a copy of which, preserved in the Boston Public Library, is well worth reading for its flavour and wit.
While serving an apprenticeship with Thaxter & Son, he formed an intimate friendship with several other clerks who, in after years, became widely known, among them, Benjamin Thompson, afterward made Count Rumford, and Henry Knox, who later became the bookseller on Cornhill, and finally a general in the Continental army.
Swan was a member of the Sons of Liberty, and took part in the famous Boston tea-party. He was engaged in the battle of Bunker Hill as a volunteer aid of Warren, and was twice wounded. He alsowitnessed the evacuation of Boston by the British, March 17, 1776. He later became secretary of the Massachusetts board of war, and was elected a member of the legislature. Throughout the whole war he occupied positions of trust, often requiring great courage and cool judgment, and the fidelity with which every duty was performed was shown by the honours conferred upon him after retiring to civil life. By means of a large fortune which fell to him, he entered mercantile business on a large scale, and became very wealthy. He owned large tracts of land in different parts of the country, and bought much of the confiscated property of the Tories, among other lands the estate belonging to Governor Hutchinson, lying on Tremont Street, between West and Boylston Streets.
His large speculations, however, caused him to become deeply involved in debt.In 1787, accordingly, he started out anew to make a fortune, and through the influence of Lafayette and other men of prominence in Paris, he secured many government contracts which entailed immense profit. Through all the dark days of the French Revolution, he tried to serve the cause of the proscribed French nobility by perfecting plans for them to colonise on his lands in America. A large number he induced to immigrate, and a vast quantity of the furniture and belongings of these unfortunates was received on board his ships. But before the owners could follow their furniture, the axe had fallen upon their heads.
When the Reign of Terror was at its height, theSally, owned by Colonel Swan, and commanded by Captain Stephen Clough, of Wiscasset, Maine, came home with a strange cargo and a stranger story.The cargo consisted of French tapestries, marquetry, silver with foreign crests, rare vases, clocks, costly furniture, and no end of apparelling fit for a queen. The story was that, only for the failure at the last moment of a plot for her deliverance, Marie Antoinette would also have been on the sloop, the plan being that she should be the guest at Wiscasset of the captain's wife until she could be transferred to a safer retreat.
However true may be the rumour of a plot to bring Marie Antoinette to America, it is certain that the furniture brought on theSally, was of exceptional value and beauty. It found its resting-place in the old Swan house of our picture, to which it gave for many years the name of the Marie Antoinette house. One room was even called the Marie Antoinette room, and the bedstead of this apartment, whichis to-day in the possession of the descendants of Colonel Swan, is still known as the Marie Antoinette bedstead. Whether the unhappy queen ever really rested on this bed cannot, of course, be said, but tradition has it that it was designed for her use in America because she had found it comfortable in France.
SWAN HOUSE, DORCHESTER, MASS.SWAN HOUSE, DORCHESTER, MASS.
Colonel Swan, having paid all his debts, returned in 1795 to the United States, accompanied by the beautiful and eccentric gentlewoman who was his wife, and who had been with her husband in Paris during the Terror. They brought with them on this occasion a very large collection of fine French furniture, decorations, and paintings. The colonel had become very wealthy indeed through his commercial enterprises, and was now able to spend a great deal of money upon his fine Dorchester mansion, which he finished about theyear 1796. A prominent figure of the house was the circular dining-hall, thirty-two feet in diameter, crowned at the height of perhaps twenty-five feet by a dome, and having three mirror windows. As originally built, it contained no fireplaces or heating conveniences of any kind.
Mrs. Swan accompanied her husband on several subsequent trips to Paris, and it was on one of these occasions that the colonel came to great grief. He had contracted, it is said, a debt claimed in France to be two million francs. This indebtedness he denied, and in spite of the persuasion of his friends he would make no concession in the matter. As a matter of principle he would not pay a debt which, he insisted, he did not owe. He seems to have believed the claim of his creditor to be a plot, and he at once resolved to be a martyr. He was thereupon arrested, andconfined in St. Pélagie, a debtor's prison, from 1808 to 1830, a period of twenty-two years!
He steadfastly denied the charge against him, and, although able to settle the debt, preferred to remain a prisoner to securing his liberty on an unjust plea.... He gave up his wife, children, friends, and the comforts of his Parisian and New England homes for a principle, and made preparations for a long stay in prison. Lafayette, Swan's sincere friend, tried in vain to prevail upon him to take his liberty.[9]
Doctor Small, his biographer, tells us that he lived in a little cell in the prison, and was treated with great respect by the other prisoners, they putting aside their little furnaces with which they cooked, that he might have more room for exercise. Not a day passed without some kind acton his part, and he was known to have been the cause of the liberation of many poor debtors. When the jailor introduced his pretended creditor, he would politely salute him, and say to the former: "My friend, return me to my chamber."
With funds sent by his wife, Swan hired apartments in the Rue de la Clif, opposite St. Pélagie, which he caused to be fitted up at great expense. Here were dining and drawing rooms, coaches, and stables, and outhouses, and here he invited his guests and lodged his servants, putting at the disposal of the former his carriages, in which they drove to the promenade, the ball, the theatre—everywhere in his name. At this Parisian home he gave great dinners to his constant but bewildered friends. He seemed happy in thus braving his creditors and judges, we are told, allowed his beard to grow, dressedà la mode, and was cheerful to the last day of his confinement.
His wife died in 1825, and five years later the Revolution of July threw open his doors in the very last hour of his twenty-second year of captivity. His one desire upon being released was to embrace his friend Lafayette, and this he did on the steps of the Hôtel de Ville. Then he returned, July 31, to reinstate himself in prison—for St. Pélagie had after twenty-two years come to stand to him for home. He was seized almost immediately upon his second entrance into confinement with a hemorrhage, and died suddenly in the Rue d'Échiquier, aged seventy-six. In his will, he donated large sums of money to his four children, and to the city of Boston to found an institution to be called the Swan Orphan Academy. But the estate was found to be hopelessly insolvent,and the public legacy was never paid. The colonel's name lives, however, in the Maine island he purchased in 1786, for the purpose of improving and settling,—a project which, but for one of his periodic failures, he would probably have successfully accomplished.