Radio Script #704

Little Talks on Common Things

November 13, 1966

I want to tell you today about a trip made nearly 120 Years ago by a teenage girl who, a few years later, married the man who was for 42 years one of the best known professors of Colby College. The professor was Samuel King Smith, professor of rhetoric from 1850 to 1892. The girl was therefore the mother of William Abbott Smith, for many years the pastor of Waterville’s Congregational Church. Through the courtesy of Rev. W. A. Smith’s widow, Lois Hoxie Smith, I have been permitted to see the diary that Mr. Smith’s mother kept on a trip to Connecticut and New York in 1847.

The girl, with her father and mother, made the trip from Augusta to Boston by boat, stayed overnight at the U.S. Hotel, and took the train the next morning for Springfield. The girl wrote: “Dr. Thayer of Waterville was with us on the boat, at the hotel and in the cars.” That reference was to Dr. Sidney Thayer, grandfather of the later more prominent Dr. Frederick Thayer.

The diarist says she had a good dinner at Springfield’s Massasoit House, consisting of boiled lamb, potato, cranberry sauce, peach pie and watermelon. Then she says: “At 4 p.m. we took the cars and arrived at Ireland Depot in a short time, where we met Mr. Lincoln of Augusta, who got horse and carriage and took Mother and me to Aunt Rachel’s. Father walked, following the railroad track.”

The next evening the girl attended what she called a “peach and pear party”. She never neglected to say what she had to eat wherever she visited. Day after day the menu included watermelon. September seems late in the season for that delicacy, but the melons were probably natives and not usually ripe until about Labor Day. At meals the watermelon usually was accompanied by another dessert. On one day it was apple pie, on another it was sponge cake. Of watermelon the Maine girl apparently never got her fill. On September 10 she wrote: “Had a delightful visit at Aunt Delia’s and a beautiful watermelon.”

The next day she went to Northampton, on which she wrote: “It is the most beautiful place I have ever seen. The street is very wide and is lined with huge shady elms. I saw the church where Jonathan Edwards preached. We visited the hill on which is situated the water cure establishment. Not far away are Mounts Tom and Holyoke, and winding through is the Connecticut River.”

This Maine girl certainly had a good appetite. On Sept. 12 she recorded that at Hannah’s she ate ten apples, six peaches and forty grapes. Of the relatives she was visiting she said: “I admire all my cousins except Henry Street. He won’t speak to me and I don’t care if he won’t.”

The next day the travelers went on to New Haven. The diary tells us: “We passed in the cars through Hartford and the meadows. Arrived at New Haven at half past three. After a restful night they had a breakfast of oysters, salt shad, potatoes and pickles.

“We stayed at Aunt Augusta’s a few miles outside New Haven”, she wrote. “In two carriages we went into town, passing some luxurious estates owned by New York families.” The girl was more impressed by the cemetery they passed as they entered New Haven. “The cemetery”, she wrote, “covers three or four acres enclosed by an iron fence. The entrance gate is of dark stone with a motto in gilt. We next passed the college”. Those five words are her only reference to the institution where young men cheer for God, for country and for Yale.

More impressive than Yale to this girl was the residence of a certain Mr. Hoadley. “We took dinner at Mr. Hoadley’s, whose house and garden occupy a whole square in the city. He lives in elegance, directly across from the shore of Long Island Sound. In his garden is an abundance of delicious fruit — apples, pears, peaches and grapes. In the barn were two elegant horses, splendid carriages, pigs and cows. We ran into the garden every 15 minutes to supply ourselves with fruit.”

On September 21 the family moved on to New York. This is the girl’s account of that journey: “At noon we started from New Haven in the cars for New York. We saw Jersey City, Brooklyn, a number of country jails and prisons, and many beautiful buildings. We arrived in New York at half past eight in the evening. We took a coach to a public house, where we took tea and stayed the night. The next morning, after breakfast, we went to see the Astor House and Trinity Church.”

The next day they all went by steamer up the Hudson. The diarist wrote: “The Hudson is a beautiful river. We passed the Pallisades, West Point and many other places before we came to Albany. There we found the State House, a fine, large building of white marble. At half past six we arrived at Troy and took a cab to Aunt Eliza’s. In the morning Father and I walked over the city. We went up on Mount Ida. which is east of the city, while the river flows to the west. Half way up the mountain is a little house called the blind man’s cottage. At noon we went with Father to climb Mount Olympus, north of the city, and from there to a cattle show and fair. Saw Mrs. Willard’s seminary.” That reference is to the famous Martha Willard’s school for girls, a genuine rarity as early as 1847.

On September 24, as the diary puts it. “We started in the cars for home. We traveled through some exceedingly romantic country, crossed the Housatonic, passed through Pittsfield, took dinner at Springfield, passed through Worcester, saw the Insane Hospital, and arrived in Boston at eight. Took a cab to the New England House.”

September 25: “Took breakfast at six and started in the cars for Portland. Took the ferry boat over to East Boston and went the lower route through Salem, or rather under it. Crossed the Merrimac and came through Portsmouth and Saco. Arrived in Portland at noon, where we immediately went on board the Huntress and started for home. We found Bill Kilborn on board and he was very polite to me. We found also several other people we knew. We reached Augusta at half past eight.”

Thus ended a Maine girl’s journey to the big cities 199 years ago.

Exactly a hundred years ago a Maine trial justice, who held court in Waterville, was Everett R. Drummond. Preserved among the papers of his son, the late Albert F. Drummond, is an account of some of the warrants issued by that judge.

In July, 1866 the Judge issued a warrant for the arrest of one Edward White, who, according to the complaint of Frank Wentworth of Vassalboro, had stolen Wentworth’s gold watch. John Livermore, Vassalboro constable, stated: “I have made diligent search in Vassalboro, Waterville and Augusta and have not found said White. On August 6 I learned his whereabouts in Massachusetts. On a requisition of the Governor of Maine to the Governor of Massachusetts I proceeded to Boston, Charleston and Lowell. In Lowell I found the said White, and without further process he consented to come with me to Maine.”

Many of Justice Drummond’s cases concerned the liquor law, which in 1866 Maine had already had for 15 years. To Justice Drummond Joseph Percival complained that Rufus Jewell was guilty of drunkenness and was found intoxicated on the street in Waterville and there disturbed the public peace. Simeon Keith, a constable, arrested Jewell and hailed him before Judge Drummond. Drummond fined the man one dollar.

Let us see what it cost to collect that one dollar fine. Complaint 50 cents; subpoena 10 cents; travel of justice 50 cents; entry fees 75 cents; issue 80 cents; two witnesses at 12¢ each, 24 cents; fees and expenses of Constable Keith $3. 23. Total $5. 12.

When people today complain about laxity in enforcing the present liquor laws, especially sale to minors, it is well to bring to their attention how the law was enforced 100 years ago. Then prominent citizens helped enforce it. Respectable men of distinction often accompanied officers on the liquor raids. Here is a case in point. In July. 1864, almost a year before the Civil War had ended, three well known residents of Waterville — Charles Dow, E.F. Webb and Benjamin Hersom -complained that a certain George Atkins kept liquor for sale in a building at the northwest corner of Main and Silver Streets. All three complainants went with Sheriff McFadden to the suspected place but found no liquor.

Dow, Joseph Percival and Joshua Nye had better luck against one Benjamin Manly concerning a cache on the, roof of the Williams House. There, accompanying Constable Keith, they found a two-gallon stone jug with whiskey, a big wicker covered glass demi-john full of rum, and another jug containing three quarts of gin. Manly was fined $20.

All sorts of complaints came before Justice Drummond. In December, 1865 Charles B. Gilman complained that Milton Branch had stolen two maple logs of the value of five dollars. The sheriff’s search, however, was of no avail. The logs had just disappeared.

When, obeying one of the Drummond warrants, a sheriff sought to attach property of one Levi Lashus of Winslow for a debt owed to B.F. Wyman of Vassalboro. Lashus was defended by Attorney Solyman Heath, who declared that his client had never promised to pay Wyman the alleged $20. The sheriff went ahead, however, and attached Lashus’ half interest in a threshing machine.

In another case Daniel Bunker of Fairfield brought a charge of fraud against James Rideout of Benton. Rideout, according to the complaint, had agreed to deliver to Bunker 25 cords of wood at two dollars a cord. for which Bunker had paid $13.25 in advance and agreed to pay the remaining $36.75 on delivery. Rideout agreed to deliver the wood at Bunker’s home in Kendalls Mills during the months of January and February. When the end of March arrived and no wood had appeared. Bunker thought it was time to bring suit. On March 7 Sheriff Nye attached 6t feet of green, hard wood on Rideout’s place. On the 25th another deputy, Asher Barton, signed this curiously worded statement: “I attached a chip as the property of the defendant and gave him a summons to appear in court.”

These were some of the litigations that reached Judge Everett Drummond a hundred years ago.

Year: 1966