"Pockets a Slope": An Example of a Proposed Uniform for a Massachusetts Minute Company

On the eve of Lexington and Concord, most Massachusetts towns were taking measures to ensure its minute and militia companies were properly armed and equipped in the event war broke out with England. Haverhill was no exception. However, it appears one of Haverhill's "independent companies" recommended the adoption of a uniform for its men.

Captain James Brickett’s Company from Haverhill was originally formed as an artillery unit. When its members were unable to procure an artillery piece, it reorganized itself as an “independent corps”. On the eve of the American Revolution, Brickett’s Company was essentially operating as a minute company. On March 21, 1775, the company voted “that we Dress in a Uniform consisting of a Blue Coat, turned up with Buff, and yellow plain Buttons, the Coat cut half way the thigh; and the Pockets a Slope. Voted, Also, that we have Buff, or Nankeen Waistcoat & Breeches, and White Stockings with half Boots or Gaiters. Also that the Hats be cocked alike. And that each one have a bright gun, Bayonet, & Steel Ramrod. Voted that the Company be equipd in this Uniform by the first Monday in May.” The unit also agreed that “each member shall be supply'd with one Pound of Powder and Twenty Balls; to be reviewed twice a year; upon the Days of a chusing."

There is no evidence that Brickett's Company actually acquired this proposed uniform. A massive fire destroyed a section of their town on April 17, 1775. Two days later, Haverhill mobilized for war.

Over the next several days, we'll share research from other towns that recommended the adoption of a uniform appearance for its military companies, including Pittsfield.

"Delivered Bayonets in the Company" - Was Lexington's John Parker a Veteran of the French and Indian War?

Captain John Parker was the commanding officer of the American militia at the Battle of Lexington.  Family tradition credits John Parker with considerable military experience before the Revolution. It is claimed that he was present at the capture of Louisbourg, served during the French and Indian War, fought in Quebec in 1759, and was a member of  Roger’s Rangers.  

So, did John Parker have military combat experience before April 19, 1775?  The answer is a resounding NO.

The first time someone claimed John Parker was a veteran of the French wars was in 1893, one hundred and eighteen years after the Battle of Lexington.  That year, two separate publications asserted that Parker had combat experience.  The first was written by a great-grandson, Theodore Parker.  In his work Genealogy and Biographical Notes of John Parker of Lexington and His Descendants: Showing His Earlier Ancestry in America from Dea. Thomas Parker of Reading, Mass., from 1635 to 1893, the Reverend Parker states, “John Parker was at the capture of Louisburg in 1758 . . .was at the taking of Quebec in 1759 . . . [and was] made a sergeant in this war.”  A second publication by Captain Parker’s great-granddaughter, Elizabeth S. Parker, alleged the militia captain “had served in the French and Indian War.”  

Neither account provided documentation supporting the argument John Parker served in the French Wars.  Nevertheless, historians quickly promoted these questionable claims over the next several decades.  Worse, many, including Historian David Hackett Fischer, expanded Parker’s service record to include being present at the 1745 Siege of Louisbourg and patrolling the New York frontier with Roger’s Rangers.

Unfortunately, no official records, journals, or surviving artifacts support the proposition John Parker enlisted in the war effort against the French, let alone saw combat.  

One argument occasionally advanced by 20th-century historians is that Parker’s father, Josiah, served as an officer at the 1745 Siege of Louisbourg.  He must have brought his then fifteen-year-old son John along as a servant.  This assertion is nothing more than bunk.  There are no records that Josiah Parker enlisted in the Louisbourg expedition.  Town records from the period establish that Josiah Parker was in Lexington and actively serving as a selectman in 1745.

Likewise, a review of marriage, baptismal, personal, town, and military records demonstrates that John Parker was also present in Lexington during the French and Indian War.  On May 25, 1755, Parker married Lydia Moore in Lexington.  In the early Spring of 1756, Lydia became pregnant.  She gave birth to a baby girl on November 8th.  According to Parker’s account book, he satisfied woodworking orders in Lexington during August 1757.  In the summer of 1758, Lydia became pregnant for the second time and gave birth to a baby girl on January 11, 1759.  

Each of these events occurred after the commencement of a seasonal military campaign.   If Parker had enlisted in a Massachusetts provincial regiment, he would have embarked to New York or Nova Scotia in April or May with his regiment.  He would not have returned to Lexington until late November.  Thus, John Parker could not have been in two places at once.

Of course, one of the more common claims of Parker’s alleged military service is he was present at the fall of Quebec in 1759.  This is simply not true.  While Provincial and Regular troops were laying siege to Quebec, Parker was in Lexington. In June 1759, Benjamin Reed noted that he assembled his militia company and issued bayonets to some of his men.  John Parker was one of them.  “The following names are a full and Just account of those to whom I the Subscriber delivered Bayonets in the company under my command in Lexington, Benjamin Reed, Captain, June 5, 1759… [49 militiamen listed including John Parker].”  

However, the fact that John Parker lacked military experience should not detract from his remarkable leadership immediately following his defeat at the Battle of Lexington.  Parker successfully rallied his company and mobilized them for war.  Less than twelve hours later, he successfully staged a devastating ambush against a retreating British column.  This action alone should put any doubt regarding John Parker's military skills to rest.   

"Antient Loyalists" - A Warning to the United States from the People of Upper Canada

In the years following the American Revolution, the threat of a second armed conflict between the United States and England loomed. When war finally erupted in 1812, many Loyalists were fearful that the United States would invade Upper Canada and drive them from their homes.

In response to this threat, the residents drafted "From the Inhabitants of Upper Canada to the People of the American States." Although most of the document details the brutality and violence the average Loyalist refugee faced during the American Revolution, it also disavows American principles of liberty and government.

The statement appeared in the Kingston Gazette on October 31, 1812.

 

"The Town will Fetch Two Small Pieces of Cannon" - Artillery in Lexington before April 19, 1775

We at Historical Nerdery were recently granted access to the 18th Century town meeting notes of Lexington, Massachusetts. Admittedly, we were reviewing the documents to reconstruct missing pieces of information about Captain John Parker’s Company. During our search, however, we found a couple of entries that peaked our interest….especially in light of the recent publication of J.L. Bell’s outstanding work “The Road to Concord: How Four Stolen Cannon Ignited the Revolutionary War”.

Lexington apparently owned two cannons on the eve of the Battles of Lexington and Concord.

In his book, Mr. Bell discusses how Massachusetts residents were scrambling in late 1774 to obtain artillery pieces. Some of the guns, mostly iron cannons, were taken from coastal defenses around Boston and sent to Watertown. While there, two of the guns caught the attention of Lexington. Its residents quickly pressed the selectmen to acquire a pair of cannons for the town.

On November 3, 1774, the town selectmen relented and announced the issue would be addressed at the next town meeting. Specifically, “Upon a request of a numbre of Inhabitants to see if the Town will fetch two small pieces of cannon from Watertown, offered by said Town for the use of the Company in this Towne.”

A week later, the town approved the purchase of two guns. “Voted. . . to bring the two pieces of Cannon (mentioned in the warrant) from Watertown & mount them, at the at the Town charge.”

After approving the purchase of two cannons, in true Yankee fashion, the residents voted to create a committee to explore the cheapest methods of mounting of the guns on carriages and building of ammunition boxes. “That a Comtee of three persons go to Watertown & see what the cost of mounting sd pieces will be & whether the carriages cannot be made by work men in this town” It should be noted that the committee included Jonas Parker, an experienced woodworker and carpenter. Parker was later killed at the Battle of Lexington.

At some point after November 28, 1774, it received the two guns from Watertown. “Voted . . . that the Selectmen receive the two pieces of cannon with their beds [from] the Towne of Watertowne and give receipts for the same on behalf of the Towne.” By late February, 1775, Thomas Robbins of Lexington was already making ammunition cartridges for the guns. On February 27th, the town “Granted an ordere to pay Mr. Tho Robbins 1/9 in full for his trimming the (balls) & providing baggs to put them in.”

Unfortunately, what became of the guns after February 1775 is unknown. Lexington’s town meeting minutes from the Spring of 1775 were stolen years ago. Records from December 1775 through the remainder of the war do not mention the cannons. Shortly after the War for Independence, Lexington formed an artillery company. Whether the guns used were the same ones acquired from Watertown in 1774 remains a mystery.

The 1776 Probate Inventory Of Nathaniel Mulliken of Lexington

Lexington resident Nathaniel Mulliken Jr. was a member of Captain John Parker's Company and a participant of the Battle of Lexington.  Early 19th Century accounts of the Battle of Lexington suggest Mulliken, upon seeing the size of the approaching British column, uttered "There are so few of us! It is folly to stand here!"   A clock maker by trade, Mulliken's shop and the house were burned to the ground on April 17, 1775 by British troops while retreating back to Boston.

On April 25, 1775, Nathaniel along with thirty three other fellow militiamen submitted sworn depositions detailing the American version of the battle. After the battle, Nathaniel joined the Massachusetts army surrounding Boston.  In early 1776 he passed away of unknown causes.

The following is an inventory of Mulliken's estate.  The document is important because it provides a snapshot of the clothing and other items common to Lexington and Massachusetts residents in the early years of the American Revolution.

Historical Nerdery is working on transcribing the document.  Once we do, we'll post it on our blog.

Mulliken's probate inventory can be found at the Massachusetts Archives in Dorchester, Massachusetts.

Skunk Waltzes, Nude Art and Poodle Dogs - Examples of Mudslinging in Late 19th and Early 20th Century Presidential Elections

Today we will be reviewing some examples of mudslinging in presidential election campaigns between the Reconstruction Era and the eve of the Great Depression.

The election of 1884 shook up politics in the United States as it brought a Democrat, Grover Cleveland, to the White House for the first time since the administration of James Buchanan a quarter-century earlier.  Unlike his presidential predecessors, Cleveland was a confirmed bachelor.  However, during the campaign it was discovered he was having an affair with a widow in Buffalo and that he had fathered a son with the woman.  Cleveland admitted the child was his.  The Republicans seized on the paternity scandal, mocking Cleveland by chanting the rhyme, “Ma, Ma, where’s my Pa?”  In the following weeks, Republican newspapers slammed Cleveland for the transgression.  It appeared as if the Democrat was going to lose the election.

Enter Republican candidate James Blaine.  Blaine was already the target of some nasty accusations from his Democrat opponent.  He was engaged in shady dealings with a railroad company. The accusations were confirmed when a letter was found in which Blaine pretty much admitted that he was involved in a corrupt business - he signed the letter, “My regards to Mrs. Fisher. Burn this letter!” Cleveland's Democrats made up their own chant based on his writings - “Burn this letter! Burn this letter!”  

However, it was one of Blaine’s supporters who helped the candidate snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.  With the election only one week away, Blaine was campaigning in New York City.  He was hoping to win over the vital Irish Catholic vote to secure New York State.  Everything was going his way until the Rev. Samuel Burchard, speaking at a pro-Blaine event, denounced the Democrats as the party of “rum, Romanism, and rebellion.”  In short, the minister had told Blaine supporters the Democratic party was controlled by alcoholics (“rum”), Catholics (“Romanism”), and ex-Confederates (“rebellion”). When Democratic newspapers across the country ran the phrase as a headline the next day, Blaine’s campaign suffered a mortal blow from which it could not recover.

Anti-Catholic sentiment reared its ugly head again in the 1928 election contest between Herbert Hoover and Al Smith.  Smith, the Democratic candidate, was a Roman Catholic.  Hoover raised the issue on multiple occasions during the campaign.  Hoover’s supporters were even worse.  They argued that if Smith was elected, the United States would be subjected to “Romanism and Ruin.”  Protestant ministers told their congregations that if Smith became president, all non-Catholic marriages would be annulled and all children of these marriages declared illegitimate. Preachers even warned their congregations that if they voted for Al Smith, they would go straight to hell.  

In Daytona Beach, Florida, the school board instructed that a note be placed in every child's lunch pail that read: “We must prevent the election of Alfred E. Smith to the presidency. If he is chosen president, you will not be allowed to read or have a bible.”  On the eve of the election, the Holland Tunnel in New York was just about completed. Republicans leveled allegations that Smith had commissioned a secret tunnel 3,500 miles long, from the Holland Tunnel to the Vatican in Rome, and that the Pope would have say in all presidential matters should Smith be elected.  

Even Hoover’s wife, Lou, got in on the action.  She and other Republicans spread vicious rumors of Smith's alleged alcoholism because he favored the repeal of Prohibition. Republicans sneeringly referred to him as “Alcoholic Smith,” told of outrageous drunken public behavior, and claimed that he had secretly promised to appoint a bootlegger as secretary of the treasury.  

Others went as far as to lash out at Smith’s wife Kate and her Irish heritage.  They claimed if she became the First Lady the White House would smell of “corned beef, cabbage, and home brew.”    

As a final kick in the pants, one Protestant minister rallied against Smith for dancing and accused him of doing the “bunny hug, turkey trot, hesitation, tango, Texas Tommy, the hug-me-tight, foxtrot, shimmy-dance...and skunk-waltz.” Another claimed that Smith indulged in “card-playing, cocktail drinking, poodle dogs, divorces, novels, stuffy rooms, evolution...nude art, prize-fighting, actors, greyhound racing, and modernism.”

Hoover won the election in a landslide while Smith was forced to slink away as the press mercilessly continued to mock him.  

Poor Smith.  Hopefully after the election he had some free time to play with his poodle dogs and do the skunk waltz with Kate.

Pimps, Wenches and Mommy's Boys - Mudslinging in Early American Presidential Elections

We here at Historical Nerdery prefer to be apolitical in regards to the 2016 presidential election.  That said, with the various claims that the current presidential race is the “nastiest”, “dirtiest” and “meanest” in American history, we thought it would be nice to look back at a few campaigns in American history that make the current contest look like a kindergarten dispute.

In 1800, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams engaged in a very nasty smear campaign against each other to win over American voters.  Jefferson hired a writer to draft insults rather than dirty his own hands (at least at first). One of his more interesting smears asserted Adams was a “hideous hermaphroditical character which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.” In response, Adams' Federalist Party raised it up a notch and asked, “Are you prepared to see your dwellings in flames... female chastity violated... children writhing on the pike? GREAT GOD OF COMPASSION AND JUSTICE, SHIELD MY COUNTRY FROM DESTRUCTION.”  Jefferson prevailed over Adams and became the third president of the United States.

John Quincy Adams must have been inspired by his father, for during the 1828 election he hurled a string of insults and accusations at his political opponent Andrew Jackson that would make many modern politicians run to their safe spaces.  He and his handlers argued Jackson had the personality of a dictator, was too uneducated to be president and his wife, Rachel was a “dirty black wench”, a "convicted adulteress" and “open and notorious [to] lewdness”.  Adams’s supporters even went as far to say Jackson’s mother was “a common prostitute, brought to this country by the British soldiers . . . [she] married a MULATTO MAN, with whom she had several children of which number General JACKSON IS ONE!!!”  

In response, Jackson and his backers literally accused Adams of being a “pimp” and procuring young girls for Czar Alexander I while he was minister to Russia.  Jackson also argued his opponent was a government hack who fed “at the public trough”.  Worse, Adams was a “lordly, purse-proud” aristocrat who decorated the White House with fancy furniture and a “gambling den.” The biggest critique was that the president had made a “corrupt bargain” with House Speaker Henry Clay to garner the necessary votes to become president in 1824.  

Naturally, Jackson bristled at the attacks against his wife.  He easily won the election, but his wife died before he took office.  At her funeral, Jackson allegedly said “In the presence of this dear saint . . . I can and do forgive all my enemies. But those vile wretches who have slandered her must look to God for mercy.”

On the eve of the American Civil War, Americans were subjected to the mud slinging of Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas.  Douglas undertook an unpopular tactic for the era by visiting various towns around the country to speak to voters.  However, to deflect criticism, he claimed these visits were made because they were along the train route he was taking to visit his mother.  In response, Lincoln announced via a “lost child” pamphlet that Douglas was a missing mommy’s boy.  “Left Washington, D.C. some time in July, to go home to his mother... who is very anxious about him. Seen in Philadelphia, New York City, Hartford, Conn., and at a clambake in Rhode Island. Answers to the name Little Giant. Talks a great deal, very loud, always about himself.” Of course, “Little Giant” was a dig at Douglas' height (he was a mere 5'4").   Lincoln even attacked his opponent’s weight. A description in the pamphlet alleged Douglas was “about five feet nothing in height and about the same in diameter the other way.”

Of course, Douglas fired back at Lincoln, saying he was a "horrid-looking wretch, sooty and scoundrelly in aspect, a cross between the nutmeg dealer, the horse-swapper and the nightman." Have to be careful of those nutmeg dealers! Another swipe claimed “Lincoln is the leanest, lankest, most ungainly mass of legs and arms and hatchet face ever strung on a single frame.”  The Democrat even went as far to stoke racial fears if his opponent were elected.  “Lincoln wants whites to be able to marry blacks, blacks to serve on juries, blacks to have equal rights, blacks to have the vote, blacks to have white servants and all these things that are supposed to send shivers of horror into the white community.”

Lincoln would rout his opponent, winning the presidency with 1.87 million votes, nearly 500,000 better than the runner-up Douglas. But less than two months after the election, South Carolina voted to secede from the union. Six more states would follow before Lincoln was sworn in as the 16th president of a rapidly dissolving United States on March 4, 1861.

Tomorrow we’ll discuss some of the nastiness of the post Civil War and early 20th Century elections.