1864 Photos Fort Pickering Salem Massachusetts

Ruthie Stearns, Gr Gr Granddaughter of Joseph Oliver Stearns shares some of Joseph’s stories from his journal and photos from Fort Pickering (Winter Island) Salem, Massachusetts. 

 

Joseph Oliver Stearns living in Amesbury, Massachusetts was a Private in the 3rd Unattached Company, Massachusetts Infantry (Militia) Mustered in for 90 days’ service May 3, 1864, and on duty at Fort Pickering, Salem, Mass. Mustered out August 5, 1864. All Photos from Stearns Family Collection Please DO NOT COPY WITHOUT PERMISSION

Joseph left  Newburyport Monday, May 2, 1864, with city cadets, to Readville, refers to as Camp Meigs. On May 13, transfers to Fort Pickering about noon. Gr He’s drilling or on guard duty, eats lots of soup, bread and beans. On May 11, the soldiers escorted the 26th Regiment to the depot. 26th Massachusetts Regiment was on leave March 22 through May 20, having been most recently in New Orleans.
Visit Mr. Peabody in Salem with his sisters Susan and Sarah. Maybe Sarah True, of Salisbury, a friend of Sarah and Susan Stearns married a John F. Peabody of Boxford MA, per census, she’s the same age as Susan.  In 1870 census John Peabody and Sarah living in Salem, she’s the right age, and they have several young children, oldest about 9.
Then visits Mr. Glaziers and Susan, sister of Peabody there. He home for a weekend May 24-26 1864.  Visits with his “girlfriend,” Helen Dennett (married in Amesbury MA 1 JAN 1867)  She went with him to Depot when he leaves Amesbury, Massachusetts. Helen writes in her journal for the same date that she “drove the horse back alone” which she would not have done before.
In his entries Joseph mentions the weather, what guard duty he was on and with whom, who he received a letter from and who he wrote, and any church services or lectures he might have attended.
He attends the military funeral for a Lieutenant Wheeler on June 9 1964 (per civil war records Richard P. Wheeler died June 2, 1864 from woulds rec’d in battle, residence Salem, place of death Fortress Monroe, Va)
Sometimes on guard duties at Fort Lee, also goes there to drill in big guns.  Has leave  again June 18-20 1864.
He goes for a sail with Rufus Greenleaf to Beverly Farms---see last photo above. And another day they went over to Marblehead in a boat.  Rufus Greenleaf is from Newburyport, Massachusetts s. of Jeremiah Greenleaf and Mary Ann Lamson. He married  Mary Jane Gowren “Jennie” Emery. Rufus d. at Newburyport, June 21st, 1880, buried at Oak Hill in Newburyport. Mary Jane married 2nd William Stone Coffin.
One day he helps mount gun in Ft. Pickering, another day moved ninety six barrels of powder from one magazine to another at Ft. Pickering.  He left Fort Pickering August 5.  went to the State House in Boston and mustered out in Boston Common.  Attended concert in the evening in City Hall.  Left for Newburyport the next morning. He received pay from U.S. $219.98.
Two days later he starts for Springfield, visiting Uncle William Stearns and Uncle Luther Stearns (Charles Oliver Stearns’ younger brothers)  He remarks a few days later he was 100 miles from Boston on the western Rail Road in West Springfield.
He heads for Worcester to Mechanics Hall and the Republic Convention, then on to Nashua, NH, staying with the Leonard Burbank family (Married to his cousin Fannie Stearns)
September 17 went to Lowell to the W.H. Hull family (his Aunt Mary Elizabeth Stearns Hull) in Dracut where his grandmother Dorcas Varnum Stearns lives, and heads home.
List of soldiers in 3^rd Unattached Company, Massachusetts Infantry (Militia)  Mustered in for 90 days’ service May 3, 1864, and on duty at Fort Pickering, Salem, Mass.  Mustered out August 5, 1864. (soldiers mentioned in JOS Journal noted by date of occurrence)

• Adams, Hazen M.
• Adams Jr., David J.
• Armitage, Charles E.
• Atkinson, Albert J.
• Ayers, Charles L.
• Bridges, Rufus
• Brown, John A.
• Burrill, James P.
• Burrill, Henry M.
• Carlton, William C.
• Cheeney Jr., Charles
• Cheever, Augustus E.
• Cheney Jr., Charles
• Clark, George W.
• Collins, John H.  Salisbury;  6/4  6/29  7/1 7/27 7/30
• Creasey, Edward K.
• Creasy, Edmund K.
• Currier, Albert E.
• Currier, Frank P.   5/30 – he’s “friend Currier” that Nell mentions.  6/2  6/6  6/17 7/2  8/5  8/8
• Currier, Alfred
• Cutter, Henry P.
• Dame, Luther  7/19.  Captain.  8/3
• Danforth, Jacob I.  6/11.  Corporal.
• Danforth, Calvin H.
• Delano, James H.
• Frothingham Jr., Joseph A.
• Gerrish, Orrin B.  8/6
• Goodwin, Daniel S.
• Green, Charles M.
• Greenleaf, Rufus L.  6/28   7/13 7/27
• Greenough, Henry F.
• Hale, Charles H.
• Haskell, George W.
• Haskell, William W.
• Hodgdon, James W.
• Holland, John E.
• Horton, Charles F.
• Johnson, Otis
• Johnson, James H.
• Keniston, James R.
• Keniston, James R.
• Knight, Joseph
• Knight Jr., George W.
• Lamson, William S.
• Lane, Isaac J.
• Lattime, Benjamin H.
• Little, William A.
• Lunt, Amos
• Merrill, Paul A.
• Morse, Joseph E.
• Morse, Joseph F.
• Morse, Albert
• Morse, Edward O.
• Mudge, William M.
• Mumford, Frank E.
• Mumford, Martin M.
• Newhall, Preston
• Noyes, Charles S.
• Ordway, George
• Pearson, George
• Pettingill, John S.  6/2  6/29  7/1  7/23
• Pillsbury, Harvey H.
• Pilsbury, Harvey H.
• Poor, Hiram R.
• Porter, Albert W.
• Pray, Joseph E.  5/9
• Ross, Jr., George
• Russell, Edward P.   5/9 5/10
• Ryan, John
• Sawyer, Albert P.   5/10 6/23
• Stearns, Joseph O.  Salisbury
• Stevens, George H.
• Stickney, Benjamin
• Stickney, Enoch P.
• Swasey, William H.
• Talbot, Tristum
• Thurlow, Charles W.
• Thurlow, Benjamin A.
• Tibbetts, Calvin E.  Salisbury   6/3
• Tibbetts, James E.  Salisbury
• Tilton, W. Byron:  6/24 Corporal  6/27 7/25
• Toppan, Roland W.  6/24 Sergeant 7/31
• Towle, Edward B.
• Varina, Edmund C.
• Varina, William T.
• Varina Jr., William T.
• Vay, Charles P.
• Walton, Joseph H.  Salisbury  Corporal.  7/31.
• Wells, Wallace D.
• Woodman, Charles H.
• Young, Jacob H.

Photo of Joseph Oliver Stearns in uniform. His father Charles Stearns served as a selectman in Amesbury, Massachusetts and his obituary “Death of a nonagenarian” clearly shows a minion deeply respected, admired, and cherished. He was expert tanner, but held many vocations including California Gold Rush venturer. News clips furnished from the Archival room at Amesbury Library reveal a full life. He was present during the visit of Gen Lafayette and the laying of the Bunker Hill monument where Daniel Webster spoke. His 90th birthday was attended by his closest mates Captain Paul Bickford, Richard Currier, Hiram Foote, and L E Burbank.

• Genealogy of the Greenleaf Family James Edward Greenleaf
• Salem Register, Salem Massachusetts September 10, 1863
• “United States; Salem; Fort Pickering; Fort William.” Saturday, November 23, 1799  Greenfield Gazette Greenfield, Massachusetts
• Newburyport and the Civil War William Hallett
• The City of Newburyport in the Civil War from 1861 to 1865: With the Individual Records of the Soldiers and Sailors who Served to Its Credit, Also the War Records of Many Natives and Residents of the City, Credited to Other Places George William Creasey

Burbank Collection Family Photos and Art Collection Leonard Burbank

A Share from Ruth Stearns Another link to 
Joseph Oliver Stearns and Hellen Louise "Nell" Dennett 

The Stearns genealogy references Oliver Stearns and Dorcas Varnum (parents Charles Oliver Stearns), and their oldest child Anne Dorcas Stearns who married Freeman Huggins of Saco, ME, daughter Frances Anne Huggins, born July 19, 1833, who married Leonard E. Burbank.  He is second cousin of William Dennett Stearns. Helen Louise Dennett Stearns’ parents were John Dennett and Louisa Frost Dennett.   Louisa had a brother, Morrill Frost married Eliza Wadsworth.
John Dennett and Louisa Frost--oldest child was Ann May Dennett who married Elbridge Cushing Sawyer.  They had a child, Ida Sawyer, born around 1861 or so, and they all visit the Dennett’s in the 1880’s per Joseph Oliver Stearns diary entries (since he lives with the Dennett’s) The Swayer's lived in Beverly.  Ida was the only child of six of John and Louisa who survived her parents. 
Worthen Dennett married Lorana Congdon, child Alice Louisa Dennett born in 1868.  Worthen died three years later and Lorana remarried to Charles Kennard and had a son named Charles Kennard.   
Alice Dennett married Milton Kendall, and had five children, including Ada Kendall.  According to Ancestry.com, Ada died in Amesbury in 1965, married to William Grieve Carter. Alice died in Putnam, CT in 1952. Leonard Freeman Burbank was the son of Frances Anne Huggins and Leonard E. Burbank. 
Willie 2nd cousin. Frances was the daughter of Anne Dorcas Stearns Huggins and Freeman Huggins. JOS 1st cousin. Anne was the daughter of Oliver and Dorcas Varnum Stearns…sister of Charles Oliver Stearns.

Frances Ann Huggins Burbank, first cousin of Joseph Oliver Stearns and niece of Charles Oliver Stearns.  

Ada Kendall

                                                                   

Ann May Dennett Sawyer

                                                         

Elbridge Sawyer

                                                                  

Morrill Frost

                                                     

Eliza Wadsworth Frost

                                                             

In October, 1897, Mrs. Eliza W. Frost of Winthrop offered $10,000 toward the erection of a library building, to cost at least $20,000, and to be called the Frost Public Library, in memory of her husband, the late Morrill Frost. Efforts to raise by subscription the amount needed to make the gift available proving unsuccessful, Mrs. Frost's proposition was brought before the town at the annual meeting in March, 1898; the town unanimously voted $10,000 toward the building, and also purchased a lot of land on which to erect the same; ground was broken for this purpose Aug. 29, 1898.

The exterior of the building is classical in design. The base is of Deer Isle granite, the cornices, belts and trimmings of entrances and windows, are of Indiana lime stone. The outside walls are of gray speckled bricks laid in light mortar. The roof is slated with Vermont green slate, with copper gutters and trimmings. The main building has a frontage on the park of seventy feet and a depth of thirty feet. The stack room extends northerly from the center of the main building forty feet, with a width of twenty-seven and one-half feet. The entrance is into an outer vestibule opening into an inner hall. The vestibules have mosaic floors of special design, marble bases with paneled oak walls. From the vestibule one enters the delivery room, to the right of which is the general reading-room; on the left is a reading-room for children and a room for books of reference. On the same floor are also rooms for the trustees and librarian. The second floor is reached by two stairways from the delivery room. Here are three rooms which will be used for the exhibition of pictures, historical relics and other articles of interest.   From The Free Public Libraries of Massachusetts on 1962 Frost Public Library, Winthrop, Massachusetts  by Mark Jackson Article Telegraph, Nashua, April 14, 1988

During his lifetime, businessman Leonard Burbank surrounded himself with beautiful artwork and after he died he made certain that other Nashuans could do the same.

A living legacy of original artwork available to patrons of the Nashua Public Library will get special recognition this month when the Burbank Collection goes on exhibit at the Library.

Included in the exhibit will be original illustrations from children’s books that will be on permanent display in the Children’s Department.  The remainder of the artworks form part of the library’s circulating art collection.

The Burbank Fund is named for Leonard Freeman Burbank.  At the time of his death in 1932 he left $5000 to a body of associates to invest for 50 years with the stipulation that, at the end of that time, the principal and interest would become a permanent trust fund to purchase “pictures, paintings and works of art of then-living artists, for display in schools, libraries and public buildings, and for public exhibitions in the state.”.

The impact of the Burbank legacy is not to be dismissed lightly.  The businessman and lawyer, who also enjoyed painting landcapes, was closely associated with Nashua nearly all his life.

He was born in Melrose, Mass., on Nov. 11, 1859, to Leonard E. and Frances A Burbank.  The following year, the family moved to Nashua, where Burbank senior manufactured overalls in a factory on Merrimack Street in partnership with Fred Buxton, father of Mrs. Laurence A Barker, one of the original advisory group members.

After graduating from Nashua High School in 1878 and Boston University Law School in 1881, the young Burbank worked briefly as a lawyer in both Nashua and Atlanta, GA.

His tastes, however, were more inclined to the arts.  He had a fundamental, intelligent interest in art in addition to being a painter himself.  Burbank also wrote for newspapers and magazines and is credited with writing the centennial history of the First Unitarian Society in 1926. 

Agnes Barker knew Burbank as a neighbor and as a businessman involved in their father’s overalls business.  She recalls:  “He loved his cup of tea, his paintings, and his garden… He was an artistic gentleman.  I always remember him going off to the country with his easel to paint.”.

Burbank, a lifelong bachelor, traveled considerably, including a trip to Europe in 1893.  Perhaps as a result of that voyage he built an English-style cottage at 7 Columbian Av., complete with elaborate flower garden.

Ever a lover of beauty, Burbank maintained the garden with great care and was not averse to putting his love of nature before his health. After he died, a group called the Burbank Associates, led by Fred D. Cross of the then-Second National Bank of Nashua, oversaw the investment of funds until 1973, when the group was dissolved and the Hillsborough County Superior Court ordered the assets, by then totaling some $25,000, turned over to the Board of Trustees of the Nashua Public Library. As of March 1988, Burbank’s original $5000 had grown to more than $106,000. 

(article continues with info on the trustees, the Burbank Advisory Group, and the art collection).  From the Telegraph Thursday April 14, 1988.

Joseph Oliver Stearns and Hellen Louise "Nell" Dennett

Joseph Oliver Stearns and Hellen Louise "Nell" Dennett married in Amesbury MA 1 JAN 1867
Joseph O. Stearns fought in the United States Civil War for the Union Side. He was listed as being from Massachusetts. He was a Private in the 3rd Unattached Company, Massachusetts Infantry (Militia) Mustered in for 90 days' service May 3, 1864, and on duty at Fort Pickering, Salem, Mass. Mustered out August 5, 1864.
Nell born 31 MAR 1843 in MA and died 25 MAR 1874 in Amesbury, MA
Daughter of  to John Dennett and Louisa Frost
Joseph born 14 JUN 1838 in Salisbury, MA died 7 SEP 1917 in Amesbury, MA
Son of  Charles Oliver Stearns  a leather-dresser; m. Sept 10, 1833 Adaline Eastman of Salisbury, MA
Joseph's grandfather Oliver Stearns, lawyer was practicing in Dracut in 1813, and in Amesbury in 1818. He graduated at Harvard in 1808, and died in 1826. From Bench and Bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Volume 2 By William Thomas Davis He was a Representative as well and married Dorcas, dau. of the Hon. J. B. Varnum, Esq. of Dracut, Mass.    See Stearns Family Project

Joseph was dealer in paints, oils, &c, at Amesbury, Mass
Only one son William Dennett Stearns b: 25 OCT 1867 in Haverhill, MA d 27 OCT 1947 in Haverhill, MA
He married Sept. 18, 1889, Nettie Florence Gould, b., July 26, 1863; settled at Haverhill, Mass.; four children.
HOWARD OLIVER STEARNS, b., Sept. 20, 1891.
MILDRED FLORENCE STEARNS, b., Jan. 4, 1893; d., Mar. 14, 1897, of scarlet fever.
HELEN RACHEL STEARNS, b., May 16, 1895.
RALPH STEARNS, b. and d., Nov. 1, 1897.

                        Image courtesy of Mount Holyoke College Archives and Special Collections

 

 Ruth Stearns from Nebraska sent me some amazing photos

Here are 4 Generations of Stearns men Charles Oliver Stearns, Joseph Oliver Stearns, WIlliam Dennett Stearns and Howard Oliver Stearns.