By Andrea Cronin, Reader Services

It is the season of graduations, celebrations, and toasts. My personal social network bubbled this past weekend with images of familial celebrations, beach weekends, and – of course – spirituous liquors. Many a photo popped up of friends in drinking establishments, and I became curious about the history of taverns as a result. I browsed our online catalog ABIGAIL and discovered a liquor license issued to Sarah Checkley of Boston on 18 July 1764. Naturally it piqued my interest for several reasons. The license states:

We the Subscribers Selectmen of the Town of Boston do approve of Mrs. Sarah Checkley’s being a Retailer of Spirituous Liquor, at the House where into she has lately removed and now dwells, in Hanover Street near the Mill Bridge Boston, and recommend her a Person of sober Life and Conversation, and suitably qualified and provided for the Exercise of such an Employment she having for many years past been a Retailer in this Town and behaved to good acceptance.

This document is peculiar for what it is not. The license is not the oldest item pertaining to liquor petitions in the Society’s collections. The honor of oldest liquor petition goes to Samuel Walton of Woburn, Mass. who petitioned the Massachusetts General Court on 30 March 1665 to sell “strong waters.” How strong, the document does not specify. Checkley’s 1764 petition is not even the only liquor license in the MHS collections granted to a woman! A quick glance among retailer’s licenses, tavern licenses, and innkeeper’s licenses shows the custom to issue such documents to women not unusual for the late 18^th century.

The Suffolk County Court and Boston Selectmen approved retailer and liquor petitions from widow Elizabeth Pittson on 7 June 1767, widow Rachel Masters on 21 July 1767, and widow Mary Rose on 8 July 1773. The court also approved a petition from Mary Vinal to sell liquor on 30 July 1771. The petition did not designate Mary Vinal a widow unlike the aforementioned ladies. Her father suffered from palsy and could not provide for his family. Thus, Mary Vinal required a means to make an income as did the widows. In their petitions to the selectmen, the women granted these licenses all clearly stated a similar problem in their personal situations: a lack of income from male earners. Sarah Checkley’s petition lacks detailed information about her familial or marital status. This lack of information does not imply that she was not a widow or did not care for aging or sick male members of her family, but the petition is more interesting to me without these details. This absence lets me rosily imagine Sarah Checkley as a robust purveyor of spirituous liquors of her own accord.

For those of us celebrating graduations, petitioning for prospective employment, or just enjoying summer fun, we all know the important role income plays in our lives. May your summer be fruitful in your endeavors, but spirituous in fun! And remember to tip your bartenders.

By Elaine Heavey, Reader Services

A few weeks ago a writer contacted me looking for material located in the Appleton Family Papers.  The writer, Ariel Sabar, was working on a piece for the June issue of Smithsonian Magazine.  The focus of the article was the act of taking souvenir clippings from the original Star-Spangled Banner, the flag that flew over Fort McHenry when the British attacked on the evening of  13 September 1814 and inspired Francis Scott Key to compose our national anthem.

Sabar hoped I could locate and provide him with a copy of a letter written to a Georgiana Appleton from a Stephen Salisbury in 1874. The letter, Sabar knew, contained Salisbury’s request for a clipping from the old Star-Spangled Banner. I was dubious, until realized that Georgiana Appleton was formerly Georgiana Armistead, the daughter of Major George Armistead. Major (later Colonel) Armistead, upon taking command of Fort McHenry in 1813, saw to it that an enormous flag was made to be flown over the fort, which he assumed would be a likely British target in the ongoing War of 1812. Sometime in the three years between the inspirational battle at Fort McHenry and Armistead’s death, Armistead came to possess the flag. His daughter Georgiana, who had married into the Appleton family, inherited the flag upon her mother’s death in 1861. 

So I spent a bit of time browsing the Appleton Family Papers (our very detailed collection guide helped me narrow my search to 5 folders contained in box 10 of the collection) and my interest was piqued! Even after I located the letter Sabar had requested, I kept reading. I needed to learn more about Georgiana and the flag.

At first glance, what I read both thrilled and slightly horrified the trained archivist in me. I kept reminding myself that the best practice guidelines for preservation of historical treasures we follow today simply did not exist in the mid-1870s. But it seemed that each letter uncovered tales about snipping souvenirs from the flag to give to different parties, shipping the flag off by mail, and schlepping it around from exhibition site to exhibition site. I thought about the stringent guidelines we impose on borrowing institutions when we loan items from our own collection, not to mention the time we invest in doing condition photographs and reports, having insurance appraisals done, hiring professional art movers to transport artifacts, etc., etc. I marveled that the flag survived into the early 20^th century, when Appleton’s son, Eben Appleton, gifted it to the Smithsonian, who has worked to preserve the flag ever since.

Starting with a letter written in February 1873 there is a rich correspondence between Georgiana Armistead Appleton and Commodore George Henry Preble. Preble authored a history of the American flag, first published in 1872, and I gleaned from his first letter that Appleton had sent him a list of corrections to his text regarding the Star-Spangled-Banner. Preble promised to correct those errors in the next edition, and then asked that Appleton facilitate his photographing the flag so that he could include an engraving of the original flag in his next edition as well.

Here is where the feeling of horror began to sink in. Appleton agreed to loan the flag so that it could be photographed, and in letter dated 15 May 1873 Preble advised Appleton to “express ‘the flag’ to the address on this letter [the Boston Navy Yard] any time after or about the 1^st of June” so that he could have it “hoisted on the Navy Yard Flag Staff & be so photographed.” It was so casual, as if she were lending him a table cloth, not a national treasure.  

But when I read a bit deeper, I discovered the horror was a bit unwarranted.  In his first letter in February 1873, Preble expressed concern for the flag, stating that such treasures should not remain in private hands and recommending that Appleton deposit her flag at the Military Academy at West Point for long-term safe keeping. And in writing on 9 June 1873 Preble assured Appleton that once he received the flag at the Navy Yard he would see to it that “the banner is carefully preserved,” noting that he will only attempt to have it hoisted at the Navy Yard if its current condition merits it. 

Alas, when the flag arrived by express on 11 June, Preble disappointedly found it “too frail & tender” to be hoisted. The next day he informed Appleton that he was having some of the ripped seams restitched, and that he planned to have the flag “hung (out of the wind) against the wall of some one of the Navy Yard buildings” so that the photograph could be taken.  Preble was clearly more preservation minded than I had at first given him credit for.

For a period of about three years Preble acted as caretaker to the flag. He arranged to have the Banner, along with two other historical flags he wrote about in his history (the flag of the Revolutionary era USS Bon Homme Richard, and a flag from the USS Enterprise, famous for its involvement in the Tripolitan Wars of the early 19^th century) exhibited at the New England Historical Genealogical Society (NEGHS).  A one-day exhibition of the relics took place on 9 July 1873. Appleton’s flag remained on display for several weeks after, until, under Preble’s supervision, it was carefully rolled up, placed in a canvas bag, and deposited in the fire proof safe at the NEHGS for safe keeping. 

Immediately after the NEHGS exhibition, Preble and Appleton began corresponding about another opportunity to publically exhibit the flag.  As early as March 1873 representatives of the Centennial Committee, based in Philadelphia, began contacting Appleton about borrowing the flag for display during the celebration of the centennial in that city.  What again seemed a risky venture on the surface, proved that Preble was concerned about the long-term preservation of the flag, as he advised Appleton (on both 12 July and 21 Aug 1873) that if she chose to lend the flag, she should require that it be insured for “$5 or $10,000 dollars” and request a guarantee from the committee that none of it will be sold for relics. He also stressed the importance of ensuring that the flag would be displayed in a manner that prevented relics from being taken by enterprising attendees.  Reading through to the letters of 1876, I discovered that Appleton did choose to loan the flag, and that Preble ensured that proper case was taken.

Of course I could not overlook that Preble also wrote of taking snips of the flag, with Appleton’s authorization, to give to this person and that.  In fact, there is a receipt in one of the folders, dated August 1873, indicating that a snip of the flag was given as a gift to the NEHGS. But as Sabar points out in his article, the act of flag snipping was common in the 19^th century, and Preble does stress in his letters that he takes great pains to take his snippings from areas where they will not be missed. So I can try to forgive this preservation transgression. [Side note: The MHS has its own snippet of the Fort McHenry flag, but it was not gifted to the MHS by Appleton.  It was received in 1917, inserted an extra-illustrated edition of Preble’s History of the Flag of the United States of America, that was donated by a Nathan Paine.]

I discovered a number of other interesting letters in the Appleton Family Papers, all of which I am sure could lead to hours of research and future blog fodder.  There were multiple letters from individuals seeking clipping from the flag (unfortunately, Appleton did not keep copies of her replies to those requests) and letters from individuals that had written poems and songs about the flag.  There was even a letter from the granddaughter of Mary Pickersgill, the woman credited with making the flag, revealing her own poverty, and asking that a sign be displayed with the flag at the centennial to generate donations to support her.  But, I must say, the letters from Preble, that not only tell the story of the flag, but offer insight into thinking about preservation issues in the mid-19^th century, are the real gem for me.   

By Amanda A. Mathews, Adams Papers

Sometimes the waiting is the hardest part. In June 1776, John Adams likened the struggle in the Continental Congress to declare independence to giving birth. For Adams, the fact of independence already existed; it was only a matter of recognizing what was already there. In a letter of June 12, Adams alluded to the momentous occasion finally on the horizon: “We have greater Things, in Contemplation, than ever. The greatest of all, which We ever shall have. Be silent and patient and time will bring forth, after the usual Groans, throws and Pains upon such occasions a fine Child—a fine, vigorous, healthy Boy, I presume. God bless him, and make him a great, wise, virtuous, pious, rich and powerfull Man.”

Those final throws and pains began in earnest on June 7, when Richard Henry Lee put forward a simple but powerful resolution: “Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.” John Adams seconded the motion, but patience was yet required. Some delegates were unwilling to take such a step without explicit instructions from their constituents moved for a delay of consideration of the Lee Resolution. So that there would be no further loss of time, however, it was proposed to form a committee that would draft a declaration to serve as a justification for the resolution should it pass. On June 11, the Continental Congress appointed a Committee of Five—Robert R. Livingston of New York, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, and John Adams of Massachusetts.

Leaving no contemporary minutes, the details of the committee’s proceedings to create the draft of this declaration have been lost to history, although Adams gave a brief, though contested, overview in his Autobiography based on his recollections thirty years later. The draft that came out of the committee on June 28 was closely debated in Congress from July 2d to 4th, and the final product—the Declaration of Independence (to Adams’s surprise)—would go on to surpass the Lee Resolution in national importance and symbolism.

Nevertheless, on July 3, 1776, the day after the Continental Congress unanimously declared “that these United Colonies, are of right ought to be, free and independent States,” Adams wrote triumphantly to his wife Abigail that the “Day of Deliverance” had arrived—the child safe delivered: “Yesterday the greatest Question was decided, which ever was debated in America, and a greater perhaps, never was or will be decided among Men…. You will see in a few days a Declaration setting forth the Causes, which have impell’d Us to this mighty Revolution, and the Reasons which will justify it, in the Sight of God and Man.” The child born, the day past, the real work could now begin.

By Gregory N. Flemming, Guest Author

Tucked away in the archives of the Massachusetts Historical Society Library are two small, leather-bound volumes printed nearly 300 years ago. These small tracts, titled Ashton’s Memorial, reveal an incredible story — the first-hand account of a Massachusetts fisherman named Philip Ashton who was captured by pirates in 1722 and then escaped and lived as a castaway on an uninhabited Caribbean island for nearly two years. Ashton’s Memorial is a rare description of a voyage aboard a pirate ship during the peak of Atlantic piracy and it reveals rich new details about the crew, captures, and nearly-fatal mishaps.

The Society may hold the only surviving copy of the original 1725 printing of Ashton’s Memorial in Boston. There are original editions from a second printing of Ashton’s Memorial, published in London in 1726, at both the Massachusetts Historical Society and the British Library. The second printing is nearly identical to the first, except the title page uses the descriptor “An Authentick Account” instead of “An History” and includes three lines of text that were omitted from the Boston printing, apparently due to a typesetting error.

Ashton’s narrative was compiled by his minister, John Barnard of the First Church in Marblehead, Massachusetts. The fact that the book was published in London a year after it was printed in Boston speaks to the popularity of the story at the time. In fact, Ashton’s Memorial may have been read in London by Daniel Defoe, who had a lifelong interest in piracy, castaways, and the maritime world. A leading scholar of Defoe’s work, Manual Schonhorn, has compared Defoe’s writings before and after Ashton’s Memorial was published and concludes that Defoe incorporated new details from Ashton’s story — never published anywhere else — in his next novel.

Barnard compiled Ashton’s Memorial shortly after Ashton returned home to Massachusetts from his three-year odyssey, but the book is written in the first person and reads as though Ashton wrote it. Barnard notes in a short introduction that he met with Ashton on several occasions to record the narrative and subsequently verified its accuracy: “I have taken the minutes of all from his own mouth, and after I had put them together, I have improved the first vacant hour I could to read it over distinctly to him that he might correct the errors that might arise from my misunderstanding his report. Thus corrected, he has set his hand to it as his own history.” In researching Ashton’s story, I found that a number of significant events recounted in Ashton’s text were supported by other sources.

The Massachusetts Historical Society also holds the papers of John Barnard, including his Autobiography and three other volumes of his sermon notes. These papers provide additional insights into the adventurous life of one of New England’s more prominent Puritan ministers during the early eighteenth century — but they reveal nothing more about Philip Ashton or Ashton’s Memorial. It is striking, in fact, that Barnard was compelled to record Ashton’s story not for the sake of history, but because he believed it conveyed important religious themes to an audience that was, in his mind, lacking in faith. This was quite common, in fact. Religious leaders during this era — including Barnard’s former teacher, Cotton Mather — frequently exploited pirate captures, executions, and other dramatic events to issue dire warnings against what they saw as a rising tide of drunkenness, adultery, blasphemy, church skilling, and other transgressions in Boston and throughout colonial New England. As interesting as Ashton’s voyage was, for Barnard the true message in the story was “God’s ability to save” an ordinary fisherman from death and disaster.

Gregory N. Flemming is the author of At the Point of a Cutlass: The Pirate Capture, Bold Escape, and Lonely Exile of Philip Ashton, published in June. He will speak at the Massachusetts Historical Society at 12 noon on Thursday, June 19, 2014. The event is free and open to the public.

By Nancy Heywood, Collection Services

Do you remember some of the people you’ve met while traveling?  Maybe your flight got delayed (a real possibility these days!) or you had a long layover during one stage of your trip and you struck up a conversation with someone in a waiting room.  Years later will you remember anything about them or your conversation?

Thanks to John Quincy Adams’ (JQA’s) diary entries from May 1814, a man named Zandelin comes vibrantly to life. This is a man JQA met while traveling between Reval, Russia (present-day Tallinn, Estonia) and Sweden.  JQA had previously been serving as minister plenipotentiary to Russia and living in St. Petersburg, but in early 1814 he was appointed head of a commission to negotiate an Anglo-American peace treaty (and end the War of 1812). JQA was told the negotiations would take place in Gothenburg (although later he learned that the location was changed to Ghent, Belgium), but as of the spring of 1814 his destination was Sweden.

By May 1814, JQA had reached Reval, a port on the Gulf of Finland, and he arranged passage across the Baltic Sea on the ship Ulysses.  Mr. Zandelin, a Swedish merchant, was another passenger on the vessel.  Although Zandelin could be seen as an unimportant figure in history, his presence on the same ship as JQA and on the pages of JQA’s diaries, means that we have a more detailed and colorful picture of an 11-day stretch within JQA’s much longer journey to the site of the peace negotiations.

When JQA made arrangements with Captain Brinkmann (of the Ulysses) on May 3, he was told that the ship would leave a few days later.  However, several factors including tricky sailing conditions (unfavorable winds and the fact that there was still a significant amount of ice in the harbor) delayed the departure of the ship.  It wasn’t until the evening of May 15 that JQA was asked to board the ship.

When JQA arrived on board the Ulysses he found Mr. Zandelin surrounded by about a dozen men wishing him (Zandelin) farewell.  These men departed the Ulysses via the same boat that shuttled JQA from shore out to the ship. 

I immediately finished the packing of my Clothes, books and Papers, and came on board the Vessel– The Ulysses, Captain Brinkman– It was between 9 and 10 in the Evening. Mr Ross with ten or twelve other Gentlemen were on board; to take leave of Mr Sandolin, a Swedish Merchant, who freights the Vessel, and is also going in her as a Passenger– They returned on shore in the Boat, in which I had come on Board–

Despite favorable winds at 4 AM on the morning of May 16, 1814, the ship couldn’t depart because the officer of the guard ship didn’t arrive with the vessel’s pass and JQA’s passport until around 8:00 AM. The interactions with the guard took some time, and by the middle of the day, when the ship was cleared for departure, the winds had died down.  A light breeze started in the evening, and despite the captain’s apprehension regarding the “floating masses of ice” he did attempt to set sail partly in response to the urgings of JQA and Mr. Zandelin. However, the unfavorable winds and ice prompted the captain to turn the ship around early on the following morning (May 17) and return to Reval.

Once the ship, crew and passengers were back where they started from—Reval’s harbor—a couple of Mr. Zandelin’s friends returned to the ship to visit with him, “In the afternoon, two Gentlemen of Mr Zandelin’s friends came on board, and spent an hour with him–“.

The temperatures were so cold that JQA had trouble holding his pen.  However he continued to write diary entries every day of his journey, and they indicate that he spent a great deal of time reading.  He was travelling with many books including a multi-volume memoir of the Duke of Sully entitled Memoirs of Maximilian de Bethune: Duke of Sully, Prime Minister to Henry the Great.  Each published volume was divided into numerous “books,” and when he boarded the Ulysses JQA was reading book 12, and by the time he departed the ship he was reading book 30.

JQA’s diary notes that the wind conditions on the morning of May 18, 1814 were favorable, but the ship remained in the harbor.  The captain had gone onshore for the day and didn’t return until the evening.  Then on May 19 the ship couldn’t depart because the winds were once again unfavorable.  JQA didn’t mention the level of his own frustration, but he wrote about Mr. Zandelin’s dwindling patience:

After a Night totally calm, there was again a light breeze this Morning. West by North– It was impossible to move. The breeze continued freshening all day long; and by 5 in the afternoon, the time of the New-Moon, had risen to a brisk Gale. It blew hard, the whole Evening; with some Rain. My fellow passenger Zandelin, for fear of losing his good humour, took to his bed, and slept, the greatest part of the day– 

Despite Zandelin’s preemptive measures not to lose his good humor, it was all gone by May 20.  JQA’s brief words clearly describes the situation:

At 6 this Morning the Wind was at North-North-East; and Mr Zandelin was in a flame to get immediately under weigh– The Captain was reluctant, and fearful; because none of the other vessels laying in the harbour shewed any signals of sailing– 

Captain Brinkman overcame his reluctance, and the Ulysses did indeed set sail (again) on May 20.  Difficult wind conditions and “ice islands” prevented it from making significant progress during the next two days (May 21-22, 1814), but the vessel did slowly move along the shore of Finland.  On May 23 Mr. Zandelin had reached his limit, but was thrilled to find more favorable traveling conditions the next day.  Zandelin’s low and high are both described by JQA: 

The Night was nearly calm. My fellow passenger Zandelin had exhausted his Patience, and told me last Evening that if the wind continued as it was it would kill him– About 5 this Morning he came down from deck, in an extasy of joy, and said, Sir, I do not know whether I dare to tell you…We have the fairest wind in the world–just this moment sprung up– I answered that he needed not to have told me: for I had seen it in his face, the moment he opened the cabin door– This wind continued fair, the whole day; a light breeze, and scarcely a cloud to be seen–

The Ulysses reached Sweden on the following morning (May 25, 1814) and by the end of the day had navigated through the tricky channels and anchored in the harbor of Stockholm.  During this final part of their journey on the Ulysses, Mr. Zandelin gave JQA information about why some of the channels were almost impassable.  This is the last time JQA mentioned Zandelin in his diary.  In the evening, JQA disembarked and found lodging at the English Tavern.

JQA’s diaries contain a lot of information, but the diaries don’t (and can’t) include everything.  Although it would be interesting to know how frustrated JQA was with the slow pace of the journey from Reval to Sweden, we don’t know.  Although it would be interesting to know if JQA was bemused or irked by Mr. Zandelin, we don’t know. We don’t really know what JQA’s and Mr. Zandelin’s interactions were like during the long voyage, although it is tempting to picture every interaction as a stark juxtaposition of a gregarious and emotive fellow with a composed and non-flappable man.

However, we do get to see references to Mr. Zandelin on the pages of JQA’s diaries, written by JQA in his steady and readable handwriting.  Thanks to JQA, we do have glimpses of Mr. Zandelin from 200 years ago.

The quotes above are from pages 104-107 of John Quincy Adams diary 29, 1813-1816, from the Adams Family Papers.  These pages, as well as all of JQA’s diaries (51 volumes comprised of more than 14,000 pages), are available online at the Massachusetts Historical Society’s website.

MHS has been tweeting JQA‘s line-a-day diary entries 200 years after the day he describes.

By Amanda A. Mathews, Adams Papers

Charles Francis Adams recorded Tuesday, April 30, 1861 as a “soft, springlike day” in Boston in his diary. Nevertheless, as serene as the weather may have been, the political world was far less so. Not yet had three full weeks gone by since the Battle at Fort Sumter—the opening salvos of what would be a long and painfully bloody Civil War. The turbulent present and still unknown future did not solely occupy his thoughts on this day however. Rather, it was to the past that he looked. He could not help but be acutely aware of the knowledge that he was following in the footsteps of both his father, John Quincy Adams in 1815, and grandfather, John Adams in 1785; as he prepared to embark as the third generation of his family to serve as the United States Minister to Great Britain.

As he was to depart Boston the next day, Charles went to take his leave from the Governor of Massachusetts, John Albion Andrew, who surprised him by making a speech before the state’s public officials. Charles recorded the meeting in his Diary:

Soon after ten o’clock Governor Andrew was announced but instead of coming as I supposed with only his immediate Aids and Secretary, there filed in all the heads of bureaus of the Commonwealth…. The Governor rose and made me an address, alluding to the peculiar position which I occupied, to the departure of John Adams eighty four years ago, to the responsibility of my present mission, and closing with the expression of the entire confidence of the State in whose name he spoke as well as his own in my capacity and fidelity in the performance of my duty. For such a speech I was entirely unprepared and yet I saw that a reply was demanded…. I expressed my thanks for this most distinguished honor, my regard for him as the head of the Commonwealth not less than as a man, alluded to the painful circumstance in which I should leave the Country, but took consolation from the fact that as my father and grandfather had both of them left in moments of the greatest national distress, so I might like them return to the hour of restoration of its prosperity.

Nearly 44 years before, a ten-year-old Charles had crossed the Atlantic travelling home with his parents and siblings at the conclusion of his father’s mission to England—now he would be returning to that country with his own wife and children and a very different mission. For his father and grandfather, the threat to the survival of the United States had come from across that ocean; now, the threat lay at home. But like the generations before him, he would ably perform his duty as his country’s minister and would return home in 1868 to a booming and prosperous but still deeply scarred nation.

By Anna J. Clutterbuck-Cook, Reader Services

When spring arrives in Boston, bicycles return to the streets. No longer are two-wheelers limited to intrepid all-weather cyclists bundled up in scarves, hats, and gloves, navigating their way around ice, snow and potholes — now riders young and old can strap on a helmet, jump on a bike (perhaps borrowed from Hubway?) and set off across the city — or further! — in search of adventure.

As I have written previously here at the Beehive, we modern-day cyclists follow in the path of a trailblazing generation of “wheelmen” (and women) who popularized bicycle riding in America during the late nineteenth century. Many Bostonians were enthusiastic early adopters of the bicycle, including a young Dorchester piano tuner named Harry Adams Hersey (1870-1950). In July 1892, the twenty-two year old set off to ride from Dorchester, Massachusetts, to Boothbay, Maine. He was accompanied to York, Maine, by his cousin Fred Howard and two friends, Arthur Newhall and Fred Ducette. He chronicled the adventure in a diary that he later circulated to friends and family as a “descriptive letter” of his travels. He writes about the weather and the state of the roads, the tourist sights visited, and where the friends found food and shelter.

Consulting this diary in our reading room recently, I was struck by the number of geographic locations Hershey mentions in his brief account. Using the free online tool Mapbox, I created an interactive map sharing quotations from the diary, as transcribed by his daughter, Helen, in the 1990s, mapped onto the locations which the diary describes. Thus, readers can follow Hersey’s journey, geographically as well as narratively, as he moves northward from his Dorchester home to the wilds of coastal Maine.

Seven years after his cycling vacation, Harry Hersey became engaged to a schoolteacher named Lottie May Champlain, shortly after his ordination to the ministry. The couple married in 1906, and raised four children while Hersey served Universalist congregations in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, New York, and Indiana.

According to his daughter Helen, Hersey rode over 100,000 miles over the course of his lifetime, “without a major accident,” riding his bicycle both for pleasure and parish business. Hersey died in 1950 in Somerville, Massachusetts, only three years after completing an ambitious bicycle trip on the coast of California. Helen Hersey Dick donated her father’s memoirs and accompanying photographs to the MHS in the 1990s, where they and her transcripts can be accessed in the Society’s reading room.

By Andrea Cronin, Reader Services

In a prior blog post, “Chinese Hanzi Characters in 1801,” I wondered what message the Chinese script on the verso of the 30 July 1801 letter from Captain Samuel Barrett Edes of the snow Pacific Trader to American merchant Sullivan Dorr expressed. Last month, to my great surprise, I received two separate e-mails regarding the script.

The first correspondent, professional Chinese translator Ye Aiyun, graciously gave me a direct translation of the Chinese characters:

带到省十三行凿石街交泗兴办馆收，即交花旗“哆”开拆，立取回头信带回。二十二日澳付，准廿三到省，如无番信回音，办馆X回书。信X二元，澳已交一元。

[This letter] is to the Sixin Grocery Store at Stoning Street in Canton, and the store will send it to Dorr of the flower flag country (United States of America). If Dorr writes back, his letter will be sent to Canton in the same way. This letter should arrive at Macao on [September] 22nd and back to Canton on the 23rd.  If the foreigner [does not have a letter to send back in return], the store will just leave it [alone]. The postage is two dollars, and [the people in] Macao have paid one dollar.

Ye’s translation confirmed my first assumption about the script.  It definitely gives directions for delivery of the letter to Sullivan Dorr.

Paul A. Van Dyke, professor at Sun Yat-sen University in Canton, China, and former Benjamin F. Stevens fellow at the MHS, also wrote concerning the Chinese script. Van Dyke gave me further context for the letter:

“The address on this envelope is to Sullivan Dorr’s residence in Canton, which was in the Thirteen Factories area. It is clear from the Chinese inscription that this [letter] was sent to the Thirteen hong district 十三行。 The confusion comes in the name of the street Zao Shi Street (鑿石街) which does not exist on any maps [of which] I am aware. And the name of the building Si Xing Ban Guan (泗興办館) is also very strange and appears in [none of the] listings of the buildings in this district. In short, we know all of the Chinese names of the streets and buildings in this district at this time and these names do not appear.”

Yet another mystery arises from this letter! Van Dyke explained that perhaps this address is a small undocumented alley within the American Factory, a trading post that American Consul Samuel Shaw constructed and Sullivan Dorr, at one time, managed. Responding to my previous post, Van Dyke also addressed my final query concerning who might have written this note. He stated that Chinese compradors (provision purveyors), pilots, linguists, and merchants were generally literate, so any one of them could have written the instructions for delivery.

Thank you to my generous correspondents Ye Aiyun and Paul A. Van Dyke for their answers to my questions. Do you have any additional information to contribute to this conversation? Please leave a comment on the blog or feel free to e-mail me.