The Loyalists of Massachusetts Part 48

Christopher Gore soon commenced the study of law in the office and under the direction of Judge John Lowell, in whose family he resided while a student. He commenced the practice of law in Boston with every prospect of success. He had to depend on himself alone, for not only had he his own fortune to make, but after he left college, he had to contribute to the support of his mother and three unmarried sisters, who were left in Boston without means when his father went to Halifax.

By his own exertion and industry, he paid his college bills after he entered on his profession, in addition to his other responsible duties, devolving upon him with honor to himself. During 1809-10 Mr. Gore was Governor of Ma.s.sachusetts. While Governor, he occupied the home corner of Park and Beacon streets, and it is said he drove through the streets of Boston in a carriage drawn by four horses. This was more than the plain republican people of Boston could stand, and they did not want him for Governor again, besides it is undeniable that Mr. Gore was a good deal of an aristocrat at heart, and consequently more or less a loyalist. But he made a fine administrator, and at the end of the term retired to private life, and did not resume the practice of his profession.

In 1791 Christopher Gore purchased in Waltham about 1000 acres of land which formerly belonged to an ancestor of President Garfield. Here Governor Gore erected a stately mansion upon a knoll or rise of the land not far distant from Gore street, where one of the drives, leading to it, runs under rows of stately trees, and through a finely kept lawn. In the rear of the house are the flower gardens, and conservatory, and behind that the kitchen garden; to the west of this is the deer park.

After the death of Governor Gore this stately structure was sold to General Theodore Lyman, who after living there seven years sold it to Singleton Copley Greene, the son of Gardner Green, who married a daughter of Copley the artist, the sister of Lord Lyndhurst: (see p.

216.) Christopher Gore married Rebecca Payne, 11 Nov. 1783. They had no children. Gov. Gore died 1 March 1827, his widow 22 Jan. 1833.

JOHN JEFFRIES.

David Jeffries was born at Rhoad, in Wilts.h.i.+re, England, 1658, and arrived at Boston, May 9, 1677. He married Sept. 15, 1686, Elizabeth, daughter of John and Elizabeth Usher, by whom he had several children.

Of his two sons, John, born Feb. 5, 1688, and David, born June 15, 1690, John became Town Treasurer, was a very prominent citizen. He married Sept. 24, 1713, Anne Clarke, and had issue, an only child Anne, who died young. He went to London in 1710, and returned in 1713. He resided in Tremont Street opposite the King's Chapel.

David Jeffries Jr., who continued the name, married in 1713, Katherine, daughter of John and Katherine Eyre, by whom he had an only child David, born 23 Oct. 1714. He was a merchant, and in 1715 he sailed for England, and was lost in the Amity, Sept. 13, 1716, on the sands near Dungeness.

His son,

DAVID JEFFRIES, married his cousin, Sarah Jaffrey, 1741, by whom he had eight children, all of whom died young except John, born Feb. 4, 1744, alone preserved the name.

JOHN JEFFRIES, the only son of the former, graduated from Harvard College in 1763, having pursued his medical studies with Doctor Lloyd.

He continued his study of medicine in London, and was honored with the degree of M. D. at Aberdeen in 1769. In 1771 he was appointed surgeon to the "Captain" a British s.h.i.+p-of-the-line in Boston Harbor, by his friend, Admiral Montague. He held that position until 1774.

Dr. Jeffries practised in Boston until the Revolution. He landed with the forces at the battle of Bunker Hill, and a.s.sisted in dressing the wounded of the Royal Army, and, it is said, identified the body of Warren, in the presence of Sir William Howe. He accompanied the British troops at the evacuation in 1776 to Halifax, and was appointed Chief of the Surgical Staff of Nova Scotia. In 1779 he went to England; and on his return to America, held a high professional employment to the British forces at Charleston and New York. He resigned in 1780, and going to England again, commenced practice in London.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DR. JOHN JEFFRIES.

Born in Boston, Feb. 4, 1774. In his balloon costume. Dr. Jeffries and Blanchard were the first to cross from England to France in a balloon.

Died in Boston Sept. 16, 1819.]

On the 17th of January, 1785, Dr. Jeffries crossed the English channel with Blanchard in a balloon, landing in the forest of Guines in France.

This feat procured for him the attention of the most distinguished personages of the day and an introduction to all the learned and scientific societies of Paris.[232]

[232] A narrative of his two aerial voyages was published In London in 1786, exact and entertaining, with a portrait of the adventurer and a view of the monument erected by the French government, on the spot where he landed.

Dr. Jeffries' first wife was Sarah Rhoads, whom he married in 1770. By her he had three children, who died unmarried. He married again, Sept.

8, 1787, Hannah, the daughter of William and Hannah Hunt. In 1790 Dr.

Jeffries returned to Boston in the s.h.i.+p Lucretia.

He resumed his practice, and delivered the first public lecture on anatomy, a branch of his profession of which he was very fond.[233] He was eminent as a surgeon, midwife and physician. He attended the poor as faithfully and cheerfully as the rich, and was never known to refuse a professional call. His death occurred in Boston, September 16th, 1819, aged 76 years, after a successful practice of fifty-three years.

[233] Curwen's Journal, P. 537.

Dr. Jeffries had by his second wife eleven children, all of whom died unmarried excepting John, Katherine who married G. C. Haven, Julia Ann, who married Thomas E. Eckley, and George J., who took the name of Jaffrey.[234]

[234] New Eng. Hist. & General Reg., Vol. 15, P. 16.

John Jeffries, son of the doctor, was born March 23, 1796, and became the only representative of the name in the city. He was a distinguished physician in Boston. He married, November 8, 1820, Anne Geyer, daughter of Rufus Greene and Ann (McLean) Amory. His children were Catherine, Anne, Sarah, Augustus, Edward P. and Henry N. Jeffries.

George Jaffrey, an elder son of Dr. John Jeffries the loyalist, was born December 21, 1789. George Jaffrey, his grand-uncle, who graduated from Harvard College in 1736, became a Counsellor and held various important positions in Portsmouth, N. H. He married Lucy, the daughter of Adam Winthrop, but had no issue. His loyalty to the crown involved him in trouble several times, but he died in 1802 leaving property, then a large amount to George Jaffrey Jeffries, on condition that "he should drop the name of Jeffries; become a permanent resident of Portsmouth, and never follow any profession except that of being a gentleman."

George Jaffrey made his home in Portsmouth and for many years was librarian of the Portsmouth Athenaeum. He died May 4, 1856, and a merited tribute was paid to his character and his labors by Mr. Brewster in the Portsmouth Journal of the 10th.[235]

[235] New Eng. Hist. & General Reg., Vol. 15, P. 17.

The Jeffries family have always ranked among the gentry of Boston, and have maintained that position from the date of the earliest settlement, to the present time.

THOMAS BRINLEY.

Thomas Brinley, Auditor general to Charles First and Second, had a son Francis who settled at Barbados, but the climate not being suited to his habits and const.i.tution, came to New England and settled at Newport, R.

I., in 1652. This was about fourteen years after the settlement of that place, and Francis Brinley held various offices; among them that of Judge. He occasionally resided in Boston, owning a large estate at the corner of Hanover and Elm streets. He died there in 1719, aged eighty-seven, and was buried in a grave in the King's Chapel burial-ground in Boston, on the spot where the family tomb now stands.

Thomas, son of the latter, was one of the founders of King's Chapel and resided in Boston. He married Mary Apthorp, and in 1684 went to England, where he died in 1693. His daughter Elizabeth married William Hutchinson, Esq., a graduate of Harvard College, in 1702. Mrs. Brinley, Francis and Elizabeth, returned to Newport, R. I.

Francis Brinley, the son of Thomas, was born in London in 1690, and was educated at Eton. He became a colonel and resided in Roxbury. His mansion was named Datchet from the house of that place in England.

Colonel Brinley returned to London, where he died November 27, 1765.

Francis Brinley's wife was Deborah, daughter of Edward and Catherine Lyde, and his marriage took place April 18, 1718. They had five sons and two daughters; one of whom married Colonel John Murray, and the other G.o.dfrey Malbone.

Of the sons, THOMAS BRINLEY was a Mandamus Councillor, and lived on Harvard Street. He married his cousin Elizabeth, the daughter of George Cradock, but they left no children. He was a graduate of Harvard College in 1744, and became a Merchant in Boston.

His name appears among the one hundred and twenty-four merchants and others, who addressed Hutchinson in Boston in 1774; and among the ninety-seven gentlemen and princ.i.p.al inhabitants of that town, who addressed Gage in October of the following year. In 1776 he went to Halifax, and thence to England in the same year. In 1778 he was proscribed and banished. His death occurred in 1784, and Elizabeth, his widow, died in England in 1793.

EDWARD BRINLEY, brother of Thomas, married Sarah, daughter of Thomas Tyler and left many descendants.

NATHANIEL BRINLEY, another brother, also married his cousin, Catharine Cradock, was a resident in South Street and at one time lived in Framingham. About 1760 he leased the "Brinley Farm" of Oliver DeLancey, agent of the owner, Admiral Sir Peter Warren, of the Royal Navy, and as is said, employed fifteen or twenty negroes, in its cultivation. It is related that Daniel Shays, the leader of the insurrection in 1786, was in the service of Mr. Brinley on this farm. In 1775 he was an Addresser of Gage, and was ordered, in consequence, to confine himself to his own leasehold. He fled to the Royal Army in Boston, and after the evacuation of that town, he was sent to Framingham by sentence of a Court of Inquiry, ordered to give bond in 600, with two sureties, to remain there four months and to be of good behavior.

"In September 1776, Ebenezer Marshall, in behalf of the Committee of Correspondence, Inspection and Safety, represented that the 'people take him for a very villain,' as he had declared that 'Parliament had an undoubted right to make void the charter in part or in whole'; 'that ten thousand troops, with an artillery, would go through the continent, and subdue it at pleasure'; that he had conveyed 'his best furniture to Roxbury, and moved his family and goods into Boston,' and had himself remained there, 'as long as he could have the protection of the British troops;' that he approved of General Gage's conduct in the highest terms;' that 'his most intimate connections were some of our worst enemies and traitors;' and that, while he had been under their inspection, they had seen nothing 'either in his conduct or disposition, that discovers the least contrition, but otherwise.'"[236]

[236] Sabine's Loyalists, Vol. 1, P. 256.

To some of these allegations, Mrs. Brinley replied in two memorials to the General Court. She averred that, by the conditions of the recognizance, her husband was ent.i.tled to the freedom of the whole of the town of Framingham; that he was in custody on the sole charge of addressing Gage; and that instead of being a refuge in Boston, he was shut up in that town while accidentally there, etc. She stated that he at one time had been compelled to work on John Fisk's farm, without liberty to go more than twenty rods from the house unless in Fisk's presence; and that he was denied the free use of pen, ink and paper. She said that after Mr. Brinley had been transferred to the care of Benjamin Eaton, he was not allowed to go from the house, and was fearful that his departure from it would occasion the loss of his life; also that she or any other person was not allowed to converse with him, unless in the hearing of some member of Eaton's family. She urged that he might be removed to some other inland town, and be treated in accordance with his sentence. Mr. Brinley's defence of himself seems to have been the simple remark: "I am a gentleman and have done nothing to forfeit that character." He merely had a rational opinion, but that was enough.

On the 17th September, 1776, the General Court, by resolve, committed him to the care of his father, on security in 600 for his appearance; and, in October of the same year, the committee of Framingham reported to the council that they had disposed of his farm, stock, farm-utensils and household furniture. Nathaniel Brinley removed to Tyngsborough, where his son Robert, married Elizabeth, daughter of John Pitts. This staunch loyalist died at that place in 1814, at the age of eighty-one.

LIST OF CONFISCATED ESTATES BELONGING TO THOMAS BRINLEY IN SUFFOLK COUNTY AND TO WHOM SOLD.

To Gustavus Fellows, Sept. 28, 1782; Lib. 136, fol. 11; Land, dwelling-house, distill house and wharf in Boston, Hollis St. S.; heirs of Joshua Henshaw deceased W.; low water mark.

REV. JOHN WISWELL.