The Portland daily press., 1870-02-15

them, in its own time, the burdens of acumu
lated years, and reunite them in perpetual
youth amoug the angels of light.
This is one of the most extraordinary case,
in the history of longevity. The three speal
OF are the Oldest children of Peter Thomas
who was born in Boston in 1745, and came tt
Portland several years prior to the Revolution
to pursue the trade of saimaker; and diet
here at the early age of 80 in 1897. In 1869 he
married Kerrenhappuck Cox, daughter of JOIN
Cox and Sarah Proctor and grand daughter Of
Anthony Bracket, descendant ofthe earliest
occupants of this Neck, now Portland. snc
survived her husband more than Az years anu
died at the age of SO in 1888. Tie marriage
produced eleven children, all of whom but one
survived their father, and four only their
mother. viz: the three above mentioned, and
Hannah the mother Of our friend Charles Rog-
/ ers.
But among these general characters sites
| which are not without interest to our elderly
readers, there is one, more extraordinary still,
and that is that these children are lineal de.
scendants of taro of the most prominent vic
tins of that Satanic tragedy which occurred
in Salem Village in 1852, by which twenty in
nocent victims were ruthlessly and re-
morselessly hurried out of the world by
this diabolical witchcraft delusiop. John
Proctor, the ancestor of Mrs. Peter Thomas
the family we are describing, was executed for
witchcraft at Salem Village, August 10, 1892;
his son Samuel was the frsG immigrant of the
name who came to Portland; his daughter
Sarah married John Cox, by whom he had
Kerrenhappuck, the subsequent wife of Peter
Thomas, and mother of the remarkable chill
dren am describing.
On the fathers side, Elizabeth, daughter of
the Rev. George Burroughs, who was executed
at the same time and place with Proctor, mar
ried George Thomas, the fist immigrant Of
his family from Wales to Boston. Peter
Thomas father of these children, was her
grandson; and thus in these children are unit
ed the blood of two of the most worthy VIC
TINS of that ferocious tragedy which has left
its damned spot on the fair escutcheon of
New England which will never sbe out"
will stop one moment to speak of another
peculiar fact which is characteristic of this re-
markable historic family. Mr. Peter Thomas
was grandson of Anthony Bracket, who
at one. time owned and occupied nearly
the whole of what is now BrambalPs Hill.
He was a descendant in direct line from
from George Cleeves, who in 1852 was the first
occupant and settler of the neck, now Port
land, under the original proprietor, Sir F.
Georges. Cleeves only daughter married
Michael Milton, and two of his daughters,
Mary and Ann, married Thomas and Anthony
Bracket, brothers, who thus inherited i'm
mQnsn frqcfq of land fba NJ
city and in Westbrook, which remained in
their families to the close of the last century,
What remarkable historic facts concentrated
in this single race!
The Rev. George Burroughs was a man of
education and respected life. For several
years he was popular preacher on this Neck.
Driven off in 1876, by the first Indian War
which destroyed the town, he returned with
the settlers about 1880, and preached to the
people in meeting house which stood where
the PortlAnd Company's works are. When
the second utter overthrow of the town took
place in 1890, he sought refuge in Salem;
where within two years he found savages
more savage than the wild natives of the for
est, and came to an untimely end
Miss Thomas, the respected subject of our
rambling thoughts, has sat under the preach
ing of every settled minister of the 1st Parish
on the Neck since the death of her great an
cestor Burroughs, and there were less than
thirty-fve years between his death and the Or
dination OF our good Parson Smith, his sue
cessor. She has therefore enjoyed the society
of the whole series of the ministers since the
revival of the parish; has lived through the
whole history of the town since it formed part
of British colony, and of the nation since it
became a nation has seen the wonderful
changes which free institutions have produced,
not only in our own country, but in the blessed
influences they have impressed upon the world
in their benignant sway. What a privilege
for an intelligent mind to have passed through
such hundred years of grand developments
not only in the institutions of civil, social and
political life, but in those of art, science, liter
allure, hiutory, and beyond all these of human
ity. Here are three members of one family
who have walked leisurely through these
eventful years, ia their native town, with open
eyes, watching the progress of men and things
| which have walked along beside them. They
were part of the times. The life of our de-
ceased friend has been brimmer; it has had
a continual sparkle. She had bright, buoy
ant temperament, and the lights were always
superior to the shadows. She was happy in
the society of her elders, and her agreeable
conversation and perpetual cheerfulness made
them happy; she was fond of reading, and her
memory not only retained the seed thought,
which were dropped in her path, but those
which were gathered up by the personal OBJ
servation of ninety years; and she had the gift
of applying them with an apt and ready wit in
her intercourse with her friends. One of these
friends of thirty five years standing observed
to me that ''her mind was richly stored with
long years of attentive reading, and her con-
versation was always profitable as well as en-
| tertaining." By these fine qualities she made
herself agreeable in any society; and while by
her presence she added graces to the lie that
now is, she never forgot that there is another
| life of higher charms and nobler possessions
than any which this can bestow, and which
will adorn with new graces and richer beati-
| tudes those who have attained the highest re-
CARDS of this. She acted upon the fact that
most of the shadows that cross our path in life
are caused by our standing in our own light.
And now as we bid farewell to this time-b
ored OBJECT of ous respect, we must not fail to
turn back to the dear and loved companions
with whom she has affectionately and tenderly
walked through the years of her long life, and
whose abrupt parting is the breaking of a
| heart cord. Your turn must soon come; you
cannot choose when you move mistily through
these bright shadows; you did not choose the
time to come into the world; you cannot Sc
lect the time when you will be taken out of it
it is for you to make the most and best of wha
remains of life by patience and calm submis
sion to the movements of Providence which
you cannot control and to which you mus
submit; and prepare yourselves to receive will
serenity the uncertain but blessed decree
which shall lift from you the pains, the vicis
situdes and trials, which no man who ha
once entered the world can escape or avoid =
| "Let this be the burden of the heart,
| The burden that 1t always bore;
We live 10 love; we meet to part,
AMI part to meet on earth more
We clasp each other to the heart,
And part to meet on earth no more"
w.
Tho City Race Course.
!. Mr.. EDITORIALS an elderly lady was cross
ing Congress street, near Oak street, on las
F Saturday afternoon about four o'clock, she wa
knocked down by horse and sleigh driven b
a couple of fellows who were racing at tn