Catharine Middleton

October 17, 1852

The knife and fork. Old with white bone handle.

Sunday Oct 17th  

Went to church all of us.  Came home

at noon with Mr Ames and had a cup

of tea and lunch in the buttery

Catharine Middleton left this evening

and I paid her five dollars for the

three weeks that she has been here now

and one week some time since

This may be the first time that Evelina uses the word “lunch” in her diary. Usually, the meal in the middle of the day was dinner, and it was the big meal. But on Sundays, the routine was changed because, ostensibly, housewives didn’t cook. It was a Day of Rest. The women were at church and had no time to prepare a hot meal between services. Instead there was a cup of tea and a piece of cake at the parsonage or, in good weather, there might be a bread and fruit picnic on the lawn of the church, near the carriages. Early tail-gating, if you will. If a housewife were at home on a Sunday, as Evelina sometimes was, she might end up cooking, especially if she had houseguests. But the norm was no cooking.

Lunch, per se, was something different. The word itself was a shortened version of “luncheon,” which was generally accepted to be a small meal that might be held at any time of day, in between two larger meals. For most of the 19th century, luncheons were considered to be the province of middle- to upper-class ladies – hence the phrase, “ladies who lunch.” Cold meats, fruit, pastries and tea might make up the menu for the female meal.

Yet as industrialization of the workday took over, replacing the former agrarian practice of a substantial meal in the middle of the day, lunch as we know it became more accepted. Men took their cold meals to work, or warmed up a can of something over a stove or a radiator at the workplace. By the 20th century in America, lunch happened in the middle of the day and dinner moved to the evening.

In her diary, Evelina was only suggesting that the meal she and her husband shared at a scrub-top table in the pantry was no regular dinner. Little did she know that this simpler midday meal would one day be the norm.

 

October 11, 1852

factory-steam-engine

Early factory steam engine

Monday Oct 11th  Catharine Middleton & Murphy washed

and I sat down quite early to my sewing

with Mother & Louisa  Mended stockings

This afternoon we spent at Augustus

Mother & Louisa are going to spend the 

night  Mr Torrey & Abby were there

Mr Ames & Oakes A went to West B

I have been sewing on the skirt of Susans

fall Delaine

This was a typical Monday as far as domestic matters were concerned. In the morning, the women washed clothes and mended stockings. In the afternoon, they went calling on relatives in the village. But it was a red-letter day at the shovel shop, as men arrived to install the a steam engine – the first – at the factory.

Old Oliver seemed excited: “this was a fair good day for the season the man came here to sett up the enjoin four of them.” The company’s first steam engine was placed in the new Long Shop by the Corliss Nightingale Company of Providence. It was a technological change that Oliver had resisted in the past, but had since come to accept. His son, Horatio, in particular, had urged the change for several years in order “to counter water supply limitations”* In January, 1847 he had written his father and his brother, Oliver Jr., on the topic.

To Old Oliver:

I shall think a steam engine […] of sufficient power to carry 3 hammers and carry all your polishing works shearing and punching and Bisbees works […] would be cheaper and better […] It is too bad that you do not keep nearer supplying the market with shovels when a comparatively small expense would do it in addition to your other works.”*

To Oliver Jr.:

I enclose you with […the] price and terms for a steam engine. It will do you no hurt to compare cost of this and water power. it will take about one ton of coal a day to drive it and the repairs will be no more than a water power if as much[…] You never need fail for water either too much or too little […] I am altogether in favor of this plan over water power in your situation.”*

Horatio was right, as it turned out. The new engine was the beginning of modernization for O. Ames and Sons.

* Gregory Galer, Forging Ahead, MIT, 2002, p. 251.  Text of Horatio Ames correspondence from Stonehill College Archives, Arnold Tofias Collection

October 4, 1852

searchsearch                                             weal_03_img0569

                       Roger B. Taney                                                                   Benjamin Robbins Curtis                

(1777 – 1864)                                                                       (1809 – 1874)

Oct 4th Monday  Catharine Middleton & C Murphy washed

Mrs Norris and all of us dined with Mrs Witherell

and staid there untill about four and then

Mrs Norris and self went to Augustus’ to tea and

passed the evening  Mrs Lincoln is there

intends spending the winter  I do but very

little sewing have made a pr of plain cambric sleeves to day

 

 

It was the first Monday in October which in North Easton meant another washday. At the Ames compound, the Irish servant girls, Catharine Middleton and Catharine Murphy, tied their aprons on, filled the wash tubs and went to work. The slight rain did not interfere.

In Washington D.C., on this first Monday in October, nine white male justices put on their black robes and also went to work. A new session of the U.S. Supreme Court got underway. Led by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney of Maryland, the 1852-1853 term would deal with, among others, the case of Cooley vs. Board of Wardens of the Port of Philadelphia. That decision would confirm the right of states to regulate commerce within their own boundaries. We might imagine that this decision had an impact on businesses such as the shovel works that shipped merchandise.

Taney and three other members of the court – John McLean of Ohio (the longest-serving), James Moor Wayne of Georgia, and John Catron of Tennessee – had been appointed by Andrew Jackson in the 1830’s. Two other justices, John McKinley of Alabama and Peter Vivian Daniel of Virginia, had been appointed by Martin Van Buren and had served almost as long. Newer to the bench were Samuel Nelson of New York, appointed by John Tyler in 1845, and Benjamin Robbins Curtis of Massachusetts, appointed by Millard Fillmore the previous year, 1851.

Associate Justice Curtis was the first and only Whig ever to serve on the Supreme Court. A graduate of Harvard, he was also the first justice to have a formal law degree. The justices up until that time had either “read law” as apprentices or attended law school without getting their degree.  Curtis would further distinguish himself in 1857 when the Taney Court handed down the infamous Dred Scott decision that determined that a black man had no rights of citizenship. Curtis and John McLean dissented from that majority decision, with Curtis so upset that he resigned from the court. He is the only justice to date to resign from the Supreme Court on a matter of principle.

 

 

September 30, 1852

Spiced-Butternut-Squash-Pie-450

Squash Pie*

Thursday Sept 30th  Have swept the parlour

and Catharine has swept the chambers

and we have baked squash and apple pies

in the brick oven.  Hannah Welch came

last night and has done part of the ironing

to day.  this evening she heard her sister

was sick and she has left and gone back 

to Lynn.  Mrs Lincoln called with Hannah

 

Life at the Ames house returned to normal after yesterday’s meeting of the Sewing Circle. Evelina and a servant, Catharine Middleton, swept and tidied up while a new servant, Hannah Welch, tended to the ironing. Hannah would leave abruptly however, never to return, making her one-day employment the shortest on Evelina’s growing list of departed servants.

The household carried on. Today was a baking day, back in the capacious brick oven that Evelina shared with her sister-in-law, Sarah Ames Witherell, in the other part of the house. Squash and apple pies were on the menu, naturally, both being part of the fall harvest. Squash pies were as routine as pumpkin pies; every contemporary cookbook offered a recipe. Sarah Josepha Hale, though critical of pies in general as being too rich, allowed that they were acceptable in the colder months “because then we can bear a rich concentrated diet, better than during hot weather.”** Her recipe:

Pare, take out the seeds and stew the squash until very soft and dry. Strain or rub it through a sieve or colander. Mix this with good milk till it is thick with batter: sweeten it with sugar.  Allow three eggs to a quart of milk, beat the eggs well, add them to the squash, and season with rose water, cinnamon, nutmeg, or whatever spices you like. Line a pie-plate with crust, fill and bake about an hour.**

The rich pies probably hit the spot with the family. Certainly, the timing was perfect because on this night, “there was a pritty havy frost.”*** Fall had arrived.

 

*Image courtesy of  www.lostrecipesfound.com

**Sarah Josepha Hale, The Good Housekeeper, 1841, pp. 81-82

***Oliver Ames, Journal, Stonehill College Archives, Arnold Tofias Collection

September 25, 1852

Music stool

 

Sat Sept 25th Louisa has a swelling on the back of

her hand which troubles her & she left this

morning and I have got Catharine Middleton

to stay untill next Wednesday when I expect

a new girl  Catharine made some squash

pies and finished the ironing. It has been about

most all the week  Helen & I have been to N Bridgewater

She had a tooth extracted  I got a Piano stool

Evelina was still spending money. In North Bridgewater (today’s Brockton) she bought a music stool to go with the new piano that was coming soon to her parlor. With her was niece Helen Angier Ames; the fifteen-year-old had a less enjoyable errand to accomplish: getting a tooth pulled. It’s interesting that Helen’s aunt, Evelina, and not her mother, Sarah Lothrop Ames, accompanied the girl to the dentist.

In the servant department, the new girl, Louisa McAvoy, departed today, having not even worked a full week. Evelina was really struggling to keep a household staff together. Catherine Middleton agreed to stay on and was helpful with the baking and ironing, the latter of which had taken “most all the week” to complete. We might wonder if Evelina ever missed Jane McHanna, the one servant who had been steady, if occasionally ill – the one whom Evelina had fired in June. Evelina had yet to really settle on a dependable replacement.

 

September 21, 1852

Funeral

Tuesday Sept 21st  Have been almost sick to day and

not able to do much  Got a quilt into the

new chamber for Catharine to work upon

Went to the funeral of Mrs Savage at

one Oclock.  Called with Mrs Witherell at

Augustus,  Mr Swains & on Mrs Wales.  She

is confined to her bet yet and has been for weeks

It appears to have been Evelina’s turn to be ill, as she describes herself as unable “to do much.”  We readers know how hard she usually worked, so not doing much might mean that she only accomplished four or five tasks today instead of a dozen. Despite feeling “almost sick,” Evelina managed to arrange sewing for her servant Catharine, attend the funeral of Hannah Savage and, with her sister-in-law, Sarah Ames Witherell, call on several households in the village. It’s hard to know if Evelina was spreading germs or picking them up as she went along, but she meant well.

According to Old Oliver Ames, “this was a fair day + pritty warm wind northerly,”* in other words a pleasant day to be out and about. Yet, in two of the homes that Evelina and Sarah visited, people were ailing. At the Swains’, their infant son was teething and fussy. At the home of Ephraim and Maria Wales, the latter was “confined to her bed yet,” an expression which hints at a recent or impending childbirth. Mrs. Wales was of childbearing age, yet census records show no children for this young couple. Perhaps Maria would lose or had lost an infant, or was simply ill with any one of a myriad of possible ailments.

*Oliver Ames, Journal, Stonehill College Archives, Arnold Tofias Collection

September 20, 1852

Hay

 

Monday Sept 20th  Staid at Edwins last night

and slept with Emeline as I did not like

to leave them alone  Augusta rested very

well and is much better to day.  Hannah

left this morning & Louisa McAvoy came

and she & Catherine have washed  I have

worked hard all day  Augustus’ wife called

here this afternoon

 

Worried about her neighbor, Evelina spent the night at the Edwin Gilmore house in case Augusta took a turn for the worse. Also staying there was fourteen-year old Emeline Pool, Augusta’s youngest sibling, who may have been sent up by the Pool family to sit with her ailing sister. Everyone was unnerved by Augusta’s continued illness, but in the morning Evelina was able to report that Augusta had improved.

At the Ames house, of course, and, indeed, all over town, it was washday. Servant Hannah Murphy departed, as anticipated, but the new servant, Louisa McAvoy and the remaining servant, Catharine Middleton, were on task. The washtubs were out. Evelina did her usual Monday choring and tidying, and the house stirred with activity.

Also on task were men who worked for Evelina’s father-in-law, Old Oliver Ames. They were mowing. Old Oliver reported that “this [was] a fair day part of time + cloudy a part wind southerly + midling warm  began to mow second crop to day.”*  The hay that had been sown in early August was being cut, each worker mindful of the importance of the crop. “[T]he most important matter connected with American agriculture,” declared one farming expert a decade later, “the hay crop is of more value than the cotton, the corn, or the wheat crop, or any single article of farm produce upon which the lives of three fourths of all the horses, cattle, and sheep depend from November to April.[…] Farmer! Have you thought how much depends upon the four weeks of haying time?”** Old Oliver could have answered that question with alacrity.

*Oliver Ames, Journal, Stonehill College Archives, Arnold Tofias Collection

** Solon Robinson, Facts for Farmers, January 1865, pp. 772-773

August 7, 1852

Wagon

Sat Aug 7th  Was sewing part of the forenoon made

some pies & cake  Went into Olivers about four,

Started to go to Augustus in a waggon and

got caught in a shower turned back at the

school house got completely wet  My sons & Mr Ames

were at tea at Olivers  Edwin & wife Lavinia & Abby

there Catharine & I have done some sewing this week

two nightgowns for self one for Susan & one cotton & 

moire skirt & c &c  Susans waists are finished

 

“[T]he 5, 6 + 7th were pritty warm day[s] + there was some rain,”* wrote Old Oliver in his journal. Evelina was out in that rain and “got completely wet.” Late afternoon showers are part and parcel of August weather in New England. The showers can come up quickly, too, so it’s small wonder that folks moving around the countryside in horse-drawn wagons could get caught in the rain.

While Evelina was getting soaked, her husband Oakes and sons Oakes Angier, Oliver (3) and Frank Morton Ames had tea next door with the Oliver Ames Jr family. How was Oakes Angier feeling, now that he was coughing so much? Perhaps he and his brothers got to hear their cousin Helen play piano again, or perhaps they just ate and conversed. Various Gilmore relatives, including Edwin and Augusta Gilmore, Lavinia Gilmore and Abby Torrey were there as well.  As previously noted, Lavinia and Helen were particularly friendly.

And speaking of friends, fans of Sherlock Holmes might enjoy knowing that August 7, 1852 is the purported birthdate of the fictional Holmes’ steady, tolerant and equally fictional sidekick, Dr. John Watson.

*Oliver Ames, Journal, Stonehill College Archives, Arnold Tofias Collection

 

August 3, 1852

Hpr HaravrdTraining-s

Harvard Crew Training on the Charles River, ca. 1869*

August 3d 1852

Tuesday  Cut out a linen & moire skirt for Catharine

to make and Susan a night gown  I have

at last got my travelling dress done  I believe

cape and all.  How provoking it is to have

to alter so much  Julia Mahoney has been

to work for Mrs Witherell making a Borage Delaine

Augusta & Mrs McHanna were here this afternoon

For Evelina, this was a fairly ordinary day of sewing and socializing. Her big news was that she “at last” completed her new traveling outfit.

In the annals of American sports, however, this was no ordinary day.  In a two-mile regatta on Lake Winnipesaukee, New Hampshire, under a bright blue sky, Harvard beat Yale in the very first intercollegiate athletic competition ever held in the U.S.A. Harvard’s  Oneida beat both of Yale’s boats, Shawmut and Undine. The first prize, a pair of black walnut oars, was presented to the Crimson team by one of the six judges, soon-to-be-president Franklin Pierce. Today, those oars are the oldest intercollegiate athletic prize in North America**. The contest itself has since moved to New London, Connecticut. It recently celebrated its 150th anniversary (not having been held in consecutive years in its earliest iteration.)

The contest was initiated by Yale, who “issued a challenge to Harvard ‘to test the superiority of the oarsmen of the two colleges.'”* According to the written recollection of James Morris Whiton, Yale Class of 1853 and bow oar of Undine, “[t]he race was supposed to be a frolic, and no idea was entertained of establishing a precedent.”*** The enthusiasm of the participants and the entertainment of the spectators, however, insured that a tradition had been born. Anticipation for the event had been high, so much so that the Boston, Concord and Montreal Railroad footed the bill for the event, believing it would attract visitors to the area. The excursion trains it set up arrived loaded with visitors.

The oarsmen themselves were so enthused about the occasion that they tried to arrange a dance at the inn where they were staying. According to Whiton, “Many of the College boys stayed at the Pemigewasset House, Plymouth, and it occurred to them it would be pleasant to give a ‘hop’, and invite the rural beauties of the town to the festivities. With this end in view, they applied to the landlord of the hostelry and received this reply: ‘Ye can hav the hall, young men, if ye want a gander dance, but ye won’t get no gal timber there, I tell ye.'”

No doubt the failure to dance with some of the “rural beauties” was a disappointment, but otherwise the race and its aftermath were entirely successful. By 1875, thirteen eastern colleges offered crew.

 

* Image from Harper’s Weekly, 1869

**Harvard Athletic Association, Courtesy of http://www.gocrimson.com

*** Wikipedia, accessed July 30, 2015

****James Morris Whiton, “The Story of the First Harvard-Yale Regatta by a Bow Oar,” published in The Outlook, June 1, 1901 and privately printed with photographs of Lake Winnipesaukee and of the course of the race.

 

 

 

June 18, 1852

servants

 

 

June 18 Friday Have to be around with the new girl

to show her which hinders a great deal about

my sewing  Mrs Holmes & Richardson came this morning

to get some plants and I worked a long while

in the garden and did not sew but very little 

before dinner  Abby & Miss Gurney passed

the afternoon here and carried home plants

 

It’s hard to tell if Hannah Murphy or Catharine Middleton, both new to the household, is “the new girl” whom Evelina accuses of hindering her sewing. After firing Jane McHanna, Evelina had to train someone new, a process for which she evidently had limited patience. She would have preferred to be working on her own projects; such was one consequence of letting Jane go.

The plus side was that Evelina had the opportunity to establish expectations and guidelines for the new servants. If she would take the time to train them, she might get excellent help around the house. She certainly hoped that the new girls would work out better than Jane had.

If the continued hot weather didn’t help her mood, at least it didn’t keep Evelina out of her flower beds. Her garden had seemed neglected of late, but the plants were growing just fine and she had many to give away. Her niece Abby Torrey and a friend, Miss Gurney, visited for a few hours and went home with a few flowers, as did Mrs. Holmes and Mrs. Richardson earlier in the day.