Plaque at 38 Federal Street, Aaron Pardee married Jane Perkins in 1786, he did not buy the land and build the house until 1796.
A Multi-Generational Newburyport Family Saga
Jane M. Pardee - an orphan, an inheritance, a lunatic asylum, marriage, a series of possible betrayals, Federal Street and Plummer Avenue
Plaque at 38 Federal Street, Aaron Pardee married Jane Perkins in 1786, he did not buy the land and build the house until 1796.
38 Federal Street in 2020
Aaron Pardee
Aaron Pardee was born in Sharon Connecticut on November 11, 1755. He fought in the American Revolutions and became a Second Lieutenant of the Third Continental Artillery. He settled in Newburyport and in 1786 married Jane Perkins (her father, Captain Benjamin Perkins’s, house and history are on the map at 29-31 Fair Street – that is another amazing story, I’d look that one up on the interactive map map.historynewburyport.com). Aaron bought the land on the corner of Federal and Middle Street in 1796* and built what is now 38 Federal Street. Aaron and Jane had a number of children, all of whom died, the date of Jane’s death is unknown. Aaron married a second time in 1820 to a widow, Mrs. Mary Knapp, they had one daughter, Jane M. Pardee, who was born in 1821. Jane’s mother died in 1835 at 56 years old and her father died in 1837. Aaron Pardee’s property at the time of his death was $4,413.41. He was a merchant and a man of considerable influence in Newburyport.**
In his will Aaron Pardee left his estate to his one remaining daughter, Jane M. Pardee who was a minor, she was 16 years old. In the event that his daughter did not have any children, his granddaughter, Fanny Currier, was to inherit his fortune. Fanny’s father was Henry Pardee and she was married to William E. Currier, they had 13 children.
William E. Currier, Collection of the Currier-Gilman family
William E. Currier
William E. Currier was a lawyer and was appointed as the judge for the Newburyport Police Court in 1866, he died in 1881. His family described him as being referred to as “the judge.”*^ His obituary states that he “was considered the finest looking man in the city.” In the Oct 4, 1853 Daily Herald, there is an account of William E. Currier challenging a teacher in his son’s school for being physically abusive. The School Committee took him to court for storming into his son’s class and confronting the teacher. William won the case and there is a later article where the School Committee laments the poor judge’s lack of good judgment. The trial took place in the Police Court where William later became the judge. William later became a member of the Newburyport School Committee.^*
Rendering of Bradford Academy where Jane M. Pardee graduated from in 1835
Jane M. Pardee
Jane M. Pardee was a well educated young lady, she graduated from Bradford Academy for Young Ladies in 1835. Among other things she studied Latin and French, Instrumental and Vocal Music and Elocution. The school appears to have been a secondary educational boarding school and that Jane was being trained to be a well educated upperclass young lady.^* 1835 was the year her mother died and she would have been 14. She was 16 when her father Aaron Pardee died.
I found the court documents in 1841 that sent Jane to the Worcester Lunatic Asylum at the age of 20.* She was diagnosed by Dr. John Brickett and committed by her guardian, Solomon H. Currier.
The first document is signed by Dr. John Brickett, a well known and connected physician and gentleman in Newburyport. It reads:
“To whom it may concern,
This is to certify that Miss Jane M. Pardee of Newburyport, whom I have attended for 5 or 6 weeks past is insane: and has been so for three or four weeks, and now has become so troublesome that it is impossible to do her justice in my opinion, without as moving her from her present situation to some institution provided for Insane Persons.” It is dated October 1841.
Document signed by Dr. John Brickett stating that Jane M. Pardee should be placed in an institution provided for insane persons.
That document is followed by the second legal document:
“Jane M. Pardee of Newburyport, a Lunatic, and who is so furiously mad as to render it manifestly dangerous to the peace and safety of the community that she should be at large; the subscriber therefore prays that your Honor will commit the said Lunatic to the State Lunatic Hospital at Worcester.” It is signed, S. H Currier, Guardian and dated October 23, 1841.
Document signed by Solomon H. Currier, Jane M. Pardee’s guardian, stating that she will be committed to the Worcester Lunatic Hospital.
The final document says:
“It is thereupon considered and decreed that in the opinion of the judge of probate, Jane M. Pardee, of Newburyport in said county, single woman, a lunatic, so grievously mad, as to render it manifestly dangerous to the peace and safety of the community, that she should be at large, and that she be committed to the state lunatic hospital agreeably to law; and that the sheriff of said county or his deputy, or any constable of said Newburyport, or Solomon H. Currier esquire, of Newburyport aforesaid, be directed to carry into effect this order.” It is dated October 25, 1841.
Document from the court saying that Jane M. Pardee was a dangerous and should be “committed to the state lunatic hospital agreeable to law.”
Jane was committed to the asylum on November 11, 1841. She was released from the Asylum in 1844, she had been there for 2 years and 8 months.***
Worcester Lunatic Asylum
The Worcester Lunatic Asylum
There is no way to know why Jane was committed to the asylum. I did find this:
“In the 18th to the early 20th century, women were sometimes institutionalized due to their opinions, their unruliness and their inability to be controlled properly by a primarily male-dominated culture. There were financial incentives too; before the passage of the Married Women’s Property Act 1882, all of a wife’s assets passed automatically to her husband.
The men who were in charge of these women, either a husband, father or brother, could send these women to mental institutions, stating that they believed that these women were mentally ill because of their strong opinions. “Between the years of 1850–1900, women were placed in mental institutions for behaving in ways the male society did not agree with.” These men had the last say when it came to the mental health of these women, so if they believed that these women were mentally ill, or if they simply wanted to silence the voices and opinions of these women, they could easily send them to mental institutions.
An early fictional example is Mary Wollstonecraft’s posthumously published novel Maria: or, The Wrongs of Woman (1798), in which the title character is confined to an insane asylum when she becomes inconvenient to her husband. Real women’s stories reached the public through court cases: Louisa Nottidge was abducted by male relatives to prevent her committing her inheritance and her life to live in a revivalist clergyman’s intentional community.” ~ Women in Psychiatric Institutions, Wikipedia
1851 Newburyport Map showing 38 Federal Street, “Pardee” is the name on the house.
1884 Newburyport Map showing 38 Federal Street, it is now the property of the estate of William E. Currier.
After Jane Pardee was released from the Worcester Lunatic Asylum it appears that she lived with her niece Fanny Currier who was 9 years older and her husband William E. Currier at Jane’s home at 38 Federal Street.^^* On the 1850 map, the house is under the name “Pardee.”
Fanny Currier, the granddaughter of Aaron Pardee, was an orphan at the age of 3. She was born in 1812, her father, Henry Pardee, Aaron Pardee’s oldest son, died in 1815, her mother (Fanny Long Pardee) died a year after she was born. One could speculate that her grandfather Aaron Pardee took her in and Jane and Fanny might have been brought up together, more as sisters than aunt and niece, they would have been nine years apart.
Fanny Currier, William’s wife, Jane Pardee’s niece, the granddaughter of Aaron Pardee, died in 1859 at the age of 48 of Typhus Fever. William then married Jane M. Pardee (his wife’s aunt) in 1860. She was 39, he was 46. Because of the laws at that time, all of Jane’s assets, including the 38 Federal Street, became William’s property when they married. Fanny and William’s children inherit their great-grandfather’s fortune.
Jane died on January 23, 1862 at the age of 41 in childbirth, there were no other children.**^ William continued to live at 38 Federal Street until his death and the house, part of the estate that was inherited by his children.
50 Plummer Avenue in 2020
The Currier Children
Five of the Currier children bought land on Plummer Avenue in1896 and shortly after and built a fancy mansion at 50 Plummer Avenue. Three parcels of land on Plummer Avenue were sold to Adelaide, Georgianna and Maria Currier and 3 parcels of land were sold to their brother, Fredrick, who was a widower.* Adelaide, Georgianna and Maria Currier were single, and their brother Rufus, also single, lived there as well. According to the 1910 census the sisters and brothers were all independently wealthy, “own income” is what is recorded. The money came from their great-grandfather Aaron Pardee.
Plan of Plummer Avenue in 1889 showing which lots the Currier children bought.
The two remaining sisters Adelaide and Georgianna Currier sold 50 Plummer Ave 1920.* The family had continued to own 38 Federal Street and two sisters moved back to their family home. The newspapers depict the Currier children as an upperclass family belonging to the Historical Society of Old Newbury, members of Old South Presbyterian Church and the Ladies and Gentleman Society of that church. An article on Adelaide Currier in the Newburyport Herald, October 20, 1942 on her 86th birthday, describes her as living at 38 Federal Street, her great-grandfather’s house, the daughter of the late Judge William E. Currier and the last surviving member of one of the older families of Newburyport.
38 federal street was sold by the estate of the last remaining Currier child, Adelaide Currier, the youngest of the Currier children in 1948, when she died at the age of 91. 38 Federal Street was built in 1796 and stayed in the family until 1948.
~ History compiled by Mary Baker Eaton with help from Beth Noble Tykod, the Currier-Gilman family, descendants of Aaron Pardee, the Newburyport History Buffs and Sharon Spieldenner, the head archivist at the Newburyport Public Library Archival Center
References, Footnotes and Acknowledgements
Footnotes:
* Salem Deeds
** “The family of John Perkins of Ipswich, Massachusetts,” by Geo. A. Perkins, M.D. 1889
*** The Annual report of the Trustees of the Worcester State Hospital, years 1841, 1842, 1843 and 1844 https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000059102
*^ The Currier-Gilman family, descendants of Aaron Pardee
^* Beth Noble Tykod, the Newburyport History Buffs.
^^* FamilySearch.org
**^ The Vital Records of Newburyport Massachusetts
References and Acknowledgments:
The Museum of Old Newbury https://www.newburyhistory.org/
The Newburyport Public Library Archival Center, with a special “thank you” to Sharon Spieldenner, the head of the Newburyport Archival Center. https://www.newburyportpl.org/services/newburyport_archival_center
Worcester Historical Museum https://www.worcesterhistory.org/
Madeline Kearin Ryan, Project Development Librarian, the Worcester Historical Museum https://www.worcesterhistory.org/library/
HeritageQuest Online
Newburyport City Directories
Check Out The Interactive History Map
More information about Newburyport and its history can be found on the interactive history map, “Newburyport – Keeping the Story Alive.”