GenMassachusetts-L Archives

From: <>
Subject: [GM-L] ABBOTT, John (desc. from Geo. Abbott, Andover, MA 1643)
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 1999 18:24:45 EDT

Surname: ABBOTT
Source: Biographical Review
Life Sketches of Leading Citizens of Middlesex
County, Massachusetts 1898 Biographical Review
Publishing Company - Boston

"Who among men art thou, and thy years how many, good
friend?" - Xenophanes.
p.109
John Abbott, a prominent machinist of Waltham, MA
was born in Billerica, MA in 1805. He was the youngest
son of James and Mehitable (Holt) Abbott, and a lineal
descendant of George Abbott, who settled at Andover, MA
in 1643, and the roll of whose numerous posterity in-
cludes many distinguished names.

George Abbott married Hannah Chandler; and their son,
Nathaniel, the twelfth of a family of thirteen child-
ren was the father of Joseph Abbott who married Deborah
Blanchard, had fourteen children and spent his last days
at Wilton, N.H. where he died in 1787. His son, Joseph
Abbott, Jr., grandfather of the subject of our sketch,
was a farmer at Andover, MA and later in life in South-
ern New Hampshire. He married Mary Barker and was the
father of seven children, the third being James Abbott
above named, a merchant at Billerica, born at Andover,
MA in 1768. James Abbott married Mehitable Holt,
daughter of Daniel and Mehitable (Putnam) Holt, of
Andover, MA. and Wilton, N.H.

He was town clerk of Billerica in 1797 and Representative
to the General Court of MA in 1803. He died in 1810,
when his son John was about five years old. Mrs.
Mehitable (Holt) Abbott who was a worthy and capable
woman, removed after her husband's death to Milford,
N.H. She lived to the age of ninety-nine years.

John Abbott was educated in Milford, N.H., and learned
his trade in Waltham. He eventually engaged in business
for himself, employing at one time over one hundred work
men, among his apprentices in his shop being Nathaniel
Banks. Mr. Abbott was at a later period engaged in
setting up machinery in several cotton-mills in Lowell;
and he also superintended the equipment of mills in
Orono, ME. He was recalled to Waltham by the offer of
a large salary, and resided here until his death, which
occurred in 1842, at the age of thirty-seven years. He
was a Democrat in politics, was elected Representative
to the legislature from Waltham in 1841 and served
during the session of 1842. Failing health caused him
to decline a renomination, and he was succeeded by
Nathaniel P. Banks.

Mr. Abbott was survived by his wife, the former Olive
Haynes, whom he married in 1832, and a daughter, Clara.
Mrs. Abbott was born in Sudbury, MA April 11, 1811,
daughter of Josiah and Lydia (Conant) Haynes, her
mother a native of Concord, MA. Mrs. Abbott's paternal
grandfather, Jason Haynes, and his father, Josias Haynes
took part in the famous Concord fight on the 19th of
April, 1775; and her father, Josiah Haynes, who was then
but a young boy, ever after remembered listening, with
the anxious women and children of the neighborhood who
had gathered at their house, to the distant firing. A
gun that Jason Haynes took from a British soldier whom
he had shot, was long kept at the homestead.

After the death of her husband, Mrs. Abbott carried on
the millinery business in company with her sister, for
about fifteen years. In 1898 she still resided in
Waltham, MA. Her daughter, Clara was educated in the
public schools of Waltham, including the high school,
and in the State Normal School at West Newton. She
subsequently taught school in Waltham, Waverly and
Newton, being thus engaged upward of twenty years.
Miss Abbott was a member of the Emerson-Browning Club,
and both she and her mother had been members of the
corporation of the Leland Home for Aged Women since
its organization. They were also connected with the
Waltham Womna's Club and the Waltham branch of the
Women's Alliance. They were members of the Unitarian
Church as was the late Mr. Abbott.

Transcribed by Janice Farnswort

This thread:

• [GM-L] ABBOTT, John (desc. from Geo. Abbott, Andover, MA 1643) by <>