Letter of Founding Father Found

Letter of Founding Father Found

Second Gerry document found in Marblehead

By Jack Butterworth / For The Item

MARBLEHEAD - Digging through the files of historic papers in the basement of Abbot Hall, Historical Commission members have uncovered another signed Elbridge Gerry document.

This one predates the first one they found by a year. It shows Gerry's humanitarian side and raises some questions about one of the darker moments in Marblehead history.

Dated Sept. 21, 1774, the new find presents Gerry's 1773-1774 cost estimate for a smallpox hospital. It is also signed by Justice of the Peace Mansfield.

According to commission member William Conly the smallpox hospital was located on Cat Island, which Gerry co-owned with John and Jonathan Glover - and it was unpopular, at least at first.

According to town police records for January-March, 1774, a mob of 800-1,000 men rioted and burned the hospital down because it made their town a destination for smallpox cases.

They also threatened recovered patients and freed two men from a Salem jail after they were arrested in connection with the fire. The total damage was estimated at 2,000 pounds. One rioter was publicly whipped for stealing contaminated clothing from the hospital. However, other records indicate that a Marblehead hospital existed during the Revolutionary War.

Was Gerry's estimate of 540 pounds an estimate of his loss due to the riots? Or was it the cost of rebuilding the hospital?

That research has yet to be done, Conly said.

Gerry - the name is pronounced with a hard "g" like "Governor" - signed the Declaration of Independence, served in the Continental Congress from 1775-1780, served as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention in 1787, refused to sign the Constitution because the Bill of Rights was not included in it and served as Governor of Massachusetts from 1810-1811 and vice president under James Madison until his death in November, 1814, his 20th month in office and four months after his 70th birthday.
Commission Chairman Wayne Butler and Commission member Paul "Chris" Johnston are in the process of cataloguing more than 100,000 town records from the 1700s and early 1800s, stored in files in a small brick basement room that is due for renovation.

"We expect to find more," Conly said. "Wayne is doing a great job."

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