known. Mrs. Ellet considered Mary Draper to be worthy of a place among those women in the time of the Revolution who became historic characters as the wives of men prominent in civil or military life, and she devotes a separate chapter to her story. In a foot-note Mrs. Ellet says: "The facts were communicated to me by a lady who was well acquainted with Mrs. Draper, and has often heard her relate particulars of the war."

This tradition, upon which the story rests for authority, is thus distinctly traced and well authenticated. In a book entitled "Revolutionary Times," by Edward Abbott, published in 1876, the author speaks of Mrs. Draper with "peculiar admiration.' In the last October number of "Woman's Progress," a magazine published in Philadelphia, the facts are again detailed very fully and appreciatively, the author of the article saying, “she was certainly the most patriotic (woman) in the State of Massachusetts." With these published accounts before us it is necessary to give only the substance of the story.

The days which immediately followed what was known in the language of the time as the "Lexington Alarm," were busy with warlike preparations in the little village of Dedham. Situated upon the post road leading from Boston to Rhode Island, the minute-men and militia, who responded with alacrity to the expected call to arms, came down from the country side south of Dedham, and from Rhode Island and Connecticut. We are not left to imagination for these facts. In the diary kept at that time by the Rev. William Clark, the Episcopal clergyman then residing here, the following entries appear:

April 20. A terrible and distressing time such as New England never saw before.

April 22. Many reports are circulating and things are yet in a great state of uncertainty.

April 25. Providence artillery goes by and several companies from that way.

Provincial cannon removed to Dedham.

April 28.

In the diary of Dr. Nathaniel Ames are these entries:

April 23. Connecticut forces gone to Boston's siege.
May 1. Few people escape out of Boston.

May 11.

Public fast for the times.

May 26. Large cannon from Providence pass by.

In 1775, a little more than a mile from where the Court House in Dedham now stands, on the post-road leading to Roxbury, now called Centre Street, opposite the present location of the Jewish Cemetery, there lived a widow named Mary Draper. Her husband, Moses Draper, died on January 21, of that year. In her recent widowhood the care of the farm mainly devolved upon her. Her eldest son, Moses, was about thirty-one years of age and married. Her other children had grown up, excepting the youngest, a boy of thirteen years. How many of the children remained at home cannot now be told. Moses Draper, Jr., marched as Second Lieutenant in one of the three companies of the Roxbury minute-men.

CHARLES RIVER

D

DRAF

Brook

Rock

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Curve

East

The line between Roxbury and Dedham, as will be seen by reference to the diagram, ran a short distance in front of her house and through her farm. The house stood just over the line in Roxbury, but the baptisms of all the children appear upon the records of the Dedham Church, and she owned one half of a gallery pew in the meeting house of the First Parish in Dedham.

The proximity of her house to Dedham village naturally made her one of that community. It was placed upon a knoll in the middle of a bend in the road, and nearly a century before had attracted the passing traveller to its hospitable shelter.

The opportunity had now come for Mrs. Draper to show herself true to the patriotic cause in a womanly way. Perhaps she saw in each passing detachment and company of soldiers the friends and comrades of her first born son, who had already marched to meet the "red coats." However this may have been, it entered into her mind to provide food and drink for the soldiers who came to her door. Accordingly, from day to day, she fired her ample brick ovens to bake loaves for the multitude. Before her door she spread a board on which she placed the bread with cheese, a combination familiar to the New-England palate. She also had cider brought out in tubs which was served to the soldiers. We are not told how long the family stores of the Draper mansion were sufficient to meet the draught made upon them, but we may well believe there was no limit to the patriotic hospitality of its mistress so long as both supply and demand lasted.

It is well known that during the siege of Boston, which was maintained for nearly a year afterwards, there was a scarcity of ammunition. Notwithstanding the supplies received from Connecticut and other colonies, still there was a demand made upon private resources; and again Mary Draper was ready to respond to this call. For that purpose she melted her pewter, platters pans and dishes, which in the eyes of a New England housewife were as precious as family silver in more pretentious households, and melted them into bullets in a mould which belonged to her husband's effects.

During the war frequent demands were made upon the inhabitants of Dedham, for clothing and supplies for the Continental army. Cloth in those days was homespun and woven on family looms. To spin and to weave were among the accomplishments of the young women of the eighteenth century. Mrs. Draper, we are told, made coats from cloth woven in her own household, and from her sheets and blankets made shirts for the continental soldiers.

Such without amplification was the practical patriotism of Mrs. Mary Draper. She showed her faith by her works. These

bespeak a woman of strong character, highly patriotic, with sympathies not limited to her own kindred, and ready to give of her substance at the country's call. It will be noted they were performed in her own house, in that natural and unconscious way which always marks heroic action. Her acts shine through the mists of a century and more with undiminished lustre, and whenever the days after the "Lexington Alarm" in Dedham shall be recalled, let the patri

otie deeds of Mrs. Mary Draper Mary Draper

be told as a memorial of her.

Mrs. Draper was the daughter of Nathan and Mary (Chickering) Aldis, and was born April 4, 1719. The marriage of her father and mother appears on the Dedham Records as of April 19, 1715. No record has been found of her own marriage to Moses Draper. It is said this was her second marriage, being at the time a widow Allen. The following entry upon the records of the Dedham Church shows the time of her death:

:

Nov. 20, 1810. Wid: Mary Draper aged 92 years, of old age. Her will was proved January 1, 1811, Dr. Nath. Ames and her son David being the executors. The homestead then came into the hands of David Draper, who occupied it for many years. In 1838 the house and building, with fifteen acres of land, were sold by David Draper to Nathaniel Fisher of Boston, and May 14, 1839, the same estate was sold to Dr. Jeremy Stimson. Dr. Stimson owned the farm during his life and it is still owned by his heirs. The house was destroyed by fire in 1870.

The Draper house was one of the very few houses of the emigrant settlers in this vicinity which stood after the middle of the present century. There seems to be satisfactory evidence that it was built by James Draper, the first settler. He was admitted townsman in Dedham in 1653, and in 1690 in Roxbury, where he died in 1694. The headstone of James Draper and his wife Miriam. are yet standing in the cemetery at West Roxbury. The estate was inherited or purchased by Jonathan his son, the father of Moses the husband of Mary Draper. The projection in the gable, the long slope of the rear roof and the large chimney in

the centre, all of which appear in the frontispiece, are distinguishing features of a house built in the seventeenth century. It was stated by David Draper to Dr. Stimson that it was one of the best constructed houses of its time. The visitor to its site to-day sees the old cellar of the size of one room, a common thing in old houses, the well half filled, the retaining walls along the passage-way from the house to where the barns and out buildings once stood, and the orchard planted no doubt in the present century. The bend in the old post-road has been discontinued by straightening Centre Street, so the site of the house does not now bound upon the street.

There is another association which we may connect with this house as early as 1704. In Madam Knight's Journal of her memorable journey on horseback from Boston to New York and back, we find that she reached Dedham on her return, March 2, 1704, and that she started with a fresh horse, hoping to reach Boston that night, but "it grew late in the afternoon and the people having very much discouraged us about the sloughy way which they said we should find very difficult and hazardous, it so wrought on me, being tired and despirited and disappointed of my desires of going home, that I agreed to lodge there that night, which we did at the house of one Draper.

From these words of Madam Knight it appears that soon after leaving Dedham, it being late in the afternoon, and the way sloughy, she was persuaded to remain over night in the house of one Draper. The inference is justifiable that the house here referred to as standing in 1704 was the house of Mary Draper in 1775.

NOTE. In the inventory of the estate of Moses Draper, the husband of Mary Draper, dated March 28, 1777, among the personal effects were two swords, a shot mould, fifty skeins of woolen yarn, and articles of pewter. One parcel of real estate was "an old house with twelve acres of land." These items furnish significant confirmation of what has been stated, especially in describing the house as an old one in 1777. E. W.