THE FRENCH CANADIAN CONNECTION: ONCE UPON A TIME…. THESE POMEROYS WERE PONTBRIANTS

By Barb Dix & Lee Connolly

            For over a year the families of Jeremiah Pomeroy and Lewis Pomeroy of Onondaga and Oswego counties in New York have languished in our unlinked database, so far unconnected to the Eltweed line. There they accumulated many descendants, but no identified parents. 

What we knew was, according to the 1850 federal census, a Jeremiah Pomeroy, age 32, and wife Harriet and children lived in Syracuse in July.  Luckily for data collector lovers they moved to Lysander in the same county in a timely fashion to be caught in a second census taker’s net that November. [i]

Another Pomeroy family unit, headed by Lewis Pomeroy, age 48, listed as a salt packer, and wife Louisa and their children were also in the July census taker’s records for Syracuse.  They too were also recorded in the November census. [ii] A recently married young Lewis, age 20 and wife Virginia lived near to this household that same month. [iii]

            We could follow these families forward, but not backwards into the ever expanding American Eltweed line.  That is why we keep a database of “unconnected” or “unlinked” Pomeroy individuals and households; hoping some day to see if these far-flung migrations continue to run parallel or converge somewhere.

            In the 1860 federal census both Lewis Pomeroy families were located in Oswego County, in the town of Granby, later Fulton, where their descendants increased and multiplied. [iv]  Jeremiah Pomeroy, variously recorded as Daniel or James, did a ten year stint in neighboring Oneida and Madison counties as boatman and butcher before returning to the land, this time in Cicero, along the south shore of Oneida Lake. [v]

And so it went.

THE ESTATE PAPER CLUE

            This past April, staff member Barb Dix, town historian in Schroeppel, and the village of Phoenix in Oswego county, and I, began doing research on the Granby Pomeroys.  We went to the Surrogate office and our spirits were buoyed by a stack of estate papers for Louis Pomeroy (the younger), who died in 1908.  There we noticed a surprising series of additions.  Each time his name was cited, written in ink was the addition of “also known as Louis Pontbriant.” 

            We looked through various NYS census records, and found the 1875 record which, unlike other years, recorded the older Louis Pomeroy household in Granby under the name Pontbriant. 

While we have Canadian Pomeroys linked to the Eltweed line who had migrated through New York in the early 1800s, we had not come across a line of Pomeroys that were French Canadian, until now.

            In July, Barbara received a phone call from the Oswego County historian Justin White, who told her Mary and Susan Pomeroy from Ottawa had stopped in his office while doing their family history research. They left a phone number.  Barb was soon in communication with Mark Pomeroy in Ottawa who researching his Pomeroy family line and who had reached a roadblock here and there.  He was surprised at what we had discovered, and quickly set about seeking his French Canadian connection with the Pontbriants in New York.

THE DROUIN RECORDS

            It is my good fortunate to be skilled in using the French dictionnaire while examining the Drouin Quebec Vital Records posted on Ancestry.com databases.

This data gave me entrance to baptismal and marriage records. I finally had enough information to deduce that Lewis/Louis Pomeroy and wife Louise in the 1850 census records for Syracuse and Lysander, were likely Louis Pontbriant/Pontbriand and Marie Louise Preville, second wife, married in St. Barthelemy, Quebec in 1843. [vi] 

           

            Thus, in the census records that followed, with the exception of the 1875 NYS census, and the probate file we found in Oswego, all the male descendants took on a new name and were recorded from thence on as Pomeroys.  Since it was the common cultural practice of dropping one’s “maiden” name at marriage, the female “Pomeroy”/Pontbriant descendants therefore had this second obscuring layer to their birth/baptismal identity.

None of these descendants, from what we currently know of this lineage, will tap directly into the Eltweed Pomeroy line, unless they marry a partner of that descendancy, though they certainly gain a rich French Canadian heritage.

            Such intermarriages have taken place. In fact while researching this family, we came across a marriage of John Pomeroy to a Harriet Pomeroy.  No Eltweed connection was established however, as John was the son of our elder Louis Pomeroy/Pontbriant, his mother being of the first wife Louise dit Pelland, and his bride was Harriet, daughter of his uncle Jeremiah (believed to be Germain) Pomeroy/Pontbriant. [vii] So a Pomeroy to Pomeroy marriage, or if the birth identities had been retained, Pontbriant to Pontbriant.

So far we have located the burial site of Louis Pomeroy, also known as Louis Pontbriant, and his wife Virginia, and some descendants, in St. Mary’s Cemetery, Fulton, New York, though we have not as yet found the parents, Louis and Louisa, who likely were buried in this vicinity. [viii]

            Their descendants have migrated from Syracuse to Granby and Fulton, across county and state lines for generations. Some know of their French-Canadian heritage, but many do not. 

           

            We have a similar puzzle of another Pontbriant who may have changed his name to Pomeroy between 1850 and 1860.  An interesting coincidence.  He was Peter, an 11 year old child in Clinton County, New York in 1850 son of a Pontbriant father. In 1860 we find a 21 year old Peter Pomeroy living in Illinois, as an individual.  The family descendants have a story that their “Peter” stowed away on a boat as a young child and came to Illinois.  We are on the trail now, and descendants are calling us now to learn more, and contribute the fruits of their own searches.  We will keep looking for clues.

NBC’s TV program “Who Do You Think You Are?’ asked a pertinent question.  Genealogists ask it all the time in their investigations.  Here, we found individuals of the diverse strands of Quebec Pontbriands who seem to have taken, or been given, the name of Pomeroy. They migrated from Onondaga and Oswego County (likely Clinton County, also) and settled in Frankfort, Herkimer County, NY, Saginaw Michigan, Youngstown, Ohio, Illinois, Kansas, and far beyond. Perhaps you are one of them. 

[If you would like to share information about these families please contact Alethea Connolly at aconnolly@cxtec.com ]

NOTES

[i] Jeremiah Pomeroy. 1850 U. S. Census. Syracuse, Ward 1, Onondaga County, New

York, P 27. Dwelling 394, Family 394; 1850 U. S. Census, Lysander, Onondaga County, New York, P 509B, Dwelling 742, Family 743.

[ii] Lewis Pomeroy. 1850 U. S. Census, Syracuse, Onondaga County, New York, P 34,

Dwelling 503, Family 503. Also 1850 U. S. Census, Lysander, Onondaga County, New York, P 509, Dwelling 738, Family 739.

[iii] Lewis Pomeroy and Virginia. 1850 U. S. Census. Syracuse, Ward 1, Onondaga County, New York, P 34. Dwelling 394, Family 497; Also 1850 U. S. Census. Lysander, Onondaga County, New York, P 509. Dwelling 739, Family 740.

[iv] Louis Pomroy, 1860 U. S. Census, Granby, Oswego County, New York, P 14, Dwelling 95, Family 103; Also Lewis Pomroy. 1870 U. S. Census, Oswego County, P 492, Dwelling 456, Family 489.

[v] Jeremiah/Daniel Pomeroy. 1860 U. S. Census. Verona, Oneida County, New York, P 813, Dwelling 778, Family 764. Also Ancestry.com U. S. IRS Tax Assessment Lists, 1882-1918 [database on-line] See: 1864, 1866, 1867. Provo, UT, USA. Ancestry.com Operations Inc. 2008; Also U. S. Census. Cicero, Onondaga County, New York, P 68. Dwelling 641, Family 633.

[vi] Ancestry.com- Quebec, Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), 1621-1967, Records for Louis Lonbreanl Dil Sausrezel (Louis Pontbriand/Pontbriant dit Sans regret) 1828, Berthierville, image 10 [This document records the marriage of Louis Pontbriand to Marie Louise Martin dit Pelland; they are the parents of Louis who in the 1850 U. S. census record in Syracuse and Lysander is married to Virginia. Variations on the spelling of Pontbriant/Pontbriand surname, sometimes Pontbrilliant, are noted through various records in the Drouin collection, and legibility issues are challenging] See also in this collection the birth of Louis baptized in Berthierville, Quebec on November 8, 1830 whose parents were Louis Pombrilland and Louise Pellan.  See also in this collection, the second marriage of Louis Pontbrillant, his wife Louise Pellan/Pelland of Sorel having died, to Louise Preville of the parish of St. Barthelemy, Berthier Co, Quebec. She is the Louisa in the 1850 census record in Syracuse and Lysander.

[vii] Our deduction that Jeremiah was baptized Germain is based upon a reading of the Quebec, Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), 1621-1967, at Ancestry.com. When the record for Germain Pontbriand (in French) titled “Enterrement (Burial)” in the 1816 book of records for Bertheirville, Quebec is examined, the letter “S” precedes the entry. Generally this signals a burial, but the language of the entry is that of a baptism, citing the common form for stating a baptism, as the child baptized being born of  the legitimate marriage of Jean Pontbriand and Marguerite Lambert, and citing the god father and god mother. These are the same parents of the elder Louis, cited in footnote [ii]. The Drouin record collection cites his baptismal date in 1807 (July 14) to these same parents in Yamaska Co. 

[viii]. Section 3, page 30 of  St. Mary’s Cemetery Index, Fulton, NY, transcribed from Cemetery Index at Oswego County Records center, Oswego, NY. 

APHGA Researchers Patricia Whipple and Kate Corbett Pollack Journey to Buckland, Massachusetts, to Visit the Spaulding House and Search for Pomeroys!

By Kate Corbett Pollack

Spaulding House

On a beautiful summer day, Pat and I headed out to Buckland, Mass., starting our trip on Saturday, the morning of June 23^rd. The total travel time from Syracuse is about four hours, and it is a very nice drive. The weather remained pleasant for most of the weekend. Upon our arrival in the picturesque Connecticut River Valley where Buckland is located, we were met by our gracious host, Ed Purinton, and his wife Valerie, owners and caretakers of the house where Reverend Spaulding and his family lived.  The house originally belonged to Ed’s parents, and he grew up in it-in Josiah Spaulding Jr.’s bedroom![i]

The Spaulding house was built in 1794, about the year that Reverend Spaulding arrived with his family in Buckland to be the town’s first permanent minister. He was provided with the house to live in for the duration of his time with the First Congregational Church of Buckland (now Mary Lyon Church), a position he held until his death in 1823. The house was as I had imagined it; a white Federal style with black shutters, the type common in New England at this time. Ed and his family showed us inside and we were pleased to find that not much has changed since the house was first built, other than an updated kitchen and bathrooms! The large kitchen hearth is still there, complete with a Dutch oven and old tools. Of course I pictured the Spaulding sisters and their mother working at the hearth, toiling away over the fire as women did in the days before modern appliances or even iron stoves. The walls and floors still had their original wooden planks-the widest I have ever seen. Some looked to be close to two feet.

The staircase to the second floor was very narrow and small. By this time, our group had been joined by former Boston Globe/ New York times writer Eric Goldscheider and his mother. Eric wrote an article for the Boston Globe about Josiah Spaulding in 1999, called A Long Ago Tragedy Gets A Second Look.[ii]

Young Josiah's Room

Pat and I brought in our suitcases, as Ed and his adorable granddaughter accompanied us. Before I knew it, there I was in Josiah’s room! It was small, with the same wide plank walls that we saw in the hallway, and an ancient brick fireplace that was original to the room. (Ed and his family did restoration work to uncover some of the fireplaces in the house). Ed showed us the grooves on the floor where Josiah had been chained up prior to being put in a cage. The grooves in the floor really made the story hit home for me. They were wide and deep, and looked very much like they had been worn away over time by a person, and not caused by dragging furniture or other damage. They were close enough (but not too close) to the fireplace to picture Josiah sitting there, trying to stay warm. Ed told us that the room gets very cold in the winter. In letters, the sisters mention the importance of keeping their caged brother in a “warm room”. Before I saw these grooves, I was not sure if Josiah had actually been chained to the floor, but it sure does look like he was. There were also unexplained deep nail marks and other surface grooves in the corner of the room, and dents in the floor around the fireplace.

Chain Grooves in Floor

I had read accounts that Josiah was chained to the floor by his father, and remained that way for a year until he broke free and tried to escape down the back staircase, which Ed showed us. The door to the back staircase was very close to Josiah’s room, and one could see how he could make a break for it and dash to the stairwell, which led to the kitchen and out the back door. I pictured Josiah bolting from his bedroom after breaking free of the chains (his door did not have a lock on it, but a latch, and all the hardware is original to the house), and running down those steps to the kitchen, where he would have been able to immediately dash out the back door to the outside and make a run towards the barn to grab a horse, as local legend says he did. The barn was very near the kitchen side of the house. Ed Purinton knows the story of Josiah’s escape attempt, and showed us the stairwell, which is enclosed and very much hidden. You would not know it was there otherwise. Neil Perry’s 1966 article ‘Raving Maniac’ of Buckland Spent 57 Years in a Cage for the Springfield Union describes how a strong neighbor heard the commotion and ran over to assist Reverend Spaulding in subduing Josiah during his escape attempt. Indeed, there was a house of the same era next to the Spaulding house, situated very near where the barn would have been, and it was easy to imagine a neighbor running up to grab Josiah.

The Spaulding house was laid out in a way that the stories about Josiah I initially wasn't too sure about began to make a lot of sense. Many aspects of the story are impossible to prove, but there is truth to oral histories, and listening to the elderly townspeople over the years is how these histories were preserved and passed down. Buckland is a small town where many families go back generations to the time of the Spauldings, including Ed Purinton’s family, who have lived in the area for 200 years. Oral histories are considered viable sources of information for historians. One thing that we do know is that Josiah was put in a cage, indicating he was ultimately unable to escape from the house and his chains, and needed something stronger to hold him, as he had proven he could break free. 

View from Josiah's Bedroom

I made sure to look out the window of the bedroom, as lonely Josiah must have done many times. The view looked out over a large field and extended to one of the many rounded hills of the Berkshire Mountains. No houses were visible. It is a peaceful view, but for someone who was trapped, it must have been even more isolating. There was no one around to see or hear him. The Spauldings did have neighbors on either side of the house, but they were supportive of the Reverend, as we have seen, and so was almost everyone in the town. In those days, a father’s authority was unquestioned, and Reverend Spaulding was a highly respected community member. Also, mental illness was just not understood, if indeed Josiah was mentally ill. People in this era (circa 1812) and region believed that God caused illness to happen, and that it was a test for the Reverend which was between him and God. It was not something for them to interfere with.

Mary Lyon Church

After touring the Spaulding house, we all journeyed up the hill to Mary Lyon Church, where Rev. Spaulding preached. It is so named because in 1822, Mary Lyon, founder of Mt. Holyoke College, was baptized there, presumably by Rev. Spaulding himself. There are still services at the church. The Spaulding family and many Pomeroys are buried in the churchyard cemetery. Buckland Historical Society director Tina Peters gave us a wonderful tour of the building, which is quite beautiful and has stained glass windows honoring past preachers, as well as one for Mary Lyon. Tina is a member of the congregation, and was able to give us a comprehensive tour. Of course I imagined Reverend Spaulding in the pulpit, and stood where he would have, facing the pews, and tried to experience his view of the congregation. I also sat in the pews myself, and they are kind of small! I thought of Mary, Nancy, Lydia and Deborah sitting in them, listening to their father preach. I wondered where they might have sat, and imagined Deborah Pomeroy Trowbridge stopping by the pew after services to say hello and deliver all the latest gossip. When Mary Spaulding married Isaac Pomeroy and moved to Southampton, Deborah, Isaac’s sister, would get the latest from Mary’s sisters in that very church and then write a long letter telling Mary all the Buckland news.

After the lovely church tour, Tina Peters showed everyone across the street to the Buckland Historical Society Museum, which she opened up just for us. It used to be a schoolhouse, and is full of many important artifacts local to the area, and has two floors full of very interesting and unique items! I saw a photograph of Reverend Spaulding in an old book, which I had seen before on his Find A Grave page[iii], but did not know if it was correct. I was happy to see that it was really Reverend Spaulding, and had his signature under the photo.

After our Buckland tour that day, Pat and I set out to find a place to eat dinner. We drove around the Buckland area a little, and went to Charlemont, a pretty little village where the Spaulding family had friends and relatives, including John Coleman, who died there after many years of alcoholism. We saw the sign in the direction of Heath, where Thankful Coleman, his daughter, worked to support herself and wrote lonely letters back home to her mother, Nancy Spaulding. We saw Ashfield, where Reverend Spaulding was president of Sanderson Academy, and Plainfield, where Josiah Spaulding taught for a brief period.

Pat and I decided on dinner in nearby Shelburne Falls, where Nancy Spaulding lived for a while. It was just beautiful, and I would recommend it as a great place to tour and visit. There are glacial potholes right downtown, a waterfall, the beautiful bridge of flowers and many interesting art shops, antique stores and bookstores (which I made sure not to stop in, lest I spend the remainder of the trip perusing books). It is a lovely area and everything is old, beautiful and historic, and surrounded by the Berkshire Mountains. In fact, Ed told us that Bill Cosby has a house there. Everyone was very friendly and hospitable.

After dinner, I was exhausted. We returned to the Spaulding house, where some of Ed’s relatives were also staying in the downstairs bedroom, and there was a group relaxing in the living room. I was secretly relieved that there were more people there, as I planned on sleeping in Josiah’s bedroom, which made me a little nervous! Pat joined the group and brought the Netbook with our database on it, so she could get a few genealogy facts from Ed and his family, as we have been working on the Buckland genealogy for a while and seeing how the Pomeroys fit in. There were many Pomeroys in Buckland, and they were among the first settlers of the area. Ed told us that his cousin Arnold lives in Enos Pomeroy’s 18^th century farmhouse, and we planned to visit it the next day. Pat and I are very familiar with Enos and his family from our research, and he is mentioned in the Spaulding letters.

Fireplace in Josiah's Room

Sleeping in Josiah’s room was interesting. The Connecticut River Valley is just so peaceful and beautiful that it is hard to feel afraid or nervous for long about anything. It seemed a very different environment that I expected, due to the grim nature of the Spaulding family letters. It is somewhat ironic that the devastation they experienced (much of it due to epidemic disease) took place amidst such a serene backdrop. I did not feel very much in Josiah’s room other than a sort of heavy, lived-in feeling. I do not think his ghost haunts that room (as many want to know!), but there was a definite feeling that struck me as sort of oppressive. Like the ceiling was slightly pushing down on me. I slept with the lamp on! I must admit that I woke up at about 2 or 3 am and felt very nervous, but I am sure it was my imagination.

Enos Pomeroy House

The next day Ed Purinton joined Pat and I for breakfast in Shelburne, and we walked around a little bit once more. Ed was such a gracious host and an excellent tour guide, and he certainly knows the history of the area, an appreciation for which was instilled in him by his mother, who researched the Spaulding family when Ed was growing up.

After breakfast, Ed took us to his cousin Arnold’s house, which was the former residence of Enos Pomeroy (b. 1761), a Buckland clothier who ran a successful business and was well-known and liked. He married Lucy Smith circa 1786, and the couple had eleven children. Enos and Lucy are also remembered for being able to successfully see that all eleven children were educated and did well. 

Enos Pomeroy Barn

 Enos is mentioned in the Spaulding letters collection, and there is a very detailed one from Deborah Pomeroy Trowbridge describing Enos’ tragic fall in the barn, which ended his life. The barn is still on the property, and Arnold has kept it up. The letter describing Enos’ death was one of the harder letters I had to transcribe. He fell from the beams in his barn and fractured his skull, living 26 hours until his death (as it even says on his tombstone). His wife stayed by his side, calmly caring for him the entire time, and, as Deborah wrote, said she was thankful that they had so many good years together and was remarkably composed. All Lucy had to soothe Enos was some Camphor on a rag. Deborah wrote, “his every breath was a groan”.

Enos Pomeroy’s house was just beautiful, and almost completely unchanged and original. It was kind of small, however, and I could not imagine eleven children there! The hearths and wooden floors were similar to the ones in the Spaulding home, although I have to say I think that the beams in the floor at the Enos Pomeroy house were even wider! I was shocked to see them.  Arnold was a very kind host and allowed us to photograph the house. He was accompanied by his adorable dogs, including a large but very friendly German Shepherd, who seems to have some kind of rivalry going on with two local birds, who kept trying to dive bomb the poor thing. The grounds were also stunning, and I am sure not much different at all from when Enos and Lucy settled the area and built the house. It is surrounded by woods and hills.

Kate in Front of the Pomeroy Milk Shed

To view the photo essays of our trip, follow the link to the APHGA Facebook page!

Here are links to my articles about the Spaulding family on the APHGA blog:

The story of the Spaulding sisters: Nancy, Deborah, Lydia and Mary:

http://americanpomeroys.blogspot.com/2011/12/spaulding-sisters.html

Reverend Spaulding, Josiah, and the Cage:

http://americanpomeroys.blogspot.com/2011/11/only-being-of-senceless-existence.html

The Spaulding family’s religious beliefs and experience with epidemic disease:

http://americanpomeroys.blogspot.com/2011/09/calvinism-and-epidemic-disease-in.html

Parts One and Two of ‘The Descendents of Lydia Spaulding: A Legacy of Mental Health Activism’. There is much more on this story that Pat and I have uncovered and I am expanding it now, but this is an introduction:

http://americanpomeroys.blogspot.com/2012/03/descendents-of-lydia-spaulding-legacy.html

http://americanpomeroys.blogspot.com/2012/03/descendents-of-lydia-spaulding-legacy_20.html

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[i] For those followers of the Spaulding/Pomeroy families of Buckland on the APHGA blog, the story of Reverend Spaulding and his family is already familiar. If anyone would like to get acquainted with this amazing story, links to previous blog posts will be provided at the end of the article. To quickly recap, the APHGA was lent and allowed to scan a collection of 144 letters sent to us by one of our members. The letters were written by Pomeroys and Spauldings over 200 years ago. The families intermarried and lived in Western Massachusetts in the early 1800s. Pat Whipple and I, along with our other APHGA researchers, have been researching these families for almost a year now, and I have transcribed the letters and written about them. The letters reveal an incredible story of the Spaulding family of Buckland, headed by patriarch Reverend Josiah Spaulding and his wife, Mary Williams. They had four daughters and one son- Josiah Jr., who was thought to be insane and kept in a cage in the family home. The letters were mostly written by the four Spaulding sisters; Mary (who married Isaac Pomeroy of Southampton), Lydia, Nancy and Deborah. Mary’s sister-in-law, Deborah Pomeroy Trowbridge, was also a very prolific letter-writer and involved member of the family. She lived in Buckland.

[ii] http://www.eric-goldscheider.com/id74.html

[iii] http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=59554737

Walter Henry Pomeroy and the Vanished Library: A Love Story of the Gilded Age.

By Kate Corbett Pollack

Research by Patricia Whipple

Walter Henry Pomeroy was born in Yarmouth, Cumberland County, Maine, on July 16, 1834, to Frederick Augustus Pomeroy and Priscilla Noyes. As a young man, he moved to New York and began his career as a teacher.  In 1869, he obtained a passport so he could travel abroad, perhaps to satiate his interest in foreign languages. It is hard to know everything about Walter, as he was not a famous man, but he was well-liked and respected, and known among many in literary, artistic and scholarly circles of the time. He certainly was a highly intelligent person, with a background in classical education. Walter’s travels to Europe served to further his interest in art, history, literature, philosophy and other fields of study.  A letter written to The Critic: A Weekly Review of Literature and the Arts in 1893, by Myron B. Benton says:

            Mr. Pomeroy was a man of fine culture. There are few in whom the pursuit of literature meant so much; or, in matters of taste, whose scale, so to speak, marked so fine gradations…Mr. Pomeroy was a man of most genial manners. Especially those whose feet were in the same flowery paths-it might be far in the rearward-found a welcome of free cordiality. There was in his presence an unintermittent flow of humor, highly individual, often exuberant and fantastic…[i]

Walter Henry Pomeroy’s wife, Laura Skeel, was written about in much the same way. They were married in 1871, at Irvington-on-Hudson, in Westchester County, New York. The two must have been quite a sparkling couple, as their wit, intelligence and wide-ranging interests and unique personalities came together. Laura was an artist, who for many years kept a salon on 86^th street in New York. She is most famous for her bust of Matthew Vassar, founder of Vassar College, which she created while living in Poughkeepsie, New York. It was during her first marriage to Dr. Ernest F. Hoffman. (The bust can still be seen at Vassar). The couple was divorced. Laura and Walter had to wait until their forties to meet their perfect match-they were married when she was 42 and he 41. They settled into New York, sharing a house with Laura’s brother, Roswell, at 84 Irving Place, and his wife Anne. There Walter worked as a professor, and is listed as “professor of languages, at 903 6^th avenue” in the 1880 census[ii].

Walter also worked as a tutor for the only son of the wealthy Baxter family of Rutland, Vermont, headed by General Horace Henry Baxter, who was a Vermont railroad magnate and Civil War veteran. The family had a home in New York, on 5^th avenue. When General Baxter died in 1884, his widow, Mary Roberts, worked to establish a memorial library in his honor in Rutland. Walter Henry Pomeroy was chosen to find the books and Laura as a librarian. In 1889 Mrs. Baxter had a beautiful stone and granite Romanesque building constructed to house the collection. The library has been attributed to architect Leopold Eidlitz, who was designer of Temple Emanu-el on 65^th street in New York, the elegant Buffalo Public Library, and many other famous structures. However, recent research has identified the creator as another Gilded Age Jewish architect, Arnold W. Brunner, designer of the 1897 Congregation Shearith Israel on Central Park West in New York, among other notable buildings in major U.S. cities[iii]. The Rutland Historical Society Quarterly describes the inside of the building: “Its interior consisted of elegant semicircular alcoves gracefully carved, a reading room, a librarian’s office for Mrs. Pomeroy…A winding staircase led to a tower, from which one had a splendid view of the fertile valley and lower Library avenue.”[iv] It was built across the street from the Baxter estate, a mansion typical to the Gilded Age.

In this era of the late 19^th century, wealthy industrialists such as the Rockefellers, the Fricks, and Andrew Carnegie, who also built many libraries all over the United States, sought to give back to their communities in this way. Business leaders of this era amassed important works of art, which contributed to the collections in many American museums today. It was also a time of unprecedented wealth, which allowed these wealthy families to live like American royalty, as the family of General Baxter did.  They had the money to buy priceless works of art from Europe and bring them to America, where they could afford to house them in magnificent mansions and private museums. However, this often meant needing to hire someone who was well educated, cultured, spoke other languages and knew what was valuable and important. Walter Henry Pomeroy fit the description, and already knew and worked for the family.

Walter was given unlimited funds to purchase the volumes for the library, which was built to contain about 20,000 books. He selected around 12,000 volumes, devoting years of his life to the project, from 1886 to his death in 1891, working alongside his wife. It is unknown whether Laura went with him, but Walter traveled in both America and Europe buying books. Laura organized his finds as the librarian, and had her own office in the library. The books chosen were to be used for reference, not checked out by the public, and were very rare and beautiful, as was the library itself. A description of the interior from 1895 states that:

The capacity of the library admits of about 20,000 volumes. These are compactly shelved in nine alcoves, which radiate from the octagonal sides toward an open centre, being closely packed on either side with volumes, which are classified in Art, Autobiography, Fiction, Drama, Folk-lore, History, Literature, Theology, Science, Travel, Shakespeare and the Classics, as well as a large range of Lexicons and Manuals of Reference. There are two spacious, well-lighted reading rooms, on the east and west ends, opening from a large central room, munificently furnished with carved oaken furniture; and carpeted with Persian rugs[v].

Notable editions of the collection included:

Romance of Paris et Vienne, Caxton 1485

Pope Pius the Sixth Latin Bible printed in Basle, 1551

Le Costume Historique, in color, Paris

Cicero’s Epistolae ad Familiares cum Hubertine clerics Comments, printed 1483[vi]

Walter also included rare early works on American history, the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812 and the Civil War. He selected books that represented fine examples of the different stages of book binding and printing in European and American history. Some books were chosen simply because of a rare style of binding. Many books were embossed with gold, covered in leather, with parchment pages. The finest examples were kept under glass, and all could be viewed by the public during library hours.

           

But what happened to this marvelous collection of nearly 12,000 volumes? Mrs. Baxter left no provision in her will stipulating what should be done with the collection. The Rutland Historical Society reports in its 1993 Quarterly of a letter written to them in 1958 by Walter Henry Pomeroy’s niece, Gertrude Pomeroy, asking them where the books went. They were unable to trace them. The library was purchased by the Anshei Shalom congregation in 1927 for $12,000, and became the Rutland Jewish Center, which remains in use today. The Baxter estate was demolished in 1945.

Henry died in 1891, and was buried in Rutland. After Mrs. Baxter’s 1896 death, the books can no longer be traced. For a 31-year period, in between Mrs. Baxter’s passing and the purchase of the library by the congregation, there was time for almost anything to happen to the books.

After Walter died, Laura Skeel Pomeroy went back to New York and set up her 86^th street salon, where she became known as “The Dear Old Lady of 86^th Street” -or at least was memorialized as such by American poet Shaemas O’Sheel in his 1911 obituary of her. There she kept company with a fascinating and diverse group of artists, musicians, actors, singers, and people of all religious backgrounds, sitting back amongst the buzz and hum of the salon, happy to be surrounded by such interesting company. She even was friends with Lord Tennyson. According to Shaemas, Laura often spoke of Walter, who she was so in love with, and so perfectly suited for:

     “Her little parlors were lined with books, they had belonged to one of whom she often spoke, never sadly, never sentimentally, always with the slightest lowering of her voice, with an indefinable undertone that struck deeply, beautifully to the heart…There is often enough a repulsion in old age which persists thru all effort at reverence; but not so here. I used to often think of what young womanhood, what young loverhood had been hers; and I thought how terrible the loss of the man she spoke of so often, so tenderly, must have been; yet how truly great that love must have been, since she could make, in these widowed years, a great beautiful thing of her lonely life…”

Surrounded by Walter’s books, Laura lived her later years on 86^th street until old age caused her to move to an apartment in the Bronx, where she spent her last days leading up to her death at age 78, on August 23, 1911. She was buried in Rutland, alongside Walter. The couple had no children.

What became of the rarest and most valuable books in the Baxter Memorial Library? Did Laura have some of them at her studio, or were those books from Walter’s personal collection? Even so, her studio would not have been big enough to house such a collection, and a bibliophile like Walter was bound to have his own small library, which his devoted wife would have likely kept. Where could 12,000 volumes have gone, leaving no record? Did Hugh Baxter, the Baxter’s son, sell them off? Perhaps there is someone out there who can shed some light on this mystery. For now, the secret has died with Laura Skeel Pomeroy-over 100 years ago.

Further sources for this story:

Ancestry.com. U.S. Passport Applications, 1795-1925 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: The Generations Network, Inc., 2007.

A Catalogue of the Books in the H. H. Baxter Memorial Library of Rutland, VT.. Rutland, Rutland County, Vermont:, 1892.

Maine. Cumberland County. Ward 6. Portland. 1850 U.S. Census. Microfilm publication M432_252. Washington: National Archives

Onondaga County Public Library System.  City of Portland [Maine] births 1712-1892.  Online [http://catalog.onlib.org/].  Accessed 12 Jun 2009

Links to images and more information on subjects in the article:

Images of the Library:

Rutland Jewish Center postcard

Baxter Memorial Library door on Flickr

Leopold Eidlitz, architect:

Leopold Eidlitz book

Dissertation on Leopold Eidlitz by Kenneth Franklin Jacobs

Buffalo Public Library postcard

Arnold W. Brunner, architect:

Jewish Arts and Monuments

Rutland Jewish Center

Laura Skeel’s Matthew Vassar bust, which has been incorporated into a full statue:

Matthew Vassar Sculpture

General Baxter:

Horace Henry Baxter Biography

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[i]  The Critic A Weekly Review of Literature and the Arts Vol. XIX (New Series) Vol. XXII January-June 1893, The Critic Company, New York, 1893.

[ii] New York. New York County. New York City. 1880 U. S. Census. Microfilm Publication T9_870. Washington: National Archives

[iii] Holliday, Kathryn E. Leopold Eidlitz: Architecture and Idealism in the Gilded Age. New York: W.W. Norton, 2008.

[iv] Rutland Historical Society Quarterly, Volume XXIII No. 3, 1993

[v] First Biennial Report of the Board of Library Commissioners of Vermont. 1895-96.  P. 66

[vi] A Catalogue of the Books in the H.H. Baxter Memorial Library of Rutland, VT., 1892.