Johnston wills of the 19th century

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Most who lived and died in the 19th century had very little to bestow on those they left behind. Many things which, today, would most likely be thrown away after a loved one’s passing, were considered valuable objects worthy of being willed to an heir.

After 72-year-old widow Almyra Randall died in 1879, her will determined that her daughter Esther was to receive “the bed I sleep on.” Her son Alvon inherited the “family Bible” and son Robert “my Webster’s Dictionary.” Almyra also willed “one sick-bed quilt.”

Phebe Slack Andrews, who died of old age on Feb. 19, 1883, had made out her will eight years earlier, leaving “my green painted chairs” to her daughter Ann.

Andrew Jackson Danforth, a 58-year-old farmer who succumbed to exhaustion from battling peritonitis on Nov. 17, 1886, had written his will seven years prior. His meager estate, worth a total of $42.15 included a clock worth fifty cents, a clothesbasket worth seventy-five cents and two tin pails worth twenty cents.

William Smith Steere, who died of consumption at the age of 31 on Jan. 10, 1889, was a successful beer- maker with more to bequeath. His estate included a “beer wagon” worth $25, “two-hundred beer racks” worth $18 and “55-hundred hop beer bottles” valued at $82.50.

Like Steere, John Albert Mathewson had acquired a comfortable estate during his life. The hotel-keeper was 42 years old when he died of uremic poisoning on Nov. 15, 1885. His estate, worth $1,141 included “contents of bar room” worth $50, “contents saloon kitchen” worth $75, “saloon furniture” worth $150 and one “sick jug” valued at a dollar.

Nelson Barnes, a 76-year-old carpenter who died on Sept. 18, 1887, had “apples in cellar”, worth six dollars. Amey Thurber, a widow who died of old age on Sept. 29, 1892, had “5 large spoons” worth twenty cents.

John Hawkes was 82 when he died of paralysis on April 10, 1890. He left his cane and his mother’s feather bed to his son John Jr. To his son Samuel, he left “my violin.”

When Henry Angell died in 1891, his estate included “1 horse named Babie” worth $75, “1 harness (Babie’s)” worth $6, a “squirt gun” worth $1 and “two foot nests” worth fifty cents.

Farmer Daniel Olney Angell, who died of stomach cancer at the age of 69 on Nov. 9, 1889, had an estate worth $808.83 which included “one horse named Bill.”

James Abraham Hill, a wheelwright who died of heart disease at the age of 54 on Oct. 22, 1887, left a “box of shoe-maker’s tools” worth one dollar and “screws and bolts in small packages”, also worth a dollar.

Frederick Charlesworth was 43 years old when he died of meningitis on March 25, 1888. His estate included “450 cigars” valued at $9.90, “cider in cellar” worth $4.50 and a thirty-dollar “pool table.”

Over the centuries, what we value has changed dramatically.

      

Kelly Sullivan is a Rhode Island columnist, lecturer and author.

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