The Complicated Life of Henry M. Brewster

by Kristen Fehlhaber 

A few weeks ago, this photo came up in my Facebook feed. It was posted by a business called Civil War Records run by my friend, Brian Rhinehart.  

“One of our clients hit the jackpot in their soldier's Civil War pension file! Henry Brewster was a private in the 55th Colored Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, and his pension file included this photo of him. Finding a photo in a file is exceedingly rare, so this was an exciting find! UPDATE: There are a lot of questions about what it is in his hands, and the truth is, I don't know. His occupation before the war was recorded as a blacksmith, but I'm not sure if what he's holding is connected to that or not. Any ideas what that is? I'm curious now too!”

Read the title story following event announcements!

Upcoming Museum Events

5 more weeks of Museum of Old Newbury Guided Tours!

Thursday - Sunday, 11:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. on the hour.

Last regular open day is Sunday, October 13, 2024.

Twilight Amongst the Tombstones: Night Walk in First Parish Burying Ground

Saturday, October 5, 2024 6:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

Twilight Amongst the Tombstones: Night Walk in Old Hill Burying Ground

Saturday October 12, 2024 6:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

Twilight Amongst the Tombstones: Night Walk in Highland Cemetery

Saturday October 19, 2024 6:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

Twilight Amongst the Tombstones: Night Walk in Oak Hill Cemetery

Saturday October 26, 2024 6:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

Conference on Newburyport and the China Trade, 1844-2024

Monday, October 28, 2024 8:30 a.m.- 4 p.m.

The Complicated Life of Henry M. Brewster

by Kristen Fehlhaber 

A few weeks ago, this photo came up in my Facebook feed. It was posted by a business called Civil War Records run by my friend, Brian Rhinehart.  

“One of our clients hit the jackpot in their soldier's Civil War pension file! Henry Brewster was a private in the 55th Colored Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, and his pension file included this photo of him. 

Finding a photo in a file is exceedingly rare, so this was an exciting find! UPDATE: There are a lot of questions about what it is in his hands, and the truth is, I don't know. His occupation before the war was recorded as a blacksmith, but I'm not sure if what he's holding is connected to that or not. Any ideas what that is? I'm curious now too!”

I reposted it to the Newburyport History Buffs Facebook group, asking if anyone could identify the tools. I wasn’t the only one curious about this photo –it’s been shared 54 times, with additional information being added on different sites. People asked about the chair and his pose, looking away from the camera.

Additional information came forth and revealed that Brewster had used an alias in the military and that he’d enlisted under the name Henry M. Forrest - in Newburyport! Local historians have long been searching for a photo of one of the Black soldiers from the city and it seemed that we’d found one. His story, though, is far from simple.  

The first sign of Henry M. Forrest in Newburyport is his marriage to Oneda E. De Bois of Newburyport on December 26, 1864 by Rev. Daniel Pike at the Baptist Church on Court St. Oneda was from Montgomery, Alabama; Henry said he was a mariner from Florence, NY and living in West Pittsfield, Mass. Both were 25 years old.  

At this time, the Civil War was winding down and the rewards for serving were higher than they’d ever been. The advertisement in the Daily Herald promised the highest bounties; in addition to the $100 for one year of service, a soldier would be paid an additional $250 by the city.  

The Daily Herald, Newburyport, MA, Feb 9, 1865, p. 3. https://newburyport.advantage-preservation.com/

Less than two months after his wedding, on February 14, 1865, Henry M. Forrest walked into 25 Merrimac Street to enlist in the Union Army. He was mustered into service the same day, joining Company E of the 55th Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers, a regiment of Black troops made up from the remnants of the famous Massachusetts 54th. In his enlistment papers, he gives information that doesn’t match what he said when he married; he says he was born in South Lee, Massachusetts (not Florence, NY). His height was 5 feet 11 ½ inches and his profession was blacksmith (not mariner).  



Henry’s military service record shows that he joined his unit in South Carolina on March 14, 1865. But something happened soon after – the card records that he was sick since May 17 and discharged on July 10 with a physical disability.  

US Colored Troops Military Service Records for Henry M. Forrest, Ancestry.com

Additional documents show that he spent the next few months in various hospitals in Charleston and completely lost vision in his left eye due to getting a thorn in his eye while on a march. Henry was honorably discharged on July 10 with a ¾ disability rating; in August, he was back in Newburyport, ready to file for his invalid’s pension. 

This document from his pension file indicates that he was wounded in the eye while on a march up the Santee River.

Henry went before the Clerk of the Police Court of Record in Newburyport to declare his disability on August 19, 1865. His two witnesses were Samuel W. Haynes, the lieutenant in the recruiting advertisement, and James W. Cheney, deputy sheriff. Both attested to knowing him. The disability pension was granted; Henry remained in Newburyport, listed as a boarder at 28 Auburn Street in the 1866 directory, working once again as a blacksmith. 

1866 Newburyport City Directory. Museum of Old Newbury.  

But when Henry returned to Newburyport, his wife wasn’t there. On May 20 in Boston, Oneda E. De Bois married Joseph Anderson, a cook from Maryland and stated that it was her first marriage.  



Who was Oneda De Bois? A search of newspapers shows that she had spent 1864 speaking to audiences, describing her flight from slavery, studies at Oberlin, and work with the people of Haiti.  It’s not clear what brought her to Newburyport, though we know that she was living at 28 Auburn Street in Newburyport’s “Guinea Village” neighborhood.  

Reading Times, Reading, PA, January 4, 1864, Page 2. Newspapers.com

No further record of Oneda after 1865 has been found. However, she appears to have reinvented herself as “Madame Parque,” a “native of Hayti.” Newspapers describe her as a “lecturess” in the 1870s, speaking throughout the South. Thanks to Prof. Brandon Byrd of Vanderbilt who shared his research on this fascinating next act of Oneda De Bois [1].  

Henry is listed on the plaque on Atkinson Common as one of the soldiers representing Newburyport in the war. Civil War Memorial, Atkinson Common, Newburyport, MA. Photo by the author.  

Henry left Newburyport sometime in 1866 or 1867. He returned to South Lee, MA and married Susan Whitford Barbour. Henry signed his name “H. Merrick Brewster,” a version of the name he was born with, Henry Merrick Brewster. Obviously, the “Henry M. Forrest” alias wasn’t useful in the town where he was born. The Bureau of Pensions still only knew him as Henry M. Forrest and he continued to receive his pension payments under that name for the rest of his life.  

Henry and Susan moved to Hartford, CT, and had a daughter while Henry pursued his metalworking trade, listing himself as a tinner in the 1880 census. In the portrait, he is holding tin snips and soldering wire; hat tip to Newburyporter Scott Nason for his sharp eyes and encyclopedic knowledge used in identifying the tools. Knowing about his injury, we can now understand why he was turned away from the camera in the photo.  



Henry went on to own a stove shop and lived out his days north of Hartford in Somers, CT, a well-known member of the community.  

The Press, Stafford Springs, CT, Nov 28, 1889, p. 3. Newspapers.com

The Press, Stafford Springs CT, April 20, 1899, p. 2. Newspapers.com

Henry died on April 18, 1899 and was buried in Somers, CT. His headstone reflects the name he used in the military, Henry M. Forrest. 

West Cemetery, Somers, CT. Photo by Dave McCaffrey, Findagrave.com 

Sometime after his death, Henry’s widow filed for a widow’s pension. Widows and children under 16 could claim the soldier’s pension if the soldier died, but the requirements to prove the marriage and relationship were very high. Applications could take years and were often denied for lack of proper documentation. For this reason, pension files are amazing for anyone doing family history, given that birth records, marriage certificates, and even photos were submitted to help with proving the relationship.  

In an affidavit within the pension file, a longtime acquaintance stated that Henry “took the name of Forrest for the reason that he did not want his people to know where he was.[2]”  We’ll come back to Henry and try to discover what he was hiding from in a future article.  



With thanks to Dan Hayden, Executive Director of the New England Civil War Museum in Rocksville, CT, who is actively researching Henry M. Brewster, alias Henry M. Forrest. And thanks to Brian Rhinehart of CivilWarRecords.com for sharing the photo and connecting me with Dan.  

Kristen Fehlhaber is a professional genealogist and the former Assistant Director of the Museum of Old Newbury.  

[1] “WE ARE NEGROES!” The Haitian Zambo, Racial Spectacle, and the Performance of Black Women’s Internationalism, 1863–1877, Brandon R. Byrd, in “To Turn the Whole World Over: Black Women and Internationalism,” Keisha Blain and Tiffany Gill, editors, University of Illinois Press, Champaign, IL, 2019. 

[2] General Affidavit, Hartford, CT, February 23, 1906, statement by Charles S. Jackson, age 64 in Union Civil War Pension Files, National Archives, Pension of Henry M. Brewster (alias Henry M. Forrest).  

"Hey, let's go to the Annual Meeting!" is not a phrase that is generally met with great delight, in my experience. It generally lands somewhere between listening to a long sermon and watching paint dry, in my experience.

Between financial reports and procedural votes, for the average member of a small museum, these meetings can feel like an obligation rather than a pleasure. And yet, we must have them.

If you were to ask any one of the staff members or volunteers at the Museum of Old Newbury what they most enjoyed over the past year, however, they would tell you about a special object, a meaningful experience, a new connection, and it is this passion that guided our September 11, 2024 Annual Meeting. Well, new acquisitions and great food.

So now, sit back and enjoy a short recap of the program, with special thanks to the guest presenters and to Bob Watts for these images. Not pictured - Sierra's presentation of the "masterpiece" cane, which you can read about here.

Operations Manager Shelley Swofford laid out a feast for our members, much of it donated by our board members, as James Dorau from Ipswich Ale Brewery and board member Eric Svahn tended bar.

Noah and Sam Clewely, our Future Leaders Interns, spent the summer cataloguing our military collection, focusing on artifacts from the American Revolution. Of particular interest is Long Tom, a gun whose extraordinary size - over 9 feet long - made it an interesting flagpole in this article from April 24, 1861. While this is not a new acquisition, their research brought its long and fascinating history to light.

Collections assistant Sierra Gitlin presented images from the Scott Nason Glass Plate Negative Collection, a very large group of images from Plum Island and Newburyport, donated in 2024. Sierra brought out other examples of glass plate negatives so attendees could get a sense of their size (see image of unknown man at the beginning of this article).

Family member Keith Lunt donated this daguerreotype of Samuel Henry Lunt and his daughter Sarah, along with a miniature painting on ivory and other records of his life. Shortly after this image was taken, Lunt died of "brain fever" or meningitis, in Mobile, Alabama, on July 28, 1865, while serving in the Union Army.

Archivist Sharon Spieldenner shared two important new purchases; a letter from Joseph Lunt aboard the prison ship Chatham in 1814, and a rare glimpse of Lord Timothy Dexter from a man who was passing through town in 1802.

This wedding dress, veil, and memory book, complete with receipts, photographs, and notes compiled by the bride's father, was a very recent gift to the museum, and costume historian Lois Valeo and yours truly shared it with the membership.

Harriett Currier married Leon Noyes on October 10, 1953 and the collection was given to the museum by her daughter. She recalled that her mother was "a kind, caring person and a great friend to many. She sang in the church choir at Belleville and was very close to her parents being the youngest at their Chapel Street home." Harriett (Currier) Noyes died in 2002, and is buried in Oak Hill Cemetery.  

Board and collections committee member Monica Reuss, an American Art specialist, introduced three new paintings of the Newbury salt marsh. Lilian Wescott Hale (1880-1963) painted the larger work in the early 20th century. It is one of only two marsh paintings by women in the collection. The two smaller pieces are by Henry Curtis Ahl (1905-1996), who lived in Byfield and is best known for his coastal scenes.

Finishing out the presentations, the audience was introduced to one of the largest - and strangest - gifts received this year by the museum. This large section of an oak stump was used to hammer out punch bowls in various sizes by the Moulton family of silversmiths. It resided in the Towle offices for many years, and was left behind when the company was sold in 1994. As one of the oldest examples of silver working devices in the United States, it holds a place of honor in the carriage barn.

Bob Watts, board member and friend, caught us hamming it up behind the bar! Thanks to all of you who came out to celebrate another year of change and growth at the Museum of Old Newbury, and thanks especially to our presenters, board members, and volunteers. We love sharing some of our many new acquisitions with you!

Something Is Always Cooking ...

Image courtesy of Bob Watts and Barbara Gregory.

Violette Punch

Note from the bartender: Punch, like soup, is very forgiving. You can vary the color, strength, and sweetness of this punch, so start with less sugar, rum, and Creme de Violette, and add to taste. The key to this punch is simplicity. The violet flavor is delicate and easily overwhelmed, but as a floral note in this late summer drink, it is just perfection. This punch was created as a last nod to summer, and served at the museum's annual meeting on Wednesday, September 11.

Ingredients:

• 750 oz bottle Privateer New England White Rum (omit and double the Bitter Lemon for a low-alcohol version)
• 2 cups Creme de Violette liquor
• 14 oz fresh lemon juice
• 1 liter Polar Bitter Lemon soda
• 2-4 liters lemon seltzer
• Sugar to taste

Directions

1. Make an ice ring by floating lemon wheels and blueberries in a Bundt pan and freezing.
2. Mix punch ingredients together
3. Pour into punch bowl
4. Adjust all ingredients for taste and color

Puzzle Me This...

Battle of Mobile Bay, by Louis Prang. This naval engagement took place on August 5, 1864. One year later, Newburyport's Samuel Henry Lunt would die blocks away from the Mobile River in the Providence Infirmary.

Click the image to do the puzzle