Benjamin Pickman, Jr. (September 30, 1763 - August 16, 1843) was a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts.
Born in Salem, Massachusetts, and a descendant of Benjamin Pickman, an Englishman from Bristol[1][2], Pickman was graduated from Harvard University in 1784. The descendant of a Salem merchant family dynasty related to other prominent Salem families such as the Derbys[3], Pickman studied law in Newburyport, Massachusetts, and was admitted to the bar, but soon relinquished the practice of law and engaged in commercial pursuits, becoming one of the most active merchants of his day in Salem.
Ironically, his father Col. Benjamin Pickman, Sr., one of the most important merchants in Salem, had been a Loyalist, his estates confiscated by the Colonial government and forced to flee America for England, only returning to Salem in 1785 after the end of the Revolutionary War.[4]
His son, Benjamin Pickman Jr., served the new nation repeatedly. He served as member of the State house of representatives 1797-1802, 1812, and 1813. He served in the State senate in 1803. He served as member of the executive council of the State in 1805, 1808, 1813, 1814, and 1819-1821.
Pickman was elected as a Federalist to the Eleventh Congress (March 4, 1809-March 3, 1811). He was not a candidate for renomination in 1810. He served as member of the convention to revise the constitution of the State of Massachusetts in 1820. He served as overseer of Harvard University 1810-1818. He served as president of the board of directors of the Theological School at Cambridge. He died in Salem, Massachusetts, August 16, 1843. He was interred with his Pickman ancestors in Salem's Broad Street Cemetery.[5]
Pickman was instrumental in the commercial development of much of the heart of historic Salem. In 1815 he and John Derby III acquired property belonging to Derby family heirs to develop Derby Square, which would encompass three brick commercial rows. The Pickman-Derby Block, built in 1817, still stands. The Pickman Building on Derby Square, built in 1816, was part of the development.[6] The Pickman family also owned Pickman farm. Salem's Pickman Street is named for them.[7]
Benjamin Pickman Jr. was married to Anstiss Derby, daughter of Elias Hasket Derby and Elizabeth Crowninshield.[8] The son of Benjamin Pickman and the former Anstiss Derby was Hasket Derby Pickman, who died in 1815, the same year he graduated from Harvard College.
References
- ^ The Founders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Sarah Sprague Saunders Smith, Sun Printing Company, Pittsfield, Mass., 1897
- ^ Naturalization papers of Benjamin Pickman, Dudley Leavitt Pickman Papers, Phillips Library Collection, Peabody Essex Museum, pem.org
- ^ Pickman House, Essex Institute Historical Collections, Essex Institute, Peabody Essex Museum, Vol. XXXIX, Printed for the Society, Salem, 1903
- ^ The Journal and Letters of Samuel Curwen, An American in England, Samuel Curwen, George Atkinson Ward, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1864
- ^ Pickman family tomb, Broad Street Cemetery, Salem, Massachusetts, smugmug.com
- ^ Architecture in Salem, Bryant Franklin Tolles, Jr., Bryant F. Tolles, Carolyn K. Tolles, Paul F. Norton, reprinted by UPNE, 2004
- ^ The Pickman Silver, Essex Institute Historical Collections, Essex Institute, Peabody Essex Museum, Vol. XXXIX, Salem, Mass., 1903
- ^ Life in a New England Town, 1787, 1788, John Quincy Adams, Charles Francis Adams, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1903
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