Alexander Dutton House

The Alexander Dutton House stood on the east side of Nashua Road, just south of its corner with Treble Cove Road, in the western part of Billerica. With the blacksmith shop on the corner lot north of it, it was the home and workplace of the blacksmith Alexander Dutton and his family from the early 1850s until 1906. The house was later taken down, and a new house was built on the lot in 2004.

The land was part of the farm of Joseph Hill Jr., who died in 1789. In December 1809 his son Joseph Hill quitclaimed to his sister Lucy Hill, for $7,000, "all the lands and buildings that my Father Mr. Joseph Hill late of said town died seized and possessed" west of the Concord River, about 424 acres "with two dwelling houses and two barns thereon," reaching along Trible Cove road "to the fork of the roads where one leads to Carlisle, the other to where Hills Bridge formerly stood." By 1820 she was the widow Lucy H. Foster, and she mortgaged the same 420 acres to Asa Richardson of Boston for $900, a mortgage paid off in 1835.

In November 1828 Mrs. Foster sold one acre at the corner of the wall "at the road leading from Carlisle to Billerica," twenty rods on "the New Western road leading from Chelmsford to Boston" and eight rods deep, to Caleb S. Brown and Samuel Brown 4th, innkeepers, who agreed "to make the fence and always support it." In 1831 the Browns sold this acre, then "having a barn thereon," together with the tavern farm across the road known as the Russell Farm, to David P. Winning of Charlestown for $2,600. Winning kept the tavern until his death in 1850; his inventory lists a "Dining or bar room" and, among the debts owed him, a note of Alexander Dutton. In March 1851 the guardian of the Winning children, Otis Adams, sold the farm at auction to the widow Rebecca C. Winning, and the deed is the first to describe the corner acre as "having a Black-Smith's shop thereon." Her daughter Susan P. Winning released her own share the same year, and the widow mortgaged the whole back to Adams.

On February 1, 1852 Rebecca C. Winning sold Jane Dutton of Boston, "singlewoman," for $350, the acre "with the Blacksmiths shop thereon standing," and took back a mortgage for $250. On March 8, 1853 Lucy H. Foster sold Jane Dutton, for $45, the lot next south, ten rods on the "Western Road" and eight rods deep, with no buildings named; Jane agreed "to make and always support all the fence" between them. Both the shop and the Dutton house next south of it are drawn on the 1853 Walling map, so the house was built in 1853, very soon after the purchase. Mrs. Winning made an entry to foreclose her mortgage in 1854, and in 1867 Otis Adams entered to foreclose his mortgage of the Winning farm (Henry A. Dutton signed as a witness), but no deed taking the shop acre from the Duttons was ever recorded.

The family held the land without any further deed for a quarter century. It was assessed to "the heirs of Alexander Dutton," and when the taxes of 1876, 1877 and 1878 went unpaid the town collector sold both parcels "with buildings thereon" at auction in March 1879 to Alexander's sons Albin P. and Henry A. Dutton, which gave them a record title. In 1888 Henry A. Dutton put his half in the name of his wife Sarah E. Dutton by a straw deed through Bryan R. Houghton. After Albin P. Dutton died, his administratrix sold his half to F. Marion Dutton in March 1906, and on May 21, 1906 Sarah E. and F. Marion Dutton sold both lots "with the buildings thereon" to Benjamin J. Johnson of Chelmsford and Mary C. Moran.

Mary C. Moran, later Mary C. Nardini, became sole owner through a quitclaim from Johnson's heirs (1928) and a probate partition deed (1930). In 1946 she sold the 1.75 acres "with the buildings thereon" to Daniel and Emma Salvucci, who sold in 1951 to Stella I. Strazdas, who sold the same year to John B. Jenney of Waltham. Jenney had the land surveyed in 1956 and in March 1957 sold the house on a lot of 31,220 square feet (Plan Book 88 Plan 149), keeping the corner. The house passed through several private owners and was replaced in 2004.

The deeds correct the usual account in two ways. The Duttons' first purchase was the blacksmith shop acre in February 1852, a year before the house lot, and the title stood in the name of Jane Dutton rather than Alexander; the family's own record title came only from the 1879 tax sales.

References

1. MACRIS BIL.213

Title References Expand all

Recorded is Book/Page at the Middlesex North Registry of Deeds unless noted; Probate # is a Middlesex probate case, Ctf a Land Court certificate of title.