Building of the Middlesex Canal

The Middlesex Canal, built between 1793 and 1803, ran about twenty-seven miles from the Merrimack River above Pawtucket Falls to the Charles River at Charlestown, and passed through the north and east of Billerica. Hazen called it "this first important canal in America." It drew its water from the Concord River at the North Billerica mills, the highest point on the line, and the canal company owned the mill privilege there for almost sixty years. That ownership shaped the village that later grew up at the falls.

The canal was planned by a group that met in May 1793 to open water carriage from the Merrimack to Boston, and so bring the trade of New Hampshire to that port. On June 22, 1793 Governor John Hancock approved "An Act incorporating James Sullivan Esquire & others by the name and stile of the Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal." The petitioners named in it were James Sullivan, Oliver Prescott, James Winthrop, Loammi Baldwin, Benjamin Hall, Jonathan Porter, Andrew Hall, Ebenezer Hall, Samuel Tufts Jr., Aaron Brown, Willis Hall, Samuel Swan Jr. and Ebenezer Hall Jr. The act let the company cut a canal from the Merrimack to the Medford River, take land for it, and collect tolls at its locks. It would become void if the canal was not made passable within ten years. The directors chose Sullivan as president and Baldwin, of Woburn, as first vice-president, and Baldwin took the lead in the work.

Baldwin made a long report on the route on May 12, 1794. The directors then sent him to Philadelphia to engage William Weston, an English engineer. Weston arrived about July 15, 1794, and he finished his survey and report on August 2. The line he settled on left the Merrimack at Middlesex Village in Chelmsford and ran southeast to the Concord River at the Billerica mills. From the far side of the river it ran through Billerica toward Woburn, Medford and Charlestown. The canal was 30 feet wide and 3 feet deep. Hazen put the Concord River at Billerica 109 feet above tide-water in Boston Harbor and 25 feet above the Merrimack, so that the Billerica stretch formed the summit level and fed water both ways. Eddy's figure was 102 feet above wharf level. In Billerica the canal crossed the mill pond above the dam, where boats were towed across the river along a floating towpath, and then ran east past the Gray Street and Brown Street neighborhoods. It left the town on an aqueduct over the Shawsheen River at the Wilmington line.

The company first had to control the water at the falls. On March 25, 1794 it bought the Billerica mills from Thomas Richardson. This was the grist-mill privilege granted to Christopher Osgood in 1708, and since the Revolution it had been known as "Richardson's." On April 16, 1799 the company bought Timothy Sprague's fulling mill and twenty-four acres on the same pond. In Billerica Center, the housewright Reuben Duren lodged and fed the canal's surveying parties at his house at the Corner, and billed the proprietors for it. In 1795 he sold the house to Richardson, and as Richardson's Tavern it became the Tavern at the Corner.

The work began at Billerica. The directors told their agents to start at the Billerica mills and first finish the level to the Merrimack at North Chelmsford, and Drake says the Chelmsford and Billerica part was built first, beginning in 1794. Ground was broken on September 10, 1794, according to the West End Museum's history of the canal, though Hazen says it was "in the spring of 1795." Water was let into part of the canal by 1800. On April 22, 1802 a boat and a large raft were afloat on the canal at Wilmington. By 1803 the canal was navigable from the Merrimack to the Charles River, and that year is usually given for its opening, though a legal opinion printed in 1843 says it was completed in 1804. The work was costly and slow: the stockholders paid one hundred assessments, and repairs and changes absorbed the income, so no dividend was declared until 1819. Hazen gives the total cost as $1,164,200, or $1,455.25 a share including interest.

For Billerica the canal mattered more as owner of the water power than as a carrier. Hazen found that all its freight between Boston and Billerica never came to more than $200 a year. The company kept the Concord River dam, with flash-boards ten inches above the stone dam, to hold water for the canal. The owners of the Sudbury meadows upstream blamed it for flooding their land, and by 1843 they had brought three suits, which the Supreme Judicial Court decided in favor of the boards. Mills could use only the water the canal did not need. Francis Faulkner came from Acton in 1811 and began making woolens in the company's old fulling mill. He rented it until 1825, when he bought it with a secondary water right that required him to close his gates when the pond fell three-quarters of an inch below the top of the dam. Hazen thought the canal, "by preventing the use of the water power," was one reason the town's population did not grow for thirty years after 1800.

The Boston and Lowell Railroad, chartered in 1830, opened on June 25, 1835 on a line close beside the canal, and it took most of the canal's trade. The canal paid dividends from 1819 to 1843, $504 a share in all, but after that its receipts fell below its expenses. In 1851 the proprietors gave up the charter, and on September 22, 1851 they sold the North Billerica mill property to Charles P. Talbot and Thomas Talbot for $20,000. The Talbots built the Talbot Mills there. In 1852 the canal was sold in sections, mostly to the owners of adjoining land, and the charter was declared forfeited in 1859. The dam outlived the canal: in 1859 the meadow towns renewed the old complaint before the Legislature, and an 1862 commission found that the Billerica dam was "not the only nor the chief cause" of the wet meadows. In Hazen's day the canal's path could still be seen at many points in town. Stretches of the channel, the towpath rings at the mill pond and the Shawsheen aqueduct piers survive, and the Faulkner Mills now house the Middlesex Canal Museum.

People

• Thomas Richardson II: Owner of the North Billerica mills (Richardson's), which he sold to the canal proprietors March 25, 1794; then bought the tavern at the Corner (1795).
• Francis Faulkner: Woolen manufacturer who rented the canal company's fulling mill from 1811 and bought it with a secondary water right in 1825.
• Charles P. Talbot: With his brother Thomas, hired a Canal Company building from 1839 and bought the company's North Billerica mill rights on Sept. 22, 1851.
• Thomas Talbot: Co-purchaser with Charles P. Talbot of the canal company's North Billerica mill property in 1851.

References

1. Acts and Resolves of Massachusetts 1792-93, pp. 412-417 (1793 May Session ch. 21): act incorporating the Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal; incorporators, powers, tolls, ten-year limit.
2. Acts and Resolves 1792-93, p. 417: closing sections of the Middlesex Canal act (toll rates, locks, ten-year completion clause) and its approval date, June 22, 1793.
3. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 273: canal incorporated June 1793; ground broken at Billerica Mills spring 1795; levels; size; navigable to Charles River 1803; cost, dividends, 1851-1859 end.
4. Hazen, History of Billerica, p. 274: canal's small carrying trade to Billerica (under $200 a year) and its packet-boat.
5. Hazen, History of Billerica, p. 275: Boston and Lowell Railroad chartered 1830 and opened June 25, 1835.
6. Hazen, History of Billerica, p. 279: Osgood mill grant; Middlesex Canal Company bought Richardson's mills March 25, 1794 and held them until sale to the Talbots Sept. 22, 1851.
7. Hazen, History of Billerica, p. 280: 1859-1862 meadow-owners' contest over the North Billerica dam; Francis Faulkner's 1811 start and secondary water privilege.
8. Hazen, History of Billerica, p. 281: Faulkner's gate condition; the Talbots hired a Canal Company building and bought its prior water rights.
9. Hazen, History of Billerica, p. 309: no population growth after 1800, which Hazen blames partly on the canal preventing use of the water power.
10. Eddy, Historical Sketch of the Middlesex Canal (1843): directors chose Sullivan president and Baldwin first vice-president; Baldwin sent to engage Weston; levels at Billerica bridge.
11. Eddy, Historical Sketch of the Middlesex Canal (1843), item record: 1793 organization, June 22, 1793 charter, 1803 navigation to Charles River, first dividend 1819; Mason opinion says completed 1804.
12. Eddy, Historical Sketch (1843): Baldwin's report May 12, 1794; Weston arrived about July 15 and reported Aug. 2, 1794; work to begin at Billerica mills; navigable 1803.
13. Eddy, Historical Sketch (1843): flash-boards ten inches above the stone dam at Billerica mills; three suits by Sudbury meadow owners decided for the canal.
14. Drake, History of Middlesex County (1880), vol. 1, Chelmsford chapter: operations begun 1794, the Chelmsford and Billerica part of the canal built first.
15. Drake, History of Middlesex County (1880), vol. 1, Billerica chapter: Canal Company owned the North Billerica mills, sold to Faulkner in 1811 and to the Talbots in 1851.
16. Drake, History of Middlesex County (1880), vol. 1: in 1803 the Middlesex Canal was opened for traffic; length and cost.
17. Hurd, History of Middlesex County (1890), vol. 1, Woburn chapter: a boat and a large raft afloat on the canal at Wilmington, April 22, 1802.
18. Wikipedia, Middlesex Canal: groundbreaking late September 1794 in North Billerica; water let in December 1800; floating towpath; last tolls 1851; charter revoked 1860.
19. West End Museum, "The Middlesex Canal: Massachusetts' First Big Dig" (2023): charter June 22, 1793; ground broken September 10, 1794; opened 1803; last toll collected 1850.