Charles H. Parker

Charles Henry Parker was born in Salem on July 20, 1820, the son of Dr. Frederick Augustus Parker, a Billerica native who graduated from Harvard in 1813, took his medical degree in 1816 and practiced in Salem, and of Mary Coggin of Tewksbury. Both parents died in Salem, his father in 1827. He was a grandson of John Parker of Billerica, whose will, proved in 1832, left land and money to his grandsons Francis James, Charles Henry and Frederic Augustus Parker.

He grew up to be a shoemaker in Billerica Centre. On May 4, 1843 he married Mary Baldwin, daughter of Col. John Baldwin; the marriage record describes him as a 23-year-old cordwainer, born in Salem, whose parents had both died there. In 1844 he bought a small back lot from his aunt Ann Parker, off Concord Road near her house (the old Samuel Ruggles House) south of the Common, and the 1853 map marks a shoe shop under his name that may have stood there. The birth records of his children in the 1840s still call him a shoemaker. They were Mary Coggin (1844), who married the Centre merchant Frederic A. Morey; Clarissa Baldwin (1846), who married Nathan H. Reed of Bedford in 1873; Frederick Augustus (1849); John, who died in infancy in 1856; Charles Winn (1860); and Lucy Baldwin (1862). When Ann Parker died unmarried in 1861 she left him the rest of her estate, including her house lot, and in 1868 he sold the six and a half acres with all the buildings to his father-in-law John Baldwin.

On May 8, 1862 he was appointed postmaster at Billerica, succeeding Benjamin L. Judkins, and he held the office until Bernard M. Cann was appointed in September 1866. During the Civil War years he was also the town's Collector of Taxes for 1864 and 1865; the treasurer's settlement of 1866 records $1,411.05 received from him on the 1864 taxes and $10,808.17 on those of 1865. As town weigher he ran the hay scales at the Centre, turning in $40.65 in weighing fees in 1864 to 1865, keeping half for his services and paying the balance to the treasurer. He also kept the town's stock of school books, selling them and delivering them to poor children on the order of the School Committee, and the 1866 accounts show him supplying "shoes and rubbers" for a child on the town's charity.

On June 5, 1873 he was appointed postmaster again, following Franklin Jaquith, and he kept the Centre post office into the late 1880s. In later years he served the town in smaller posts: he was paid as an election inspector and deputy inspector in 1890 and 1891, and in the mid-1890s town meeting chose him each year as one of the surveyors of wood and lumber, last in 1897.

His wife Mary died on January 2, 1876. Charles H. Parker died on August 11, 1899, aged 79, and was buried in the Old South Burying Ground in Billerica, where his stone gives his birth on July 20, 1820 and his death on August 11, 1899.

References

1. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), Genealogical Register p. 107, PARKER 25
2. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 308, list of Billerica postmasters (appointed May 8, 1862 and June 5, 1873)
3. Vital Records of Billerica (1908), marriages: Charles H. Parker, 23, cordwainer, born in Salem, and Mary Baldwin, May 4, 1843
4. Vital Records of Billerica (1908), births: Charles Henry Parker, July 20, 1820, and his children by Mary, father a shoemaker
5. Billerica Town Report, 1865 (accounts of C. H. Parker for school books and as Weigher at the hay scales)
6. Billerica Town Report, 1866 (treasurer settlement: received of C. H. Parker, Collector, 1864 and 1865)
7. Billerica Town Report, 1892 (paid for services as election inspector and deputy inspector, 1890 and 1891)
8. Billerica Town Report, 1897 (town meeting chooses Charles H. Parker a surveyor of wood and lumber)
9. Find a Grave: Charles Henry Parker (1820 to 1899), Old South Burying Ground, Billerica