Charles Lund House

The Charles Lund House stands on the west side of Boston Road just south of Billerica Centre, on land that was for half a century part of the Bowers "Old Homestead." When Dr. William Bowers died in 1820 his homestead of about 25 acres "with all the buildings thereon" passed undivided to his family, and his daughters Priscilla, Mary and Fanny Bowers held it in thirds until their deaths in 1869, 1870 and 1871. Priscilla left her share to the First Baptist Church (Billerica) and her sisters left theirs to the town for the support of the poor.

In May 1871 the town and the First Baptist Church (Billerica) divided the road frontage by a plan surveyed by Samuel Sage and sold it in lots the same day: Lot 1 to Sage, Lot 3 to the blacksmith Lund T. Eastman, and Lot 2, "containing 1 acre 54 rods," eight rods on "the main road leading to Boston," to Mark Lund, who paid the town $150 for its two thirds and the church $75 for its third. The lot was still bare in June 1876, when Mark Lund sold it for $300 to Charles W. Lund of Billerica. Charles built at once: in November 1876 he mortgaged the lot to Alden Pinney of South Chelmsford for $1,000 as "a certain parcel of land with a new house and barn thereon." In April 1884 he paid off Pinney and borrowed the same sum from Ann E. Baker.

On October 18, 1884, Charles W. Lund and his wife Henrietta sold the place "with all the buildings thereon" for $2,450 to William H. Patten, who took over the Baker mortgage. The deed was not recorded until April 1909, when Patten's son William T. Patten of Lowell, "the only heir at law of said William H. Patten," needed it to borrow $1,500 from the Central Savings Bank of Lowell. About 1900 the Pattens put up a second house on the north part of the lot, now the William H. Patten House at 427-429 Boston Road. Henry N. (Harry N.) Patten, who took the property through the administration of both estates, passed it through a straw deed in 1924 to hold it with his wife Adelaide, and in October 1939 had Brooks, Jordan and Graves of Lowell draw a plan dividing it into Lot A, with the newer house, and Lot B, 31,140 square feet with the 1876 house and its outbuildings, running back 501 feet along the old Eastman lot.

In February 1940 the Pattens, then of Claremont, New Hampshire, sold Lot B "with the buildings thereon" to Maude M. Barton and her son Ralph H. Barton, who financed the purchase with a $2,300 mortgage from the Middlesex Co-operative Bank. The Barton family kept the house for more than half a century, and a large addition was later built at its rear; in 1992 the town took it briefly for unpaid 1991 taxes of $58.91. After the last of the Barton owners died the house passed in 1997 through their estate to a neighboring owner, and it has since been held privately and in trust. The original frame of the 1876 house can still be seen at the front of the building.

References

1. Billerica assessor, 433 Boston Rd (parcel 61-58-0): 0.715 acres, Lot B of plan 62-30, sales history 1966-2010

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.