She said, he was born in Montpelier, Vermont back in 1802, (Thomas Jefferson was President of our country at the time). She said her father was a captain of a ship that sailed the Great Lakes. She also remembered living on a canal barge with her mother, (Melvina Abbott), father and brother John when she was very young. Great grandpa Freeman died a few years after the end of the “Great Rebellion” (Civil War) in 1872. He was 70 years old, Lily May was only 5 years old at the time. Great Grandma Melvina was 32 years old, a widow again, with two young children. (If she owned the canal barge, she probably sold it and lived off the proceeds). She also died ten years later in 1882.

Getting back to Great Grandpa Edward Freeman, there are not many records except the City Directory and Grandma Lily May’s recollections. From these, plus the rich historical era that he lived in, we can speculate about his life. From what my Grandmother told me about her father working on the Lakes I figure Edward was working on the sidewheeler "paddle" steam ships that were prevalent in the mid 19th century, before the propeller ships took over.

Edward Freeman was born in Vermont in 1802, when the country was very young. Only 11 years earlier, Vermont had become the 14th state in the Union. His father may have fought in the Battle of Saratoga, one of the most crucial battles of the Revolutionary War. The battle was fought on William Freeman's farm who was a Tory and had moved to Canada. Most of the family stayed in America and fought on the side of the American Revolutionaries.

Records show the original Edmund Freeman family migrated to America on board the sailing ship "Abigail", sailing from England to Boston, MA in 1635. His son, John Freeman was 8 years old when he arrived with his parents, bothers and sisters in America just 14 years after the Pilgrams had arrived. Some of the things Edmund brought over with the family were 8 metal chest protectors whose purpose was to ward off Indian arrows if the need arised. Paintings of that era show the men wearing similar chest protectors. The family settled in Massachusetts where Edmund, helped establish the town of Sandwich, MA situated at the beginning of Cape Cod. Later his son John helped establish Sudbury. Over the years, decendants of the original family slowly migrated westward in Massachusetts to Vermont and New York state territories. By the time Edward was born in 1802 the Freeman family had already been living in America 167 years.

(Other Freeman families immigrated from England to the southern colonies around 1735 and firmly established the Freeman name throughout the southern part of the country. There is no indication of these families coming into contact with the New England Freemans until they fought each other in the Civil War.)

Edward grew up in the beautiful mountains of Vermont. The country was spectacular but their was not much work so when he heard about a big construction job going right across central New York State he decided to go down and see what was doing.

The construction project was New York Governor Dewitt Clinton’s, Erie Barge Canal. President Thomas Jefferson had said that a project of this enormity wouldn’t be technically feasible for another 100 years, but Clinton and his backers were doing it anyway. The construction had started at Rome, NY in July 1817 when Edward was only 15 year old. By the time he went down there it may have been under construction for about three or four years.

Being a husky young man in his prime, Edward got a job and soon found himself digging the canal and living with the other workers in the shanty towns that followed the diggers. It was a tough life but the pay was good, 80 cents per day and the “jigger boss” (the boy who doled out jiggers of whiskey) came around 16 times a day with jiggers of whiskey for the canal workers. Them little jiggers sure made time pass fast and you slept real good at night. ( I wonder if the Chinese workers who built the Great Wall of China had a “jigger boss".)

Edward met a lot of fine people during these years. They were mostly Irish immigrants and people from the surrounding country who needed the work. They had some really good times in their off hours and Edward learned how to “Box” and do the “Irish Jig”.

By 1825 the canal was pretty well complete, Edward and the rest of the workers found themselves in Buffalo at the western terminus of the canal looking for a place to live and work. Buffalo was a bustling frontier town now. It had been rebuilt after the British burned it in January 1813. It was now located on the western frontier of our country at the time. With the completion of the canal, Buffalo became the gateway to the west for thousands of westward bound pioneers and settlers.

Many of the Irish canal construction workers eventually settled the area that became Buffalo’s First Ward. Others continued their migration westward where their decedents helped build the great transAmerican railroads later in the century. Edward liked the idea of sailing the schooners on the lakes and decided to follow that life. The next thirty two historic years he spent sailing the lakes. Edward got a job as a sailor on a schooner and soon was sailing up and down the lake, taking passengers westward and bringing lumber, furs, other cargo, back to Buffalo. He enjoyed this life very much and decided to make a career out of sailing these beautiful lakes.

The sailing season was great but the long winters back in Buffalo must have been tough. I have no idea how he spent his winters, perhaps he took a few trips down the Mississippi with Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) although Sam wasn’t born until 1835. There was plenty of work back in booming Buffalo. There was also plenty of excitement down on Canal Street, the roughest, toughest most bawdy street in the country. The art of boxing, that he had learned from his Irish coworkers on the canal came in pretty handy in these times. He was always glad when spring rolled around, so he could get back on the lake.

A strange new type of ship began making its appearance on the lakes around this time. It belched smoke and churned up the waters but made great headway, even against the wind. It was at the cutting edge of technology at the time, it was the sidewheeler steamboat. Huge paddle wheels on each side of the ship pushed it through the water at a pretty good clip. Edward decided to try working on these new ships. He gave up his job as a sailor on a schooner and became a “paddler” on a steamship. He was still doing this when the City Directory interviewer asked him in 1857 what his occupation was? “I am a paddler”, he answered.

Today when I sit by the old lighthouse at the head of Buffalo harbor, enjoying a warm summer day, veiwing our beautiful waterfront I like to think of the many times the old Captain must have sailed into the harbor being guided by the light beam of this same lighthouse, which was not so old at the time.

Things were really heating up in the country in the 1850s. The Southerners were threatening to secede from the country and start their own country. Thousands of Irish and German immigrants were coming into the country. They were not keen on slavery especially when they saw recaptured slaves being brought back south in chains. They were mostly refugees from oppression themselves and did not like what they were seeing. They were becoming a bigger and bigger voice in the country's politics.

Harriet Beecher Stowe had written her book entitled: “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” which was getting everybody all riled up. The Republican Party, a brand new political party, had just been formed specifically to combat the spread of slavery. At its first meeting in Jackson, Michigan, July 1854 it adopted resolutions calling for the repeal of Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Fugitive Slave Law. It also denounced slavery as a political, moral and social evil. This action sent shock waves through the south. The Southerners could see the writing on the wall, the powerful influence they had exerted on the country since its inception was on the wain. They were going to secede before they lost too much power.

Edward had seen some of the slaves escaping up to Canada through Buffalo on the “underground railway” and some being caught and taken back south in chains,. When the war finally broke out in 1861 Edward was already 59 years old. Too old to join in the fighting. During the next four years of bloody slaughter, Captain Edward’s sidewheeler paddled up and down the lakes, moving cargo and troops to the Union Army fighting along the Mississippi. His ship brought back captured prisoners and wounded soldiers.

By the end of this terrible war, Edward was 63 years old and thinking it may be time to settle down, although he didn’t relish giving up life on the lake. Around this time he met a beautiful young widow named Melvina Abbott Carlyle. She was only 25 years old, when she fell in love with this rugged old “paddler” and accepted his marriage proposal. They were married in 1866. Edward gave up his beloved "sidewheeler" but he could not give up life on a boat altogether so they decided to buy a small canal barge that they could live on, earn a decent living and also bring up their children.

Grandma Lily May was born in 1867 and spent the first five years of her life traveling up and down the Erie Barge Canal. The canal that her father had helped build forty five years earlier. Edward died in 1872 when Lily May was only five years old leaving Melvina a widow again. Melvina died ten years later, leaving Lily May, then 15 years old and her brother John, orphans.

After Great Grandmother Melvina died, Lily and her brother John, moved to Coburg, Ontario, where they lived for the next several years, with their mother’s family. Lily Mae was working as a maid in Oshawa, Ont. when Grandpa William Hamilton spotted her singing in the choir at the Methodist church. He fell in love at first sight and began courting her. She felt the same way toward him so they were married in Whitby, Ontario in 1890.

The young couple moved to Morris, Illinois where they began raising their family and Grandpa worked as a tanner. Around 1900 they moved back to Buffalo to continue raising their family. I only remember Grandma when she was a little sweet old lady who had to do all her chewing with the one tooth she had left in her mouth. She and Grandpa had 12 children, (my dad, Charles was one of them). Grandma Lily Mae died in 1949, she was 82 years old. Just two generations, Edward and Lily Mae, had spanned 147 years!