GMLewis

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WINSLOW LEWIS, JR. 1799-1875

WinslowLewis2_1871.jpg

Junior Grand Steward, 1834-1835
Grand Sword Bearer, 1836
Corresponding Grand Secretary, 1841-1844
Junior Grand Warden, 1841-1843
Grand Marshal, 1845
Deputy Grand Master, 1846-1847
Grand Master, 1855-1856; 1860.


TERM

1855 1856

1860

BIOGRAPHY

From Moore's Freemason's Monthly Magazine, Vol. XXIII, No. 1, November 1863, p. 20ff:

BRIEF MEMOIR OF R. W. WINSLOW LEWIS, M. D.
BY R. W. JOHN H. SHEPPARD.

Dr. Winslow Lewis was descended more immediately from the Rev. Isaiah Lewis and his wife Abigail, daughter of Kenelm Winslow, a lineal descendant from Edward Winslow of England, in the fifth generation. Gov. Hutchinson, in his remarks on the death of Gov. Edward Winslow, says : "He was a gentleman of the best family of any of the Plymouth planters, his father Edward Winslow, Esq., being a person of some figure at Droughtwich in Worcestershire."

Capt. Winslow Lewis was born in Wellfleet, Cape Cod, May 11, 1770, son of Winslow Lewis of that place, sea captain. He was married to Elizabeth Greenough, daughter of Thomas Greenough, (mathematical instrument maker,) and Ann Hobby. He had great practical knowledge and skill in hydraulic engineering. After he quit going to sea, he was constantly employed in building new lighthouses on our coasts, rivers and lakes, or in altering and repairing old ones. He furnished plans and specifications for beacons, buoys and monuments for the shoals and harbors along our shores, and was very successful in the construction of the Beacon on the Romer shoal in New York bay, the beacon on Bowditch's Ledge in Salem harbor, and other permanent ones, which to this day, stand as monuments of his skill and long and faithful services to his country. He was contractor and builder in his lifetime of 200 lighthouses for the government; he invented the Binnacle illuminator, for which he got a patent, and which is now in such general use; he introduced the cotton duck into his factory at Watertown, and it became a substitute for the more expensive Russian duck ; was the owner of a ropewalk at the foot of the Common ; for several years Port Warden of Boston; and in 1829 and 1836, was one of the Aldermen of the city.

But the reputation and talents of Capt. Lewis will be long held in remembrance for his public services, and "when the history of the lighthouse establishment in this country is written," as a gentleman, well acquainted with him, stated to me in a letter, "it will appear that Mr. Winslow Lewis was the first to introduce the present mode of illumination, and to lay the foundation for the modern improvement in the structures as well as lantern lamps and reflectors."

Dr. Winslow Lewis, was born in Boston, July 8, 1799, in the same house in which his mother was born. He was fitted for college under the tuition of Mr. Daniel Staniford, who kept a private school of high repute in Boston; graduated at Harvard University in 1819, studied medicine under the late eminent Dr. John C. Warren, and took his degree of M. D. in 1822. His favorite pursuit was anatomy, for which he had a peculiar tact, as he had a firm nerve and quick, decisive judgment, qualities so essential in delicate and critical operations of surgery. To perfect his studies he went immediately to Europe, attended the lectures of Depnytren in Paris, and Abernethy in London, both surgeons of great celebrity. This was not, however, his first visit, for he crossed the Atlantic, when only seventeen years of age, and saw many places and persons; and if the old adage would apply, Noscistur e sociis, he stood high, for he kept good company ; coming home with such distinguished men as Dr. Edward Reynolds, the late Hon. Abbott Lawrence, and Franklin Dexter, Esq., who died not long since.

On his return he commenced practice in Boston. In Febuary 22, 1828, he was married by the Rev. Bethel Judd, to Miss Emeline Richards, daughter of Capt. Benjamin Richards, New London, Conn. He has been two years Physician of the Municipal Institutions, three of the House of Correction, and since Dr. Warren's decease, he has been consulting Physician in the Massachusetts General Hospital.

In 1849 he again visited the Continent, leaving his family at home. He was gone only seven months, and visited several places of note. He was in Rome when it was attacked by the French, and quitted that city only the day before the siege commenced, of which he wrote home a glowing description which was published in the Transcript. He journeyed on to Geneva, and was admiring the sublime scenery which surrounds that city —the overhanging Alps and the mirror of the blue lake beneath them — when, not dreaming of evil, he took up a newspaper from Boston and read the death of his only surviving son, Winslow ; this young and promising lad of only ten years, had followed the fate of his two infant brothers, cut off by that ravaging disease, the Scarletina. The blow was sudden and heavy to the afflicted father, and he hurried home.

The next year, 1850, he again embarked for Europe, with his family, consisting of Mrs. Lewis and his three daughters. The Doctor is an observing voyageur and took notes of his travels, extracts from which would be a rich treat to the reader of dry pedigrees, but they are, as yet, a sealed book. The writer of this has never had a glimpse of them, and could only, here and there, get a word or hint of his travel's history in a hurried conversation, but he has followed him from place to place in imagination, when he spoke of clasic grounds he had visited.

Dr. Lewis and his family spent six months in Paris, where he was introduced to Louis Napoleon, then President of the Republic, now the illustrious Emperor of France. The Duke of Tuscany and his lady, became his intimate friends, and their portraits now adorn his library. They also spent some time in England and Scotland, visiting all the remarkable spots and places sought by strung. ers, traveling as far north among the Highlands and lakes as Inverness. They also set out on a journey to Italy, the Classic land — the land of beauty and poesy, of fallen greatness, and august recollections. Rome with its ruins of past grandeur, lying as it were, beneath the magnificent dome and structure of St. Peter's — Milan with its palaces and splendid cathedral — Venice with its numerous islands, canals and Bridge of Sighs — and Naples with its enchanting bay and picturesque scenery, successively became the objects of their admiration. Three times, the Doctor said he had ascended Mount Vesuvius; more fortunate than the elder Pliny, of whose death from a sudden eruption of the volcano, his nephew the younger Pliny has given in his letters a melancholy, but graphic description ; and although written eighteen centuries ngo, the reader feels as though he was present at the scene. But the principal inducement of his journey to Italy, and where he wished to make a transient home, was Florence, that beautiful city with the vale of Arno on one side, and the Appenines on the other; Florence lies encircled by these mountains from whose submit, it is said, the Adriatic and Mediterranean seas are visible; through the city flows the river Arno on its way some 50 or 60 miles from the coast, and watering Pisa, famous for its leaning tower, and university. Florence is the central city of Italy, remote from the Alpine snows in the north and the sultry Calabrian heat on the south—a truly delicious climate. It has been called the city of churches, palaces and bridges; for every house is a palace, from the richness and elegance of its structures.

Dr Lewis and his family returned home in 1853. He resumed his profession as a matter of choice, for his fortune placed him above dependence on the severe labors and arduous duties of a physician; yet such was his skill and knowledge of surgery, that he could not avoid the frequent calls of sufferers from disease or injury who came to him far and near; more especially since the death of Dr. John C. Warren. But he was much relieved in practice by the growing and well deserved reputation of his son-in-law Dr. George H. Gay, to whom, Nov. 21, 1855, his oldest daughter Elizabeth Greenough was married. One fact in his practice, so well known to his friends, ought not to be suppressed. Often, very often, his charges to the poor and unforlunate have been light or none at all. To feel for the distressed, to administer to the victims of pain and sickness, is the delight of the good physician and the glory of a great one.

Dr Lewis' favorite study has been surgery and anatomy, in which he is acknowledged to have few superiors, if any in the country. To these he united a love of antiquarian researches, and has retained his fondness for the Latin classics, the beauties of which seem to cling to his memory, as the perfume lingers in the sandal wood in every change of condition. Such are the sweet influences of the cultivation of taste and knowledge in early life; they give a tone to character and a charm to conversation, which neither age nor misfortune can take away. But his great object was his profession, and during the last 35 years the number of his private pupils have exceeded 400. He translated from the French, Gall on the Structure and Functions of the Brain, which was published in six volumes, edited Paxiori's Anatomy, and also a work on Practical Anatomy.

He was a representative from Boston to the General Court in 1835, '53; one of the Common Council of the city in 1839; on the School Committee, 1839, '40, '41 '44, '45, '57 and '58; visitor of the U. S. Marine Hospital 1856 to 1862; one of the Overseers of Harvard University from 1856 to 1862, and lately re-elected for six years more; Consulting Physician of the city, 1861; Counsellor of the Massachusetts Medical Society; a member of the American Medical Society of Paris; for three years he was Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts, viz: in 1855, '56 and '60, and has been at the head of several Orders in Masonry, a recapitulation of which would sound strange and forthputling to the uninitiated, and give no information to those who are. He has for very many years been a fervent and active friend to that noble Institution. The reason of his becoming a Mason was singular. In the days when the Fraternity were abused without mercy and persecuted to the utmost, he saw an advertisement in a paper of one of the furious antimasons, Avery Allyn—a name now almost forgotten—that on a certain day, in 1829, he would deliver a lecture, showing up the weakness and hypocrisy of Freemasonry, and its dangerous tendency. The Doctor was led by curiosity to go and hear him; and the very sophisms this arch-enemy of the Brotherhood used, and the abuse he heaped upon many of them, who were men without fear and without reproach, made him a convert on the other side, and he became a Mason in Columbian Lodge, then under the government of Joshua B. Flint, M. D., since G. M. of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts.

The last honor he received was an unanimous choice as President of the New England Historic-Genealogical Society in 1861 ; an office he still retains ; and long may he be spared to preside over us. It would be ungrateful in ourselves and injustice to him not to mention the liberal and valuable donation he has made to the Society—several hundred volumes, and some of them very rare and costly. He has also made to the library of Harvard University several donations of ancient works, many of them the result of his purchase abroad.*

But I must pause and let this brief memoir of Dr. Lewis come to an end ; truly lamenting that the account must necessarily be meagre and imperfect; for he was absent under the call of the U. S. government, devoting his professional skill to an examination of all the hospitals o( New York and vicinity, where many of our sick and wounded soldiers were sent; and of course I have depended on other sources for information, and received not much help from him, touching his travels; yet from a long acquaintance, and the unbroken friendship of many years not only with him, but his excellent father, it gives me unfeigned pleasure to offer this tribute of affection and respect.

Dissolvi me, otiosua operam ut tibi darem.. — Terence.

Bro. Winslow Lewis was initiated in Columbian Lodge, Nov. 3, 1830; passed Jan. 6, 1831, and raised Feb. 3, 1831. He is a member of St. John's Lodge, St. Paul's Chapter, Council of Royal and Select Masters, Boston Encampment, Grand Chapter, Grand Encampment, affiliated member of the "Loge Clement Amitie," at Paris, and honorary member of Pythagoras Lodge, No. 86, at New York. He has been Senior Warden of St. John's Lodge, High Priest of St. Paul's Chapter, Commander of the Boston Encampment, Grand King of the Grand Chapter, Grand Master 'of the Grand Encampment of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, Grand Generalissimo of the Grand Encampment of the United States, Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, a Trustee of the Grand Charity Fund and a Trustee of the Masonic Temple. This enumeration does not evidence the extent of his official services, as he has also held many subordinate stations.

His unremitting and arduous efforts to advance the welfare of the Brotherhood, have endeared him to them in bonds which cannot be sundered; and the elevated position which he now so ably fills, he justly merits. In speaking recently of his regard for the Masonic institution, he remarked, that "truth and my feelings prompt the declaration, that in Masonry I have found the best friends, the best social ties and comforts; and that the ' whitest' hours of my life (apart from my family) have been when surrounded by ' Brothers,' and around that Altar, where heart beats responsive to heart, and all ' mingle into bliss."

A particular account of his lineage may be found in the N. E. Historic-Genealogical Register, lor January, 1803, in which the foregoing Memoir was originally published.

SPEECHES

From Proceedings, Page VI-269; December 14, 1859, report of the Library Committee:

The Committee on the Library Report— That its increase during the past year, has not added much numerically to its importance, still a few additions have been made of great value, and which did not accrue to the G Lodge at its expense.

Your Committee regret to state that the annual Report of the Proceedings of the G. Lodges of the United States are sadly incomplete in your Library and that their is not one perfect set of any Gd Lodge proceedings, no, not even of our own. The very last acquisition to the Library, (and every intelligent Mason would suppose it should have been the very first) was the "Freemasons Magazine — the work of your own Gd Secy: everywhere, known, every where prized, as the very best exponent of Masonic Law — the most conservative, as well as the oldest in the Union — a perfect series of which is with great difficulty obtained for a sum less than $110.

Undoubtedly there are many who may be disposed to decry the formation of a Library, especially those of the cui bono species, who deem it a Bibliomania, involving expenditure, without return. It may releive such who look to the pecuniary outlay, to learn that the now valuable Collection of the G Lodge of Massachusetts, has only cost the Institution the paltry sum of about $150.

Is a Masonic Library profitless? When the future historian of our country shall have occasion to portray these popular excitements which have agitated society, and among them, the wrorst of them all, the Anti-masonic, where could he glean all on the subject, where could he turn for the most extensive details of that nefarious Body, but to the ample pages of the Masonic Mirror — a work of rarement and fidelity, and which has become, even now, a rarity among book-collectors, a book so rare, that your committee, know of no other perfect copy, than the one in your collection.

How often is it necessary to consult authorities, and seek information on the History of the Order and on the various subjects connected w7ith it? How desirable it is, that those who hold official positions should have a "Collectania from whence to derive such opinions or decisions as their stations impose—much perhaps that is generally considered as worthless is sent forth from the press. But every department of literature has its trash mingled with its good, still that work, which has in it no one idea, either curious, quaint or original, must of itself be a curiosity.

The Library of the G. Lodge is therefore like all collections, a collection of the valuable mingled with the almost useless, we say almost, for many of these "turn up" to satisfy the literary researches of some antiquarian minds seekers of the "odds and ends" of the of the teeming press chiffoniers, who raking from the gutters of intellectual sewers, sometimes from the mud itself bring to light that which is valuable and worthy of preservation.

Your Committee would therefore solicit from the Brethren, donations of any books or pamphlets, good, bad, or indifferent, which have any relation, direct or indirect with Freemasonry, for or against it.

Among the very few donors, our excellent Br. Thos. Waterman must again be mentioned as having contributed a very choice collection of bound volumes of pamphlets, interspersed with which are short biographies of the shining lights of our Order by his pen. Your committee in thanking him for his liberality would commend him as an example to others "to go and do likewise".

From Proceedings, Page VI-345; December 10, 1860, correspondence with the Grand Lodge of Virginia:

M W. [John R. McDaniels] G. Master of the Gd. Lodge of Virginia.

Dear Brother.

The period has arrived (alas! that it should ever be so.) when it behoves every one who has lived and flourished under the benign influence of our glorious Union, to exert his best endeavors to obviate that sad impulse which threatens its dissolution. In the relations of fellow-citizens of a wide spread republic, our efforts have proved ineffectual. Fanaticism is the predominate demon, and the ties which have bound the South and North so long together, which carried them shoulder to shoulder in the days of our fathers, and have continued them in their prosperity as a United Nation, are now in preparation to be severed.

It is too late to avert the calamity. Is there nought remains of conservatism to be tried? Have we not an institution which binds us together not only as fellow citizens but as Brothers, and as Brothers can we lacerate those pledges, the foundation of our Faith & Practice? Therefore may we not look to it as a strong element to allay the bitter anguish of these dark days in our Nations' History ?

It was my good fortune to visit Richmond with a band of our Order, and to witness and feel the mighty operation which cemented the hearts of all the participants on that occasion.

The influences of that meeting are ineffaceable the impress indelible, with such feelings of so powerful a fraternization, how disunion must pall the hearts of those whose affections as Brothers are so warmed towards those so dear to them in Virginia, and as one I was resolved to pour out my own, and to express to you what I deem to be, the predominate sentiment in Boston, if not, in the whole jurisdiction over which I have the honor to preside, and I assure my dear Brother, that we cling to you, not only as Brothers, but as Fellow-citizens; and may that evil day be far removed, when Virginia and Massachusetts, the States which gave to our country a Washington and a Franklin and to Freemasonry two of its brightest lights, shall be found opposed as enemies, and severed as components of United States.

May God avert that terrible issue: and may He instil into the hearts of all of our Order, the observance of that precept of his Holy Word, that first before to every neophyte in Free-masonry. "Behold how good and how pleasant it is for Brethren to dwell together in unity," and may all under your fraternal jurisdiction, demonstrate by their acts, that in the "Old Dominion" fellow citizens, and Brotherly Love, as Masons shall now, in this the perilous hour, as heretofore under the days of prosperity, be their aim and Resolve. — "So mote it be."

From Proceedings, Page VI-544; December 13, 1864, report of Library Committee:

The Com. on the Library of the G. Lodge are compelled to present a Report on that which is not extant on those things which now "are among the things that were now to be cataloguised as res non inventi non existentibus.

All that was, of a really excellent Library, so recently a proud monument of the literature of Freemasonry, belonging to this G. Lodge is burned among the ashes and rubbish of our Temple. That collection of Masonic Works, was a valuable one, collected by the labors of years. Most of it was the gift of two of the Brethren, and towards it this Body paid but a small sum. It was insured for $400. The Com. however have to congratulate the Fraternity (it being accidentally in the hands of the binder) that the most rare work, and of which no other perfect copy can be found, the Masonic Mirror, was preserved. It consists of two folio, and seven quarto volumes. It embodies all the details of that exciting period when Anti-Masonry was rampant and utter downfall, death and everlasting interment.

The Directors of the Corporation have placed the amount received from the insurance, in the hands of the Com. on the Library, and already many works have been purchased, and several donations have been made, and the Com. would express in behalf of this G. Lodge their thanks to the G. Lodge of Maryland, Ohio, Illinois and Louisiana for their donations of copies of their transactions.

A Masonic Library cannot now be readily obtained. It is a well known fact, that works on the subject of Freemasonry, are eagerly sought for, and obtain large prices and that several of the Brethren in this jurisdiction, have at a great expense, their private collections which have been obtained after much research, at the cost of much time and expenditure of money. Moreover, our Library cannot be enlarged by purchase, at this time, of foreign wrorks, on account of the enhanced cost of importation.

The Com. therefore, look to their Masonic Brethren for their voluntary contributions, surely there should be a response from all, who are or should be interested in this matter.

The Com. are willing to contribute all their attention and care, to effect so desirable an object—a catalogue hasbeen already prepared and every book and pamphlet registered and a column denoting the name of the donor of each gift. They trust to see that column filled with the names of the ardent lovers of the Order, and its interests, and among these interests should be the founding of a storehouse of Masonic Literature.


NOTES

CHARTERS GRANTED

1855-1856:

1860:

CHARTERS RESTORED

1855-1856:



Grand Masters