William H Brewster, U.S. Civil War Veteran

Approx. Location: Harmony Grove Cemetery, Portsmouth, NH [?]

 

William Henry Brewster

born 6 May 1840, Troy, Rensselaer Co, NY

died 5 May 1902, Portsmouth, Rockingham Co, NH

buried in a family plot in the Harmony Grove Cemetery,

Portsmouth, NH

 

Parents

John Brewster of York, Maine

Elizabeth Soule of Troy, NY

 

Marriages

m1 Mrs Ellen Josephine Avery

married 2 January 1864, Newburyport, Essex Co, MA

 

m2 Henrietta E Caswell

married abt 1871

died 19 September 1929, buried in Harmony Grove

 

Henrietta was born in Gosport, Rockingham Co, NH, a town

that no longer exists but was located on the Isle of Shoals,

a group of 9 islands off the Maine and New Hampshire coasts.

In 1860 her Father, Lemuel Caswell, owned the Atlantic Hotel on Star Island.

 

Refer to: www.seacoastnh.com/Places_&_Events/Isles_of_Shoals/Wh...

 

Military Service: on behalf of Newburyport, MA

1.)Enlisted on 30 October 1862 in the 8th MA Infantry, a nine month unit.

2.)Enlisted on 30 December 1863 in the 4th MA Cavalry

3.)Transferred on 8 June 1864 to the U.S. Navy; served on the

USS Braziliera, as part of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron.

 

William was discharged from the Navy in Mid-1865 and returned to the Seacoast area of Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts.

 

The ocean always played an important part of William’s life, a life he was born into. His Father was a ship carpenter and he was a mariner prior to the Civil War.

 

In the Massachusetts State Census of 1865, he is also shown as a ship carpenter, living with his wife, Ellen, in Newburyport. There are also 2 Foote children, Ellen’s siblings, living in the same boarding house. Their Father had died in 1851of typhoid fever but it is unknown what happened to their Mother.

 

In the federal census of 1870, William is back in York, where he had lived in 1860, a single man, again listed as a mariner, living with his parents.

 

In 1880, he, his 2nd wife Henrietta, and 2 small children are living on one of the Maine Isles of Shoals (the Maine/NH state border splits the Isles). Unfortunately the census does not state on which island, they resided, Appledore or Smuttynose but I assume it was the latter. His occupation is shown as a mariner but I suspect he was actually a fisherman, perhaps a mate on one of the island fishing schooners. I believe there was not much else for a sailor who lived on an island 10 miles out to sea.

 

We do not know when he moved to the City of Portsmouth but his name does appear in the city directories beginning in 1888. It is written that he worked at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, Kittery, Maine, as a shipwright.

 

 

Done