COMMODORE MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1794 April 10, Thursday, 1794: Matthew Calbraith Perry was born in South Kingstown, Rhode Island.1 1. Edward Perry of Sandwich, Massachusetts, a great-great-great-grandfather of Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry, named as son in the will of Edmund Freeman, was probably the son by a previous husband named Perry of his mother, who was Edmund Freeman’s 2nd wife. He was probably descended from Abraham PREBLE who was of Scituate, Massachusetts in 1637 and married Judith Tilden, daughter of Nathaniel Tilden. His wife Mary Freeman (who may have been daughter of that Edmund Freeman or of Edward Freeman) gave birth to Samuel Perry in about 1664, and probably there were other children as well. Samuel Perry was of Newport, Rhode Island, and got married on December 12, 1678 with Mary Miller. Their daughter Mehitable was born on April 30, 1680, their son (?) Jaciel was born on May 6, 1682. He remarried on May 9, 1690 with Mary Tucker, daughter of Henry Tucker of Sandwich (the family generally considered her to have been from Dartmouth, Massachusetts) and they had James Perry, Edward Perry, Samuel Perry (born 1695), Simon Perry, and Benjamin Perry. He died at Kingston in 1716. HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1797 December 25, Monday, 1797: William Speiden was born in Washington DC to Robert Speiden and Ann Williams Speiden. One of the San Juan Islands between the state of Washington and Canada would be named “Speiden Island” by Lieutenant Charles Wilkes on the US exploring expedition of 1838-1842, the expedition commonly known as the “Wilkes Expedition “for the purpose of exploring and surveying the Southern Ocean,... as well to determine the existence of all doubtful islands and shoals, as to discover, and accurately fix, the position of those which lie in or near the track of our vessels in that quarter, and may have escaped the observation of scientific navigators,” so named because allegedly he had proved himself “one of the most valuable officers of the expedition.” (Speiden Island would for awhile be stocked with the sort of big-game animals that American hunters are eager to pay good money in order to gun down, but it now lies abandoned.) HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1828 October 7, Tuesday, 1828: William Speiden got married with Marian Coote, daughter of Clement Tubbs and Mary Cole Coote of Cambridgeshire, England. Their children would be Marian Eliza Speiden, William Clement Speiden, Clement Coote Speiden, William Speiden, Jr., Edgar Speiden, Mariana Speiden, Theodore Speiden, and Ada Rosana Speiden. HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1809 1809: At the age of 15, Matthew Calbraith Perry became a Midshipman under his older brother, Lieutenant Oliver Hazard Perry. HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1813 1813: At about the age of 19, Matthew Calbraith Perry was promoted from Midshipman to Lieutenant. HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1819 October 2, Saturday, 1819: Percy Bysshe Shelley and Mary Godwin Wollstonecraft Shelley moved to Firenze. Alfred Hawkins got married with a Martha Peterson or Patterson at the Anglican Cathedral of Québec. The gazette for October 13th would report: “Married, at Québec on Saturday evening 2nd instant, by the Rev. G.J. Mountain, Mr. Alfred Hawkins, wine merchant, to Miss Patterson, daughter of Mr. James Patterson, of the same place.” The nation was learning that Commodore Oliver Hazard “We Have Met The Enemy And They Are Ours” Perry, hero of the War of 1812, had in Venezuela succumbed to the yellow fever: OLIVER HAZARD PERRY Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 7th day 2nd of 10 M 1819 / This Afternoon Attended the funeral of My Cousin Ruth Marsh, she departed this life last evening about a quarter past 8 OClock. I returned to the House & took tea with the family she being the last of her generation, & to take my leave of a house where I took much pleasure & derived much benefit in my youth from the proffitable conversation of her Sister Mary & Brother Jonathon. The estate will be divided into so many divisions that it is Probable it will now soon go out of the name & the house so old that it must be Pulled down. — from the best information I can obtain the Marsh House on the east side of Thames Street was built by Walter Clarke & given to one of his daughters who married a Gould & their daughter Mary Married Jonathon Marsh the father of Ruth aforementioned & has been regularly inhabited by Friends to the present day & she is the last of our society that will probably have any claim to it. —- The fashon & all things in this World change. - while sitting in the Room at the funeral my mind was lead into a very serious train of reflection, on the many changes I had seen in that House & now it seemed as if the final change had come to it. — May I proffit by the feelings which I experienced while commemorating the past hours spent with the past inhabitants of that house, & I am Sure I felt much more that I have here conveyed. RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1821 May 11, Friday, 1821: According to an article in the Freeman’s Journal and Daily Commercial Advertiser of Dublin, Ireland for May 17th, an announcement of military promotions had been issued by the “WAR- OFFICE” on May 11th, according to which Captain John Thoreau, who had been on half-salary paid by the 40th Regiment of Foot, had arranged with Archibald Taylor to take up that officer’s full-pay position as Captain in the 37th Regiment of Foot.2 (That may well mean that John had passed along some coin of the realm.) Lieutenant David Heard received his captain’s commission. The 1st ship under the command of Matthew Calbraith Perry was the schooner Shark, that would be sailing African waters as part of the US Navy’s (alleged) efforts to interdict the international slave trade. 2. 37th (North Hampshire) Regiment of Foot. On the 1st of August of each year, known as “Minden Day,” he would be wearing a rose in his headdress to commemorate this regiment’s participation in the Battle of Minden. HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1823 December 25, Thursday, 1823: Narciso de Heredia y Begines, Conde de Ofalia replaced Carlos Martinez de Irujo y Tacon, marques de Casa-Irujo, duque de Sotomayor as 1st Secretary of State of Spain. Two works for chorus and organ by Samuel Wesley were performed for the initial time, in St. Paul’s Cathedral, London: “Magnificat” and “Nunc dimittis.” In Newport, Rhode Island, Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 5th day 25 of 12 M / Rode to Portsmouth in the Stage to attend Moy [Monthly] Meeting - The first was a favourd Meeting & Hannah Dennis was engaged in a lively testimony. — In the last there was not much life, but the buisness was pretty well conducted. — Wnet to Uncle Stantons, dined lodged & next Morning Walked home. — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS This Christmas marked William Speiden’s 18th birthday (this was the age of adulthood, at which he would begin his life’s work as a purser, in the US Navy Yard’s purser’s office in the city of Washington DC). HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1825 1825: At about this point London became larger than Beijing and thus became the largest city in the world. The nationalist professor Aizawa Seishisai produced SHINRON “NEW THESES” analyzing the manner in which Western power made use of Western religion as the “thin edge of a wedge,” by which their imperialism best proceeded — and how important it was that Japan be relentlessly resistant to such hegemonic colonialism. October 26, Wednesday, 1825: Governor DeWitt Clinton officially opened the Erie Canal and departed from Buffalo, New York aboard the Seneca Chief, eastward past Lockport, Rochester, and Rome to the canal’s junction with the Hudson River at Albany.3 Then the canal boat was towed down the river behind one of Clinton’s new steamboats (truncating several days’ journey into one account, as in fact the fastest of the canal boats traveled at but 3mph) into the harbor, where the US fleet, guns roaring, fell in line behind this barge. A series of 32-pounder cannon captured at Oliver Hazard Perry’s victory on Lake Erie had been distantly spaced along the entire canal, and as each one heard the detonation of the cannon to its north, it fired in relay. That signal required an hour and twenty minutes to pass from Buffalo to New-York City — and then the process was repeated in reverse. The Great Lakes had been connected to the Atlantic Ocean. 3. 363 miles in length, 40 feet wide, 4 feet deep, maximum displacement 75 tons; 77 locks, 90 feet by 15 feet; total lockage 655 feet. HDT WHAT? INDEX COMMODORE PERRY MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY 1835 September 26, Saturday, 1835: The Liberator. Elisha Reynolds Potter, Senior died in South Kingstown, Rhode Island (his grave is in the Potter family burial ground in Washington County). (This datapoint helps us understand how Cato Pearce’s book A BRIEF MEMOIR OF THE LIFE AND RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE OF CATO PEARCE, A MAN OF COLOR: TAKEN VERBATIM FROM HIS LIPS AND PUBLISHED FOR HIS BENEFIT could be printed in Pawtucket.