Other Places of InterestThese institutions hold collectionsof manuscripts and other materialsrelated to Nathaniel Bowditch:

Boston Public LibraryCopley Square, Boston, MA

Phillips Library, Peabody Essex MuseumEast India Square, Salem, MA

Harvard University LibrariesCambridge, MA

Nathaniel Bowditch is buried inMount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge.This cemetery contains the graves ofmany famous people and is one of theearliest examples of cemeteries designedas landscaped parks.

A Walking Tour of the Great Age of Sail

Bowditch’sSALEM

The Bowditch HouseBuilt on Essex Street about 1760 and renovated in1805, the Nathaniel Bowditch House is a NationalHistoric Landmark and is significant botharchitecturally and historically. It was the home ofNathaniel Bowditch from 1811 to 1823, but itssignificance goes further. Bowditch purchased thehouse from the Curwen family, famous for their partin the Salem Witch Trials. Owners after Bowditchincluded the Massachusetts General Hospital andJoseph B. F. Osgood, a Salem lawyer and judge, wholived in the house while serving as Mayor of Salemduring the Civil War. During the early to mid-twentieth century, the house was owned andoccupied by a series of doctors, including Dr. KateC. Mudge, one of Salem’s first female physicians.

In 1946, the Bowditch House and the structure nowknown as the Witch House were threatened withdemolition in a project to widen Essex Street. Agroup of citizens came together and formed HistoricSalem, Inc., (HSI) and raised funds to purchase thebuildings. They moved the Witch House back onits site and relocated the Bowditch House from EssexStreet to its present location on North Street.

Both houses were given to the city. The Witch Housebecame a tourist attraction, and the Bowditch Housewas used for city offices. In 2000, the city returnedthe Bowditch House to HSI, which is restoring thehouse with the intention of turning it into aneducational and historic resource center.

Nathaniel Bowditch:Practical Navigator

The history of Salem . . . the history of maritimescience . . . the history of American education. . . the history of mathematics and finance . . .the history of modern capital development—none can be told completely without the storyof Nathaniel Bowditch. If Nathaniel Bowditchcan be described as a “contribution” from theCity of Salem, this is indeed a contribution ofglobal proportions and a source of great pridefor Salem.

Born in Salem in 1773 and with little formaleducation, Bowditch produced in 1802 one of themost remarkable scientific books published in earlyAmerica—The New American Practical Navigator.The book helped give the new United Statescredibility in the world scientific community.

The manual has saved countless lives and fortunesby making the latest knowledge accessible tothe ordinary sailor. All naval ships still carry a“Bowditch.” Bowditch made many other signi-ficant scientific contributions and was recognizedwith membership in virtually every nationaland international scientific society of the age.

Maritime SalemWe began as a maritime nation, tied to the seafor our livelihoods and our power. Salem is oneof the few places where those beginnings canstill be experienced.

Founded as a fishing station in 1626, early onSalem became active in coastal shipping and thetriangular trade across the Atlantic. Harmed byBritish restrictions on trade, Salem merchantssupported the Revolution and outfitted theirtrading ships as privateers, supplementing thesmall American navy.

When independence was won, Salem’s glory yearsbegan, as Salem ships explored parts of the worldpreviously closed to them—the Mediterranean,the North Sea, and especially the East Indies andChina. From the 1780s until the Embargo of1807 and the War of 1812, when its prominencebegan to decline, Salem was synonymous withthe overseas luxury trade. Salem’s merchants tookgreat risks and reaped great rewards in sendingships on long trading voyages “to the farthestport of the rich East.”

For two hundred years, Salem’s life revolved aroundthe sea. Learn about life in the great age of sail byfollowing in the footsteps of one of Salem’s mostdistinguished citizens, Nathaniel Bowditch.

His last work was a trans-lation and commentary onPierre LaPlace’s multivolumeMécanique Céleste, making itstheoretical science availableto a wide audience.

Bowditch enjoyed morethan just success in science.He reformed the finances ofHarvard College. He partici-pated in and helped found anumber of benevolent institu-tions in the region. As the head of insurancecompanies in Salem and Boston, he served as whatwould today be called a “money manager” for thewealthy individuals who made their fortunes at sea.This particular role was significant for the economyof the region. Bowditch helped redirect this wealthinto new manufacturing projects, building the millsthat industrialized Massachusetts.

Nathaniel Bowditch died a few days before hissixty-fifth birthday in 1838. His legacy has echoedfor generations.

Presented by Salem Maritime National Historic Sitein partnership with Historic Salem, Inc. andThe House of the Seven Gables

Statue of Nathaniel Bowditch (above) courtesy ofMount Auburn Cemetery; all other photographscourtesy of the Peabody Essex Museum.Design: Bonnie Hurd Smith. Map: Keith Phelan.

Nathaniel Bowditch’sbook, The New AmericanPractical Navigator, helpedgive the new United Statescredibility in the worldscientific community.

Historic Salem, Inc. is restoring NathanielBowditch’s house, shown, circa 1900, at itsoriginal location on Essex Street.

In 1806, Nathaniel Bowditch published hischart of the harbors of Salem, Marblehead,Beverly, and Manchester, Massachusetts.

Recommended reading for younger readers: Jean Lee Latham, Carry on Mr. Bowditch(Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1955). Available in paperback.

Bowditch built manyof his own navigationalinstruments, such asthis quadrant hedesigned in 1792.It may be seen at thePeabody Essex Museum.

The House of the Seven GablesNathaniel Bowditch’s family had lived in Salem for fivegenerations, was related to most of the major families inthe city, and had long been part of the maritime trades.His grandmother, Mary Turner Bowditch, who lived with thefamily, grew up in The House of the Seven Gables, the daughterof Salem’s wealthiest merchant of the early 1700’s. Nathaniel’smother, Mary Ingersoll, a sea captain’s daughter, was relatedto the family that owned the mansion after the Turners.However, Nathaniel’s parents’ share of this wealth had beenrisked and lost by the time Nathaniel was born.

Old Burying PointThe graves of some of Nathaniel’s ancestors, siblings, andchildren can be seen in this burial ground, Salem’s earliest.Before this section of Salem Harbor was filled in during thenineteenth century, the cemetery overlooked the waterfront.

2 Kimball Court1

Nathaniel Bowditch was born on March 26, 1773, in this housewhen it stood at 14 Brown Street and was much smaller than itis now. It was one of a series of rented or borrowed homes thatthe family lived in. The fourth of seven children, Nathaniel,like most of his siblings, was born while his father, HabakkukBowditch, was at sea. Hab suffered several marine disasters, andso his wife’s life was one of poverty and drudgery. The familywas assisted for some time by the Salem Marine Society, abenevolent society of mariners founded in 1766. Just beforethe birth of their seventh child, Hab returned to his earlytrade as a cooper—a barrel-maker for the shipping trades—and expected his sons to follow him. Nathaniel’s mother diedwhen he was only ten.

St. Peter’s Episcopal Church

The First ChurchThe Bowditches attended St. Peter’s when Nathaniel was youngbecause his mother was a staunch Anglican, and Nathaniel wasbaptized there. The original building was replaced with thecurrent church in 1833, but the Bowditch pew is still inside,and the gravestone of Nathaniel Bowditch’s favorite sister, whodied when he was eighteen, can be seen in the small churchyard.However, the Bowditches were historically Congregationalist,and returned to that church in 1791. The CongregationalistFirst Church, now Unitarian, met at the corner of Washingtonand Essex Streets when Nathaniel belonged as an adult. In thetwentieth century, the First Church merged with the NorthChurch, which had built this edifice in 1836. Bowditch helpedarrange the financing for this building.

Master Watson’s School2

Because his family moved around, Nathaniel’s schoolingwas irregular. For a time, he attended a school run byJohn Watson (corner of Union and Essex Streets, now gone).At age ten, when times were especially bad because of the effectsof the Revolutionary War, Nathaniel was removed from schoolto work alongside his father in the cooperage. After two years,his father had him tutored in bookkeeping so that he could beapprenticed in a ship chandlery.

Ropes & Hodges Chandlery,Neptune Street2

An apprenticeship bound a child to work for a business fora certain number of years, in Nathaniel’s case until he wastwenty-one. The child was provided with room, board, andclothing and was taught the “art and mystery” of a trade.A chandlery was a “one-stop shop” where a ship’s captaincould purchase the goods needed to outfit a vessel for a voyage.Nathaniel worked for Ropes & Hodges Chandlery for fiveyears; when they left the business about 1790, Nathaniel’scontract was transferred to another ship chandler, SamuelWard. Nathaniel probably first learned about the science ofnavigation from visitors to the shop. The shop is no longerstanding, but the waterfront, which originally reached thislocation, was dotted with such firms, and the Derby WaterfrontHistoric District, from here to the power plant, still showsthe dense mix of stores and homes that existed two hundredyears ago.

Ropes Mansion(Peabody Essex Museum)

Crowninshield-Bentley House(Peabody Essex Museum)

Salem AthenæumWhile at the chandlery, Nathaniel was mentored by several menwho were impressed by his desire to learn. His employer’s father,Judge Nathaniel Ropes II, gave him access to his library ofworks on navigation, surveying, astronomy, and mathematics.Nathaniel taught himself Latin, and the Rev. William Bentleylent him the greatest scientific work of the age, Isaac Newton’sPrincipia. Most important, Bentley and Rev. John Princearranged for Nathaniel to have access to the PhilosophicalLibrary, a private collection of scientific books now housedat the Salem Athenæum, which Bowditch later helped found.In the absence of public libraries, these kinds of private andinformal arrangements fostered learning in the new nation.

Salem Maritime National Historic SiteSoon after completing his apprenticeship at age twenty-one,Bowditch made his first sea voyage as a crew member on amerchant vessel much like the Friendship, a modern replica.His five voyages between 1795 and 1803 lasted between sevenand fourteen months each and included stops in Mauritius,Portugal, the Philippines, Spain, and Indonesia. Officers andcrew could profit by trading for themselves on the side, andBowditch was able to accumulate a little wealth. His first fourvoyages were on ships belonging to Elias Hasket Derby, the“king” of Salem’s waterfront and reportedly America’s firstmillionaire. Salem harbor was filled with wharves, all privatelyowned, with Derby Wharf the most prominent. Bowditch heldpositions as clerk, mate, supercargo (business agent), and finallyas captain on his fifth voyage, when he was a part owner of theship Putnam. On his voyages for Derby, Bowditch made thecalculations that resulted in the 1802 publication of The NewAmerican Practical Navigator.

82 Washington Square East1

On March 25, 1798, Bowditch married Elizabeth Boardman,the daughter of a captain who had died at sea. The couple livedwith Elizabeth’s mother at 82 Washington Square East. SalemCommon, once a swampy area used for common pasturage,was rehabilitated into Washington Square Park, the centerpieceof a neighborhood newly developed for stately display of thewealth arising from maritime trade. Five months after hismarriage, Bowditch left on his third voyage, and a few monthslater learned of his wife’s death. He could not return home forseveral months after that. Salem families were used to the longabsences of men at sea, and the women kept society functioningand looked after each other. In 1800, between his fourth andfifth voyages, Bowditch married his (and Elizabeth’s) cousin,Mary Ingersoll. The couple probably continued to live at theBoardman house until they moved to Chestnut Street in 1805.

12 Chestnut Street1

From 1805–11, the Bowditches shared a house with Nathaniel’sformer boss, Jonathan Hodges, in what is now the McIntireHistoric District, named after Salem’s famous architect of theFederal style. This neighborhood was developed shortly afterthe Common area for the newly wealthy merchants and seacaptains who wanted to move away from the waterfront wherethey did business. Bowditch pursued his scientific interestshere, including observing the solar eclipse of 1806, and wrotenumerous scientific articles. This district was a center ofFederalist political sentiment, and Bowditch shared thatperspective, possibly because President Jefferson’s 1807–09embargo on overseas trade so hurt New England’s economy.

Peabody Essex MuseumBowditch was an early member and later president of theEast India Marine Society, established in 1799 for captains andsupercargoes who had sailed around Cape Horn or the Capeof Good Hope. Their sea journals and the items they broughthome became the nucleus of what is now the Peabody EssexMuseum, the oldest continuously operating museum in thenation. The museum currently has a permanent exhibit aboutBowditch, as well as exhibits on all of Salem’s maritime history..

11 Central Street1

In 1804, Bowditch became President of the Essex Fire andMarine Insurance Company, located on the site of this buildingdesigned by Charles Bulfinch (now an antiques shop). Thegrowing insurance industry was critical to the full maturing ofthe maritime trade, as it controlled risk-taking. It also createdpools of money that could be invested in new businesses.Bowditch brought that opportunity to fruition when he leftSalem for Boston in 1823 to head the Massachusetts HospitalLife Insurance Company, a large financial institution, fromwhich he helped launch a number of factory projects. Maritimetrade had made America an independent country; it nowfinanced its industrial revolution.

Bowditch House1

Nathaniel and Mary bought this house in 1811 and lived herewith their children until 1823. A National Historic Landmark,it is being restored by Historic Salem, Inc., as a research andeducational center. During his years here, Bowditch carriedon his scientific inquiries and was offered, but declined,professorships in mathematics at Harvard College, theUniversity of Virginia, and West Point—offers made toa man whose schooling had ended when he was ten.

1Not open to the public 2No longer standing

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For further informationSalem Maritime NHS: www.nps.gov/samaHistoric Salem, Inc.: www.historicsalem.orgThe House of the Seven Gables: www.7gables.org

Peabody Essex Museum: www.pem.orgSalem Athenæum: www.salemathenaeum.orgDestination Salem: www.salem.orgHSI Bowditch Initiative: www.nathanielbowditch.org

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