Nathan Low

Yeoman of Boxford. Mollie says he and Lucy first owned property on the east side of High Street in Ipswich, bought of William Kimball and later sold to a Lord. In 1767 they moved to Boxford, where he hired the Hale farm (Perley, Dwellings of Boxford, p. 47). John Hale “built the late ancient Low mansion about 1750, and a few years later erected the saw-mill”; about 1772 “it came into the possession of Nathan Low (father of Gen. Solomon Low), and was kept in the family until the death of Major William Low (son of Gen. Low) in 1870” (Perley, History of Boxford, p. 198).

“Low, Nathan, Boxford. Private, Capt. Jacob Gould’s co. of militia, Col. Samuel Johnson’s regt., which marched on the alarm of April 19, 1775; service, 4 days” (Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors 9:1030). Perley also lists him among Boxford men “stationed at New York for two months” and “stationed for two months at Winter Hill” (pp. 229-230); no other Nathan Low of Boxford was of age, so this is probably him.

His will of 31 March 1803 leaves his wife Lucy the use of a third of the real estate, “two cows and two sheep,” “my chaise and sleigh … together with the privilege of using a horse for all necessary purposes,” and the household furniture “except my desk and a low chest”; “my son Nathan Low two dollars in addition to what I have already given him, as his full portion of my estate”; $50 to James, $100 each to Daniel and William, $2 more to Jeremiah; the homestead to Solomon; and to Joseph part of “the Back Pasture … lying westerly of a valley, where stones are laid for the purpose of making a wall,” with $300. His son Caleb is not named. Executors Solomon Low and Moses Dorman.

Family tradition, in a note on Lucy’s Bible (informant Emma Damon Eaton): “Old Nathan fought in Revolutionary war and killed by falling off apple tree. His son Nathan Jr. was Major.”

Children (Boxford VR pp. 59-60; the Bible list agrees except for Caleb’s year): Nathan, “at Ipswich, Oct. 18, 1765”; Caleb, 24 Dec 1767 (Mollie: Dec. 23; the Bible: 1770); James, 17 June 1770; Daniel, 20 Oct 1772; William, 2 June 1775; Jeremiah, 6 Apr 1777; Jeremiah, 6 Aug 1779 (Mollie omits him); Solomon, 9 Apr 1782; Joseph, 28 Dec 1784; and an unnamed daughter, 19 Oct 1786, whose gravestone is in Harmony Cemetery.

His son Gen. Solomon Lowe “died April 3, 1861, lacking six days of being eighty years old. The remains of General Lowe repose in his tomb in Harmony Cemetery. Upon the face of the tomb are illustrations of himself and … wives engraved on marble tablets” (Perley, Dwellings of Boxford, p. 48). Solomon’s son Major William Lowe “died in 1870, from injuries caused by a bull which attacked him in his cowyard.”

Mollie (p. 78) says he went against Quebec with his grandfather “when a very young lad,” under Capt. John Smith of Rowley Village. That is impossible: his grandfather Sgt. David Low died in 1746, when Nathan was three. Her “also in the French and Indian War with Capt. Gideon Parker” has not been found. Nor was Capt. David Low of the Revolution his brother, as she says. That David, who marched in 1777 and helped guard Burgoyne’s army, was bp. 1728, son of David and Susanna, and so Nathan’s first cousin (Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors 9:1021).

Open questions

• The Essex probate file (docket, inventory, division); the will is known from the record book.
• Gravestone photographs in Harmony Cemetery.
• His New York and Winter Hill service in the Massachusetts muster rolls, perhaps under another spelling.