Parker River, Byfield, MA

The Wheeler-Tenney Mill is believed to be the oldest of the Parker River mills still standing.

According to Woodman (1982), Nathan Sr. left Nathan jr. his homestead of 35 acres in his will which was proved in 1741. "A sawmill was built and in use until a date later than 1771. This mill and 70 acres adjoining reverted to Samuel and Rebecca Noyes and Sarah Sawyer, children of Nathan Wheeler."

On November 15, 1796 Sarah Sawyer of Newburyport and Rebecca Noyes of Newbury along with her husband Samuel Noyes Esq sold the mill privilege along with seventy acres between Wheeler Brook and the Parker River as well as some additional land to Joseph Pearson for the sum of $2500. The deed included the right "to raise the water as high as a certain bound in a rock in the aforesaid land about a rod above the Mill Dam formerly erected by Nathan Wheeler which bound is a hole drilled in a rock." (Recorded in 1799, Essex Deeds 166-61)

In a deed dated July 10, 1804 Joseph Pearson, for the sum of $650, conveyed 2.25 acres "together with the mill standing thereon" to Deacon Samuel Tenney of Newbury. The deed also mentions the right "to raise the water as high as a certain bound in a rock in the forsaid land" (Recorded in 1805 Essex Deeds 176-77). It is believed that Deacon Tenney converted the mill to snuff production shortly after he purchased it because subsequent owners, Larkin and Morrill, listed 1804 as the founding date for their snuff company.

In Reminiscences of a Nonagenarian (1879) Sarah Emery described her uncle, Deacon Tenney, as the "prince of hospitality, and an invitation to his house gave occasion for much satisfaction." She mentions that he was a " tobacconist" who traveled frequently to Boston to sell cigars and snuff. John Ewell in his book The Story of Byfield: A New England Parish (1902) reproduced a map from the Massachusetts State Archives dated 1811 which lists the site as Tenny's Snuff Factory. A map of Byfield as it was in 1830, from the same book, describes the site as "snuff mills."

Thomas Larkin and Orlando W. Morrill purchased the mill between 1822 and 1837 (Woodman, 1982). A map of Newbury, Newburyport and West Newbury by Philan Anderson (1850) lists the site as a Snuff Factory. In the 1870's, Gorham D. Tenny and Daniel Bailey purchased the major interest in the mill from Larkin's heirs (Woodman, 1982). One of these deeds, from 1876, states that William F. Larkin of Haverhill in consideration of $800 paid by Gorham D. Tenney of Georgetown sold his 1/9 interest in the estate of Samuel Larkin. The estate consisted of "an undivided one half of a snuff mill and house and buildings there with ... one house barn and five acres of land near the depot in said Newbury, said depot being Byfield depot. The homestead in said Georgetown. Also a lot of woodland in said Georgetown and said Newbury being three lots in each of said towns-said personal property being U.S. Government bonds, money on deposit in Banks, notes, horses, carriages, and harnesses" (Recorded October, 1876 Essex Deeds 961-208).

The mill was purchased by the Pearson Tobacco Company of Kittery Maine in 1899, later known as the Byfield Snuff company. According the Library of Congress's Historic American Engineering Record, the dam, headrace, and penstock were rebuilt in 1914. The dam currently produces a fall of about ten feet. In the twentieth century the mill was known as the Byfield Snuff Factory No.1 and snuff grinding continued at the site until 1951. In 1990 the mill was purchased by Town of Newbury for $70,000.

The framing of the mill, as it exists today, is typical of post and beam construction from the late18th century. The frame exhibits abundent evidence of multiple episodes of remodeling as well as fire damage. It would appear that the building dates from the time of Joseph Pearson.

References

Ewell, John Louis (1902). The Story of Byfield: A New England Parish. George E. Littlefield, Boston.

Woodman, Betsy H. (1982) "Larkin-Morrill Snuff Mill, Parker River, Byfield, Massachusetts, 1804-1951." Society for Industrial Archeology: New England Chapters Newsletter, vol. 3: 2-6.