The Norfolk County Courthouse served Norfolk County, Massachusetts from soon after its establishment in 1792 until 1827. It was replaced by a new Norfolk County Courthouse. In later years, the building was known as Temperance Hall.
The Norfolk County Courthouse served Norfolk County, Massachusetts from soon after its establishment in 1792 until 1827. It was replaced by a new Norfolk County Courthouse. In later years, the building was known as Temperance Hall.
After the creation of the county, the Court of Common Pleas and the Court of General Sessions of the Peace first met in Dedham's meetinghouse. [1] Nathaniel Ames was chosen as the clerk of both and they met for the first time on September 23. [1] [lower-alpha 1]
When the court met on January 7, 1794, it was so cold in the building, which lacked any sort of heating, that they moved to the Woodward Tavern across the street. [1] The Anglican Church in town had also offered their building, but it was in such a state of disrepair that the offer was not accepted. [1] The First Church and Parish in Dedham then offered a piece of land on their Little Common, and a new courthouse was ordered to be constructed. [1] Construction was sluggish, however, and the delays frustrated Ames. [1]
The court was still sitting in the meetinghouse in 1794 but the new courthouse was completed in 1795. [2] [3] It was found to be too small, however, and the ceilings were so low as to stifle people in the courtrooms. [4] Charles Bulfinch was hired in 1795 to design a turret for the building and Paul Revere was commissioned to cast a bell. [4] [5] [lower-alpha 2]
In 1827, it was sold at public auction. [3] The first floor was then used as a millinery shop and residence while the second had an assembly room. [3] In 1845, it was sold again to the Temperance Hall Association and burned down on April 28, 1891. [3]
The first major trial to be held at the new courthouse was that of Jason Fairbanks. He lived in the family homestead on East Street and was courting Elizabeth Fales, two years his junior at 18. Jason had told a friend that "planned to meet Betsey, in order to have the matter settled" and that he "either intended to violate her chastity, or carry her to Wrentham, to be married, for he had waited long enough." [6] On May 21, 1801, Fales met Fairbanks in a "birch grove next to 'Mason’s Pasture'" and told him that she could not marry him. [7]
Fales was stabbed 11 times, including once in the back, and her throat was slashed. Fairbanks staggered to her home, covered in blood, and told her family that she had committed suicide. He also told them that he had also attempted to take his own life, but was unable to, and that accounted for his wounds [7] which left him "still alive, but in a most deplorable situation." [8] The editor of the local paper, Herman Mann, was called to the scene and reported the incident in the next edition of his weekly newspaper under the headline "MELANCHOLY CATASTROPHE!" [9]
Fairbanks' murder trial opened on August 5, 1801, at the Courthouse but interest in the case involving two prominent families was so great that the trial was moved to the First Parish Meetinghouse across the street. When that venue proved to still be too small, the trial again moved to the Town Common. Prosecuting the case was the then-Attorney General and later Governor James Sullivan and defending Fairbanks was future Boston mayor and US Senator, Harrison Gray Otis. The trial lasted three days after which Fairbanks was found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging. He escaped on August 18, at which time a $1,000 bounty offered for his capture and a newspaper implored readers to "Stop the Murderer!" [7]
Fairbanks was captured in Skeensborough, New York as he attempted to escape to Canada. On September 10 he was returned to Dedham from the Boston jail and was hanged. To ensure that he would not escape again two Army Cavalry and one volunteer militia units stood guard. In addition to the military presence, "the 10,000 people who showed up at the Town Common to witness the execution were five times the town’s population at the time." [7]
Within days of the execution the first of four installments of the Report of the Trial of Jason Fairbanks was published by the Boston firm Russell and Cutler. It was 87 pages long and was issued over the course of several months, making it "the first demonstrably popular trial report published in early national New England." [9] A number of books and pamphlets would be written about the case in the months and years to come including "one of the earliest novels based on an actual murder case," the Life of Jason Fairbanks: A Novel Founded on Fact. [10]
Dedham is a town in and the county seat of Norfolk County, Massachusetts. The population was 25,364 at the 2020 census. It is located on Boston's southwest border. On the northwest it is bordered by Needham, on the southwest by Westwood, and on the southeast by Canton. The town was first settled by European colonists in 1635.
The history of Dedham, Massachusetts, 1635–1699, begins with the first settlers' arrival in 1635 and runs to the end of the 17th century. The settlers, who built their village on land the native people called Tiot, incorporated the plantation in 1636. They sought to build a community in which all would live out Christian love in their daily lives, and for a time did, but the Utopian impulse did not last. The system of government they devised was both "a peculiar oligarchy" and a "a most peculiar democracy." Most freemen could participate in Town Meeting, though they soon established a Board of Selectmen. Power and initiative ebbed and flowed between the two bodies.
The history of Dedham, Massachusetts, from 1800 to 1899 saw growth and change come to the town. In fact, the town changed as much during the first few decades of the 19th century as it did in all of its previous history.
The Norfolk County Courthouse, also known as the William D. Delahunt courthouse, is a National Historic Landmark at 650 High Street in Dedham, Massachusetts. It currently houses the Norfolk County Superior Court. It is significant as a well-preserved Greek Revival courthouse of the 1820s, and as the site a century later of the famous Sacco-Vanzetti trial. The building was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1972, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It replaced an earlier courthouse, built in 1795.
Theron Metcalf was an American attorney and politician from Massachusetts. He was a New England jurist and served as an associate justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.
Allin Congregational Church is an historic United Church of Christ church in Dedham, Massachusetts. It was built in 1818 by conservative breakaway members of Dedham's First Church and Parish in the Greek Revival style.
The Norfolk House also known as the Norfolk Hotel, was a tavern in Dedham, Massachusetts originally built in 1801 and located at 19 Court Street. It hosted John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, and the Marquis de Lafayette.
The First Church and Parish in Dedham is a Unitarian Universalist congregation in Dedham, Massachusetts. It was the 14th church established in Massachusetts. The current minister, Rev. Rali M. Weaver, was called in March 2007, settled in July, and is the first female minister to this congregation.
Nathaniel Ames represented Dedham, Massachusetts in the Great and General Court.
Jason Haven was the longest serving minister of the First Church and Parish in Dedham.
Alvan Lamson was a minister at First Church and Parish in Dedham, Massachusetts. His ordination led to a split in the church and eventually a lawsuit, Baker v. Fales, that helped disestablish the church and state in Massachusetts.
Baker v. Fales, also known as The Dedham Case, was a seminal case of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. It involved the First Church and Parish in Dedham rejecting the minister the Town of Dedham selected for it and its split into the Allin Congregational Church. It was a major case on the road to the separation of church and state and led to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts formally disestablishing the Congregational Church in 1833.
The history of Dedham, Massachusetts from 1700 to 1799 saw the town become one of the largest and most influential country towns in Massachusetts. As the population grew and residents moved to outlying areas of the town, battles for political power took place. Similar battles were taking place within the churches, as liberal and conservative factions bristled at paying for ministers with whom they had differences of theological opinion. New parishes and preciencts were formed, and eventually several new towns broke away.
The Norfolk County Jail was a jail located on Highland Street in Dedham, Massachusetts. Following the creation of Norfolk County in 1792, Timothy Gay deeded land to the county for the creation of his jail next to his tavern on Highland Street in October 1794. Construction began that year but it was not complete until 1795.
Thomas Thatcher was the third minister of the West Church of Dedham, Massachusetts.
Jabez Chickering was a lawyer and businessman from Dedham, Massachusetts.
Temperance Hall was an assembly hall in Dedham, Massachusetts associated with the temperance movement. It previously served as the Norfolk County Courthouse.
This is a timeline of the history of the town of Dedham, Massachusetts.
The death of Elizabeth Fales took place on May 18, 1801, in Dedham, Massachusetts. Her boyfriend, Jason Fairbanks, was convicted of the murder and sentenced to death but escaped from jail before he could be hanged. He was recaptured, returned to Dedham, and hanged before a crowd of 10,000. The case made national headlines.
The town of Dedham, Massachusetts, participated in the American Revolutionary War and the protests and actions that led up to it in a number of ways. The town protested the Stamp Act and then celebrated its repeal by erecting the Pillar of Liberty. Townsmen joined in the boycott of British goods following the Townshend Acts, and they supported the Boston Tea Party. Dedham's Woodward Tavern was the site where the Suffolk Resolves gathering was first convened.
