Nancy Perkins (1801-1887) was the daughter of Samuel Gardner Perkins and Barbara Cooper Higginson. Her father was a merchant in Boston who was in business with his brother, Col. Thomas Handasyd Perkins, a prominent resident of Brookline. Her younger brother, Stephen, also lived in Brookline.
Never married, apparently fairly well-off, impressions of the non-traditional life of "Miss Perkins" can be formed from fragments of available information. Although her brother's family also lived in Brookline in 1850, it appears that she lived on Washington St., very near Adeline, boarding with the family of John Woods, he the father of well-known Brookline chronicler, Harriet Woods.
Perkins was deeply involved in both the church and teaching the young people of Brookline and Adeline talks of her frequently in the diary. She would maintain a life-long relationship with the family of Frederic Knapp, the new young pastor of the First Parish Church and this involved an additional intersection with Adeline in Walpole, New Hampshire. Frederic Knapp had grown up in Walpole and his mother still lived there in what is today the still-standing well-known "Knapp House". Adeline spent the summer of 1850 in Walpole, apparently in close association with Nancy Perkins who was also there in the summer. Frederick Knapp came up for visits, once bringing up items for Adeline from her Brookline house.
In 1855, newly married, Knapp left his position at the church following a bad accident in an Omnibus crash. The Knapps relocated to Walpole, along with Nancy Perkins. An 1858 map shows her house very next door to his. In 1869, Knapp became a preacher in Plymouth, Massachusetts and, again, Nancy Perkins joined the Knapps there.
courtesy, Nancy Osborne Almquist. From a family photograph album compiled and annotated by Elizabeth Osborne (1919-2009), family historian
"Lissy" Perkins (1848-1928) is the young daughter of Stephen Perkins, who also lived in Brookline and was the brother of Nancy Perkins. This photo shows the two of them together, just a couple years after this diary entry with its uncannily similar description. A family descendant writes:
courtesy, Nancy Osborne Almquist. From a family photograph album compiled and annotated by Elizabeth Osborne (1919-2009), family historian
Harriet Elizabeth ("Hatty") Bird, (1837 - 1854). Hatty Bird is most likely 12-year old Harriet Elizabeth Bird, daughter of Jesse and Sarah Bird, whose family lived on the northwest corner of Cypress and Walnut, just down the hill from the church and high school. She is the only child of Jesse Bird's second wife, Sarah Dix Thwing. The family of Jesse Bird's son, John Bird, lived in the house next door. Hatty Bird died in 1854 of consumption.
Margaret Percival was written by Elizabeth Missing Sewell (1815-1906) and first published in 1847. Sewell was an English author who wrote a number of religious and educational books geared to children.
John Gardiner Faxon (1793-1861) was Adeline's father. He worked at James Whiting & Co., lumber importers, at 118 State St., Boston. He was an accomplished violinist and a member of the Handel and Haydn Society of Boston.
courtesy, The Digital Commonwealth
Sarah Mellen (1835-1906) appears to have been Adeline's closest friend. The Mellens lived in this house on Harrison Place, now lower Kent St. The walk to Sarah's house via the streets would have been a number of blocks long but their actual houses were back-to-back.
Harrison Fay was a Boston merchant and the Fay family of five children lived at 43 Linden St., right next door to the Faxons. He was a major financier of St Paul's Episcopal Church which was constructed in 1851/52.
Sarah Tobey Peckham (1836-1855) was Adeline's cousin and they corresponded regularly. The sister of Adeline's mother married Amos Lockwood, brother to Sarah's mother (ref. Family Tree.)
Thomas Bissell (1809-1877), born in England, was a music teacher living in Boston.
