John Lowell - Early Life and Family

Early Life and Family

John Lowell's ancestor, Percival, a merchant, came from Bristol, England, to Newbury, Massachusetts, in 1639, and his father, John, was the first minister of Newburyport, where he officiated 1726-67. The minister married Sarah Champney, and “The Old Judge” was their second son, born in Newburyport. He was the only child to survive infancy. John was among the third generation in the Lowell family to be born in the New World and the second generation to attend Harvard College. Like his father before him, Lowell graduated at the age of 17, in 1760. John was admitted to the bar in 1763 and soon established his law practice in Newburyport, Massachusetts.

Lowell married his first wife, Sarah (January 14, 1745 – May 5, 1772), daughter of Stephen Higginson and Elizabeth Cabot, on January 8, 1767. John and Sarah had three children, Anna Cabot (1768–1810), John Lowell, Jr. (1769–1840) and Sarah Champney Lowell (1771–1851). John the younger, known within his family as The Boston Rebel, and later as The Roxbury Farmer for his love of agriculture and support of botanical studies, produced the clan line that included businessmen (John Amory Lowell, Augustus Lowell, and Ralph Lowell), federal judges (John Lowell and James Arnold Lowell) and siblings (author and innovator Percival Lowell, Harvard President Abbott Lawrence Lowell, and poet Amy Lowell). Lowell's wife, Sarah, died on May 5, 1772.

Lowell married his second wife, Susanna(1754–77), daughter of Francis Cabot and Mary Fitch, on May 31, 1774. Together they had two children, Francis Cabot (1775–1817) and Susanna Cabot (1776–1816). Francis Cabot became a leader and innovator in American industry; the city of Lowell, Massachusetts, is named in his honor. Descendants of Francis Cabot include businessman and philanthropist John Lowell, Jr., federal judge Francis Cabot Lowell, and architect Guy Lowell. Susanna died on March 30, 1777.

At the onset of the American Revolution, and after Susanna's death, seizing upon the opportunity as the wealthy Tories of Boston fled local hostility for the safety of England, abandoning their grand estates, John Lowell relocated his children to Roxbury, Massachusetts, and his law practice to Boston. On December 25, 1778, John married his third wife, Rebecca (1747–1816), widow of James Tyng and daughter of Judge James Russell and Katharine Graves.

John and Rebecca had four children, Rebecca Russell (1779–1853), Charles Russell (1782–1861), Elizabeth Cutts (1788–1864) and Mary (1786–89). Charles Russell's son was the famous American poet James Russell Lowell; his grandsons included the American Civil War hero Gen. Charles Russell Lowell and Boston banker and family lawyer William Lowell Putnam. His great-great-grandson was the poet Robert Lowell.

It is through John Lowell's daughter-in-law, the wife of Francis Cabot, Hannah Jackson (1776–1815), who was a granddaughter of Edward and Dorthy (Quincy) Jackson, that descendants of both the Francis Cabot and John Amory families claim relation to the Holmeses of Boston, which include poet Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. and U.S. Supreme Court Justice and Civil War hero Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr..

Other notable children of the daughters and granddaughters of John Lowell include mathematician Julian Lowell Coolidge, and writer and biographer Ferris Lowell Greenslet.