Joseph
Muzzy Graves 
was born May 7, 1793, probably in Shrewsbury, MA. He descended
from Samuel Graves, a Puritain who settled in Lynn,MA., about 1630.
His maternal grandfather,
Joseph Muzzy, was a Minuteman. He marched under Col. Artemas
Ward to engage the British forces on April 19, 1775, in response
to Paul Revere’s alarm that "the British are coming!" Within
nine days, he was reported dead. His wife Hannah bore their
youngest son just nine months later.
The picture of him to the
right is from a portrait painted on a wooden shingle. Painted
into his shoulder, "by W.S. Elwell Pinxt, executed at
one sitting, Springfield, Mass., July 29th, 1838".
I can so clearly see the beginnings of a smile twitching the
corners of his mouth, as though he were trying to hold back
for the sake of the portrait, but having a difficult time doing
so. From letters he wrote to his daughter, we know him to have
been a hearty and enthusiastic man, serving the Lord with great
love and joy!
After Joseph’s death,
his daughter Stella made notes of an interview with his cousin
Annis Parks Boynton. According to those notes, Joseph Graves’ parents
were Crispus Graves and Sarah Muzzy. Crispus was lost at sea
about 1795, and Sarah died four years later. His aunt, Annis
Muzzy Parks, took him into her family, in Franklin Co., MA,
where he learned the trade of shoemaking. Joseph was converted
at the age of 16. Not long after his marriage, he began sensing
a call to the ministry. He left his family for a time to study
first with Rev. Jonathon Going of Worcester, MA, and later
with Rev. Isaiah Matteson, in Shaftsbury, VT. He was ordained
in 1821 (I have his certificate of ordination--it’s backed
with fabric to add durability) in his first church in Royalston,
MA. Shortly before the ordination, he fell sick with the deadly
typhus fever. He thought he would die until he dreamed of Joshua
the high priest in Zach. 3: 4-5, after which he believed he
would live to be ordained and do the Lord’s work. The
fever broke soon after, and his recovery brought great rejoicing
in the church, and as a result revival broke out, many being
saved and added to the church. He served there for five years.
In 1834, he received an honorary master's degree from Middlebury
College in Vermont, the same year in which his son Hiram graduated
there.
Joseph retired from ministry
about 1860, due to poor health--medical records of a granddaughter
state that he was epileptic. He died in Charlestown, a suburb
of Boston, January 15, 1870, and was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery
in Everett, another suburb of Boston.
A summary of his ministry:
1821--Joseph was ordained
in Royalston, MA, his first pastorate.
1826 to 1829--West Townshend and Jamaica,
VT.
1829 to 1834--Jericho,
VT.
1834 to 1840--Ludlow,
VT.
1841 to 1843--Claremont,
NH.
1843--founded and
pastored a church in Tewksbury, MA.
1844 to 1847--Central
Square Baptist Church, in East Boston--Joseph's son Hiram
was their first pastor, but 
retired a year or so later due to
poor health, Joseph took over then.
1847--Methuen, MA.
1850--Bristol, Rhode
Island.
1853 to 1856--Brighton,
MA.
1856--Working with
a church in New Bedford, MA, for a short time. By summer,
he was under a doctor’s care in Ludlow, Vermont.
1857--Pastored in
Newtonville, MA, for one year.
1860 or so--Joseph
gave up the ministry due to poor health, perhaps epilepsy.
He and Susannah spent their last years together in Charlestown,
perhaps living with their son Andrew.
In Sept. 1993,
my family and I visited New England, and saw some of the
places Joseph M. Graves and his family had lived, including
Jericho, VT, where his daughter Stella was born, and his
daughter Sarah Ann died. We were unable to find Sarah’s
grave. But the local historical society sells a book, History
of Jericho, Vermont, 1763-1916, by Hayden, Stevens,
and Wilbur, which was originally published in 1916, and recently
reprinted. In the book was some information about Joseph:
"Pastorate of Elder
Graves:
"An era of prosperity came to the church during the pastorate of Rev.
J. M. Graves, who began in 1829 and stayed four years. The details of his
salary, which were altered three or four times, were at one time that he
should receive $250 in grain and produce, $50 in cash, house rent, fuel,
hay, and pasturing for one horse, and a cow. The salary was raised by assessment
upon the grand list. This was a revival period, and the record of baptisms
was 4 in 1830, 64 in 1831, 18 in 1832. A creed had been adopted at the
beginning of the history of the church, but at this time at more elaborate
and detailed one was substituted . . . . Rev. Tim Spaulding succeeded Elder
Graves in 1833 . . . . The greatest prosperity [of the church] was perhaps
in the ten years’ ministry of Rev. Hiram C. Estes, 1862-1872, but
the most extensive revivals were in 1831 and 1839, under Elders Graves
and Huntly."
Joseph died in 1870.
Here is an obituary:
"Joseph Muzzey Graves
was born in Shrewsbury, MA, in 1793, was baptized into the
fellowship of the Baptist church in Wendell, MA, in 1816, spent
some time in study with Dr. Jonathon Going of Worcester, was
ordained pastor of the church in Royalston in 1821. Here he
labored earnestly and successfully for the Master for five
years. Afterwards he went to Vermont and spent fifteen years
in pastoral work with the churches in Townsend, Jericho, and
Ludlow. His work in Vermont was crowned with very rich blessings,
he being permitted to baptize into the fellowship of these
churches about five hundred converts. After this he served
several churches in Massachusetts with great acceptance, until
about ten years ago, when his health broke down and he was
obliged to retire from active life. The evening of his days
was spent in Charlestown. On the morning of January 15th he "fell
on sleep." He was a devoted Christian and an earnest laborer,
and was permitted to see large results of his labors. He baptized
in all about a thousand persons."
Massachusetts Baptist Convention, 1870
Joseph’s
first son was Hiram
Atwell Graves , a 1834 graduate from
Middlebury College in Vermont. He followed his father into
the ministry, earning the reputation of being a powerful
preacher, and taking a strong abolitionist stance. His
health was poor, however, and he gave up the pulpit to
take on the less physically demanding post as editor of
the Christian magazine, the Watchman and Reflector.
His health continued to wane, and he and his family went to the island
of Jamaica, hoping the time of rest would bring a cure for his pulmonary
illness. It did not, and he returned to die in his father’s home
in Bristol, Rhode Island, on November 3, 1850. His grave is near those
of his parents and his wife in Woodlawn Cemetery, in Everett, MA, a
suburb of Boston.
The epitaph on his gravestone
reads: "Ordained in Springfield in 1836 and afterwards
settled in Lynn and at a later period preached to the Central
Square Society in East Boston as their first minister. For
several years he was editor of the Christian Watchman and Reflector.
An invalid through the greater part of his life, he was always
cheerful, ________such __tive traits in connection with his
suffering gained for him both admiration and sympathy and won
the strongest attachment of a large circle of friends."
The 1846 Boston City Directory
shows Hiram as, Rev., editor Christian Reflector, 11 Cornhill,
house London, E. Boston. An ad for the paper in the "yellow
pages" [which weren’t yet yellow!] reads, "Christian
Reflector, Rev. H. A. Graves; Damrall, Graves & Upham,
11 Cornhill, $2 per year. Baptist."
Joseph’s
younger son Andrew
F. Graves was well known in Christian circles in Boston as a publisher
and seller of 
Christian books. He was loved and respected in
the church there. In his later years, he developed gangrene,
as a complication of diabetes, and the doctor amputated his foot
in an attempt to save his life. Some years later, gangrene
set in again, in his remaining foot. The doctor believed that
amputation was futile this time, and Andrew died Feb. 17, 1894,
in Boston. He was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in Everett, MA,
near his parents and his brother Hiram.
The 1859 Boston City Directory
shows him as, "bookseller, 24 Cornhill, house at Charleston".
He was probably already living at 6 Cedar Street, which we
found to be just a block north of the Bunker Hill Monument,
which is in Charleston. This was the address nephew Hiram Judson
Graves put in his diary -- he and his sisters were living with
Andrew and Amanda after the death of their parents. This was
probably the house his sister Stella and her husband Emery
lived in when their second child was born. In her diary of
her visit to Boston in 1874, Stella listed all her expenses.
One of the entries she made was "Received from Andrew
Rent--$124,45". I believe she and Emery had bought the
house, and when they moved on to another pastorate, Andrew
and his family rented it from them. I think it possible also,
that Joseph and Susannah lived with Andrew at the time of Joseph’s
death. At the time of his death, the family were living at
19 Johnson Ave., in Winthrop, MA.
Cedar Street,
Charlestown, just two blocks from the Bunker Hill Monument
#6 is the first doorway from the left, the former home of the Graves
family
March 1, 2013
Polli Turner
