SKETCH 



OF THE 



LIFE OF ANDREW JACKSON HOWE. 



ANDREW JACKSON HOWE was born in Paxton, 

 Worcester county, Massachusetts, on the 14th of 

 April, 1825, and was the fourth of nine children. His 

 father was Samuel H. Howe, and his mother Elizabeth 

 Hubbard Moore. John Howe, mentioned in Savage's 

 Biographical Dictionary as living in Watertown, and 

 his son, one,, of the principal settlers of Sudbury, 

 petitioner for the grant of Marlboro in 1657, after- 

 ward residing there, were the earliest of this branch 

 of the Howe family in America. The grandson of 

 John Howe of Marlboro went to Paxton in the first 

 part of the eighteenth century, and bought a consider- 

 able tract of land, building the house upon it in 1743, 

 where four generations of the family have lived, and 

 which at the present time is in a good state of pres- 

 ervation. 



This was the birthplace of Dr. Howe, and al- 

 though his father removed to Leicester, three or four 

 miles distant, when he was but a few years old, the 

 picturesque scenes of hill, woodland and stream had 

 already indelibly impressed his mind. He had a 

 strong imaginative temperament, but it was not devel- 

 oped in a marked degree. In his writings the poet- 

 ical impulse can often be discerned. 



(5) 



