ANDOVERS HISTORIC INDUSTRIES and HOMES AT
DAM #3 ON THE SHAWSHEEN RIVER AT PRESENT
STEVENS and NORTH MAIN STREET:

1.Lovejoys grist mill; west side of the shawsheen river at dam. On march 24, 1778 it becomes Phillips grist mill.

2.Phillips powder mill #1 march 1776 first in the Commonwealth; on the east side of river with 3 separate buildings (powder, Magazine and drying). Mill race still present.

3.June 1778 an explosion at the powder mill # 1, as a result three employees were killed and their mangled bodies were buried close by at the William Bell house near to the Dillaway house.

4.Phillips and Houghton Paper Mill 1788/1789 on the east side of river, at dam.

5.Phillips powder mill # 2 approximately 1795 on the west side of river and very north of the dam nd much smaller in size.

6.Phillips powder mill # 2 fire and explosion and 2 men killed and 1 buried at South Church Cemetary the other?

7.Mr. Marland bought 30 acres of this property and turn it into a large textile operation in 1828.

Excerpt from "Andover in the American Revolution" (Harris) Pg.1

Chapter I

ANDOVER IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

 In the period considered by this work, Andover was a town situated in the northeastern part of the British Province of Massachusetts Bay, on the southern or right bank of the Merrimack River and on the western boundary of Essex County. The town had been originally set aside for settlement in 1634, but permanent settlers did not begin arriving until 1641 and the town was not incorporated as such until 1646.
   Following the Treaty of Paris of 1763, ending the Seven Years War, or the French and Indian War, as we know it in this hemisphere the British territorial acquisitions gave them unbroken control of the Atlantic coast of North America from Laborador to the Floridas Quebec and Nova Scotia (including the present-day New Brunswick) and Ile. St. Jean (the present-day Prince Edward Island) and other small islands in the St. Lawrence River were ceded by France, (France retained the islands of St Pierre and Miquelon off Newfoundland) while East and West Florida were ceded by Spain as part of the complicated transfers of territorv which followed the war. Newfoundland was already under British jurisdiction at the time and Laborador was added to the former, under the terms of the 1763 treaty. (See Map I.)
   No map exists of the town of Andover which adequately shows its boundaries, physical features and roads in the second half of the Eighteenth Century. The 1795 map surveyed by John Farnum and Moses Abbot at State direction and deposited in the Archives, shows the town boundaries and main roads, the ponds and Shawsheen River, but little else. The earliest complete map is that of 1830.The 1830map is being used herein as an illustration, as it does represent the size and shape of the town, it's hills and waterways, but the road net is, of course, inaccurate for representation of the situation 50 years earlier.

Excerpt from "Andover in the American Revolution" (Harris) Pg.9

  No public library, as we now think of the term, seems to have existed as early as the later Eighteenth Century. However, there was what was known as the "Andover Social Library" in being at least as early as 1770. It was maintained by private subscription. Membership in this society was limited to persons living within a radius of ten miles of the North Meeting House. Membership included payment of a fee of "not less than four dollars in cash."We are led to understand that the books of the Social Library were kept in Samuel Phillips' store which was conducted in a room in Mr. Phillips' house.
   A number of small mills for cutting timber, grinding corn and the like, had been established on the waterways in Andover from the early days of the town. The Shawsheen River and the Cochichewick Brook were particularly well suited to this small type of operation, and we have already seen reference to some of the mills in the votes on the control of fishing in the town. However, no manufacturing as we think of it today was undertaken in the town until the establishment of a powder mill on the Shawsheen River by Samuel Phillips, Jr., in early 1776. This mill was established under the provisions of a resolve of the General Court and was intended to supply the deficiency in gunpowder from which the colonies suffered in the early part of the Revolutionary War. It will be discussed in more detail elsewhere. As will be seen, this mill was later converted to the manufacture of paper and had a profound effect upon the industrial development of the town.
   The steps taken by the town to provide for the poor men and women living within its bounds represents an attitude characteristic of the times. At the town meeting in March, 1760, the proposal having been made that the town build a work house, it "passed in the negative," as the expression goes. Similarly, at the adjourned town meeting in March, 1767, an identical proposal was turned down. It does not seem to have been until the town meeting of March, 1784, that the town granted authority to "enable the Overseers of the Poor to provide a workhouse for the reception of the poor of said town and for idle loitering persons who waste and mispend there time"

From Andover Advertiser October 29th 1853 Pg.2:

   A Powder Mill, in the winter of 1775—6, vas built in this town at great expense, by s. Phillips, Jun.Esq., which was probably the first in the country.  It was located on the east side of the Shawshin river, where the wooden factory now stands. owned by the Marland Manufacturing Co.

   At a considerable distance from the mill, were the dry house and magazine; the latter building standing very near the spot where Nathan Frye has  recently built a new house.  In l778,June 1, the Powder mill vas blovn up, aud three persons were killed viz. Joseph Abbott; Josiah Johnson; and Ebeneza Currier.'  The mangled bodies with their fragments were taken to a house which stood near the Dillaway house; owned by William Bell, from which they were buried.  Josiah Johnsonwas expecting soon to be married to Polly Ballard.  After he was killed  she became the wife of Henry Phelps, now residing in the West Parish.

   Mr. David Holt lived and had a blacksmith shop where the brick block now stands near Marland's factory. Mr. H. at the time of the accident was moving in a field near by.  On hearing the report, he ran to the river and passed water to put out the fire. Being warm at the time, he contracted an acute rheumatism, from which he never recovered, and  as ever afterwards an invalid.  A part of his shop was blown in, and all the glass and crockery in his house was broken, except the looking glass plate, which was knocked from the frame and was aftervards found stannding up in one corner of the room.  This relic of by gone days is preserved by his daughter, Miss Sarah Holt, with very great care.  The west end of the house occupied by Josiah Lovejoy,where Chandler Moar now lives, was
blown in, and much damage done in the vicinity of the disaster.

   In l788, the making of powder was discontinued in the mill, and the manufacture of paper substituted.  This business was carried on by Phillips & Houghton.  The mill was burned in 1811, and rebuilt the next year.  About $10,000 in value of paper was made here annually, for several years, and twenty persons were constantly employed.  Amos Blanchard, Daniel Poor, and Abel Blanchard continued the business until the building, was sold to Marland Manufacturing Co. about twenty years since.

   After the manufacture of powder had been suspended for a while, the demand for the article was so great that a mill was built of smal1er dimensions than the former one, on the west side of the river, a little more than half the distance from the brick factory  to the house of Mr. Stimpson, and the magazine and dry house were situated very near where his barn now stands.In October, 1796, the magazine was discovered by a drover to be on fire near the chimney, upon the roof.  The inside of the building wss lined with brick and covered with a double thickness of plastering.  The alarm was immediately given, and sentinels were placed at differeut points to give the people warning of the impending danger.  Moses Abbott commuinicated tha intelligence to Mr. Phillips, the owner, who, although  he regretted the heavy loss about to fall on him, comfort he himself with the reflection that timely notice had been given and no one would be injured.  In this conclusion however he was sadly disappointed.  Two persons were killed by the explosion, David Hall and Peter Mccarty; ad Jebidiah Burtt was so much injured  by the shock that he never fully recovered from it.

The mother of Hall came from Quebec and lived in a small house situated a little west of Doct. Johnson's barn.  She was a baker, and furnished cake for trainings and town meetings, and carried on quite an extensive business in that line.

McCarty, although warned of danger, insisted that the Americans could not make powder that would kill a Frenchmen like him. Mr. Burtt had stopped at the blacksmith shop of Mr.  Abner Abbott, who lived on what is known at the "Kneeland place",  for the purpose of getting his horse shod.  McCarty boarded with Mr. Abbott.—— When it was announced that the magazine was on fire, they hastened to the scene of danger, exihibiting more  zeal than discretion.  Mr. Abbott took a ladder from the building a short time before it blew up, and others ventured very near the building, simply to remove shingles, and lumber, and only escaped with their lives by being in the valley below, while the building and contents were thrown with great force above them.

There was in the building at the time, fifteen hundred pounds of powder, which had been sold to a Mr. Derby of Boston, for one dollar per lb.  Saltpetre at this time was worth seventy—five cents a pound.

From Andover Advertiser October 29, l853 p2.