Which Buck stopped here?

The Buck family had its own prominence.

Several branches of the family originating in Haverhill, Massachusetts, arrived early on in Eastport.

The most celebrated and traceable line descends from Revolutionary War Colonel Jonathan Buck (1719-1795), who came to Maine and gave the Penobscot Bay town of Bucksport its name. He is best known through a questionable story of a witch he supposedly sentenced who then cursed him at her execution.

His son, Captain Ebenezer Buck (1752-1824), born in Haverhill, built the first framed house in Bucksport, but because he was captain of the local militia, the British burned it during the Revolutionary War.

So much for broader historical importance.

Ebenezer’s son Jonathan (1796-1843) brought the line to Eastport. He was a member of the Eastport Light Infantry in 1818 during the War of 1812, as was a John Buck.

Beyond that, Jonathan’s “business life was passed at Eastport, where as a merchant, he was associated with a Mr. Pillsbury, of Portland, Maine,” as one account noted, while the Eastport Sentinel in October 1839 reported,

“Died, in this town, on Wednesday last, Jonathan Buck, Esq., aged forty-three years. Mr. Buck belonged to that class of men who may well be called the creators of the wealth of a community. To an untiring energy, which enabled him to accomplish more than most men, he added an enterprise, energy, and intellect well fitted to direct the exertions of others. In every relation of life, he will be missed and lamented. To his family the loss is irreparable. Those whose labor he has for years directed will miss their guide. The community loses one of its leading men and little at this time can it bear the loss. He rests from a life of severe labor, and when such a man dies, we feel that a part of society has gone.”

The account was signed by Seth B. Mitchell, editor.

Another line in the Passamaquoddy area came through Captain Eliphalet Buck. The 1820 Census for Eastport includes an Eliphalet Buck, who wed Mehitable Vose in 1818 in Robbinston, Maine, and drowned in 1836.

None of this, though, pointed toward our house.

Only later, after learning that Fisher Ames Buck had once owned our house, could I sense a different route going back to Jacob Buck, half-brother of the Bucksport founder. Jacob’s wife was Hannah Eames, a surname that evolved into Ames. They had six sons, four of their fates unknown, as far as I can tell.

That line led through Canada and the Loyalists who left the United States at the end of the Revolutionary War. You probably weren’t taught about them in your American history classes, but they were a significant factor around here, as I’ve learned in this project.