The Forbes family of Boston were descended from the Forbes of Newe through a minister in East Florida. They married into the wealthy merchants called the “Boston Brahmins” and became themselves wealthy traders.
John Forbes (1670 – 1739), a younger son of William Forbes, 5th laird of Newe, purchased the estate of Deskrie after his father’s death in 1698. John married Margaret Farquharson of Belenach in 1699 and died in 1739. His son Archibald sold Deskrie to Alexander Mitchell, merchant of Aberdeen, and died in 1793.
His eldest son John Forbes (1740 - 1783) received his Masters of Arts at King's College in Aberdeen. He became a clergyman and was appointed Minister at St. Augustine in East Florida in 1763. He took up the post the following year. In 1769, he traveled to Boston, where he married Dorothy Murray (1745-1837), daughter of James Murray, a member of the North Carolina Assembly. The couple returned to St. Augustine and had three children: James Grant Forbes (1769-1825), John Murray Forbes (1771-1831), and Ralph Bennet Forbes (1773 – 1824).
Dorothy Murray Forbes eventually returned to Boston with the children. From 1763 to 1783, John Forbes served in a variety of governmental positions, including on Governor's Council and various judgeships, including the position of chief justice. During the American Revolutionary War, John Forbes remained loyal to the English Crown and returned to England in 1783 when Florida was ceded to Spain in the Treaty of Paris.
His youngest son Ralph married Margaret Perkins (1773-1856) and had three sons Thomas Tunno Forbes (1802-1829), Capt. Robert Bennet (Ben) Forbes (1804-1889), and John Murray Forbes (1813-1898). The three brothers built their initial fortunes working with their uncle Thomas Handasyd Perkins (1764-1854). Thanks to bequests from his grandfather and father-in-law, Perkins amassed a huge fortune as a slave trader in Haiti, a fur trader from the American Northwest to China, and then a major smuggler of Turkish opium into China when the port of Canton was opened to foreign businesses in 1785.
In 1817 at the age of 13, nephew Robert Bennet (Ben) joined the crew on his uncle Thomas' Canton Packet and made his first voyage to China, the first of the three brothers to do so. After more than 10 years at sea, he was promoted captain. When his uncle’s company merged with Russell & Company in 1830, Captain Ben took command of the opium storehouse vessel Lintin. He supervised the repacking of the opium and negotiated trades with drug smugglers. He visited China several times and became the American vice-consul at Canton. His oldest bother Thomas followed him into the business but died in a typhoon in China in 1829.
His younger brother John first joined him in the business but then shifted his efforts to the railroad business. He became president of both the Michigan Central railroad and the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad in the 1850s.
In 1847, the brothers Captain Ben Forbes and John Forbes embarked on America’s first international relief effort, bringing food to County Cork during the Irish Potato Famine. The “Great Famine,” as it was called within Ireland, was initially caused by a potato blight, which infected crops throughout Europe during the 1840s. The brothers attended a public meeting on February 18, 1847, at Faneuil Hall featuring poet and abolitionist John Greenleaf Whittier (1807 – 1892.) The assembly created the Boston-based relief committee, formally called the New England Committee for the Relief of lreland and Scotland (NECRIS). Its mission was to organize relief efforts and accept contributions from individuals throughout New England. The Committee was chaired by Boston Mayor Josiah Quincy, Jr.
On Sunday, February 21, the Forbes brothers submitted a relief plan to textile magnate Abbott Lawrence who was vice president of the relief committee. They proposed that the Committee should petition Congress to furnish and retrofit a warship currently idle in the Navy Yard. Ben Forbes reported that the sloop-of-war USS Jamestown was almost ready for sea and that he would volunteer to command it. The Committee took the advice and petitioned Congress to lend them a warship to deliver relief provisions to Ireland. President Polk approved a joint resolution passed by Congress on March 3, 1847. On March 28, 1847, Captain Forbes sailed the USS Jamestown, stripped of guns and loaded with more than 8,000 barrels of bread, beans, pork, peas, corn, flour, rice, beef, potatoes and other supplies. Captain Ben Forbes detailed his mission in a report to the Committee called “the Voyage of the Jamestown on Her Errand of Mercy.”
In 1860, John Murray Forbes became an elector for Abraham Lincoln and served as the Chairman of the Republican National Committee during the administration of President Abraham Lincoln. John was elected as a delegate to the Republican conventions of 1876, 1880 and 1884. However, he eventually became displeased with the Republican party and worked successfully to get Democrat Grover Cleveland elected President.
Captain Ben Forbes and John Forbes built a mansion in Milton, Massachusetts, in 1833 for their mother Margaret Perkins Forbes. At first, the house was used only in spring and fall, since the family wintered in Boston and summered in Maine. Margaret shared the residence with her four daughters, Emma Perkins, Margaret Perkins, Mary Abbot, and Cornelia Frances. With the exception of Mary Abbot, none were married, and all remained at the mansion for their lifetimes.
In 1871, Captain Ben’s son, James Murray Forbes (1845–1937), came to live at Forbes House with his new wife, Alice Francis Bowditch Forbes (1848–1929), and made considerable renovations to the home. His daughter, Mary Bowditch Forbes (1878–1962) was the last family member to live permanently at the mansion.
In 1962, Mary bequeathed the property to her nephew, Dr. Henry Ashton Crosby Forbes (1925–2012) who converted the estate into a museum two years later. Today, the Forbes House Museum is furnished with the family's furniture, art, and American, European, and Old China Trade heirlooms. The museum also contains Mary’s large collection of Abraham Lincoln memorabilia and a replica of Lincoln's birthplace cabin. She wrote, “I am providing this trust as a memorial to Abraham Lincoln, in the hope that the opportunity to the public from time to time…to visit the Cabin and see its contents will help to foster a strong and active appreciation of what our nation owes to Abraham Lincoln as a man and as an inspiration to the maintenance of our ideals of citizenship.”
The Forbes House Museum is located at 215 Adams Street, Milton, Massachusetts 02186, at the website www.forbeshousemuseum.org, via telephone at (617) 696.1815, and via e-mail at info@forbeshousemuseum.org.
For more information:
Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, edited by his daughter Sarah Forbes Hughes (1899)
Robert Bennet Forbes Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society
Personal Reminiscences: Rambling Recollections Connected with China, by Robert Bennet Forbes (1878)
Letters from China: The Canton-Boston Correspondence of Robert Bennet Forbes, 1838-1840 (Maritime), edited by Phyllis Forbes Kerr
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