Major William Erving
Lest we take him to be the perfect intellectual, Harvard records show William was fined for playing cards and missing church services. Friendships made at Harvard would endure; Oliver Wendell (listed below) continued his relationship with the Ervings, and served as an Executor for the wills of both William, and his father, John. (2)
Graduation list published 23 July 1753 (3)
William continued his
education, but was absent from his "second degree" ceremony at
Harvard because he was "gone to the expedition against Crown
Point." He was known as a military engineer. His career took him to
the second battle of Louisburg-now Cape Breton Island-and he was with General
Wolfe at the British victory at Quebec in 1759.(4) The surrender of
the French ended the French and Indian War in New England, but Britain's Seven
Years War continued. William participated in the siege of Havana in 1762.
Most of the portraits that depict
the second generation of Ervings were painted at the time of their marriages. In
his will, William states, "whereas I have never been married and so of
course have not benefitted society by adding to their number.” If he sat for a
portrait, its disposition is unknown.
William requested a grant of land for his
military service, which was defined in June of 1775. He received 4,368 acres
and 3 rods in northern New Hampshire from King George, through the Provincial
Governor of New Hampshire. The grant was subject to establishing a road and
settling three families, paying taxes, and growing hemp or flax on 10% of the
land. Timber suitable for ship’s masts would also be reserved for His Majesty’s
Navy.(5) The land is mountainous without a waterway
to transport lumber from the interior. During the Revolution, William was
unable to fulfill the terms of his grant. Although undeveloped, the land
is still unincorporated as Erving's Location in Coos County, just south of
present Dixville Notch. The population was recorded as 31 in 1920, but none
were enumerated in most other years of record. There are a handful of vital records
that indicate a birth or death in the grant.
William may have sat out the war in New Hampshire; he did not fight with the Continentals. He was reportedly jailed briefly upon his return to Boston. The Massachusetts Legislature acted on his petition on 8 February 1786 to "naturalize" William Erving as a citizen of the Commonwealth, giving him all rights, liberties, and privileges as if he had been present at the establishment of the government. (6)
William Erving died 27 May 1791. Although he had inherited a sizable fortune from his father only a few years earlier, he did not inherit his father’s longevity; William did not live to see his 57th birthday. His simple Roxbury house was valued at only $20 in his estate inventory, while the Marlboro Street home that he had inherited from his father was valued at $1,350. With his furniture and kitchenware that are enumerated, the inventory of his personal property included four wigs, and from his military past, his gun and bayonet, two swords, and a pair of pistols. His scientific tools included a compass, a spyglass, a thermometer and barometer, and "a case of instruments." He valued education and had acquired a large library. He willed a portion of the land he had inherited from his father, 120 acres in the Town of Wendell, to support a school there. He wrote, "Whereas I think it of the highest consequence that Learning should be preserved among us for fear from the great inattention threat that people will relapse into a State of Barbarism." He also gave a lot to the Town to support a minister. (11)
THE REMAINS OF
MAJOR WILLIAM ERVING
ARE DEPOSITED
IN THIS
TOMB. (13)
