... 18 Ephraim (9 Jeremiah, 1 John) born 6 July, 1791, died 22 March, 1877, married 8 June, 1826, Mary Ann Sage, born 1 Apr., 1805, daughter of Daniel and Deborah (Silsbee) Sage, of Salem. ...
... Ephraim was early initiated into the mysteries of commerce. So early as the summer of 1806, when he was fifteen, he had sent an adventure to Alexandria, Va., in the hands of his half-brother John Ives. This was followed by his employment in the countingroom of Clifford Crowninshield, who was cousin to John Ives, sen., from May, 1807, till the death of his employer.
In 1810 he was clerk to Robert Stone, jr.
In 1811 he made a voyage to Russia in the ship Mary Ann, as clerk to Capt. Timothy Wellman.
During the locally unpopular war of 1812, with its long period of enforced idleness, doubly bitter to enterprising young Federalists, he was sergeant of "The Essex Guards," a company mostly made up of young seafarers and justly famous for drill and military discipline, though never called upon for duty away from home.
Meanwhile he was Ensign of "The Washington Rangers" a company organized about 1807, and made up of those too young to serve in the militia. Some account of this company and the speech of the Ensign, on accepting colors presented to the company on July 4, 1808, may be found in the Historical Collections of the Essex Institute, Vol. VI, p. 202.
An order, still extant, dated Camp (on the Neck near the Willows) 25 July, 1814, instructs "Seargent E. Emerton" how to post the guard under his command that night on Crowningshield's wharf, and another, dated 29th of the same month, directs Ephraim Emmerton and three others "to inspect the arms and accoutrements [sic] of the members of the Company of Essex Guards at their respective places of abode."
After the war came a period of active employment as supercargo in the ships Francis, Glide, China, and especially the famous George, that well known type of the American merchant ship of her day, making her annual Calcutta voyage with almost the regularity of the steam service of to-day, handy, swift and lucky, but so small that her supercargo was bantered one day while visiting a huge Company-ship off Sand Heads, with an offer to hoist her on deck and give her a life homeward. Not much abashed, he suggested a comparison of invoices, and the little George's indigoes and silks far outweighed in that scale the cargo of the bulky boaster.
After his marriage he remained in Salem employing his capital at first in the familiar Calcutta channels, but afterwards for many years in the Zanzibar trade, in which he was among the first to engage.
He owned the brig Richmond, the barque Sophronia, and an interest in several other vessels. He was Alderman 1839-41, and held many places of honor and trust in the gift of his fellow-citizens, but was deterred, as the years went on, from accepting the more prominent positions for which he was nominated, by deafness, which seriously impaired his hearing a mixed conversation.
He was much interested in the "Old Aqueduct," and on his resignation of office in 1850, received "the thanks of the stockholders for the able and acceptable manner in which he had discharged the duties of Director, Vice President and President of the corporation for several years past."
In 1831, he bought the estate No. 13 Summer street. The house, built about 1762, was somewhat noted in the Revolution as the residence of William Pynchon who built it and who refused to repair, otherwise than by covering with boards, his front windows which had been shattered by a mob that resented his Toryism.
President John Adams in his diary under the date of 1766, mentions a pleasant evening at Mr. Pynchon's with a jolly party of lawyers over nuts and wine, pipes and tobacco.
John Derby, the second owner, was specially deputed by the Boston Committee of Safety to carry their account of the battles of Lexington and Concord to England.
Here the subject of our sketch was privileged to live nearly half a century, enjoying a full share of "that which should accompany old age As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends."
And if, as the years passed by, his mental powers did seem to fail him, his bodily health was remarkably preserved, and he enjoyed a great amount of outdoor exercise till within a week of his happy, painless death.
