I bought the above book from a well known auction site the other day and it arrived this morning. It was published by (ahem) The Religious Tract Society and it says under the title – A New England Story. I think it was published around about 1890-1900. It also has the title Lee Chester.
I collect postcards and old prints of the town of Dumbarton because I was brought up there from the age of 5. The photograph on the left hand side (west) of my header is of Dumbarton Castle/Rock. So when I saw this book for sale I thought I might as well buy it, thinking that it would be something to do with Dumbarton Oaks in the US – but it isn’t.
Chapter II begins:
Dumbarton lay amid the hills, the principal part of the town nestling in a broad valley around which rose undulating slopes, growing still higher in the distance, till far away they rose to mountains, bounding the township with a granite barrier. It had taken its name from that old city on the Clyde, whence a large number had come in early colonial times to find in this new land ‘freedom to worship God,’ and had bestowed upon the little settlement they founded the name of their birthplace.
I haven’t been able to find any mention of a town in America with the name of Dumbarton, only Dumbarton House in Washington, so I’m wondering if it is purely fictional or if there is such a place in New England.
Has anybody heard of Lucy Lincoln Montgomery? Obviously it’s a Scottish name so maybe she or her family originally came from Dumbarton. I discovered that she wrote a few books and possibly a poem about a little quaker girl who sewed a tuck in her dress, but I can’t find out anything about LLM herself.
Can anybody help?
Hiya, I just stumbled across your post while I was researching how to find postcards of Dumbarton. There is a town in the (apparently exact) centre of New England called Dunbarton. Named after Dunbartonshire which was the hometown of a prominent settler, Archibald Stark (wikipedia). All I could find about Lucy Lincoln Montgomery was that she was a friend of Lucy Maud Montgomery, (author of Anne of Green Gables) (http://lmm.confederationcentre.com/english/tourists/tourists-2.html)
http://dunbartonnh.org/ , the towns official website. Think I’ll just wait until the castle opens back up, or find a way to print my own postcards.
Mary,
Thanks for the info, I didn’t know about the New England town. I have quite a lot of old postcards of Dumbarton but have only got around to putting some of them on Pinterest – which you can see here. https://www.pinterest.co.uk/katrinastephen/dumbarton/. You might be able to print out copies, let me know if you want something a bit more modern. The photo at the top of my blog is of Dumbarton, taken from the top of the castle last year, I showed it to my brother who hasn’t been to the town for over 40 years as he lives abroad and he didn’t recognise the town at all. The pile of rubble in the photo is what is left of the Ballantines distillery.
Regards, Katrina