From the Vineyard Gazette edition of March 24, 1939:

The house which has now become the editorial office of the Vineyard Gazette is an old one. In recent years it has been unkempt and down at the heel, and not a few passersby thought that the town would be better without it. That was the effect not only in age, but of a fall from grace which many old houses suffer.

In the beginning, the house was the home of Capt. Benjamin Smith. Just when this beginning was, it is impossible to say with exactness, but there is proof that a Captain Smith lived here during the Revolution. He was a commander of Island militia then, and the Island was worried about the threat of British invasion.

This was the first company raised on the Island during the war, and it consisted of three commissioned and eight non-commissioned officers, two musicians and thirty-one privates. The two musicians were Joseph Shed, drummer, and Samuel Frothingham, fifer.

There is no evidence that the company saw any particular action, but there was not much action on the Vineyard to see. On the face of it, it was impracticable to make the Island independent of the king’s navy and the king’s troops. If there had been any real military value in this place, the British would have occupied it. But since there was little value of the sort, the Island drifted. Benjamin Smith was in command at Edgartown and Nathan Smith at Tisbury. The two companies, by the democratic process in force at the time, elected Barachiah Bassett as their major.

On Sept. 10, 1776, Major Bassett issued the following field orders, which are quoted by Dr. Banks:

“As there appears some danger of an attack every soldier is required to repair to his Barrack at Eight of the Clock every Evening on Tattoo Beating.”

But in November of that year, the provincial council ordered the discharge of most of the troops on the Vineyard, and the Island was abandoned to neutrality. Except for the exploits of Capt. Nathan Smith and a few other individuals, this about completes the military history of the Vineyard, as a community, in the Revolution.

Benjamin Smith was prominent in his time, as the military record has indicated already. He serves as sheriff, and was often a member of important committees of the town. Two of his sons became successful ship-masters. Many Islanders of today trace back to him.

His children were: Richard W., Benjamin, James, Ebenezer, Enoch, Fanny and Jonathan.

It was Ebenezer who took over the house. Which sons were the ship-masters it is now difficult to say, but it is known that Jonathan died at sea about 1812. Whether he died in war or in the ordinary labor of the ocean is not recorded. At any rate Benjamin Smith sold the homestead to his son Ebenezer, with certain reservations.

Evidently, despite the parental relationship, Captain Smith was determined that his son Ebenezer should be legally bound to recognize his rights.

In the stipulation that the parents should be permitted to wash and bathe in the kitchen for the rest of their natural lives, there is a hint of the cold winters of those old times. Although the old house has eight fireplaces, it could hardly have had any other form of heat and much of the year the privilege of the warm kitchen was doubtless valuable.

Ebenezer owned the house until three years after the death of his distinguished father. Then he sold to Matthew Pease, in October, 1824. Only a year later Matthew Pease sold to Dennis Ripley, a mariner, and a Noank man.

For the past generation or so the house has been known as the Mills house, after Isaiah Mills who occupied part of it for many years. Finally, in 1858, Captain Mills sold half the house to Jonathan H. Munroe, for the sum of $200.

This brings the story of the old house down to modern times. Jonathan Munroe was a distinguished citizen of Edgartown in his day. At first divided into two apartments, the old house was finally increased further in size by an addition at the rear, and turned into a four family establishment, probably the only structure of the kind on the Vineyard. It would be useless to pretend that the ancient landmark maintained its social position in the community. Once the home of prominent citizens, it now sank in its pretensions, and finally had no pretensions at all.

For some years past it had gone familiarly by the nickname The Beehive, because, as a four family house, it was so thickly populated.

Thus matters stood when the property was acquired by the Gazette last summer. The old home of Benjamin Smith, built before the Revolution, the scene of stirring incidents through the years, the birthplace and home of prominent Islanders, and a place of considerable inherent beauty, will now be preserved, it is hoped, for centuries more into the future.

Compiled by Hilary Wall
library@mvgazette.com