Henry T. Parker

Quick Facts

Significance:

Boston Vigilance Committee member, counsellor

Place of Birth:

Boston, Massachusetts

Date of Birth:

May 4, 1824

Place of Death:

London, England

Date of Death:

August 18, 1890

Counsellor Henry T. Parker served as a member of the 1850 Boston Vigilance Committee.

Born in Boston on May 4, 1824, Henry Tuke Parker received his education at Harvard College, where he then went on to law school. He became a counsellor in Boston after being admitted to the bar in 1846. An active member of the community, Parker served as part of the Massachusetts Historical Society, a proprietor of the Boston Athenaeum, and as an agent for the Boston Public Library.¹

Living in Boston, Parker also grew involved in social reforms and politics. In 1850, Parker joined the Boston Vigilance Committee, an organization dedicated to aiding those coming to and through Boston who escaped slavery on the Underground Railroad. In November of 1851, Parker donated ten dollars to the organization’s efforts.²

Parker ran for local political positions as a member of the Free Soil Party in the 1850s, alongside fellow Vigilance Committee members such as Henry I. Bowditch, Timothy Gilbert, Nathaniel C. Nash, and John P. Jewett.³

However, in 1855, he left Boston to take up permanent residence in London, England. Living permanently in London, Parker still maintained a connection to his former city; he continued work with the Boston Public Library while abroad, and hosted friends who visited him from Boston. Parker remained in London until his death on August 18, 1890.⁴

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Footnotes

1. “October Meeting, 1890,” in Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 164, https://archive.org/details/jstor-25079711/page/n99/mode/1up; William T. Davis, Bench and Bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, (Boston: Boston History Company, 1895), 452, https://archive.org/details/benchbarofcommon01davi/page/452/mode/1up; “Boston Athenaeum,” Boston Evening Transcript, January 2, 1850, 2; “Recent Deaths,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 21, 1890, 5. 
2. Parker is mapped at his location on the Vigilance Committee's broadside, 4 Court Street. Francis Jackson, Account Book of Francis Jackson, Treasurer The Vigilance Committee of Boston, Dr. Irving H. Bartlett collection, 1830-1880, W. B. Nickerson Cape Cod History Archives, https://archive.org/details/drirvinghbartlet19bart/page/n3/mode/2up, 75; "Members of the Committee of Vigilance," broadside printed by John Wilson, 1850, Massachusetts Historical Society.
3. “Candidates at Massachusetts Election,” Springfield Daily Republican, November 11, 1851, 1; “Free Soil or Republican,” Springfield Daily Republican, November 14, 1851, 1. 
4. Richard Henry Dana Jr., Hospitable England in the Seventies, (London: J. Murray, 1921), 11, https://archive.org/details/hospitableenglan00danauoft/page/11/mode/1up; Boston Public Library, Annual Report 1856-7, (Boston: Boston Public Library, 1857), 41, https://archive.org/details/annualreport185657bost/mode/2up; Recent Deaths,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 21, 1890, 5; The Spectator, August 5, 1938, 237, https://archive.org/details/sim_spectator-uk_1938-08-05_161_5745/page/237/mode/1up.