Benjamin Pickman Jr.

{{Short description|American politician (1763–1843)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=July 2020}}  {{Infobox officeholder | name = Benjamin Pickman Jr. | image = BenjaminPickman ca1843 byChesterHarding MFABoston.jpeg | state = [[Massachusetts]] | district = [[Massachusetts's 2nd congressional district|2nd]] | term_start = March 4, 1809 | term_end = March 3, 1811 | preceded = [[Joseph Story]] | succeeded = [[William Reed (politician)|William Reed]] | office3 = Member of the [[Massachusetts House of Representatives]] | term3 = 1797-1802<br>1812-1813 | office4 = Member of the [[Massachusetts Senate]] | term4 = 1803 | birth_date = {{birth date|1763|9|30}} | birth_place = [[Salem, Massachusetts|Salem]], [[Province of Massachusetts Bay]], [[British America]] | death_date = {{Death date and age|1843|8|16|1763|9|30}} | death_place = [[Salem, Massachusetts|Salem]], [[Massachusetts]], U.S. | resting_place = | party = [[Federalist Party|Federalist]] | spouse = Anstiss Derby | relations = | children = Hasket Derby Pickman, [[Benjamin T. Pickman]]<ref>{{Citation | last= Roberts |first= Oliver Ayer| title = History of the Military company of the Massachusetts, now called The Ancient and Honorable Company of Massachusetts. Volume II. 1738-1828.| page = 408 | publisher = The Ancient and Honorable Company of Massachusetts. | location = Boston, MA | year = 1897}}</ref> | alma_mater = | occupation = | profession = | signature = | website = | footnotes = | allegiance = | branch = | service_years = | rank = | commands = | battles = | awards = }}

'''Benjamin Pickman Jr.''' (September 30, 1763 – August 16, 1843) was a [[United States House of Representatives|U.S. representative]] from [[Massachusetts]].

==Biography== Pickman was born in [[Salem, Massachusetts|Salem]] in the [[Province of Massachusetts Bay]], a descendant of Benjamin Pickman, an Englishman from [[Bristol]].<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=V4yBOCV5-pEC&dq=%22benjamin+pickman%22+bristol&pg=PA161 The Founders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Sarah Sprague Saunders Smith, Sun Printing Company, Pittsfield, Mass., 1897]</ref><ref>[http://www.pem.org/museum/newmanuscripts8-08.pdf Naturalization papers of Benjamin Pickman, Dudley Leavitt Pickman Papers, Phillips Library Collection, Peabody Essex Museum, pem.org] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141218203340/http://www.pem.org/museum/newmanuscripts8-08.pdf |date=December 18, 2014 }}</ref> Pickman graduated from [[Harvard University]] in 1784 after having attended Dummer Academy (now known as [[The Governor's Academy]]). The descendant of a Salem merchant family dynasty related to other prominent Salem families such as the Derbys, the Pickerings and the Crowninshields,<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=qRURAAAAYAAJ&dq=pickman+derby+house+washington+street+salem&pg=PA112 Pickman House, Essex Institute Historical Collections, Essex Institute, Peabody Essex Museum, Vol. XXXIX, Printed for the Society, Salem, 1903]</ref> Pickman studied law in [[Newburyport, Massachusetts]], and was [[Admission to the bar in the United States|admitted to the bar]], but soon relinquished the practice of law to engage in commercial pursuits, becoming one of the most active merchants of his day in Salem. [[File:Benjamin Pickman by John Singleton Copley.jpeg|thumb|right|[[John Singleton Copley]], Portrait of Benjamin Pickman, Sr.]] Pickman's father Col. [[Benjamin Pickman, Sr.]],<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=V4yBOCV5-pEC&dq=%22dudley+pickman%22&pg=PA162 The Founders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Sarah Sprague Saunders Smith, Sun Printing Company, Pittsfield, Mass., 1897]</ref> one of the most important merchants in Salem, had been a [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]], his estates confiscated by the Colonial government and was forced to flee America for England, only returning to Salem in 1785 after the end of the [[American Revolutionary War|Revolutionary War]].<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=ZjEDAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22william+pickman%22+benjamin+salem&pg=PA627 The Journal and Letters of Samuel Curwen, An American in England, Samuel Curwen, George Atkinson Ward, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1864]</ref>

Benjamin Pickman Jr., served the new nation in several capacities. He was a member of the [[Massachusetts House of Representatives]] in 1797–1802, 1812, and 1813. Benjamin Pickman Jr. also served in the [[Massachusetts Senate]] in 1803, as well as a member of the [[Massachusetts Governor's Council|executive council of the State]] in 1805, 1808, 1813, 1814, and 1819–1821.

Pickman was elected as a [[Federalist Party|Federalist]] to the [[11th United States Congress|Eleventh Congress]] (March 4, 1809 – March 3, 1811), but he was not a candidate for renomination in 1810. He served as member of the [[Massachusetts Constitutional Convention of 1820–1821]]. He served as overseer of [[Harvard University]] 1810–1818. He served as president of the board of directors of the [[Harvard Divinity School|Theological School at Cambridge]]. He died in [[Salem, Massachusetts]], August 16, 1843, and was interred with his Pickman ancestors in Salem's Broad Street Cemetery.<ref>[http://gravematter.smugmug.com/gallery/1120948/1/82114924/Large Pickman family tomb, Broad Street Cemetery, Salem, Massachusetts, smugmug.com] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090804145147/http://gravematter.smugmug.com/gallery/1120948/1/82114924/Large |date=August 4, 2009 }}</ref> He was elected a Fellow of the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] in 1815.<ref name=AAAS>{{cite web|title=Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter P|url=http://www.amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterP.pdf|publisher=American Academy of Arts and Sciences|access-date=August 7, 2014}}</ref>

Pickman was instrumental in the commercial development of much of the heart of historic Salem. In 1815 he and John Derby III acquired property belonging to Derby family heirs to develop Derby Square, which would encompass three brick commercial rows. The Pickman-Derby Block, built in 1817, still stands. The Pickman Building on Derby Square, built in 1816, was part of the development.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=9iP5brDeiq4C&dq=salem+witch+museum+church&pg=PA87 Architecture in Salem, Bryant Franklin Tolles, Jr., Bryant F. Tolles, Carolyn K. Tolles, Paul F. Norton, reprinted by UPNE, 2004]</ref> The Pickman family also owned Pickman farm. Salem's Pickman Street is named for them.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=qRURAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22pickman+street%22+salem+massachusetts&pg=PA104 The Pickman Silver, Essex Institute Historical Collections, Essex Institute, Peabody Essex Museum, Vol. XXXIX, Salem, Mass., 1903]</ref>

Benjamin Pickman Jr. was married to Anstiss Derby, daughter of [[Elias Hasket Derby]] and Elizabeth [[Crowninshield family|Crowninshield]].<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=tl0SAAAAYAAJ&dq=pickman+salem&pg=PA102 Life in a New England Town, 1787, 1788, John Quincy Adams, Charles Francis Adams, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1903]</ref> The son of Benjamin Pickman and the former Anstiss Derby was Hasket Derby Pickman, who died in 1815, the same year he graduated from [[Harvard College]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://gravematter.smugmug.com/gallery/1499497/1/71888985/Large |title=Gravestone of Hasket Derby Pickman, Old Burying Point, Salem, Massachusetts, gravematter.smugmug.com |access-date=December 26, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081004035659/http://gravematter.smugmug.com/gallery/1499497/1/71888985/Large |archive-date=October 4, 2008 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

While he was known as Benjamin Pickman Jr., he was actually the fifth continuous Benjamin in the line. His daughter, Anstiss Derby Pickman, married John Whittingham Rogers. They were the parents of Anstiss Derby Rogers, who married merchant [[William Shepard Wetmore]] on September 5, 1843. Their son, [[George P. Wetmore]], was the Governor of Rhode Island and a United States Senator from that state, and their daughter, Annie Derby Rogers Wetmore, married businessman [[William Watts Sherman]]. The daughter of Sherman, Georgette Wetmore Sherman, married [[Harold Brown (Rhode Island financier)]], son of [[John Carter Brown]] and grandson of [[Nicholas Brown Jr.]]

Benjamin's niece, Mary Toppan Pickman, married Massachusetts Congressman and diplomat [[George B. Loring]], who is Benjamin's great-nephew through his brother Clark. She is the daughter of Benjamin's brother, Dr. Thomas Pickman. His aunt, Judith Pickman, married physician and scientist [[Edward Augustus Holyoke]]. He died in August 1843 at 80

==References== {{Reflist}}

==External links== {{CongBio|P000330}} * {{Find a Grave|18636221}}

== See also == * [[Dudley Leavitt Pickman]]

{{s-start}} {{s-par|us-hs}} {{US House succession box | state=Massachusetts | district=2 | before=[[Joseph Story]] | after=[[William Reed (politician)|William Reed]] | years=March 4, 1809 – March 3, 1811}} {{end}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pickman, Benjamin Jr.}} [[Category:1763 births]] [[Category:1843 deaths]] [[Category:Harvard University alumni]] [[Category:Members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives]] [[Category:Massachusetts state senators]] [[Category:Massachusetts lawyers]] [[Category:American businesspeople in the real estate industry]] [[Category:Members of the Massachusetts Governor's Council]] [[Category:Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] [[Category:Federalist Party United States representatives from Massachusetts]] [[Category:Politicians from Salem, Massachusetts]] [[Category:Burials at Broad Street Cemetery]] [[Category:19th-century American lawyers]] [[Category:The Governor's Academy alumni]] [[Category:19th-century United States representatives]] [[Category:18th-century members of the Massachusetts General Court]] [[Category:19th-century members of the Massachusetts General Court]]