John Breck Account Book

Scope of collection

Labeled on the cover "Petty debts B, Iron Accounts," this volume of accounts includes records of a substantial business in selling iron and steel at the turn of the nineteenth century. Although the owner of the book is nowhere recorded, it has very tentatively been assigned to John Breck based on his signature on p. 101 (and p. 49), settling an account with the clockmaker Nathan Storrs. Most of the entries are brief, often for petty sums and often cryptic in nature, however a significant number note the sale of iron or occasionally steel, with occasional intriguing detail. In 1807, for example, the book records the sale of a quantity of iron to the sawmill owner Simeon Clark of Easthampton, along with a crow bar and bullet molds; repayment came in timber and labor in constructing a kitchen and clapboarding. Most of the entries simply refer to a page number in another, presumably more detailed, daybook, sometimes adding "to iron" or "to steel." The title "Iron Accounts" suggests the possibility the owner kept books for other commercial accounts as well.

Although the location of the account book is also not recorded, it can more certainly be located in the Connecticut River Valley of Massachusetts and almost certainly in Northampton. Many of the clients recorded in the volume are clustered in the area in and around Northampton, including in Westhampton, Easthampton, Southampton, Williamsburgh, and Worthington; with others located east of the River (Amherst, Belchertown, Hadley, New Salem); northward to Whately, Greenfield, and Conway; and into the Berkshires at Cummington, Chesterfield, Goshen, and Pittsfield. Several notable Northampton residents appear -- notably without the town being noted -- including the physician Harvey Frink (p.33), Maj. Seth Pomeroy (p.71), Col. Charles Chapman (p.62), and the clockmaker Storrs (p.101). The accounts indicate the Breck rented his shop to Frink.