Jehu Macumber, Newport Merchant

Nova Scotia # 2 on December 19th, 1857, embossed cover to Newport, Nova Scotia. Addressed to J. W Macumber, Esq., Agent, Newport, Hants Co. Backstamp HALIFAX NOVA SCOTIA DE 19 1857, NEWPORT N.S. DE 22 1857. Printed envelope Equitable Fire Insurance Company of London.

Nova Scotia # 10 on 11 July 1864 cover from Halifax to Newport, Nova Scotia. Addressed to J.M. Macumber, Esq., Newport, N.S. Two backstamps, Halifax JU 11 64, Newport, JU 16, 1864.

Nova Scotia # 10 on 186? cover to Newport, Nova Scotia. Addressed to J. M Macumber, Esq., Newport, N. S. Two illegible postal stamps of front, Backstamp from Newport, date illegible.

Jehu Mosher Macumber was a merchant and shipowner in Newport, Nova Scotia. He and his twin brother Michael were born on April 10, 1801, in Newport Corner, Nova Scotia to John and Deliverance Macumber.

Jehu married Sarah L. Sanford, daughter of Peleg Sanford, on February 5, 1824. They had nine children. After Sarah's death, he married Elizabeth Georgie Burgess, 26 Dec 1863 in Hants, Nova Scotia. He was a merchant and ship owner, owning the schooner Active, built in 1835. In the 1850's he was apparently an agent for the Equitable Fire Insurance Company of London. He died on September 13, 1883, in Scotch Village, Hants County, Nova Scotia, at age 82. He is buried in Scotch Village Baptist Cemetery. His epitaph reads "IN MEMORY OF JEHU M. MACUMBER DIED SEPT. 18, 1889, AGED 83 Y'RS. ASLEEP IN JESUS"

A.F. Church map of Hants County sgowing the shop/residence of J M Macumber

The Macumbers of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Nova Scotia

Jehu's original New England immigrant ancestor was William Macumber, a cooper. In the spring of 1638, at the age of 28, William, along with his wife, Ursulla, their son Thomas, and William’s younger brother, John (1613-1688), sailed to New England. William and family settled in Plymouth Colony.

Jehu's Nova Scotia immigrant ancestor, his grandfather Ichabod, was the son of Matthew (1698-1759) and Elizabeth (Manchester) Macomber (c.1692-1736). He married Lydia Tomlln, daughter of John (1691-1761) and Mary (Smith) Tomlin (1697-1736), on 7 Mar 1751 at Little Compton, Newport, Rhode Island.

Brothers Ichabod Macumber and Stephen Macumber were both Grantees of Newport, Hants County, Nova Scotia in 1761.

Jehu's father, John was born in 1757 in Tiverton, Rhode Island. He passed away in 1830 at Newport, Hants, Nova Scotia. He married Deliverance Mosher and they had 10 children. Jehu was their fifth child.

Ichabod Macumber's grant along the Kenekook River

Newport and the Golden Age of Shipbuilding

In 1847 when Newport produced its first full rigged ship the Jenny Lind and two years later in 1849 the famous Barque Moro Castle Newport, like many other Nova Scotian communities, became a participant in what later generations would call The Golden Age of Shipbuilding. The Avon River area became one of the great square-rigged wooden shipbuilding centers in Nova Scotia. Hundreds of wooden vessels built along the Avon visited ports all over the world. Here in Newport Landing, over 165 vessels were built in two shipyards that were located on the lands of this park.

While ships were built for many purposes, from transporting gypsum to ferrying passengers, the growth in shipbuilding was largely driven by the needs of sugar production in the Caribbean. Locally built ships carried salt fish to the West Indies, picked up sugar and its by-products (molasses and rum) to transport to England, and there loaded manufactured goods and salt for preserving fish. This Triangular Trade was built on the Transatlantic Slave Trade that saw over 12 million people enslaved and shipped from Africa to the Americas before this transport was halted in 1891. 

Timber for local ships was mostly softwood harvested during winter. Some ships were built closer to the source of timber and then floated, without masts, down the Kennetcook or St. Croix Rivers at high tide. http://www.avonriverheritage.com/golden-age-of-sail.html