* * * * *

HISTORICAL RECORD.

August 3.—­Pemberton Square was chosen as the site for the new Suffolk County Court House.

* * * * *

On August 3 was celebrated at Middletown, Conn., the centenary of the first Episcopal ordination held in this country.  “The clergy met their Bishop at Middletown on Aug. 2, 1785, and after a formal acknowledgment of their Bishop on the part of the clergy, he held an ordination of three candidates from Connecticut—­Philo Shelton, Ashbel Baldwin and Henry Vandyck—­and one from Maryland, Colin Fergusun.”  There was a large attendance of clergymen from various parts of New England.

* * * * *

August 5.—­The Washburn Library, erected by the surviving members of the Washburn family, was dedicated at Livermore, Maine.  Among the guests present were ex-vice President Hannibal Hamlin, Senator Frye, Mr. E.B.  Haskell of the Boston Herald, and Hon. E.B.  Washburn, of Illinois who delivered the address.  Over a thousand people attended the services.

* * * * *

August 6.—­Death of the Hon. John Batchelder, a well known citizen of Lynn, Mass, at the age of eighty.  He was a native of Topsfield, Mass., but went to Lynn when a young man.  He taught school in Ward 5 for thirty years previous to 1855, and was elected to the Massachusetts senate that year.  He was also in the same year elected city clerk and collector of taxes.  He was re-elected to the senate in 1856 and 1857.  He was the first treasurer of the Lynn Five Cents Savings Bank.  He afterward taught the Ward 6 Grammar School, and held that position ten years, and then became a member of the school board.  The last office held by him was that of postmaster, being appointed by President Grant in 1869.

* * * * *

At a meeting of the Battle Monument Association, held at Bennington, Vt., on the 12th of August, there were present Governor Pingree, who presided, Senators Evarts and Morrill, Professor Perry of Yale College, Lieutenant Governor Ormsbee of Brandon, and other gentlemen.  The report of the special committee was read, and a resolution passed accepting the design of J.P.  RINN, of Boston for a Battle Monument.  A committee was then appointed to report the details to the President of the United States and the governors of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, which action will entitle the Association to receive the appropriations made by Congress and the Legislatures of these states for the monument.  The fund now amounts to $80,000.

* * * * *