Congressman William Burleigh’s home on Portland Street, South Berwick, was also the birthplace of another Congressman, Burleigh’s son John Holmes Burleigh (see map below). Click here to enlarge.

William Burleigh arrived in South Berwick as a young lawyer about 1820, the year Maine became a separate state from Massachusetts. Born in 1785 and raised in Gilmanton, NH, Burleigh worked as a school teacher, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1815, when he moved to South Berwick to begin practicing as an attorney. In 1817 he married Deborah Currier, sister of Micajah Currier, a local merchant. William Burleigh immediately assumed a position of importance in York County, and had six children. The Burleigh House today is 79 Portland Street, Berwick Estates.

In 1823, when the First Congressional District was formed, William Burleigh was elected the first Congressman from this district. He served in the 18th, 19th and 20th Congresses until his death at age 42 in 1827. One of his accomplishments was getting the federal government to dredge the Salmon Falls River to improve shipping up to Quamphegan Landing, where the new cotton mill was about to be built.

Congressman Burleigh died young, however, in 1827, and the family’s story demonstrates the precariousness of life in those days, even for leading families. While his wife remained in their home and raised their young children, family resources dwindled.

A son who attended Berwick Academy, John Holmes Burleigh, had to go away to sea as a deck hand at age 16. Young John Burleigh sailed several times around the world in the 1840s, and was promoted through the ranks till he became captain of his own ship—but not without some harrowing experiences. He survived a hurricane off Bermuda, and later was shipwrecked off the Orkney Islands. In 1850, bringing his wife Matilda, of North Berwick, he sailed around Cape Horn to Calcutta, then returned by the Cape of Good Hope.

On his return to South Berwick in 1855, Capt. Burleigh became leading proprietor of the woolen mills on the Great Works River. In the 1860s, he followed in his father’s footsteps by representing South Berwick in politics, first in the state legislature. In 1864 he was Maine's representative to the Republican national convention that nominated Lincoln at Baltimore. That same year, he built a mansion near Berwick Academy on Academy Street.

In 1872 and 1874, as his father 50 years before, John Holmes Burleigh was elected to Congress representing Maine’s First District. He served on the naval committee, was instrumental in perfecting the management of the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, and arranged for the building of the first lighthouse at Nubble Light.

From the South Berwick village map in the York County Atlas of 1872 is an excerpt showing the Burleigh family homestead on Portland Street. Click here to enlarge.

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