Pipe Organ Database

An original installation. Identified by T. Daniel Hancock, using information found in Ochse, 1975. Although the builder is unknown, this instrument is usually referred to as the "Brattle Organ," after the name of its donor, and presumably, the man who imported it from Great Britain, Thomas Brattle. The organ was originally willed by Brattle, who had it in his home, to the Brattle Square Church, who refused it. Anticipating this, Brattle made provisions that the organ should go to King's Chapel, should the Brattle Square Church refuse it. It was removed to St. Paul Episcopal, Newburyport, MA, in 1756, when it was replaced with the 1756 Richard Bridge organ at King's Chapel. From there it went to St. John Church, State Street, Portsmouth, New Hampshire in 1836, and again to St. John's new building on Chapel Street in the 1920's. A new case in the American Empire style was built for the instrument in the first decades of the nineteenth century, and the organ was restored by C. B. Fisk in 1965. It is still playable and receives at least occasional use, and bears the distinction of being the oldest organ installation in the United States which is still playable.