"To my son Benjamin" was the estate next left. Benjamin received it on August, 1771, and died in May of the following year. Charles, his eldest son, became the next owner. He was a man prominent in church affairs. We find him a firm adherent of Whitfield, taking part in the great controversy which eventually divided the old town church and led to the establishment of the old South Society at the Port. Among the most distinguished descendants of the Pierce family was the late Franklin Pierce, the fourteenth President of the United States, who was said to have been a visitor at this historic house. It is hard to say whether Nathaniel Tracy, the merchant, or his father was the next owner of this house. It was sold by Daniel Pierce, who owned half of the estate, to Nathaniel Tracy in 1778, and by the widow of William Pierce the same year. This was at a time when Tracy was possessed of great wealth and lived in magnificent style, owning a large house on State Street in Newburyport nearly opposite the Dalton house, and a large farm at Medford, as well as the Craigie house in Cambridge. Nathaniel Tracy was well known in the mercantile profession. He was a dashing young man, who loved to change his place of residence at his whim. Few men of the period had a more brilliant career than did he. At the breaking out of the Revolution he was a very young man, and with patriotic zeal he fitted out a fleet of privateers to prey on British commerce, the first privateer ever fitted out in our country being his, and sailing in 1775. They were small vessels, manned by intrepid men and having but few guns which, however, were handled in so masterly a manner that many valuable prizes were brought by them to both Boston and Newburyport. During the next eight years he was the principal owner, according to records, of one hundred and ten merchant vessels which had a gross tonnage of fifteen thousand six hundred and sixty tons and cargoes valued at $2,733,300. Many of his fleet were lost or captured,--so many indeed that at the end of the war there were only thirteen left. The value of the work they had done in aiding the government can never be estimated. They brought into port quantities of stores and ammunition that were designed primarily to supply the British army. The records show that during this period Tracy's men captured one hundred and twenty vessels with twenty-two hundred and twenty-five men, and their cargoes were sold for $3,950,000. His patriotism is well shown from the fact that in addition to these services he loaned the government $167,000.