Abraham Hyatt © 2025

The Planemaker Who Walked Beneath the Water

The pages of A Guide to American Wooden Planes are filled with the biographies of planemakers who worked in wildly varying professions, from music teachers to mail clerks. But I know of no other planemaker with a resume like Ebenezer Clifford, architect, master joiner, bell diver, cabinetmaker, turner, justice of the peace, and quartermaster sergeant in the Revolutionary War.

Born on Oct. 29, 1746 into a family of carpenters, Clifford lived the first half of his life in Kensington, New Hampshire. By the time he was in his 20s, he was likely a well-known joiner. A paneled room he is said to have built in 1774 was eventually purchased by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, dismantled, and displayed in its American Wing. (The New York Times called it “one of the best examples of early American paneling in existence.”) At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War in 1775, he enlisted in the 2nd New Hampshire Regiment and possibly took part in the siege of Boston. He served as quartermaster sergeant until he left the army in 1777. 1

Ebenezer Clifford's joinery work in the stair hall of the Governor John Langdon House in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Photo: Historic New England.

When he got home, he went straight back to work as a joiner. In 1777, he built a staircase for a Deerfield farmer, charging £1-8-0 for his time and another £1-11-0 for turning 31 balusters. Clifford bought two “Cornish [crown molding] irons” and a “Cornish bed mold Plain Iron” in 1784 when he worked as a joiner on the stair hall in the Governor John Langdon Mansion. (He served as a justice of the peace for Rockingham Co., Mass. that same year.) The volume of wood he was purchasing at the time — “1,600 board feet of cherry, 900 feet of maple, and 900 feet of birch” in 1788 and 1789 — speaks to his output as a cabinetmaker. In 1788, he sold a “Cherrytree” clock case, a “Mahogany Stand Table,” six chairs, and an 18-inch “Mahogany Teaboard.” His surviving planes are all from this time period. A local blacksmith’s account books shows him buying more than 200 plane irons between 1772 and 1794.2

Clifford moved to Exeter, New Hampshire, in 1793, and began focusing on more than construction. (His personal library at the time included architectural books like the 1756 edition of Plans, Elevations, And Sections, Of Noblemen And Gentlemen’s Houses.) He designed, or co-designed with builder-architect Bradbury Johnson, a number of buildings that still stand. They both worked as master joiners for the Phillips Exeter Academy in 1794, with Clifford being paid £234-16-11. Clifford designed the building and Johnson designed the cupola. Both men are credited with planning the Congregational Church in Exeter in 1798. Either Johnson or Clifford worked as the master joiner for the Samuel Tenney House in 1800. The only known building whose design can be solely credited to Clifford is the Atkinson Academy, built in 1803 when he was 57 years old.3

It was around this time Clifford’s interests turned to sub-marine exploration. He used a diving bell to salvage silver coins from a shipwreck at the Isles of Shoals, about six miles off the coast of New Hampshire in the Atlantic Ocean. It’s unknown what vessel the coins came from, but the money had been submerged long enough that it was encrusted with marine life. In 1803, Clifford and Richard Tripe of Dover tried to raise a sunken gundalow (a type of sailing barge) on the Piscataqua River. They made 12 dives in their bell, attaching cables to the hull of the barge in 72 feet of water. Unfortunately, a ship collided with the cables, shattering the barge’s hull. 4

An 18th century diving bell.

The salvage was a failure; they were only able to bring up a few iron bars from the ship’s cargo. But Clifford enjoyed his time underwater. His chronic rheumatism was so improved by the increased pressure at the bottom of the river that he was able to walk six miles after a dive. The bell was 5-feet 9-inches tall and 5 feet across at the base, with two seats and a footrest made from an anchor. With their signal buoy — a full-size hand-carved wooden swan — floating above them, the men were slowly lowered to the bottom over the course of 20 minutes. As they probed the river bottom, fish gathered around them like “a flock of chickens.” 5

In 1808, Clifford and Samuel Palmer of Milton received permission from the state of Massachusetts to conduct salvage operations on the Penobscot River where the British had sunk 44 American ships during the Revolutionary War. Palmer was no stranger to diving bells. He had unsuccessfully tried to raise sunken cargo in the Portsmouth River and a lake. Over the next few years, they retrieved “36 pieces of cannon, a brass howitzer, and several tons of cannon balls.” In 1810, the state paid the men $2,078.84 for the metal (about $53,700 today). 6

When Clifford began working on the Penobscot River, Tripe, his original diving partner, sued. Tripe had received a patent (Improvements in Diving Machines, #681) on April 1, 1806, for an apparatus that provided air to a diving bell. In his lawsuit, he claimed Clifford had used his invention. The outcome of the case is unknown. Confusingly, a story ran in the Boston Centinel in 1810 (and was subsequently reprinted in newspapers in Pennsylvania, Maryland and North Carolina) crediting Clifford, not Tripe, for having “invented an improved [and] ingenious Diving Bell, of a new construction.” Clifford may have been involved with salvage efforts after 1810. An 1811 article in a New York City newspaper described ongoing work by a “Mr. Palmer” and “the company who own the Diving Bell” to raise parts of the wrecked British frigate Hussar in the East River.7

Following several years of declining health, Clifford died on October 10, 1821, at the age of 74. A state legislator recalled his father attending an auction in 1878 at the old Clifford home “when the last of the fourth generation of cabinetmakers sold the place.” His account includes this heartbreaking detail: “A farmer bought their old planes and tools for firewood, many of them then over 100 years old — he had to go twice with a two horse wagon to haul them home.”8

Born on: James L. Garvin, “Ebenezer Clifford, Architect and Inventor,” Old-Time New England 65 no. 3-4 (1975), and Thomas L. Elliott, ed. A Guide to the Makers of American Wooden Planes, 5th ed. (Astragal Press, 2018). he is said to have built … New York Times: “American Room Of 1740,” The New York Times, April 7, 1912. The Times dates the Shaw House to 1740s. However, historian James L. Garvin puts the date at 1774; the New Hampshire Historical Society, citing an unnamed “leading 20th-century Kensington historian,” acknowledges 1774 as a possible date as well. possibly took part: His muster records show he traveled 52 miles in May, 1775, which is the distance from Kensington to Boston. ↩
built a staircase: Garvin, “Clifford,” 24. Cornish irons: James L. Garvin, Instruments of Change (Phoenix Publishing, 1985) 9. 1,600 board feet…Mahogany Teaboard”: Garvin, “Clifford,” 23, 24. 200 plane irons: Garvin, “Instruments,” 11. ↩
Garvin, “Clifford,” 24-32. ↩
Isles of Shoals … marine life”: Charles Henry Bell, Exeter In 1776 (News-Letter Press 1876). In 1803: William G. Saltonstall, Ports of Piscataqua (Harvard University Press, 1941) as cited in Garvin, “Clifford,” 33. 12 dives … ship collided: Timoruy Aupen, “Descents in a Diving Bell,” in The American Journal of Science and Arts 22 (1832) 325. Images of both Clifford’s bell and carved swan buoy exist; unfortunately neither are available online. ↩
Aupen, “Descents,” 325-327. ↩
received permission: “Resolve on petition of Samuel Palmer and Ebenezer Clifford, Nov. 18 1803” in Resolves of the General Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts 1806-1810 (Adams and Rhoades). Palmer was no stranger: Silvanus Hayward, History of the Town of Rochester New Hampshire, ed. (John B. Clarke Co. 1892) 155. they retrieved: “Resolve on the petition of Ebenezer Clifford and Samuel Palmer authorizing the Quarter-master-general to purchase cannon of them, February 22, 1810.” in Resolves, 1806-1810. The howitzer came from a vessel sunk “opposite Frankfort,” and some of the cannon balls were found between Hampden and Orrington, see “A diving bell…” Vermont Gazette, Oct. 30, 1809. paid the men: “Resolve granting the Quarter-master-general two thousand and seventy eight dollars eighty four cents, to pay for cannon, etc, purchased of Clifford and Palmer. March 3, 1810” in Resolves, 1806-1810. ↩
sued: Garvin, “Clifford,” 33. Boston Centinel: see The (Windsor, Vermont) Washingtonian, Feb. 7, 1810. subsequently reprinted: see United States (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) Gazette, Feb. 8, 1810; Weekly Raleigh (North Carolina) Register, Feb 15, 1810; Maryland Gazette, Feb 28, 1810. 1811 article: “By a gentleman who came to town…” The Vermont Journal, Jul 29, 1811. ↩
state legislator recalled: Garvin, “Clifford,” 65n. ↩

Editor: Links in the original article were not included here.