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GENEALOGY COLLECTION.
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01092 4014
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Dome Webster
HISTORY
OF
NEW HAMPSHIRE
BY EVERETT S. STACKPOLE
Author of "Old Kittery and Her Families," "History of Durham, N. H.," etc.
A
VOLUME III
THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY NEW YORK
1481618 CONTENTS
CHAPTER
PAGE
I. Political Status at the Opening of the Nineteenth Century . . 3
II. The War of 1812
21
III. The Dartmouth College Case.
41
IV. Daniel Webster
53
V. Death of the Federalist Party 65
VI. Reconstruction of Political Parties 85
VII. A Miniature Republic 103
VIII. State Politics and the Mexican War
I13
IX. The Abolitionists
129
x. Period of Discord 147
XI. Railroads 165 .
XII. Manufactures
181
XIII. Native Sons as Manufacturers and Inventors Abroad. 197
XIV. Public School System and Institutions of Higher Education .. 209 XV. Honored Sons as Educators Abroad. 239
XVI. Franklin Pierce-President 253
XVIII. New Hampshire in the United States House of Representatives 3II
XVII. Sons of New Hampshire in the United States Senate.
289
XIX. Organization of Cities
338
Appendix-Constitution of 1784
355
Index of Subjects and Places
373
Index of Names
375
Chapter I POLITICAL STATUS AT THE OPENING OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
Chapter I POLITICAL STATUS AT THE OPENING OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.
Population-The Country Boys-Industries-Political Rivalry-Vilifying of Candidates-Mr. Plumer's First Political Machine-Triumph of Organ- ized Effort-Property and Education Rule-The Republicans Come to Power-Their First Legislative Acts-Senator Nahum Parker-Concord the State Capital-Decline of Business Affects Politics-The Embargo of 1807-9-The Federalists again in Office-Hon. Jeremiah Smith-Op- position to President Jefferson-Election of Gov. William Plumer-His Inaugural Address-Sound Advice about Corporations-Accusations against Great Britain-State Prison Built in 1812-Change in Courts- Sketch of Hon. Jeremiah Mason-The New Hampshire Patriot and Isaac Hill.
T HE opening of the nineteenth century found New Hamp- shire with a population of 183,868, about enough for a respectable city of the present time. These were scattered all over the State, wherever there was arable land, and many rocky slopes of its hills and mountains yielded scant returns to hard labor. But wants were few then, and farmers' boys were many ; therefore the thrifty farmers, with economy and with scorn of privations, accumulated money enough to send their sons to college, the latter aiding by teaching school and doing farm work during vacations. Colleges for girls were then unknown, and so they took the earliest promising opportunity to get married, not often to the college boys, who went into the cities, but to some neighboring farmer or mechanic. The rural dis- tricts from that time to this have been raising live stock and boys. The latter have become the leaders of this and other States. Somehow the boys reared in the cities have not done their proportionate part in professional and political careers.
The age of mechanical industries had not yet come. At Portsmouth there had been from the first settlement consider- able shipbuilding, and also in the towns of Exeter, Durham, Dover and wherever tide water reached. Next to agriculture lumbering and shipbuilding were the principal industries. The
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NEW HAMPSHIRE
small water powers were utilized for saw-mills and grist-mills, but there was no demand for the great water powers of the State. These awaited capital, machinery and better means of transportation. The first cotton factory was built at New Ipswich in 1803, followed in a few years by similar manu- facturies at Peterborough, Pembroke, Hillsborough and Jaffrey, but these were not attended with great success. They were but the beginning of a great movement, accelerated by the introduc- tion of railways.
It was during the first decade of the nineteenth century that the oppositions of political parties became more pro- nounced. The common good of all the people has often been lost out of sight in the desire to secure the victory of a party. Then began the practice of vilifying both presidential candi- dates, Adams and Jefferson, and to blacken the private char- acter of a political adversary has been a favorite policy of party leaders ever since. If accusations of immorality, infidelity, cowardice, such as were hurled against President Jefferson, have no foundation in fact, then suspicions and inventions have been thought expedient and necessary in order to win an elec- tion, or defeat a rival. The tactics of war, which seem in the minds of many to justify abrogation of all moral law and decency, have been used too often in time of peace. Thus politi- cal parties became arrayed against each other as though they were foes, while both parties and all parties ought to have been planning and striving for the common good. Political oppositions were increased by the spoils system, which began with President Jefferson and culminated in President Jackson's time,-that the victorious party should divide among its leaders and bosses the fat offices, sometimes regardless of personal qualifications and fitness. Governmental offices with enticing salaries have been considered in all times the perquisites of the wealthy and professional classes, and when this has become sufficiently apparent to the common people and the toilers, there has been a revolution by means of arms or ballots. In our country ballots have determined the political changes.
The Federalists were the party of the aristocracy, as it was thought and at length systematically taught. William Plumer was the first to set up widely organized party machinery to
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A HISTORY
sustain the Federalists. John Taylor Gilman had been governor of the State from 1794 to 1804. In the latter year both houses were Republican. Mr. Plumer formed a self-elected State Com- mittee, associating with himself five others, one from each county. The State Committee organized county committees, and these in turn selected committees in towns and school dis- tricts, the end in view being to bring out every Federal voter on election day and to turn every wavering and doubtful voter in favor of that party. This is believed to have been the first systematic attempt to thoroughly organize a body of voters so as to control an election in New Hampshire, and it worked so successfully that all parties ever since have tried to establish and perfect such a machine. It has been found that, no matter what a party may represent, it can not win at the polls without organized effort. Education by means of newspapers, pamphlets and stump speeches is not enough. Voters must be pledged definitely in advance, and it is generally known before election about what the majority will be in ordinary times. Whatever evils there may be in this system, it is difficult to see how the general plan can be avoided in a democracy. There must be at least two political parties, chosen nominees and concentration of votes to effect a purpose, and a central com- mittee must direct the political campaign. Otherwise the efforts even of reformers are scattered and mutually opposed. Much has been said against the party machine. Let William Plumer be blamed for it in New Hampshire, if blame it must have, but let somebody inaugurate a better method, if possible. Plumer's committee circulated newspapers gratuitously and post-riders distributed them throughout the State. Six thousand copies of an address by Mr. Plumer were carried into all the towns. Thus the Federalists elected their representatives to congress by a majority of nearly eight hundred votes. Who furnished the money? History does not name them, but it is reasonable to think that the money needed came from those who hoped to get the offices for themselves or for their friends. Politicians usually put out money as a means of making more money. It has become a business enterprise. The election of an admired man to office is a sufficient inducement to open the pocket-books of some. Before William Plumer's time it did not cost much to
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carry an election ; the expense has been steadily increasing ever since.
At the presidential election, however, the Republican majority was five hundred over the Federalists, and the next year, 1805, John Langdon was elected governor by a majority of nearly four thousand. William Plumer had changed his politics and perhaps his guiding mind may be seen in the changed majorities. The successful reformer must be an organizer or get somebody to do the practical work for him. Plumer in 1805 wrote thus :
"Democracy has obtained its long-expected triumph in New Hampshire. John Langdon is governor-elect. His success is not owing to snow, rain, hail, or bad roads, but to the incontro- vertible fact that the Federalists of this State do not compose the majority. Many good men have grown weary of constant exertions to support a system whose labors bear a close affinity to those of Sisyphus."
Any political organization that champions the cause of the common people, of the laboring masses, is sure to win at last. All political reforms have their welfare in view. The struggle between capital and labor, between privilege and want, has been going on a long time. If the masses come into power for a short time, capital and brains reassemble and deploy their forces ; in a little while they again have the reins of authority and manage things generally to suit themselves. Give the people their rights and they soon lose them. Give millions of freedmen the ballot, and it is soon taken away. Property and education have always ruled this world; the masses must get both in order to get and hold political rights. It is true, as Lincoln said, that all of the people can not be fooled all of the time, but the masses have been fooled and oppressed most of the time in the history of all governments,-and still we hope for something better. The politicians will please pardon these reflections suggested by the first political machine of New Hampshire.
The Republicans came into full possession of power in the State in 1805. For the first time a Republican representative was sent to congress, in the person of Nicholas Gilman of Exeter. Every branch of the State government was in the
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A HISTORY
hands of the Republicans, the party of Thomas Jefferson, later called Democrats. Levi Bartlett, Joseph Badger and Benjamin Pierce were in the council. Clement Storer presided over the senate, and Samuel Bell was speaker of the house. Dr. Philip Carrigain of Concord became Secretary of State, in the place of Joseph Pearson, who had filled that office for nineteen years in succession. In fact there was a political landslide in favor of the Republicans, and the leaders were not slow to seize the offices. The administration of Jefferson was endorsed by the legislature and "that spirit of malignant abuse," with which he had been assailed, was condemned.
The new party legislature sought to distinguish itself by reforms. It prohibited the issue of private notes as currency. It limited all action for the recovery of real estate to twenty years. A betterment law enabled the bona fide purchaser to collect the value of improvements after occupation of lands for six years. Another law of 1805 secured the division of towns into school districts. Imprisonment for debt still remained law, and Hon. Russell Freeman, once speaker of the house, was cast into jail with one Josiah Burnham and another companion. All were suffering for the same cause. Burnham became angered by the complaints of his fellow sufferers of his abusive man- ners, and he murdered them both in prison. For this foul act he was executed by hanging, at Haverhill, the following year. Yet for a long time thereafter men were imprisoned for debts which they could not, or would not, pay.
In the election of 1806 Governor Langdon was reelected by a strong majority and five Republican representatives were sent to congress. The vacant seat in the United States Senate was filled by choice of Hon. Nahum Parker of Fitzwilliam. He was born in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, March 4, 1760, and removed to Fitzwilliam in 1786. At the age of fifteen he took part in the battle of Saratoga, which led to the surrender of Burgoyne. He served in the State legislature from 1794 to 1804, and was judge of the court of common pleas in Cheshire county for many years. Preferring the latter office he resigned his seat in the senate after three years. Afterwards he returned to the State legislature and was President of its Senate in 1828. His career in his town and State was an honorable and useful one. He died November 12, 1839, aged eighty years.
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The year 1807 marks the beginning of continuous sessions of the legislature at Concord, although no law ever fixed upon that place as the seat of government. The June sessions of 1806 and 1807 had been held at Hopkinton, and that then thriving town aspired to be the capitol of the State. One session each had been held in Amherst, Charlestown, and Hanover, but most of the sessions had been in Portsmouth, Exeter, or Concord. Concord was found to be easier of access, and there were enter- prising citizens here, that offered inducements. The sessions at Concord were held for several years in the Town Hall, built partly for that purpose, where the County Court House now stands. In 1816 began the erection of a State House, and there was great agitation in Concord, whether it should be at the "North End," or "South End" of the town. The spot selected was called a frog pond. The building was completed in 1819, and it has been altered and enlarged more than once. The legislature required by enactment that the people of Concord should furnish gratuitously all the stone needed and haul the same to the spot selected, as well as present to the State the building site. It was a good bargain for Concord and also for the State.
Events which greatly affected American commerce deter- mined political campaigns. Nothing affects party politics so much as commercial prosperity or the reverse. A decrease in revenues, or a financial panic, is laid at once to the charge of the dominant party. Hard times demand a change in rulers; it is hoped that any change will be for the better. About the year 1807 the encroachments of both French and English upon American commerce had become so unendurable, that congress enacted an embargo law. This prohibited the sailing of vessels from our ports and stopped immediately all exportation as well as importation of goods. England was at war with France, and the case was similar to that which now exists between England and Germany. Both nations sought to ruin the commerce of the enemy and neutrals had to suffer from both fires. Such a result is in some degree inevitable, whenever two powerful commercial nations are at war; the neutrals have to suffer with the combatants, just as civilians often have worse trials and mishaps than the soldiers. War can not be kept within the rules of peace.
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A HISTORY
Portsmouth had been the one commercial town of New Hampshire up to the time of the American Revolution. During that war its commerce was practically destroyed. Then followed a period of gradual and rapid growth, till in 1807 it reached the amount of $680,000 in exports and $800,000 in imports. Its tonnage amounted to 22,798 tons, and one hundred and three vessels cleared from its harbor for the West Indies alone. The embargo, which was in force from 1807 to 1809, put an immediate stop to all this apparent prosperity. The ships of trade rotted at the wharfs. Many persons were thrown out of employment. Fortunes were swept away and ruin stared many in the face. Jefferson and the Republican party were called to an account. Some persons in the North began to threaten secession, and the Massachusetts legislature, in 1809, declared the embargo "unjust, oppressive, and unconstitutional, and not legally binding on the citizens of the State." It is a relief to declare anything unconstitutional that pinches the pocketbook and there are easy ways of proving it to the satis- faction of the pinched.
Depression in trade and hard times brought restoration to power for a short time to the Federal party in New Hampshire. The national election of 1808 yielded five members of congress to the Federal party, and also the presidential electors. The following year John Langdon was defeated in the contest for the governorship by Judge Jeremiah Smith, one of the ablest lawyers of his time.
Jeremiah Smith was born in Peterborough, November 29, 1759, son of William and Elizabeth (Morrison) Smith. Both parents were of Scotch descent. At the age of seventeen he was wounded at the battle of Bennington. He studied two years at Harvard College, but graduated at Queen's College, now Rutgers, in 1780. After studying law he opened an office in his father's farm-house in Peterborough and soon began to serve as a member of the legislature. Previously he had been instructor one year at Phillips Academy, Andover, and had taught at Salem, Massachusetts. He read everything within his reach, and his memory was stored with literary, historical and legal lore. At Peterborough he was one of the selectmen and an aider of public schools. As a member of Governor Bartlett's
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staff he attained the rank of colonel. The constitutional con- vention of 1791 numbered him among its most useful members and he was chairman of the committee that prepared the draft of the revised statutes in the same year. He was elected to the second, third, fourth and fifth congresses of the United States, where he was a supporter of Washington and of the Federalist party. In 1797 he resigned his seat in congress to become United States district attorney for New Hampshire and removed to Exeter, which became his home for many years. In 1800 he was made judge of probate for Rockingham county and com- posed soon after a treatise on probate law, which was never put into print. He was judge of the United States circuit court in 1801 and chief justice of the superior court of New Hampshire from 1802 to the time of his election as governor, during which period he traveled in the discharge of his duties through the State twice each year. As governor he could accomplish but little because of the oppositions of the legislative body and he failed of a reelection in 1810, John Langdon and the Republicans being then restored to power. From 1813 to 1816 he was chief justice of the supreme court of New Hampshire. That court was abolished in 1816 and Mr. Smith confined himself to the practice of law, serving as counselor and advocate in many important cases, none more so than that of the Dartmouth College controversy, where he furnished with Mason the legal arguments for Webster. In 1820 he retired from business and spent his leisure in literary studies, serving as president of a bank and as president of the board of trustees of Phillips Exeter Academy. In 1842 he removed to Dover, where he died September 21, 1843.
All biographical accounts of him credit him with doing more than any other for reducing the administration of law to a system and of bringing order out of chaos. Daniel Webster said of him, "He knows everything about New England, having studied much of its history and its institutions; and as to law, he knows so much more of it than I do, or ever shall, that I forbear to speak on that point." A volume selected from his manuscript decisions, while he was judge, was published in 1879, known as Smith's New Hampshire Reports. For general character, legal abilities, able administration, fulness of knowl-
WILLIAM PLUMER
II
A HISTORY
edge and conversational powers Judge Smith ranked among the very foremost of New Hampshire's prominent men.
In 1810 John Langdon, as the Republican candidate, was again elected governor, and the following year he offered $2000 as a campaign fund to be released from being a candidate for reelection, yet it was thought that no other candidate could poll as many votes as he, and so he was elected for the last time. Charles Cutts of Portsmouth, descendant of the President Cutt of colonial times, was chosen United States senator, to fill out the unexpired term of Nahum Parker. The two political parties were pretty equally divided, most of the wealth, educa- tion and social standing being with the Federalists. Nearly all the clergymen of New England were Federalists and cordially disliked President Jefferson for what was called his "infidelity," notwithstanding his religious opinions were more in accordance with modern thought than were the doctrines of his critics. Orthodoxy has ceased to be a required presidential qualification. The unstable equilibrium of parties stirred up public interest in the elections, led to much reading and discussion, and thus educated the voters to independent opinions. At least those who read the political journals thought they were thinking for themselves.
In 1812 William Plumer, who has been often mentioned as a political leader, was the victorious candidate of the Repub- lican party for the governorship. There was no election by the people, but in the convention of both houses he was chosen by one hundred and four votes against eighty-two for John Taylor Gilman. The Federalists, however, chose their presidential electors and members of congress, among whom was Daniel Webster, whose career must be noted more at length in a sub- sequent chapter. Governor Plumer suffered the usual amount of personal abuse in the political campaign, but his conduct as governor won approval by its dignified and impartial character. In his inaugural message he summed up the national situation. It is interesting when we compare it with similar accusations made against Germany at this time.
Both from France and England we have long suffered, and still continue to suffer great injustice. They have unjustly captured and condemned our commerce, imprisoned and held in servitude our seamen, and grossly violated
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our national rights; whilst towards both those nations the government of the United States has steadily and uniformly pursued a course of conduct founded in the strictest justice, and marked with the most impartial neutrality. The conduct of Great Britain towards the United States still manifests a spirit of obstinate persevance in measures hostile to our dearest interests and most essential rights. She has impressed thousands of our seamen, forced them to serve on board her public ships, and, in the event of war, will no no doubt compel them to shed the blood of their innocent brethren and un- offending countrymen. She has unjustly captured and condemned our ves- sels and cargoes; permitted her subjects publicly to forge and counterfeit our ship papers, and assume the American flag, thereby exciting suspicion against our mercantile character, and subjecting our lawful commerce to capture by other belligerent powers. And, as if these flagrant acts of in- justice did not afford sufficient evidence of her deadly hostility, she has sent spies into our country, to alienate the affections of our citizens from their own government, and effect a dismemberment of the Union. Against these outrages and aggressions the government of the United States, preferring negotiation to war, has long and patiently sought redress-and even suppli- cated for justice, till it has approached a state of humiliation incompatible with national dignity. . In this state of affairs but one alternative re- mained, either tamely to surrender our rights, or manfully to prepare for their defense. A nation of freemen could not long hesitate between submis- sion and war. Though war is a great calamity, the sacrifice of our essential rights is greater. It is with a nation as with an individual; there is a point of suffering beyond which forbearance, instead of repelling, invites aggression. If we cherish a spirit of submission to a foreign power, and tamely acquiesce in the loss of one right after another, we shall thereby pre- pare the public mind for a state of degradation and servitude, more dreadful in its consequence than that of war; for a nation cannot long survive the loss of its spirit.
The Federalists were excusing the conduct of England ; they were hyphenated, or English-Americans. They wanted peace at any price. They could not forget the land of their origin; they were just like some German-Americans at the present time. Their sympathies were with the mother country in her fight with France. History repeats itself, since human nature always remains the same. The message of William Plumer might be a good campaign document for the present belligerent party; if unsigned, it might be thought to have flowed from the pen of Theodore Roosevelt. The soundness of its principles can not be questioned, yet a little more patience and forbearance would have prevented a war with England then. Something must be pardoned in the acts of a nation, when it is in mortal struggle with another. The rights of on-
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