A history of Walpole, New Hampshire, Volume I, Part 3

Author: Frizzell, Martha McDanolds, 1902-
Publication date: 1963
Publisher: Walpole, Walpole Historical Society
Number of Pages: 786

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and Lay Preacher's Gazette', embracing all the poetry and spicy gems and anecdotes contained in the 'Museum' during several years' publication (1797-1810). . .. The next building south was Gen. Amasa Allen's store (MacDonald #109), business being then done there under the firm name of Allen & Crafts (Royal). The building is now owned by the Blake heirs. On the site of David Buffum's (Griswold #110) brick store once stood an old two story wooden building, which for many years was occupied for a store. It was burned in 1859 and rebuilt in 1860. Further south, a few rods, the ground was occupied by a building, now the residence of Mrs. Wm. Farnam (now Jensen #83 on High St.), where Maj. Samuel Grant for many years carried on the business of a saddle and harness maker, and which afterwards was converted into a drug store and kept for many years by Deacon Thomas Seaver, till about the time it was moved away. There was probably no other house on the east side of Main Street till the foot of the hill south of the Unitarian meeting house was reached, except where Mrs. Prentiss Foster now lives (Harold S. Putnam #139) which was built and occupied by Gen. Benjamin Bellows. South of the Crafts Tavern, which was in 1793 advertised for sale by Samuel Mead of Alstead who had married the widow Crafts and was guardian of her children, stood a large building called the Great White Store, near where B. F. Aldrich's (east part of the bank) house now stands, and a little west stood a dwelling once occupied by a son of the ventriloquist, Potter. The Abel Bellows (McKenven #170) house was built by Dr. George Sparhawk, the next (Tatem #172) by Amasa Allen, the next (Mrs. Wallace Graves) which once stood where Dr. W. B. Porter's (Hastings) now is, by David Stevens. It was moved back west about 40 years ago (1840), and now is owned and occupied by Mrs. Asa Titus (Mrs. Wallace Graves #175). This house once went by the name of the 'Cochran House'. The Wm. Buffum (Spitzli #178) house was once owned by Ebenezer Crehore and it is supposed he built it; at any rate a deed shows that it was owned by him in 1786. The original shape of all those four houses was nearly the same, with 'gambrel roofs'. Col. John Bellows built the house which the Rev. H. W. Bellows now owns and occupies as a summer residence (his daughter, Mrs. Thorndike Endicott #205). Up Prospect Street there were a few scattered dwellings. The first was known as the Drew house and occupied by Thomas C. Drew (Mrs. Albert Dickey estate #149); the next was the house now occupied by the Misses Maynard (Austin Hubbard #150). It was then a one story house. The house where A. K. Maynard now lives (Mrs. Maude Maynard Slade #204) was built very early, but by whom is not known. Jonathan Livingston occupied it very early in the present century. The Caleb Bellows house, now occupied by Moses J. Hale (Holmes Whitmore #153) was built as early as 1793 by Benjamin Bellows for his son Caleb. The next house was owned and occupied many years by Pliny Dickinson, though previously occupied by Eliphalet Fox (Cutter #200). The house opposite, where Mr. Barnes now lives (Norbert Hudson #162) was once owned and occupied by Oliver Sparhawk, who for many years had charge of the singing in the old church, and was also, at one time, a merchant in town. The next house was built by Stephen Mellish early in the present century. The old house was torn down and John Selkirk has re- cently erected a new house on the site (Wm. Burrows #403). On the site of the house now occupied by Isaac M. Graves (Mrs. Irene Chickering #406) a house was burned some 25 years ago, which for many years was owned and occupied by James Campbell who for a long time was Register of Deeds for the county of Cheshire which then em- braced Sullivan county; and the old woodshed now standing on the premises was the

Register's Office. Gamaliel Huntington resided on the east side of the road (Mrs. Hazel Cummings #405). There might have been more than the Apollos Gilmore (#411 on golf course) and Pressey houses (#409, burned 1912) standing on the road before the meeting house was reached, but those enumerated were the principal ones in 1793. Near the meeting house (on Prospect) stood two houses, one occupied by Thomas Parker and the other by Antipas Harrington (Country Club #410). A few houses may have been built west of Main Street in 1793. If any, the John Livingston house where John C. Brown now resides (Douglas & Ashmore #192), the Mead house now owned by Oliver Martin (Tilton #179) and the Stephen Rice house where Mrs. Stoddard now resides (Carola Graves, occupied by Brainard #25) were among the number. On the east side of Main Street, on the site of the academy building, stood a distillery owned and run by Col. Caleb Bellows, where a large quantity of potato whiskey was made annually. The road from the village to the meeting house at or soon after 1793 was shaded on either side by beautiful forest trees . .. but vandalism and the hand of ruthless time have swept them mostly away." (AH 75)

Beginning about 1784 post riders carried the mails and small parcels. February 12, 1791, a post was established, by federal act, from Concord through various towns to Keene, then Westmoreland, Walpole, Acworth, Charlestown, Claremont ... back to Concord. The route was covered once a week in each direction, beginning April 1. The charge for private single letters was 6 pence for every 40 miles, 4 pence for less; other mat- ter by weight or bulk.

"The roads were only bridle paths, most of them, although laid out; the people had no use for carriage roads, for there were no carriages. Four- wheeled pleasure-wagons were not seen in town till 25 years later. There was no postoffice in town till April 1, 1795, and Samuel Grant was ap- pointed postmaster. Before this time letters were taken from some cen- tral point and carried by the 'post rider' to the persons directed on the letter. Newspapers had no circulation prior to 1793, there was no free library, and very few books found in farmers' houses. The almanac was in every house and relied upon implicitly as a weather prognosticator. Under the circumstances, how could people be anything but ignorant? Still, those people were happy. They had seasons of enjoyment-their election and thanksgiving days, their apple bees and kitchen junkets, their husking bees and quilting frolics, and, more than all, their burst of patriotism on the glorious Fourth." History of Cheshire & Sullivan County 431-433.

"On the fourth of July the small, loyal town of Walpole remembered those who gave Independence to our country. A discharge of cannon announced to the inhabit- ants, the morning of the twenty-fourth anniversary of their liberty was arrived, and summoned them to the duties and delights of the day. A procession, composed of soldiers and citizens, and cheered by an excellent band of music, proceeded, at eleven,

to the meetinghouse, here, after a vigorous, pious, and pertinent address to Heaven, from the Rev. Mr. Fessenden, a crowded audience was instructed and entertained, by an excellent and chaste oration, of the historical class, from the pen of John Hubbard, Esq. At intervals several favorite marches were played. An Ode, composed by certain of our own poets, was performed to the popular tune of 'Hail Columbia'. At 2 o'clock, at the hall of Maj. Bullard, a party of gentlemen were regaled with an elegant and well served repast."

"The Farmers' Weekly Museum enjoyed a degree of popularity then unprecedented in the case of any paper published in a country village. It was begun in April 1793 at Walpole, New Hampshire, by Isaiah Thomas and David Carlisle. Carlisle was a native of Walpole, and had served an apprenticeship with Thomas, at Worcester. .. . Thomas furnished the printing office with its types and press, and a bookstore with a handsome assortment of books, and the whole business of printing and bookselling was carried on under the firm of Thomas and Carlisle.

"Published first as the New Hampshire Journal, it soon gained a respectable circu- lation on both sides of the river and was liberally patronized in Vermont. . . . At the commencement of the second year the name was changed to The New Hampshire and Vermont Journal, or, Farmers' Weekly Museum.

"The size of the sheet was 18" x 11", the paper coarse and dingy, the type inferior and old-fashioned. At its commencement there were no elaborate original articles- snatches of news, a few deaths and marriages, some foreign intelligence, a few lottery and other ads, some practical effusions, an essay or so.

"Carlisle was then the sole editor of the paper; but he received aid from several correspondents.

"In 1795 Joseph Dennie took up his residence in Walpole, and began to write for the Museum that series of papers, which did more to extend his reputation than all his other literary efforts, entitled 'The Lay Preacher'. These lay sermons were repub- lished in nearly all the newspapers in the nation. ... It is believed that these con- tributions were at first voluntary and entirely gratuitous; but, in the spring of 1796, Carlisle having become, nominally, the sole proprietor of the paper, an arrangement was made with Dennie, by which the entire control of it, except the selection of news and the advertising department, was transferred to him.

". .. During this year, the Lay Preacher was pretty constant in the weekly produc- tion of his labors; and he was aided in his task as an editor, by Royal Tyler (then a lawyer in Guilford, Vt.) who furnished all those agreeable and humorous articles, pur- porting to be 'From the Shop of Messrs. Colon & Spondee'. Thomas Green Fessenden was the author of sundry pieces of humorous political doggerel. The motto of the Museum was,-'Ho, every one, that thirsteth for novelty-come!' At the beginning of the fifth volume, April, 1797, the titles of the paper were transposed. . .

"As a literary periodical, the Museum had now no rival. Its circulation extended from Maine to Georgia, and large packages filled weekly an extra mail-bag, to supply the subscribers in New York, Philadelphia, Charleston, and intervening cities.

"For three years succeeding this arrangement, the Museum was more richly supplied with original communications of a literary character than any other paper, that had then, or has since, been published in the United States. 'Colon & Spondee' came out almost every week, with new varieties of their small wares; T. G. Fessenden produced his political lampoons, under the signature of 'Simon Spunkey'; Isaac Story opened

a shop with the sign of Peter Pindar in his humorous style of versification; 'Common Sense in Dishabille' was furnished by David Everett; and besides these, 'The Meddler', 'The Hermit', 'The Rural Wanderer', 'Peter Pencil', 'Eeri Besdin', and numerous other writers, whose contributions I am not able to assign to the authors by name, en- riched the Museum, and gave it an unprecedented popularity. Dennie, however, was not merely the responsible editor, but was the enlivening spirit, around which the others congregated. . .. The selected articles were of his choosing. The weekly sum- mary of 'Incidents Abroad' and 'Incidents at Home', which was not the least attractive feature of the Museum, was prepared by him; and though this feature of the Museum has had many imitators, I know of none which can claim any near relationship or striking resemblance. The notes 'To Readers and Correspondents' make, of themselves, an amusing department. These were also the sole composition of Dennie, and were frequently written in the printing office, and extended or contracted in length, so as precisely to fit the space, in which the last column of the form might be deficient in matter.

"In less than a year from the time when the Museum put on this new and promising aspect, Carlisle became involved in embarrassments, and the property fell back into the possession of Thomas."

Apparently the paying patronage of the paper was not equal to the desires of the editor who wrote ". . . a paper so cheap, so closely printed, and so free from advertisements must, to support its present reputation, attract not only copious subscriptions, but punctual payment. . . . Like every other industrious workman, he (the editor) has a right to bread, and sometimes, to write 'all cheerily', he ought to have wine. The in- cumbrance of excessive wealth is scarcely to be dreaded by an author, but for the decent recompense of literary labor he has an importunate claim. . . . "

"Alexander Thomas, a relative of Isaiah Thomas, had been taken into the partner- ship in the Bookstore connected with the Printing-Office, and about the first of June, 1798, took upon himself the full charge of conducting the paper, while Dennie took a recess from his labors. From that time on Dennie's efforts were sporadic. . .

"The essays of the Lay Preacher were continued, with tolerable though not con- stant punctuality till the beginning of September (1799), when they were again sus- pended, and never again revived, as contributions to the MUSEUM. Dennie was invited to Philadelphia, to a different employment, and the editorial management of the paper was given to Alexander Thomas. ... In consequence of the departure of Dennie and the entire suspension of his labors, the title 'Lay Preacher's Gazette' (which had been added in April) was expunged and that of 'Literary Gazette' took its place. This was in February 1800. The weekly summaries, which had frequently filled two or three columns, dwindled down to less than half a column and had none of the raciness and agreeable humor that had frequently made them attractive."

"In October 1801 Thomas and Thomas made a temporary disposal of the establish- ment to David Newhall. The dimensions of the paper were reduced, and the spirit evaporated. In 1803 the publication was resumed by Thomas and Thomas. The next

year the paper was again enlarged and the second title dropped. ... From this time to October 1806 the MUSEUM was respectably conducted, but had no remarkable excellence. ... In March 1807 the publication was suspended ... with a recom- mendation of the NEW HAMPSHIRE SENTINEL published at Keene by John Prentiss . . . to the favor of their subscribers ... it was revived in October 1808 and published by Thomas and Thomas and Cheever Felch. In July 1809 the names of Thomas and Thomas disappeared from the imprint, and that of Cheever Felch remained as the sole publisher and editor ... notwithstanding flattering assurances the FARMER'S MUSEUM rapidly approached its end. In October 1810 the publication was suspended. Felch remained sometime in Walpole in the business of bookselling. (From Specimens of New Hampshire Literature by Joseph Buckingham 1852.)

"I have a vivid recollection of Joseph Dennie's personal appearance in 1796 when I began my apprenticeship in the printing office of David Carlisle. In person, he was rather below than above the middling height, and was of a slender frame. He was particularly attentive to his dress, which, when he appeared in the street, on a pleas- ant day, approached the highest notch of the fashion. I remember, one delightful morning in May, he came into the office, dressed in a pea-green coat, white vest, nan- kin small-clothes, white silk stockings, and shoes, or pumps, fastened with silver buckles, which covered at least half the foot from the instep to the toe. His small- clothes were tied at the knees, with riband of the same color, in double bows, the ends reaching down to the ankles. He had just emerged from the barber's shop. His hair in front was well loaded with pomatum, frizzled, or craped, and powdered; the ear- locks had undergone the same process; behind, his natural hair was augmented by the addition of a large queue ... which, enrolled in some yards of black riband, reached half way down his back .. .

"Dennie wrote with great rapidity, and generally postponed his task till he was called upon for copy. It was frequently necessary to go to his office, and it was not uncommon to find him in bed at a late hour in the morning. His copy was often given out in small portions, a paragraph or two at a time; sometimes it was written in the printing office, while the compositor was waiting to put it in type. One of his best Lay Sermons was written at the village tavern, directly opposite to the office, in a chamber where he and his friends were amusing themselves with cards. It was de- livered to me by piece-meal, at four or five different times. If he happened to be engaged in a game, when I applied for copy, he would ask someone to play his hand for him, while he could give the devil his due. When I called for the closing para- graph of the sermon, he said, call again in five minutes. 'No,'-said Tyler-'I'll write the improvement for you.' He accordingly wrote a concluding paragraph, and Dennie never saw it until it was in print.

"Joseph Dennie was admitted to the bar in Cheshire County. He did not follow the profession and there is a report of his having appeared in court only once as an ad- vocate. The account of this first and last attempt to address a court was reported with considerable embellishment by his friend Tyler, for the New England Galaxy July 24, 1818. (See Specimens of Newspaper Literature by Joseph T. Buckingham, Vol. II, p. 199, State Historical Society.)

"Dennie's most intimate friend and associate in his literary enterprises was Royal Tyler, a native of Boston, graduate of Harvard College in 1776, a law student. .. . His contributions to the FARMER'S MUSEUM would, if collected, fill several volumes.

He wrote rapidly, and could vary his style 'from grave to gay, from lively to severe', as easily as he could draw on his glove. Most of the articles purporting to be 'from the Shop of Messrs. Colon & Spondee' were written by him; the poetical pieces are said to have all come from his pen." (Joseph Buckingham.)

Isaac Story, the writer of the articles From the Shop of Peter Quince graduated at Harvard College in 1793. Most of his contributions were imitations of the odes of Peter Pindar, alluding to incidents which have little interest now.

Thomas G. Fessenden, son of Parson Fessenden of Walpole, graduated at Dartmouth College in 1796. While in college he had gained some notoriety by writing poetical trifles, particularly a Yankee ballad called Jonathan's Courtship. While at college he defrayed his expenses by in- structing a village school and by teaching psalmody several evenings a week. He later studied law at Rutland, Vermont.

The most important of his contributions to the Museum were signed Simon Spunkey. He spent most of his life as an editor of various publi- cations, particularly the New England Farmer published in Boston. (See also Connecticut River and Valley of Connecticut, p. 388-9.)

Joseph Buckingham was well qualified to write concerning the Mu- seum, having had a personal connection with the publication, as de- scribed in his Personal Memoirs published in Boston 1852:

"In December . . . through the agency of my brother ... a place was provided in the office of David Carlisle, at Walpole, N. H., and there I was initiated in the mys- tery of type-setting. My apprenticeship began on the 5th of March, 1796, and owing to a difficulty in accommodating myself, with the 'steady Habits' in which I had been educated in Connecticut, to the less economical propensities of some of the other and older apprentices, my service there was closed about the beginning of the Septem- ber following. During these six months I never spent a happy day. Two hours had not elapsed after my entrance into the office, before I was called upon 'to treat'. I resisted the call for several days, but was at length overcome by the daily and almost hourly annoyance, and more than half of the small amount of money I possessed was expended for brandy, wine, sugar, eggs, crackers, cheese, etc., etc. Till then my lips had never been in contact with either of those liquors. Now, I was literally compelled to swallow them, distasteful and nauseous though they were. I say COMPELLED, for what boy of sixteen could stand up against the sneers and ribaldry of eight or ten older ones, who laughed at his scruples and reproached him for his lack of honor and manhood in having never been drunk. After having 'treated', as I was the youngest apprentice, I was not called upon for change to buy the wine and eggs, which were taken by my seniors three or four mornings a week; but it was my lot to go to the store for these articles, and to be on the watch, to see if they were not likely to be disturbed by the appearance of Carlisle. How it happened that I did not acquire an appetite for intoxicating liquors, during this period, I cannot tell; for the most irresistible argument to overturn the resolution of a young mind, namely ridicule,

was constantly applied. Whether I should have come off victorious if I had continued longer in the place, is more than I would undertake now to assert."

About this time Maj. Asa Bullard came to Walpole and for some years thereafter kept the once famous Crafts Tavern. His house was the resort of a coterie of wags, wits and literati from all the surrounding country among whom were those men already mentioned as contributors to the Museum. Also in this group was Jeremiah Mason who after- wards became a distinguished lawyer in Boston. He had come up from Connecticut to read law with Att. Stephen Rowe Bradley in Westmin- ster. He wrote in his autobiography: "There was little or no good society in the place (Westminster), nor was it much better at Walpole, the vil- lage on the opposite bank of the river." This was not long prior to 1791. Soon after that time he settled in practice in Westmoreland.

"But I became tired with the solitariness of my situation, and, late fall of the year 1794, I removed to Walpole, six miles higher up the river. This was a brisk, active village, with several traders, and many industrious mechanics, and two or three tav- erns, in one of which I took lodging for a short time, when I engaged a clever house, and small family to keep it, in which I lodged and kept my office. Walpole was, at that time, a place of more business than any in that vicinity, and was much resorted to by the people of the neighboring towns. There was also a considerable travel from a distance, passing on what was called the great river road, so that my situation here seemed quite a contrast to my former solitude. The inhabitants of that part of the Valley of the Connecticut river were then just passing from the rude and boisterous manners of first settlers to a more civilized, orderly, and composed state. There was more motion, life and bustle than in the older parts of the country.

"A set of young men, mostly of the legal profession, extending from Greenfield in Massachusetts to Windsor in Vermont, a distance of fifty or sixty miles, were much in the habit of familiar intercourse for the sake of amusement and recreation. They occasionally met at village taverns, but more commonly at the sessions of the courts and freely indulged in gambling, excessive drinking, and such like dissipation. The most of them were gentlemanly in manners, and some talented. I rejoice that I am able to say with truth that I did not belong to them, and never associated with them in their dissipation; my poor friend, Col. Alpheus Moore, who had been a leader among them and was already ruined, served me as a warning beacon,-added to this was the friendly advice of Mr. West (from Charlestown), for whom I early enter- tained the most reverential esteem and respect.

"Soon after I removed to Walpole, Joseph Dennie, who had studied law in Mr. West's office, and had just been admitted to the courts, came to reside in that village under the pretense of practicing law. His legal knowledge consisted wholly in a choice selection of quaint, obsolete, and queer phrases from 'Plowden's Commentaries', the only law book he had ever read with any attention, and this was read for the sole purpose of treasuring up in his memory these quaint phrases. These he often repeated in ridicule of the law, to the great amusement of his auditors. He was the most aerial, refined, and highly sublimated spirit it has ever been my hap to meet

with. He was graduated at Cambridge University, and was of the class of 1790, and, against his own inclination, by the urgent advice of his friends, he undertook to study law. With a good share of native genius, he had a delicate and accurate taste, much cultivated by an ardent study of the English classics, with which he was thoroughly imbued. His language in common conversation, without any appearance of stiffness or pedantry, was always pure and classical. He early determined on the life of an author, and he deemed it necessary to avoid the use of low or vulgar language in conversation, in order to be secure against it in writing. His powers of conversation were of the highest order. He had a slender and feeble frame and was often depressed by bad health; but when in good health and spirits, I think I have never known a more eloquent and delightful talker.

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A history of Walpole, New Hampshire, Volume I, Part 3

Author: Frizzell, Martha McDanolds, 1902- Publication date: 1963 Publisher: Walpole, Walpole Historical Society Number of Pages: 786

Author: Frizzell, Martha McDanolds, 1902-
Publication date: 1963
Publisher: Walpole, Walpole Historical Society
Number of Pages: 786