Genealogical and family history of the state of New Hampshire : a record of the achievements of her people in the making of a commonwealth and the founding of a nation, Vol. IV, Part 52

Author: Stearns, Ezra S; Whitcher, William F. (William Frederick), 1845-1918; Parker, Edward E. (Edward Everett), 1842-1923
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: New York : Lewis Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 878

USA > New Hampshire > Genealogical and family history of the state of New Hampshire : a record of the achievements of her people in the making of a commonwealth and the founding of a nation, Vol. IV > Part 52

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(VI) Moses, eldest child of Colonel Rement- brance and Elizabeth (Elliott) Chamberlain, was born in Newbury, November 25, 1777. He was a farmer at Bradford, on the upper plain, where he bought out his Uncle Moses. He married (first) Martha Child, daughter of Cephas and Martha Child, of Woodstock, Connecticut, and West Fairlee. She died in 1839, and he married (second) Mrs. Jemima Peckett. He died November, 1854, and she married (third) a Mr. Morris, of Bradford. The children, all of the first marriage, were: John Elliott, Cephas Child, Martha E., Mary C., Moses Remembrance, Elizabeth, Benjamin F., Elizabeth E., Amanda N. and Azubah A.

(VII) John Elliott, eldest child of Moses and Martha (Child) Chamberlain, was born in Brad- ford, November 4, 1806, and died October 7, 1886. His education was academical. He was a farmer in South Newbury and held most of the town offices. In 1843 he was a member of the constitutional con- vention. Being a shrewd man of good judgment and executive ability he improved the opportunity to engage in railroad construction, and with Robert Morse built the White Mountain railroad from Woodville to Littleton, and later with Joseph A. Dodge built the Boston, Concord & Montreal rail- road extension from Littleton to the Fabyan House. He was also interested in other enterprises. He married, March. 1831, Laura, daughter of Israel Willard, of Bradford. She was born February 5, 1807, died May 16, 1864. They had six children : George Willard, Horace Elliott, Remembrance Wright, Leona Eveline, Ella Amanda and Charles Wesley.

(VIII) Horace Elliott Chamberlain, son of John Elliott and Laura (Williard) Chamberlain, was born at Newbury, Vermont, November 30, 1834. His primary education was obtained in the public schools, from which he went to the academy at Bradford and Newbury Seminary, where he attended for a con- siderable time. Having a natural inclination for a business life he entered the railway service in 1856. and was station agent at Littleton, New Hampshire, about seven years. He was then made general agent for the Rutland railroad at Burling- ton, Vermont, filling that place for a year. The following six years he was general freight agent

for the same road. In 1871 he was made superin- tendent of the Concord railroad, and discharged the duties of that place for nearly twenty years, finally resigning when it went into other hands. A year later he became superintendent of the Con- cord division of the Boston & Maine railroad and retired in 1900, after serving that road nine years. Since he left the service of the Boston & Maine. Mr. Chamberlin has lived retired, residing in a beautiful mansion on Pleasant street, Concord. He is an independent gold standard Democrat. His life has been too much occupied with business to leave any time for office holding, had he so desired. He is a member of the Unitarian Church of Concord, which he joined in 1886. In 1860 he became a mem- ber of Burns Lodge, No. 66, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of Littleton, of which he is now a past master. He has also taken the York Rites to and including the Knights Templar degrees, and the Scottish Rites to and including the thirty-second degree.

He married, March 31, 1880, at Laconia, New Hampshire, Nellie M. Putnam, daughter of Perley Putnam, proprietor and manager of the Laconia Car Works, and his wife Ellen M. (Goulding) Putnam, the latter the daughter of an English sea captain. Her mother was Mary (Elvord) Gould- ing, a native of Ireland. Nellie M. Putnam re- ceived an academic education, and in early life joined the Unitarian Church. There are no chil- dren of this marriage. Horace E. Chamberlin, born a farmer boy and educated in the less pretentious of our school institutions, had inherited from a respected line of ancestors, strong in body and mind the elements necessary to success. He selected his tasks, put all the energies of his nature into the performance of them, and today after more than half a century of hard work looks back with satis- faction over a long and useful life.

It is claimed that the family

CHAMBERLAIN is of French descent and that one Jean or John de Tanker- ville, a Frenchman, became chamberlain to the King of England, which constituted the origin of the surname of Chamberlain. It is also stated that John Chamberlain, son of the above-mentioned John, emigrated to New England and settled in Boston. These stories, however, are but family traditions. and should be treated accordingly. There were several early emigrants of this name. Henry Cham- berlain, who came in the "Diligent" in 1638, and settled in Hingham, Massachusetts, and William Chamberlain, who appears in the Woburn records in 1648, and removed to Billerica, Massachusetts, in 1653, are supposed to have been kinsmen. Thomas Chamberlain was made a freeman at Woburn, May 29, 1644, and resided there until 1655. The christian name of his wife was Mary and his children were: Thomas, presumably born in England; and Samuel, born at Woburn in 1645. (III) Thomas Chamber- lain, probably a son of (II) Samuel, married Abigail Hildreth (or Hildrick), of Chelmsford, and had sons John and Samuel. Abigail survived hier hus- band and was married a second time to a Hammond, of what is now Swanzey, New Hampshire. Her sons John and Samuel Chamberlain are believed to have settled in Swanzey, although the avail- able records of that town fail to mention them.

(I) Elisha Chamberlain, of Fitchburg, Massa- chusetts, held several town offices there between the years 1795 and ISOI, including those of select- man and highway surveyor, and was also a member of the school committee. He died in Keene. New

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Hampshire, June II, 1840, in his seventy-eighth year, and Susannah, his widow, died in Swanzey, New Hampshire, May 16, 1846, aged eighty years.

(Il) John, son of Elisha and Susannah Cham- berlain, was born in Fitchburg, September 10, 1795. In early life he was in the employ of Martin New- ton, an extensive lumber manufacturer of Fitchburg in his day, and he later engaged in the same busi- ness for himself at Swanzey, also operating a grist mill. In 1850 he retired from business and pur- chasing a residence at Middletown (Swanzey) re- sided there for some years. His death occurred in Swanzey, August 28 or 29, 1870. He married (first), March 18, 1820, Nancy Stone, born May 8, 1798, dicd June 1I, 1822; married (second), September 25, 1822, Olive H. Wyman, born March 18, 1792, died April 14, 1826; married (third), late in the year 1826, Sylvia Perry, born September 14, 1797, died October 28, 1852; married (fourth), February 7, 1854, Harriet Ware, daughter of Jacob Ware, of Winchester, this state. His first wife bore him one daughter, Nancy S., born October 2, 1820, married Franklin Holman, died October 22, 1845. The chil- dren of his second union are Martha W., born July 7, 1823, married a Mr. Austin, of Newton, Massachu- setts ; and William B., born April 9, 1826, died April 15, of the same year. Those of his third marriage are: Olive H., born September 9, 1827, became the wife of Albert N. Chase, of Worcester, Massachu- setts; John E., born November 29, 1830, died Au- gust 19, 1849; Sylvia, born March II, 1832, died in infancy ; William P., who will be again referred to; Sylvia A., born October 5, 1835, married (first) Rev. Albert E. Briggs, (second) Otis B. Wheeler, of Whitingham, Vermont; Sarah J., born Septem- ber 5, 1837, married Rev. Pearl P. Briggs, a brother of above named minister; and Edmund H., born October 18, 1840. His fourth wife became the mother of three children: Flora E., born January 9, 1855, married George F. Newell; Herbert R., born December 28, 1856; and John S., born in Janu- ary, 1864.

(III) William Perry, second son and fourth child of John and Sylvia (Perry) Chamberlain, was born in Swanzey July 2, 1833. He attended the public schools of Swanzey and Keene, and concluded his studies at the Keene Academy. His first employ- ment was in a tailoring establishment at Keene, but the possession of a melodious tenor voice and a decided taste and capacity for a musical career, shortly afterwards led him into the concert field. The appearance in 1850 of Jennie Lind, who was the first great European cantatrice to visit the United States, was not only a most important event in the musical life of the Republic but served to stimulate our native singers and instrumentalists to higher artistic aspirations as well, and also in- spired the general public to encourage and patronize native talent. Among the most prominent Ameri- can artists of that day was Ossian E. Dodge, an excellent musician and a composer of merit. Mr. Dodge organized a company of singers and instru- mentalists which was known as the Ossian Bards, and while this troup was touring New England in 1853, Mr. Chamberlain was induced much to his gratification to become its first tenor. While with the Bards, which visited the principal cities of the country, he entered the field of original composition and produced an inspiring patriotic song entitled : "Hurrah for Old New England," which acquired widespread popularity. Severing his connection with Mr. Dodge in 1854, he organized the Chamberlain Concert Company, which was inaugurated auspic-

iously and with which he was identified for a num- ber of years or until 1861, when he withdrew from the concert field permanently. Entering mercantile business at Felchville, Vermont, he conducted a general store under the firm name of Chamberlain & Keyes until 1869, and immediately thereafter en- tered the shoe business at Keene. He subsequently became associated with Edward Spaulding in con- ducting a dry goods store, but shortly afterwards disposed of his interest in order to open a new establishment devoted to the same line of trade, and some fifteen years ago he admitted his son-in- law, Frank Huntress, as a partner. Possessing the necessary sagacity for successfuly conducting busi- ness on a much larger scale, and realizing that a judicious expansion would increase his purchasing advantages in the wholesale markets, he began the organization of a chain of branch stores, and at the present time is actively interested in dry-goods establishments known as the Chamberlain Syndicate in Vergennes and Rutland, Vermont, Nashua, Win- chester and Claremont, New Hampshire, and Fitch- burg and Leominster, Massachusetts. These, to- gether with the Keene store, which is one of the best dry-goods emporiums is the state, are all financially sound and therefore in a flourishing condition.

Prior to the incorporation of Keene as a city Mr. Chamberlain served as a selectman, and was elected later to the common council. For the years 1878-79-80 he represented Keene in the lower branch of the legislature, and in 1885 and '86 he was in the state senate. At Concord he devoted his energies to progressive and reform legislation and he labored assiduously and successfully against apparently over- whelming odds to change the character of the "Old Grab Law" (so called), carrying his bill practically alone and finally winning out by nine votes in the senate and three in the house. For a period of nine years was a member of a special railroad commission and rendered excellent services in that capacity. Mr. Chamberlain has been for many years vice-president of the Citizens National Bank. Politically he is a Republican. For the past twenty-six years he has officiated as president of the board of trustees of the Keene Public Library. In Free Masonry he has taken thirty-two degrees, and also affiliates with the Knights of Pythias. He attends the First Congre- gational Church.

On January 8, 1857, Mr. Chamberlain married Harriet E. Persons, his first wife. She died August 17, 1894, leaving one daughter, Berdia Alia, who is now the wife of Frank Huntress, previously referred to. He was again married, March 16, 1897, to Ellen M. Atwood, daughter of William and Pamelia At- wood, of Keene. Mr. and Mrs. Frank Huntress have three children: William Chamberlain Hunt- ress, born September 5, 1892; Frank Chamberlain Huntress, born August 4, 1894, and Harriet Cham- berlain Huntress, born October 12, 1898.

The Chamberlain family of

CHAMBERLAIN this sketch is very probably an untraced branch of the family of Chamberlains whose generations are else- where given in this work.

Loammi Chamberlain, son of Captain Isaac Chamberlain, was born in Chelmsford, Massachu- setts, June 6, 1791, and died in Mason, New Hamp- shire, November 24, 1853, aged sixty-two years. Early in life he showed a partiality for mechanical occupation and an aptitude for ingenuity in the construction of such tools and utensils as he had occasion to make or mend. He chose to learn a

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trade, and was apprenticed to Salathiel Manning, a machinist of Chelmsford. Mr. Manning afterward re- moved to New Ipswich, New Hampshire, where young Chamberlain completed his apprenticeship in 1812. Soon after he took a contract for building the cards for the Mason Cotton Mills Company, doing the work at the shop of his late master in New Ipswich. When he had finished the cards he went to Mason village and put the carding and spinning machinery in operation. The two or three years next following he was much engaged in setting up machinery and "starting on" mills, in New Ipswich, Milford, and other places.

About the year 1815 Loammi Chamberlain, Roger Chandler and Eleazer Rhoades bought a small mill in New Ipswich, which they fitted up, and there manufactured cotton yarn for two or three years. In 1818 he contracted for water power of the Mason Cotton Mill Company, and built a machine shop. In 1821 he contracted with the Mason Cotton Mill Company "to build, make and put in complete oper- ation sixteen power looms, equal in every respect, to those in the Waltham Factory," and, if necessary, "to buy a loom of the Waltham Factory for a pat- tern, and then the said company to advance the money for the same, etc." About this period he made a valuable improvement in the power looms then in use. This greatly enhanced his reputation as a ma- chinist, and gave him employment in other states. For several years he carried on quite extensively the manufacture of woolen and cotton machinery, machine tools, and so on, employing at times thirty or forty workmen. In 1846 he sold his machine tools and went into other business. For several years he was engaged in blacksmithing.

About the year 1840, in company with Thomas Pierce, he fitted up the lower cotton mill, which had stood idle since the failure of the Mason Cotton Mill Company, and for a short time manufactured satinets and other woolen fabrics. About this time also he built a saw mill below the village. For several years before his death he was chiefly employed in overseeing his saw mill and his farm. He was a member of the two great fraternal orders, the Masons and the Odd Fellows, in both of which orders he was prominent locally.

Mr. Chamberlain possessed inventive talent and mechanical skill in a high degree. He was one of the busiest and most useful of the ancient citizens of Mason, and gave employment to many persons, some of whom spent many years in his service. He never sought public office, 'but filled some public positions in the town with honor and ability. He possessed strong powers of observation and great enterprise. He was a good neighbor and a public- spirited citizen, and highly esteemed. But it was in the family circle that his virtues of head and heart were most observable, and there his excellencies were most fully appreciated.

He married, in 1821, Eliza S. Tucker, of Brook- line. She survived her husband. They had but one child, James L., whose sketch follows.

(II) James Langdon, only child of Loammi and Eliza S. (Tucker) Chamberlain, was born in Mason, February 16, 1824, and died there. He was edu- cated in the common schools, and, succeeded to the extensive business of his father, which he carried on successfully. In 1857 he erected one of the most extensive and complete flouring mills in the state, which he operated. He married, February 16, 1854, Mary A. Prescott, of Mason.

(III) Ida F., daughter of James L. and Mary A. (Prescott) Chamberlain, became the wife of Herbert J. Taft, of Greenville. (See Taft, III).

Charles Gale Shedd is a lineal descend- SHEDD ant in the seventh generation of Daniel "Shed," an early settler in Braintree, Massachusetts, and in the tenth generation of Ed- mund Doty, the Mayflower Pilgrim. The posterity of both these immigrants have acquired an honorable record for their sturdy patriotism and steadfast de- votion to the cause of civil and religious liberty, which constitutes the fundamental basis of our liberal republic, and those of the present generation repre- sent the highest type of American citizenship. The name is unquestionably of remote English origin, and in the early Colonial records it was subjected to the usual variation in spelling, sometimes appear- ing as Shode.

(I) The family was established in New England by Daniel Shed, who emigrated prior to 1642, in which year his name first appears in the records of Braintree, and lie resided in that part of the town which is now Quincy. In 1645 he was granted more land at the mouth of the Weymouth river, on a peninsula which for over a century was designated in the town records as Shed's Neck, and he resided there until 1659, when he removed to Billerica, Mass- achusetts. His death occurred in the last named town July 27, 1708, at the age of about eighty-eight years. He was twice married, and the christian name of one of his wives, probably the first, was Mary. He was the father of eleven children, two of whom were twins, and one of these was Zacharialı, the next in line of descent. (Mention of his young- est son, Nathan, and descendants follows in this article ).

(II) Zachariah Shed, third son and sixth child of Daniel and Mary Shed, was born in Braintree, June 17, 1656. He was about three years old when his parents went to Billerica, and he resided there for the greater part of his life, which terminated in Chelmsford, in 1735. He was three times married; his first wife together with two of his children were massacred by the Indians in August, 1692. The maiden name of his second wife is not at hand. "His third wife, whom he married July 13, 1702, was Hannah Harris, and she died in Chelmsford, July 4, 1758. The total number of his children was seventeen, eight of whom were of his third union.

(III) Zachariah (2), seventh child of Zacharialı (I) and Hannah (Harris) Shed, was born in Billerica, August 27, 1720. He was a carpenter and joiner, and followed that occupation for the major portion of his active life in Chelmsford, where he died February 2, 1784. The family record at hand does not mention the name of his wife, but states that he had five children.

(IV) Captain Ebenezer, fourth child of Zachariah Shed, Jr., was born in Chelmsford, July 10, 1753. Like his father he was a carpenter, but at the age of twenty-two years deserted his bench and with the majority of the young men in his neighborhood espoused the cause of national independence, enlist- ing April 27, 1775, in Captain John Ford's com- pany, which joined the Twenty-seventh Regiment of the Continental line. He possessed unusual physical strength, and is said to have withstood without injury a hand-to-hand encounter with the enemy at the battle of Bunker Hill. After the completion of his military service he resumed his trade, and sub- sequently settled in Westford, Massachusetts, died in that town, March 2, 1829. In September, 1780, he married for his first wife, Mary Blood, born April 9, 1757, daughter of Stephen, Jr., and Mary Blood. She died August 13, 1785. May 16, 1793, he married for his second wife Lucy llartwell, born October 20, 1763, daughter of David and Rachel

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( Wortley) Hartwell, of Carlisle, Massachusetts. She survived him nearly twenty years. He was the father of ten children.

(V) Franklin, son of Captain Ebenezer and Lucy (Hartwell) Shedd, was born in Chelmsford, May 25, 1800. Having inherited his father's robust physique he attained a strong and vigorous manhood, and acquired a wide reputation for his muscular prowess. When a young man he engaged in the man- ufacture of hand-rakes at Plymouth, Vermont, where he resided until 1840, in which year he removed to Mount Holly, same state, and his death occurred in Weston, Vermont, March 30, 1875. He possessed a strong defined character which engendered pro- nounced opinions in all matters relative to the moral and religious welfare of his fellow-beings, and he not only professed christianity but conscientiously practiced it in his daily life. He was also an earnest advocate of total abstinence from intoxicat- ing liquors, and on every opportune occasion vigor- ously emphasized his views upon that subject. No- vember 4, 1830, Franklin Shedd married Lydia Kim- ball, born in Nelson, New Hampshire, November 12, 1804, daughter of Major David and Lydia (Sim- mons) Kimball. She died May 7, 1889, having been the mother of nine children.

(VI) Captain Charles Wesley Shedd, sixth child of Franklin and Lydia (Kimball) Shedd, was born in Mount Holly, October 21, 1810. He attended school in his native town, and at the age of thirteen entered the employ of M. Tarbell, manufacturer of lumber and hayrakes, with whom he remained for eight years. At the breaking out of the Civil war he and his brother were desirous of enlisting in the army, but the father refused his consent, the sons being under age. However, on the day that he was twenty-one, Charles and his brother joined a com- pany of nine months men organized in the town, Charles with his characteristic energy and patriotic fervor, being the first man to record his name, mount- ing a table in the recruiting room and urging his young friends to join with him. This body of young men became Company H, Fourteenth Regiment Vermont Volunteers, and Charles Shedd was elected orderly sergeant. The regiment became part of General Stannard's famous Vermont Brigade. The regi- ment's term of service expired just before the battle of Gettysburg, but with superb patriotism the men went into line in that sanguinary engagement, and on the second day repelled one of the most desperate attacks witnessed on that historic field. After his discharge Sergeant Shedd aided in recruiting the frontier cavalry organized to protect the Canadian border, and with that command performed efficient service.

After the war he became foreman in Batcheller & Son's fork manufactory in Wallingford, and Tar- bell's rake factory in Mechanicsville, Vermont. In 1870 he removed to Keene, New Hampshire, where he engaged in business for himself as an upholsterer and manufacturer of spring beds and mattresses. Shortly afterward he entered the employ of the late M. T. Tottingham, then the leading upholsterer, furniture dealer and undertaker in the town, in which business he continued until about 1903, when failing health made it necessary for him to abandon active work, after thirty years constant application. He was intensely interested in military affairs. At the time of the organization of the Keene Light Guard Battalion, and of Company G, Second Regi- ment New Hampshire Guard, which preceded it, he was one of the first to join, and was elected orderly sergeant of the first company. At the battalion for- mation he was commissioned first lieutenant of

Company H, and was promoted to the captaincy when Captain J. W. Sturtevant became major. Captain Shedd was one of the most efficient in organizing both company and battalion, and was in- defatigable in procuring means to perfect the or- ganization and promote its usefulness. At one time he procured the sum of twelve hundred dollars for this purpose. At the time of his resignation, necessi- tated by failing health, he was the oldest officer in the battalion in period of service. He was an active member of John Sedgwick Post, Grand Army of the Republic, in which he held various offices, and was a charter member and first sachem of Pokahoket Tribe of Red Men. He attended the Unitarian Church. He was a Republican in politics, an earnest worker in many campaigns, and in 1880-81 rendered valuable service in the common council as a repre- sentative from the Fourth Ward. On June 12, 1864, he married Sarah Frances Doty, who was born in Wallingford, June 6, 1843, youngest daughter of Elihu and Rhoda (Sayles) Doty, great-granddaugh- ter Jerathmiel Doty, who is said to have served in General Lafayette's bodyguard during the Revolu- tion, and a lineal descendant of Edward Doty, the Mayflower Pilgrim, previously mentioned. (See Doty, VIII).

Captain Shedd died suddenly, at his home, on the evening of February 2, 1907, from apoplexy. He had been out as usual during the day, and was read- ing the evening paper when stricken. In compliance with his frequently expressed wish, the funeral was private and entirely devoid of display. A local paper (the New Hampshire Sentinel) in comment- ing upon his demise said: "As a man, Captain Shedd was whole-souled and generous to a fault, and was always doing for others, oftentimes aiding those in affliction in a quiet way, or raising money for a worthy object. He had a faculty of making friends wherever he went, and a very unusual faculty for ac- complishing whatever he undertook, being a tire- less worker, a skillful mechanic, and a good judge of human nature."

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Genealogical and family history of the state of New Hampshire : a record of the achievements of her people in the making of a commonwealth and the founding of a nation, Vol. IV, Part 52

Author: Stearns, Ezra S; Whitcher, William F. (William Frederick), 1845-1918; Parker, Edward E. (Edward Everett), 1842-1923 Publication date: 1908 Publisher: New York : Lewis Publishing Co. Number of Pages: 878

Author: Stearns, Ezra S; Whitcher, William F. (William Frederick), 1845-1918; Parker, Edward E. (Edward Everett), 1842-1923
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: New York : Lewis Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 878