USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > Peterborough > Historical sketches of Peterborough, New Hampshire : portraying events and data contributing to the history of the town > Part 34
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Rhode Island; James White enlisted in Capt. Parker's Company in 1777 for the defense of Rhode Island; John White, Sr .- known as ".Pond John"- settled on the old White homestead, near Cunningham Pond; he was with Capt. Robbe's Company at Ticon- deroga in 1777. William White was a member of Capt. Robbe's Com- pany in 1776 and enlisted in 1777 in Col. Moore's regiment and was at the battle of Stillwater. Charles White, nephew of Patrick White, was in Capt. Scott's Company and answered the Lexington alarm and a nephew, John White, Jr., enlisted for the Rhode Island defense ..
William McNee, (son of William Mc- Nee, who was born in Ireland in 1711 and was one of the settlers of Peter- borough-the name was changed in the third generation to Nay) was a prominent citizen and joined Col. Moore's Regiment and marched to Saratoga in 1777; he subsequently enlisted in Capt. Cunningham's Com- pany for the defense of Rhode Island.
The Moore family were well repre- sented among the Peterborough sol- diers in the War of the Revolution; there was James Moore in Capt. Scott's Company, John Moore in Capt. Robbe's Company, Samuel Moore, Jr. in Capt. Scott's Company and William Moore in Capt. Parker's Company, all were descendants of John Moore who emigrated from Ireland in 1718 and is the ancestor of our respected citizen, William Moore.
The Morrison family-with but few descendants now living in town- were.well represented in the Revolu- tionary War. John Morrison enlisted in Col. Stark's regiment in 1775 and answered the Ticonderoga alarm, he was in the battle of Bennington and marched to the defense of Rhode Island in 1778. Robert, Morrison was with the men who marched to
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Lexington and Cambridge in 1775. Samuel Morrison was in Capt. Scott's Company and Thomas Morrison en- listed at Cambridge in 1775. All of these and all of the name of Morrison (more recently spelled Morison) in town today, are descendants of Sam- uel Morrison, who with his wife and eight children emigrated from Ireland.
Nathaniel Holmes, whose father and grandfather were born in Cole- raine, Ireland, at 16 years of age was urged to enlist by his brother-in-law, William Moore, who offered to in- crease his wages to ten dollars a month, but the boy declined on the ground that his clothes were not good enough. His sister, Mrs. Moore, hearing the conversation, said to her husband, "Billy, you furnish the shoes and I will furnish the clothes." There were only two pounds of wool in the house but the next morning four lambs were sheared and within twenty days the wool was colored, spun, woven and made into cloth and he joined the army and was in the battles of Saratoga and White Plains.
James Turner, one of the three sons of Joseph Turner, all natives of Ireland, was in Col. Bagley's regiment and died at Crown Point. His regi- ment rendezvoused at Litchfield and marched by way of Milford over the notch between the two East Moun- tains through Peterborough to Keene, thence to No. 4 and Crown Point. They had to clear a road, formerly a mere bridle-path, from the Merrimac river to Keene and were forty-four days cutting a road from No. 4 to the foot of the Green Mountains. They hauled their stores over the mountains on "horse-barrows." He entered the Revolutionary War and commanded a Sharon Company in the Ticonderoga alarm in 1777.
John Swan, son of John Swan, was a native of Ireland, and one of the pioneers of Peterborough; he enlisted
in Capt. Taggart's (Sharon) Company in 1777. A son of his, John Swan, Jr., also enlisted with Capt. Taggart. John Swan, 3d, grandson of the pioneer, was in Capt. Scott's Com- pany. Robert and William Swan were in Capt. Robbe's Company.
Thomas Cunningham, a native of Ireland, was the progenitor of all of this name, once so numerous here, including James, Robert and Capt. Samuel Cunningham. Capt. Samuel was in the French and Indian Wars; was a prominent man here, holding many town offices. He was in Capt. Robbe's Company and responded to the Ticonderoga alarm in 1777; he participated in the battles of Bennington and Saratoga. His broth- er, James Cunningham, also a promi- nent citizen, enlisted with him and they were together during their mili- tary service. The cellar-hole of the old Cunningham homestead is all that now remains to indicate where the house stood-within the memory of many of us-beside the Wilton highway, near Cunningham Pond.
James McKean, who lived and died on the David Blanchard Place, was with Capt. Scott's Company at Lexington. His- brother, William McKean, was a member of Capt. Robbe's Company of Militia, but in 1777 joined Capt. Findlay's Com- pany at Saratoga. Both of these men were sons of John McKean, who was born in Ballymoney, Ireland, in 1714.
Charles Davidson, son of Thomas Davidson who emigrated from Ire- land with his brother John and Matthew Wright, enlisted in Col. Hercules Mooney's Regiment in 1776 for the defense of Rhode Island. His brother, Thomas Davidson, enlisted in Col. Hale's Regiment which marched to the defense of Ticondero- ga and West Point.
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Benjamin Alld, son of William Alld a native of Armagh, Ireland, enlisted in 1776 in Col. Baldwin's Regiment, raised to protect New York and was in the battle of White Plains. He died in 1823 and parents and son are buried in the cemetery on the East Hill.
John Todd, (son of Andrew Todd born in Ireland in 1697,) enlisted in Capt. McConnell's Company raised to reinforce the Continental Army in 1776 and was in the battle of Bennington.
David Smiley, son of John Smiley, a native of Ireland, enlisted in Capt. Carr's Company in 1778.
John Wallace was in Capt. Scott's Company in 1776 and later on was at Valley Forge, Pa., in that darkest period of the war. His ancestor was John Wallace, who emigrated from Ireland in 1719.
Thomas Little came from Ireland with his parents about 1736. Arriving in Peterborough in 1764, he enlisted in Capt. Haskell's Company.
Adam, Hugh and Jacob Gregg were all in Capt. Robbe's Company which answered the Ticonderoga alarm; they were descendants of James Gregg who emigrated from Ireland in 1718.
Henry Ferguson, (son of John Fer- guson who was born in Ireland in 1704,) became an influential man in Peterborough and was First Lieuten- ant in Col. Burnham's Regiment in the Cambridge Campaign of 1775-6. This regiment was raised to take the place of the Connecticut troops sta- tioned in Rhode Island who refused to remain after their terms expired.
The Miller family not only fur- nished soldiers in the War of the Revolution, but in Peterborough in 1776 was born Gen. James Miller, who, July 25, 1814, had charge of a
division at the battle of Lundy's Lane and whose response, "I'll try, sir," to the command to execute a des- perate charge on a strong and im- portant redoubt, will go down in the annals as the hero of one of the most important engagements of the second conflict with England, the War of 1812; his ancestors, the an- cestors of the Revolutionary War Millers and the ancestors of all of those of the name in town today, were natives of Ireland.
Dr. John Young-the first physi- cian in Peterborough-came to town from Worcester about 1764 and was the only physician down to 1788. He was an eccentric character, and quite dressy, with silver buckles on his shoes. He held many town offices. He practiced, according to the cus- toms of the day, with heavy doses and many of them, of the most re- pulsive medicines, administered with- out palliatives and in the raw state; he made no pretensions to surgery- although he did practice it in a way- but never operated if he could avoid it; he purged, bled, blistered, plas- tered and poulticed with a freedom and frequency which would make modern physicians tremble.
Notwithstanding his crude knowl- edge of surgery, Dr. Young, strange as it now appears, was a surgeon in Nichols' Regiment in the Bennington campaign in 1778 and in Col. Pea- body's Regiment in the defense of Rhode Island in 1778. He died in 1807 after a practice in Peterborough of 43 years and was buried in the old cemetery on the East Hill.
There was no organized medical department worthy of the name in the army, no high standard of medical or surgical knowledge was required and Dr. Young was gladly accepted as an "expert" army surgeon and entered upon that delicate work with
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the crude knowledge and the lack of any modern anesthetie to deaden pain. The suffering of the wounded in that war must have been something horrible and is beyond the imagina- tion of our generation with its skill and the painlessness of the present surgical operation.
I have the time here to mention only the names of the most prominent men from Peterborough in the. War of the Revolution. They were prac- tically all Irishmen, or of immediate Irish descent. In this connection Judge Smith, on page " 26 of his" "Peterborough in the Revolution,"" describes them as follows:
"They were a contented and peace- loving folk, not of those who were eager to excite war, but they had inherited a taste and aptitude for military life. . Many of them had come to this country in the migra- tion of 1736, while the rest were the children of the Londonderry immi- grants of 1719. Probably nineteen out of every twenty were of that race which has ever been dangerous ma- terial for royal despotism to handle."
Ncarly all of these Revolutionary War soldiers were buried in the old cemetery on the hill, east of the village of Peterborough, but unfor- tunately only a few of the old slate- stones at the head of their graves, record the fact that they participated in the war. This oversight ought to be corrected by this society.
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Protected in a conspicuous glass ease on the main floor of the Lexing- ton Historical Society may be seen an ancient drum, "The Drum of . Lexington"; an almost sacred relic, looked upon' reverently by all who visit that interesting building, be- cause it was the timbrel from which issued the first hostile note of rebel-
lion against the English Crown; from it came the first drum-beat to summon the patriots to the terrible' expedient of war, which might end either in their newly born freedom, or in their death as traitors to their government.
It was late in the night, just 149 years ago the 18th of last month, that the epoch-making lanterns were hung in the' steeple of Boston's Old North Church, starting Paul Revere on his historie ride to awaken "every Middlesex village and farm" and the word was quickly given at Lexing- ton as the rider hastened on to extend the alarm to Concord.
It was on the approach of dawn: of that fateful day that William Diamond was ordered . to beat the reveille and thus summon the small company of minute-men to assemble on Lexington common to oppose the British invasion who fired the first hostile shot of the war at the invad- ing British Grenadiers and thus constituted, as it did, the first war- like assault on the Crown of England.
Hence, the names of Paul Revere and William Diamond became in- separably linked in the first step of active violence in the War of the Revolution in the "firing of the shot heard around the world," heralding as it did the new doctrines embodied . in the imperishable Declaration of Independence, which great document has since then served as a bcacón light of progress and civilization throughout the world.
Paul Revere has been rightly glori- fied in song and story and monuments and statutes of granite and bronze have been reared to perpetuate his namc and glory, while the ashes of William Diamond rest, within our' keeping beneath the pines in the old cemetery on the East Hill in Peter- borough marked only by a plain
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slate-stone on which appears the following inscription:
"William Diamond, died July 29, 1828, aged 73. A Revolutionary Soldier; drummer at Lexington and Bunker Hill."
When seven years ago, Clinton Scollard was selecting a subject to arouse the military spirit to defend against the great German menace in the approaching World War, he made William Diamond his hero and pub- lished in the New York Sun the epic poem of which I will repeat only the opening and closing stanzas.
"But yesterday I saw the historic drum
Which William Diamond beat,
Upon that fateful far-off April morn, Along each winding street,
And on the memorable Green of Lex- ington,
Bidding the patriots come
And face the banded hosts of tyran- ny."
After several verses eloquently urg- ing the people to arouse in our country's defense he closes with this striking appeal:
"Now every slope of our dear land is fair
Beneath the azure of the April air;
The impatient loam is ready for the seed,
But we? Take heed, take heed, My brothers! And O you, brave wraith
Of dauntlessness and faith, You, William Diamond, come!
Come, sound the old reveille on your drum,
The drum of Lexington,
And make us all, in steadfast purpose, one!"
We never had a war in which a greater number of soldiers, in propor- tion to the population of our town,
were furnished. The first census taken in 1767 showed a total popula- tion of 443. In 1773 the census showed a population of 514, and the one in 1775, two years later, showed a population of 549 out of which sixty- five or more officers and men were accredited by the New Hampshire or Massachusetts rolls to Peter- borough in the campaign of 1775, but not all of them can be properly claimed as belonging or serving to the credit of the town in that cam- paign. Many of the men serving in 1775, upon their discharge, im- mediately re-enlisted and served . through the year 1776. There are no rolls of this service and their names, all of them, cannot be given. Some of those who served in 1775 claimed an enlistment for that year (1776). It is safe to say, however, that Peterborough furnished at least 65 men.
The obtaining of soldiers for the Revolutionary War was conducted on a purely volunteer basis. Not so much as a requisition for troops was at first made on the several states and the first battles were fought without even a system of call for troops. It was the spontaneous up- rising of the people, the flocking to- gether of all the able-bodied men for the common defense. In the War of the Rebellion, President Lincoln called for volunteers, but was after- wards compelled to resort to the draft system for the first time in our his- tory introducing in this country the process of compelling men to go into military service and resulted in the terrible draft riots. In our own day, however, a more equitable and peace- able mode of selection has been adopted to get soldiers for the World War, by a most just and perfect selective system of draft, universally commended.
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In the Revolutionary War the volunteer system of obtaining troops was tested to its limit and came very near proving itself inadequate, but the zealous determination of the patriots to win their freedom was the incen- tive to finally tip the scales and bring victory to the American arms. Nearly a century later-in the War of the Rebellion-an army was again at- tempted to be raised by the same volunteer process, but it then proved a failure and the draft had to be resorted to. Never again can a large army be raised in this country wholly by the volunteer process as was done in the Revolutionary War; it must hereafter be by selective draft.
The history of those brave, self- sacrificing patriots in the war for inde- pendence is the proud heritage of the Daughters of the American Revo- lution and of all our people. The story of the sufferings, privations and sacrifices those ancestors under- went in that cruel struggle against the then most powerful empire on earth, should be instilled into the minds of the present and the future generations in order to create an adequate appreciation of the great price that was paid for the liberty and happiness we now enjoy. The blood and treasure that was so un- stintingly given that liberty and
democracy might here build an en- during shrine-in the bright light of which has taken form and substance the most beneficent, prosperous and powerful nation on earth-has es- tablished here a government so at- tractive and permanent that today it excites the admiration and despair of all other peoples.
We must be ever mindful of the fact that it was the supreme sacrifices of the patriots of the Revolutionary War, a century and a half ago, re- sisting oppression and defending their liberty, who created this government which gave us the liberty and union we now enjoy; that it was the patriots of sixty years ago, in the War of the Rebellion, who preserved our Union, and, that it was the patriots of the World War-within the memory of us all-who protected our country from foreign domination and our flag from dishonor.
The responsibility of preserving this great heritage is now in our care and keeping. May we fail not in our duty, and, if called upon to make like sacrifices, may we fulfill that patriotic duty with a devotion equal to those who have gone before us and thus transmit to future generations this government in all its matchless efficiency and beauty.
[Published in The Peterborough TRANSCRIPT, May 29, 1924]
TABLET UNVEILED AT THE UNITARIAN CHURCH
Last Sunday a service of much historic interest was held at the Uni- tarian Church, The occasion was the unveiling of a tablet by the de- scendants of William Smith in mem- ory of their ancestors, and the address of presentation was given by Judge Jonathan Smith of Clinton, Mass.
The tablet is of bronze and bears the following inscription:
IN MEMORIAM
William Smith 1723-1808-one of the founders of this church. Elder 1778-1808.
Elizabeth Morison Smith, his wife, 1723-1808. Member 1752-1808.
Jonathan Smith 1763-1842. Son of William and Elizabeth Morison Smith. Deacon of this church 1799- 1842.
Nancy Smith, his wife, 1770-1847. Member, 1797-1847.
John Smith, 1803-1881. Son of Jonathan and Nancy Smith. Deacon of this church 1842-1876.
Susan Stearns Smith, his wife, 1809-1870. Member 1834-1870.
(Gratias ago Deo meo in omni memo- ria vestri.) Phil. 1-3.
Rev. Frederic W. Smith, minister of the Church of Our Father, New- burgh, N. Y., assisted in the service, reading the responses, and the scrip- ture lesson and pronouncing the benediction. Miss Mabel Shattuck, as a special number, sang a soprano solo and was accompanied on the 'cello by Mr. Harry Pierce.
In presenting the tablet Judge Jonathan Smith spoke as follows:
The descendants of William Smith have asked permission to erect this tablet as a memorial to their an- cestors. It seems to them altogether
fitting to do this, for it was this church they all loved and for it they labored and sacrificed beyond any other institution outside of their own home throughout the whole of their long and busy lives. Beginning with its foundation in 1751 or 1752, for one hundred and twenty-five con- secutive years, through three genera- tions, they, one and all, were its ardent supporters and loyal communi- cants. From 1778 to 1876, ninety- eight successive years, father, son or grandson filled its highest lay office. Is not such a record worthy of place upon the walls of the church which they served for almost a century with such rare fidelity and faithfulness?
William Smith was born in Money- more, Ireland, and came to this country in 1736. He was one of the first permanent settlers of the town in 1749. When the church was or- ganized, two or three years later, he was one of its founders and was actively identified with it from that time until his death. He was elected elder in 1778. It is possible he held the office before that date, but there is no record of it, nor any family tra- dition. His wife, Elizabeth Morison Smith, was the daughter of John Morison, a pioneer emigrant to Lon- donderry in 1718. She came to Peter- borough on her marriage the last day of December 1751, united with it and for fifty-six years was a devoted and earnest laborer for its interests.
Their son, Jonathan Smith, was born into this church, trained in its, then Calvinistic creed, and was a most loyal member until his decease in 1842. He was chosen deacon in 1799. His wife, Nancy Smith, was a daughter of John Smith, a brother
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of William. She was born in Peter- borough, joined here in early life and was a communicant for more than fifty years.
Their son, John Smith, was like- wise born into this church and edu- cated in its faith. Cn the death of his father in 1842 he was chosen deacon to succeed him, and held the office until his removal from town in 1876. His wife, Susan Stearns Smith, came here on her marriage in 1834 and was a faithful member until her death in 1870.
This church was founded in the Calvinistic faith and was organized on the Presbyterian model. It is now progressively Unitarian. The steps by which this change was wrought out are most interesting in the light of the attitude the names on this tablet assumed towards the successive changes. Its members held to the five points of Calvin without question up to the close of the Revolution. That great war, as is always true of a long armed conflict, brought a wide departure from the old order, not only as to forms of worship, but as to religious opinions and faith. A young- er generation had come upon the stage which demanded new methods of religious expression, and the applica- tion of the new light to questions of religious forms and belief. The first controversy broke in the storm- center of every religious society, the music. Hitherto it had been con- ducted in the primitive Presbyterian method, the minister, or elder, read- ing a line of the psalm and the con- gregation singing it after him. The young people demanded a choir and the introduction of Watts Hymns, and they prevailed. Jonathan Smith organized the new choir and led the singing for several years. This change was effected against the intense op- position of the conservative element of the society and bred a quarrel be-
tween the conservatives and progres- sives which was never healed.
The second step came ten years later. The society being without a minister extended a call to Rev. Zephaniah Swift Moore, afterwards president of Amherst College. He declined on account of divisions in the church and that it was a Presby- terian and not a Congregational body. The society then offered to settle him in the Congregational way. William Smith wrote and signed the letter conveying the second invita- tion, but it did not avail.
A year later, in 1799, Mr. Dunbar was chosen minister. He was called and settled as a Congregationalist, by Congregational u'sage, and the Presbytery was wholly ignored. This was a radical step because it was a declaration that the society had ceased to be Presbyterian and had become Congregational. Though set- tled by Congregational forms, Mr. Dunbar was really in faith an Ar- minian. Arminianism may be defined as a little snow on the hard sledding of Calvinism, and as giving the sinner a little better chance at the Day of Judgment.
In 1801 the society adopted a Con- fession of Faith. It contained the Apostles Creed and the other points were substantially in agreement with Arminianism, and what is now held by Evangelical churches. It remained the creed of the church down to the ministry of Mr. Ferry. At least there is no record of any change.
The settlement of Mr. Dunbar was most vigorously protested on the part of the conservatives, and in- tensified the religious differences be- tween the parties in the church.
Events then moved along without any great modification for twenty years. But between 1810 and 1820 great changes took place in the the- ological opinions of the people. The
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sermons of Dr. Channing and of other liberal ministers were in cir- culation through the society and widely read. There were many strong and able men and women in the par- ish, intelligent and vigorous thinkers who were strongly attracted to the new light and who soon came to ac- cept the new thought. It is a family tradition that when Samuel Smith received a copy of one of Dr. Chan- ning's sermons, he would forthwith summon his brothers to his counting room and there read it aloud to them, all giving to its sentiments a cordial approval. A majority of the parish came to adopt these liberal views and the result was that when the society was invited to send delegates to the ordination and installation of Mr. Leonard, as minister of the church in Dublin, it accepted the invitation and sent as delegates its minister and two deacon's, one of whom was Jonathan Smith. Mr. Leonard was a Unitarian and was called and settled as such. This act .was an open declaration that the society had ceased to be Evangelical and had become Unitarian. Two years later the conservative party of the church withdrew.
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