USA > New Hampshire > Merrimack County > Concord > History of Concord, New Hampshire, from the original grant in seventeen hundred and twenty-five to the opening of the twentieth century, Volume I > Part 34
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It was on the 5th of March, 1800, that the town established its second public cemetery, by voting that " the selectmen vendue the fencing of the burying yard on the east side of the river, and charge the expense to the town."2 This inclosure was located-according to the record-" near Jeremiah Eastman's house," and was known as " The Fort Burying Ground." Filled with its hundreds of graves, and afterwards disused for years, it was to receive, near the end of
? Town Records, 339.
1 Bouton's Concord, 312, 430.
316
HISTORY OF CONCORD.
the century of its establishment, becoming renovation and adornment, in especial honor of the thirteen heroes of the Revolution asleep be- neath its turf, and, thus reconsecrated, was again to be committed to municipal keeping, as a precious historic trust.1 The town having established its second public cemetery, made provision in 1804 for its third, by voting "to purchase" at Horse Hill, "one acre of land of David Carter, for a burying yard, and fence the same."2 In such action, the municipality was but carrying out the earlier enlightened purpose of the plantation to provide fit resting-places for the dead-a purpose that was to count among its appropriate results cemeteries bearing the names of " Millville," " West Concord," " Pine Grove," " Woodlawn," and " Blossom Hill."
Meanwhile, in 1802, the meeting-house had been enlarged by Cap- tain Richard Ayer and other enterprising parishioners, in considera- tion " of the addition of pew ground," and " without any expense to the town."3 Those gentlemen gave bonds to execute the work according to a plan, proposed by a committee of seven, namely, Jacob Abbot, Richard Ayer, Paul Rolfe, William A. Kent, Benjamin Emery, Stephen Ambrose, and Abiel Virgin, and adopted in town-meeting,4 on the 21st of December, 1801. The plan provided for a semi-circu- lar addition " projecting thirty feet in front, and divided into seven angles."5 The meeting-house thus enlarged was accepted by the town, on the 1st of March, 1803. It was now " the most spacious and commodious 6 edifice of its kind in the state," capable of seating " eight hundred persons on the floor and about four hundred in the gallery," and actually accommodating, " for many years," an average Sabbath " congregation of about seven hundred,"6 the largest in New Hampshire.
But as yet the meeting-house had no bell, though its belfry had long been up, surmounted by tall spire and literal weathercock. As early as 1800 the town had voted " to accept of a bell, if one " could " be obtained by subscription, and cause the same to be rung at such time as the town " might think proper ;7 but it was not until 1809 that effective action was taken to supply the want. Then the select- men were instructed " to mark out the ground of the two front seats on the floor of the meeting-house for pews, and sell the same at public vendue, the money arising from the sale to be appropriated towards purchasing a bell, when a sufficient sum in addition " should " be subscribed " to complete the purchase.8 The auction sale of
1 See Old Fort Cemetery, etc., in note at close of chapter.
2 Town Records, 370.
3 Dr. Bouton's Anniversary Sermon, 1830; Town Records, 350-1.
4 Ibid, 351-2.
" Ibid, 352. "Town Records, 340.
" Bouton's Concord, 325.
8 Ibid, 426.
317
THE CHURCH BELL.
the four pews thus provided for brought a little more than three hundred dollars. With this sum duly swelled by contribution, the long desired bell was at last obtained, and at the March town-meet- ing of 1810 the vote was passed that it " be rung at seven o'clock in the morning, twelve at noon, and nine at night, except Sundays," on which the time of ringing was left to the direction of the selectmen.1 It was further voted that " the ringing of the bell and the care of the meeting-house one year be set up to the lowest bidder, and that the person bidding off the same give bonds to the selectmen for the faith- ful performance "1 of duty. Sherburne Wiggin, having bid twenty- five dollars, became the first sexton. This place was, for the next two years, disposed of at vendue, Benjamin Emery, Jr., being the successful bidder. Afterwards, a definite sum, varying from twenty to forty dollars, was annually appropriated to this service, under the appointment of the selectmen. In 1814 the town ordered, in addition to the daily ringing of the bell, its tolling " at all funerals, upon application to the sexton."2 This practice was to be continued thirty-seven years, till in March, 1851, the following preamble and resolution, offered by Asa McFarland, were unanimously adopted by the town :
" WHEREAS the tolling of bells on funeral occasions is productive of no good, and may, in case of the illness of the living, result in evil ; Therefore, Resolved, That the practice be discontinued here, as it has generally been in other populous places."
With the beginning of the century, the school began to outstrip the pulpit in annual appropriations for support; the sum voted to the former in 1800, being four hundred dollars, and to the latter, three hundred and fifty. Educational interest was further shown, the same year, in the appointment of a committee, consisting of the selectmen and "one man from each district where there " was "a school-house," to divide "the town into school-districts." 3 The addition of six members to the selectmen in the make-up of the com- mittee denotes at least that number of so-called " districts "; while it may have been that two or three schools in the main village were not included in the selection of committeemen. Nothing practical seems to have resulted from this action. Indeed, it was not until 1805 that the state law was enacted, authorizing towns to lay out school districts. Accordingly, in April, 1807, another committee was ap- pointed, similar to that of seven years before, but with an increased number of members to act with the selectmen, indicating the exist- ence of at least seventeen localities, or districts, in which public schools were supported upon "orders drawn for school money annu-
1 Town Records, 434.
2 Ibid, 466, 494. 3 Ibid, 339.
318
HISTORY OF CONCORD.
ally."1 This committee, in the following May, with Ebenezer Dus- ton as its chairman, and town clerk, John Odlin as its clerk, laid out the town into sixteen school districts, duly bounded and numbered.2
The general location of these was: No. 1. Horse Hill; 2. The Borough ; 3 and 4. West Parish ; 5. West of Long pond ; 6. Little pond and Ballard's hill ; 7. Hopkinton road, three miles from Main street ; 8. Millville ; 9. South end of Main street; 10. Middle Main street; 11. North end of Main street; 12. South part of East vil- lage; 13. The Mountain ; 14. "Snaptown," northeast part of the town ; 15. Oak Hill road to Loudon; 16. Garvin's Falls.3 From these, by division, seven other districts were subsequently formed, as follows: From 8, Nos. 17 and 23, the first near Hopkinton line, the second near that of Bow ; from 9, No. 18; from 12, Nos. 19 and 22, the latter on the Dark Plain towards Chichester; from 2, No. 20, in Fisherville, or Penacook.4
These twenty-three districts were permanent divisions of Concord's territory down to a recent period, and some of them yet exist. Here, too, it may be added in reminder and explanation of statements made in a previous chapter5 concerning the Bow gores, that the district numbered sixteen belonged to the southern gore, which, in 1804, was severed by the general court from the modern town of Bow and annexed to Concord. This action had been asked for by the former town and opposed by the latter. Bow, in view of liabilities incident to the holding of the detached gores, including this wedge of land that lay across the Merrimack, and between that river and its con- fluent Soucook, was eager to yield possession ; for already the town had been obliged to build a bridge over the Soucook, and was asking the legislature "to make a county charge " of the same.6 Concord, on the other hand, did not desire the expansion of its territory over gores outside the original Rumford bounds which it wished to have restored, whereby would have been saved to it that triangular por- tion of its former domain, southeast of the Soucook, which was in 1804 set off to Pembroke.
In 1801, ten years after the regular establishment of the post-office in Concord, Charles, a son of Judge Timothy Walker, and a gradu- ate of Harvard, who was then in the practice of the law, succeeded George Hough as postmaster, but did not serve long. His successor was David George, but, as there were a father and a son of that name, which of the two was the first to succeed Mr. Walker has been made a matter of doubt, though it was probably the son, sometimes desig-
1 Town Records, 398. + Bouton's Concord, 340.
2 Ibid, 398-404.
5 Chapter VII.
3 Bouton's Concord, 339-40.
" Bow, in History of Merrimack and Belknap Counties, 279.
319
THE POST-OFFICE-A ROAD STRAIGHTENED.
nated as " David George, Jr." At any rate, whether the father, who was a tailor residing just south of the burying-ground, ever served as postmaster or not, it is certain that the son, who was a hatter and had a shop on the east side of Main street,-nearly opposite its junc- tion with the modern Church street,-served as such from 1806 to 1816. There, in a six by eight compartment of his shop, Mr. George kept the post-office, where, in the earlier years at least, a Concord mail might have found accommodation in one of the postmaster's "good- sized hats." ] Indeed, the high rate of postage, increasing according to distance, from the minimum of ten cents a letter for the shortest transmission, tended to make " correspondence rare "-as another has said-" and mostly of imperative necessity ; love-letters were few and far between."1 Still, the little office, while meeting the wants of its locality, also had central importance in affording postal facilities for a wide circuit of towns, including Allenstown, Bow, Canterbury, Dun- barton, Henniker, Hopkinton, Loudon, New London, Northfield, Pem- broke, Warner, Weare, and even others more remote.2
An important highway improvement was effected early in the first decade of the century. Hitherto, "the road from the meeting-house to Boscawen line " had been a very "crooked "3 one. It had run from the main street through a valley south of the modern Fiske resi- dence, and onward, near the Coffin house, to the modern Penacook street, and westward along that to a point beyond the Bradley prem- ises, whence, turning sharply northward, it skirted "John Bradley's land, at the west end of his dwelling-house," also "George Arlin's lot," and came to Wood's brook, at the southeast base of Blossom Hill. From this point it had run, at various angles, to West Con- cord, with westward deflection to the elevated site of Henry Love- joy's fort, and of the later residence of Levi Hutchins-premises destined to become public property appurtenant to the city water- . works. Thence the road had extended northeasterly for a considera- ble distance, and then, turning, had passed on northwesterly to the " Borough," 4 and from there northeasterly again to the bridge over the Contoocook, within the limits of the modern Fisherville, or Penacook.
In 1804 the selectmen, Jonathan Wilkins, John West, and Amos Abbot, Jr., as instructed by the town, "laid out a highway four rods broad, beginning at a stake and stones near Benjamin Hannaford's house,5 and running north forty-nine degrees west, one hundred and twenty rods to Wood's Brook bridge."6 This almost direct line of
1 Col. William Kent's Reminiscences, cited in Mcclintock's New Hampshire, 462.
2 Bouton's Concord, 330.
3 Ibid, 325.
4 Ibid, 325-6.
5 On what was to become North State street, and near the residence of V. C. Hastings, in 1900.
" Town Records, 375.
320
HISTORY OF CONCORD.
road, extended along the east side of the Bradley and Arlin premises, instead of the west; the old road being subsequently relinquished as entire or partial compensation to the owners of the land through which this part of the new highway was laid.1 From the Wood's brook bridge the new thoroughfare took a comparatively straight and northerly course to and along Rattlesnake plain and through West Concord-without westward deflection to the Hutchins place-" to the bridge over Hoyt's Brook on Contoocook plain." 2 The diver- gence to the "Borough " seems to have been, for the present, retained, as also the former course thence to the Contoocook bridge at Pena- cook.
This terminal bridge of the straightened highway had been built in 1765 at the joint expense of Concord and Boscawen, although wholly within the latter town. It was located in a bend of the river east of the site of Captain John Chandler's tavern, erected in 1787, and known, in modern times, as Bonney's hotel, or the Penacook house. The Concord road, crossing the town line, reached the bridge located at a narrow gorge below the falls, whence the Boscawen road wound north and west to the left, over a steep hill, and by the tavern site just mentioncd.3
By 1805 the bridge, forty years old, was becoming unsafe, and already the question of rebuilding it had been agitated and a new location suggested. In this connection a question of boundary arose. The language of the grants as to the line between the towns was con- fusing. In the original grant of Penacook (Concord) by Massachu- setts in 1725, the north line west of the Merrimack was described as " commencing where Contoocook river falls into Merrimack river." The probable intent of this indefinite statement was that the line should run from the middle of the Contoocook's mouth ; for when, in 1733, Massachusetts granted the plantation of Contoocook (Bos- cawen), its south line was described as "beginning at the middle of Contoocook river where it empties into the Merrimack, where it joins on Penacook plantation." But when Boscawen was incorporated as a town, by New Hampshire, in 1760, its south boundary was fixed to begin "at the southerly side of Contoocook river's mouth, where the saiuc falls into Merrimack river." In this uncertainty of description, the selectmen of the two towns perambulated the line in 1797, and established its beginning "at a stake and stones on the southerly side of Contoocook river, nearly opposite the middle of the main branch where the same empties into the Merrimack." 4
In 1805, pending the question whether the towns should co-operate "in building and supporting a bridge across Contoocook river," Con-
1 Town Records, 382.
$ Coffin's Boscawen, 92-3.
2 Ibid, 376.
4 Town Records, 306.
321
CONTOOCOOK BRIDGE.
cord, on the 22d of March, chose a committee, consisting of John Bradley, Jonathan Wilkins, and Ebenezer Dustin, to consider the mat- ter with a like committee of Boscawen, and to report upon the same.1 The following report was agreed upon : "That the old spot where the bridge now stands shall be the place where a new bridge shall be built ; and that the towns of Concord and Boscawen petition the General Court that the centre of the river Contoocook from the mouth be considered the line between said towns, until it reaches the present line crossing said river between said towns." 2 Boscawen accepted the entire report ; but Concord, at a special meeting held on the 13th of May, accepted only so much of it as recommended the building and supporting of "one half of the bridge at the old place "; it also being voted "to raise two hundred and fifty dollars to carry into effect that part of the report." 3 The matter of petitioning the legislature to establish the line, as suggested in the report, not being approved by Concord, was left to be done by Boscawen alone, at the ensuing June session of the general court. At another special meet- ing, held on the 25th of the following November, the town declared that it was "not willing that the prayer of the petition preferred " by Boscawen "to set off a part " of that town, "lying on the south- erly side of Contoocook river," and "annex " the same to Concord, " should be granted "; and it was ordered that William A. Kent, the representative, should have a copy of the vote.4 The petition was not granted; but the bridge was rebuilt at the old place, and Con- cord paid half of the expense.
This, however, was not the last of the bridge controversy. In- crease of travel and transportation demanded a straighter road on the north side of the river, and one that should avoid the steep hill beyond the Boscawen end of the bridge. This demand involved the erection of a bridge in a new place. In 1820 Concord had again offered to go halves with Boscawen in repairing, or rebuilding, the bridge at the old place ; but in 1821 the court of sessions laid out a road from Chandler's tavern in Boscawen, on a direct southerly line across the Contoocook to the locality in Concord subsequently known as Washington square, on condition that Boscawen should give security to build and maintain one half of the bridge over the river. Boscawen gave bond to that effect in the handwriting of Ezekiel Webster, and of date, January 12, 1822. Inasmuch as the new loca- tion of the bridge was wholly within Concord, it was now Concord's turn to petition the general court "so to alter and establish the line between Concord and Boscawen that " it might "strike the centre of
1 Town Records, 383.
2 Coffin's Boscawen, 200.
3 Town Records, 385.
+ Ibid, 386-7.
22
322
HISTORY OF CONCORD.
Contoocook river at the place fixed upon to build a new bridge." But nothing more came of this petition than of Boscawen's, seven- teen years before ; and the bridge was built in 1823.
Boscawen stood by her bond for years, and until another dispute arose as to the boundary line-in special reference, this time, to a factory erected by the Fishers on the north side of the river. Both towns claimed the soil on which the factory stood; each appealing to the description of the boundary line in its charter, and Boscawen especially insisting upon the construction given in the perambulation of 1797.1 As the towns themselves could come to no agreement, the selectmen of Concord, in 1837, petitioned the court of common pleas for the appointment of a committee "to examine and establish the line." The committee, consisting of John Porter, Thomas B. Merrill, and Henry B. Chase, finally had a hearing on the 9th of October, 1840, at the Chandler tavern, then known as Johnson's hotel. Con- cord had for counsel its own lawyer, Samuel Fletcher; Boscawen was represented by George W. Nesmith and Ichabod Bartlett. The committee confirmed the old line of 1797, with more definite descrip- tion, and stone bounds were set up according to the decision, to mark the permanent settlement of the troublesome question.2
Boscawen refusing after this to contribute to the maintenance of " a bridge out of town," Concord brought suit upon the bond of 1822. The case went up to the superior court, with Franklin Pierce and Asa Fowler as counsel for Concord, and Ichabod Bartlett for Bos- cawen. In 1845 Judge Woods rendered the decision of the court in favor of Boscawen, on the ground that "the contract by which " the citizens of Boscawen "undertook to bind themselves to raise money for building the bridge was not founded upon such a consideration as to create a debt, and thus give the town a power to raise money." 3 Consequently, the entire burden of maintaining the bridge over the Contoocook, winding in and out between the contending towns, was left upon Concord.
The growing advantages of Concord, as a business and financial centre, received recognition in 1806, when the legislature made it the location of an incorporated bank, with "a capital of not less than twenty thousand dollars, nor more than two hundred thousand, in specie." The corporators, specially named in the charter, were men of means and influence, resident in Concord and neighboring towns ; those of Concord being Timothy Walker, John Bradley, Robert Har- ris, Richard Ayer, and William A. Kent. There had been some delay in obtaining the charter, primarily occasioned by rivalry between Hopkinton and Concord. Two petitions were presented to the gen-
1 Coffin's Boscawen, 199. 2 Ibid, 200. 3 Ibid, 647-8,
323
BANKS.
eral court, in 1805 ; one praying for a bank in Hopkinton, the other for one in Concord. On the 19th of December of that year the house committee on banks made a report, giving "liberty to the petitioners to unite, and bring in a bill for the establishment of a bank in Concord." 1 But by sixty-one yeas to seventy-nine nays the report was not accepted, and the petitioners had leave to withdraw. Five days later, however, this vote was reconsidered by eighty-six yeas to fifty-five nays ; and, on the 27th of December, the bill brought in by the united petitioners, according to the terms of the bank com- mittee's report, was passed by the house, but on the 30th was post- poned by the senate till the next session. At this session, then, it was that, at last, the act of establishing a bank in Concord passed both branches of the legislature, and was approved by Governor John Langdon on the 17th of June, 1806.
In organizing under the charter, a controversy arose as to the loca- tion and management, which, intensified by rivalry between North End and South End interests, resulted in the opening of two banks ; the " Upper" or "North End " and the " Lower" or "South End"; each claiming to be "The Concord Bank." Of the former, Timothy Walker and Samuel Sparhawk were the president and cashier; of the latter, Joseph Towne of Hopkinton and William A. Kent. For some time the rivals pestered each other not a little; the " Upper " making runs upon the " Lower " for the redemption of the bills of the latter in specie ; the "Lower" instituting suits against the " Upper " for issuing bills contrary to law. It is related that one Nehemiah Jones, in the interest of the "South End " bank, brought an action against Timothy Walker, in more than a hundred counts covering all points at issue. But his counsel, Jeremiah Mason, the great lawyer of his day, perceiving at last "the difficulties of the sub- ject," and desiring to bring about a settlement, effectually cooled the ardor of his client by signifying to him that "as he had got into gentlemen's company he must expect to pay a gentleman's price." When, finally, the "disagreeable competition " 2 and unprofitable liti- gation ceased, the two institutions, offspring of one legislative act, gaining each its share of public confidence, successfully prosecuted business to their twenty years' limitation. The " Upper" then ob- tained a new charter, and took the name of " The Merrimack County Bank "; while the " Lower " secured a modification and extension of the old charter, and retained the name of "The Concord Bank." The former prosperously performed its functions for forty years longer, and until the expiration of its third charter in 1866, when, in perfect solvency, it voluntarily closed its doors. The latter trans-
1 House Journal, December session, 1805,
" Bouton's Concord, 338.
324
HISTORY OF CONCORD.
acted business for fourteen years after receiving its second grant of corporate power, but in 1840 succumbed in bankruptcy to the finan- cial stress of that period.1
Historic interest attaches to the places wherein these first two banks of Concord did business. The "Lower " bank erected, about the time of its opening, a brick building of two stories on the main street, opposite the Hutchins, or Phenix, premises. This was the first public edifice of brick reared in Concord; though the first residence of that material had been erected in 1804, at Millville, by Jacob Carter, the miller,-the builder little forecasting that it would within half a century become, by the enlightened giving of another owner, the nucleus of the famous educational establishment of "St. Paul's." The bank occupied the first floor of its building, while the Blazing Star lodge of Free and Accepted Masons found quarters on the sec- ond, which bore for years the name of " Masonic, or Masons', Hall." Later, with enlargements, the building was for a while to be owned and occupied by the First National bank of Concord; and later still, to be devoted to miscel- laneous uses. The " Upper " bank hav- ing done business for twenty years in the former residence of Major Daniel Livermore, erected in 1827, upon southerly adjoining land, for its own The Merrimack County Bank. and other uses, a three-storied, com- modious edifice of brick-" somewhat ambitious for those times"-as it has been characterized-and "the pride of " the North End " por- tion of the town."2 It was destined to answer well its earlier busi- ness purposes, and to subserve conveniently its later literary uses as the home of the New Hampshire Historical Society-once a tenant of its upper rooms, but becoming at length its sole owner and occupant.
And now the time came for the town to win, as the strongest as- surance of future progress and importance, the prestige of being the Capital of the state. For a quarter of a century after 1782 the gen- eral court, though migratory, had held more sessions in Concord than in all other places taken together, including Exeter, Portsmouth, Hopkinton, Amherst, Dover, Charlestown, and Hanover. Indeed, the real competition for the coveted prize of permanent legislative session became, from considerations of requisite convenience and cen- trality, practically confined to a region in which Concord was the magnetic pole of attraction. Boscawen, Pembroke, and Salisbury
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