USA > New Hampshire > Grafton County > Littleton > History of Littleton, New Hampshire, Vol. I > Part 61
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Major Farr was frequently called to fill positions of a non- political character relating to schools, temperance, and as an officer of fraternal bodies of which he was a member. He was public-spirited, and had a lively interest in all questions affecting the public interest.
After reaching manhood he was so engrossed in political affairs that he neglected to prosecute his legal studies beyond acquiring such knowledge as was necessary for immediate use in his
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practice. Yet, in spite of this disregard of the science of the law he had a large clientage, and his professional equipment was always sufficient to satisfy his clients that their interests had been well protected while in his charge.
In 1867, when General Harriman was nominated for Governor, Major Farr opposed his nomination with zeal, and afterwards refused for some time to support his candidacy. When the scheme to place Onslow Stearns in the field as an independent candidate was abandoned, the Major gave the General a reluctant support. In 1869 Onslow Stearns was Governor, and Major Farr had become an important factor in State politics, with increasing influence. He had in fact become enamoured with politics, and relied largely upon his father to conduct their legal business. The father's withdrawal created a vacancy which led to the em- ployment of Elbert C. Stevens, a son of an old sheriff of the county, Grove S. Stevens, of Haverhill. The young man had been a pupil in the office of N. B. Felton, and possessed instinctive liking for the technicalities of the law as well as a legal mind of no mean order. Mr. Stevens remained with Major Farr until 1878 to their mutual advantage, when the latter formed a partner- ship with Edgar M. Warner, and occupied a law office in the same building, Tilton's Block, to which the firm had moved in 1872 from the Bailey building, occupied by John Farr for many years.
Major Farr was a pleasing speaker. His voice was full and penetrating ; his matter was calculated to influence those to whom it was addressed. His presence and bearing added to the effective- ness of his argument. He was tall, straight as an Indian, his features regular and highly intellectual, the brow being both broad and high, the eyes blue, large, and expressive; his complexion was fair. His social qualities were of a high order ; he made friends in every walk of life.
His contest for re-election to Congress was exacting, and made demands upon all his energies for two or three months preceding the election. When the successful campaign was ended, his health was such that rest was required, but business forbade its indul- gence. In the last week of November he was prostrated with an attack of pneumonia, and he passed away on the thirtieth. His untimely death was widely lamented.
The youngest and the only surviving son of the family is Charles A. Farr, who was a merchant of the town for twenty years, but since his retirement from trade has been engaged in the insurance business. Like his brothers, with a single exception, he has been much interested in political affairs, but, unlike them,
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has seldom been a candidate for public office. At this writing it is understood that he is to receive a nomination that will be equivalent to an election to the office of Register of Deeds for Grafton County. He has been a Republican with a tendency to do his own thinking, and was one of the considerable number of members of that party in the town who in 1872 joined with the Democrats in support of Horace Greeley for the Presidency. After that event he gradually drifted back to his old party connections. He is a man of intelligence, widely read in current affairs, and an authority on important events of the past.
The election of 1888 was without incident. The representa- tion of the town had, by the operation of an amendment passed by the Constitutional Convention of 1876 and approved by the people in 1877, been reduced from three to two members in the House of Representatives.1 The successful candidates were Harry Bingham and Albert S. Batchellor. In this instance the rule of but two terms for all representatives except Mr. Bingham was broken in favor of Mr. Batchellor, by giving him a third elec- tion. He had been an active and useful member, and, in spite of his political affiliations, was made chairman of the committee on the State Library, where he began his long connection with that institution, as chairman and trustee, which resulted in bringing order out of disorder and transforming a haphazard and broken collection of books into a well-organized library with completed sets and many thousands of added volumes. He was the author of much of the legislation by which these changes in organization and those purchases were authorized.
The Republican candidates were Capt. John T. Simpson and Frederick A. Tilton. Captain Simpson was a soldier in the war between the States, and well merited his promotion from a private
1 The ratio of representation prescribed by the Constitution in force prior to 1877 was as follows : " Every town, parish, or place entitled to town privileges having one hundred and fifty ratable male polls of twenty-one years of age and upward, may elect one representative ; if four hundred and fifty ratable polls, may elect two repre- sentatives ; and so proceeding in that proportion, making three hundred such ratable the mean increasing number for every additional member." Constitution of New Hampshire, Part Second, Art. IX.
In the amendment adopted by the Constitutional Convention of 1876 the ratio was changed from a basis of ratable polls to that of population as follows : "Every town or place entitled to town privileges, and ward of cities having six hundred in- habitants by the last general census of the State taken by authority of the United States or of this State, may elect one representative; if eighteen hundred such inhabitants, may elect two representatives ; and so proceeding in that proportion, making twelve hundred such inhabitants the mean increasing number for any additional representative." Constitution of New Hampshire, Amendment of 1877, Art. 9.
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in the ranks. Mr. Tilton was the youngest son of Franklin Tilton, one of our most successful merchants. The son had been in business several years, but at the time fortunes were supposed to be had for the asking in Spokane, Wash., he made his home in that far Western city, where he died in 1893.
The election in 1880 made apparent the change that passing events were gradually bringing about in the political standing of the town. The old-time Democratic majority of more than a hundred was disappearing. At this election Harry Bingham's plurality was only thirty-nine above the vote given to Captain Simpson, who was again a candidate. Mr. Bingham's colleague was William A. Richardson, landlord of the Union House. He was .a man of ability, great energy, and limitless ambition. He was a fearless worker in any cause he espoused, had many friends, but was his own worst enemy. He died quite suddenly in the summer of 1900.
In 1882 any fair canvass of parties in the town would have shown that the reliable vote was about evenly divided between the two prominent parties. The unreliable vote was large and was to de- cide the political fortunes of the day. The result, according to the declaration of the moderator, was the election of Frank T. Moffett and Silas Parker, the former a Republican, the latter a Democrat. Henry F. Green, the defeated Republican candidate, contested Mr. Parker's election in the House and was given the seat. The contention of the contestant in this case was that the Democratic board of supervisors had placed upon the check list the names of certain Democrats, and refused to some Republicans that right to which it was claimed they were entitled. The House sustained this view.
The following election, that of 1884, was the first in a genera- tion that was not contested with vigor by a hopeful minority. The " doubtful vote " had become a burden that the men of all parties wished to lay down. An attempt was made to ignore it entirely by an agreement between the leading men of both sides. Such an agreement was reached at a series of meetings held in October, 1884, at which a paper was executed that was well cal- culated to eliminate this element from our politics; but the result, for obvious reasons, was not satisfactory to the great majority of the people.
The Republicans, at this election, placed in nomination Captain Edgar Aldrich and Col. Henry L. Tilton, both strong and able men, and they were elected by majorities exceeding one hundred and fifty. Mr. Aldrich, when the Legislature assembled, was
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chosen Speaker of the House of Representatives, and is the only representative of the town who has held that honorable and im- . portant legislative office. At this time the Democratic candidates were George W. McGregor and Fred H. English.
The election of 1886 was much like that of 1884. Ira Parker, the leading manufacturer of the town, and Captain Simpson, twice the candidate of his party when it was in a minority, were hon- ored with an election. Porter B. Watson was the associate of Dr. McGregor on the Democratic ticket.1
Porter B. Watson, a brother of Dr. Henry L. Watson, was a tanner by trade. He was an enterprising citizen. He had formerly represented the town of Salisbury in the Legislature, and after he became a resident of this town was a member of the Board of Selectmen and County Treasurer. He was a liberal con- tributor to the fund subscribed by Liberal Christians to build the Unitarian Church.
In 1888 the Democrats made a strenuous effort to carry the town. They placed in nomination Harry Bingham and William A. Richardson. The Republican candidates were Benjamin W. Kilburn and Isaac Calhoun, two of the most popular and re- spected members of the party. A large vote was cast, but owing to the Prohibition vote there was no choice for Representatives. The contest of the day had been exhaustive, and there was no disposition to repeat it on the following day. A brief recess was taken after the declaration of the vote, a conference held by rep- resentative men of the parties, and an agreement reached that Albert S. Batchellor should cast a ballot for Harry Bingham and Isaac Calhoun. When the meeting came to order, this agreement was executed, and the most fiercely contested election held in Littleton up to that time resulted in a draw.2
Isaac Calhoun was one of the most active and reliable business men the town has had. Born in Lyman, his parents moved to Littleton when he was seven years of age. Before he reached his majority he was in business on his own account, with his cousin James Everett Henry as a partner. He was also in partnership with Charles Eaton. These three friends were at different times in business as merchants, lumber manufacturers, or dealers in all kinds of meat for many years. They often dissolved these rela- tions, but there seemed to be some irresistible attraction that
1 For sketch of Ira Parker, see vol. ii. pp. 12 and 13. Captain Simpson's record as a soldier may be found on pp. 468, 469, of this volume, and Dr. McGregor has an appropriate place in vol. ii. p. 117.
2 The vote for Governor was, Democratic, 429; Republican, 444; Prohibition, 3.
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JAMES E. HENRY.
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would draw all or two of them together again. Mr. Calhoun finally turned his attention to farming on a large scale and to dealing in timber and wood. He was eminently successful in this business. The only other offices he held were those of Selectman for three years, beginning in 1881, and supervisor for one term.
In 1890 the contest for party supremacy was renewed with in- creased vigor, if that were possible. The census of 1890 showed an increase in the population sufficient to entitle the town to an additional Representative. Accordingly each party placed in nomination three candidates, one of whom was voted for on a separate ballot under the designation of " if entitled," that ques- tion to be determined by the Legislature. These candidates were Harry Bingham, Israel C. Richardson, and Leslie F. Bean, on the Democratic ticket ; Benjamin W. Kilburn, Fred A. Robinson, and Abijah Allen on the Republican. In its main features this con- test was like that which preceded it. Every influence known to veteran and skilful campaigners to secure votes was brought into use, and the result of the first day of the conflict was also like that of 1888, -there was no choice. The following day the Re- publicans did not renew the fight, and the Democratic candidates were elected. Of these candidates Israel C. Richardson is a promi- nent business man and owner of improved real estate, his holdings in this respect being second only to those of Daniel C. Remich. The rapid growth of his prosperity in a few years from hundreds to many thousands of dollars tells the story of his success. He is, perforce, frugal, industrious, and far-seeing in business affairs. Still in the prime of life, he is not yet prepared to abandon the field of endeavor to younger men.
Leslie F. Bean was for many years one of the progressive farmers of the town. Recently he has retired from that occupa- tion and is engaged in the ice business. He is an active member of the Grange, is generally interested in public affairs, especially such as relate to education, and under the system which divided the town into two school districts, was superintendent of the Town District. He is a well-informed and useful citizen.
Fred A. Robinson was for some years a druggist, doing business at the Hodgman stand, being the immediate successor of Curtis C. Gates. He was popular with all classes, and interested in matters that promised to promote the material welfare of the town. He was for some years a member of the Board of Fire Wards, a District Commissioner, and was a messenger to carry the electoral vote of the State to Washington in 1889. He was in
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declining health for some years, but death came unexpectedly in June, 1896.
Though Harry Bingham lived nearly ten years after these events, this was his last public service for the town and the State, both of which he had served faithfully and well.
The Bingham family in America is descended from Thomas Bingham, who pursued the trade of master cutler in Sheffield, Eng- land. A grandson of this Thomas, of the same name, came to this country about 1660 with three brothers, then under age. In 1666 he was one of the proprietors of Norwich, Conn. His brothers Samuel and Joseph also settled in New England, while William located in Pennsylvania. Thomas subsequently removed to Windham, where he died in January, 1730. He was a man of substance and a deacon of the church in Windham. Deacon Thomas had eleven children, of whom Abel, the second child, was the progenitor of the Binghams of Littleton. It appears that Abel while a young man visited England, where he married, and returned to Connecticut.
Several of the children or grandchildren of Abel settled in New Hampshire ; among them a grandson, Jonathan by name, who was among the early settlers of Cornish. He was born in Windham, Conn., in 1764, and married Elizabeth Warner, who was a relative of Col. Seth Warner, the Revolutionary patriot. Jonathan Bingham was a deacon of the church, and is buried on the Benjamin Cummings farm in Cornish.
Little is known concerning the four generations in America that preceded Elisha Warner, who was among the first settlers of Concord, Vt. The most important incident in their history that throws light upon their standing in the community in which they passed their lives, is that found in the church records, showing that at least two of this branch of the family held the position of a dea .- con in the church. In a State governed by the town system, where " town and church were but two sides of the same thing," it was no small honor to hold the office of deacon in the church when the minister was the first citizen and his deacon second only to him. The deacon was usually a man of dignity and sobriety of thought and demeanor. In the absence of proof either of record or tradition we may assume that Deacons Thomas and Jonathan were men of character as well of as more than common ability.
In 1796 Elisha Warner Bingham, following the trend of emi- gration up the valley of the Connecticut River, sought a home where lands were cheap and the choice well-nigh unlimited, in Concord, Vt., where he bought a lot on the banks of Moose
Hany Bingham
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River, in that part of the town since known as West Concord. One of the members of the family at this time was his son War- ner, a lad of seven years, who on reaching his majority in 1814 married Lucy, daughter of John Wheeler, a near neighbor, who had come to Concord from Chesterfield in 1806. About this time Warner Bingham purchased a lot adjoining that of his father, and soon after built a large and imposing brick mansion, which was the family home for more than a generation. Mr. Bingham was a useful and influential man in town and county, and held positions of honor and trust, among them those of State Senator, and of side, or assistant, judge of the county court. Mrs. Bingham was a woman of strong character, a devoted wife and mother, who found her sphere of duty within the somewhat circumscribed limits of the family circle ; but her influence ex- tended through another generation, and was felt in distant States.
Warner and Lucy Bingham had five sous. Of these, two were long and intimately connected with Littleton, and another began here his preparation for a distinguished judicial career. The eldest of the three, Harry, was born March 30, 1821. His home life was such as to awaken an ambition to live an intellectual life, and before he had reached his teens he was concentrating all his ener- gies to acquiring an education. He attended the district school in what is known as the " old castle" district summer and winter until 1833. This school was a nursery of several youths who were destined to win a name and fame that were to outlive their day and generation. Here the Hibbards, Grouts, and Binghams, who were known and honored beyond the borders of their native State, acquired far more than the elementary part of their education. In 1833 Harry for the first time left home. A young man by the name of Hardy, a graduate of Columbia College of Georgetown, D. C., opened a select, or tuition, school at Upper Waterford, in a building that stood upon the site of the present meeting-house. The building was also used for religious meetings. Among his schoolmates were Edward Cahoon, of Lyndon, who roomed with him at Lyman Hibbard's; William J. Bellows, Cephas and Charles W. Brackett, of Littleton. His introduction to the Brackett boys was when he first entered the school-room. Their seats were directly back of his, and one of them, as he was seating himself, reached forward and "poked " him in the cheek. When school was dismissed at noon, as he once told the story, " I licked him and we were pretty good friends after that for the rest of the term." In the autumn of 1837 he attended Concord Academy, then in charge of a Mr. Cheney, a graduate of Middlebury College. The following
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winter he taught his first school, in the district in his native town known as Royalston Corner. During the next two years his time was fully employed. He attended Lyndon Academy, of which Ezra Abbott, a classmate at Dartmouth of President Bartlett, was prin- cipal, for two terms, worked on his father's farm in the summer, and taught in the Bemis district in Lyndon in the winter. In August, 1839, he entered Dartmouth College and was graduated with the class of 1843. In the four years' course he taught each win- ter in schools at Woodstock, the Academy at Concord Corner, Wells River, and Waterford, Vt., and a select school at Lower Water- ford in the fall of 1844, until his admission to the bar. It is the con- current testimony of those who knew him as a student and teacher that in the former capacity he was diligent and pertinacious. "Slow, but sure" was the characterization bestowed upon him by a class- mate. As a teacher he was a strict disciplinarian, quickly winning the confidence and obedience of his pupils ; thorough in method, and eminently successful in awakening the ambition of the indifferent. Edwin A. Charlton, who attended his school at Lower Waterford in 1844, says of him : "I have attended other schools since, but none, perhaps, which in the same length of time made a stronger impression upon or gave me more of an impulse in the right direc- tion." He made it a point, he once said, "to give attention to, and aid, the slow pupil, as the quick would take care of himself, except, in some instances, where he might require curbing to pre- vent his becoming superficial. Any person who knew the books could teach a pupil who learned easily, but it required a good teacher to keep a dullard well to the front of a class."
Long before his graduation it had been practically settled that he would enter the legal profession, and while teaching at Water- ford and elsewhere near home he had borrowed books from the law library of David B. Hibbard, father of Harry Hibbard, and without an instructor began his study of the law. In the spring of 1844 he entered the office of George W. and Edward Cahoon at Lyndon, Vt., and before the close of the year went to Bath, where he became a pupil in the office of Harry Hibbard. From this office he was admitted to the bar at the May term at Lancaster in 1846, and opened an office in this town. At this time the members of the bar in practice in Littleton were Henry A. Bellows, Edmund Carleton, and Charles W. Rand. It was then the almost invariable custom for a client seeking the services of an attorney to employ one of his own political opinions. The re- moval of William Burns to Lancaster opened the way for a lawyer who was also a Democrat. William Brackett, Ebenezer and
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Cyrus Eastman, and others, after consulting Harry Hibbard, invited Mr. Bingham to open an office here, which he did early in June. He had an office in the Eastman store, the front room on the second floor, where he continued until the com- pletion of the Paddleford building, where he secured more com- modious rooms. The Grafton bar was strong in those years. It was against such skilful practitioners as Bellows, Quincy, Hibbard, and Kittridge that he contended in the legal arena. There he bore himself with such ability as to win respect for his powers. From the start he had a good clientele, which was increased each passing year through his long professional life.
From 1852, when his brother George A. became his partner, down to his final withdrawal from practice, there were associated with him as partners, at different times, Judge Andrew Salter Woods and Edward Woods, John M. Mitchell, Albert Stillman Batchellor, and William H. Mitchell. The last three had received their legal education largely under his direction.
For twenty-five years, dating from 1870, he was at the head of the bar of the State, and engaged in the most important litigation of that period. In the first of the so-called Concord Railroad cases, that of the directors of that railroad to annul a lease of the property executed by a previous board, on the eve of its retirement from control, to the Northern Railroad, Mr. Bingham was associated with Judge Benjamin R. Curtis, Gilman Marston, Marshal & Chase, and others for the plaintiffs and made the closing argument for his clients, -an argument that in breadth of view, knowledge of the law, clearness, and weight at once placed him in the ranks of the foremost lawyers of New England. The decision was in favor of his clients, and from that time he was the principal counsel of the road in the various suits with connecting roads that grew out of the struggle to control the transportation interests of the State.
Mr. Bingham had no taste for criminal practice, but his thor- ough knowledge of the law governing this branch of the profes- sion caused his services to be sought by persons arraigned for capital offences on four occasions. The first was the case of John Scannell, of Bethlehem, indicted for the murder of his wife in 1864. John H. George appeared with Mr. Bingham for the defence, and made the closing argument for his client, while Mr. Bingham pre- pared the defence, made the opening statement, and presented the evidence. Briefly stated, the facts in this peculiar case were as fol- lows. The Scannells lived near the Gale River Mills, which were not then in operation, and this family was the only one living in the
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neighborhood. Mrs. Scannell disappeared in the winter of 1864, and some weeks after her remains were found near a path leading from her home to that of some neighbors on Beech Hill. A post- mortem disclosed the fact that blood had settled on one side of the head between the skull and the scalp and that a suture had separated. There was testimony for the State tending to prove a quarrel and a blow by a piece of slab wood, and the contenl- tion in behalf of the State was that death was caused by such a blow and her body removed to the place where it was sub- sequently found. The critical point in the defence was reached when Mr. Bingham called to the witness box several physicians in succession who testified that the suture was, or might have been, opened by freezing and expansion of the brain. This theory was sufficient to create a doubt as to the cause of death and insured a verdict of "not guilty." The other cases in which he appeared for the defence were those of Moses B. Sawyer, tried for the murder of Mrs. Jolin Emerson at Piermont ; Martin Dickey for the murder of Eastman, and together with Judge Edgar Aldrich and Irving W. Drew for Williams and Mrs. Steere for the murder of Orrin Steere. In these cases popular sentiment was against the prisoners, yet a verdict of acquittal was returned in each. There can be no doubt but that the skilful defence made by Mr. Bing- ham was the decisive factor in reaching the result. In the trial of Mills for the murder of Maxwell at Easton he appeared for the State. We need not enumerate the civil actions in which he appeared as counsel ; they were many and important, in respect to the principles and interests involved, and it is sufficient to say that for many years he was retained in nearly all the cases tried in this county as well as many in other counties of the State. His practice in other States and in the United States courts was considerable, and employed much of his time.
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