History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire, Part 117

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed
Publication date: 1885
Publisher: Philadelphia [Pa.] J. W. Lewis & co.
Number of Pages: 1520

USA > New Hampshire > Merrimack County > History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire > Part 117
USA > New Hampshire > Belknap County > History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire > Part 117

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In the building of the new church in Gossville too much credit cannot be given Mr. Goss for the energy, perseverance and persistence with which he advocated and assisted the enterprise. When others were dis- couraged and ready to abandon the matter altogether he took the leadership and bore, for the time being, the burdens himself, and carried it forward to com- pletion, and this same spirit has characterized him through life.

Like other men who undertake and achieve diffi- cult enterprises, he has met opposition, and borne heavy burdens,-burdens under which one less res- olute would have faltered ; but being of stern stuff, with vigorous mind and body, Mr. Goss kept up courage and endeavor, and has lived to see the "waste places made glad," and the barren hills dotted with comfortable and cozy homes. They have now in the village a shoe-factory, which has employed as many as sixty or sixty-five hands. This was built by a stock company, but Mr. Goss was the prime mover in the enterprise, and now owns more than half the stock. His son, Nathan J., is the agent and manager of the shop.

Mr. Goss has twice represented his town in the State Legislature, and has been a selectman of Ep- som.

Mrs. Goss died May 3, 1873. She was the mother of four children : John Abbott, born August 26, 1847, married Electa Ann, daughter of Charles H. Car- penter, of Chichester. They have two children,- Charles C., born February 9, 1871, and Clara H. M., born July 11, 1874. Mr. Goss is eashier of the Pitts- field, N. H., National Bank, and manager of the Opera-House in that town; also treasurer of the Farmers' Savings-Bank, and also treasurer of the Pittsfield Aqueduct Company. Elizabeth J., born September 2, 1849, married Alfred Porter Bickford, of Epsom, January 2, 1870. They have four children, -William P., born February 15, 1871; Nathan A., born July 17, 1872; Alfred G., born February 4, 1875; and Harry, born May, 1883. Noah William, born July 12, 1861, now in the grain und grocery trade at

Pittsfield. Nathan Jonathan, born September 13, 1863.

Mr. Goss married, as his second wife, December 23, 1873, Mrs. S. Rebecea Crockett (née Randall) ; no issue. Mrs. Goss had by her first husband one daughter,-Annie R., who married James Yeaton, of Epsom. She has three children,-John C., Helen E. P. and George H. Mrs. Goss is a native of Deerfield, but most of her life has been spent in Concord.

In politics Mr. Goss is a Democrat, as were his father and grandfather. He is a member of the Bap- tist Society. In all the relations of life, as son, husband, father, neighbor or citizen, Mr. Goss has been a true man, and probably no man in the com- munity is more highly respected by his fellow-towns- mien.

ORREN STRONG SANDERS.

Orren Strong Sanders, M.D., Boston, Mass., was born in Epsom, Merrimack County, N. H., September 24, 1820. He is the eklest son of Colonel Job and Pollie Sanders, being the senior of four sons. The palms of his hands were hardened before he reached his teens in handling the implements of an industrious farmer.

At the age of thirteen years and a half he went to live with General Joseph Low, Concord, N. H., for one year as a servant, receiving for his services two months' schooling and fifty dollars, the whole of which sum, with the exception of five dollars, he gave to his father.

The succeeding year he served seven months as a farm-hand with Judge Whittemore, Pembroke, N. H., for nine dollars a month, rising carly and working late. During the following winter he attended the town school in his father's district.

In April, when fifteen years and a half old, he went to Northwood, N. H., to Jearn the trade of a carpenter with the late Luther and William Tasker, receiving fifty dollars and three months' schooling that year.

In March, 1836, as soon as the district school closed in Epsom, he decided to change his purpose in life, and, with his neighbor and friend, Henry F. Sanborn, went on foot, with a bundle of clothes, a few books in hand and seventeen dollars in his pocket, seven- teen miles to Gilmanton, N. H., where he commenced in earnest to obtain, in the middle of the spring term, an education. In the summer term he again went to Gilmanton, boarding himself, with three other stu- dents, for ninety cents each a week.

In the autumn of the same year, a younger brother desiring to attend school, he changed his plan, and went to Pembroke, N. H., it being less than half the distance to "Old Gilmanton," and there he continued his studies for several successive terms, practicing the economical method of "playing house-keeping."

Shortly after he had attained his sixteenth birth- day he commenced his first school in t'hichester, N. II., known as the Meeting-House, or Reed District,

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HISTORY OF MERRIMACK COUNTY, NEW HAMPSHIRE.

for the sum of eight dollars a month and "boarded round." This school had about thirty scholars en- rolled, and the sixteen dollars appropriated to the object of education for the winter months secured for them the benefit of young Sanders' earnest efforts to stimulate them to increased mental activity, to make up for brevity of opportunity.

The following winter this persevering youth was re- engaged to instruct in the same district, and at the termination of this school term he commenced teach- ing the school in Bear Hill District, and at the end of twelve weeks closed his efforts with a brilliant ex- hibition.

In the following autumn he spent fourteen weeks in Northwood, teaching in the lower part of the town; following this school, he served as teacher in the "Young District," in Barrington, returning to North- wood the succeeding winter, and gave another term of service in the same locality as before.

His last and final experience as "school-master " was in the Cilley District, in his native town, where he was favored with a large attendance and secured a successful result.

Six months after he had passed his nineteenth birth- day he commenced the study of medicine with Dr. Hanover Dickey, Epsom. In the autumn of 1841 he attended his first course of medical lectures at Dart- month College, after which he pursued his medical studies in the anatomical laboratory with Dr. Haynes, Concord. When he had completed his studies in an- atomy, physiology and hygiene with Dr. Haynes he entered the office of Drs. Chadburne and Buck, with four other students, forming an interesting class, with daily rccitations, taking up several branches of the medical course.

In the spring of 1843 he went to Lowell, Mass., and entered the office of Drs. Wheelock, Graves and Allen. In this new relation he had not only the assistance of Dr. Allen as a private medical tutor, but saw much practice with Dr. Graves. In the fall of 1843 he grad- uated at the then very popular medical college, Castle- ton, Vt.

On the 27th of November, 1843, he united in matri- mony with his present wife, Miss Drusilla, eldest daughter of S. M. Morse, Esq., Effingham, N. 11. In December following he commenced the practice of medicine in Centre Effingham, where he remained till June, 1847. He then moved to Chichester, where lie entered upon a large and lucrative practice; but in the autumn of 1848 he became interested in the sci- ence of homeopathy, as best embodying the true prin- ciples of healing. At this time he disposed of medi- cines and equipments, and went to Boston, entering the office of Dr. Samuel Gregg, a distinguished homco- pathic physician ; remaining with him, investigating, by study and observation, this new method of the healing art, for eighteen months; and from that time to the present Dr. Sanders has followed his profes- sion in Boston, and has been, from the first, conspicuous

among the physicians of that city for his extensive and lucrative practice and his successful treatment of disease.

The habits ofindustry and frugality, formed in youth and student-life, not only gave to Dr. Sanders a vigorous constitution, but laid a broad foundation for that power of endurance so essential to enable him to bear that long, continuous professional strain which has secured him unparalleled success and a high profes- sional reputation.

While he is a "medical winner" in every sense of the term, with aspirations ever for the right, he has enjoyed the confidence of his numerons friends, not only in the city government and Masonic fraternities, but also of the members of the church to which he has so long been attached.

His generosity has been equal to his success, and he has contributed with no stinted hand to public in- stitntions, and freely given aid to the deserving poor. He is ever ready to give his support to any worthy object; and if his large-hearted charities, for the most part secretly performed, find no place in news- paper reports, they are written in letters of light by the recording angel in the Book of Life.

His munificence in establishing the "Home for Lit- tle Wanderers" is but one of the many grand and noble acts of his life.

For several terms Dr. Sanders was a member of the Boston School Board, and, despite the exigent de- mands made upon his time by his extensive practice, he was unfailing in his attendance, and his utterances were always valued for their suggestiveness and prac- ticability. In fact, industrial education has long been with the doctor a favorite study, and he has written some excellent essays on the subject.

He is not, in any sense of the term, a politician, and yet he has always endeavored, from a considera- tion of the duties of citizenship, to make himself familiar with the ever-varying phases of political life, to thoroughly comprehend the tendency of each polit- ical movement and to give his intelligent support to every measure which he has regarded as conducive to the public welfare. His judgment has frequently been appealed to, his influence solicited and nom- inations to office have been tendered him by apprecia- tive friends; but hitherto his professional tastes and duties have led him to decline to have his name ap- pear in the list of political aspirants.

Within the pale of his profession, however, honors have been thrust upon him, and on the medical plat- form he has been a frequent and eloquent speaker.

In 1872 he delivered, before the Massachusetts Homeopathic Medical Society, a masterly oration on "Progress without Change of Law." In 1875, before the same body, his address on "Dynamization" was pronounced to be an able production ; and in 1878, when elected president of the society, his oration on "Homeopathy, the Aggressive Science of Medicine," was received by the audience as a new revelation of

George Saunders Jr.

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EPSOM.

the triumphant progress of similia similibus curantur. He has frequently lectured before the Ladies' Boston Physiological Society, and his Incid expositions of hy- gienic law were always listened to with marked appre- ciation ; and the records of other medical societies will bear witness to his readiness to contribute his quota of original thought to the medical knowledge of the day. His article on cholera, which appeared in the Boston Globe July 5, 1885, is exhaustive of the subject and has attracted much attention.

As a speaker, he is forcible and earnest, and his appearance on a platform is such as to at once win the sympathies of an audience. As a writer, his style is vigorous and terse; and his clear-ent sentences make it peculiarly attractive. If his studies had been so directed, he might have excelled as an orator or obtained a conspicuous place in the ranks of literature.

We give an engraving of his present commodious residence, at 511 Columbus Avenue, Boston, which was finished in 1872. This house, which is his own property, and which was erected at a cost of some hundred thousand dollars, was designed throughout by himself, and seems to indicate that, if he had not been a doctor, he might have become eminent as an architect. The sanitary appliances are perfect, the decorations in excellent taste, the arrangements for comfort and convenience the best possible, and from basement to attic it bears testimony to the high devel- opment of the doctor's constructive faculties.

The lion, life-size, which is placed in couchant atti- tude on the corner of the house, and is a conspicuous ornament to the avenue, was carved from a block of granite selected by the doctor himself, and, as a work of art, may compare favorably with the famous lions of Landseer, which adorn Trafalgar Square, in London.

To my own knowledge, the benevolent deeds done by this physician during his residence in the city of his adoption are sufficiently numerous to fill a volume, but in such an outline sketch as this it would be im- possible to enumerate them, and I can only say, in closing, that what Dr. Sanders has done for God and humanity is but an example of what other young men may accomplish, if they will only model their lives after his perseverance, self-denial and unblemished habits. " M."

GEORGE SANDERS, JR.

One of the representative agriculturists of this section, whose keen practicality, industry and devo- tion to that science well deserves more than a mere mention, is George Sanders, Jr. He is a son of George and Polly (Twombly) Sanders, and was born in Epsom, N. H., November 6, 1832. The ancestor of the American family of Sanders was Christopher Sanders, who came from England prior to 1671. We cannot fully trace the line to George, nor tell trom which one of the sons of Christopher he is descended.

The great-grandfather of the one of whom we now

write was George Sanders, a resident of Rye, N. II., where he passed his days, a quiet and useful citizen. His son John, the pioneer of the family in this town, was born in Rye, and when a young man came to Epsom, married and became a resident. Hle was a stalwart man, vigorous and energetic, and devoted him- self to his farm with all the force of his strong nature, and as a citizen was much respected. About 1850 he removed to Concord, where he resided until his death, March 13, 1870, aged nearly eighty-nine years. George Sanders, Sr., son of John and Anna Sanders, married Polly Twombly, of Barrington. They have had three children,-George and Mary (twins), and John. Mr. Sanders, inheriting the strong physique and hardy nature of his father, became a farmer, and in 1832, shortly after his marriage, he purchased a farm of one hundred and twenty acres, and by his nnremitting labors and constant care he brought the land into such a state of cultivation that it soon became remunerative, and he was able to increase his first ownership in land some hundreds of acres by adding to it at various times, and at present the Sanders family have five hundred and thirty acres in their possession. It is located in different tracts, but the home-farm is considered one of the best farms in the town of Epsom. Mr. Sanders, Sr., has been selectman, and held some minor town offices. His religious convictions are in accord with the Free- Will Baptists, of which church he has been a mem- ber abont twenty years. He is now living, at the age of eighty-one. Mre. Sanders died December 22, 1884, aged eighty-one.

George Sanders, Jr., could hardly have consistently followed any other vocation than that of the farmer, having been born and passed his childhood days where everything about him revealed the bounteons gifts of Mother Nature, and also inheriting, in some measure, from his father and grandfather the charac- teristics of a good agriculturist. He received a good common-school education, supplemented by a term at Pembroke Academy. He has always resided on the old place. He married, January 5, 1875, Nancy A., daughter of David and Mary Ann (Carr) White, of Antrim, N. H., a descendant in the fifth generation from John White (1), of Ireland, whose son, Patrick (2), studied for the priesthood; but renouncing his faith in the doctrine of the Catholic Church, he was obliged to flee to this country, where he made a home. David (3), son of Patrick, married Sarah Dutton, of Peterborough, and when the clarion notes of the trumpet called the brave and the willing to their country's defense, he responded and proved a faith- ful soldier to his father's adopted land. David (4) married Mary Ann Carr, a descendant of William Carr, a prominent man in the early days of Goffs- town. Mr. Carr, in 1787, went to Antrim and built the house and settled on a farm which is now oecu- pied by David White. He married Ann Boyce, of Bedford, and died at the age of eighty-three years;

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HISTORY OF MERRIMACK COUNTY, NEW HAMPSHIRE.

his wife lived to be ninety-three. Mary Sanders, (twin sister of George) married Nathaniel Twombly, of Barrington. They have four children.

George Sanders, Jr., has always pursued that oldest and most honorable calling among men, farming, and has proved himself the right man in the right place. To be convinced of his wisdom and care, you have only to look on his fields and meadows, his walls and buildings, his barns and stalls, his stacks and eribs. But, with all these cares, he has identified himself with the civil and religious interests of the town, has been selectman for several years, and is an earnest and liberal member of the Free-Will Baptist Church. Democratie in politics, he represented Epsom in the Legislature of 1874-75.

This family, for several generations, have been mostly " tillers of the soil," industrions, careful, prac- tical working people, doing their dutics well in the sphere of life to which they were called. They have been men of good judgment, active temperament, strong physique, and have performed their share of the publie matters of the town, and discharged their social, public and religious duties conscientiously.

CHARLES CURRIER DOE.

Charles Currier Doe was born in Durham, N. H., July 21, 1823. He is the son of James and Patience (Langley) Doe, and grandson of John Doe. His fa- ther, James Doe, was a farmer, and when Charles C. was but two years of age removed to the town of Lee, in Strafford County, where he resided ten years. He then spent about a year each in Newmarket and Nottingham, when he removed to Barrington, where he made his home for several years. He then moved to Grafton, and there his wife died (1845). Mr. Doe continued to reside there, making his home with his eldest son, till 1856, when he came to Pittsfield, where he died (1862).

He reared a family of eight children,-

John, married Abby Davis and resides in Pittsfield; has two children, a son and daughter.

Naney, married John Garland, of Nottingham. They have one daughter.

Drucilla married, first, L. Kimball ; no issue. Sec- ond, Moses Brown, of Andover. By this marriage she had two children. She is now deceased.

Abigail, married John T. Gilman ; resides in Deer- field ; has two sons.

Charles C., subject of this sketch.

Gilman L., married Nancy Ellenwood. They reside in Jowa ; have three sons.

Mary J., married David Garland, of Nottingham. They have one son.

Hezekiah H., married - Sleeper; had one son. Hezekiah enlisted in Company B, Ninth Regiment New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry, and died in hospital at Nicholasville, Ky., August 31, 1863.

Charles C. Doe, like so many of the sons of the

yeomanry of New England, had but limited facilities for obtaining an education, the public school of the town in which his father chanced to reside affording the only opportunity he enjoyed. Being one of a somewhat numerous family, in very moderate cireum- stances, he had to contribute his share of labor to the support of the family as soon as he was old enough for his services to be of any avail. When he was six- teen years of age he hired ont away from home to work on a farm, and from that time till he attained his majority his wages went to the support of his par- ents. December 15, 1845, he married Mehitable P., daughter of Amos and Nancy (Libby) Davis, of Ep- som, N. H., and went to reside with his father-in-law and manage the farm. Mr. Davis lived but a few months after his danghter's marriage. There still re- mained, however, three old people in the family,- Mrs. Davis, her mother (Mrs. Libby) and a bachelor brother of Mrs. Davis. Mr. Doe took charge of the farm and assumed the care of the old people, a trust . which he most faithfully performed to the time of their death.

He has followed farming as his chief occupation through life, and has been successful. In addition to farm labor, however, he has usually employed the winter months in teaming and lumbering; and for many years, while his sons were growing up to man- hood, they employed their time at shoemaking and thus added to the family exchequer.

Mr. Doe represented his town in the Legislature during the two years of 1865 and 1866. He has been selectman of his town and has been a member of the Christian Church for more than forty years.

Mrs. Doe's ancestors, both on the paternal and ma- ternal sides, came from Rye, N. H., to Epsom, about a century ago, when this country was almost an un- broken wilderness. Her grandfather, Davis, settled on the spot where Mrs. Doe now resides. The old homestead has never been out of the possession of the family. Her grandfather, Libby, was a soldier in the War of the Revolution, and her uncle was in the War of 1812.

The children of Mr. and Mrs. Doe are,-

Walter C., born November 12, 1846; married Elva Cass, of Epsom; resides in Lynn, Mass .; is a shoe- maker by trade.

Amos, born September 11, 1849; married Mellie Hobnan, of Dixfield, Me .; resides in Boston ; is by trade a carpenter.

James A., born March 7, 1852; married Angusta Ladd, of Deerfield, N. H .; resides in Manchester ; is a surveyor of lumber, etc., in a large sash and blind- factory and lumber-yard.

Sarah A., born November 1, 1854; married Calvin D. Clark, of Barnstead, N H. He was for four years engaged in the grocery trade in Pittsfield, N. H., but in 1884 he sold out his business and went to reside with his father-in-law on the farm.

George W., the youngest of the family, was born

Charles. C. Doe

Davich At Philbrick

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EPSOM.

August 24, 1857; died December 17, 1883; unmar- ried. He always resided with his parents. He was a young man of bright intelligence and more than ordinary ingenuity in mechanical matters.

Mr. Charles C. Doe is an honest, upright, sincere man ; unobtrusive, attending strictly to his own af- fairs, and of a generous, manly, frank disposition. The world would be better for more such men.

DAVID MORRILL PHILBRICK.

D. M. Philbrick was born August 26, 1823, in the north part of the town of Epsom, N. H. He is the son of Daniel and Polly (Locke) Philbrick, and grandson of Daniel and Ruth (Morrill) Philbrick. His paternal grandfather was a native of Hampton, Rockingham County, N. H., and moved to Epsom when a young man, and when the virgin forest of the "Catamount " and surrounding hills was almost un- broken.

The Philbricks belong to that sturdy, self-reliant and self-contained class of men who have played so important a part in the rise and progress of civiliza- tion in New England. In the county of Rocking- ham, and in other parts of Eastern New Hampshire, the name is a frequent one, and all bearing it show unmistakable evidence of descent from the same com- mon progenitors. They are calm, earnest, industri- ous, persevering men and women, with the reputation of being law-abiding and just, useful citizens. Daniel Philbrick, Sr., became quite a large land-holder in Epsom. He had a family of twelve children, of whom Daniel was one. Daniel settled on a part of his father's farm, where his son David M. now re- sides, and was a tiller of the soil all his life. He had a family of eight children, of whom David M. was the only son. The names of the children were Abigail, died in childhood. Ruth, married first a Mason ; second a Merrill; has four children. Mary, unmar- ried, resides with David M. Asenath, unmarried, re- sides with David M. Abigail (2d), married E. B. Sargent ; has four children. Betsy, married Stephen F. Ring; no issue. David M., subject of this biog- raphy. Peggy Almira, married George Buffum ; has one child.

David M. Philbrick may be fairly said to stand as a representative farmer of his town and section. He has all his life made agriculture his chief pursnit, and by constant and intelligently directed effort he has made it a success. He owns, in various tracts, about six hundred acres of land, a very large farm for New Hampshire. He is probably the largest land- owner in town. In the winters, after work on the farm is impracticable, he has employed his time in cutting and hauling wood and lumber.

He is a man who is respected and confided in by his neighbors and townsmen, and was chosen to rep- resent them in the Legislature in 1876 and 1877. He has been selectman of Epsom two years, and sur-

veyor of highways twenty-five years. In politics he is a Democrat.

He married, November 27, 1850, Sarah A., daughter of John and Margaret (Wallace) Stearns, of Deerfield, N. II. Their children are: A babe (unnamed), died in infancy. Clara 1., married Frank Butfum, of Ber- wick, Me .; has five children. Daniel. David F., died aged seventeen. Mary A., married George Giles, of Pittsfield, N. H. ; no offspring. John S., Susan M., George H. and Augustus T.

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History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire, Part 117

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed Publication date: 1885 Publisher: Philadelphia [Pa.] J. W. Lewis & co. Number of Pages: 1520

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed
Publication date: 1885
Publisher: Philadelphia [Pa.] J. W. Lewis & co.
Number of Pages: 1520