History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire, Part 156

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 156
USA > New Hampshire > Belknap County > History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire > Part 156

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The foregoing eulogy of Judge Harvey is copied verbatim from " A Sketch of the Life and Character of Hon. Matthew Harvey," by William L. Foster; read before the New Hampshire Historical Society, June 13, 1866.

Governor Harvey is his own authority for the statement that the suggestion for the State to furnish the State prisoners, on their release, with at least enough of money to save them from being driven into immediate crime to satisfy immediate wants, origin- ated with him, in his message to the Legislature.

Judge Harvey's mental and physical powers were faithful to duty till almost the last possible demand for their use. The day before his death he walked about the street, came home, lay down and passed into an unconscious state, from which, in this mortal life, he never awakened. In twenty hours afterwards he ceased to breathe, dying without the least evi- dence of pain or suffering of any kind, being in his eighty-fifth year.

MATTHEW HARVEY (3d) .- The following is an ex- tract from the Boston Journal, of February 2, 1885:

" Matthew Harvey, whose death occurred at Newport, N. H., Saturday night, January 31, 1885, was born in Sutton, January 14, 1815. He be- loaged to one of the most distinguished and scholarly families of the State. He was a son of Colonel Joho Harvey, a grandson of Matthew Harvey, Sr., and nephew of Matthew Harvey, Jr., who was Governor, Representative to Congress, and a judge of the United States District Court, and of Jonathan Harvey, who was also Representative to Congress. He received a common school education and went to Newport in 1831, where he served a full apprenticeship in the Argus and Spectator office, noder Benjamin B. French and Simon Browo. Then he came to Bos- too, where he worked several years as a journeyman prioter. Returning to Newport io 1837, he became a compositor in the Argus office. In 1840, io company with Mr. Carleton, he purchased the establishment, and for

forty years the firm published the Argus and Spectator, Mr. Harvey being, during that time, the leading editor. Io 1880 the deceased retired from business to private life with a competence. Mr. Harvey was, from 1846 to 1852, register of deeds of Sullivan County, assistant marshal for tak- ing the census in 1860, and was four times a Democratic candidate for Representative to the Legislature from Newport, but his party wasin the minority. He was a gentleman of decided poetical ability, and was the author of many most creditable compositions, written by request for special occasions. He had been a prominent Free-Mason for many years, and had been twice elected Worshipful Master of Mt. Vernon Lodge of Newport. In private life Mr. Harvey was a man of the highest purity of character. As a citizen he was liberal iu his views, popular, generous and public-spirited, and was a gentleman of the old school."

This Matthew Harvey (3d) was the only brother of Mrs. Augusta Harvey Worthen, author of this sketch of Sutton.

HON. JONATHAN HARVEY was the oldest son of Deacon Matthew Harvey, being born at Sutton Feb- ruary 25, 1780. Immediately after becoming of age he took the lead in the political affairs of the town, being repeatedly chosen town clerk and selectman; . was a civil magistrate from 1810 till his death, August 23, 1859. A brief reference to his long career of pub- lic service will show how deeply he shared the con- fidence of his fellow-citizens. He made his first ap- pearance in the House of Representatives in 1810, and to this body he was annually re-elected till 1815; he then represented his district in the State Senate from that date till 1823, and was president of that body during the five last years of his connection with it. By reference to dates it will be seen that the two branches of the Legislature were, from 1819 to 1821, three years, presided over by the brothers Jonathan and Matthew Harvey,-Jonathan being President of the Senate at the time Matthew was Speaker of the House.

In 1823 and 1824 Jonathan Harvey was a member of the Executive Council. In 1825 he was elected a member of Congress, as the successor of his brother, Hon. Matthew Harvey, then of Hopkinton.

He was in Congress six years, at the expiration of which time he was again elected to the Legislature of this State, where he served two years, thus completing an unbroken term of twenty-three years of public service. He was again returned to the Legislature in 1838 and re-elected in 1839, when he finally retired to private life, after leaving a spotless record upon the journals of his State and nation and securing those enviable tokens of approbation which but few unprofessional men have either merited or received. He filled all the places of trust within the gift of his townsmen.

He was never defeated at the polls in the election to any office for which he was a candidate.

But little need be said of the virtues that adorned the private life and character of Jonathan Harvey, because the public needs no information upon those points. His social and genial nature made his ever- hospitable home the abode of cheerful hearts and the resort of numerous friends.

These prominent characteristics of the man shed a

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bright halo of light around his declining years and illumined his path to the grave.

But few men have been permitted to complete the entire circle of eighty years and die upon the soil of their ancestral homes; yet such a life and such a death was reserved for the well-known subject of this notice.

The above, extracted from one of the public priuts issued a few days after his decease, is only one notice among many of similar date and character.

This record of his public services is known to be correct, having been carefully gleaned from the rec- ords at Concord by the writer of the sketch above- copied.

GEORGE A. PILLSBURY was born in Sutton August 29, 1816. (For sketch of Mr. Pillsbury, see "History of Concord," in this volume.)

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

WADLEIGH.

On the town records of Sutton, as well as on the proprietary records of Perrystown, the name of Wad- leigh occurs so frequently in connection with town affairs as to demand some special notice of the family.

Several years prior to any settlement in Perrys- town Thomas Wadleigh, of Hampstead, became a proprietor by the purchase of a right, and consequent- ly used his efficient endeavors to promote its interest, and occasionally resided here with the earliest set- tlers. From the record, as well as from some known facts, it is to be inferred that he was possessed of much practical ability, good sense and judgment. He was also a man of immense bodily strength-double that of average men-which was in itself about as desirable capital as could be had to invest in an enterprise so full of hardship as the settlement of Perrystown. This Thomas Wadleigh had nine sons and three daughters. Several of the sons settled early in town, the father being at one time the possessor of a thousand acres of land in one tract. His deed to his son Benjamin, conveying to him a lot of land, No. 68, in the first division, in Perrystown, is yet preserved and bears date November 11, 1777. This lot, unimpaired and undivided, is now possessed by Milton B. Wadleigh, one of the fifth generation from him, counting himself one.

This, with two exceptions (the Johnson estate, and Caleb Kimball estate, owned by his descendants, the Eatons, of whom General John Eaton, so long United States commissioner of education, is one), is the only instance in Sutton of an entire lot remaining, un- changed and undivided, in the same family.

This Benjamin, coming here as a settler, at the age of twenty-one, became one of the leading men of the

town. Mr. Dresser, who, many years ago, prepared a brief sketch of some of the most prominent early settlers, says of him,-"He was firm and uncompro- mising, a wise counselor to the town, church and society. His wife, Hannah, a daughter of Ebenezer Kezar, at the age of nineteen, came with him to live on Wadleigh Hill, and had there her home till the end of her long and useful life. She died in 1836, aged eighty-six. He died in 1817, aged sixty-eight, his death being occasioned by an accidental slight in- jury to the knee, resulting in mortification."

Much of the town business was transacted by the two noble brothers, Benjamin and Thomas Wadleigh. The latter, however, did not settle here till after the close of the Revolutionary War, in which he had served six years and seven months ; was at the battle of Bunker Hill, and fought side by side with his brother John. The main-spring of the gun that John carried broke at the first discharge, rendering the weapon useless; but telling Thomas he would load while the other fired, he did this so quickly that the piece became too hot for holding. But the two brothers with one gun were able to load and fire all the ammuni- tion of both before they left their position.

Thomas Wadleigh was very highly esteemed in his day by the citizens of Sutton for capacity, integrity and patriotism; was the first town clerk after incor- poration, and every year afterwards till 1806, a period of twenty-two years; selectman and representative, as elsewhere stated in this sketch.

Benjamin presided over town-meetings thirteen years in succession. Both brothers were civil magis- trates. The commission of Benjamin is dated Sep- tember 16, 1786.

At this time it can hardly fail to seem to us that the distinction of being justice of the peace was worth something a century ago, when Benjamin Wadleigh, Sr., received his commission, signed by John Sullivan, "President,"-i. e., Governor of New Hampshire; while in the list of those justices who were contemporary with him we find such names as Samuel Livermore, Josiah Bartlett, Matthew Thornton, John Langdon, etc.

Erastus Wadleigh was made a civil magistrate in 1857, and so continued till his death, in 1881, he be- ing the third " Esq. Wadleigh " in regular line of descent from Benjamin Wadleigh, Sr., who received his commission-the first in town-in 1786; his son Benjamin, Jr. (the judge), in 1823. It will thus be seen that the time covered by their several comuiis- sions is but little short of a century, and includes al- most the entire corporate existence of the town.

The Thomas J. Wadleigh whose name appears on the town record as selectman in 1857 and 1858, and as representative in 1865, who, in 1858, received his commission as justice of the peace, was son of Moses Wadleigh, brother to Thomas and Benjamin, Srs.

Hon. Bainbridge Wadleigh, of Milford, N. H.

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(since of Boston), six years United States Senator from New Hampshire, is grandson of Moses, being son of John D. Wadleigh, of Bradford.

JUDGE BENJAMIN WADLEIGH, JR.

Benjamin Wadleigh, Jr., was born in Sutton in 1783. He was the youngest son of Benjamin Wad- leigh, Sr., and succeeded to the homestead of his fa- ther, who died October 8, 1817. The mother of Judge Wadleigh survived her husband more than twenty years, and it was this period of her long wid- owhood which gave room and opportunity for the manifestation of that filial devotion, on his part, which was so noticeable in him continuously, and up to the last day of this venerated lady's life. She died in 1836, aged eighty-six.

Judge Wadleigh married, early in life, Polly Mars- ton, daughter of Jacob, a native of Sutton, a woman whose kind and unselfish nature is still reverently remembered.

As a wife and mother, she was ever ready to sur- render every thought of self to the welfare of her family. She died December 17, 1857, aged seventy-six years.

The product of this union was six sons and two daughters, and two children who died in infancy.

Eliphalet was born November 21, 1804; died in Illinois about the year 1866.

Luther, born July 11, 1806; married and settled in East Corinth, Me., where he died in 1873. Dur- ing all his life there he occupied positions of trust and responsibility.

The resolutions passed by the town at his death testify to the esteem in which he was held. These resolutions speak of him " as a municipal officer com- petent and faithful; as a citizen, he was unpretend- ing, yet at all times ready, by fitting words and timely deeds, to help the needy; a consistent lover of his country and his home and those virtues so pleasing to the patriot and the parent ; an unobtrusive worker ; a doer of the word ; steadfast ; a keeper at home, med- dling never with that which did not concern him, but faithful in all life's duties."

Erastus, whose biography is elsewhere given, was the third son.

Milton, the fourth son, graduated from Norwich Uni- versity, Vermont, as civil engineer, in 1837. Subse- quently he went West and engaged in railroad engineer- ing ; located at Galena, Jo Daviess County, Ill., then distinguished for its mines, and the most flourishing and promising place in the State. For many years he filled the office of city engineer. At the present time he is surveyor of Jo Daviess County, an office to which he has, for many consecutive years, been elected, irrespective of political ascendancy.

Hannah, the fifth child, born November 23, 1814; married Nathaniel A. Davis ; died November 8, 1853, lovingly remembered by her surviving family.

Lydia F. was educated at New Hampton Institu- tion, where she remained as teacher three years. For the past thirty years she has been engaged in teach- ing in New York City,-first, as organizer and princi- pal of the Senior Public School, in Twelfth Street ; and, since 1870, as superintendent of the Normal College in that city.

Benjamin, the seventh child, was engaged in mer- cantile business in Newport and elsewhere. Died in Newport, N. H., November 8, 1868.

Gilbert, the youngest son, graduated at Dartmouth College in 1847 ; studied law and settled in practice at Milford, N. H., where he now resides. During the Civil War he was paymaster in the army.

Judge Wadleigh was born and spent his life, mar- ried and reared his family, on the same farm. He is remembered as being of fine personal appearance, gentlemanly in manner and possessed of a pleasant, genial nature, which was very attractive to young and old.

He was an earnest promoter of education, and no sacrifice was deemed too great to afford the educa- tional advantages of the times to his children.

Through life he commanded the confidence, re- spect and friendly regard of his fellow-townsmen ; while, as a citizen and the leader of a party, no man's views had more weight than his.

His sound judgment and recognized integrity caused his opinions and advice to be much sought in controversies, not only between his own townsmen, but by those of neighboring towns, and for many years no inconsiderable part of his time was devoted to the settlement of such controversies in which he acted as arbitrator-sometimes with associ- ates, but frequently alone-by mutual consent of parties.

Judge Wadleigh has now been dead more than twenty years, but within a few days one man, a law- yer, who used frequently to act with him in reference cases, has volunteered this testimony to his uprightness, -"I remember him well; I remember his unflinching honesty ;" and he added, " If I were his worst enemy, or if he were mine, I would trust him for honest deal- ing. He never gave opinions at random."

Judge Wadleigh was active in the public service during most of his life. His name appears on the record as selectman in 1809, 1810, 1813, 1814, 1815, 1817, 1820 and 1822; as moderator in 1822, 1823 and 1824; as representative in 1823, 1824 and 1825; as town clerk in 1825, 1826, 1827, 1828 and 1829.

He was justice of the peace from 1823 till his death. He was judge of the Court of Common Pleas from 1833 till his age (seventy years) disqualified him.

He died June 24, 1864, aged eighty-one years.

ERASTUS WADLEIGH, ESQ.

Erastus Wadleigh, Esq., was the third son of the

Erastus Wadleigh

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late Hon. Benjamin Wadleigh, and was born April 27,1808; died May 21, 1881.

A high-minded, honorable gentleman, scholarly, courteous and hospitable, he was one of those men whose presence gives character and dignity to the community in which they make their life-long abid- ing-place.

Possessed of superior intellectual powers, cultivated and strengthened by the habit of study and investi- gation, with much natural sagacity, quickened by thorough acquaintance with men and practical ex- perience in the managing of public affairs, his in- fluence was strongly felt. As a politician he was conservative enough for safety, yet not too timid to adopt new measures in place of the old when the new seemed founded in justice.

In his young manhood, as teacher and as superin- tending school committee, he was the means of giv- ing to the cause of education in Sutton a decided impulse forward, being among the foremost of those who substituted emulation to excel in scholarship for the old fashion of seeking to govern by authority founded on the rod and ferule.

No man who ever lived in Sutton has a clearer right to the favorable remembrance of his fellow- townsmen than Erastus Wadleigh, since no man ever did so much as he has done to rescue from oblivion the names and memories of others. He prepared many biographical sketches of deceased citizens, which found their way into the journals of the day, and copies of which are still preserved. In this work he spent many laborious days, but it was his favorite employment, and many of the latter years of his life were largely devoted to the early history of his na- tive town. No one so well as the writer of this sketch, who labored jointly with him on that work, can testify to the enthusiastic interest, the study, the faithful accuracy and patience which he brought to bear upon it.

Both authors were descended from original settlers prominent and active in the earlier years of the town,-the one from Benjamin Wadleigh, Sr., and the other from Matthew Harvey, Sr.,-and both hav- ing access to the papers and records of their respec- tive ancestors, much valuable matter was thus col- lected and recorded. Selections from this unpub- lished history have, to some extent, formed the basis of the present work. By his separate and individual efforts Mr. Wadleigh added greatly to that which is the chief merit of those historical collections, as in- deed it is of all historical works,-their reliability.

He left no means untried for obtaining correct infor- mation. By many letters of inquiry, by conversation with aged persons, and by carefully. consulting burial- stones in ancient grave-yards he compelled both the living and the dead to add their testimony to the writ- ten record. No part of the town was left unvisited, and from every part he gathered something. In reponse to his close questioning, "North " Sutton " gave up"

all it ever knew about itself, and "South " Sutton " kept not back." He left nothing for guess-work ; accepted no statement unless supported by other and well-known facts.

He was, perhaps, at first led into this pursuit by the strong love and interest he always felt for the scenes and localities amid which his infancy and boyhood, his young manhood and mature life had been spent. To him every hill and valley, every lake and stream had a history of its own, suggestive of the toils, the alternate successes and defeats of the men of the preceding generations; of their continuous conflict with the very roughest side of nature; of the cold and hardships, sometimes even hunger, that they braved; of the rocks that they blasted, the stone walls they built, the swamps they filled up and the hills they laid low to make passable roads; of the forests their determined arms converted into fields and farms. Occasionally, too, there bubbled up in his memory, like a living spring in the dense forest, some jest or joke, some anecdote of fun or frolic, that had its origin among those hardy pioneers, and which, having served its refreshing purpose of making an hour or a day of their toilsome life more endurable, had reached down to our time.

Kezar's Pond was to him an object of especial love and admiration ; there was no sheet of water so beau- tiful, no sandy beach so white and smooth as that on its south and southeastern shore. For more than seventy years he had watched its face, playful or frowning, as it lay nestled at the foot of the noble eminence on which stood his ancestral home.

Following with his eye the hills beyond, and in every direction, the desire grew upon him to repeople them all; not, like the novelist, with creatures of his own imagination, but with those to whom these localities had been the theatre on which they had acted their part in the drama of real life.

The history of Sutton was commenced, but the work had not proceeded far before the discovery was made that it is one thing to put on record facts al- ready within reach, and quite another to find right answers to all questions of genealogy and descent to which those facts gave rise.

(And here, perhaps, is as good a place as any other to state, for the benefit of all those who are ambitious of entering the field of antiquarian and genealogical research, that no one ever yet entered that field with any adequate conception of the amount of labor in- volved in the attempt to operate there. Why, then, does not the aspirant quickly abandon a work the proportionate results of which are so small ? Simply because he cannot. His interest in the work grows with his constantly-enlarging conception of its mag- nitude and its importance. He soon becomes thor- oughly identified with it, or rather the work has mastered him, and he has become subordinated to it. For genealogical research, apparently so dry, once entered upon, becomes the most fascinating of all

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literary work, becomes magnetic even in its attrac- tiveness to its pursuer. Very unwillingly, and only under pressure of strong necessity, will the genealo- gist suspend, even temporarily, his work while search- ing for "missing links" in some family chain. The clue he may chance to hold in his hand is so slight, so elusive, has been so difficult to attain, and yet is of such value if it leads to the result he is working for; with the conviction that, if he lets it slip, it is lost forever, and no future genealogist will be able to reach it, and yet will blunder for lack of it,-all this makes him cling to it with a miser-like tenacity till he finds the desired link and has got it fairly riveted in its proper place. Not only does the genealogist feel compelled to do his work, but he must do it aright. An assertion based, for lack of proof, upon supposition or even upon probability may prove to be a misstatement, which will fatally bewilder and mislead the future historian. For history is forever going on, and the record is by no means completed when the writer of our day lays aside his pen forever.)

Mr. Wadleigh, of course, realized that in succeeding years some other would take up the work where he dropped it, and would make this, his early work, the foundation on which to build his own. It was this sense of double responsibility to the past which, to his ear, clamored for remembrance, for recognition and historical justice, at his hands, as well as to the future, which was to sit in judgment upon his work, united with a natural honesty and conscientiousness which, if a man possess it, enters as closely into his literary work as into his business dealings,-it was all this which urged him to use the strictest accuracy of statement rather than fullness of detail. Through- out his entire work there is no possibility of miscon- struction through diffuseness or carelessness.

When, with advancing age, the hand of disease was laid heavily upon him, it was with deepest re- gret that he yielded to the conviction that he was no longer able to continue his chosen work. And yet he could not fail to view with satisfaction that which was already accomplished. He had brought the thirty years succeeding the first settlement out of the region of fog and fable in which the antiquarian usually finds such years, when searching for material for the centennial address, long before the town had seeu its hundredth birthday.

In the following brief words he explains his aims and object, and gives his moderate estimate of what he had accomplished. He says :

" Fellow-Citizens of Sutton : I euhmit to you the following early his- tory of the town and a sketch of the settlers previous to 1800, and come of their descendants, taken from the records of the original grantees, town recorde and information preserved by some of the settlers them- gelvee, together with personal knowledge of a large number of the persons referred to. It is believed by the writer, so far as hie knowledge extends, to be materially correct, although deficient in other respects- not embracing all that is desirable. It is designed to be a record.of mere facts, as far ae it goes, without embellishent or exaggeration. If the writer has been able to make himself understood, he will feel that he has done something towarde reecning the memory of our forefathers from immediate oblivion, which is his principal design."

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History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire, Part 156

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