History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire, Part 162

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 162
USA > New Hampshire > Belknap County > History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire > Part 162

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Two miles beyond Waterloo is Roby's Corner sta- tion, the residence of M. H. Roby and George C. Eastman. A beautiful scene lies here. A broad intervale stretches to the south; green sloping pas- tures are on the west, and the east and north are bounded by high hills, covered with sombre pines and gnarled oaks that have bid defiance to the storms of years. Between Roby's and Melvin's Mills there is a gorge of wonderful beauty and wild grandeur. The river, bound in by a narrow defile, dashes and foams and roars, so as to be heard many rods away. Several dwelling-houses and a busy factory nestle below in the valley, and the railroad, with its high grade and trestle-work over the river, carries the steaming iron horse high above the chimney-tops. It is a wild and picturesque scene.

Melvin's Mills was so named after the Melvin brothers, who built a saw and grist-mill there as early as 1825. The Melvins were large, muscular men, and their feats of strength are still the wonder- tales of many a rural neighborhood. To the genera- tions that have passed away Melvin's Mills and the Calico school-house were landmarks of particular in- terest. Davisville, in the southeasterly part of the town, is a beautiful and busy little village. It has the finest water-power to be found on the Warner River, and from the time the first mills were built here until the present time, it has been taken advan- tage of in every possible way. Most of the manufac- turing interests of the place are controlled by various members of the Davis family, who have given their name to the little hamlet which has grown up around this valuable water-power. There is a small store at the place, a post-office and some fine farms in the adjacent section.

"North village," so called, is one of the pleasant little neighborhoods of Warner. The name has been in use during more than a hundred years. In the early days of the settlement there was quite a far- mers' village on the Gould road and over Waldron's Hill. Between Bartlett's Brook and "Kiah Corner," a dozen deserted building-sites can be counted where families once resided. These, with the buildings that still stand, made a lively, bustling street, the first of the century. At the north of this line of dwellings extended another cluster of farm-houses, taking in the Elliots, at the J. O. Barnard place, and Isaac Dalton and his taunery, at the Levi O. Colby

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place. The people of the South road called this settlement of the North road the North village.

It is not strictly a village or hamlet now, the houses being too scattered to allow such a dignified appel- lation, but within the radius of a mile are some twen- ty-five houses, principally the homes of hard-work- ing and prosperous yeomen. The surface of the land is uneven and somewhat rocky, but the soil is strong and fertile and large crops are raised. A wild, dash- ing little stream, called Silver Brook, having itssources among the eastern slopes of the Minks, flows down through the valley and joins the Warner River near River Bow Park. Along the banks of this rivulet the highway leads, lined on either side by the farm- houses, the shops and the ample barns of the rural populace. Graceful willows and birches, with here and there a maple or an elm, throw their branches out on the breeze and make a grateful shade in the warm summer-time. A drive through this neighborhood on a still, hushed noon or at the sunset hour is per- fectly enchanting ; and if one drives round by "Kiah Corner," he will view a scene that is not easily sur- passed in New England. Another beautiful drive is through the Kimball District. A view from Kelley Hill, looking to the north and west, at the sunset hour, the whole Warner Valley, with the village in the foreground and Kearsarge Mountain standing as a sentinel in the background, is worth going miles to see.

Six ponds are within the limits of the township, namely : Tom, Bear, Pleasant, Bagley's, Simmonds and Day's. The largest of these is Tom Pond, or, rather, as it is now called "Lake Tom." This is a beautiful sheet of water half a mile long and a quar- ter of a mile wide. Its shores are attractive, its waters clear as crystal. During the last few years it has become quite a summer resort. A company has erected a commodious pavilion on its western shore, improved the adjacent grounds and built a fleet of hoats for aquatic and piscatorial purposes. The pa- vilion and grounds were formally opened and dedi- cated on July 4, 1884.

CHAPTER IV. WARNER-(Continued).

MEMORABLE EVENTS, NATURAL AND SOCIAL.

The Old Meeting-House Fight .- The quarrel in which Warner was involved over the question of the location of the meeting-house, from 1783 to 1790, was on > which was fought out to the bitter end with intense feeling, and has probably never been equaled by anything which has occurred since in the history of the town.

churches and the support of preaching was divorced from the State and the meeting-houses and the min- isters were remanded to the support of those only of the citizens who were voluntarily disposed to give their aid, it was binding on every tax-payer to con- tribute his share, according to his means, to build meeting-houses and to pay the minister's salary. Therefore, it followed that every voter had a personal and direct interest in churches and ministers.

In our review of the evangelical history of the town we had something to say about the first church. This structure, which was built at the South Lower village, was small and rude, and was in use only four years. In 1770 it was superseded by another of lar- ger proportions and superior architectural design, erected on the same site. This, too, in process of time, became too small for the needs of the citizens, and the question of a new one was agitated. Mean- while the population had been increasing on the north side of the river, and they, for reasons of the greater convenience to themselves, wished a meeting- house built on their side of the river. The town could support hut one church, and as the people on the east side, for similar reasons, wished the new build- ing to be erected on the old site, a sharp controversy grew out of the matter. Innumerable town-meet- ings were held, and votes for and against a new house and against changing the location were passed in al- ternate confusion for several years.

Finally, at a town-meeting held in May, 1788, the town voted both to build and not to build, and, in hopes of a final adjustment of the vexed question, voted, according to the record, "to petition the General Court for a committee to appoint a place where to set a meeting-house in this town," In June of that summer Benjamin Sargent and Richard Bartlett, two of the selectmen, appeared hefore a committee of the Legislature with a formal petition, and the court accordingly appointed a trustworthy committee to decide on the location of the meeting-house. This committee was composed of Col. Ebenezer Webster, of Salisbury ; Robert Wallace, of Henniker; and Jo- seph Wadleigh, of Sutton; and their report was as follows :

" The committee, having attended to the business referred to, and after viewing the greater part of the towo, with the situation of the inhab- itants thereof, agree to report as their opinion that the spot of ground where the old meeting-house now staods is the most suitable place to set the new meeting-house on.

" Warner, Sept. 12, 1788."

This did not, however, end the fight, for at a meet- ing in October and at another in November the town repudiated the decision of the committee and voted not to build on that site. At last, April 25, 1789, it was voted to build between Ensign Joseph Currier's and Mr. Isaac Chase's, on the north side of the road, under the ledge, at the northwest end of what is now the Lower village. A building committee was appointed at the same time, consisting of Joseph

Prior to 1819, when the State Legislature passed the "Toleration Act," by which the building of Sawyer, Tappan Evans, Richard Straw, Jacob Wal-

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HISTORY OF MERRIMACK COUNTY, NEW HAMPSHIRE.

dron, Benjamin Sargent, Reuben Kimball and Wil- liam Morrill.

In the face of a protest of forty-six of the promi- nent men of the town, headed by Aquilla Davis, the committee proceeded about their work, and before the end of the summer erected a church, which was called "The House under the Ledge." But this did not soothe the spirit of discord, and the evil results of this division lasted for some time, as is shown by the vote, which was passed at the November town election not to meet in the new house, and that preaching should not occur there. There was even an effort on the part of some to get a vote to move the house over to the south side of the river. Oppo- sition, however, gradually died away, and in August, 1790, it was "Voted That Mr. Kelley should preach in the new meeting-house for the future, and the inhab- itants meet there for public worship." In March of the next year a vote was passed to take down the old meeting-house and appropriate the stuff towards fencing the burying-ground.

A Day of Terror .- The 19th of January, 1810, was, in the central part of New Hampshire at least, a day of terror, one never to be forgotten in the an- nals of the "hill towns" of this beautiful State. The afternoon of the 18th was unusually warm and mild ; the thermometer indicated forty-three degrees, or eleven degrees above freezing. Before light the next morning a winter hurricane was sweeping over the mountains, hills, plains and valleys, snapping off good-sized pine-trees, in its extended path, as if they were but fragile reeds. Great oaks were twisted by the force of the wind like withes in the hands of a giant. Barns were swept to ruin, and sheds of lighter construction were carried away by the storm of wind like chaff. This horrible blizzard continued during nearly a whole day. Nearly all the while the air was filled with fine, hail-like particles of snow, caught up by the gale, so that it was impossible to see more than a few rods away. To add to the gloom of the occa- sion and its deathly danger, the mercury of the ther- mometer sank, in the sixteen hours following the previous day's thaw, to twenty-five degrees helow zero. The mercury runs as low every winter as it did that day, but mortal man has never known a severer day in this New England. Thousands of fowl were blown away and never seen by their owners again ; rabbits, partridges and crows were frozen in the thickest woods ; young cattle were frozen solid as they huddled together in the half-open barn-yard sheds, some of which withstood the force of the wind ; many cattle perished where they were tied in their stalls.

The heavens roared like the sea in a cyclone. Branches of trees, hay from demolished barns, loos- ened clapboards and shingles from such houses as had great oaken frames and immense chimueys to hold the structures in place, rose in the air and mingled together in terrifying confusion. The loss

of live stock and buildings in Merrimack County aggregated scores of thousands of dollars. The " cold Friday " was known and is remembered throughout the New England States.

A Year without a Summer .- The year 1816 is known among the few old men who remember it as " the year without a summer." In every month there was a severe frost, and the greater part of the crops were substantially destroyed. There are old farmers living in Warner who remember it well. It was often referred to as " eighteen hundred and starve to death." January was mild, as was also February, with the exception of a few days. The greater part of March was cold and boisterous. April opened warm, but grew colder as it advanced, ending with snow and ice and winter cold. In May ice formed half an inch thick, buds and flowers were killed and corn frozen. Frost, ice and snow were common in June. On inauguration day, in June, there was snow to the depth of four inches on a level in Warner ; in Maine the snow was ten inches deep. Almost every green thing was killed, and the fruit was nearly all destroyed. July was accompanied with frost and ice. On the 5th ice was formed of the thickness of win- dow-glass in New York and all the New England States. In August ice formed half an inch thick. A cold northern wind prevailed nearly all summer.

Corn was so damaged that a great deal was cut and dried for fodder. Very little ripened in New Hamp- shire, and even in the Middle States the crop was small. Farmers were obliged to pay four dollars, and even five dollars, a bushel for corn of 1815 harvest for seed for the next spring's planting. The first two weeks of September were mild ; the rest of the month was cold, with frost, and ice formed a quarter of an inch thick. October was more than usually cold, with frost and ice. November was cold and blustering, with snow enough for good sleighing. December was quite mild and comfortable.

The Tornado of 1821 .- Warner has not often been visited by great and noteworthy disasters, either natural or otherwise. The great whirlwind or tor- nado of 1821 was the most terrible of the kind that ever visited this section. Many of the older inhabit- ants of the town still remember the catastrophe, and the path of the tempest is visible in several places after the passage of more than sixty years.

The month of September, 1821, according to the testimony of those who were living at the time, was eminently a season of uncommon storms and tem- pests. But the most of them, severe as they were, produced little injury in comparison with the whirl- wind of the 9th of the same month. The tornado is said to have commenced near Lake Champlain, gath- ering in violence as it went along. It passed over Lake Sunapee and through a portion of New Lon- don and Sutton, and entered that part of Warner called the Gore not far from the base of Kearsarge Mountain. The tempest carried away the barn of

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William Harwood, injured the houses of M. F. Good- win, J. Ferrin and Abner Watkins, completely de- stroying Ferrin's barn and unroofing Watkins'. Next in the path of the wind stood the dwelling of Daniel Savory. Apprehending a storm, Samuel Sa- vory, aged seventy-two, the father of the proprietor, who was himself absent, went up-stairs to fasten a window that was open. The women went to assist him, but all were too late. The tornado seized the house in its giant grip, lifted it and whirled it around, burying six of the family in its ruins. The body of the aged Samuel Savory was found six rods away, his brains dashed out against a stone. Elizabeth, his wife, was badly injured by the falling timbers. Mary, the wife of Daniel Savory, was severely bruised, and an infant that she had in her arms was killed. The others escaped with slight wounds.

The house of Robert Savory was also demolished. The family, consisting of eight persons, were all wounded, but not seriously. John Palmer, who lived half a mile away, saw the cloud coming, in shape, as he represented it, like an inverted funnel, the air filled with leaves, limbs of trees and pieces of timber. Before he could enter to give an alarm, the house came down over his head. Mrs. Palmer was considerably hurt, but the rest of the family were not sensibly injured.

Between Savory's and Palmer's the wind tore up everything in its course. Whole acres of corn and grain were swept off clean, trees were uprooted, stones half-buried in the earth were overturned; one stone weighing six hundred pounds was moved several feet.

From this place the tornado passed two and a half miles, sweeping away the buildings of Peter Flan- ders, killing a Miss Anna Richardson and injuring the infant child of Mrs. Flanders so severely that for several days her life was despaired of. Mr. and Mrs. Flanders testified that no sound of wind was heard, although some might have observed the cloud, until the crash of the building took place, and then all was over in an instant.

The buildings of Deacon Joseph True, in the cor- ner of Salisbury, were next swept away. The whole family was buried in the ruins. Mr. True was saved by a huge timber, which fell endways into the gronnd, within two feet of the place where he stood, and the other timbers falling upon that one pro- tected him from injury. By almost superhuman exertions he dug Mrs. True and four children out from beneath the bricks, where they were actually buried more than a foot. The oven had just been heated, and the bricks were so hot that in removing them from his children the deacon burned his fin- gers to the bone. Mrs. True was badly hurt. The youngest child, an infant, seven weeks old, was found at the distance of one hundred feet under the bottom of a sleigh, the top of which could not be found. After this the tornado passed into Warner again, tearing down a barn and passing over a pond,

the waters of which were drawn up in its centre, and finally terminated its ravages in this quarter in the woods bordering on what is now Webster.

Lafayette's Visit .- In 1825 the Marquis of Lafay- ette made his famous journey through the United States. In the course of fourteen months he trav- ersed the whole country, visiting every State in the Union and all the leading cities, and was received everywhere with sincere tokens of reverence and affec- tion. June 22, 1825, he was at Concord, where a grand reception was given him. Among the mili- tary companies of the State that were in attendance at that time was the Warner Light Infantry, under the command of Captain William Currier. Monday, the 27th of June, the Marquis proceeded westward to Vermont, going through Warner. When he reached the Warner line an escort of our citizens met him, and Dr. Moses Long made an address of welcome. The party then marched in a formal procession to Captain Kelley's tavern, where the old veteran alighted from his carriage and was conducted to the church near at hand. It was now noon, and, in front of the church, on the level green, stood a long table spread with choice refreshments. The general partook lightly of these, being waited upon by several of the beautiful young ladies of the village. One, who remembered how he looked at this time, says that his appearance surprised every one. He presented a fine, portly fig- ure, nearly six feet high, and his weight of years was lightly worn, his only apparent infirmity being a slight lameness resulting from his old wound at Brandywine.

After the collation was served, and Lafayette had shaken hands with every man, woman and child, the distinguished visitor remounted his carriage and con- tinued his way through Warner, the old and young thronging the door-yards to catch a glimpse of the great man's face. As he passed out of sight the old brass cannon was fired repeatedly, awaking the echoes of the hills around him. And so the "Nation's guest" passed from Warner.

Citizens of Note .- Warner has raised her share of noted characters. Near the northeastern border of the town still stands the birth-place and early home of ex-Governor Ezekiel Straw. At the opposite ex- tremity of the town are the ruins of the old home- stead where ex-Governor Walter Harriman was born and brought up. Half-way between these extrem- ities, and under the very shadows of the Minks, was the early home of ex-Governor N. G. Ordway.

Hon. John Pillsbury, ex-Governor of Minnesota, spent a part of his boyhood here, and his brother, Hon. George A. Pillsbury, mayor of Minneapolis, was once a trader in the store now occupied by B. F. Heath . More extended notices will be found of these men in an- other portion of this volume.

A short distance from the road leading from War- ner to Henniker is an old ruined cellar, all that now remains of what was once the habitation of Prince

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Hastings. Prince was a negro, who, for many years, lived in the Warner woods, enjoying a local reputa- tion not below that of many better men. Yet Prince was no ninny. He was a great jokist, and could sing songs and play on the bones. Many stories are re- lated of him, but none, perhaps, better than the one told of his being discovered in the mill stealing meal, when he explained, "It is not I; it's Tony Clark." Tony, or Anthony Clark, was another negro, who was quite a character fifty or sixty years ago. He was a fiddler and dancing-master, and probably did more to- wards instructing the young folks in the arts and graces of politeness than any other man of his day or generation. He was born a slave, served in the Rev- olutionary army, was a waiter for several years to General Washington, and finally was manumitted and came to Warner to live. Prince Hastings was born free, and, consequently, always regarded Tony with contempt. So, when caught in the flagrant dereliction before alluded to, it was natural that he should charge the deed to his rival, though the man- ner in which he did it did not materially serve to ex- culpate himself. Prince died in 1846 at or about, the age of seventy-five. Tony Clark also lived to a great age, dying in 1854, aged one hundred and four years. In honor of his Revolutionary service, they gave him a military funeral, which was a splendid affair.

In 1876 (centennial year) a little excitement arose over the matter of changing the town's name from Warner to Georgetown. A petition, backed by the names and influence of a number of the prominent citizens, was presented to the General Court for this purpose. But a counter petition, containing the names of three-quarters of the citizens of the town, several of whom had signed the first, was also presented, and, after a protracted discussion by the representatives of both parties, the committee decided not to change the name; so Warner it is to-day, bearing the noble cog- nomen of the patrician councilor whose very name recalls all that wealth and ease and almost baronial greatness that is associated with the great crown offi- cers of colonial times.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

GENERAL WALTER HARRIMAN.1

The name of no New Hampshire man of the pres- ent generation is more broadly known than that of Walter Harriman. His distinguished services to the State, both in the Legislature and in the executive chair, his honorable service as an officer of the Union army, the important trusts he held at the hands of one and another of our national administrations, and,

not least, his brilliant gifts as an orator, which made him always welcome to the lyceum platform, and caused him to be widely and eagerly sought for in every important election campaign for many years, combined to make him one of the most conspicuous men in our commonwealth.

The Harriman family is of English origin.

Rev. Ezekiel Rogers, a man of eminence in the church, was born in Yorkshire, England, in 1590. He graduated at the University of Cambridge in 1610. Becoming a dissenter from the Church of England, after twenty-five years of faithful service, his ministerial functions were suspended. He says of himself,-" For refusing to read that accursed book that allowed sports on God's holy Sabbath, I was sus- pended, and by it and other sad signs driven, with many of my hearers, into New England." This stanch Puritan arrived on these shores in 1638. In his devoted flock there was an orphan lad, sixteen years of age, named Leonard Harriman, and from this youthful adventurer the subject of this sketch descended, heing of the seventh generation.

Rogers selected for his colony an unoccupied tract of country between Salem and Newburyport, Mass., to which he gave the name of Rowley, that being the name of the parish in Yorkshire to which he had long ministered.

The oldest son of Leonard Harriman was massa- cred, with ninety of his comrades,-" the flower of Essex County,"-in King Philip's War, September 18, 1675, at Bloody Brook. The great-grandfather of Walter Harriman saw eight years of hard service in the French and Revolutionary Wars. His grand- father settled in the wilds of Warner, N. H., at the foot of the Mink Hills, but lost his life by an acci- dent at the early age of twenty-eight. His father, the late Benjamin E. Harriman, was a man of character and influence through an honorable life. He reared a large family at the ancestral home in Warner, where the subject of this sketch, being a third son, was born, April 8, 1817.

Muscle and intellect and the heroic virtues can have no better nursery than the rugged farm-life of New England, and the Warner homestead was a challenge and stimulus to the qualities that were needed in the future man of affairs. This child of the third generation that had occupied the same home and tilled the same soil grew up with a stalwart physical organization and a fine loyalty to his native town, a deep interest in its rude history and tradi- tions, and a sympathy with the common people, which, in turn, made him a favorite with all. To him there was no spot to be compared with his birth- place, and there were no people so interesting and endeared as his old neighbors in the rugged hill-town. A few years before his death he wrote a "History of Warner," which is regarded as " one of the most syste- matic, comprehensive and generally interesting works of the kind yet given to the public in the State."

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History of Merrimack and Belknap counties, New Hampshire, Part 162

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