USA > New Hampshire > History of New Hampshire, from its first discovery to the year 1830; with dissertations upon the rise of opinions and institutions, the growth of agriculture and manufactures, and the influence of leading families and distinguished men, to the year 1874; > Part 32
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On the twenty-eighth day of August, 1826, occurred the most destructive flood that has been known in New Hampshire. The little mountain streams became raging torrents ; the rivers be- came inland lakes throughout their entire length. Mills, dams, buildings, herds, flocks and crops were swept away. The results might be aptly described in the very words of Ovid, by which he portrays the fabulous flood of Ducalion. The following extract from Whiton's History of New Hampshire shows the ruins pro- duced by the freshet in the northern portion of the state :
"At Bath, the Ammonoosuc suddenly became turbid and thick with earth, then spread itself over its lower banks and meadows, and soon exhibited one wide, sweeping roll of billows, bearing along the wreck of bridges, buildings, fences, crops, and animals caught by the waves in their pastures. The beds of many mountain streams were excavated to a surprising depth and width; in some places the fury of the flood cut out for the waters new and permanent channels. Torrents of water rushed through the Notch of the White Mountains, breaking up the very foundations of the turnpike road for a great distance and leaving a shapeless mass of loosened crags, rocks piled on rocks, and yawning chasms. From the sides of the moun- tains, slides or avalanches descended to the lower grounds, bearing down thousands of tons of gravel, rocks and broken trees, and laying bare the solid mountain rock over an extent of hundreds of acres. Late in the pre- ceding day, a party of gentlemen, among whom were Colonel Bartlett and Mr. Moore of Concord, left Crawford's, a house more than four miles from the Notch, on an excursion to the summit of Mount Washington. They ar- rived in the evening at a camp which had been constructed at the foot of the steep ascent of the mountain, where they passed the night. The next morning being cloudy and rainy, they concluded to remain in camp that day, but the increasing rain having in the afternoon put out their fire, they reluct- antly decided to return. With the utmost difficulty, and not without danger, did they effect their retreat, and arrived at Crawford's in the evening. Had they remained on the mountain another night they must have perished, as the camp was afterward found to have been swept away, and avalanches to have passed on either side at the distance of a few rods. The most affect- ing story of this flood remains to be told. Two miles from the Notch at "the Notch House" lived the family of Samuel Willey, consisting of himself and wife, five children and two hired men. An avalanche in its descent from the mountain came near the house, where it divided itself into two parts, one of which crushed the barn and an adjoining shed. Alarmed at the noise, and fearing the destruction of their habitation, the family fled for safety; but in the darkness of the night they fell into the track of the other avalanche and were all buried under masses of earth and rocks. Some of
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the bodies were found by the scent of dogs, at the distance of fifty rods from the house. The house itself remained uninjured, and had the unfortu- nate inmates remained within, they had been in safety, but an inscrutable Providence otherwise directed. 'It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.'"
In 1817 a new county was formed. The second section of the act creating it reveals its location and boundaries. It is as fol- lows :
" SECT. 2. And be it further enacted, That said county of Sulli- van shall contain all the land and waters included in the follow- ing towns and places, which now constitute a part of the county of Cheshire, to wit : Acworth, Charlestown, Claremont, Cornish, Croydon, Grantham, Goshen, Lempster, Langdon, Newport, Plainfield, Springfield, Unity, Washington and Wendell; and that said towns be, and they are hereby, disannexed from the county of Cheshire."
At the June session of the legislature of 1817 an excellent law was passed "for the support and regulation of primary schools." It placed our educational system very nearly upon its present basis. The selectmen of every town are required to assess, annually, upon all the property of its inhabitants " a sum to be computed at the rate of ninety dollars for every one dollar of their proportion for public taxes, for the time being, and so for a greater or less sum," for the sole purpose of supporting one or more English schools within the towns where the taxes are as- sessed. The law also requires the selectmen to appoint in each town a superintending committee, whose powers are almost un- limited with respect to the approval of teachers and the selec- tion of books. The district is also required to choose annually a prudential committee to employ teachers and attend to the lo- cal interests of the school. These judicious provisions for good schools attest the wisdom of the legislators of that generation.
In political matters, parties had become so blended by "amal- gamation," that Hon. John Bell, a supporter of John Quincy Adams, was elected governor in 1828. He was a member of a distinguished family who have exerted a controlling influence in the state for a century and a half. Their common ancestor was John Bell, born in the county of Antrim, Ireland, in 1678. He received a grant of land from the Londonderry colony, in 1720, where he spent the remainder of his life. His son John inher- ited the homestead and passed his life in the same town. His grandson John resided in Chester, was engaged in merchan- dise and held several important offices in the state, prior to his election as governor. His brother, Samuel Bell, whose official career has been previously noticed, was in public life for more than a quarter of a century. As representative in the state leg-
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islature, speaker of the house, president of the senate, justice of the superior court, governor of the state, United States sen- ator, and trustee of the college, " he bore his faculties " so hon- orably that the succeeding generation has pretty unanimously agreed to call him a wise, great and good man. He left eight sons, all distinguished for superior endowments and high schol- arship. Samuel Dana Bell, late chief justice of the superior court of New Hampshire, was very eminent as a scholar and jurist. Of the brothers of Judge Bell, four studied medicine, and three became lawyers. They all have acted on the principle of Bacon, that "every man is a debtor to his profession," and have reflected honor upon their chosen vocations. Only one son of Hon. Samuel Bell, Dr. John Bell of Dover, now survives ; and Hon. Charles Henry Bell of Exeter is the only representa- tive of the family of Governor John Bell. He continued in office only one year.
Parties were at that time constantly changing. In 1829, the opponents of the national administration recovered their power, and General Pierce was again elected governor. In his second message to the legislature, he announced his determination to retire from public life at the close of his official year of service. In 1830, Hon. Matthew Harvey, a friend of General Jackson and a life-long follower of Jefferson, was chosen chief magis- trate by a majority of four thousand, over his opponent Colonel Upham of Portsmouth. The contest was bitter and malignant ; the result proved that the state, for some years to come, was to be decidedly democratic. The census of this year showed the population of New Hampshire to be two hundred and sixty- nine thousand.
CHAPTER LXXXII.
CHARACTER OF HON. BENJAMIN PIERCE.
In March, 1827, Hon. Benjamin Pierce of Revolutionary memory, always an ardent republican, was elected governor. It may not be improper here to give a brief account of the offi- cial life of General Pierce. "He was a native of Chelmsford, in the commonwealth of Massachusetts. He entered the ser- vice of his country in the spring of 1775, being then in the seventeenth year of his age; fought at Bunker's Hill, and con-
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tinued in the service until the peace of 1783. In his military career he participated in all the privations, perils and glory of the struggle which terminated in the independence of these United States. He entered the service a common soldier, and left it a major, by brevet.
A republican by nature, Gen. Pierce, at the close of the war, was anxious to maintain, in his intercourse with the world, that state of independence he had so successfully aided in establish- ing for his country, and no way then appeared so likely to effect this generous purpose as by engaging in some honest employ- ment in a new settlement. He accordingly abandoned the place of his nativity to the less enterprising and, accompanied by the wife of his youth and his trusty sword (still in his possession), he pitched his tent in the town of Hillsborough, near the spot where he spent the remainder of his life. Hillsborough at that early period was little more than a wilderness, and General Pierce's first efforts were spent in constructing a log house for his own accommodation and in felling with his own hands the green forest and preparing the ground for cultivation. The la- bors of honest industry seldom fail of success, and in few in- stances have they been more prosperous, than in the case of General Pierce. From a state little short of absolute depen- dence (the common lot of the Revolutionary soldier), he soon began to thrive, and soon took rank among the most independ- ent and intelligent farmers in the county of Hillsborough.
When General Sullivan was elected president of the state in 1786 he appointed General Pierce his first aid-de-camp, and from this time his promotion in the militia was rapid until he attained the highest grade in the gift of the executive.
General Pierce's services in the various branches of the state legislature were long and useful. He was ten times elected coun- cilor, and three times appointed sheriff of the county of Hills- borough. This last office he filled with great honor to himself and the most entire satisfaction to the community.
In his habits General Pierce was frugal and chaste ; in his manners easy and affable ; and in his deportment frank and generous." No person in the state did more for his country, and no contemporary of his had stronger claims upon the gratitude of his fellow-citizens.
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CHAPTER LXXXIII.
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POPULATION OF NEW HAMPSHIRE AT DIFFERENT PERIODS.
During the first twenty years of New Hampshire's history, the settlers were limited to small companies governed by the agents of the proprietor, Captain John Mason, occupying three centres of business, Portsmouth, Dover, and Exeter. Hampton was under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts. Those little com- munities were engaged in farming, lumbering, fishing and hunt- ing, and increased very slowly. They were unable, without aid from the proprietor, to gain a livelihood. They were a constant drain upon the treasury of the company. The settlers were not permanent inhabitants. They often migrated to Massachusetts or returned home. Of course the number varied from year to year, and depended for its increase upon new arrivals. It is thought, by good judges of the fact, that when the union with Massachusetts took place in 1641, the entire population of New Hampshire did not exceed one thousand souls. When, by the authority of the crown, that union was dissolved in 1692, the population is supposed to have been about five thousand. In 1730 it was estimated at ten thousand. When the province was divided into counties, in 1771, it probably contained between sixty and seventy thousand inhabitants. The increase was about forty per cent. every ten years. After the Revolutionary war and the establishment of a firm government, in 1790, the state had a population of one hundred and forty-two thousand, and the in- crease for the preceding nineteen years had been at the rate of forty-three per cent. for each decade. This period covered the war of eight years, when twelve thousand four hundred and ninety-seven men had served in the army, and probably nearly one half of these had perished by violence or pestilence. From 1790 to 1830, the rate of increase varied from thirty to ten per cent. every ten years. Dr. Belknap estimates the increase so great from 1771 to 1790, when the first census was taken, as to make the population double in nineteen years. This is not es- sentially different from the estimate made above. After the peace of 1763, when the Indians ceased to make systematic ag- gressions upon our frontiers, many new townships were settled and large emigrations were made from other states. Also, after the peace of 1783 a new stimulus was given to emigration ; the wilderness was penetrated and subdued, the bounds of civiliza-
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tion were carried into the interior and northern portions of the state, and the population and resources of the state were greatly enlarged. Peace always brings men and wealth in its train. War brings death, disease and desolation.
CHAPTER LXXXIV.
MONEY.
The origin of coined money dates at a period "whereto the memory of man runneth not to the contrary." Herodotus, "the Father of History," refers the invention to the Lydians. Plu- tarch says that Theseus caused money to be impressed with the figure of an ox ; other authorities ascribe the honor to Phidon, one of the early kings of Argos, B. c. 895. The monarch's seal was probably an earlier invention than coins. Whenever authority was delegated, the king needed some uniform token by which his will could be made known without his personal pres- ence ; hence the signet ring became the certificate of the king's command. When this abridgment of public business was once adopted the transition from a sealed decree to a sealed bit of metal was easy. Among the discoveries made in the ruins of Babylon are found small tablets of clay, stamped with the royal seal, which are supposed to have served as money. The earliest method of transferring the precious metals was by weight. The earliest standards both of weight and measure must have been very rude, when twenty-four seeds or grains represented a penny, and three kernels of barley taken from the middle of the head made an inch. The Bible refers to the bag and balances of the money lender and to the stamped shekel which bore on one side an image of the golden pot that held the manna, and on the other a bas-relief of Aaron's rod. The Athenians stamped their coins with an owl which was sacred to Minerva. The Greek states near the sea adopted symbols for their money appropriate to their condition, as a crab, a dolphin or a tortoise. Monarchs honored their coins with their own "image and superscription." It is still doubted by archeologists whether coined money existed in Homer's time. He often refers to trade by barter, as in the following quotation :
" From Lemnos' isle a numerous fleet had come Freighted with wine -- " *
* * * * *
" All the other Greeks
Hastened to purchase, some with brass and some With gleaming iron ; some with hides, Cattle or slaves."
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In celebrating the games at the funeral of Patroclus, Achilles proposes for prizes a tripod and a slave.
"A massy tripod for the victor lies, Of twice six oxen its reputed price ; And next, the loser's spirit to restore, A female captive valued but at four."
Among the treasures disinterred by Dr. Schliemann, forty feet beneath the supposed site of ancient Troy, armor, ornaments and vessels of gold and silver were found, but no coins are men- tioned. We are more interested in modern than in ancient money. The Celtic race were sufficiently civilized to use coins. Cæsar affirms that the early Britons had no money, but coins have been discovered in the island which the best authorities in numismatics refer to times anterior to the Roman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon kings had rude coins as early as the sixth century. The penny appears in the eighth. The etymology of this word is variously given. Sharon Turner derives it from the Saxon verb punian, to beat or knock ; others derive it from the Latin pendo, to weigh. Scyllinga, or shilling, denoted at first a quan- tity of bullion, from scylan, to divide, or, possibly, from sceale, a scale, meaning so much silver cut off or weighed; when coined it yielded five of the larger and twelve of the smaller Saxon pennies. Two hundred and forty pence were equivalent to a pound of silver by weight. In France, England and Scotland a pound of money contained twelve ounces of bullion or two hun- dred and forty pence. In process of time, as monarchs became needy, they divided the pound of bullion into a larger number of pieces, thus falsifying the certificate of value stamped upon the coins, till in the reign of Elizabeth sixty-two shillings or seven hundred and forty-four pence were coined from a pound of bullion. The mint price of silver was then said to be 5s. 2d. per ounce. Gold was afterwards made the standard of value, and the mint price of gold was fixed at £3 17s. 1012d. per ounce. The computation by pounds, shillings and pence existed as early as the reign of Ethelbert, the first Christian king of Kent. The payments in Doomsday book, under the conqueror, were made in the same denominations now used in England. The Norman kings coined pence only with the monarch's image on one side and on the other the name of the city where the money was coined, with a cross so deeply impressed upon the metal that the coin could be broken into two parts called half-pence, or into four, called fourthings, or farthings. In the time of Richard I., German money was in special demand, called from its purity easterling money, as the inhabitants of that part of Europe were called Easterlings, or Eastern men, hence the origin of the word sterling. Gold began to be coined in Europe at the beginning of the fourteenth century ; in England, by Edward III. Previ-
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ous to that time gold passed by weight. The English guinea, which first appeared in the reign of Charles II., was so named from the region from which the gold was brought.
The dollar is a coin of different value in different countries. Its name is derived from the German word "thal," a valley. The German thaler, Low German dahler, Danish daler and the Italian tallero all come from the name of a Bohemian town called "Joachims-Thal," where in 1518 the Count Schlick coined silver pieces of an ounce weight. As these coins were held in high re- pute thalers or dollars were coined in other countries of nearly the same worth and weight. Our "cent" is from the Latin centum, one hundredth part of a dollar ; the dime from decem the tenth part, the mill from mille, the thousandth part of a dollar. The British colonies computed their accounts in pounds, shillings and pence, as they were valued in the mother country. The Spanish pillar dollar was worth 4s. 6d. sterling ; or 6s. in New England currency.
Massachusetts coined money as early as 1652. The following account of it is from the pen of Mr. Hawthorne :
"Captain John Hull was the mint-master of Massachusetts, and coined all the money that was made there. This was a new line of business ; for in the earlier days of the colony, the cur- rent coinage consisted of gold and silver money of England, Portugal and Spain. These coins being scarce the people were often forced to barter their commodities instead of selling them. For instance if a man wanted to buy a coat he perhaps exchang- ed a bear-skin for it. If he wished for a barrel of molasses, he might purchase it with a pile of pine boards. Musket bullets were used instead of farthings. The Indians had a sort of money, which was made of clam-shells, and this strange sort of specie was likewise taken in payment of debts by the English settlers."
This was called Wampumpeag ; and, by abbreviation, either " wampum " or "peag." A fathom or belt consisted of three hundred and sixty beads. It was of two kinds, white and black. One fathom of the white was valued at 5s. sterling ; the black at Ios. It was made a legal tender only for 12d. in Massa- chusetts. The value of coined money may be learned from the price of labor. Mechanics received from 12d. to 2s. per day. Magistrates had 3s. 6d. and deputies 2s. 6d. per day. A married clergyman was allowed £30 per annum.
" Bank bills had never been heard of. There was not money enough of any kind in many parts of the country to pay the salaries of the ministers ; so that they sometimes had to take quintals of fish, bushels of corn or cords of wood, instead of silver or gold. As the people became more numerous and
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their trade one with another increased, the want of current money was still more sensibly felt. To supply the demand the general court passed a law for establishing a coinage of shil- lings, sixpences and threepences. Captain John Hull was ap- pointed to manufacture this money, and was to have one shil- ling out of every twenty to pay him for the trouble of making them. Hereupon all the old silver in the colony was handed over to Captain John Hull. The battered silver cans and tank- ards, I suppose, and silver buckles, and broken spoons, and sil- ver buttons of worn-out coats, and silver hilts of swords that had figured at court, all such curious old articles were doubtless thrown into the melting-pot together. But by far the greater part of the silver consisted of bullion from the mines of South Amer- ica, which the English buccaneers-who were little better than pirates-had taken from the Spaniards and brought to Massa- chusetts. All this old and new silver being melted down and coined, the result was an immense amount of splendid sixpences, shillings and threepences. Each had the date, 1652, on the one side and the figure of a pine-tree on the other. Hence they were called pine-tree shillings. In the course of time their place was supplied by bills of paper parchment which were nom- inally valued at threepence and upward. The value of these bills kept sinking because the real hard money could not be obtained for them. They were a great deal worse than the old Indian currency of clam-shells."
The first settlers of New Hampshire used but little money as a medium of exchange. They exchanged the products of their industry for the necessaries of life. No bills of credit were used. Gold and silver coins, imported from other countries, were alone considered lawful money. Four shillings and sixpence were equal to a Spanish dollar. The French and Indian wars exhausted the treasury of the state and imposed a heavy debt upon the province. The legislature from time to time secured temporary relief by the issue of bills of credit. These depre- ciated ; but the credit of the state was repeatedly saved by the reimbursement of these war claims by the English government. When they joined the revolutionary party, their bills became less valuable because there was little hope of redemption. In 1720, an ounce of silver was worth 7s. 6d., in currency, in 1725, 16s .; in 1730, 20s. ; in 1735, 27s. 6d. ; in 1740, 28s. ; in 1745, 36s. ; in 1750, 50s. ; in 1755, 70s. ; in 1760, 120s. February 20, 1794, an act was passed abolishing the currency of pounds, shillings and pence, and afterwards accounts were kept in dollars, dimes and cents, or dollars and cents. This act took effect January 1, 1795.
When the congress of the United States, on the tenth of May, 1775, began to issue "Continental Money," New Hampshire had
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a large amount of its own issues in circulation which were rap- idly depreciating. The numerous counterfeits of these bills also contributed to diminish their value. The addition of the United States money, which never commanded the confidence of the people, hastened the decline of our domestic bills. At the commencement of the Revolutionary war, paper money passed at par ; but it gradually declined in value, till in 1781 one hun- dred and twenty dollars were worth only one dollar in silver. It soon became entirely worthless.
CHAPTER LXXXV.
DISCOVERY AND SETTLEMENT OF THE WHITE MOUNTAIN REGION.
For a century and a half after the first settlement at Straw- berry Bank and Hilton's Point, the northern portion of the state was the favorite hunting-ground of the Indians. They were ac- quainted with all the streams that run among the hills and the valleys through which they flow. They undoubtedly were fa- miliar with all the gorges and defiles which divide the White Mountains ; and the far-famed Notch was probably threaded by them as they led their weeping captives from the early settle- ments of New Hampshire to Canada. It is not now certainly known when these mountains were first visited by white men. Among the early adventurers who landed at Little Harbor in 1623, there is no mention of soldiers by profession. In 1631, Thomas Eyre, one of the patentees, wrote to Ambrose Gibbins, their agent, as follows : "By the bark Warwick, we send you a factor to take care of the trade goods ; also a soldier for discov- ery." "This soldier," says Mr. Potter, "was doubtless Darby Field, an Irishman who, with Captain Neal and Henry Jocelyn, discovered the White Mountains in 1632." This narrative is now discredited. It is supposed by the best authorities, that Dr. Belknap and those who adopted the above statement from the first edition of his history, made a mistake of ten years in the date of the discovery ; and consequently failed to state cor- rectly names and facts connected with it.
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