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 35
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had two thousand applications for board. The first families come in May, and some prolong the season into October. On a high point of Appledore rest the remains of Thomas B. Laighton, surmounted by a single granite slab, with a modest inscription. He was one of the many peculiar charac- ters which the Granite State has produced. His name will live as long as Appledore shall last, as the reclaimer to civilization and usefulness of one of the waste places of creation."
NOTE. The records of Gosport, in the last century, show a peculiar disregard of orthog- raphy. Notice the following : "On March ye 25, 1771. then their was a meating called and it was gurned until the 23d day of Apirel." Among the "offorsers" of "Gospored" were "seelekt meen," " counstable," "tidon meen," "coulears of fish " and "sealers of whood."
CHAPTER LXXXIX.
THE INFLUENCE OF DISTINGUISHED FAMILIES IN NEW HAMPSHIRE.
Previous to the Revolutionary war, New Hampshire was gov- erned and controlled by a few influential families. There was no aristocracy of birth, but that of wealth was substituted for it. Only the rich could acquire a liberal education, and when learning and wealth were united they usually secured patronage and offices. When such men were once elevated to places of power, the people gave them their homage and made them per- manent leaders. The history of the state cannot be thoroughly learned without some special account of these leading families. They gave laws to society, regulated politics, originated and ex- ecuted laws, sometimes for the benefit of the people and some- times for their own aggrandizement. They built princely man- sions, rode in coaches, and in their dress, equipage and enter- tainments exhibited something of the dignity and exclusiveness of the old nobility of England.
In the annals of Portsmouth, the only seaport, and for many years the chief town in the state, the representatives of certain leading families appear on almost every page. Prominent among the early settlers was the Cutt family. Three brothers, John, Robert and Richard, came from Wales as early as 1646. They were all men of mark and enterprise. In 1679, when New Hampshire was made a royal province, John Cutt was appointed the first president. The names of Pickering, Sherburne, At- kinson, Wentworth, Livermore, Sparhawk, Vaughan, Sheafe and Langdon occur very frequently in the historical records of the last century, Capt. Tobias Langdon, the ancestor of the Lang-
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don family, came from England in 1687. John Langdon, born in 1740, was, perhaps, the most illustrious of his descendants. His history for the last half of his official life is thus recited by Mr. Brewster :*
"John Langdon was a judge of the court of common pleas in 1776 ; but resigned the next year. In 1778, he was agent under congress for building ships of war ; and was continental agent for supplying materials for the America seventy-four. In 1779, he was president of the New Hampshire convention for regulating the currency ; and from 1777 to 1782, was speaker of the New Hampshire house of representatives. In 1780 he was a com- missioner to raise men and procure provisions for the army, and June 30, 1783, was again elected delegate to congress. In 1784- '85 he was a member of the New Hampshire senate, and in the latter year president of the state. In 1788 he was delegate to the convention which adopted the constitution of the United States. In March, 1788, he was elected representative in the New Hampshire legislature and speaker of the house, but took the office of governor, to which he was simultaneously chosen. In November, 1788, he was elected . a member of the senate of the United States, became the first presiding officer of that body, and was reëlected senator in 1794. Later in life he was nomi- nated for vice-president, but declined on account of age. From 1801 to 1805 he was a representative in the New Hampshire legislature ; in 1804 and 1805 was speaker. From 1805 to 1808 and in 1810 and 1811 he was governor. The degree of LL. D. was conferred on him by Dartmouth College in 1805. Very few men of any age or nation have been more trusted, honored and revered than John Langdon."
* Many of the facts relating to distinguished families of Portsmouth have been taken from Mr. C. W. Brewster's " Rambles about Portsmouth," one of the best books ever published in New Hampshire.
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CHAPTER XC.
THE LIVERMORE FAMILY.
There is a house still standing in Portsmouth which was built nearly a century and a half ago, by Matthew Livermore, the first citizen of that name known to New Hampshire history. The street on which it stands is called Livermore street. Matthew Livermore, born in Watertown, Mass., 1703, came to Portsmouth in 1724, and for seven years taught the grammar school in that place. He afterwards studied law and held several responsible offices under the king.
Samuel Livermore, a relative of Matthew, was one of the most illustrious jurists and statesmen of New Hampshire during the eighteenth century. He was a descendant of John Liver- more, who was a citizen of Watertown as early as 1642. A branch of the family settled in Waltham, where Samuel Liver- more was born in 1732. He was graduated at Princeton in 1752. He began the practice of law in Portsmouth in 1758, where he was, for several years, judge advocate of the admi- ralty court, and in 1769 was made the king's attorney-general for New Hampshire. In 1765 he commenced the settlement of Holderness ; was one of the original grantees, and at one time owned nearly one half of the township. Here he fixed his res- idence permanently, and so great was his influence, from his learning, wealth and dignity, that he lived a kind of social dic- tator in the new town. When the dispute arose in relation to the "New Hampshire Grants " in Vermont, which, like Poland, was parceled out and claimed by three sovereign states, Mr. Livermore was appointed commissioner for the state of New Hampshire in congress. To secure his admission he was chosen delegate to congress. He took his seat in 1780 and remained, by reelection, till 1782, when he was appointed chief justice of the state. In 1784 he and Messrs. Josiah Bartlett and John Sullivan were appointed a committee to revise the statutes of the state and report new bills necessary to be enacted. While holding the office of judge he was again elected to congress in 1785. He was also an active member in the convention which met in 1788 to consider the new constitution of the United States. New Hampshire was the ninth state which adopted it, and thus gave vitality to this organic law. Judge Livermore's influence promoted, if it did not absolutely secure, this result.
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He was immediately elected a member of the first congress, and having resigned his office as judge, Hon. Josiah Bartlett became his successor. Mr. Livermore served two sessions in congress. In 1791 he was called to preside over the convention called to revise the constitution of the state. In 1793 he was elected to the United States senate, the successor of Paine Wingate. He served in that responsible position six years and was reelected, but resigned his seat in 1801. He had then been in public life more than thirty years. He retired to his home in Holderness, where he died in 1803, in the seventy-second year of his age. Two of his sons were distinguished in public life. Edward St. Loe was judge of the supreme court of New Hampshire from 1797 to 1799, and was a member of congress from Massachu- setts from 1807 to 1811. He died in 1832, aged 80. Arthur Livermore was, for more than half a century, a prominent jurist and legislator in New Hampshire. He was judge of the su- preme court from 1799 to 1816 ; judge of the court of common pleas from 1825 to 1833, and representative in congress from 1817 to 1821 and from 1823 to 1825. As a judge he was re- spected by the bar and reverenced by the people. As a public speaker he was logical, forcible and judicial, sometimes witty, caustic and severe.
CHAPTER XCI.
THE PICKERING FAMILY.
John Pickering, the ancestor of all the families of that name in New Hampshire, came from England among the first colonists of Massachusetts. He removed to Strawberry Bank as early as 1636. He was a man of great worth and possessed remarkable business qualities, though he could not write his name. The early settlers entrusted to him matters of great importance. He was one of the company who gave fifty acres of glebe land for the ministry. He built his house on a site now lying on "Mill Street." His sons, John and Thomas, became leading men in the colony. In 1665, the town granted to John Pickering, senior, a tract of land on Great Bay. Thomas, the second son, who is the ancestor of all who bear the name of Pickering in Ports- mouth and towns adjacent, also took a farm of five hundred acres from the same grant on Great Bay, within the present
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town of Newington, which after the lapse of two centuries still remains in the hands of his descendants. It has been transmit- ted in regular succession ; and no deed has ever been made of some portions of the estate since the first grant to John Picker- ing in 1665. In 1658, the town granted to John Pickering the south mill privilege, on condition of his keeping in repair a path for foot passengers, over the dam, on going to meeting. The mill was built; and the son and grandson of the grantee man- aged it in succession.
Captain Thomas Pickering, son of the third John, was hewn to pieces by the Indians, in 1746, in the vicinity of Casco, Maine, where he was on duty. He was helpless from rheumatism, and thus became an easy prey to the savages. The six daughters of this martyr to his country were all married and had children. Five of them lived to the average age of ninety-one years.
John Pickering, 2d, who inherited "Pickering's Neck" and the mill, discharged with credit the duties of farmer, miller, law- yer, captain, and legislator. In the first assembly called by President Cutt, he was a representative of Portsmouth. There were six of this family who bore the name of John. They all had a military reputation. It was Captain John Pickering, 2d, whom Dr. Belknap styles, "a rough and adventurous man and a lawyer," who compelled Richard Chamberlain, the clerk of the superior court and secretary of the province under Andros, to surrender the records and files of papers in his possession. They were for a time concealed ; but Governor Usher constrained the captain, by threats of imprisonment, to give them up. Captain Pickering was a member of the assembly most of the time from 1697 to 1709. For several years he was speaker of the house ; and was appointed attorney for the state in the great land case of Allen against Waldron, in 1707. In 1671, he was the con- tractor with the town for building a strong wooden cage, stock and pillory near the meeting-house for the confinement of evil- doers, especially of "such as sleepe, or take tobacco on the Lord's day, out of meeting in the time of the publique exercise." In our day the offenders would be more numerous than the of- ficials ; and the "cage " would be more spacious than the church. During the same year Rev. Mr. Moody, who had preached twenty-three years without settlement, was ordained. Captain Pickering, as usual, was master of ceremonies. He, in true dem- ocratic spirit, practised upon the motto of his mill, "first come, first served," reserved no seats for the minister and his friends. For this contempt of the magnates, he was censured by an ec- clesiastical court. "Like many other men" (and, we may safely add, women), "Captain John Pickering liked to have his own way ; unlike many others, he generally enjoyed the power."
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His brother, Captain Thomas Pickering, was a man of mag- nificent physique. A press-gang once attempted to seize him when alone in the outskirts of the town and put him on board an English man-of-war. When the officer of the gang replied to his earnest plea to be left to care for his family, " No excuse, sir ; march !" the captain laid him upon the ground in a trice, and raising his axe as if to chop off his head, the terrified sub- alterns begged his life and promised a speedy retreat. There is a tradition that this same athlete carried upon his back eleven and one-half bushels of corn up the steps of a mill !
The biographies of all the eminent men who have borne the name of Pickering would fill a volume. I can only mention one or two more. Hon. John Pickering, a lineal descendant of Thomas, was a man of eminent ability. He was a member of the convention that framed the constitution, filled the office of governor when Langdon resigned, and was chief justice of the supreme court for five years. He was born at Newington in 1738, and was graduated at Cambridge in 1761. To Captain Thomas Pickering Mr. Brewster assigns the chief honor in the capture of Fort William and Mary in 1774, contrary to the re- ceived tradition, which gives the credit of that achievement to Sullivan and Langdon.
CHAPTER XCII.
THE WEARE FAMILY.
The progenitor of this distinguished family was Nathaniel Weare, one of the early proprietors of Newbury, Mass. His name was spelled in the records of that town in seven different ways. There was very little agreement among the scribes and clerks of that day in spelling proper names ; indeed, there was no fixed standard of use for the orthography of common terms. The name of Shakespeare, in his day, was as variously written as that of Weare. He did not always spell it in the same way himself, and editors still differ with regard to its proper orthog- raphy. 'Mr. Weare's son Nathaniel, who was born in England, settled in Hampton. He was a surveyor ; and in that capacity was employed, in 1669, to establish the south line of the town of Hampton. Mr. Weare also officiated as an attorney in the man- agement of law-suits. During the oppressive prosecutions in-
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stituted by Mason against the first settlers of New Hampshire, Mr. Weare was sent, as their agent, to England to ask the pro- tection of the king against the unjust proceedings of the pro- prietor. More than two hundred citizens of Portsmouth, Dover, Exeter and Hampton signed the petition. Doubtless all the owners of real estate were interested in it. He also carried with him charges in eight district courts, against the tyrannical gov- ernor, Cranfield, who had conspired with Mason to rob the settlers of their lands. He presented his allegations before the lords of trade, and advocated them with so much eloquence that they reported to the king against the governor, and he prudently resigned his office. Thus unarmed justice triumphed over armed oppression. This act of moral heroism finds a parallel later in American history, in Samuel Adams, when he appeared as the representative of the people before Hutchinson, another royal governor, to demand the removal of the British troops from Bos- ton. The petty tyrant refused at first to listen to the request ; but at a second interview he became alarmed, wavered, prevari- cated and finally consented. The aged patriot stretched out his unarmed hand over the governor and exclaimed : "It is at your peril if you do not remove the troops. The meeting is composed of three thousand people. They have become very impatient. A thousand men have already come from the neigh- borhood; and the country is in general motion. Night is ap- proaching ; an immediate answer is expected." The answer came immediately. The troops were removed ; and the people were the victors. In after years, Adams said : "As I gazed intently into the eye of the tyrant, I observed his knees tremble; I saw his face grow pale and I enjoyed the sight." The vulgar heroism of the red battle-field pales before the glory of such moral daring,
" As a dim candle dies at noon."
Mr. Weare went to England a second time to defend the rights of the farmers against the claims of Mason ; and though unsuc- cessful in his mission, his labors were warmly commended by his clients. In 1685 he was elected to represent the town of Hampton in the assembly. During the continued controversies so persistently carried on by the proprietor and the people, for many years, Mr. Weare always acted an important part. In 1694 he was appointed chief justice of the supreme court, which office he held two years. He was for many years a councilor and a justice of the peace. He was also an active member of the church at Hampton, the oldest in the state. He died at Hamp- ton. His death is thus recorded : "Nathaniel Weare, Esq., for some years one of the members of the council of N. H., died the 13th of May, 1718, in the eighty-seventh year of his
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age." He left two sons, Peter and Nathaniel, both eminent in church and state. Peter was a member of the council, which then corresponded to our senate ; and, for four years, a justice of the superior court. Nathaniel held for eight years a seat upon the same bench. This fact shows the estimation in which he was held by rulers and people. He was the father of Meshech Weare, so long and so honorably known as judge, president and governor of the state. No name in our history has come down to us with a more unsullied reputation than his.
Meshech Weare was one of the great and good men of the last century. His name is associated with the most important transactions in New Hampshire through the whole of the Rev- olutionary war and the period of the formation of the general and state governments. He was born at Hampton Falls, then a parish of Hampton, June 16, 1713. He was one of the younger sons of the family and, on account of his high scholarship and good deportment, he was selected for a liberal education. He was graduated at Harvard, in 1735, with a high rank as a scholar. He prepared for the ministry and, for a time preached as a licentiate to the great acceptance of those who heard ; but his fellow-citizens required his services as a civilian, and he deemed himself justified in relinquishing the pulpit. He was early em- ployed in town duties, as selectman, justice of the peace and representative. He was also, under the royal government, a col- onel of the militia. He was speaker of the assembly in 1752. At the beginning of "the old French war " in 1754, he was one of the commissioners to the convention at Albany, to negotiate a treaty with the "Six Nations." At the commencement of the Revolution he was an active leader of the friends of liberty. In resisting the tyrannical claims of England, he was prepared to go to the extreme limits. He was a leading member of the state convention which met to form a new government, and was at once made the executive head of the state with the title of presi- dent. In 1776 he was made chief justice of the superior court of New Hampshire. He held this office till 1782, six and one- half years. When the new constitution of the state went into operation, in 1784, Mr. Weare was chosen the first president ; but resigned the office before the close of the year on account of ill health. He died January 15, 1786, aged seventy-three, having been in the public service forty-five years. His official life and character scarcely find a parallel in human history.
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CHAPTER XCIII.
THE BARTLETT FAMILY.
The earliest known ancestor of this family in this country was John Bartlett, who with four other citizens of the same name, removed from Beverly to Newbury, Mass., in 1635. The exact date of their arrival in America is not known. It is probable that they were among the earliest immigrants. Robert Bartlett landed at Plymouth in 1623. All who bear this name in New England are supposed to have had a common origin. The New Hampshire family descended from John Bartlett. President Josiah Bartlett, from his public services, is better known than his ancestors, though the family have always been distinguished for superior endowments and executive energy. Joseph Bart- lett, the nephew of Josiah, studied medicine with his distin- guished relative at Kingston, N. H., and immediately after his marriage, at the age of twenty-two, removed to Salisbury, N. H. He was the first physician of that town. He had a very exten- sive practice in that and the adjacent towns, and won the confi- dence and respect of all who knew him. He was also much employed in business transactions, as he held the pen of "a ready writer." He died September 20, A. D. 1800, aged forty- nine, leaving a family of seven sons and two daughters. Two of the sons were physicians ; two were lawyers and two were merchants. They were all distinguished in their several call- ings, all honored and trusted citizens. At one session of the New Hampshire legislature four of these brothers met as repre- sentatives from their respective towns: Ichabod from Ports- mouth, James from Dover, Samuel from Salisbury and Daniel from Grafton. Samuel Colcord Bartlett was a merchant in Salis- bury, successful in business, commanding the universal respect of all who knew him. His sons have all proved themselves worthy of their distinguished ancestry. Among them are Rev. Joseph Bartlett of Buxton, Maine, Prof. Samuel C. Bartlett of Chicago, Illinois, and the late Judge William Bartlett of Con- cord. The merchant, Samuel C. Bartlett, assisted his younger brother Ichabod to obtain an education.
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CHAPTER XCIV.
THE WEBSTER FAMILY.
Inquiries are often made respecting the father, brothers and sisters of the late Daniel Webster, and it is not probable that the time will ever come in our state or in the United States when that interest will wholly cease. It may be proper, therefore, to incorporate these facts in the history of New Hampshire, where all who choose can refer to them. Judge Nesmith, a few years since, published a full and accurate account of Mr. Webster's family. From this sketch I make the following extracts :
"In the political canvass in our state which closed with the March election, 1858, it was publicly stated by some of the speak- ers that Judge Webster, the father of Hon. Daniel Webster, could neither read nor write. Now, in the course of the last summer, we spent some time in investigating the history of Judge Web- ster. We have sufficient evidence, in Franklin and Salisbury, to satisfy the most skeptical that he could not only read and write, spell and cipher, but he knew how to lend the means to found a state. Daniel Webster, in his autobiography, and in his letter to Mr. Blatchford of New York, gives us a brief but too modest an outline of the life of his father. At the risk of being tedious we propose to show some of the acts or works that gave him his deserved influence and fame in this region.
Ebenezer Webster was born in Kingston in 1739. He resided many years with Major Ebenezer Stevens, an influential citizen of that town, and one of the first proprietors of Salisbury. Salisbury was granted in 1749, and first named Stevenstown, in honor of Major Stevens. It was incorporated as Salisbury in 1767. Judge Webster settled in Stevenstown as early as 1761. * Previous to this time he had served as a soldier in the French war, and once afterward. He was married to Mehitable Smith, his first wife, January 8, 1761. His first two children, Olle, a daughter, and Ebenezer, his son, died while young. His third child was Susannah, born October, 1766 ; married John Colby, who recently died in Franklin. He had also, by his first wife, two sons-David, who died some years since at Stanstead ; also Joseph, who died in Salisbury. His first wife died March 28, 1774. Judge Webster again married-Abigail Eastman, October
* When Judge Webster first settled in Stevenstown, he was called Ebenezer Webster, Jr. In 1694, Kingston was granted to Jaines Prescott and Ebenezer Webster and others, of Hamp- ton. He descended from this ancestor.
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12, 1774. By his last wife he had five children : viz., Mehitable ; Abigail ( who married William Hadduck ) ; Ezekiel, born March II, 1780; Daniel, born January 18, 1782, and Sarah, born May 13, 1784. Judge Webster died in April, 1806, in the house now converted into the New Hampshire Orphans' Home, and with his last wife and many of his children now lies buried in the grave-yard originally taken from the Elms farm. For the first seven years of his life, after he settled on the farm lately occu- pied by John Taylor in Franklin, he lived in a log cabin, located in the orchard west of the highway, and near Punch brook. Then he was able to erect a house of one story, of about the same figure and size as that now occupied by William Cross, near said premises. It was in this house that Daniel Webster was born. In 1784 Judge Webster removed to the tavern house, near his interval farm, and occupied that until 1800, when he exchanged his tavern house with William Hadduck for that where he died.
In 1761, Captain John Webster, Eliphalet Gale and Judge Webster erected the first saw-mill in Stevenstown, on Punch brook, on his homestead, near his cabin.
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