History of the city of Nashua, N.H., Part 18

Author: Parker, Edward Everett, 1842- ed; Reinheimer, H., & Co
Publication date: 1897
Publisher: Nashua, N.H., Telegraph Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 652

USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > Nashua > History of the city of Nashua, N.H. > Part 18

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Going northeast about seventy rods from the angle of the gravel ridge before described to an excavation through it at Lock street, we find it is there formed of stratified yellow sands sloping away toward the west from the Merrimack river at an angle of about forty degrees. The location, color and character of this sand show that it came down the Merrimack on the ice when that stream filled the whole interval of the river, being about a mile wide at this point and at least one hundred and twenty- five feet deep, and that it was washed off in the water that ran off its side into an open space that lay between the glacial Merrimack and the tongue of ice before mentioned which had then come to a stand still and no longer at this point coalesced with the ice river, but, through the influence of sun and rain, had retreated from it a few feet. There might have been some water standing in this open crack along side of the ice stream but there was some outlet for the water when it rose to this height; which fact is shown by the absence of clay. Most of the wash which carried in the sand came from the glacial Merrimack, but not all; for if we observe closely we shall see that a nearly horizontal sweep across the top of these strata, with a little incline toward the river, has been made as if by the sudden irruption of water and gravel from the surface of the local glacier on the land side. How do we know it came from the west or northwest ? Because it is a gravel made up in part of the dark colored slate found between Winter hill and Merrimack. How do we know it was a sudden irruption? Because it swept clear across the ridge and left a deposit of gravel three or four feet in thickness. On the bottom of that layer and resting on the top edge of the strata of yellow sand which is cut off at an angle, is a flooring of black slate pebbles three or four inches in diameter. The rest, though finer, is of the same material. At the time of this irruption of gravel from the west, the ice extending across the Merrimack interval must have stood as high as the top of these yellow strata, or the layers of yellow sand would have been cut down still lower by this torrent from the hill over the local glacier ice tongue. This sand bank not only tells its own story but also that of innumerable similar deposits all over New England. The finest debris from the broken rock floor is carried farther by the current of the stream whether it be of water or of ice. The slower the current of that stream moves the more likely the smallest and finest particles are to be deposited. The very finest of the rock paste, unless deposited where there is no current, goes on to the ocean. If deposited in perfectly still water it forms

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HISTORY OF NASHUA, N. H.

a clay bed. Fine, heavy sand falling off the ice stream in still water is put down in level strata. Coarser sand, gravel and pebbles, as they glide off the ice stream's edge, back up against the ice and form strata at angles varying from twenty to twenty-five degrees and from one to three feet in thickness. As the moving ice stream diminishes in depth, and even after it has ceased to move, while it still retains its general shape and features, even though its surface has sunk below the sand and gravel ridges in its outer edges, both the ice stream itself and these lateral ridges are subject to incursions of torrents of water bearing immense quantities of gravel, pebbles and bowlders from the bordering hills and from the overhanging tongues and sheets of the glacial ice upon their tops. Thousands of banks of fine stratified sand all over the country are thus held down by layers of coarse gravel and small bowlders which have prevented the wind seizing them and transporting the pulverized particles in moving dunes across the country.

This layer of dark slate, gravel and stones thrust nearly horizontally across the upturned strata of yellow Merrimack sand here at the Lock street section of this gravel ridge solves another mystery. It discloses the method of the formation of the valley terraces of New England and those of Scotland, and of the fjords of Norway and of every other country that has once been glaciated. Agassiz explained the "parallel roads of Glen Roy"-a series of terraces around the sides of a Scottish valley -as being caused by a glacier building a series of transverse moraines one after another, each following one lower than its predecessor : and these moraines serving as dams, held back the waters at different times at the different heights of the existing terraces. So late as his journey to Brazil, he alludes with some satisfaction to that early discovery. But he fails to show how a valley lake thus held in check can receive and retain the material comprising the terrace and hold it at the level of the water's edge or that any such process is anywhere going on at the present time.

An early and frequent explanation of these river or valley terraces is that the river interval was first filled up level across from side to side with the drift, which for that purpose is usually described as lying in level strata, and then afterwards the existing interval was cut out by the water courses, which were considerably intensified in order to perform that work. This is the explanation of the text book writers, of Geike, the Scottish geologist, of Mr. Warren Upham, and of many others. Another explanation which met with considerable favor a generation ago was that these terraces stood at the water level and that a succession of them marked the successive steps in the gradual upheaval of the continent. In trying to verify this theory Professor Hitchcock was perplexed by the fact that there was no connection between one set of valley terraces and another either as to their elevation above the sea or in the height of each successive upheaval. Both these theories still find many adherents. It is easy-in theory-to hoist and submerge again the continents. It is easier to talk about the drift in a valley terrace than to examine it carefully. It is not difficult to be pleased with the thought of having made a great discovery in nature and yet to neglect to verify the details. A lake or pond silts up first at the upper end ; no transverse moraine or other dam can be contrived to make the still water build up a terrace all around the edge of a pond at the water level, or place the gravel and bowlders of the terraces in such position. Besides, as the writer has discovered from numerous observations, the valley terraces are not level ; they all descend with the valley often more rapidly than the brook or river at its bottom. Thus a river near the mountains here in New England was found by the writer to have a fall of eleven feet in two miles, while a well defined terrace one hundred and sixty-five feet above it fell forty feet in the same distance.

The reason why the slanting strata of yellow sand was not cut down any lower by that furious irruption of water, bearing dark gravel and stones from the west at this section of the gravel ridge on Lock street, can only be explained by the fact that there was something substantial and solid on the east of that ridge and close along side of it that could not be overturned or washed away. There is nothing of that nature there now. We know that what was there then and is gone now was the great ice stream of the Merrimack. The ridge of sand along its side could be cut off lower than the top surface of that ice against which it rested. When the water came with sufficient force the sand could stand no higher than the top of the ice, but if the torrent came from the hills or local side glacier the top of the sand ridge was thrown over and upon the ice stream, and if the torrent came down or across the ice stream the top of the sand or gravel ridge would be struck off, as a miller strikes off the full measure of grain, and the surplus thrown upon the other side of the sand ridge toward the hill side, and thus the intervening space between the ridge and the bordering hill filled in up to the

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height of the top of the ice stream. The top of the ice stream in either event was the gauge of the height of the terrace. The ice which held the terrace in place and regulated its height has disappeared. The bed-rock upon which it scraped and ground along has been silted over and covered up but the terraces remain. The dam was longitudinal and not transverse, the ice itself and not its moraine. North of Lock street the ridge becomes a terrace and extends northerly past the O'Donnell school house, the Laton homestead and along the western side of the Merrimack interval, and the space between the top of the ridge and the hill to the west is filled in as before indicated.

Fairmount Heights, which overlook the city on the northwest, constitute an elevated plateau standing about two hundred feet above the sea level and about fifty feet above Main street. This plateau is twenty-five hundred feet long from east to west and from seven hundred to twelve hundred feet broad upon the top. It lies parallel to the interval of the Nashua which flows at its southerly base seventy-five feet below. This plateau is nearly level, with, however a slight incline

"THE ISLAND"-A VIEW ON THE NASHUA RIVER OF TODAY.

toward the east or down the valley of the Nashua. It can be reached in no direction except by making a considerable ascent. It is all within a mile of the City hall. It constitutes a very large and perfect glacial terrace, made up of sand, gravel, pebbles and small bowlders of gneiss, mica schist and the dark slate found in the region lying to the north and northwest. The clay and fine sand has been entirely washed out and carried away so that no water will remain on the surface and to obtain any by means of wells they need to be sunk at least seventy-five feet. At the time this terrace was formed the Nashua interval from Mine falls to the Merrimack was full of ice. This drift which now constitutes the Fairmount terrace probably was once the terminal moraine of a great northwestern ice stream, a remnant of the continental ice cap, and this moraine banked up close against the Nashua ice stream, while some of its material no doubt is made up of the lateral moraine of that stream. Before it was stricken off comparative level down to the surface of the ice stream, (then from a hundred to a hundred and fifty feet deep), that moraine stood in irregular conical ridges,

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some of them perhaps fifty feet higher than the present plateau, and it took an immense force of water to sweep off and level down the tops of these ridges. When that was done, the tongues of ice from the north were also banked up against the moraine on that side and there they remained until they melted, leaving the precipitous sides and deep depression still to be found toward the Wilton railroad .*

When the general ice cap was on its course toward the south and southeast, after passing over the site of the present city, it struck the mass of very hard crystalline rock composed of mica schist with streaks of feldspar, lying between the Merrimack and Salmon brook, the remains of which now constitute Pratt's hill and Long hill, and extending from the Harbor south beyond the state line. This rocky prominence was so hard it could not be entirely eroded, but was much rasped off and ground down. When the ice cap on this hill finally disappeared it left the thin paste beneath it, in some places not more than two or three feet deep covering the hill. There are also many bowlders, some of them of porphyritic gneiss which have come at least thirty or forty miles from beyond the Contoo- cook. The ice disappeared so gradually that neither the water from its melting disturbed the ground moraine nor did that moraine itself, though not held back by the roots of grass or trees or any vegetation, slide down the polished and slippery sides of the bed rock except in a few places.

When the ice cap had rested from its labors on this hill, the ice stream of the Merrimack still kept on its course and has left its lateral moraine stranded in gravel ridges along its right bank, and these ridges may be traced at an altitude of more than one hundred feet above present low water in the Merrimack across the land of J. L. H. Marshall, near which they now furnish material for the cement pipe works of Hon. Seth D. Chandler on the Lowell road. Traces of this ridge are found running south from that point on the west side of the highway and further along on the east between it and the railroad for several miles.

On the other side of the Merrimack one may begin on the west side of Otternic pond in Hudson and follow a corresponding ridge parallel with the present Merrimack and about half a mile east of it for three or four miles southward. The ridge, irregular in height, is only eight or ten feet wide on top. It stands from fifteen to forty feet above the adjacent land. Its sides are steep and nearly devoid of soil. It is composed of coarse gravel, pebbles and small bowlders, smooth and well rounded. It is unstratified. Opposite where the ice stream of the Nashua united with that of the Merrimack, deflecting the latter to the eastward, the ridge rises the highest and appears in a succession of parallel bow shaped hills with their concave sides toward the river. They are the lateral moraines of the ancient Merrimack and stand from a hundred and ten to a hundred and forty feet above the rocky floor of that glacial stream. Beyond it to the eastward the lateral glacier and subsequently the larger pond that occupied the site of Otternic and Hudson Centre found an outlet toward the east until the waters broke through this ridge where Otternic brook now runs, draining the pond to its present dimensions and emptying its waters into the Merrimack. The westerly side of the ridge is banked up with drifts of fine sand blown up from the shores of the Merrimack by the prevailing northwest winds. Toward the southern extremity of the ridge, on the farm of Mr. Fuller, the dune has been retarded in its easterly movement by the action of man, who now seeks to hold it back from the destruction of the fertile territory between. This lateral moraine is a kame and differs from an osar in being laid down in the air. Opposite this kame the main current of the ice must have been deflected near to the eastern shore, rising above it for that reason, and allowing the rubbish borne along on its surface to slide down upon the eastern side, thus building up the gravel ridge. Within its walls are found bowlders of the coarse pink granite found in the vicinity of Manchester and which one sees in the curb stones and flags of that city. None of this granite is found in the moraines or gravel ridges west of the Merrimack. But they in turn hold many bowlders of Milford granite, which is not found in the Hudson kame. This is in accordance with the well known law that the material constituting the lateral moraine of an ice stream is never transferred by the ice to the opposite side of the current.

The lakes and ponds which covered so large an extent of the surface of New England during the disappearance of the ice cap were held in place by barriers of the ice itself in the first instance, and subsequently by dams built up by the ice as we have seen that the osar across Lock street was produced.

*This explanation of the formation of the terraces in glacial regions was arrived at by the writer in 1885 from his personal investigation of many terraces in New England and northern New York, and so far as he is aware is original with him. His conclusions were first given to the public in a paper read by him before the Nashua Fortnightly club, February 6, 1888, and printed at that time.

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The extensive sandy plains about Nashua indicate the bottom of such a lake through which there was a sufficient current of water to carry away to the ocean the clay in solution which the wash from the bordering hills brought down from the ground moraines left bare by the ice cap. The rock bottom of this lake is probably fifty or seventy-five feet below the level of Main street, and was covered over deeply with sand and gravel from the hard pan by the same water which carried away the clay. In the same way the lake of Geneva is now being silted up by the stream flowing from the Rhone glacier.

At the close of the ice period, a barrier-possibly an ice gorge-near the state line caused the waters to be held back, forming a narrow and shallow lake which extended northward beyond Goffe's falls, northwest to Amherst and thence along the Souhegan river for two or three miles, and southwest up the Nashua to Mine falls. That part of Merrimack lying between the Souhegan and Pennichuck brook was an island. Nearly the whole of Litchfield was submerged. In places this pond was four or five miles wide and its surface was about two hundred feet above the sea level, and it varied in depth from five or ten feet at the upper end to fifty or sixty in the vicinity of Nashua. At first it was much deeper but it was rapidly silted up, especially toward the north and northwest extremeties. There was a considerable current through the lake, sufficient to carry away nearly all the clay in the soil. Many spots were still occupied by the ice and the faces of the terraces in many places were protected from the action of wind and wave by glacial ice. Now and then huge masses were broken off and floated away from their moorings until they became stranded on the bottom, and the silting up process still going on around them, when they had melted and the waters came to depart, the hollows lately occupied by these miniature icebergs formed small ponds without inlet or outlet, like Sandy pond, and Round pond near the Amherst road. The bottom of these ponds in some instances is as low as the surface of the neighboring rivers, and always lower than the rock floor of the surrounding hillsides, so that they are generally fed with a lasting supply of pure water of a quality superior for drinking purposes to that of such sluggish streams of the vicinity as are filled with the ooze of swamps and the unfiltered wash of the surface.

Many other depressions in the sandy plain which once formed the bottom of this ancient lake, though not deep enough to reach down to the water, were formed in the same way, and some mark the places where, near the moraine terraces, tongues of ice were covered up when the gravel ridges were struck off in the formation of the terraces, and these bodies of ice, until they melted, constituted a part of the terrace and helped to hold up the surface earth to the general level of the terrace, but as the ice underneath slowly melted away, the surface gradually sank down and the existing hollows or "kettle holes" were formed.

The disappearance of a series of such bodies of ice, either banked up with, or sbmerged by the gravel, has resulted frequently in creating water courses, either upon the surface or underneath, between the lateral moraine of the ice river and the bounding hills. An example of such underground currents is found at the base of Winter hill, the water on the east side finding its outlet into the Merrimack by the well known spring upon the Laton farm, and on the west, from the vicinity of Concord street, through the North common, across Amherst street, under the Wilton railroad and along at the northerly base of the Fairmount terrace, where it feeds a succession of ponds, around to its outlet to the river at the never failing cold spring, much visited by boatmen on the river at the "steep banks."

The glacial ice, even that which upon the formation of the terraces was buried to a great depth beneath the gravel, we have reason to believe is all gone in this vicinity. No phenomena, charac- teristic of the Siberian tundra, like that observed upon the opening of the "frozen well" in Brandon in the neighboring state of Vermont, has ever been chronicled in this locality. People cannot drink ice water from their springs in August even in the White Mountain state. How long ago the last remnant of glacial ice stored away in Nature's ice house, yielded to the combined strength of the sun's rays and the internal heat of the earth, and melted, whether it was a few hundred or a few thousand years ago, no man can now say.

When the mean annual temperature of this region shall be lowered again in the coming aphelion winter, and the snows of spring shall linger all summer through upon Monadnock and Mt. Washington; when they and their sister peaks and ranges shall again become centers of dispersion for the ice, until, gradually deepening year by year, the glaclal plow shall again furrow all New England and wipe off the face of the earth as with a sponge all the boasted works of man-all his

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HISTORY OF NASHUA, N. H.

mechanical, architectural and engineering achievements-when all this shall come again the astronomer may perhaps with tolerable certainty foretell; but we ourselves know, that, whatever of that character nature has in store for this region, it is so far in the remote future it can in no manner affect our lives or the lives of any who will have us in remembrance ; for we shall then be

"As much forgotten as the canoe That crossed the bosom of a lonely lake A thousand years ago."

A.B. aumentano.

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HISTORY OF NASHUA, N. H.

JOHN M. HUNT.

John M. Hunt was born at Dracut, Mass., March 31, 1797 : died at Nashua, Oct. 30, 1885. He was a son of Israel Hunt, born Aug. 27, 1758, died March 2, 1850, and Catherine (Nowell) Hunt, born June 15, 1765, died May 15, 1850. Their ancestors came from England in the seventeenth century and were among the early settlers in Massachusetts Bay colony. Their descendants have been among the pioneers in near and remote sections of this continent and many of them havedistinguished themselves in the service of their country, in the professions and employments that have developed the civilization whichis thecrown- ing glory of the nineteenth cen- tury.

Mr. Hunt ob- tained a common school education, and beyond that, for he was a well informed man on topics of general interest, was self- taught. From 1803 till the time of his death in 1885 he was one of the best known resi- dents of Nashua. In the beginning of his honorable career he was in trade at the Harbor in a store that stood in the south triangle where the Lowell and Dun- stable roads form a junction. He was also interested in a linen manufactur- ing enterprise, the mill of which was located on the site of the present Vale mill. The business was not successful. In 1820 he was appointed postmaster of Nashua, which office he held until July, 1841. During all these years, and in fact during his active career, he took part in town affairs and performed the duties of citizenship with fidelity to every trust, being town clerk and chairman of the board of selectmen in 1830, 1833, 1834, 1835 and 1836, and instru- mental in causing the first town report to be issued to the taxpayers in printed form. When the Nashua State bank, chartered at the June session of the legislature in 1835, was organized in 1836, he was appointed cashier,

JOHN M. HUNT.

which position of trust he held until the bank closed its business in October, 1866. Hon. Isaac Spalding was president of the bank during its entire life, and it was a matter of pride with him and Mr. Hunt that the institu- tion never lost a dollar by a bad investment, and that when its affairs were liquidated it paid its stockholders their principal and a handsome dividend in addition to the dividends paid yearly when it did business. As a citizen, neighbor and friend, no man of his generation stood higher in the regard of the community. He was democratic in all his ways and deal- ings ; a man whose influence in the community was always on the side of justice, morality and religion. Mr. Hunt was a regu- lar attendant at the Unitarian church and a mem- ber of Rising Sun lodge, A. F. and A. M., of which he was senior warden in 1826 and wor- shipful master in 1827. January 28, 1823, Mr. Hunt was united in mar- riage with Mary Ann Munroe, who was born in Lex- ington, Mass., Oct. 31, 1812: died at Nashua, Dec. I, 1894. She was a daughter of Thom- as Munroe, born March 30, 1785, died July 8, 1854, and Elizabeth (Jewett) Munroe, born Sept. 8, 1785, died Nov. 23, 18.48. Mrs. Hunt'sances- tors were among the first English settlers in Massa- chusetts, and a great number of their descendants have made their mark in the world and have served, and are still serving in honorable professions and callings. Mrs. Hunt came to Nashua with her parents when she was a child and her home was here until her death. She was a constant attendant at the Unitarian church and very much inter- ested in its work. In fact she left a bequest to the society. Two children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Hunt: The first, born April 8, 1839, died in infancy ; second, Mary E., born April 10, 1842, unmarried. Mrs. Hunt was a woman of retiring disposition, of modest deportment and domestic tastes.

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History of the city of Nashua, N.H., Part 18

Author: Parker, Edward Everett, 1842- ed; Reinheimer, H., & Co Publication date: 1897 Publisher: Nashua, N.H., Telegraph Publishing Company Number of Pages: 652

Author: Parker, Edward Everett, 1842- ed; Reinheimer, H., & Co
Publication date: 1897
Publisher: Nashua, N.H., Telegraph Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 652