History of the town of Haverhill, New Hampshire, Part 43

Author: Whitcher, William F. (William Frederick), 1845-1918
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: [Concord, N.H. : Rumford press]
Number of Pages: 838

USA > New Hampshire > Grafton County > Haverhill > History of the town of Haverhill, New Hampshire > Part 43

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tion in Grafton County under sentence of the court, that of Thomas Palmer of Lebanon, July 28, 1796, and the people of the entire section of country round about made the most of their opportunity to witness the tragic spectacle. It was claimed at the time that no less than 10,000 people were gathered on the west side of Powder House hill a number perhaps over estimated, but "they came from far and near, in carts and in wagons, on horse back and on foot, old men and young men, beaux and lassies, mothers with babes in their arms and even invalids." The hanging of Burnham was made a general holiday for the people of the Coos country. The event took place with much ceremony. The sheriff, David Webster, assisted by a military guard escorted the doomed man from the jail to the scaffold, where standing with the noose about his neck, he listened to a long sermon, preceded by singing and prayer, by Rev. David Sutherland of Bath. He chose as his text, "The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." Before announcing his text he said: "The occasion of our meet- ing is inexpressibly awful. Several months ago a man confined in the jail of this place, impelled by the impetuosity of his vile passions, laid violent hands on two of his fellow prisoners, and put a period to their temporal existence. Since the perpetration of the horrid deed he has had an impartial trial, and has been condemned to die by the hands of the public executioner of justice. You have assembled to be spectators of the shocking scene and to attend to some devotional exercises." His sermon saturated with the prevailing New England Calvinistic theology of the time occupied an hour in its delivery. At its close he made a per- sonal address to Burnham. He began:

Unhappy Fellow Creature. You are now an old man.1 In the course of your long life you have experienced many painful seasons of adversity, but this is the most trying of them all. You are now exhibited as a spectacle of horror to this immense concourse of your fellow men. Already you are pinioned, the fatal cord is wreathed about your neck, the terrible gibbet is erected over your head, and your grave is open beneath your feet. A few minutes more and you shall be in eternity! Whilst this company is dis- persing, and previously to reaching their respective homes, you shall have received an irreversible sentence, from the mouth of the Judge of the whole earth. Addressing you, therefore, for the last time, in the immediate view of eternity you will bear with me, whilst with plainness of speech, I would endeavor to deal faithfully with your soul.

This he proceeded to do, and there certainly was according to the lights of the time, and marked and able personality of the preacher, most faithful dealing. He had a personal word also for the multitude whom he faced:

Possibly there are some among you, who if your crimes were as well known as those of Josiah Burnham, should like him be brought to an untimely end. Others of you are now

1 Burnham was sixty-three years of age on the day of his execution.

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living in the commission of sins, not cognizable indeed by human laws, but for which God will call you to account. You esteem it a matter of alarming consequence to be arraigned at a human tribunal, tried, convicted and hanged; and you think right for so it is. But, alas, many of you think nothing of the probability of your being condemned at the bar of the eternal Judge. In a few minutes you will shudder to see a fellow creature launched into eternity! but, oh remember that it shall be much more intolerable to fall into the hands of the living God, who is angry at the wicked every day. All the temporal judgments that overtake ungodly men are only as a single drop in comparison with that overflowing cup, the very dregs of which they shall be forced to wring out in the eternal world. Consider this, therefore, ye that forget God, lest he tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver.

It is difficult to imagine the scene on Powder House hill on that 12th of August more than a century ago. Every thing conspired to make it dramatic in the extreme. The like had never before been known in the history of New Hampshire. It has never since been known. Preacher and occasion would be alike impossible to day. "Priest Suther- land" as he was familiarly called and "the Burnham hanging" were unique.

The trial of William F. Comins of Bath for the murder of his wife, Adeline T. Comins, occurred at the September term of the Court of Com- mon Pleas in Haverhill in 1843. It was charged in the indictment that Comins committed the crime by strangling, and then by suspending the body from a bed post, attempted to make it appear that it was a case of suicide. The tragedy occurred September 9, 1842. Comins was arrested in the state of New York February 21, 1843, and an indictment was found charging him with murder, by the Grand Jury, at the May term of the Court of Common Pleas at Plymouth. The trial began September 12, and ended with the conviction of Comins, and sentence of death by the court September 20, 1843. On the bench were Andrew S. Woods, pre- siding judge, Noah Tibbetts, circuit judge, David C. Churchill, Nathaniel S. Berry, associate justices. The counsel for the prosecution were Attor- ney General L. B. Walker and Harry Hibbard, and for the defence Josiah Quincy, Leonard Wilcox and C. E. Thompson. The trial was a sensational one, and attracted wide attention. There was the inevitable woman in the case, the state attempting to show a motive for the crime in the infatuation of Comins for a young woman, named Abbott, who lived in Bath just across the river from Woodsville. She was a witness for the State, and confessed to criminal intercourse with Comins, which confession he confirmed in a pamphlet published by him subsequent to the trial and sentence. He was sentenced to be hanged October 30, 1844, but a reprieve was granted by Governor Steele till December 26, in order that a vote of the citizens of the state upon the question of abolishing capital punishment might be ascertained by the Legislature to which returns were to be made November 20. The legislature recommended commutation

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of the sentence to imprisonment for life. He remained in prison until June 1853 when he was pardoned, went West and died soon after.

The next execution subsequent to that of Burnham was that of Enos G. Dudley, a clergyman from the town of Grafton, who was found guilty of the murder of his wife in March, 1848. He was tried at a special term of the Court of Common Pleas held in January, 1849, and the death sentence was executed in the jail yard in May, 1849. Joseph Powers of Haverhill was sheriff and executioner.

The next execution was that of Samuel Mills who was hanged by Sheriff Grover S. Stevens in the jail yard on the first Wednesday in May, 1868. Mills was an Englishman who was indicted for the murder of George Maxwell at Franconia in December, 1866. He was indicted for the crime at the March term of court, 1867, tried at the same term, found guilty and sentenced to be hanged in May, 1868. Mills had been at work in the mines at Lisbon, and his crime, which was a peculiarl brutal one, was committed for the sake of obtaining a few paltry dollars in money from his aged victim. Previous to his execution he broke jail and was at large for several days, but was retaken before the day set for execution. The execution was public. The special train run to accom- modate those wishing to attend was well filled. The scaffold was erected inside the jail yard, the platform a few inches higher than the yard fence. Mills was taken from the upper story of the jail onto the scaf- fold in full view of the spectators. He declined all spiritual consolation. The noose was adjusted, the cap drawn over his head and Mills dropped out of sight. His neck was not broken and he slowly strangled to death. His body was taken down, put into a coffin, taken outside the jail yard, set on two carpenter's horses and the public invited to view the remains. This was the last public execution in the state; all hangings since have taken place in the state prison at Concord.

The only other capital trial in which the result was conviction and execution was that of Frank C. Almy at the November term at Plymouth in 1891. Almy was arraigned at Woodsville September 29, 1891, for the murder of Christie Warden at Hanover the previous July, and on his plea of not guilty was held for the grand jury, which returned an indict- ment for murder in the first degree at the November term. He retracted his plea, and on a plea of guilty, was sentenced by Chief Justice Doe to death by hanging, and the sentence was carried into execution at the state prison in Concord on the first Wednesday of December, 1892. Attorney General Daniel Barnard appeared for the state and Alvin Burleigh of Plymouth for Almy.

CHAPTER XIX

MANUFACTURES AND MERCANTILE

LUMBER, BEGINNING IN 1764-THE MILLS BUILT SINCE-AT THE BROOK VARIOUS FLOURISHING INDUSTRIES-SHOVEL HANDLES AT WOODSVILLE-LIME BURNING- PIKE MANUFACTURING CO .- THE MERCHANTS.

HAVERHILL is, first of all, an agricultural town, ranking among the first three or four towns in the state in the value of its agricultural prod- ucts, and in many years taking first rank. Yet its manufacturing industries and its mercantile business have taken, as a whole, during its history, no mean proportions. That it has not like many other towns been a manufacturing centre has been due not so much to lack of enter- prise and initiative on the part of its citizens as to lack of water power. Such power as its streams have furnished has been fairly well utilized.

For some years after its settlement nearly every home was a manufac- tory, and necessarily so. Even the settlers who were possessed of means brought with them only the absolutely necessary articles of household furniture and kitchen utensils. There were no roads, and whatever was brought for furnishing the log houses which were first built was brought over the bridle paths on the backs of horses, or hauled up the river on the ice in winter. The town, except on the river meadows, was covered with forests, and sawmills were first in order, followed immediately by the erection of gristmills, that the first harvests of corn, rye and barley might be converted into meal and flour. Most of the furniture was made from the product of the sawmills. The chairs, tables, bedsteads and such articles were of home manufacture, rude indeed, but they answered the purpose. Plates, platters, bowls, kneading and mixing troughs were of wood, as were in many cases spoons and other articles of table furniture. Most of the clothing for years was fashioned from cloth woven in the home from flax and wool raised on the farm clearings, and sheared from the few sheep which the settlers had driven up through the wilderness with their cattle. Carts, sleighs, plows, harrows, in short nearly all farming utensils were of home manufacture. Mills were erected on Poole Brook by the proprietors in 1762, and passed into private ownership two years later.

A sawmill and gristmill were erected on Hosmer's Brook (Oliverian) in 1764, and other saw and gristmills soon followed. The lumber industry assumed large proportions until the immense pines and other forest growths were cut down. At first logs were sent down the river and later

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great rafts of sawed lumber, until the river as a means of transportation was superseded by the railroad. The first mills on Poole Brook had sev- eral successors, all of which save one went out of existence when the supply of standing timber grew scant. Among those in the last century who did a large business at the Brook were the Pearsons, father and son. The sawmills on the Oliverian were at the Brook, and along up the stream at Pike, East Haverhill, and up the cast branch in Number Six. Isaac Pike, William Garenett, W. R. Park, and Jeffers Brothers did a large business. The water power of the Ammonoosuc at Woodsville was utilized to convert the heavy pine growth of the vicinity into lumber by Mills Olcott, John L. Woods and their successors, and the saw and grist- mills on Poole's Brook, North Haverhill, have been operated by Nathan- iel Merrill, Obadiah Swasey, the Whitmans, Blood & Meader and the Sleepers. The Woodsville Lumber Company (Ira Whitcher and L. C. Pattee), later F. L. Pattee, and still later D. S. Stone, carried on an exten- sive lumber business at Woodsville, as did also C. B. Smith who did a thriving business in the manufacture of shovel handles at the J. L. Woods mill site. The steam sawmills at Centre Haverhill of F. Bacon and of Sumner Clifford at North Haverhill, and numerous portable steam sawmills in different sections of the town have combined in recent years to make the lumber industry one of large importance.

For several years prior to 1880 there were several factories for the manufacture of potato starch. At the Brook, Ladd Street and the Corner, from the early settlement until the latter part of the last century, there were various flourishing industries. Ezekiel Ladd was the owner of a tannery in the last decade of the eighteenth century and this was in operation for years by his successors. John Montgomery conducted a large tanning business as did also the firm of J. Bell and Company, and an extensive business in tanning and currying was carried on for years in the last half of the last century by the Currier brothers, James and F. P.

There was a flaxmill at Hosmer's Falls as early as 1779, and a little later Samuel Brooks ran an oilmill nearby. Cloth and carding mills were established early, and the manufacture of potash was carried on by the Bell brothers. John Osgood made clocks, some of which, veritable grandfather's clocks, are still ticking away the seconds as accurately as they did a century ago. Uriah Ward was engaged in the manufacture of hats, and Blumley & Sturtevant had a woolen mill. Paper making was carried on for many years by Hutchins and Company and later by P. F. Litchfield until the mill was burned. At the Oliverian Iron Foundry all kinds of mill irons, sleigh and sled shoes, hollow ware, cauldron kettles, cook stoves and parlor stoves were manufactured up to 1840. Fire did destructive work among the industries at the Brook and unfortunately mills and factories were not rebuilt.

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Cabinet making was carried on at the Corner by Michael Carleton, and specimens of his really fine work are much sought after by purchasers of the antique.

Richard Gookin came to Haverhill in 1799, at the age of 30, and became a large factor in its industrial life. It is said that in connection with his brother, Samuel, he was the first person to manufacture watch and hair springs in America. Before coming to Haverhill he was foreman in the first cut nail factory in Amesbury, Mass. He was a man of inventive genius and of great enterprise, and introduced from England the wool carding machines for the improvement of which he obtained several patents, and manufactured, in Boston, the first machines of this kind ever used in the United States. Previous to the introduction of this machine all wool was carded by hand. He lived on Ladd Street and erected at the Brook a large factory for the manufacture of his improved machine and its output was sold in all parts of the United States and Canada. He was part owner in woolen mills in Bath and other towns, and with Obadiah Swasey was for some years the owner of the Fisher farm. He filled an important place in the industrial life of the Coös county. He died in 1826. One daughter was the wife of John L. Bunce, cashier of the Grafton Bank and editor of the Intelligencer. A son, Warren D. Gookin, inherited much of the versatility of his father. Educated at the academy and at Dartmouth, he spent some years in Cuba on a sugar plantation, travelled extensively, and later became a shipping merchant in New York where he won large success.

There have been numerous other industries, like that of the burning of lime from the limestone quarries in the Eastern part of the town, the burning of charcoal in the brickkilns at East Haverhill, the quarrying of granite at the Corner, and work of the French Pond Granite Company at North Haverhill. Much of the stone in the Christian Science Church in Boston was furnished by the company, and the Jesseman Granite Company is still engaged in a small way in working the pink granite quarry for monumental purposes. Few of the manufacturing industries have been of large importance, but taken as a whole they have contributed in no small degree to the prosperity of the town. A single exception, that of the Pike Manufacturing Company at Pike, will be noticed in another chapter. In 1917, A. C. Grey of Manchester opened a cheese factory at Woodsville near the Stone mill, which employs a dozen or more hands and is proving a great success. The factory building is about 50 by 150 feet.

While, as has been stated, every home was a manufactory in the early history of the town, there were still articles of necessity which had to be brought in, which it was impossible to make in the home, and some me- dium of exchange of surplus articles was desirable, and stores were estab-

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lished as soon as roads would permit the transportation of goods. Pre- vious to the construction of roads heavy goods were hauled up on the ice from Number Four, and lighter articles came in on pack horses. The old account books and papers of Carr, Asa Porter, and Ezekiel Ladd show that at early date they kept some articles of merchandise on sale-prin- cipally in a liquid form-but the first real store for the sale of general merchandise was probably that opened by Samuel Brooks at the Corner about 1790, whose successor was Henry Barstow, and later the Barstow Brothers. Other stores at the Corner in the last century were those of Stephen Adams, Benjamin Merrill, Russell Kimball, Samuel Page, Tim- othy K. Blaisdell, Rix & Chapin, Blaisdell & Williams, Rix and Cum- mings (John L. Rix, William H. Cummings), Bailey Brothers, William H. Page, Page & Poor, Poor & Westgate, S. F. Hook, Noah Davis, Henry Merrill, John W. Merrill, John Osgood and Henry Towle, jewellers, R. N. Brown, L. B. Ham, E. J. Facey, hardware. At the Brook with John Montgomery, Bell Brothers, Bailey Brothers, Blaisdell Brothers, A. M. Bowen, W. H. Nelson, F. T. Kiernan, J. Le Roy Bell. The store of Isaac Pike was the first at Pike, and other merchants there have been A. F. Pike, Pike and Davis, C. J. Ayer and the Pike Manufacturing Com- pany. At East Haverhill the earliest store was that of Wheeler & Aiken, succeeded by Davis and Aiken, A. L. Page, and later by Park & Davis, Richardson & Merrill, G. W. Richardson, H. D. Gannett and W. F. True. Charles Martin had a store in North Haverhill early in the last century, and others there were owned by Thomas and Joshua Hall, Joshua Morse, the Hibbards, Caleb Webster, Morse & Kelsea, S. B. Rodgers, Joseph B. Cotton, W. H. Nelson, E. R. Weeks, Morris E. Kim- ball, N. C. Wright, C. H. Wetherbee, Kimball Brothers, Cryan & Morse and C. F. Southard.

The first store in Woodsville was that of John L. Woods, who was suc- ceeded by Edward Child, later by E. S. Kimball, John Hale for Hutchins & Buchanan, and then by Charles M. Weeks. The latter erected about 1860 what is known as the Weeks Block south of the railroad track where he conducted for many years a large business in general merchandise. These were the first of the large number of stores retail and wholesale which, combined with the excellent railroad facilities, have made Woods- ville the mercantile centre for a large section of the north country.

The class and variety of goods kept by the early merchants of Haver- hill was regulated naturally by the demand of their customers, and some of their advertisements indicate the wants and necessities of our fathers and grandfathers. For example in 1822 Stephen Adams, whose store was just north of the old academy building at the Corner, advertised "A general assortment of groceries of superior quality among which are old hyson, young hyson, skin and souchong teas, loaf and brown sugar,

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brandy, rum, gin, wines, lemons, oranges, raisins, figs and most other articles necessary for family use, which he will sell at fair prices for ready pay or approved notes: also cabinet furniture as usual, crockery ware, looking glasses, etc., etc."

Henry Barstow announced that he had begun business in the store formerly occupied by Samuel Brooks, and offered for sale "W. I. goods, wines, rum, brandy, sugar, etc., hard ware, crockery, glass ware, and dry goods," enumerating "Green bockings, rattinetts, Caroline plaids, figured silks, Canton crêpes, bandana and flag handkerchiefs, silk and tabby velvets, raw silk shawls, black levantine, and 500 pairs ladies' kid Morocco and Denmark satin shoes."

Blaisdell & Page (T. K. Blaisdell, John A. Page) advertised "Hollow ware; caldron kettles: 6, 5, 3, 1 pail kettles and pots; high pans; bake pans; fire dogs; spiders; basins; skillets; No. 1 and 2 teakettles; cart boxes, and crow bars. Also wanted in exchange for goods 1,000 yards 4-4 wool flannel; 1,000 yards 7-8 wool frocking; 2,000 pairs woolen socks for which a fair price will be paid."

It would appear from the advertisements of the day that West India goods were for the most part wet goods, the brandy, gin, rum-especially rum-being necessary articles of family consumption.

CHAPTER XX

THE CORNER, NORTH HAVERHILL, WOODSVILLE AND PIKE

THE CORNER-OLD TIMES-LIVERMORE REMINISCENCE-CHANGE BEGAN AFTER 1860 -FIRES BROKE OUT IN 1848-ANOTHER IN 1902 AND ANOTHER IN 1913-BUSINESS DIRECTORY IN 1827 AND ANOTHER IN 1916-NORTH HAVERHILL FIRST SETTLED -SWASEYS MILLS-SLAB CITY-HORSE MEADOW-BRIER HILL AND THE CENTRE -CORNET BAND -- TOWN HALL IN 1847-NEW TOWN HALL-NOTABLE CELEBRA- TION 150TH ANNIVERSARY AND UNVEILING SOLDIERS' MONUMENT, WOODSVILLE- GOVERNOR'S FARM-J. L. WOODS-GROWTH BEGUN BY CHARLES M. WEEKS- OTHERS C. B. SMITH, IRA WHITCHER, EZRA B. MANN-GEORGE E. CUMMINGS -MORE THAN A RAILROAD VILLAGE-SCHOOLHOUSES-BUSINESS HOUSES-BANKS -HOTELS-DIRECTORY 1916-EAST HAVERHILL AND PIKE

THE golden age of Haverhill Corner as a stage centre, and as centre for trade and manufacturing industries is found in the three decades between 1820 and 1850. The population of the town in 1820 was 1,609, in 1830, 2,153, in 1840, 2,675. In 1850, it had fallen off to 2,405, and in 1860 to 2,291. During this time the waterpower at the Brook had been used to its fullest capacity, while at the Corner hatters, cabinetmakers, printers, clock makers and silversmiths plied their trade. The rooms at Towles' Tavern, the Columbian, Coon's, Bliss's and the Grafton were filled every night, and on extra occasions like court weeks the homes of large numbers of residents were opened for the accommodation of boarders.1 The Superior Court was holden annually in May, and the event was one of deeper and more pervading impression than can easily be described. The best parlor and the best bedroom, closed and secluded through the rest of the year, were opened in every house. The paper curtains were rolled up, the fireboards were removed from the fireplace they had kept sealed, the year's gathering of dust removed, and all things put into working order; so that what seemed sacred and sepulchral before took on light and cheerfulness. Such were the prepa-

1 "Seventy Years Ago," by Arthur Livermore. Mr. Livermore, son of Chief Justice Arthur Livermore of Holderness, came in 1820, a boy of nine years, to Haverhill where he spent two or three years at the academy, boarding with his grandmother, the widow of Joseph Bliss of Bliss Tavern fame. He was consul at Londonderry, Ireland, 1861-85, when he removed to Bath, England, where he engaged in the practice of his profession till his death in 1906 at the advanced age of 95. In 1888 he wrote a little volume of reminiscences of Haverhill Corner for the perusal of a personal friend, with no thought of their publication. They are the impressions made upon the mind of a boy of ten or eleven, recorded seventy years later, and in this fact lies their charm.

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rations of almost any house for the reception of boarders for "court week." A dollar a day was paid by the judge and lawyers for the most sumptuous accommodations provided, and for jurors, witnesses, and others the scale was adjusted in a reasonable manner. It was usual for two gentlemen to occupy one bed, and the pairing was a per- manent arrangement extending over a succession of years. The court, and many of the bar and the sheriff were commonly lodged at Mrs. Bliss's who sent for Mrs. Fifield to come in and do the cooking.

At the time of which Mr. Livermore writes in his reminiscences, there were formal ceremonies in connection with the court which have been ignored in these later days. In the twenties of the last century, Chief Justice Richardson and his associates, Green and Woodbury of the Supe- rior Court, were attended in going and coming from the court house by Colonel Brewster of Hanover, the sheriff for the county wearing a coat with brass buttons and red collar and bearing a fine dress sword. Two deputies bearing maces also attended the judges. The maces, the sword, the red collar and brass buttons were impressive. Fancy Judge Sawyer being thus escorted by Sheriff Huckins, and Deputies Cotton and Rine- hart to and from the court house and Hotel Wentworth! The Grafton bar in those days was a notable one. There were Ira Goodall, Moses P. Payson, Jonathan Smith, Andrew S. Woods and Harry Hibbard of Bath; Miles Olcott, Henry Hutchinson, Daniel Blaisdell and William H. Dun- can of Hanover; William P. Weeks and Elijah Blaisdell and Jonathan Kittredge of Canaan; Nathan B. Felton of Lebanon; Henry A. Bellows of Littleton; Abiather G. Britton and Leonard Wilcox of Orford; Samuel C. Webster, Nathaniel P. Rogers, William C. Thompson and Jonathan Bliss of Plymouth; Josiah Quincy of Rumney, and David Sloan, Joseph Bell, John Nelson, Samuel Cartland, and Charles E. Thompson of Haver- hill. There were others but these were the names most frequently appear- ing on the docket. Then from outside the county there came the great lawyers from the southern part of the state and from Massachusetts. There was Jeremiah Mason, and Jeremiah Smith, and Levi Woodbury, each driving into town in his "one horse shay"; and then there was Ichabod Bartlett of Portsmouth, and George Sullivan the elder, so long the able and accomplished attorney-general; Ezekiel Webster and Judge Fletcher of Boston were also in evidence, the latter said to have been the ablest advocate that ever appeared at the Grafton bar. The term of court was a great event in those old days of seventy and ninety years ago, and court weeks were great weeks. Mr. Livermore speaks of them as "occasions of conviviality among gentlemen known to each other. Because they were well known to each other this conviviality was free but because they were in general gentlemen, it never became coarse. Outsiders familiar with the general demeanor and lordly form of Ezekiel Webster, would

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History of the town of Haverhill, New Hampshire, Part 43

Author: Whitcher, William F. (William Frederick), 1845-1918 Publication date: 1919 Publisher: [Concord, N.H. : Rumford press] Number of Pages: 838

Author: Whitcher, William F. (William Frederick), 1845-1918
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: [Concord, N.H. : Rumford press]
Number of Pages: 838