USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > Wilton > History of the town of Wilton, Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, with a genealogical register > Part 27
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SOLOMON KIDDER LIVERMORE .- FROM THE HISTORY OF HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY.
He was the fifth child of Rev. Jonathan Livermore of Wilton. and was born March 2. 1779. He was taught at home in his early years, but the common school was established before his entire youth had passed. In the summer he helped in the fields, and in winter in the woods ; his love for his native hills and valleys grew with his growth, and continued to the end of his life. When advanced enough in his studies, he entered Mr. Pemberton's school for boys in Billerica. his mother's native place, where he remained till fitted for Harvard College, which he entered in 1799. and grad- uated in 1802 in a class large and distinguished for its ability.
DANIEL CRAGIN.
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He studied law with Oliver Crosby, Esq., of Dover, and was admit- ted to the bar about 1806, and after a few years came to Milford as the earliest established lawyer of the town. Mr. Livermore was eminently a lover of justice, beloved by those for whom he labored : he looked first to the public good, and was utterly averse to towns or citizens pursuing narrow or selfish ends.
Political partisanship the most pronounced prevailed during Mr. Livermore's early life, but he could be no partisan. Unmoved by the invectives of the partisans of France, he saw much more that was good and hopeful, and less that was mischievous, in the Federal party, which crystallized into the Whig party : he worked with that party until it was bereft of life, when he found himself a Free Soil sympathizer, and from that evolved a Republican.
Mr. Livermore was a member of the First Congregational Church for nearly twenty-five years ; then a member of the First Unitarian Society. He married Miss Abigail Atkins Jarvis of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Six children lived to mature age. A son and a daughter settled in Baltimore, Maryland : another son in Galena, Illinois, and the youngest son finally in Cambridge on the maternal grandfather's homestead. Two grandsons have been in the navy for years : one grandson, Colonel Thomas L. Livermore, rose from the ranks to a colonelcy in the war of secession, was at the head of the largest manufactory in the country for some years, and is now a lawyer in Boston.
Through his long life Mr. Livermore felt a keen interest in the colleges and schools of the country, in the young and their progress towards right living and good citizenship. He was a judicions friend, a wise counsellor and a good citizen. He died in July, 1859, in the eighty-first year of his life. His descendants surviv- ing at the date of this History are a daughter, twelve grandchildren and nineteen great-grandchildren, living in six different states,
DANIEL CRAGIN.
Daniel Cragin, fourth child of Augustus and Almira (Boynton) Cragin, was born in Merrimac, December 31, 1836. IFis parents had ten children. When Daniel was but six months old, his father, who was a farmer and mechanic, removed from Merrimac to Tem- ple. Young C'ragin was early taught to labor, his boyhood being spent on his father's farm until he was seventeen years old, when he engaged with John Newell of Lyndeborough to learn cabinet- work. After three years spent with him, he went to Wilton, where
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for a year he was engaged in a furniture shop. Then returning to Lyndeborough, he, in company with a partner, purchased the shop and business of Mr. Newell, his first employer. Continuing here with varying success something more than a year, Mr. Cragin dis- posed of his interest in the business and came to what was known at that time as the "Putnam Corporation," in the north part of the town of Wilton.
This was in 1858. Mr. Cragin had just attained his majority, and while, as before stated, he had had some business experience, yet fortune had not favored him with financial success, and he began business in Wilton, as a manufacturer of knife trays and toys, on a cash capital of ten dollars. He rented one room in the Putnam Bobbin Factory in which to carry on his manufacturing. Continuing here two years and meeting with fair success, he pur- chased a small building on the site of his present factory, and removed his manufacturing there. Soon after this he built an addi- tion to his shop, and from that time to the present, as the exigencies of his increasing business have demanded, he has made additions to the space and the facilities with which he started. In addition to the water-power, which at the beginning was sullicient to operate his machinery, he has since found it necessary to add steam-power, and now both are in use.
About the autumn of 1876 Mr. Cragin began the manufacture of dry measures, which has since grown to be the leading feature of his business. At the time when he undertook this line of mann- facturing, the machinery in use for the purpose was very crude indeed ; in fact, the measures were bent and made almost entirely by hand. And just here comes a practical illustration of the genius or faculty which, more than all others, has made New England the centre of capital and the cradle of progress in America : the faculty of invention, that predominant and distinguishing characteristic of the Yankee character, which, seeing a need, proceeds at once to devise a way of supplying it. With a singleness of purpose and a determination to succeed, Mr. Cragin began at once to devise simple and labor-saving machines to do what had hitherto been done only by hand. One contrivance after another was made, experimented with, improved and perfected, until now. by the aid of various ingen- ious, curiously contrived, yet simple machines, the lumber is carried through the manifold processes necessary to convert it into meas- ures of various sizes and capacities, in an amazingly rapid and skilful manner; until the vessels are completed, the whole work is
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practically done by machinery. And what is more, every piece of machinery in Mr. Cragin's factory, except a few of the simpler con- trivanees, is the product of his own inventive genius. The improved facilities which he has thus created for himself have enabled him to produce first-class work at prices which have prac- tically driven from the field all competitors, so that in the area which he attempts to cover, he has almost a monopoly in this spe- cialty. In addition to manufacturing he has dealt more or less in lumber, real estate, etc., and has made other investments.
He has been selectman of the town of Wilton five years, and chair- man of the board for three years. Ile represented his town in the Legislature two years, 1875-6, and in 1884 was nominated as a candidate for senator on the Democratie ticket, but with no chance of election, as the district is strongly Republican. Mr. Cragin is a staunch, though tolerant. Democrat, broad and liberal in both political and religious views. He is one of the directors of the Wilton Savings Bank. Hle married, March 29, 1859, Jane L., daughter of John and Lucetta (Draper) Dolliver of Lyndeborough. HENRY NEWTON GRAY .- FROM THE HISTORY OF COUNTY. HILLSBOROUGH
Henry N. Gray was born January 1. 1826, at what is known as "Gray's Corners " in Wilton. He is descended from Joseph Gray, who was a soldier in the War of the Revolution, and participated in the battle of Ticonderoga. Joseph Gray was by occupation a farmer, and was a man of great energy and force of character. Hle retained his interest in military affairs, and after the Revolutionary War he became adjutant of militia, a position which he held for many years. He was a man of robust constitution, full of energy, an early riser, and noted for his push and vigor. IIe lived to be more than eighty years of age. His wife was Chloe Abbot.
Calvin Gray was his son, and was brought up on his father's farm. When about eighteen years of age. he learned blacksmith- ing with James Means of Wilton, and followed that occupation as long as he lived. He was a genial, pleasant man, and fond of the jollities of life. He inherited his father's love for military affairs. and rose to the rank of adjutant of militia, the same rank his father had formerly held. Ile married Clarissa King. They had three children who survived him : II. Newton : Harriet N., who married Henry K. Freneh of Peterborough, and died, leaving one child ; and Charles D., who married Kate Spaulding of Mason, and died.
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leaving no issue. Calvin Gray was born in 1800, and died in 1806.
II. N. Gray was brought up on the farm and in the blacksmith shop of his father, with whom he remained until he attained his majority. Hle then hired the shop of his father, and conducted business for himself. Upon his father's decease, he purchased of the other heirs their interest in the estate, and has successfully prosecuted the business, to which he added carriage building, to the present time. He was the originator of what is known as the Wilton Wagon, and has made a specialty of its manufacture for several years. He has the reputation of doing thoroughly first- class work, and has the grandest of tributes paid him by his neighbors-that of being in all respects an upright, reliable, truth- f'ul man. Ile is a Republican in politics and a Unitarian in religion. He is an industrious, pushing man and has made for him- self and his family a beautiful home. He married, January 3. 1853, Mary Ann Heath of Barre, Massachusetts, an estimable lady. They have three children. [See Gray Genealogy. ]
Mr. Gray's venerable mother, who is still living [now deceased, 1888], is in many respects a remarkable woman, possessing a strong mind in a strong body. She has been a woman of remarkable activity and industry, of clear judgment and sound common sense. full of life and energy. She has, perhaps, done more labor and successfully carried through greater responsibilities than any other woman of the community. She has been a model New England housekeeper : neat, frugal, industrious and self-reliant. Such mothers have given to the world the successful men of the world. She has all her life prided herself on promptitude, never failing to perform to the letter whatever she promised ; and this trait, inher- ited by her son, has been the key-note of his success in business, and of his standing as a reliable man among his fellow-townsmen. It is a pleasure to be able to preserve on the pages of history some record of the virtues of such wives and mothers. All honor to their memory, and may their descendants revere their names, and emu- late the example of their unselfish, noble lives !
NON. ISAAC SPALDING .- BY ISAAC SPALDING WIHTING.
Isaac Spalding was born in New Ipswich. February 1, 1796. His father removed to Wilton with his family in 1800. Having had what education he could get at the district school, Mr. Spalding started out in 1809 to earn his living. He took service with Mr. Robert Reed, a store-keeper of Amherst. who took him into partner-
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ship in 1816. Ilaving spent ten years in this relation, he moved to Nashua and opened a store for himself on Main Street. The goods dealt in were the general miscellany of a country store of the time. Ilere he laid the foundation of his fortune. The village was thriving, and Mr. Spalding's shrewdness easily secured for him a large share of its prosperity. Though still successful, he gave up business in 1838, and thenceforward devoted himself to public enterprises and the care of his estate. This voluntary relinquishment of a profitable business, when he was only forty-two years old, is a sufficient answer to the charge of avarice, to which his subsequent wealth exposed him. Having been selectman, representative and moder- ator, he was now promoter of the Concord Railroad and one or other of its officers for thirty years ; member of the Constitutional Convention in 1850 ; member of the Governor's Council, 1866, '67 and '68 ; trustee and president of the State Asylum for the Insane in 1863 and 1869, respectively ; president of the Nashua Bank, &c. He died May 14, 1876, being reputed to be the richest man in the state.
Ile possessed all the business qualities in good proportion, but the dominant ones of his nature were two, caution and thrift. First, his caution : his maxim in investing was, better take six per cent. interest on a safe principal than ten per cent. on a risky one. Thus his income was uninterrupted, his capital had few periods of enforced idleness. No alluring prospectus could captivate his judgment. If he invested in new, unproved undertakings, such as the Concord Railroad, his motive was something more than imme- diate money-making ; he hoped to benefit the community in which he lived. But he said to promoters of distant enterprises : " I have no interest in them except as investments, and before investing, I prefer to see them completed and established, so that I can judge of their value." The bank of which he was an officer is said never to have had a dollar's worth of poor loans. Second, his thrift : ambi- tious to be wealthy, he clung to his purpose, and looked well to the dollars to see that they were saved and put to work. Yet he felt no miser's glee in handling money. Ilis care of his estate was a piece of his character and resulted not from instinct but from prin- ciple. He protested against dissipation and luxury in all their forms, not alone in what money was accountable for. He frittered away just as little time and strength as he did money. When he spent, he spent freely, and got something for his outlay worth having. Thus his house was the richest in the city for its time,
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solid and finished to the last degree. He travelled much, and bought the most comfortable accommodations attainable, and his gifts were not niggardly. He married Lney Kendall of Amherst, May 1, 1828. She was born December 13, 1796, and is now living [May, 1888]. They had two children, both of whom died in child- hood.
REV. SAMBEL BARRETT. D. D.
Rev. Samuel Barrett, the eldest son of Major Benjamin Fiske and Betsey (Gerrish) Barrett, was born August 11, 1795, in Royalston, Massachusetts. His father removed to Wilton April 22, 1803, in whose district schools young Barrett received his rudi- mentary education. He loved his books, and at an early age began to dream of obtaining a liberal education, and of becoming a minis- ter of the gospel. Ile became a member of the family of Rev. Thomas Beede, and by his instruction was prepared for college. He graduated at Harvard College in 1818, and at the Cambridge Divinity School in 1822. After preaching in various New England parishes and in Philadelphia and Baltimore, he was invited to the pastorate of the Twelfth Congregational Society of Boston, and was ordained February 9, 1825. He ministered to this church and society till 1858, when he resigned his office on account of infirmity and age, much to the regret of his people, and received the gra- tuity of six thousand dollars as token of their gratitude and esteem.
Dr. Barrett, besides his special labors in his own society, was a large public benefactor. as editor of various religions periodicals and as a writer of tracts : he was chaplain of the Massachusetts State Senate. missionary of the American Unitarian Association, and author of many discourses and occasional addresses. He aided the members of his own family in obtaining a liberal education, and extended a helping hand to others. After his resignation he removed to the Highlands, Roxbury, where he lived till his death, June 24, 1866. His memoir and sermons were published by his devoted parishioner, Lewis G. Pray. His immediate neighbor and friend in the West Church, Boston, Rev. Cyrus A. Bartol, D. D .. has recorded his estimate of the life and character of Dr. Barrett, to which we are sure all his friends will cordially assent as not over- drawn, but as sound and true. We quote his beautiful words :
AAs a preacher, Dr. Barrett was regarded as having but few, if any. superiors in the effectiveness of his pulpit ministrations. There was nothing about him cold, indifferent or tame; rather, an extraordinary
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fervor. I never met him but to see this divine ardor in his face. hear it in his voice, and mark it in his manner. Yet there was no attribute in him his friends would perhaps sooner single out than his wisdom. though it was wisdom without suspicion of management or cunning. He was as simple as he was wise. Bright and cheering views his own mind moved him to take. To him in his goodness, all was good. The world was a good world ; the race was a good race ; all fortune was good fortune, and Providence was infinitely good. In the darkest time he never despaired. I suppose there never was profounder faith in the future of mankind, and the immortal destiny and bliss of the children of men. Never was pity more tender or reflective or circumspect. I should leave out one of the principal traits if I omitted this uniform, unsurpassed forbearance to rub unnecessarily the sore spot. Not that he was reticent or close. He was transparent and altogether decided in his opinion. But he differed entirely from those who are diligent to thrust in the probe where they have not been called as surgeons, and in chafing into morbid activity old and half-healed wounds. The young are good judges, and he singularly drew them as a teacher in early life. He was a good man. Perhaps no clergyman has been more beloved by his parishioners and professional associates. Many a heart was in the cotlin holding the precious remains that had been his body. the shrine of a nature as noble and affectionate as is ever dressed in human form, still keeping, in decay, his innocent and generous look.
Dr. Barrett married, September 11, 1832, Mary Susan Green- wood, daughter of Dr. Greenwood of Boston, and sister of the emi- nent Unitarian minister, Rev. Dr. F. W. P. Greenwood, minister of King's Chapel, a lady of the most beautiful and winning Christian character. She died March 15, 1874. Dr. and Mrs. Barrett had eight children, four sons and four daughters, and numerous grand- children and great-grandchildren.
REV. DAVID GAGE.
Rev. David Gage, born December 26, 1809, in Wilton, is the son of Richard and Betsey (Hutchinson) Gage. Ile writes : " When I was quite a young man, I helped make the brick for the Baptist meeting-house. In 1829 I left Wilton to work for Luther Law- rence of Groton, Massachusetts. After working for Mr. Lawrence one year I returned to Wilton, In 1831 I became a member of the Baptist Church. Subsequently I entered the institution at New Ilampton. In 1833 the Baptist Church in Wilton gave me a license to preach. In 1834 I commeneed to preach in East Wash- ington, and was ordained as pastor of the Baptist Church there Sep- tember 23, 1835. In 1845 I was dismissed from the pastoral care of the church in East Washington, and became pastor of the Baptist
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Church in New Boston the same year. In 1855 I was appointed by the New Hampshire Baptist Convention as their domestic mis- sionary. I labored in this capacity in Acworth, Marlow and Unity until 1862, when I was appointed missionary and financial agent. In 1878 I resigned my agency, having labored for the Convention twenty-three years. In 1862 I removed to Manchester, where I have resided until the present time. Since 1878 I have preached nearly all the time as a stated supply in different churches. I have been able to preach nearly every Sabbath for fifty years. I am here in East Canaan as a stated supply, and preach every Sabbath. I wish to die with the harness on."
REV. EPHRAIM PEABODY, D. D.
He was the son of Ephraim and Rhoda (AAbbot) Peabody, and was born March 22, 1807. He was fitted for college at Phillips Exeter Academy, and graduated at Bowdoin College in 1827, and at Cambridge Divinity School in 1830. After preaching for some time in Meadville, Pennsylvania : Cincinnati, Ohio ; and Mobile, Alabama, he was settled over the Unitarian Church in New Bedford, Massachusetts, in June, 1838. Ile became minister of King's Chapel in Boston in January, 1846. He married Mary Jane Derby of Salem, Massachusetts, in 1833. He received the degree of Doctor of Divinity from Bowdoin College in 1848. He died November 28, 1856. "A man of sound judgment and self-sacrificing benevo- lence, combining with great practical wisdom the utmost simplicity and purity of character."
The following beautiful picture of Dr. Peabody, drawn by the loving hand of Rev. John II. Morison, D. D., for several years his associate in the New Bedford society, is as true as it is beautiful. It is taken from a sermon preached May 20, 1888, at the liftieth anniversary of the last services in the old church :
It was my privilege fifty years ago to be ordained here the associate pastor of this society with one of whom Ican hardly think without the deepest sense of grateful emotion and affections. He was one of the truest, wisest. saintliest of men, a man of widely extended learning, a man of far-reaching. self-forgetting sympathies and affections, loving and beloved as few men have ever been, a man in whose large and liberal nature no room could be found for so much as a momentary suggestion that was not generous and manly. a man very modest in his estimate of himself, if he thought of himself at all, diffident apparently in his inter- course with others, but in an emergency no man was more independent or self-reliant. and no man braver in troubled times nor truer to the
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deepest convictions of nature than he. Once I remember, when we were returning from a succession of parish calls, he said to me, and I heartily assented to what he said: "Among all these homes which we have entered there is hardly one which it is not a pleasure and a privilege to visit." So it was, here, fifty years ago. And the cordial good feeling which united your ministers extended to all the members of their house- holds. A dear child* of his, beautiful in person and lovely even beyond what is usual at that most attractive age, dying before she had completed her thirtieth year, bore to her grave a name which, from its associations, could not but bind all still more closely together.
With these great qualities added to extraordinary beauty and personal attractions, our friend was trusted, beloved and honored as few men ever are. In any community he could not fail to have a commanding influence, especially with the most intelligent, highest and upright members of society. As a preacher, he was grave, impressive, instructive, with a voice sometimes hard, often monotonous, sometimes deep, rich, melodious, filling out as with organ tones passages of sustained moral dignity and power, sometimes like the sunlight at even-song, illuminating with richest hues pictures of rare poetic beauty, or, most effective of all, flowing as a tearful melody through passages of tender. melting pathos, such as I have never found in any other preachers.
For five years we worked here together, the labors of the parish pretty equally divided between us, he the principal, I the assistant. It was a most happy, affectionate union, no shadow of misunderstanding falling on the relationship which bound us to each other and to our own people. And it is a great happiness now to see the same friendship drawing our children's children affectionately together.
REV. WARREN BURTON.
Ile was the son of Jonathan and Persis (Warren) Burton, and was born, November 23, 1800, in Wilton. He was fitted for college by his pastor, Rev. Thomas Beede, and graduated at Har- vard in 1821. He went through the course of the Cambridge Divinity School, but was obliged to suspend his studies for a time on account of ill health. He travelled one summer as the agent of the American Unitarian Association, being the first who aeted in that capacity. Health restored, and the course of study finished, he received the customary license to preach. In March, 1828, he was ordained as the first pastor of a new Unitarian Society at East Cambridge, Massachusetts. Resigning the charge of the society at the end of the first year, he supplied the pulpit at Washington for a time, and afterwards preached at Keene, Nashua, Hingham, Wal- tham and other places. In August, 1844, he entered upon his
* The first wife of Charles W. Eliot, President of Harvard University.
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duties as minister-at-large in Boston, and remained in that position until the autumn of 1848. He afterwards became minister-at-large and chaplain of the county prison in Worcester, Massachusetts, where he remained two years. Ile then devoted himself to writing and lecturing. He was the author of the "District School as It Was," " Home Education," and several other publications, and was an eminent promoter of education. He was a most earnest and enthusiastic man, of guileless childlikeness, and warm and affectionate sympathies. Born in the cold north, he had all the ardent temperament proverbially attributed to the children of a tropical clime.
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