Notes
Note N336 Index
Jonathon was a Housewright (builder of houses).
Notes
Note N367 Index
Samuel performed "patriotic service" in New Hampshire during the Revolutiionary War (DAR PATRIOT INDEX, CENTENNIAL EDITION, PART 2 [op.cit.], 1316).
Notes
Note N376 Index
Benjamin came to Sandwich from Brentwood as one of the fifteen laborers working for Judge Daniel Beede, whose son, Nathan, married Benjamin's sister, Dorothy (See the entry about Dorothy and Nathan for more information about Judge Beede). Besides Benjamin, those workers included his younger brothers, 14-year-old Nathaniel and 9-year-old Stephen, and his 18-year-old sister, Dorothy. The workers were to clear the land for Judge Beede, who had so much land because, prior to his move to Sandwich, he secured a promise that he would be granted 100 acres of land for each of his eight children. He had six sons and two daughters when he moved to Sandwich (As an historical note: Sandwich was originally a part of Strafford County, but became part of Carroll County in 1840).
Benjamin eventually acquired a large farm near the top of Scribner (now "Image") Hill at the Lower Corner, about halfway between Center Sandwich and Moultonboro. There, he built a large two-story house, unlike most of his neighbors, whose homes were small.
In one of the Sandwich Historical Society record books ("Annual Excursion 28"), there appears Judge Nathan Crosby's description of life in the Lower Corner about 1810. It reads, in part:
"The country was very rough and rude, there was a great deal of work and very little play; the people were scattered over the hills, and the woods were abundant and dense; the roads were bad and the houses were small, clothing was coarse, and the manners of the people very blunt but kind; the schools had poor teachers, poor books and poor lessons; the terms were short, and the vacations long; boys must work at ten or twelve years of age to help their fathers subdue the ground and make it productive; education and personal culture were of necessity neglected."
In his book on the Hoag and allied families, Albert Boyden says "My grandmother and mother always said that the best blood in the family came from the Tappans and Scribners, and if this is so, good blood must have been widespread throughout the Sandwich region for Benjamin and Huldah had fourteen children" (Albert Boyden, HERE AND THERE IN THE FAMILY TREE [Salem, MA: Newcomb & Gauss Co., Printers, 1949], 62). Boyden later (p. 65) says "It may be noted that Benjamin was one of the original Trustees of the Quimby Academy, chartered about 1824. A suggestive item comes as we learn that, upon the opening of the Revolutionary War, the forty-six voters of Sandwich being offered a pledge 'at the risk of our lives and fortunes, with arms, to oppose the hostile proceedings of the British Fleets and Armies,' Benjamin Scribner was one of eight who would not sign--this attitude being doubtless a strict adherence to his Quaker principles."
The complete text of that pledge, properly referred to as THE ASSOCIATION TEST (a declaration of independence by New Hampshire people, which preceded the national Declaration by a few months) is: "We the subscribers do hereby solemnly engage, and promise, that we will, to the utmost of our power, at the risque of our lives and fortunes, with arms, oppose the hostile proceedings of the British fleets and armies against the United American Colonies." There were 8,199 persons in New Hampshire who signed that pledge. 773 refused, some (like Benjamin) because of religious principles, others because they were not favorable to the American cause, and a few others who were not courageous enough. Most of those who refused to sign were Quakers.
On 13 March 1781, at a Sandwich Town Meeting, Benjamin was elected to be the town's Constable. True to his Quaker beliefs, he refused to accept the position, and he refused to pay any fine related to his refusal. Another man, Richard Sinclair, was then chosen for the position (SANDWICH TOWN RECORDS 1763-1836. N.H. State Library Microfilm Roll 311).
Notes
Note N377 Index
The story is told about how it was that Dorothy (called "Dolly") came to marry Nathan. "Judge Beede promised Dolly Scribner at the first settlement of the town that if she would go to the town and live with his family she might have the choice of his sons. She did, and took the oldest" (Held, CHARLES VARNEY AND RACHEL PARKER [op. cit.], 33).
On 3 February 1810, Nathan and Dolly sold the farm of 165 acres to a blacksmith named Benjamin Choate. Later that year, Mr. Choate was licensed to keep a tavern at his house. Taverns were important in those early years. The main form of public transportation was the stagecoach, and travel was slow over the rough roads. Taverns were places where horses could be rested and fed and, if necessary, fitted with new horseshoes. At the taverns, travelers found food, shelter and a place to sleep. There were no newspapers in most of the towns along the stagecoach routes, so news came in with the travelers, and people met at the taverns to hear the news.