CS 71 .G487 1306 Copy 1 THE OILMAN HOUSE \ KKINC. A HISTORY OF THE DWELLING HOUSE ERECTED IN EXETER NEW HAMPSHIRE ABOUT 1740 BY DR. DUDLEY ODLIN OCCUPIKl) DL'KINC. THREE GENERATIONS BY THE OILMAN FAMILY AND NOW n\ THE CUT OK DR. DAVID HUNTER McALPIN AND CHARLES WILLISTON McALI'IN IN THE lOSSESSION OK THE PHILLIPS EXETER ACADEMY BY (;fx)R(;?: b. ro(;ers REI'RINTKD KROM THE BULLETIN OK THE I'Hll.l.H'S KXKTER ACADEMY, MARCH, I906 EXETER, N. H. Zi)t Xrtos=1Lfttfr idxtsa 1906 A \ ^"g* Cni.. NATHANIEL OILMAN THE OILMAN HOUSE IN the September number of the Bul- letin was described the recent ben- efaction of the McAlpin brothers. The greater part of their gift to the Academy consisted of the (rihiian home- stead. Old Exeter boys will remember it as the large, gambrel- roofed house that stood on the south side of Front Street, facing the brick Ba])tist Church, the town library, and the meeting-house • in the Academy yard. It was distinguished by the spacious grounds which surrounded it, and the ancient, spreading elm that over- hung its roof. During the last century and a half it has been so closely connected in manifold ways with the fortunes of the town and of the Academy, and the life within its walls has been so varied, rich, and full of human interest, that it seems pro]jer and profitable to gather and set in order, so far as is now possible, the facts bearing upon its history. The following pages aim to give the annals of the house itself and such account, besides, of its occupants and the events of which they were a part as may deepen our interest in the past of this venerable town and in- crease our regard for one of its most pre- cious monuments. The Exeter of the eighteenth century was very different from the town we know. As the " Falls of the Piscataquack " and the river below had determined Wheel- wright's choice of a site for his little set- tlement a hundred years before, so still the straggling village kejjt close to the water's edge. The sawmills and the ship-yards were there. Most of the houses stood on THK (il I.MAX HOUSE (;II.MAN HOUSE FROM THE WES I Water Street, which followed closely the winding course of the river, past the old meeting-house hill, and on northward toward Newmarket and Dover. The nar- row, deep-cut lane that now leads up from the river past Dr. (lerrish's door was an important highway for the logging teams coming from the great forests to the west- ward. The town burying-ground was on the little hill below which now stands the gas-house. Eastward, across the bridge, a road led through the woods to Hampton ; and in the opposite direction another,' jjast the " new meeting-house," to Brentwood. This was all. The land lying south of the village and extending to the Little River, a tract of which the (lilman lot and the Plim|)ton Playing Fields are parts, was in the earliest days the proj)erty of Councillor John (iilman, i)erhaps the most eminent citizen of Exeter in the first half-century of its ' The present Front Street. history. From his hands it passed in 1696 to the Rev. John Clark, the young minister who had then just been estab- lished over the First Church. Two or three months before the transfer of this l^roperty, the town, which had hitherto worshipi)ed in the little log structure at the northern end of the settlement, above the shi])-yards, voted that a new meeting- house " should be erected on the hill be- tween the great fort" and Nat Folsom's barn." Though the location of the latter building is still unknown, and will ])rol)a- bly remain so, it is certiiin that the hill referred to is that on which the i)resent First Church stands. It was natural, therefore, that Mr. Clark should acipiire the })roi)erty which was so near to the place of his future labors. It seems not im])robal)le that the minister became landholder ])erforce, for in those times the town was richer in land tlian in si)ecie. ' Now called the " garrison house." THE OILMAN HOUSE THE "LirrLE PARLOR and the cost of maintaining public ordi- nances was often reckoned in terms of house-lots and meadows, or even pine boards and pipe staves. Less than two years later Mr. Clark died, and the Rev. John Odlin was or- dained over the church in his stead. Hav- ing married his predecessor's widow, Mr. Odlin not unnaturally came in time into possession of this tract of land with which we are concerned. Upon it he built the house in which he lived during most of the years of his long ministry. The site was very nearly that of the present Merrill, or Ilsley house, ^ which stands on the south- ' Those who were Academy boys as long as fifty years ago can identify the spot by recalling the residence of the Rev. Isaac Hurd, a low, sf|uare house, resembling Dr. .Soule's, and facing the church which stood in the school yard. Mr. Hurd's house has not been destroyed nor removed, Init altered almost beyond recognition by the ad- dition of tower and Mansard roof. erly side of Front Street, almost directly opi^osite Peabody Hall. Thus the par- sonage was not far from the meeting- house, but still, as it seemed to the Exeter of that time, well out of town. Front Street was hardly more than the road to the Pickpocket mills. South of it was only farm land or forest. Even so late as 1800, the only building between Front Street and the river was " Nathaniel Oil- man's barn," perhai)s near the spot now commonly designated as the " Sunday Campus." Court, Elliot, and Pine Streets were still in the future. On the very out- skirts of the village, somewhat beyond Mr. Odlin's house, stood the newly erected Second Church. It was on the north side of the road, near the spot where the Whitefield stone is, and just across the way was the residence of Judge Nicholas (jilman. On the road westward appeared only an occasional farm-house. When ♦; Tu r: c I iM A x n () I'sr I )r. Abbot removed from the old Phillips mansion down by the river to the house now known as the Frimipal's residence, it is related that he exi)ressed reliu tance at making the ( hange, because, besides be- ing in the midst of the sands, it was out of the way of all his friends and neighlxjrs. The Rev, John Odlin had sons P'lisha, Dudley, and \\'ooractised among his fellow-townsmen, and that, somewhere between his twentieth and thirtieth year, he ere( ted for himself in the eastern corner of his reverend father's yard, the great gambrel-roofed house whi( h became known in later years as the (xilman mansion. It is this house that after the vicissitudes of one hundred and seventy years, after numerous additions and alterations, to whic h the varying needs and tastes of its occupants have subjected it, has now come into the pos- session of The Phillips F'xeter Academy. John Phillips was a boy at Harvard when it was Ijin'lt. (ieorge Washington was its contemporary. Its first owner was an offi- cer in the French and Indian wars.* ITie style of Dr. Odlin's house was a common one in his day. Three others of the same period and built after the same model are still to l)e seen in the town. One is next to the Methodist Church, and is now occujjied by Dr. W. B. Kenniston. At the beginning of the last century it was the home of Benjamin Clark (iilman. The second stands at the corner of Park and Simimer Streets, o])posite the resi- dence of Dr. (ierrish, and was built by Major John (iilman, hini who escaped from the massacre of Fort William Henry in 1757. It has the same great, shrug- ging gambrel as its contemj^orary on Front Street, the same simplicity and dignity of line, and the same mixture of rusti( itv and elegance. The existence of the third house is known to few. It too was Imilt by a (iilman. and stood for a hundred and thirty years on the site of the present town hall. The revolutionary Committee of Safety freipiently met there. Its bril- liant and act i)mi)lisheil mistress was wont to entertain the young French officers of * Dr. Dudley Odlin was cajitain of a company raised in 1 746 to take part in an expeilition against Canada. THE OILMAN HOUSE the American army. Some fifty years ago it was carried down to Franklin Street, deprived of its lower story, and set among the tenement-houses, where it stands to this day, squat and squalid, a jMtiful relic of its heroic jiast. The roof that once sheltered Samuel Adams now echoes to the strange accents of Quebec or Poland. So far as we know, it was only the main part of our (rilman house that was built bv Dr. Odlin. Two or three ells have seem to have been quite ample for the needs of a bachelor, as Dr. Odlin is said to have been. In 1748, Dr. Dudley Odlin died at the early age of thirty-seven. His house was bequeathed by him to his sixteen-year-old nephew John, the son of that Elisha who was a minister in Amesbury, but on this condition, — so the story goes, — that the said John should follow his uncle's pro- fession. This condition was fulfilled. It THE LIBRARY been added in later years, but there is no reason for thinking that his plans extended beyond the plain rectangle. One should be careful to notice also that even the main structure has been widened by add- ing to the original Odlin frame eight or ten feet of house-room on the southern side. The timbers of the old outer wall can easily be seen in the ceilings of the southwest corner rooms. The extension is betrayed also in the asymmetry of the roof. But even without an ell, and with only its first proportions, the house would is conjectured that the boy even began his medical studies under his uncle's tuition. Like the elder Dr. Odlin again, he seems to have been ready to serve his king and country in the wars. At twenty-six he joined as surgeon's mate one of the regi- ments sent to Crown Point, and it may be that he took j^art in the Louisburg expe- dition. He was then already married, and presumably living in the house which his uncle had given him. The first child ever born there was his daughter Mary. Soon after the war was over he turned again to TH F C I I \f A V HOl'SE nil-: NoKMi\vi:>i liiamhkk his profession, and < ontinued to i^ractise it in the town for twenty years. Mean- while in the old homestead next door the inevitable human ihanges had come. The venerable grandfather had linished his threescore years and ten, and gone. His son, the Doctor's uncle ^\'oodl)ridge,*' had followed in the ])astorate of the First Churi h, had married, and reared a large family, and, after leading his j)eople through the stormy ])rerevolutionary days and up to the very threshold of national independence, had likewise ceased from his labors. In 17S2, Dr. Odlin and his wife and three children removed from Fvxeter to Concord, and the house and lot where he had lived were st)ld to a neigh- bor, Colonel Nicholas Crilman. I'hc land which at the beginning was the |)roperty of old Councillor John (.ilman thus came after many years and many ( hanges into the hands of one of his lineal descendants. Thenceforth the house that Dr. Dudley Odlin built was to be intimately associated ' f'.reat-uncle of the Wnodbridjje Odlin who founded our professorsliip of English. with the fortunes of another family, and a new chai>ter in its history was opened. The Ciilmans of this ])eriod were j^er- hajjs the most numerous, certainly the most distinguished, familv in Hxeter. It was in the first decade of the town's ex- istence, that John (iilman and his brothers came up from the Mas- sachusetts Hingham and o i n ed Wheelwright's little coK)n\ at the falls of the Piscatiicjua. Their characteristii- enterjjrise, energy, jiruilence, and thrift, combined with their relatively ample means, made them from the beginning natural leailers in the com- munity, and these (jualities appear to have been carried down from generation to generation with a remarkable continuity, ■rill.' Aimiicaii ( iilnians arc descended from Edward, who was Ijorn in the Enj^hsh IIin}j;liani, county of Norfolk, and for rehj^ous reasons mi- grated with his family to Massachusetts in 1638. Ak.MS OK THK NOK- rOl.K' CIIMANS THE OILMAN HOUSE '9 The toiATi records teem with Crihnan names. Councillor John himself was the father of sixteen children, six of them being sons ; and their lineage an turn was in- •creased in like proportion. But the emi- nence of the family depended e\en less ■upon its numbers than upon its unvarying capacity and public spirit. The student ■of Exeter history must indeed be wary if he avoid confusion amid the numerous Nicholases, Nathaniels, Daniels, and Johns that have at one time or other, in one way or other, served and been honored by their native town. They built its houses and churches, founded its industries, ad- ministered its finances, guided its affairs in times of peace, and assumed leadership in the perils of war. If a meeting-house was to be erected, Gilmans would be found on the committee. If a military com}:)any was to be recruited, a Oilman would be among its officers. A final dis- tribution of the common lands was made in 1738. Of the seven commissioners to whom the business was intrusted, four were Gilmans. One half of the modera- tors during the first two centuries of the town's history bore the name. In the family have been councillors, judges, state treasurers, governors, state and national senators and representatives, and an in- definite number of captains and colonels. One ardent chronicler writes ; " Edward (Oilman's descendants are as numerous as the sands of the seashore. There is hardly a state in the Union where they may not be found. The family has been in civil office from the time our colony became a royal province." Another takes the word : " The sturdy phalanx of Gilmans did more to keep up the steady course of the Colony, the Province, and the State, cer- tainly till 1815, than any other two or three families together." In the last gen- eral catalogue of The Phillips Exeter Academy are found the names of sixty- five (iilmans. The Smiths only are more numerous. The purchaser of the Odlin house and lot was Colonel Nicholas (Oilman, the great- grandson of Councillor John, and at this time the mast prominent citizen of the town, if not of the state. The historians are wont to call him the " brains of the Revolution in New Hampshire." In spite of his military title, and of the fact that he took part in the camjjaign against Bur- goyne, his fame rests less upon martial achievement than on success in the man- agement of the public finances during the "UNDER THE ELM " IN 1905 long revolutionary struggle. He was the Robert Morris of his province. The royal governor Wentworth had become attached to him because of his faithful and efficient service under the old government, and endeavored by every means to save him to the King's cause. Even after Colonel (rilman had thrown himself into the con- flict on the patriot side, the governor was accustomed to say that after the rebellion was crushed he should see that his friend was spared. The genius of the old (rilmans was preeminently that of the market-place and the counting-house. Now and then, indeed, one entered the profession of the ministry or of law or of arms, and adorned it too, but it was trade and finance that I a -\\\ r: CI f.Nf A x HOL'sr: called forth their ]>e< uliar jjowers. Ihey (lis]>layed pnulence, diligence, and energy in the management of their affairs, and were prosjjered accordingly. ITioiigh they enlisted dutifully for the wars, and cer- tainly had the stuff of soldiers in them, they were often detained at home to keep the jHiblic ]nirse. In the i>ost of sUite treasurer, whic h he held for se\en years, Colonel N'ichoJas was succeeded l)y his son, and this son in turn l>y another, until together they had held the office for twenty-five years. Meanwhile they acted also as agents of the federal treasury. Two of the family have been treasurers of The Phillips Exeter Academy, and one the jjresident of its board of trustees. Colonel Nicholas (iilman lived on the little knoll overlooking Water Street and the river, in the okl house' now occupied by the Society of the Cincinnati. He had married early, and a large family had grown up about him. Three stalwart sons had already reached years of maturity, and had been associated with their father in the jniblic service. 'i'he eldest, John Taylor, now approaching thirty, had been an officer in the comjjany that marched from Exeter on the morning after the bat- tle of I,exington. On the memorable day in July, 1776, when the news of the Dec- laration of Independence reached the town, it had been he who was chosen to read the document l)efore the assembled ])eople. He had served a term in the state legislature, and had been ap|)ointed to the Committee of Siifel\. lie was now for the second year a memlKr ol the Con- tinental Congress, the youngest man in the bodv. The second son, who had the father's name, Nicholas, had entered the Continental army at twenty-one, and was now serving on (General Washington's staff * Though the purchaser, he was never an occu- pant of the Front Street house. with the rank of {-ajitiiin.* Nathaniel, the third son, a tall, grave young man of twenty-three, had remained at home with his father during the war, while his two elder brothers were in the field or at Phil- adeli)hia. He assisted in the administra- tion of the state finances and in the busi- ness of the Continental treasury. In this latter office, indeed, he became his father's successor within the year. His early con- nection with the state militia had brought him the title of Colonel, and, although he was throughout his life engaged only in the l>ursuits of peace, his fellow-townsmen, with that fine sense for titled distinction which still marks the New Hampshire citizen, refused to allow the name to lajjse and would know their neighbor only as Colonel (iilman. In 1783, almost a year after the pur- chase of the Odlin house, and two months after the formal proclamation of i)eace i)etween Creat Britain and the revolted colonies, the head of the (iilman house- hold was taken by death. In the division of his large property the homestead on Water Street fell to John Taylor, and the Odlin house and lot'" to Nathaniel. How long the latter remained at the old home with his brother cannot be said, but cer- • A copy of the report which, as assistant adju- tant-general, he made of the prisoners taken at the surrender of Lord CornwalHs is still preserved. 'Ihe document was evidently prepared with the most scruiiulous care, and is a perfect examjik' of the art of bookkeeping. As to which, one cannut help ..lisiiviiig how, even in the distracting husi- lu-ss (if war, the ( lilnians kept true to the type. '" In the inventory of Colonel Nicholas (iilman's ])roperty the value of the " ( Mlin I louse and Land adjoining" is given as £2^0. In the deed of the ])receding year, which conveyed the property fnim Dr. Odlin to Colonel (Iilman, the value is given as "four hundred and eighty poimds." It is ilith- cult to account for the tliscrepancy, unless we have to do here with a difference between Con- tinental currency and hard money. THE (ULMAN HOUSE 11 THE SOinHWEST CHAMBER tainly after his marriage, which occurred in 1785, he must have occupied his own house on Front Street. From that time until a few months ago it was the Gilman homestead. Three generations of the family have lived under its roof, and it was from Nathaniel's grandchildren that it was purchased for The Phillips Exeter Academy. Though altered and put to new uses by its present owners, it still fittingly bears the name of the family which has given it distinction. The property must have come into the hands of Nathaniel Gilman very near the time when the Academy was first opened. How strange it would have seemed to him, if he could have looked on into the future through another century, and could have seen his house and the broad farm lands stretching southward to the river appro- priated at last to the uses of his neighbor lohn Phillips's school, the only visible man- ifestation of which at that time was the little wooden building" perched on a hill " This first Academy building, erected in 1783, is now occupied as a dwelling-house on upper Front Street, a half-mile distant from its original site. to the westward, beyond " Tan Lane." Less than a dozen years later his brother John Taylor had given the land for the present yard on Front Street, and a large school building had been erected in plain view of the Gilman parlor windows. The wife that Nathaniel Gilman brought to his new home was the Rev. Woodbridge Odlin's daughter Abigail, a girl of seven- teen, who had been born in the Odlin homestead close by and was still living there at the time of her marriage. This union effected an odd interlocked rela- tionship , between the (iilman and Odlin families, for Nathaniel's sister Elizabeth had come to the Odlin house three years before as the wife of the eldest son ; that is, sister and brother of one family had married brother and sister of another. It seems not improbable that Colonel Nich- olas Crilman had i)urchased Dr. Odlin's house, as described above, in order to provide a home for his daughter near and yet separate from her husband's family. But, as we have seen, when her father died and the property was divided, this house fell not to her but to her brother Nathaniel. Two years later he married his sister-in- 12 THE c. I i..\f A \ ii()r>r: law Al)igail and came to live as neighlujr to the Odlins. lltimately he became ])Ossessor also of his wife's old home. When the imrchase was made cannot be determined ; perhaps it was even after her death, but at all events both lots were under the (iilman title a» early as 1802, when rhinehas Merrill's map" was pub- lished. Therein the older Odlin home- stead bears the name '* Xath' (irilman Esfp," while the larger house, which served as the owner's residence, is dis- tinguished by the sounding appellation of " Nath' (lilman's Seat." Mistress then of this seat became young Abigail. She could not have found her new station and duties altogether easy. Kxeter was the virtual capital of the state, and her husband belonged to a family which occuj)ied high official and social po- sition. Nathaniel's distinguished brother Nicholas, being unmarried, made his home with him, and was a member of the house- hold when iHiblic duties did not recjuire his jjresence at the national capital. A strong bent toward territorial expansion '* This is preserved in the town library, and is an extremely entertaining delineation o( Exeter as it was a century ago. All tin- necessary dry de- tails of the gengra|)lu-r's art arc indeed present, h.ut so varied and eniiveneart of the great farm that ultimately stret( hed a mile or more along the banks of the " fresh river." Upon the wife of such a landholder must rest the care and direction of no mean (U)- mestfc establishment, with aH the varied occupations and industries which were found in the old New England farmstead. In the yard beside the mansion-house were a barn and other fami-lniildings, where were kept horses and oxen, cows and swine and jjoultry. On the other side of the house, to the eastward, was a large garden extending far back, filled with old- fashioned flowering plants and fruits and vegetables. Beyond that the farm ran otT into cultivated fields, ])astures, and finally extensive woodlands. '^ 'ITie neighbors were few. To the west were the Odiins, and to the east another minister's family, Mr, Mansfield's, with no Elm Street yet between. Across the way the land was un- occupied, except for a single house on the site of the present Baptist Church. There is no knowing when the first ell was added to the house, but in all likelihood it was as early as this, for the main jjart of the house alone could have hardly provided living-room enough for the growing family and the servants male and female whom the work of farm and kit( hen required. During this period Colonel Ciilman was the financial agent of the federal govern- ment, and also the treasurer of the state. The more or less ])iiblic ])lace of business which his duties rendered necessary was ])rovided by the little room on the ground llcjor called the " office." It was in the northeast corner of the house, and now constitutes the streetward end of the long '^Charles H. Bell, " John Taylor Oilman, M.D." THE CrILMAN HOUSE 13 library, the partition having been torn away in 1815, when so many other alter- ations were made. A letter written to his brother Nicholas one February gives a pleasing though somewhat frigid picture of the worthy Treasurer at work here : " The Robins have been plenty all winter. While writing I have seen one fluttering round my Office window, although it is so cold as for ink to freeze in my pen." The first of Nathaniel Oilman's eleven children was born in 1787 and christened Frances. A second daughter, named after elected by the citizens of his state. His connection with the Continental treasury has already been referred to. Before he had reached his forty-fifth year he had been a member once of the lower house of the state legislature and twice of the senate. The post of state treasurer he occupied for eight terms. There is no doubt that he could have played a more important part in politics had he been in- clined, but he knew his own tastes and refused to do them violence. A remark found in one of his letters to his brother THE OILMAN MEADOW, NOW BECOME THE I'LlMlTdN I'LAVINCi MELDS her mother, Abigail, was born two years later, and a son, who received his father's name, Nathaniel, in 1793. The birth of the third daughter occurred on the same day as her mother's death, August 10, 1796. Abigail Odlin had been mistress of the (iilman mansion eleven years, and was but twenty-eight years old at her death. The eldest of the four children left thus motherless was not yet nine. The infant daughter was given the name of Ann, which her grandmother Oilman had borne. Mention will be made of these four children again on a later page. In public life Colonel Oilman was less eminent than his two older brothers, yet at various times he held positions of honor and responsibility to which he had been appointed by the federal government or Nicholas, then a member of the Conti- nental Congress, expresses aptly his judg- ment of himself in this relation : " You say you were in hoaps that 1 would have gone into the Legislature. I think I am better fitted for a private than a public life." In another letter, written several years later, after his eldest brother, John Taylor, had become governor of the state, he hits off the anxious sensitiveness of the jniblic man to the breath of popular favor with a delicate touch of humor (juite out of accord with his usual dry epistolary style: "'i'he (rovernor has been in high health, for him, for a number of months ]jast, is more corpulent than I ever saw him before — perhaps his official conduct meeting the approbation and applause of the people of his own and other states, u I II r: (i 1 i.M A N HorsE has contributed in part to his health," It need hardly he addeil that Colonel Cril- man was often elected to the imj^ortant town offi< es, and was a leader in public- enterprises of various kinds. The place in the dilnian homestead left vacant by the death of the wife and mother was fillcil by a second marriage, Nathan- iel writes to his brother Nicholas: "On the 1 2th Inst. I went to Portsni'*' and took a partner to assist at the other end of the yoke, I shall not at this time bestow any l)anegyricks, but re(]uest you to come and see for yourself," The new yoke-fellow was Dorothea Folsom, granddaughter of (ieneral Nathaniel Folsom, a distinguished Revolutionary soldier. 'ITie two families had already been allied through the mar- riage of her aunt to Nathaniel's brother, John Taylor, twenty years before. That the other meml)ers of the (iilman family regarded the match with favor seems evi- dent from a letter written to Nathaniel a fortnight after the wedding by his brother Daniel, then in Boston engaged in foreign trade : " 1 feel very particularly pleased at the Partnershi]) you have lately engaged in. Say to Dolly that in me she is always to find a regular and uniformly affectionate brother." Dorothea was twenty-one at the time of her marriage, and remained mistress of the (Iilman mansion from that time till her death. No other one life has been so long and intimatelv connected with it. 1 )uring more than sixty years she directed the affairs of the household. F'leven children grew lo manhood and womanhood under her care, and during her last years she lived in dail)- < ontact with grandchildren and even great-grand- children. " The house was the abode of jjlenty and hos])itality and charity. Whenever a farmers' meeting occurred, or the court opened its session, or any other extra- ordinary oc>f the Gilman fields in recent years perpetuates this lady's name. out his life so closely associated with the family that his career deserves at least brief mention. His earlier life has been sjjoken of above, l'|>on his father's death he assumed the duties of state treasurer, and remained in the ofifice almost contin- uously till the time of his elevation to the chief magistracy. He was the second governor of the state, and was elected to l".1II KK THE (;iLMAN HOUSE ly brother was governor, he was elected to the national senate from New Hampshire, and was in his second term when he died. A great part of these years must of course have been spent at home in Exeter. The room reserved for him in his brother's house was the southwest chamber in the second story. It was much smaller then than now, the position of the old outer wall being indicated by the exposed timber in the present ceiling. There he kept the " desks, books, maps, guns, swords, pistols, papers, and wearing apparel " which he mentions in his will. His letters are written in an excellent style, not lacking the laborious dignity and formality char- acteristic of the period, yet clear and forceful. They betray a vigorous intellect and large views. He was diffident of his capacity for public speech, but on paper certainly he was able to put a case forcibly, and even eloquently. In one of his letters is found a chance remark that expresses an almost touching depreciation of his own powers. He is giving reasons for his dis- like of a certain acquaintance : " I never was very intimate with him, his habits were something different from mine — besides, he had wit and I had none." In his long and numerous letters to his brother Nathaniel he writes chiefly of national politics and finance, if not with " wit," still certainly with an earnestness and grasp that give evidence of his eminent fitness for the high station which he occupied. Almost as characteristic of Senator Nicholas as the *' swords, books, and pa- pers " was the "wearing apparel." He dressed with extreme care and elegance. Not gigantic, like Nathaniel, nor portly, like the (rovernor, he possessed a graceful, erect figure, of slightly more than medium height, and a carriage of great dignity. His long familiarity with (leneral A\"ash- ington's leading officers and with the cul- tivated and polished society of the cities to the southward was reflected in his courtly manners and faultless dress. These must have rendered him a striking figure in the little New Hampshire town. When Wash- ington visited Exeter in 1789 and was entertained in the Folsom Tavern on the village square, it was his former staff-offi- cer. Captain Nicholas (rilman, who was appointed to do the honors. It would be natural that a gentleman possessing such personal graces and following the profes- sion of arms should be uncommonly at- tractive to women, and he is known to have been so, but in spite of this and of the example of his brothers, one of whom was thrice wedded, he remained unmarried throughout his life. As Senator (iilman was passing through Philadelphia on his way home from Wash- ington in the spring of 18 14, he was taken suddenly and violently ill in his lodgings, and died within a few days. Two of his Odlin relatives, whose home was in the city, being apprised of his illness, took him to their house and attended him during his last hours. The letter in which they informed Nathaniel of his brother's death is still preserved. His courage, dignity, and courtesy, maintained even under the shadow of death, impressed them deeply. Benjamin Ives Ciilman, an Ohio relative, who chanced to be in Philadel- phia a few days later, learned from them the circumstances of Senator (iilman's death, and wrote a consolatory letter to the Exeter brother. " During his illness," the letter runs, " he was not for a moment deranged ; and his mind appeared active, unclouded, and perfectly serene thro' the whole progress of the disease. He ex- hibited all the firmness of character, and delicate propriety of conduct in sickness, for which he was so remarkable in health." In the catalogue of The Phillips Exeter 20 1 UK (ill, M AN HO LSE Academy is published every year a list of the benefactions which have been received by the school since the founder's death. Second in this list stands the gift of Nicholas (iilnian. It is thus describeaper-money rebellion, in the suppression of which he had played a soldier's part. The last year of his life was made happy by the return of his beloved son Joseph, who after an absence of eleven years came tu make his home again under his father's roof. Joseph had been diligent and pru- dent in business, and had pros])ered. He returned to Exeter a rich man. His parents coiild not but be proud of his achievements, and enjoy the sense of se- curity which his wealth gave, but their chief satisfaction must have been in the steadfast devotion to them and his old home. '' Neither the excitement and the gains of business," writes his friend Or. Nicholas E. Soule,** " nor the multitudi- nous attractions of his eastern life had weaned him from it. Through the chan- nels of that strange experience had been flowing, all the while, the cherished, un- obtrusive current of unchanged early pre- ferences, desires, and hopes." In the letter written to his son Josejjh, Colonel ("iilman had s]>oken uncertainly of the winters that might still be left to him. They were but four. He died in lanuary, i>^47. The night before his death he was brought into the "long room" liv the faithful old negro retainer, Charles Tash, and knowing that his last hour was approaching, spoke to the members of the family gathered about him concerning his burial and the manner in which thev should honor his memory. ''" Arthur Gilman, "The Gilman Family." THE (ilLMAN HOUSE 25 He repeatedly charged them that every- thing should be done with the utmost simplicity, and that their grief should not be marked by mourning apparel. "Avoid ostentation, spend u])on the living, not upon the dead." \Mien Charles Tash came in to remove him for the night, he remarked : " I have no dis])osition to leave this pleasant circle. I love to l)e here surrounded by my friends and dear children ; " then after briefly commending to them the worship and service of Ood, " I am ready to go, and wish you all good night." Joseph came into possession of the farm, and devoted himself to its care and im- provement with the same industry that had characterized his career in business. Like his father he loved the land, and the management of his large estate was under- taken with zest and carried on with ever increasing satisfaction. He was familiar with every acre of his fields, and as proud and fond of them as of the venerable homestead and his native town. " Mad- am " Oilman, as his mother was wont to be called, after the American manner of designating ladies of superior position, still presided over the household with un- diminished authority and dignity, and continued to do so even after her son's marriage. Mr. Oilman's regard for her was profound, and the last years of her life were filled with the comfort of his constant attention and care. She lived to see his sons born and growing up at her side. Her long and beneficent reign was terminated by her death in 1859. The new mistress who took the place of Madam Crilman had been a member of the family since her marriage to Joseph nine years before. This was Mary Elizabeth Orav, who was born in Boston, in 1826, the daughter of Harrison Oray and Clarissa Eastham. After her father's death she had come to live in her mother's old home at Exeter. The house stood almost across the way from the (rilman mansion, and is now occupied by Mr. A. S. Wetherell. Like Dorothea Folsom, she came to the homestead a young woman and spent there MRS. DOROTHEA OILMAN the greater part of a long life. During two generations the home was but the expression of her gracious personality. She guided its affairs, dispensed its hos- pitality, and bestowed its charity. The dignity, orderliness, and refinement which distinguished it were the visible forms of her spirit. She honored and maintained its traditions, and in her, the last mistress, its history had a fitting close. The structural changes which the house has undergone in the last half-century can be briefly described. In 1859 the old ell was removed to give place to the present one. The discarded building is now occu- pied as a tenement-house on South Street. In this same year plumbing was put in, the library got its marble mantel, the front 26 I n K C, I I.M A \ II Ol SE door was enlarged to its present dimen- sions, and the front porch added, h was at this time also that the bra* keted caps were mounted over the front windinvs. There is reason for regret that the carpen- ter to whom the work was intrusted diarn and sen'cd as carriajje-house and woodshed was l)roken aj)art and carried away. A fraj;nu-nt of it is now to he seen anions the small buildinjjs opposite the railroad station. The old stal>le was then pushed forward a few feet into its present positinn and promoted io ser\'e as wixai- house. writings of Tennyson had made on the imagination of his readers in those days. It was only three years after the loss of his mother, and when he had hardly ar- rived at middle age, that Josei>h (iilman died. His life in Kxeter after the return JOSEl'U TAVl.uk (ilK.MA.N from China had been iiuiet and unevent- ful. I ie had devoted himself to his estate and his family, and to the interests of the community in so far as a private citizen could serve them. Extremely modest and distrustful of his own powers, he neither sought nor cared for public office. In 1855 he was prevailed u|)on by the trus- tees of his old school. The Phillips Exeter Academy, to undertake the duties of treas- urer. These he performed until within a few months of his decease, hi accepting Mr. (iilman's resignation, the trustees re- (iucste