Trying to determine the history of an antique home is a bit like the telephone game you played as children- oral history can vary widely from source to source, and can vary again over time. Where you end up usually doesn’t resemble anything like where you started.
We’ve been trying to verify the age of the barn, as well as when it was moved to its current location, as some observations and details within the barn differ from the oral history. We’ve already pretty much confirmed that the barn is much older than the build date of 1840 that we were originally told. We’ve also noted that the barn used to be a drive-through English-style barn, and was not built as a bank barn, as it is currently oriented. We have since confirmed that the barn pre-dates 1803, and likely predates the house by a year or two. We did find two newspaper articles from 1982 and 1995 that both note the date that the barn was moved from across the road to its current site in 1858, not the 1916 noted by the oral history, or in the Federal Historic Registry application (1983). The actual move date coincides with the day that the daughter of the owner at the time, passed away from Tuberculosis- June 7, 1858. Regardless of the date it was moved, the fact that it was moved from a flat field where it was a drive-through English barn (doors on the two opposing longer sides) and made into a bank barn with the door moved to the gable end (shorter side) answers a lot of structural questions.
We spent some time at the Dublin town archives this past week (the house used to be in Dublin before Harrisville was formed in 1870), and using the 1796 tax records, we were able to finally piece together the size of the original homestead. It appears that it was originally roughly 176 acres, and was spread much further south than we had thought. I’ve highlighted the original homestead on this copy of Fisk’s map from the mid-nineteenth century (updated in 1907);
The current property is the small area noted by my penciled hashmarks in the northeast corner of the intersection, in the middle of the highlighted area, and is now roughly 2.3 acres. The house is noted by the dark dot. Interesting thing to note is the house which is at the bottom of the highlighted area, noted as “2”, is still there today. This house was noted in the 1850’s book “The History of Dublin” by Rev. Levi Leonard as being occupied by John and Margaret Gilchrest, and is now on the Federal Historic Registry as the “Gilchrest Homestead” c1817. We’re not sure if the Gilchrest’s leased the land from the Warrens, or if they rented the house, but it is no longer part of the original property. The land is still shown as being owned by the Warrens in the 1826 property tax map, so we’re not sure when it was sold. In addition, a large portion of the original homestead land was “eminent-domained” over to the Corps of Engineers for the Edward MacDowell Flood Risk Management project in 1948- the dam and reservoir are just southeast of our house, and now control the water levels in the Contoocook and Merrimack rivers. The rest has been parceled off over the years by the subsequent residents, and is now under ownership by roughly a dozen different owners. A mere 2.3 acres remains with the original home.
The lower portion of the triangular intersection across from our house is no longer used, but you can still see the rock walls that used to delineate the road (Lower Road), and is where we often walk the pup. It’s a beautiful area along the Nubanusit River, and contains many rock walls, remains of an old storage shed, and a very large downed tree- one of the largest we’ve seen in the area;
We’re still trying to (hopefully) get more information about Daniel and Abigail, and possibly some links to nearby descendents soon. We’re waiting for a rainy day or two, then we’ll head down to Westborough and Waltham, MA where Daniel was born, and where he enlisted, respectively. Our ultimate dream would be to find a portrait.
Aside from all this detective work, we’re taking advantage of the lower bug populations (thanks to a couple of nights in the low 40’s/upper 30’s) and enjoying some hiking. There are so many trail options just within a few miles of the house, and they’re all beautiful- lakes, rivers, mountains, forests….
We’re also wrapping up some landscaping projects before winter sets in- mainly, adding a front walkway. We’ve dug out (yes, by hand) roughly an 8-10″ deep mix of beautiful soil: clay perfect for making pottery, crumbly loam, and yes, lots of roots and rocks. There are a few “nuggets” that are too large for us to remove, so the next time our excavator guy is here, he’ll pluck them out for us. Once cleared, we can put down a minimum bed of 6″ of stone dust, then top off with tumbled pavers. We’re not in any hurry, as the granite front stoop will be pulled out in about a month or so to allow a new granite sill to be placed under the front door, as the original was pulled out at some point and replaced by (deteriorating) brick and concrete. That very well may have been the original sill that we just dug out of the back yard and drug around to the front to be placed in the walkway.
While we’re working harder than we’ve ever worked, physically, we’re having the time of our lives. We like to say it’s not Crossfit, it’s Farmfit.
This was a bit of a rambling post, but we’ve recently discovered so much about the history of the house that we just wanted to get it recorded. We’ll let you know what we find out when we head down to MA to visit the towns that Daniel and Abigail were born in, lived, married, and enlisted. At some point, we’ll also head to Boston to visit the Bunker Hill Battlefield Historic Park to see if they have anything concrete there regarding Daniel or his infantry unit.
Thanks for following along on our adventure. Please leave us a comment if you have any questions, or would like more information about anything we’ve talked about.
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