Sketches of Successful New Hampshire Men
In March, 1877, desiring a more extensive field of business operation,
Mr. Carpenter resigned his position as cashier of the Pittsfield
National Bank and removed to the city of Manchester, where, with
characteristic vigor and enterprise, he immediately set about the work
of procuring a charter for and organizing the Second National Bank of
Manchester, of which institution he has been a director and cashier
since its organization. The national bank being well established, he
assisted in securing a charter for and organizing the Mechanics Savings
Bank, of which he has been from the first a trustee and the treasurer.
Both these institutions, under his skillful supervision, have attained a
prosperous and flourishing condition. Aside from his general banking
operations, he has in Manchester, as elsewhere, dealt extensively in
notes, bonds, and real estate, and has been, for the past few years,
quite largely engaged in building. In company with ex-Gov. Smyth, he is
proprietor of Smyth and Carpenter's block, on Elm street, the northern
half of which has recently been completed. This block is four stories
high and basement; has a frontage, on Elm street, of two hundred feet, a
depth of one hundred feet; contains ten stores on the first floor, with
offices and tenements above; and is, beyond question, the largest brick
block in the state in the ownership of any single firm.
Mr. Carpenter has always manifested an interest in educational affairs,
and has been specially interested in the establishment and prosperity of
the Holderness School for Boys, located at Holderness in this state,
under the auspices of the Episcopalian denomination, with which he is
associated. He has been one of the trustees of this school from the
inception of the enterprise, and is also the treasurer. He devoted much
time and personal care to the work of remodeling the buildings at the
outset, and, since then, to their enlargement as the growth and success
of the school has demanded.
September 1, 1858, Mr. Carpenter was united in marriage with Georgianna
Butters Drake, born January 15, 1836, a lady of fine mental capacity and
attainments, endowed with the graces and virtues essential to true
womanhood, and at home alike in the social as well as the domestic
circle. She was the only daughter and eldest child of the late Col.
James Drake of Pittsfield, a prominent citizen of that town, well known
in public life, who filled various responsible offices, including that
of state senator, and who died April 7, 1870. He was a descendant of the
celebrated Sir Francis Drake, the English explorer and naval commander
who was the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe, and attained
the rank of vice-admiral of the British navy. The family were among the
earliest settlers of New England, and trace their ancestry more than six
hundred years. The elder brother of Mrs. Carpenter--Frank J. Drake--is
the partner of Mr. Carpenter's younger brother--Frank P.--in the firm of
Drake & Carpenter, heretofore mentioned, while her younger
brother--Nathaniel S.--is in business at Pittsfield.
Two children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Carpenter,---a daughter,
Georgia Ella, born October 13, 1859, an accomplished young lady who
resides with her parents, and a son who died in infancy. Their residence
is a fine brick mansion, among the most substantial in the city, on
north Elm street, at the corner of Sagamore.
Mr. Carpenter is now in the prime of life, though his business career
has already been more extended and successful than that of most men of
similar vocation who have been engaged a lifetime therein. Filling
various positions of trust and responsibility, public and corporate,
with the greatest acceptability; of sound judgment, strong will, quick
perception and a practical, well balanced mind, and unquestioned
integrity of action; enjoying the general confidence of the public, and
in a special degree that of those persons obliged or accustomed to seek
advice or assistance from others, in matters of business,--his success
may indeed be regarded as far greater than that of those ordinarily
known as fortunate business men, while there yet remains, in the
ordinary course of life, ample time for farther successes and greater
achievements.
HON. CHARLES WILLIAMS.
BY O. C. MOORE.
It has long seemed to the writer that the successful organizer of modern
industry deserved a high place in public estimation. The qualities
usually found in such a person constitute as rare a combination as can
be found in any department of human activity. Those qualities are
industry, probity, intelligence, judgment, and executive ability. These
virtues will always be found to lie at the foundation of a well ordered
and prosperous state. When to these are added enterprise and energy,
there is little wanting either to the successful individual or to the
growing community. It is to this class of men that New England owes much
of its pre-eminence to-day. What the pioneer settlers did to smooth the
path for their successors; what the forefathers of the Revolution
contributed to establish a new government and place it upon a
self-supporting basis,--the men who established the industrial
enterprises of New England have done for their posterity and the
perpetuity of republican institutions. If New England should be stripped
to-morrow of her mills, shops, and foundries, and the wealth and
institutions that they in turn have created, New England would be but
little more than an obscure and unenterprising hill country, with a
diminishing population and lessening influence. She would have a noble
and inspiring history, but her glory would be departed.
HON. CHARLES WILLIAMS, the subject of this sketch, belongs to the
untitled American nobility of organizers of industry. He comes of an old
industrial stock, and can trace his lineage back, through six
generations of workers, to a stalwart ancestor in old Wales. The
Williamses formed a large part of the population of Wales, "somewhat
like the O's of Ireland and the Mac's of Scotland." It is an interesting
fact that the ancestor of Oliver Cromwell, in the fourth remove, was a
Williams, known as Morgan ap Williams, of Glamorganshire, Wales, a
gentleman of property, who married a sister of Lord Thomas Cromwell,
afterwards Earl of Essex. Carlyle speaks of the Protector as "Cromwell
_alias_ Williams." The "Encyclopedia Americana" states positively that
the genealogy of Cromwell is traced to Richard Williams, who assumed the
name of Cromwell from his maternal uncle, Thomas Cromwell, secretary of
state to Henry VIII.
However this may be, Richard Williams, the sixth remove in a direct line
from the subject of this sketch, came to America from Glamorganshire,
Wales, in 1632, and settled in Taunton, Mass. Among his descendants were
Hon. John Mason Williams, a distinguished jurist of Massachusetts; Gen.
Seth Williams, of Augusta, Me., a graduate of West Point, and a
distinguished officer in the Mexican war; Hon. Ruel Williams, of
Augusta, Me.; and Hon. Lemuel Williams, a member of congress from
Massachusetts. It is a coincidence of note that the occupation of the
subject of this sketch, as well as that of his lineal descendants,
follows the distinctive characteristic of the Welch ancestry.
Glamorganshire is famous for its iron and coal mines, and its iron-works
are on the most extensive scale, it having sixty blast furnaces, some
of which give employment to six thousand men.
The direct descent from Richard Williams of Taunton is as follows:
Benjamin Williams, settled in Easton, Mass.; Josiah Williams, settled at
Bridgewater, Mass. Seth Williams, the great-grandfather of Mr. Williams,
was born at Bridgewater, May 21, 1722. At the age of eighteen he went to
Easton, Mass., and took up one thousand acres of government land. He
married Susannah Forbes, of Bridgewater, and built the homestead now
standing in Easton. Edward Williams, his son, married Sarah Lothrop, of
Bridgewater, in 1772, still retaining the "homestead," where Lieut. Seth
Williams, the father of the subject of this sketch, was born January 29,
1776. He was a tanner by trade, and took part in the war of 1812. He
married Sarah Mitchael, daughter of Colonel Mitchael, of Bridgewater,
Mass., an active man in the Revolutionary war, and for many years a
member of the legislature from Easton. They were married in 1800, and
lived near the "homestead." They had eight children, Charles, the
present subject, being the third son, born at Easton, August 1, 1816.
The first seventeen years of his life were spent on the farm, receiving
such rudimentary education as could be obtained at a district school. At
the age of eighteen he apprenticed himself to Gen. Shepherd Leach,
proprietor of the "Easton Iron-Works," for the term of four years, to
learn the foundry business, with a compensation of twenty-five dollars
for the first year, fifty dollars for the second, seventy-five dollars
for the third, and one hundred and twenty-five dollars for the fourth.
By the death of Gen. Leach the contract was surrendered; but young
Williams still continued in the employ of his successor, Mr. Lincoln
Drake, until the panic of 1837. In this stagnation of business at the
East, he determined to go West, and purchased several hundred acres of
land near Springfield, Ill. The now flourishing capital of the state was
then represented by a few dwelling-houses, one church, and a small
hotel. This "New West" could then boast of no railroads, and the
difficulty of getting produce to market, which was mainly by flat-boats
down the Mississippi, offered but little attraction to farming, and he
returned East. For two years he was employed in the foundry at North
Chelmsford, Mass., and the subsequent three years in the Amoskeag
foundry at Manchester, N. H.
Mr. Williams came to Nashua in 1845, at the age of twenty-nine, endowed
with good health, correct habits, and an honorable ambition. In company
with his elder brother, Seth, they established the foundry business,
under the firm name of S. & C. Williams, erecting a building eighty by
one hundred feet, and the business commenced. It was in the same year
that two other important and still flourishing industries were begun in
Nashua,--the manufacture of shuttles and bobbins by J. & E. Baldwin, and
the manufacture of mortise-locks and doorknobs by L. W. Noyes and David
Baldwin. This was the day of small beginnings, and only twenty-five
hands were employed in the foundry for several years. The business grew
steadily, however, and everything seemed propitious. On the second of
July, 1849, a fire broke out in the works, and, in spite of all
exertions, the entire property was consumed, including all the patterns.
The total loss was estimated at forty thousand dollars. It was a
staggering blow, as these young men had no insurance. Men of less
courage and energy would have succumbed to such a misfortune; but on the
very day of the fire the work of rebuilding was begun, and pushed with
rapidity, a brick structure taking the place of the wood one destroyed.
The partnership of S. & C. Williams was dissolved in 1859, and the
business has since been continued by Charles. His brother Seth has been
extensively employed in similar business. The business of the Williams
foundry in Nashua has steadily increased, and was never more extensive
than to-day. The pay-roll shows one hundred and twenty-five hands
employed.
Strict attention to business, unyielding integrity, and thorough mastery
of his calling have been Mr. Williams's secret of success. He was one of
five who organized the Second National Bank, and has since held the
position of vice-president of the bank. Mr. Williams was elected a