Sketches of Successful New Hampshire Men
He represented that city in the legislature in 1864, 1865, 1868, 1869,
and 1870, and in 1876 was a member of the constitutional convention of
New Hampshire. In the house, he was on the judiciary committee in 1864,
and its chairman in 1865, also chairman of the finance committee in
1868; and in the constitutional convention was chairman of one of the
four only leading committees, vis., that on the bill of rights.
In 1869 he was chosen speaker of the house, receiving nearly all the
votes of his party in caucus, and much beyond his party vote in the
house. He was rechosen in 1870, again receiving more than the vote of
his party. As a member of the house, he was always recognized as a
leader whose counsel it was safe to follow and whose opposition was
generally fatal; and, as speaker, he was distinguished for his dignity,
courtesy, and knowledge of parliamentary law. He was several times the
leading Republican candidate for congress in the first district, and the
peculiar methods by which other men were put into the place which the
people demanded he should fill have disgraced and weakened the party in
that section ever since.
In the year 1866, Mr. Wheeler received the honorary degree of Master of
Arts from Dartmouth College. He was president of the Dover National Bank
from 1858 to 1874.
Mr. Wheeler married, December 31, 1848, Priscilla E., daughter of Joseph
W. and Phebe (Wheeler) Clement, of Franklin, N. H. They have but one
child,--Helen Maud,--born March 27, 1858. Mr. Wheeler is still in the
prime of successful practice in Dover.
HON. EDWARD SPALDING, M. D.
The subject of this sketch, born at Amherst, N. H., September 15, 1813,
was the son of Dr. Matthias Spalding, who was of the fifth generation in
direct descent from Edward Spalding, who came to New England about 1632,
and settled first at Braintree, Mass., removing a few years later to
Chelmsford, Mass., of which he was one of the earliest proprietors. Col.
Simeon Spalding married, for his second wife, Mrs. Abigail Wilson, whose
maiden name was Johnson, the fourth generation in descent from Edward
Johnson of Woburn, who came from Kent county, England. Matthias Spalding
was one of the youngest of her children, born at Chelmsford, June 25,
1769, and graduated at Harvard College in 1798. Adopting the medical
profession, he went abroad to perfect his education by attending
lectures in London. Having a natural aptitude for the practice of
medicine and surgery, with this superior training, he was soon
distinguished for his successful treatment of disease, and his services
were widely sought.
In 1806, after the settlement of Matthias Spalding at Amherst, he
married Rebecca Wentworth, daughter of Hon. Joshua Atherton, and sister
of Charles H. Atherton, an eminent lawyer and father of Hon. Charles G.
Atherton, late United States senator. Mrs. Spalding was a woman of a
refined nature and elegant manners. Of eight children, Edward was the
first son and the fourth child. Favored in his parentage, he was also
favored in the circumstances and companionships of his early life. The
society of Amherst embraced a number of families of superior talents and
education. Among the children of these families he was an active, manly,
and generous boy, fond of fishing and athletic sports, and popular with
his schoolmates.
When eleven years of age he was sent to Chelmsford, to be under the
instruction of Rev. Abiel Abbott. At thirteen, he was one of a company
of Amherst lads who became students at Pinkerton Academy, in Derry, then
in charge of Abel F. Hildreth, a celebrated master in those days. While
preparing for college, he was associated with Jarvis Gregg, Stephen
Chase, James F. Joy, and James McCollom, who were subsequently
distinguished as scholars, becoming tutors in the college at Hanover,
after graduation. In college young Spalding made good use of his
opportunities, and counted among his friends and classmates at Dartmouth
Rev. F. A. Adams, Ph. D., Prof. Joseph C. Bodwell, D. D., Hon. J. F.
Joy, LL. D., John Lord, LL. D., Judge Fowler of Concord, and Rev. E.
Quincy S. Waldron, president of Borromeo College, Md.
In the autumn following his graduation, in 1833, young Spalding went to
Lexington, Ky., hoping to obtain employment as a teacher. The effort to
establish a private classical school in Lexington, though widely
advertised, was not successful. The patronage did not answer to the
promises of the ambitious prospectus, and, after a trial of a few weeks,
the enterprise was abandoned as unremunerative. The West was not to be
the scene of Dr. Spalding's life, nor teaching his employment.
Mr. Spalding returned to New England in the spring of 1834, and
commenced the study of medicine in the office of his father at Amherst.
He attended three courses of lectures in the Harvard Medical School at
Boston, and was graduated at that institution in the summer of 1837.
Having spent a few months riding with his father, and observing his
treatment of the sick, he decided to enter on what seemed a promising
field for a physician at Nashua. Accepting an invitation from the elder
Dr. Eldredge, he became a partner with him in practice. After this
partnership was dissolved the business increased, and he gained for
himself an extensive and valuable patronage. He enjoyed the confidence
of a large circle of families, and his success as a physician had given
him an enviable reputation. In the meantime he had been called to assume
responsibilities of a fiduciary nature, involving such care and labor as
seriously to interfere with his professional engagements. The transition
to these new employments was the natural sequence of the excellent
judgment and rare capacity for business which he manifested. The
accuracy and promptitude with which his accounts were rendered to the
probate, and the just consideration for the feelings and interests of
all persons concerned in the settlement of the estates committed to his
trust, brought such a pressure of occupation that he was compelled to
relinquish his profession.
He had now been in practice twenty-five years, and satisfactory as his
services as a physician had been to the community, he was yet to perform
an imperative and valuable service by his judicious management of
important trusts and his earnest co-operation in the direction and
enlargement of new enterprises. In addition to his engagements in the
settlement of large estates, he became interested in banking,
manufacturing, and railroads, holding various offices of labor and
responsibility in these institutions and corporations. He was for
several years treasurer of the Nashua Savings Bank and subsequently its
president. He was one of the original projectors of the "Pennichuck
Water-Works," of which company he is president. A director in both of
the large cotton manufacturing companies which have contributed so much
to the prosperity of the city, he has also fulfilled similar duties in
other corporations elsewhere. For a time a director, he has become the
president, of the Indian Head National Bank.
In municipal and town offices he has performed important duties, taking
a lively interest in the progress of popular education. He has been a
member of the school committee a large portion of the time that he has
lived in Nashua, and is now chairman of the board of education. A member
of the New Hampshire Historical Society, his encouragement and
assistance are gratefully acknowledged by several gentlemen who have
been engaged in the preparation and publication of genealogical and town
histories. He has also been actively engaged in building up the city
library, of which he has been a trustee from the beginning of the
enterprise.
Never seeking political preferment, and personally disinclined to the
strife for political distinctions, he was elected mayor of the city in
1864, and served as delegate to the Baltimore convention in the same
year. He was a member of the state convention for the revision of the
constitution in 1876, and councilor for two years during the
administration of his Excellency Governor Prescott, 1878 and 1879.
In 1866 he was elected a trustee of Dartmouth College, a position which
he still retains, and in which he has contributed to the substantial
prosperity of the institution by frequent, unobtrusive gifts, and the
steady service of a loyal and judicious mind. He has also represented
Dartmouth College as a trustee of the College of Agriculture and the
Mechanic Arts during the whole period of its existence as a department
of instruction.
On the 23d of June, 1842, Dr. Spalding was united in marriage with Dora
Everett, second daughter of Joseph and Mary Appleton Barrett, of New
Ipswich, a family associated favorably with the history of the town so
widely known by the character and achievements of its sons. By this
marriage Dr. Spalding had three children, of whom two daughters are
living; the second child, a son. Edward Atherton, died November 10,
1863, aged eleven years and two months. With this exception, the life of
Dr. Spalding has been singularly exempt from afflictive changes. Happy
in the circle of his kindred and the connections formed by marriage, his
home has been a welcome resort to the youth of both families, while the
older generation was tenderly cared for by the thoughtful and continued
ministrations of this son and his companion.
As might be inferred from what has been said of the general esteem in
which Dr. Spalding is held, he has many personal friends among men of
thoughtful and scholarly habits. Himself a student, and thoroughly awake
to whatever affects the nation's welfare, he has been a careful reader
of current history. He has marked the progress of the various moral and
political questions that agitate the minds of the people and shape the
legislation of the country, with deep concern that the issues might be
favorable to the principles of truth and righteousness. A sincere
believer in the teachings of our Divine Lord, he has recognized as a
Christian the claims of the country, as well as the claims of the city
where he dwells. A liberal and constant contributor to the institutions
which are organized to extend the knowledge of Christ throughout the
world, he is known as the patron and advocate of missions at home and
abroad. For many years he has been the president of the New Hampshire
Bible Society. He has cheerfully borne his full proportion of the
expenses incident to the maintenance of the local institutions of public
worship and religious instruction in the church and society with which
he is connected. When the meeting-house of the First Congregational
church was burned, he at once proposed to his friend, Mr. Isaac
Spalding, that they two should each give ten thousand dollars towards
the cost of rebuilding,--a proposition to which Mr. Spalding promptly
assented, thus insuring the immediate erection of the commodious and
pleasant edifice which that church now owns.
With such a variety of offices and engrossing employments still
demanding his attention, we should anticipate that the duties would
become burdensome, and the skillful hand lose something of its cunning;
but the Doctor is still vigorous and works easily. This continued
capacity for labor is doubtless owing to the natural endowments of a man
who has nurtured his forces by avoiding excesses on the one hand, and on
the other by carefully husbanding his strength. He has not only arranged
his business on system, but he has resolutely reserved to himself,
annually, seasons of almost absolute rest. Retaining his early fondness
for fishing, for a few weeks in every year he has resorted to the
mountain streams and inland lakes of northern New England for his