Sketches of Successful New Hampshire Men
state. The Veterans, as is well known, uniformed in continental style,
and to-day enjoy a wide reputation for their unique and quaint
appearance on parade, their martial bearing, and soldierly mien, and for
the character of the rank and file. In the fall of 1855, upon the
invitation of President Pierce, the Amoskeag Veterans visited Washington
and became guests at the White House, freely enjoying its hospitality,
and receiving official honor. While there they made a notable pilgrimage
to the tomb of Washington at Mount Vernon. On its return, the battalion
attracted much public notice. At Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York,
it received special attention and entertainment. During the late war the
Veterans showed patriotism, both in deed and sentiment, and otherwise
promoted the national cause.
In politics, Mr. Riddle was a Whig, during the existence of the party;
and subsequently became a Republican. Though not a politician, he took
an earnest and active interest in the public affairs of the country.
Respecting the constitutional rights of all sections, he most faithfully
upheld the integrity of the nation. With him, liberty of thought,
speech, and action was a fundamental and inherent idea. To him the
history and traditions of the American people were a sacred heritage,
and the constitution and union were solemn and paramount obligations,
inseparable and indissoluble. In political faith, he believed the nation
co-existed in perpetuity, and that the people were the source of all
sovereignty; that parties and policies were expedients,--essential, but
subordinate to principle and the fundamental concerns of the state. In
the early discussions prior to the outbreak of the late rebellion, he
took an earnest and serious interest. He regarded secession as
treasonable heresy, and odious. During the war he was an ardent
supporter of the government, and threw all his influence in its behalf.
With deep faith in free institutions, and the power of the nation, he
"never despaired of the Republic." Upon the close of hostilities, peace
was welcomed by him as the harbinger of a redeemed country.
Though nurtured under Scotch Presbyterian influences, Mr. Riddle was
ultimately a Unitarian in his religious faith. He was prominent among
the founders of the Unitarian society at Manchester, and exercised much
personal regard for its success. Liberal in his views, he was always
actuated by principle, and aimed at consistency in Christianity. The
Sermon on the Mount was to him an abiding force. Dogma was subordinated
to faith; and faith enlightened by reason. A patient listener to
religious teaching, he molded his own opinions. In his last days he was
wont to say, that, upon a retrospection of his life, he "did not wish to
change anything." Simplicity of character, charity, and hospitality were
marked traits in life. Energy, efficiency, and integrity characterized
his whole career. In private life he was much respected, and fully
sustained the confidence of his fellow-men. In public life he was
identified with every worthy achievement of his time. Few men of his
generation and nativity have lived more active lives, and few will leave
for a memorial a wider record of usefulness and enterprise.
In the full possession of his faculties, at the ripe age of eighty-six
years, the subject of this sketch passed quietly away, on the 18th day
of May, 1875. The church he helped to build and to sustain was the scene
of his obsequies. In the cemetery at Bedford, by the place of his birth,
within the old family tomb, he was interred, amid the kindly offices of
friends, and the associations with which he had so long been identified.
Such is the brief portrayal of a life and character, which in some
degree was the logical outcome of the rugged circumstances that beset
the early settlements of New Hampshire.
The causes which led to the establishment of civil and religious liberty
in New England equally wrought out the characteristics of the people.
Bedford, Londonderry, Antrim, were primarily a part of the wilds, and
the "rock-ribbed" hills, that were subdued and made habitable by the
indomitable energy and frugal industry of those early pioneers. Their
descendants, partaking somewhat of their own robust virtues, have in
turn impressed the higher culture and the later institutions of the
country. In those old towns may yet be traced the lineaments of the
ancestry which so eminently struggled for "conscience' sake." Perhaps to
no influence more than that of the New England mothers' is attributable
the steady, underlying moral force which pervaded that elder
civilization.
Well may it be said, that "New Hampshire was a good state to emigrate
from,"--for those communities which have had the good fortune to be the
recipients of such an emigration.
JOHN B. CLARKE.
BY JOHN W. MOORE.
Among the various pursuits of the American people there can be no one
which ranks higher in a literary point of view than journalism. Once the
orator, the teacher, the learned adviser, and the judge had the greater
influence among the people; but now the newspaper, as a power in
civilization and culture, exceeds all other influences, for journalism
has become, in this country, a most potent agency for good, and editors
now, far more than statesmen, teachers, or ecclesiastics, are the guides
of current opinion. It was at one time a common saying in England, that
"America is too much governed by newspapers." Thomas Jefferson, hearing
this assertion, answered, "I would rather live in a country with
newspapers and without a government, than in a country with a government
but without newspapers." The well managed newspaper of to-day is not
only a recorder of events, but it occupies itself with all the thoughts
and doings of men, the discoveries of science, the treasures of
literature, the progress of art, the acts of heroes, and the sayings and
doings of Christendom. Sustained by the people, and laboring for them,
it has the power to make and unmake presidents, control parties, build
up free institutions, and regulate the minutest details of daily life;
it becomes in one sense school-master, preacher, lawgiver, judge, jury,
and policeman, in one grand combination. Among the influential
newspaper-men of this country who are now, and who for thirty years past
have been, busy in publishing journals, speaking for truth, honesty,
liberty, religion, and good government, is found the subject of this
sketch, JOHN BADGER CLARKE, the well known, genial, liberal,
enterprising, able, and very successful editor and publisher of the
Manchester, New Hampshire, _Daily Mirror and American_, and the _Weekly
Mirror and Farmer_.
John Badger Clarke was born at Atkinson, January 30, 1820, and was the
junior of six children--five sons and one daughter--of Greenleaf and
Julia (Cogswell) Clarke. Atkinson was a good town to be born in, and an
excellent place in which to gain religious, moral, and educational
instruction. The direct ancestors of the present Clarke family were from
Atkinson; and from that excellent farming town the children of Greenleaf
Clarke went forth on their way to college and to places of
responsibility, and to high callings in life,--the ancestors being known
as intelligent, honored, enterprising, patriotic people, conscientiously
religious, after the Puritan faith.
Julia Cogswell, the mother of Mr. Clarke, was the daughter of Dr.
William and Judith (Badger) Cogswell, and sister of Rev. William
Cogswell, Hon. Thomas Cogswell, Hon. Francis Cogswell, and Hon. George
Cogswell, biographical sketches of whom appear in this book. She was a
woman of great intellectual powers, a fine scholar, and was preceptress
of Atkinson Academy at the time when John Vose, author of a treatise on
astronomy, was principal.
The Badger family, connected with the Clarkes and Cogswells, are
descendants of Giles Badger, who settled at Newbury, Mass., in 1643.
Gen. Joseph Badger, born at Haverhill, Mass., January 11, 1722, and who
died April 4, 1803, in the eighty-second year of his age, was active in
the Revolution, a member of the provincial congress, and of the
convention which adopted the constitution. After removing to Gilmanton,
N. H., he held many town offices, was made a brigadier-general, was a
member of the state council, and was a stanch supporter of the
institutions of learning and religion. Hon. William Badger, born in
Gilmanton, January 13, 1779, was a representative, senator, president of
the senate, and governor of the state in 1834 and 1835. He was also an
elector of president and vice-president of the United States in 1824,
1836, and 1844; was an associate justice of the court of common pleas
from 1816 to 1821, and for ten years high-sheriff of the county. Hon.
Joseph Badger, Jr., son of the general, was born in Bradford, Mass.,
October 23, 1746; was distinguished as a military officer for thirty
years, passing from captain to brigadier-general. He served in the
Revolutionary war, and was present at the capture of Burgoyne. He died
at Gilmanton, January 15, 1809, aged sixty-two. His wife was a daughter
of Rev. William Parsons, and their marriage was the first one recorded
in Gilmanton.
Of Mr. Clarke's four brothers, a sketch of the eldest, the Hon. William
Cogswell Clarke, is given elsewhere in this book. Dr. Francis Clarke was
a very successful physician, who resided during his professional life at
Andover, Mass., where he died July 10, 1852. Hon. Greenleaf Clarke was a
teacher of the high school at Lynn until obliged to leave because the
sea air disagreed with him, when he returned to the old homestead in
Atkinson, where he has since resided. He was a member of Gov. Hubbard's
staff, several years a representative to the legislature, and, in 1879,
the senator from the Rockingham district, and is now New Hampshire's
commissioner of the Boston & Maine Railroad, an office which he held in
earlier days. Dr. Moses Clarke graduated from the Medical College,
Hanover, and received his degree in 1842. He was eminent as a physician
and surgeon; settled at East Cambridge, Mass., in 1845, and was a member
of the medical societies of that state in 1854, and a representative to
the American Medical Association. He was city physician for many years,
school committee, and one of the standing committee for the
Congregational society. He died at Cambridge, March 27, 1864. The sister
of these gentlemen, Sarah Clarke, married Col. Samuel Carleton of
Haverhill, Mass., and has since resided in that town. It is seldom that
a whole family of six children have so creditably been advanced to
distinction.
The marriage of John B. Clarke with Susan Greeley Moulton, of Gilmanton,
a descendant of John Moulton, who came to Hampton in 1638, more firmly
united the mentioned old families, adding the Thurstons, Gilmans,
Lampreys, Towles, Beans, Philbricks, and others, as did the marriage of
William C. Clarke with a daughter of Stephen L. Greeley unite the
Nortons of Newburyport, and others; while Moses Clarke, by marrying a
direct descendant of John Dwight, who came from England in 1634, and
settled in Dedham. Mass., 1636, became connected with a family which
furnished a commandant at Fort Dummer, during the Indian war, and whose
youngest son, Timothy C. Dwight, born at the fort, was the first white
child born in Vermont; thus through the Dwights, connecting the
Woolseys, Edwardses, Hookers, and other Massachusetts and Connecticut
families known in the history of education and the growth of Yale
College with the Clarkes, Cogswells, Badgers, and Gilmans of New
Hampshire.
Mr. Clarke passed the years of boyhood upon the farm of his father,
breathing the pure air, and enjoying the healthy exercise of farm labor.