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| Account Book, Jonathan Batchelder (1800 - 1847) |
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| Jonathan Batchelder's Account Book of Chichester New Hampshir 1831 January the 12 |
Back in 2004 a wonderful thing happened to me. A gentleman who had bought a box of books on the West Coast found a small account book dating from 1831. The name Jonathan Batchelder of Chichester, New Hampshire was written on the first page. This gentleman spent much time trying to find a descendant of Jonathan. Someone at the Chichester Historical Society found my online family tree because Jonathan Batchelder is my 4th great grandfather.
Note: I had
posted a query about Jonathan Batchelder at a bulletin board at GenForum in
2000. It’s still there fifteen years
later, and it still brings me email about the Batchelder family. It pays to plaster the names of your
ancestors everywhere- forums, Facebook, blogs, bulletin boards, wikis,
everywhere. You never know what will
happen or who will contact you.
Back in 2009, when my blog was new, I wrote a post
about how I received Jonathan Batchelder’s account book. You can read that story by clicking
HERE. Since that time I have been
researching the life of Jonathan Batchelder and his family. It’s a very sad story. But it’s amazing that his little book ended
up on the West Coast and somehow found its way back to me.
There was nothing of genealogical value written
inside this account book. Of course,
there are lots of names of people who lived near Jonathan and probably lived in
Chichester, New Hampshire in the 1830s and 1840s. It is fascinating community
information. Some of the names might be
relatives because there are quite a few Batchelders and Lanes listed. Prices listed of items and labor traded
are interesting. The spelling is
atrocious. The biggest surprise was this
slip of paper stuck inside:
This is a wonderful find! This paper has much more information than
what I found in the probate records online.
I first went to Family Search where I found an index of probate in this
time period, where I found this index card:
Using the date and the docket number from this index
card I was able to find the record in this volume and page here:
"New Hampshire, County Probate Records,
1660-1973," images, FamilySearch
(https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1942-32660-11094-71?cc=2040537&wc=M797-G68:347815801,348206601
: accessed 18 February 2015), Merrimack > Dockets 1844-1858 no 2275-4869
> image 76 of 339; county courthouses, New Hampshire.
And here is a close up of this case:
Why was Nancy Batchelder named guardian to 14 year
old Pauline Ann Batchelder? Well, it’s a long story…
Jonathan Batchelder was born about 1800 in Hampton,
New Hampshire, the son of Elisha Batchelder and Sarah Lane. On 11 February 1822 in Belmont, New
Hampshire he married Nancy Thompson. She
was born about 1804 in Gilmanton, New Hampshire. They had two children born in Chichester:
George born in 1822 and Pauline Ann born in 1828.
In the
newspaper New Hampshire Patriot and State
Gazette on 21 November 1840, I found a notice on page 3 stating that
Jonathan Batchelder had emancipated his son George. My 3rd great grandfather, George, had just reached the age of
18, and went off on his own to earn a living. This was a common notice in those days.
However, as I was searching the
newspapers I found a more sinister notice in the New Hampshire Patriot and State Gazette on 3 December 1846, page 4:
Guardian’s
Notice:
Notice
is hereby given, that the subscriber has been duly appointed by the Judge of
Probate for the county of Merrimack, guardian of the person and estate of
Jonathan Batchelder, of Chichester, in said county, decreed to be an insane
person. All persons indebted to the said
Jonathan Batchelder are requested to make immediate payment to the subscriber,
and all having claims to present them for adjustment.
David
M. Carpenter, Guardian
Chichester,
Nov. 24, 1846
A few months later this was found in the New
Hampshire Patriot and State Gazette, 11 March 1847, page 4:
Guardian's
Sale
"By
virtue of a license from the Judge of Probate for the county of Merrimack, the
subscriber as guardian of Jonathan Batchelder, of Chichester, in said county,
who has been decreed an insane person, will sell at public auction on
Wednesday, the 24th day of March next, at ten o'clock in the forenoon, all the
right and interest the said Batchelder has in the homestead place on which he
the said Batchelder has heretofore resided, containing about fifty five acres
of first rate land, on which there is a good lot of timber and wood; the house
large and two stories, and recently painted; the barn and shed not old. Said farm is within about two miles of
Pittsfield Village, and on the main road from Pittsfield to Concord and Manchester,
on which road Stages pass and repass every day.
Also, about fifteen acres of pasture and wood land, lying about one half
of a mile from said farm, adjoining and of David Brown and others. Terms of payment liberal. Sale on the premises.
D.
M. Carpenter, Guardian
Chichester,
Feb. 24, 1847
This was followed by another notice in the fall of
the same year, New Hampshire Patriot and State Gazette, 4 November 1847, page 3:
Administrator's
Notice
"The
subscriber hereby gives notice that he has been duly appointed administrator of
the estate of Jonathan Batchelder, late of Chichester, deceased,
intestate. All persons indebted to said
estate are requested to make immediate payment, and all having claims to
present them to the subscriber for adjustment.
D.
M. Carpenter, Adm'r
Chichester,
Sept 29, 1847
It is never easy to read that an ancestor was insane
and died so young. The family home was
sold and the courts at this time granted guardianship of the minor child,
Pauline, to her mother. This was also
common at the time. Mothers were not automatically given their children upon the
death of the father.
One clue I have is that according to the book Batchelder,
Batcheller: Descendants of Rev. Stephen Bachiler by Frederick Clifton Pierce
written in 1898, it states that Jonathan Batchelder died in Concord, New
Hampshire. No date given. No other details about his life, not even a
maiden name for his wife, Nancy. From
the newspaper notices we can guess that he died before 4 November 1847. There was a state insane asylum in Concord at
the time, just a few miles away from Chichester. Jonathan’s death was not recorded in any
vital records.
Nancy Batchelder drops out of the records after her
guardianship was recorded. She is not in
any census, nor is she in the vital records as remarrying or dying. I’d love to
know what happened to her. She was my 4th
great grandmother, and I don’t know her origins, parents nor her birthday. I only learned her maiden name from Pauline’s
death record. Nancy Thompson is a true brickwall
ancestor.
Pauline grew up to marry David C. Watson of Vermont
sometime before 1849 when her first son, Charles, was born in Pittsfield, New
Hampshire. About 1851 she had another
son, and she named him George. David
Watson had a clothing business in Boston on Howard Street with his brother
Charles. David died in Sutton, New
Hampshire in 1903, and Pauline died in 1911.
Pauline’s brother, George E. Batchelder, is my 3rd
great grandfather. He spent the rest of
his life in Chichester as a farmer, like his father. He also died young, at age 26, in 1848. He married Abigail M. Locke of South Boston
in 1845 and had two children before his early death, Abby Ann, born in 1847 and
died two weeks old, and George E. Batchelder, Jr., born posthumously on 8
October 1848, one month after his father’s death. George, Jr. is my great great
grandfather.
You can see that after more than 20 years of
researching this family, there still are lots of details yet to find!
Click here to read my previous blog post about Jonathan Batchelder's account book:
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The URL for this post is
http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/02/insanity-guardianship-account-books-and.html
Copyright © 2015, Heather Wilkinson Rojo
