Dedication of Marker for Samuel Kinney

Revolutionary War Veteran

June 16, 1921

The New Ipswich Historical Society held a program to dedicate a marker to Samuel Kinney, a revolutionary war veteran who died from Smallpox and was not buried in any of the town’s cemeteries.

The Program

• Poems - “Once in the Flight”, “We Know What it is”

• Life of Samuel Kinney written by a High School Student

• “America” sung by students of Schoolhouse #4 (located near the marker)

• Taps - Walter Hardy

ONCE IN THE FLIGHT

   Once in the flight of ages past 
      There lived a man, and who was he? Mortal, howe'er thy lot is cast 
   That man resembled thee. 

   The bounding pulse, the languid limb 
      The changing spirits rise and fall 
   We know that these were felt by him 
      For they are felt by all. 

   He suffered, but his pangs are o'er Enjoyed, but his delights are fled, 
      Had friends, his friends are now no more And foes, his foes are dead. 

   He saw whatever thou hast seen Encountered all that troubles thee, 
      Не шаs whatever thou hast been 
   He is what thou shalt be.

WE KNOW WHAT IT IS - Mary Ruth Dodge

   We know not what it is at all, this sleep so calm and still 
      But this we know that all the dead if they should come this way 
   Should come and ask us what is Life ? not one of us could sау. 

   Life is a mystery as deep as ever death can be 
      Yet oh how dear it is to us this life we live and see. 
   Then might they say, those vanished ones and blessed is the thought 
      So death is sweet to each of us tho we may show you naught. 
   We may not to the quick reveal the mystery of death 
      Ye cannot tell us if ye could the mystery of breath. 

   The child who enters life comes not with knowledge or intent 
      So those who enter death must go as little children sent. 
   Nothing is known, but we believe that God is overhead, 
      And as life is to the living, so death is to the dead. 

LIFE OF SAMUEL KINNEY - A.L.P. June 1921

   We are here today to honor a man about whom we know very little, but a careful search of our old and new histories has brought to light a few statements which are in all probability facts. 

   We know that he was here very early somewhere about 1762, and that he lived on Range 4, Lot 4, the successive owners of the spot being Jonathan Kinney, Nathaniel Williams, Levi Bailey, Zaccheus Walker, Danforth Walker, Shebuel Shattuck, Samuel Cushing, Edmond Barton, John Wilkinson, William H. Foster, Charles Stanyan, and later owned and occupied by different families of Finnish people. 

   How long the original house stood is unknown, but descendants of Samuel Cushing tell us their ancestor built the one now standing on the spot. We know that Samuel Kinney was several times Selectman, and held other town offices and by this fact judge him to have been a trustworthy and respected citizen. There is no record of the births of his children or deaths of the family, but we know he had several adult sons. The venerable Isaac Appleton told our first historian that the fir first military training he ever witnessed was in 1771. He said the Company was very large, containing no less than a hundred men. He heard the Clerk call the Roll and five brothers answered to the name of Kinney. 

   We know that at one time a large number of people in the south part of the town became greatly interested in the Shakers or Shaking Quakers and find Samuel Kinney to have been one of the converts to that faith. Large numbers of them used to gather at what we call the old Daniel Ramsdell place which stood not far fromwhere we are assembled today, and hold their meetings. Their exercises used to consist of furious and long continued whirling and dancing accompanied with singing and shouting which could be heard for a long distance. A stick which had been used for thumping time at these meetings was for thirty years preserved on the beams of Kinney's house. By his having this stick it would seem as if he held the office of beating time for the company. 

   That he was a farmer we know for everyone was at that time that he was a carpenter also we know, but it remained for our late historian Prof. Charles H. Chandler to discover in him a soldier of the Revolution. From the Massachusetts Revolutionary Rolls in the State House in Boston Prof. Chandler found that Samuel Kinney was a Private in Col. William Prescott's Regiment, Capt. John Nutting's Company, and it is for this we honor him today. His end was tragic. In the summer of 1777 he and his son Samuel were engaged as carpenters in erecting for Col. Thomas Heald what has since been known as the Esterbrook Tavern. As they were busily engaged at their work one day along came a traveller, a discharged soldier. What more natural than that they should stop and converse. Kinney had been in the war and so had the stranger. Surely they had many things to talk about; all well and good but the stranger was just up from the small pox and it appears that the germs were still about him, for in a short time Samuel Kinney and his son developed the same disease died. 

   At that time it was the custom to bury those who died of that disease in some remote spot, so the father and son were buried here. It might seem strange to call this spot remote when it is within a stones throw of the school house but at the time of these burials it is known that the school house stood on the Ashburnham road about half a mile from the Gibson Four Corners. The exact spot is not known. Eventually this house was built and many generations of children have played around the spot, but most of the later ones have known nothing of its history. For many years there was a low wall of stones laid in a circle around the graves and such children as knew about it always approached it with awe and respect. 

   There used to be quite a number of wild cherry trees around and even inside the circle but apparently these have been gone for some time. Lately road makers have been getting gravel from this bank to such an extent that we who knew of the ancient burials were afraid the graves would be uncovered. As soon as it was known that Samuel Kinney was a Revolutionary soldier the Historical Society purchased the bronze marker we dedicate to-day to mark the spot, hoping in this way to keep the graves unmolested, and also to arouse the respect and interest of the future generations of children who will play around this spot.

This might be Schoolhouse 4

This building has been renovated into a family home, located near Gibson Four Corners. The students mentioned in article might have attended this school.

Formulas

Stephen A. Thayer’s “One Hundred Formulas” was published in 1883. It contains recipes from everything from printing ink to pain killers. Itchy?

WARNING: Please don’t try any of these “remedies”, many contain ingredients which have been shown to be harmful.

James Roger diary entry

December 2, 1908 (Wednesday)

Hard frost bitter cold day, wind west with slight snow flurries.  Hills beyond Temple partly white in morning.  David working at church cleaning up with G. Sargent.  I cleared the leaves off lots in Cemetery and walked to Greenville in afternoon with Hamish’s bag came back by Jowder’s and got mail one letter from Alice.  At the Parsonage social last night there was a good turnout.  A short literary programme on the “Origin of Man” and social hour afterward.