In the Line of Fire: The Trefethen Tragedy of August 1863

On this day 150 years ago, William Trefethen and his wife Izette, and their children John, William, and George of New Castle, New Hampshire near Portsmouth were enjoying a relaxing summer excursion on a small island in the Piscataqua River, which during the previous century had been used to quarantine small pox patients (click here for more info http://www.seacoastnh.com/Places-%26-Events/Brewster%27s-Rambles/Smallpox-Parties-on-Pest-Island/. 

But on that warm, idyllic August day, death must have been furthest thing from their minds. The bloodiest summer of the Civil War that had recently transpired on the gruesome fields of Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, and Vicksburg must have seemed a world away. But the war was about to make a violent intrusion far from the battlefield, and shatter the Trefethen's world. 

After President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation had taken effect on January 1, 1863, many states and the Federal government began organizing units of black troops. During the summer of 1863 at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, which was only across the river from Pest Island and New Castle, black troops were brought in to garrison Fort Sullivan and learn how to fire the cannons which lined the river in case of an enemy attack from Confederate raiders such as thee Alabama. Click here to see post-war images of Fort Sullivan: http://www.northamericanforts.com/East/Maine/Fort_Sullivan/history.html

But on August 28, 1863 the Trefethen family suddently found themselves in the line of fire and this newspaper clipping from the New Hampshire Statesman on September 4 described the horrific scene:

A gravestone at the Riverside Cemetery in New Castle identifies John Trefethen as the boy who was killed. Additional records reveal that Mrs. Trefethen was also pregnant at the time of incident,  making her heroic actions even more remarkable (see here
http://kristinhall.org/fambly/Neal/IzetteNeal.html). 

 I am still searching for documents at the National Archives that might reveal the internal investigation by the Shipyard into the incident. Given how controversial blacks serving in the military was in 1863, my guess is that the Trefethen tragedy only served as confirmation to those who doubted former slaves could be competent soldiers. One can only imagine the remorse and embarrassment the unidentified soldiers themselves felt about the innocent loss of life they had caused.

The impact of that errant cannonball on August 28, 1863 lasted for decades. A document written more than twenty years later tragically hints at the severe psychological scars, probably post-traumatic stress, which Mrs. Trefethen suffered. On April 27, 1886, William Trefethen submitted a petition to Committee of Claims of the U.S. House of Representatives of the 49th Congress, which responded to his claim below:

The facts in this case are that on the 28th day of August, 1863, the wife and sons of the petitioner...were gathering berries on Pest Island , about three-fourths of a mile from Fort Sullivan, and that while so engaged a detachment of United States colored troops, stationed at said Fort, commenced firing shells upon the island, the result of which was that the petitioner's son was killed, and his wife was rendered insane from the fright received by the firing and the shock produced by the killing of her son. These facts are abundantly proven by affidavits...

Your committee are of the opinion that petitioner has not strictly legal claim for compensation, yet, in view of the facts that the gun firing was, according to the testimony of Rear-Admiral Murray, the result of carelessness and ignorance on the part of the United States troops, we report a bill allowing petitioner the sum  of $5,000, and respectfully recomment that it do pass. 

(Click here for the original document from the Congressional Record): http://books.google.com/books?id=ylFHAQAAIAAJ&pg=PR433&dq=son+of+William+Trefethen+killed+1863&hl=en#v=onepage&q=%20William%20Trefethen%20killed%201863&f=false

Unfortunately for historians today, I was informed by the Center for Legislative Archives that all of the affidavits mentioned in the petition above have been lost. But the monetary compensation would never heal the invisible wounds suffered by the Trefethen family. Back in New Hampshire, Izette Trefethen died in March 1887, according to her headstone in the same cemetery as her poor son, where they lie for eternity within sight of the island which witnessed the tragedy that shattered their world.

Babes in the Woods: Lost Children from New Hampshire's Past

© 2012 by Chris Benedetto, all rights reserved. The material on this website cannot be reproduced or quoted without written consent from the author. Endnotes indicating sources may be found at the bottom corresponding to numbers in the text.

As a parent, there is perhaps nothing worse than the feeling of sheer panic that creeps in when your child has suddenly disappeared from sight, into the wild or the arms of someone who may harm them. But this primal fear of every parent is by no means a modern one. Centuries ago, the rugged landscape of early New Hampshire was a treacherous place for children to wander, where some of them vanished, never be seen again. And even for those who were found, the tramautic experience of being alone in the wildnerness was one these New Hampshire children would never forget. Their stories remain haunting today.

In October 1756, Daniel Fowle and his slave Artimus began publishing the first newspaper in the colony, the New-Hampshire Gazette, a fascinating hodge-podge of international politics, maritime affairs, and local news and gossip. Just over a year later on December 9, 1757, perhaps the first printed notice of a missing child in New Hampshire's history appeared in their paper :

"We hear from Dover, that a Child about three weeks old having been Missing from its Parents for about five Weeks, was found dead last Sunday about a Mile and a half from Home: 'Tis almost incredible how it got thro' the bad Traveling, the Bushes, and over the rocks to the Place where it lay."

The identity of the parents and child of this tragedy remain unknown, but another New Hampshire family in Temple would suffer perhaps an even worse trauma a few years before the American Revolution.Thomas Maynard was born on December 18, 1764, to his parents Artemas and Miriam Maynard of Temple.(1) On the morning of August 7, 1769, young Thomas and his father went out to harvest some crops. After a while, the boy wanted to return home to see his mother and little sister, Lucy, who was eight months old. But when Artemas returned that evening from his labors, he learned from his wife that Thomas had never arrived! A neighbor said that she had seen the boy pass their home at about 11 AM, but by the next morning no trace of the child had been found. One can only imagine the stress and shock that Maynard family endured as each day passed with no news concerning the fate of their beloved son. On August 25, 1769, the following newspaper article appeard in the New Hampshire Gazette, discussing the mystery:

For several weeks, the residents of Temple scoured the surrounding forests and fields but all hope was lost for the child's survival. Then in October 1769, according to the town historian Amos Blood, men surveying some woods north of the town found remnants of clothing who were alleged to belong to young Thomas Maynard.(2) But no human remains were ever found. The boy's disappearance was so traumatic to the entire community that the local minister composed an elegy, a style of mourning poetry popular during the eighteenth century, which was recorded for posterity by the nineteenth-century historian of Temple. Below are a few of the most poignant stanzas:

"And now behold his parents dear,

and friends in many a bitter tear;

 They sigh and grieve continually,

And for him weep most bitterly.

Now when he died, we cannot tell,

No mortal else, we know full well; 

We s'pose that he did sigh and cry,

Till with great hunger he did die."

To read the whole work, click here: http://books.google.com/booksid=KCUwAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA179&dq=casualties++nh&hl=en&sa=X&ei=TrufUbukMfOn4AOVz4GQBg&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAA#v=snippet&q=maynard&f=false

The following year,  there were a few missing children cases in New Hampshire that fortunately had happier endings. In May 1770, seven year old Thomas Wentworth of Middleton went missing, and after searching for seven days, the searchers gave up and assumed he had "been carried off and devoured by some wild beast!"(3)  However on the fifteenth day of his disappearance, Thomas Wentworth was found eating wild berries in the woods and news of miraculous deliverance reached as far as Boston.

During the fall of 1770, the three year old daughter of John Mellen, Lucretia, also got lost in the woods near her home in Fitzwilliam. Her family and dozens of other townspeople searched the forest for hours with pine boughs as torches until they found her resting under an uprooted tree with her dog. While this story had a happier ending then the one in Temple, the historian of Fitzwilliam claimed that "this lost child carried the effects of this fright all through her life." She lived nearly a century, dying in 1861 at the age of ninety-five.(4)

In a future post, I will discuss the cases of children of the past who were not lost but forcibly abducted from the homes. It is not as modern a trend as you might think...

Endnotes

1. Henry Amos Blood, The History of Temple, N.H. (1860), 260.
2. The History of Temple, 16-17.
3. Boston Newsletter, June 7, 1770.
4. John Foote Norton, The History of Fitzwilliam, N.H. from 1752 to 1887, 125-126.

Before Newtown: Mental Illness & Murder in a New Hampshire Family

© 2012 by Chris Benedetto, all rights reserved. The material on this website cannot be reproduced or quoted without written consent from the author. Endnotes indicating sources may be found at the bottom corresponding to numbers in the text.

In this post-Newtown massacre world, the ineffective treatment of people suffering from mental illness and tragedies like the one which transpired in Connecticut have become the proverbial elephant in the room; everyone knows it is there but no meaningful action has yet been taken. While the hereditary nature of mental illness and the murder of a mother by her disturbed son may seem like profoundly modern phenomena, the shocking history of the Kendrick family reveals that this same debate over mental illness, violence, and what to do about it was raging more than two centuries ago.

 In the Congregational Cemetery in the quiet town of Hollis lie for eternity several members of the Kendrick family, but their impressive slate headstones reveal nothing of the tortured existence and demise. For example, the marker of Daniel Kendrick Jr.http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76005626 has customary sentiments of mortality from the late 18th century inscribed on it, but tells nothing of the circumstances of his death, and perhaps for good reason. One must delve into the print media of their time to learn the real story.

The May 25, 1790 issue of the Concord Herald reported that thirty-year old Kendrick had "in a fit of delirium, finished his existence by hanging himself in his barn. His wife found him suspended by a bridle, which she immediately cut and set him down...but Death had closed him in his iron jaws!"

Even more disturbing at the end of this obituary was the following disclosure: "It is a little remarkable, that the father, and a brother, of Mr. K. had died of delirium, in the course of a year." Could this actually be true?

The sad headstones in Hollis silently speak to us. On March 17, 1789 twenty-two year old Caleb Kendrick, Daniel's younger brother, had indeed passed away, though we will never the true cause of his death http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76006995. Their father Daniel Kendrick Sr., a Revolutionary War veteran and town selectman, died soon after in May 1789, and his gravestone can be viewed here: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76005685.

For the remaining members of the Kendrick clan, which included included thirteen year old John Kendrick, his older sister Hannah, and his mother Hannah, these must have been dark days indeed. They had buried three men of their family within a year but tried to preserve some sort of social decorum and normalcy by hiring New Hampshire stone carver John Ball to erect markers in memory of their loved ones. For more than a decade, the Kendricks persevered until another devastating tragedy would claim the surviving members of the family.

"Melancholy Relation": April 1805

Fifteen years after the dark days of 1789-90, the youngest of the Kendrick children John had begun to exhibit signs of the same mental illness (possibly depression) which had claimed the lives of his father and older brothers. The newspaper reports of the time are eerily reminiscent of those which followed the Newtown massacre; they tell of warning signs ignored and failed attempts to avert an impending tragedy. According to Amherst's own newspaper, John Kendrick "for several years past discovered symptoms of insanity; but had generally been able to conduct his business...and when well, was sober and regular in his deportment." (1)

But in April 1805, his behavior had become so alarming that the Kendrick's neighbors went to their house and "made his situation the subject of conversation with his mother and sister, who, though sensible to his derangement, were unwilling anything should be mentioned to him, or that it should be generally known." Like Nancy Lanza more than two hundred years later, Mrs. Kendrick was unfortunately paralyzed and lulled into a false sense of security by  innate love for her son, and the refusal to believe that John was capable of doing harm to himself and others;  "This reluctance in them undoubtedly arose from the severe sufferings which the family had before experienced , in consequence of insanity...The mother and sister doated on this only remaining son and brother...and therefore were unwilling his failings should be made public." But this inability to face their family's issues would cost them their lives.

At nine on the morning of April 22, John Kendrick appeared like a demon at the door of his neighbor, "his hands red with blood...for his mother, he said, was dead, and his sister nearly so." When the alarmed neighbors arrived at the Kendrick homestead, they were greeted with a revolting scene of carnage. Mrs. Kendrick had been  "mangled in a manner to shocking to relate" and his sister inflicted with twenty fatal wounds with various tools and objects in their house, "such as the leg of a chair, a cane, a hammer, a pair of tongs...To describe the scene of horror would be too much for the finer feelings of nature." John Kendrick was immediately placed in the town jail, where he awaited a trial that never came. Below is a haunting description of him in the wake of the murders of his sister and mother:

One cannot blame John for not wanting to wear the clothes splattered with his mother's and sister blood, which suggests he was certainly capable of feeling remorse for his deadly deeds. But it is ironic that in the weeks that followed, the household goods and even clothes of the Kendrick family were sold off. I wonder who would have purchased the vestiges of this horrific tragedy?

 

By the time of this public auction, John Kendrick himself was dead, perhaps from sickness or suicide. (2) The fact that he was buried near his victims, and his father and brothers who had all committed suicide is in itself interesting, as there was a tradition in Anglo-America to not allow the bodies of those who had committed suicide to be buried inside the sacred ground of a cemetery. In fact, not too far away in 1806, when a man in Hallowell, Maine murdered his family and killed himself, diarist and midwife Martha Ballard recorded that he was buried in the middle of the road outside the cemetery. (3)  But in a span of a few months, new headstones appeared in the Hollis cemetery, which spoke nothing of the tragedy that had obliterated an entire family:
John Kendrick: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76006027

His mother: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76006189

His sister: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76005534

In June 1805, the remainder of the Kendrick's possessions were put up for sale, but one wonders who would have wanted to attend an auction at the scene of a double murder?

Apparently, the house was inhabited after the Kendrick atrocity, but according to a local history website, the house was haunted. It also affords us a view of what the haunted Kendrick home site looks like today long after it vanished: http://www.hollisnh.org/windowsonhollispast/historicSites/sitesAcrossHollis/sites/035-063.htm 

Like the media today in the wake of Newtown, newspaper editors in 1805 did not shy away from expressing what they thought should be done to prevent future incidents. In April 1805, the editor of the Farmer's Cabinet preceded contemporary calls for government intervention: "We would leave the fact on record, as a solemn warning, against allowing insane and distracted persons the privilege of doing mischief, by permitting them to go at liberty. We think it worthy of legislative attention." But in the wake of Kendrick tragedy of 1805, New Hampshire would take nearly another thirty-five years to erect a facility specifically for the treatment of the mentally ill. That is a story for another time. But the desperate pleas to improve the treatment of the mentally ill and protect those around them have remained unanswered because mental illness is still a taboo subject that has not received proper attention in our society. But if there is to be change, it must start in the homes of America, not the hollow halls of government.Unlike the Kendrick family, we need to stand united against our inner demons and not be ashamed to get our loved ones help if they need it. But let us hope we take more effective and immediate action in the wake of the enormous tragedy of our own time before it happens again.

Endnotes

1. Farmer's Cabinet, April 30, 1805. All subsequent quotes in this paragraph are from this paper, which was printed in Amherst for most of the nineteenth century.

2. Farmer's Cabinet, May 21, 1805.

3. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, based on Her Diary 1785-1812 (Vintage Books: New York, 1990), 291-296.