The Faces of Spanish Influenza - Hartford Vermont

The Spanish Influenza was a worldwide epidemic that travelled with the soldiers of World War I in 1918. It killed 500 million people worldwide and at least 500,000 in the United States. Families in the Upper Valley lost loved ones to the Spanish Flu, but not on the huge scale experienced in other places. Most sources state that influenza hit the state of Vermont harder than the state of New Hampshire, but scientists and historians are at a loss to explain why. Possibly more Vermonters were serving in Fort Devens, and as they got sick, they went home so that their families could take care of them, bringing the illness with them.

On September 25^th, the epidemic started in Hartford when Clarence Jones, a laborer, died at age 30. Clarence was a married laborer. His wife's name was Clara and it does not appear that he had any children. Avon Lincoln, of Wilder, died of influenza at Fort Devens and arrived home in a coffin, on September 27. A few weeks later, his brother Harold also died of influenza. They were the only children of Charles and Viola Lincoln, who lived right next to what is now the Wilder Events Center. Through September and October of 1918, people in Hartford continued to die of influenza.

Pearl Dunn died next. He lived on Maple Street, with his wife Leslie. Pearl and Leslie were newlyweds, and Pearl was a postal clerk.

Lela May Green Hunt died on September 28^th. Lela was born in Canada and was married to George Hunt. They moved to Rochester where they raised their family of 7 children on their farm. In 1900, the census shows George as the head of the household in Rochester, but in 1910, Lela was the head of the household, farming with the children in Rochester. George does not appear in the census in 1910. Since Lela died in Hartford in 1918, and in 1920, George appears in the Hartford census as a bridge builder for the railroad, I am assuming that the Hunts decided that they would have a better life if they got out of farming, left Rochester, and George moved to Hartford to work building bridges for the railroad. In 1910, Lela was probably waiting for the property to sell in Rochester while George was already working at his new job in Hartford. This follows the pattern of many families who abandoned their worn out farms in the hill towns and got jobs working for factories or the railroad. The Hunts lived in the Forest Hill section of Hartford, in a house that they rented. Lela was 49 years old when she died. Two of her children were grown up when she died, and her son George was 18,leaving   five children still at home. George died four years later.             George and Lela Hunt

 Many of the children stayed in Hartford as adults. Sarah and Walter

lived very near each other in the Forest Hill neighborhood.

Julia Corkery was a cook. She was 58 years old when she died. She spent most of her life in Marlboro, Massachusetts, and probably cooked for the hotel or a restaurant in the center of town near the railroad. Both of her parents were born in Ireland, but she was born in Marlboro. In the 1900's, White River Junction was a bustling place, with trains pulling in and out of the railroad station constantly. Lots of people had jobs in the hotels and restaurants that served both railroad employees and passengers.

Albert Cutting died on October 3^rd. Albert's parents were Sidney and Flora Eaton, who got married in May of 1891, the same month and year Albert was born. Flora was the illegitimate daughter of Albert Lucas and Sarah Green, and she was born in Quincy, Massachusetts. In 1880, Sarah had relocated to Bridgewater, Vermont, and in the census, she is listed as a widowed servant It is typical for a woman with an illegitimate child to move away and invent a dead husband. Later, she married someone named Woodward.

In the meantime, Flora married Sidney Eaton in May of 1891, the same month Albert was born. Flora was 19 years old and Sidney was 26. Albert was named after his paternal grandfather. In the 1900 census, Albert was 9 years old and living in the home of Martin Frank Cutting,in Lebanon, with his mother and younger brother Elmer. Flora was listed as Albert's daughter, and the boys were listed as his grandsons. Flora's parentage had always been a mystery, so it was no stretch for her to move in with Martin Cutting and say he was her father.

Sidney Eaton, Albert's father, was living with his parents, also in Lebanon, and working at his brother's marble company. By the time the census was official, Flora had died, of consumption, and it is reasonable to assume that Mr. Cutting raised the boys to adulthood and Albert took his name. In 1900, when Flora and the boys lived with him, and Flora died, Martin Cutting is listed as a widow. There is another person living there, a boarder, Sarah Woodward, an older woman who was a washerwoman. In 1910, Martin is married (not to Sarah Woodward) and has three different children living with him, siblings. It's reasonable to assume that Martin took in boarders, and that Albert, Elmer, and Flora boarded with him. The question is, who paid him to take in a woman and her two young sons. What part did Sydney play in all this? Albert clearly thought enough of Martin Cutting to take his last name, although his brother did not.

In 1910, 19 year oldAlbert moved to Hartford, Vermont, boarded with the Hill family, and worked for the railroad. Two years later, he married Susie Alice Gilman. They had two children, Burton and Helen, and they lived on Nutt Lane. When Burton was five and Helen was two, Albert died of Spanish influenza. Suzie continued to live in Hartford. She worked in one of the factories, and in 1930 she, too, lived in the Forest Hill neighborhood, in a home that she owned. Burton died in 1982 and Helen died in 1995. By 1919, “the grippe” had pretty much burned itself out. From September 25 of 1918, to January 15 of 1919, 32 people died in Hartford of Spanish Influenza.

Alice and Dudley Chase of Cornish

The original incorporators did not settle in Cornish. They were land speculators who sold their land to families that wanted to build new communities in the wilderness. Two years after Governor Wentworth established the grant, the first family to live in Cornish traveled up the Connecticut River from Sutton, Massachusetts, a distance of 140 miles. Judge Samuel Chase had purchased extensive parcels of land from the incorporators of Cornish. In 1765, he and his son Dudley, son-in-law Daniel Putnam, and family friend Dyer Spaulding, brought Dudley's wife and children to New Hampshire to start a new town in the wilderness.

Coming up the Connecticut in a canoe, Judge Chase got as far as Walpole, which was the last real settlement. He was 60 years old, and decided to stay there while the rest of the group continued up the river. After they had cleared the land and built a house, he would join them, but for the time being, he would stay in Walpole. The rest of the band continued up the river.

Dudley and his wife Alice had seven children. Imagine them paddling up the river, into completely untamed wilderness. Canoes full of kids and provisions, along with their mother, father, and a couple of other men. Actually, the “History of Cornish” mentions that they had “workmen” with them, and you have to wonder if that means slaves. The “History of Cornish” also tells us that tradition says that it was in the earliest days of June, when the weather was at its nicest and the leaves were newly green.

Alice and the kids made it as far as Fort Number 4. Dudley left them at the fort while he and the other men continued up the river to begin work on their land. His priority was not to build a house, but to clear enough land to plant crops, and get the crops in the ground. After that, his plan was to start on a house and when all that was done, he would return for the kids and Alice. By that time, there was not much going on at Fort Number 4.

William Child, the author of “The History of Cornish”, writes that Alice's youngest son, Philander, writing as an adult, describes his mother as horribly lonely at the fort, with only her children for company. She spent most of her time down at the riverbank, looking for her husband coming down the river. Finally, one day at sunset, she saw a canoe in the distance. At first she thought it might be Indians, but as the canoe got closer she saw that it was not Indians, so it had to be her husband. Well, it wasn't. It was Dyer Spaulding, who was coming down to check on the family and get some provisions. Child says, “No sooner did the canoe reach the shore than the children were in it, and on his knee, telling him that their mother was resolved that they would all go upriver to join their father in the woods.

Dyer informed them that this was not the plan. The men were focused on clearing the land and getting the crops planted. They, themselves had no shelter, and there was certainly nowhere safe for a woman and seven children to stay. Apparently Alice was a woman who didn't take no for an answer, or Dyer was a man who couldn't resist a forceful woman, a woman who had spent day after day down by the river's edge waiting for word from her husband. He brought Alice and the kids up the river to their father, who had no idea they were coming.

 

The Connecticut River served as the only means of transportation for these early settlers. If you are

ever out on the river on a canoe, the river does remind you of the interstate. Once you were on the river, the banks were too steep to allow you to easily leave the river with your canoe. River travelers used the brooks and streams emptying into the river as a way to leave waterway, traveling up these small inlets and pulling their canoes up the less steep banks. The Chases “put in” by traveling up the brook that is now called “Blow Me Down Brook” in the northwest corner of town. They found a meadow near the mouth of the brook and began preparing the land there for cultivation. (Disregard the powerboat in the illustration.  Obviously it isn't historically correct.  But this is a good illustration of the steep banks on either side of the river)

Alice was 32 years old at the time. Mercy, her oldest child, was 10, Lois was 9, Simeon was 7, Abigail was 6, Salmon was 4, Ithamar was 3 and Baruch, the youngest, was 1 year old. This was the crowd that mobbed Dyer that day and demanded to be taken up the river to their father.

When they arrived at the campsite, their father could not believe they were there. He asked his wife, “Have you come here to die before your time? We have no shelter for either you and you will perish before we build one”.

The authors of these town histories often wax poetical when describing the intrepid early settlers in all their saintly heroic history. Alice is supposed to have replied, “Cheer up,my faithful. Let the smiles and rosy cheeks of your children make you joyful. If you have no shelter, you have the strength and hands to make one. The God we worship will bless us and help us obtain shelter.” This is a quote from her son Philander. Really? I think it's more likely that she said, “How dare you leave us all alone at that nasty old fort? You have strong arms and hands – build us a shelter! We will all help.”

Child's history says that it took three hours for them to build wigwams out of birch bark and branches for the family to spend the night in, and the next day they built a cabin. The first English family north of Fort Number 4 had a home. Four months later, Alice gave birth to a baby girl, the first English baby born north of Fort Number 4, and named her Alice. Eventually, the Chases moved three miles south, onto Cornish plain.