Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 6.djvu/285

 THE

��GRANITE MONTHLY,

A NEW HAMPSHIRE MAGAZINE

Devoted to Literature, Biography, History, and State Progress.

��Vol. VI.

��JUXE, 1883.

��Xo. 9.

��HON. OLIVER PILLSBURY.

��BY HOX. J. W. PATTERSON.

��William Pillsbury, from whom most and probably all of the Pillsburys of this country have descended, emigrat- ed from Dorchester, England, in 163 1, and settled in old Newbury, new New- buryport, Mass., in the year 1641.

It will be seen that the family be- longed to that brave old Puritan stock that had been ground and sifted in the mills of God for generations, and had been prepared to go forth in the fullness of time and take possession of a continent in the name of liberty and truth. In such mysterious ways the progress of government, church and societv is evolved from the seed of the dead ages, and we move upward by the providence of him who "works within us to will and to do of his own good pleasure."

The families that planted our na- tion were not the sport of fortune, drifted by an accident of history to these shores, but were preordained and guided to their destiny.

Oliver Pillsbury, the subject of this sketch, sprung from this line. He was born in Henniker, N. H., Febru- ary 16, 181 7. His parents, Deacon Oliver Pillsbury and Anna Smith Pills- bury, were both persons of unusual physical and mental strength. The

��writer recalls distinctly, after a lapse of more than thirty years, the amia- ble expression and serene dignity of Mrs. Pillsbury, and the masculine thought and deep, solemn voice of the deacon, as he led the devotions of the religious assemblies of the people. He was one of the strong men of the town and a pillar in the church. Oth- ers might veer and drift, but we all knew that the deacon was anchored within the veil, and was as sure to outride the storm as the hill upon which he had fixed his home. He was a man of strong powers, a stern will, and constant devotion to the great ends of life as he saw them. The qualities of both parents were transmitted in large measure to their children. Our state has produced but few men who were the peers in intel- lectual strength and moral courage to their first born, Parker Pillsbury. Not many men in our country, indeed, in the years that preceded the civil war, struck heavier blows for, or clung with a more courageous, self-sacrificing de- votion to, liberty than he. Those of us who knew him could hear the deep undertone of the deacon's voice in his, and knew he would conquer or die. In the roll-call of the imperish- ables in the great struggle for liberty,

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