NEW LONDON CENTENNIAL ADDRESS.
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��some distance whole, and was left stand- ing on dry land, and a hog house, con- taining a hog weighing from three to four hundred pounds, was carried away whole several rods and dropped on the top of a stone wall, where it fell into fragments, and the hog released from his prison walked away unhurt. A pair of cart wheels strongly bound with iron and nearly new, with the spire and axle, were carried ten rods, the spire brok- en off in the middle, all the spokes but two broken out of one wheel and more than half out of the other. All the trees in an orchard of one hundred, without asin- gle exception, were prostrated, and one half of them were wrenched up by the roots, and carried entirely away, root and branch. The trunk of one of these trees, divested of its principal roots and branches, was found half a mile distant and at the top of a long hill ; near the top of this hill was an excurvation some forty feet long, and in places two to three feet deep, partly filled with man- gled boards and broken timbers, ap- parently made by the perpendicular fall of the side of a barn, which must have been blown whole at least eighty rods. The track or path of the whirl- wind in New London, was some four miles long, and varied in width from one fourth to one half a mile as the col- umn rose and fell, and passed off upon the north side of Kearsarge Moun- tain. In passing, it seemed to hug to thq mountain, so that its course was changed more to the south,and it passed down the mountain on the easterly side into the Gore, touching a corner of Salisbury and into Warner, and finally terminated in the woods of Boscawen. A great amount of property, many build- ings, and several lives were destroyed in the Gore and in Warner.
The track of the whirlwind is thus described : " It appeared as if a rushing torrent had been pouring down for many days ; the dwellings, buildings, fences and trees were all swept off in its course. The earth was torn up in places, the grass withered, and nothing fresh or living was to be seen in the path of the desolation." It is difficult for us to conceive the horrors of that
��instant — for it was but an instant — when horses, barns, trees, fences, fowls, and other moveable objects were all lifted from the earth into the bosom of the whirlwind and anon dashed into a thousand pieces. Probably no event has occurred in this town during the hundred years of its existence, that was so well calculated . to teach man his utter impotence, and to impress upon his mind the awful sublimity, the terrible grandeur of the scene, where the hand of omnipotence, even for* a moment, displays its resistless power, as the great whirlwind of September 9, 1 82 1.
Let us now look back and briefly review the events that have occurred since the year 1800. June 9, 1801, the Social Library was incorporated, which had about one hundred volumes of very valuable books. The library was kept at the house of Josiah Brown, Esq. I recollect that from about the year 1825 to 1833 I obtained most of my reading matter from this library and found it very profitable and interesting. Whether this institution yet remains I do not know. In 1803 the town first had the necessary number of ratable polls to entitle it to send a representa- tive alone, and Joseph Colby, Esq., was elected as the first representative of the town, and he was re-elected every year until 1816.
In 181 7 there was a political revo- lution in the town, and everything was changed. Daniel Woodbury, Esq., was the moderator, first selectman, and representative for that and several suc- ceeding years ; and the dominant party held a celebration over their victory, in the spring of 1817, at which, as I am informed, the liberty pole was erected, which used to stand in front of the old meeting-house, around which the people in the olden time used to congregate, and spend their intermissions between the forenoon and afternoon services on Sunday. My first recollections of at- tending church are associated with hearing Elder Seamans preach, and Elder Ambrose pray ; of riding to church in the wagon with father and mother, — standing up behind and holding on to
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