Local historian Nellie Palmer George had grown up in the Wentworth Cheswill mansion, her parents having rented it from Martha Cheswill during the 1850s and 60s. Her description of the house was published in the Granite Monthly in 1916.
Nellie was the daughter of John and Bertha Palmer. The couple had nine children, four of whom died before they reached the age of three. Both before and after the Civil War John worked as a carpenter and farmer. During the War he enlisted at age 45 in Company D, NH 15th Infantry, where he engaged in battle at Port Hudson, Louisiana. The family was active in the Federated (later Congregational) Church; and as such John was a staunch abolitionist. Nellie was about 21 years old when her father raised the money to install the town clock in the steeple of the church.
Nellie (1850-1939) says she was born in this house, and she refers to living in the house in her youth. The 1860 Census does not list addresses, but it places the family in the immediate vicinity and with other families who would have been neighbors. Nellie was 10 years old in 1860. We don’t know how long before 1850 the family lived in the house; likewise, we don’t know exactly when the family left the residence. They would have vacated by 1867 when the property was sold to John Smart, as he soon moved in. (Nellie’s father died in 1874 and her mother in 1898.)
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The following are excerpts from her essay[1]:
WENTWORTH CHESWILL MANSION
as described by Nellie Palmer George, published in the Granite Monthly, May 1916.
I wish I could describe as well as I can remember the old-time mansion house of Wentworth Cheswill. In this house I was born and spent my childhood. Every room in its detail of finish and furnishing and the chambers of the ell in their dark of finish is clear in my mind. I will try to describe it as it was in 1864, when it was soon to be sacrificed to the modern idea in the mind of the owner.
[The house] was beautiful for its situation. The stately elm tree in the wide front yard, the shrubbery and oldfashioned garden, and beyond to the west and north, the farm, 120 acres of orchard, corn field, pasture and woodland to Pigeon’s Hill, with its woods road winding through the old
growth of pine sloping to the bank of the Piscassic. There flowed the river to the west, through the birch and alder, there the high bush blueberries grew, quite to the abutment of Moonlight Bridge. There were oaks and walnut trees, straight and tall in the rocky pasture, and in the apple orchard the native fruit had a flavor all its own. Beyond, a stone wall, bordered by white-bloomed locust trees, enclosed the graves of many Cheswills, marked by slate and marble stones… There were four big elm trees in the front yard with a stone wall surrounding it…
The house faced the south and it was founded upon a rock. The foundation wall of the east end of the house was part of the ledge… The house looked old but not dejected. Its solid oak timbers had resisted decay, the band-wrought nails and spikes held beams and boards in their original position…
I have never since seen a house with the same kind of portico. The front door opened upon a flat stone, perhaps two and one half by three yards. Two round wood pillars in each outside corner upheld the roof of the portico, which joined on to the house. From the stone floor five steps of stone led to the front walk and five steps led to a flagstone walk which extended from the portico on either side the width of the house. The stone of these steps was cut smooth…
On either side of the front door, extending the width of the house was a wall of stone, oddly built from the flag stone walk, up perhaps four feet or higher. This was doubtless the foundation wall. It projected from the house and was topped with a slanting roof not more than two feet wide. This roofed wall seemed a part of the house.
The front door was heavy and wide, and the latch lifted with a brass handle…The windows were fitted with inside shutters or blinds of paneled wood, in two sections, where half or all the light could be excluded.
The front hall was square, with a high closet built in the wall east of the stairway… The wainscoting was after the manner of the times. The rooms were lofty… huge beams ran horizontally through the ceiling of the room and in the outside corners were upright beams, which gave an appearance of solidity and strength…
Our parlor was real good, and all the children felt proud of it. The windows were hung with curtains that rolled up halfway and were tied with red cord and tassel overlayed with embroidered white muslin.
[1] The entire article on The Mansion House : https://nhnmhs.com/wp-content/uploads/documents/histories/MANSION%20HOUSE%20OF%20WENTWORTH%20CHESWILL.pdf