ELISHA PIPER
Pgs. 264-266

Was one of the early settlers of Parsonsfield. He was born in Stratham, New Hampshire, June 17, 1746. At an early age he married Sarah Barker, and after living in Stratham a few years, he purchased a farm in Wakefield, New Hampshire, not far from Province Pond, and moved there with his family about 1772. He lived there between eight and nine years, but the farm proving frosty, he resolved to sell, and purchase in some other locality. He directed his course to the new town of Parsonsfield, or Parsonstown, as it was then called. A short time was occupied in prospecting for a farm in the fan season of 1778, and during that time, he amused himself about a week in hunting with George Kezar, a famous hunter, who then resided in the north part of the town. A farm was soon selected, and he first purchased lot No. 25, in the second range, of Benjamin Hilton, of Parsonstown, for one hundred and twenty-five pounds, the deed being dated November 5, 1778, and on this lot he settled. He subsequently purchased four other lots-lot No. 171, in the tenth range, of Alpheus Spring, of Kittery, for five pounds, deed dated November 28, 1785; lot No. 51, in the third range, of John Brown, of Parsonsfield, for five hundred dollars, deed dated May 13, 1790; lot No. 13, in the first range, which was a tax sale, for six shillings and two pence, deed dated June 27, 1791; lot No. 88, in the fifth range, of Chase Wiggin of Stratham, New Hampshire, for forty-five pounds (A pound was worth at that time about three dollars, thirty-three and one-third cents), deed dated February 15, 1793.

In June, 1779, the next year after his first purchase, he came over from Wakefield to Parsonsfield, built him a log camp, covered with hemlock bark, and felled several acres of trees. He then returned to his family in Wakefield, and in March of the next year, 1780, went back to Parsonsfield. As there were no roads passable for teams at that season of the year, he hauled his camp furniture, consisting of a bed and a few cooking-utensils, on a hand-sled over Ricker's Mountain on the crust. Before the season arrived for burning the trees felled the previous season, he was employed in preparing materials for building a log-house for his family. In May he burned the felled trees, and planted the ground with corn and such other crops as he would need for the support of his family the next winter. His planting was all completed before the nineteenth of May, and on that day, which was the famous Dark Day * of 1780, he was helping his neighbor, Mr. George Bickford, finish planting his corn. After his crops were harvested, and his log-house completed, he returned to Wakefield again to move his family, consisting of his wife and six small children. He moved with an ox-team on the snow, late in the year 1780, probably in December, as the day is represented as having been extremely cold the coldest of that winter.

He was now in the prime of life, being thirty-two years of age when he made his first purchase in 1778, and with his wife, who was two years younger, and his children around him, was fairly settled down to the business of farming, which he pursued successfully and scientifically, although he had never received any instruction in scientific farming. His whole mind was absorbed in his business. His land was fertile and his crops abundant. The log-house was succeeded in a few years by a neat one-story frame-house, and finally, in about 1812, a story was added to this, and the whole neatly finished and painted. It is now standing, and occupied by his descendant Samuel F. Piper. The lower story is nearly, if not quite, a hundred years old.
To each of two of his sons he gave a farm, and assisted the others in purchasing theirs. To each of his daughters he gave the usual sum of one hundred dollars, as her marriage portion. He always kept money by him, usually not less than one hundred dollars, and I have known him to have five hundred in his desk at a time, obtained from the sale of stock and products of the farm. He did not permit any of his neighbors to be in advance of him in any of their farm work, or surpass him in their farm products.

His farm stock was of good breed and carefully selected; and having good pasturage, and being fed in winter on hay cured in the best manner and o£ the best quality, it was unsurpassed in size and beauty by any in town. It, therefore, sold for the highest market prices. He kept one hired man through the year, and in the haying season one additional and sometimes two, if needed to secure the crop at the best time for cutting it; so that his haying was always finished in season, generally about the end of July, and the hay was of the choicest kind.
In person, he was of middle size, quick and active, and of the Anglo-Saxon type. He was a religious man and never omitted to ask a blessing at the table. He died March 10, 1836, on the homestead, at the age of about ninety years.

*I have often heard him speak of the Dark Day " being a very wonderful phenomenon. The darkness began about ten o'clock in the forenoon, and Was so great that candles had to be lighted, common print could not be read. fowls retired to their roost. and cattle returned to the barn. It continued about fourteen hours. Its cause has never been satisfactorily explained. It was not an eclipse. Meteorologists think that it was caused by a very dense vapor, charged, perhaps, with foreign matter, which shut out the light of the sun; but how the vapor was produced is unknown. See an interesting account of it in a work entitled Our First Century, from which the preceding has been taken.
(Contributed by Nancy Piper)