The baptism of
Hannah has always played a huge part in the tradition of the Carter
family. As previously stated there is
only one known contemporary account of this event thanks to the then 15 year
old Eliza Ann Carter Snow’s short journal.
It seems inexplicable that with 11 living family members (not counting
spouses of the children) there would only be one account of this event. The fact is we have one account to draw on.
Questions arise – most
that will never be answered - surrounding this day and event:
1.
What illness did Hannah suffer that brought her
neigh unto death?
2.
How did the missionaries just happen to show up
at her door – was it inspiration or had someone else sent them (such as
Dominicus?)
3.
Who was present that day? Were the married children around? Did the married children even know about
their mother being so sick?
4.
Was their house a half mile from the Bear River?
I have my opinions about each of the above questions
but really #4 is the only question that can really be addressed with a definitive
answer. The ability to test this came
with two “finds.” The first a plot map
of Newry showing where the various properties in Newry were located. Secondly, I attended a class taught by Lisa
Louise Cooke on using Google Earth.
When the decision to first settle Newry, Maine was
made the orderly New Englanders divided up the land of this new community into
rectangular lots consisting of about 100 acres each. These lots were laid out in rows that ran
from southwest to northeast. These rows
were called ranges. The reference point
for all this subdividing appears to be the point that the Bear Riven flowed
into the Androscoggin River. There was
an east and west set of ranges based on which side of the Bear River they were located.
Lot one of the eastern Range one
was found on the north side of the Androscoggin River and east of the Bear
River where they met. The lots were sequentially
numbered as they fanned out to the east.
There was a western range of lots that repeated this process starting
with Lot one near the Bear River and sequentially increasing as they approached
the Sunday River to the west.
 |
| Newry Maine 1805-1955 by Carrie Wight |
John’s lots were in the eastern ranges. His first purchase was Lots 2, 3 and part of
14 in Range 3. Later he bought the south
half of Lot 1 in Range 3. This second
purchase assured John of a minor contact with the Bear River on his property. I was able to visualize all of this thanks
to the book Newry Maine 1805 – 1955 by Carrie Wight where she published
the Newry plot map. With this
information at my fingertips, it took a fortuitous attendance at a genealogy
seminar class to bring this information to life.
Several years
ago I attended a seminar in northern Utah where Lisa Louise Cooke taught a
class on “Google Earth for Genealogy.”
In this class she taught us how to take a map (like the Newry map) and
overlay it on Google Earth so you could find in the present day where a
property would be located. This requires
overlaying the map on Google Earth then manipulating it until to fits the
contours of Google Earth.
The result – which is shown below – establishes that
the middle of Lot 2 in Range 3 would be exactly a half mile from the Bear
River. Essentially this verifies that
part Elia Ann’s account of her mother’s baptism.
In the summer of 2015 my wife and spent two weeks in
New England. As part of this trip we
drove to Newry and, using the geo coordinates from Google Earth we were able to
locate the approximate location of John Carter’s property. It felt special to be standing along the side
of the highway and knowing that Hannah walked along in this very place as she
went to the Bear River to be baptized.
(This is 119 Bear River Road today. According to the geocode coordinates this would have been where the portion of John's half of Lot 1 Range 3 was located. The top picture is pointed towards the Bear River which is in the gully but not visible. The lower picture faces east towards where the Carter home would have been on back in the woods.)
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