Gravestone of Hannah Gilmore
Jan 26 Sunday Have been to meeting all day and heard two
excellent sermons from Mr Whitwell Came home
between meetings. Alson rode home with Mr Ames
Mother came with us from the afternoon meeting will
stop a few days. Mr Whitwell walked up this morning
expecting to exchange with Mr Lovell but he (Mr Lovell)
was not prepared. Mr W says a minister ought always to
be prepared. Edwin called this evening. It is a beautiful day.
A scheduling mix-up at church today caused consternation. Most congregations had a practice of exchanging ministers. On a regular basis, a minister from one church would swap one Sunday with a minister from another, allowing the congregations to listen to other voices and sermons. On this Sunday, the scheduled switch between Reverend Whitwell of the Unitarian Church and Reverend Lovell of the soon-to-disband Protestant-Methodist assembly failed to take place. Mr. Whitwell wasn’t pleased, but he seemed to recover just fine. He delivered two more “excellent sermons.”
“Mother” was Hannah Lothrop Gilmore, or Mrs. Joshua Gilmore, as she would have been known, or perhaps The Widow Gilmore, her husband having passed away in 1836. One year shy of eighty, she was the mother of eight children, of whom only three were still alive. Evelina was her only living daughter.
Mrs. Gilmore lived most of the time with her middle son, Alson, his wife, Henrietta, and their children at the family farm in the southeastern corner of Easton. Just north of the town line with Raynham, the Gilmore property lay on what was known as the Turnpike Road. In the distant past, Joshua Gilmore had maintained a tavern at that site, and had collected the fees from travelers on that road. In 1851, the family still got income from the Turnpike, but the tavern was gone. The land was all farm.
Occasionally, Mrs. Gilmore would visit with her daughter in North Easton. Alson would carry her to church and after the service was over, Hannah would leave with Oakes and Evelina to stay at their home for the week. While in North Easton, she’d be able to visit not only with her Ames grandchldren, but also with other grandchildren in the area, like Abby and Malvina Torrey. And on this Sunday, her grandson Edwin Williams Gilmore, a grown son of Alson who no longer lived at the farm, paid a visit. He would soon be building a home close to the Ameses.
evelinaames 