Pioneer Families - WILSON
Extracted From
Chapter XVII
Early history of the town of Hopkinton :
history of East Village (Nicholville) and vicinity,
diaries of Elisha Risdon and Artemas Kent,
soldiers of the Civil War,
genealogical record of sixty of the pioneer families
Carlton E. Sanford
Boston: Bartlett Press, 1903
[Transcribed by Dave Swerdfeger]
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IN this chapter is given the genealogical records of many of the pioneers of the town, of all that I have been able to gather sufficient data and information to make a fairly full record. The preparation of these records has required much time, labor, correspondence, persistence and patience. Had I had in the beginning a full comprehension of the tedious labor required, I now feel sure I should not have undertaken it. That there are some errors in dates and possibly a few in names I am quite satisfied, since considerable of my information came from elderly people who wrote feebly and indistinctly. I think it will be readily understood, if the reader will bear in mind that it is in continuous order; that the first, second, third and fourth generations are each carried slightly to the right, and that each generation always has the same indentation. SAMUEL WILSON b. April 16, 1790, Keene, N.H.; d. March 28, 1881; m. Sally Blanchard, 1821; b. March 27, 1801; d. August 14, 1881. He came to Hopkinton in 1808 or 1809 and worked in Roswell Hopkins's sawmill, and lived in his family for some years. He took title to the "Culver Corner" in 1816 and built a house and store there that year, as I learn from Mr. Kent's diary. It is also known that he built a dam and sawmill at the East Village in 1817. An account of what he did there is given in the sketch of that village. He was a natural mechanic and millwright, which made him a man of great service and usefulness in those early times. He possessed remarkable ability in the matter of computations in his head, using no pen or pencil. One evening in Culver's store a wager of two dollars was made that he could not compute "in his head" in one hour's time the seconds in forty years, allowing three hundred and sixty-five days and six hours for a year. The other gentlemen worked it out with pencil that they might know the correct number. Mr. Wilson accomplished the feat in fifty minutes and correctly, and won the money. He was a great man to be occupied with his thoughts, forgetting all else. A good story is told of him as to this peculiarity which I heard only recently by a judge. The bridge at Nicholville had two tracks with a heavy timber on the outer ends of the plank and in the middle of the bridge to hold the plank in place. Going over one evening, occupied as usual, and about to meet a team, he stepped over the log, as he supposed, into the upper track, but, in fact, into the mill pond twenty feet below. The banks were high and it took some time to get him out. When they had, in response to a query how it happened, he replied, "Well, I thought I was in the lower track, but saw where I missed it as soon as I stepped over." This curt reply was so often told for years that it became a byword and is even still repeated. Had ten children:
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