A Fortunate Find

My co-author David Lambert collects mid-nineteenth century photographs of very elderly people. Yesterday he called me to report a previously unidentified image in his collection now had a name. Here's what David told me:

"While examining a supplement to the History of Goshen, N.H. I stumbled upon a small section of photos. I noticed that some of them were reprints of daguerreotypes, ambrotypes and CDV’s. One caught my eye. I knew it as one of the unidentified carte-des-viste in my collection. I never had his name before, nor did I know he was a centenarian. But now I know purely by accident who he is.

John McCrillis, born at Deerfield, N.H. July 15, 1773; died at Goshen, N.H. September 4, 1873. His father was Capt. John McCrillis (1746-1822) his father's rank of Captain was granted before the Revolution!

Here is the little blurb from Walter R. Nelson's History of Goshen, New Hampshire (1957)on John the centenarian

"Family tradition cites the fact that he remembered the Revolutionary War, being nine years old at its close; he recalled seeing a cannon bust at a meeting of rejoicing and told of seeing incidents of enlistment of men into the Colonial Army who were to receive a two year old heifer each as a bounty".