Page:Sketches of representative women of New England.djvu/488

This page needs to be proofread.
REPRESENTATIVE WOMEN OF NEW ENGLAND
363


year. Edmund J. Perham in the Civil War enlisted in the Ninth New Hampshire Infantry, and died in the service at Knoxville, Md. Frances Ann Chase taught school in Keene for fourteen years.

Elizabeth Ellen Chase in her girlhood attended the public schools of Keene and, for one term, Momit Ca-sar Seminary, in iSwanzey, N.H. In early life she united with the Unitarian church in Keene. She was at one time secretary of the Gospel Temperance Union of Keene.

On the 7th of September, 1S59, she was married by the Rev. William O. White to the Rev. William Willis Haywanl. Mr. Hayward was born in Hancock, N.H., October 17, 1<S;M, son of Charles Hayward and Ann, daughter of Jacob G. and Betsey (Stanley) Lakin, the latter a scliool-teachi'r in her district. Mr. Hayward's maternal grandfather was a son of Leuuiel Lakin, a soldier in the Revo- lutionary army, son of William, the second permanent .settler of Hancock, descended from William' Lakin, an early settler in Reading, Mass.

Charles Hayward, born in LS()6, son of Charles Prescott" Haywanl and his wife, Sarah Mason, was descended from George' Haywanl, one of the early settlers of Concord, Mass., through Josej)h,^ born in 1643, and his second wife, Elizabeth Treadwell ; Simeon,^ who married Re- becca Hartwell; Lieutenant Joseph,* who married Abigail Hosmer; and Joseph,^ born in 1746, who married Rebecca, tlaughter of Colonel Charles Prescott, of Concord, and was the father of Charles Prescott Hayward.

The Rev. William W. Hayward was educated in the public schools, in the academies at Hancock, Peterboro, and Francestown, and at the New England Normal Institute in Lancaster, Mass. For nine winters he taught in the country schools and for three years in private schools. At twenty-one years of age he was elected a member of the superin- tending school committee in Hancock. He afterward served for one year as superintendent of schools at Newfane, Vt., three years as a member of the school board in Keene, N.H., and one year as chairman thereof. Deciding to enter the ministry, he studied two years with the Rev. Lenmel Willis in Warner, N.H., autl was ordainetl in June, 1859, as a Universal- ist, at Enfield, N.H. He took a subsequent course of study at the Tufts Divinity School, from which he received the degree of B.D. in 1871, being the first graduate from this school. He was settled as pastor of Universal- ist churches at Newfane, Vt., P'airfield, Me., Keene, N.H., and in Wakefield, Acton, Me- thuen, Plymouth, and South Framingham, Mass.

A resident of the Pine Ti-ec State during the Civil War, he enlisted in the Thirteenth Regiment, Maine ^olunteers, conunanded by Colonel Henry Russ, Jr., and .served as chap- lain.

While he was in the ainiy, Mrs. Haywartl spent several weeks with him, literally on the picket line, at Martinsburg, W. V., at that time the base of General Phil Sheridan's supplies and the object of repeated and untiring attacks on the i)art of the confederates of Mosby, the noted guerrilla. When Mrs. Hay- ward went to Martinsburg, firing upon the night trains on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad was a frequent occurrence. On reaching the Martinsburg station at about five o'clock of a November morning, she was informed by the officer in charge that the Thirteenth Maine had left the town. A private, however, cor- rected the mistake, and to him was entrusted the task of conducting her through the town, past .several barricades in the streets, to the headquarters of the regiment. Mrs. Hayward was an excellent honsewoman, and soon be- came deservedly popular with the soldiers. She assisted the captains in making out the pay-rolls, and has the enviable record of never having maile a mistake. She rendered good service in the convalescent camps and in the hospital, writing letters for the sick and wounded and taking care of their money, which in times of danger she concealed about her person.

In the various parishes over which her husband presided, Mrs. Hayward was active in church and Sunday-school work, for several years being superintendent of a Sunday-school. An active member for some j'ears of the Woman's Centenary Association of the Universalist