June 16, 1864: Still short of the state’s recruiting quota for the Union Army, Gov. Joseph Gilmore announces a state bonus of $400 for any man who will sign up for the First New Hampshire Cavalry Regiment.
June 17, 1840: On Concord’s Rumford Square, a five-acre field of trees between School and Center streets below Rumford Street, a speech by the Whig Sen. Daniel Webster draws a rousing crowd. The speech follows a “Log Cabin Procession” for Gen. William Henry Harrison.
June 18, 1812: Congress declares war on Great Britain. Siding with the Federalist opposition, New Hampshireman Daniel Webster calls the declaration of war “premature and inexpedient” and accuses the Republicans of having entered an alliance against England with the “papists, the infidels (and the) atheists” of France.
June 18, 1861: Thaddeus S.C. Lowe, a 29-year-old native of Randolph, N.H., sends a telegram to earth from his balloon 1,000 feet up. Watching this experiment in Washington, D.C., is President Abraham Lincoln. Lowe will become an aeronaut, performing reconnaissance duties for the Union army. Alas, most of his efforts will be ineffectual.
June 19, 1856: One hundred booms of the cannon in Concord celebrate the nomination of John Charles Fremont, the first Republican candidate for president. The cheer goes up: “Free Soil, Free Men and Fremont.”
June 20, 1841: More than 1,000 people gather at the Old North Church to hear a lecture by John. H.W. Hawkins, a self-proclaimed “reformed inebriate” who is now a silver-tongued missionary for temperance.
