Sunday, October 9, 2022

Dementia in a Colonial Ancestor

Nathaniel Hill: 1659-1741 (Maternal 8th Great Grandfather)

 

While dementia in the elderly is a common concern in today’s world, we rarely consider that our ancestors also had to deal with dementia. Dry records from the past usually don’t refer to the mental status of our long-dead ancestors. The occasional will may state that it was made while the testator was of “sound mind and body” which indicates that some people were not sound of mind, but otherwise historical records rarely mention mental or physical illnesses. As a result, I was startled to find a history of the Hill family that stated that a 17th century New Hampshire family member, Nathaniel Hill, suffered from what sounds like dementia.

My eighth-great-grandfather Nathaniel Hill was born in the Oyster River Plantation in the New Hampshire Colony on March 16, 1659. This area is now part of the city of Durham, New Hampshire. Nathaniel was the son of immigrants Valentine Hill and his wife Mary Eaton Hill. Valentine Hill was a merchant with extensive real estate dealings. He built up great wealth, and then lost most of it in the years before his death in 1660. Nathaniel was barely a year old when his father died.

Oyster River Plantation as it existed in 1670, from the map of ‘Pascatway River in New England’ by John Scott, at the British Library

As a result of his father’s bankruptcy, Nathaniel, his mother and some of his siblings grew up in near poverty. He must have had some of his father’s business sense, however, for he built up his own holdings and had considerable property to leave to his own children. Nathaniel married Sarah Nutter around 1690. He was respected in his community, serving as a church deacon. He and Sarah had several children, at least five of whom survived into adulthood and were named in his will.

However, records state that “He gradually lost his reason and spent the last six months of his life at the residence of his son-in-law, Captain Benjamin Mathes.” Mathes was the husband of Nathaniel’s daughter Abigail.

This brief description sounds like he was suffering from Alzheimers or some other form of dementia, which would not be unusual in a man over eighty years in age. I wonder how his friends and family reacted to his affliction. In the 1700s, doctors had no clue as to the cause of dementia, and certainly no treatments. It was fortunate that Nathaniel’s daughter and son-in-law were willing to take him into their home and care for him once he was unable to care for himself. I am sure it was a difficult situation for them all.

Nathaniel died in 1741. The exact date is unknown, as is the place of his burial. His will left his properties, money and possessions to his sons Samuel (my ancestor) and Valentine, and daughters Sarah and Abigail, and to the husband and four sons of his daughter Mary Hill Burnam who had pre-deceased him.  

Sources:

Jones, William Preble, b. 1869. Four Boston Grandparents: Jones And Hill, Preble And Eveleth And Their Ancestry. Somerville, Mass., 1930.

History of the town of Durham, New Hampshire : (Oyster River Plantation) with genealogical notes. by Stackpole, Everett Schermerhorn, 1850-1927; Thompson, Lucien, b. 1859; Meserve, Winthrop Smith, 1838-

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