Elihu Thayer

Rev. Elihu Thayer, D. D., seventh child and fourth son of Nathaniel and Mary Faxon Thayer, was born in the town of Braintree, Massachusetts, March 18, 1748. He graduated from Princeton College, New Jersey, and settled in the ministry at Kingston, New Hampshire, where he was ordained December 18, 1776. His salary was sixty pounds of lawful money, use of parsonage, and twenty cords of wood a year.

He had clear and logical ideas of what a church in a community should be, and these ideas he carefully put into practice with the result that his church was instrumental in bringing many into the fold, and in aiding his parishioners to lead better and more useful lives. He was a man of deep piety and spirituality, an excellent scholar, and eminent and renowned preacher of the Gospel for more than three and a half decades, and a staunch adherent and supporter of the tenents of the congregational Church.

His earnestness, his clear reasoning, his logical arguments and his gift of oratory attracted large audiences, and his work was particularly successful not only in his own parish, but in the community about Kingston and throughout the state. From the organization of the New Hampshire MIssionary Society, Dr. Thayer was annually elected president of that institution until 1811, when he publicly stated that his health obliged him to decline a re-election, which statement caused universal sorrow.

He married December 28, 1780, Hannah Califf, who was born March 14, 1757, daughter of Colonel John Califf, one of the leading men in the eastern part of the state. Their children are as follows: Mary, born February 24, 1782; Nathaniel, August 6, 1783; Judith, February 26, 1785; Hanah, July 29, 1787; Samuel, July 31, 1789; Sarah, May 6, 1792; John, April 4, 1795; Martha, June 11, 1798; Calvin, July 2, 1800; died October 24, 1802; Elihu, August 25, 1802; and Calvin, June 20, 1805. Dr. Thayer died April 3, 1812, aged sixty-five years. His wife survived him for many years, passing away March 4, 1859.

SOURCE: Genealogical and Family History of the State of New Hampshire, Volume 3