[For the account of the following medical gentlemen we are
indebted to Dr. Samuel Pray.]
_Dr. James Jackson_ was the first physician who settled in Rochester.
He went from Connecticut, but in what year he went and how long he
lived in the town, is not known.
_Dr. James How_ was the son of Deacon How of Methuen, and brother of
David How, Esq., of Haverhill, Ms. He went to Rochester about the
year 1777, and practised in his profession till near the time of his
death, in 1807. He was a Representative to the State Legislature
several years, and was elected a member of the N. H. Medical Society
in 1791, soon after the Charter was granted. He was also surgeon's
mate in the army of the Revolution. He died at the age of 53.
_Dr. Samuel Pray_ was born at South Berwick, Me., July 3, 1769. He
received his preparatory education at Dummer Academy, Newbury, Ms.,
in the years 1784, '85, and '86, studied medicine with Dr. Jacob
Kittredge of Dover, three years, and commenced the practice of his
profession in September, 1792, at Rochester, where he has resided
about fifty-five years. He united with a number of physicians in
the old County of Strafford in 1811, who constituted the Strafford
District of the N. H. Medical Society, of which he was Secretary
several years. He was elected a Fellow of the N. H. M. Society in
1816, and has been one of the Censors for Strafford District. Dec.
14, 1821, he was elected an Honorary Member of the Medical Society at
Dartmouth College.
_Dr. Timothy F. Preston_ went to Rochester in the year 1807, and
resided in town about a year, and then returned to New Ipswich, his
native place.
_Dr. John Perkins_ went to Rochester in 1807, and resided there till
1815, when he moved with his family to Jaffrey. It is not known where
he received his education.
_Dr. Asa Perkins_ went from Dover, his native place, to Rochester, in
1816, and resided there two years, and then returned to Dover, where
he now resides. He is the son of William Perkins, who was a merchant
in Dover, and who died several years since. The Doctor studied
medicine with Dr. Jabez Dow of Dover. He was born April 5, 1793.
Having abandoned his profession, he entered into mercantile business.
_Dr. James Farrington_ went to Rochester in August, 1818, and has
resided in town, to this time [1847]. He was born at Conway, October,
1791, and is the third son, now living, of Jeremiah Farrington,
late of Conway, who emigrated when a young man from Concord, N.
H., and with several others formed a settlement upon the banks of
the Saco river, in that section of the country then called by the
Indians Pequawket, now Conway and Fryeburg; and grandson of Stephen
Farrington, who was one of the first settlers of Concord, and whose
wife was a sister of Jonathan and Samuel Bradley, who, with Obadiah
Peters, John Bean, and John Lufkin, were massacred by the Indians,
Aug. 11, 1746, between Concord and Hopkinton, and to whose memory a
granite monument has been erected on the spot where the massacre was
perpetrated, by their surviving relatives. He received an academic
education at Fryeburg Academy, where in 1814 he was prepared to enter
college. He commenced the study of medicine under the tuition of
Dr. Moses Chandler of Fryeburg, Me., February, 1815, and concluded
his term of study under the instruction of Dr. Jabez Dow of Dover,
in February, 1818. He was examined in the science of medicine and
surgery by the Censors of the N. H. Medical Society, Drs. Crosby and
Pray, July 18, 1818, and commenced practice in Rochester on the 9th
of August following. He is a Fellow of the N. H. Medical Society,
and has been Censor and a Counsellor of the Society, and for several
years President of the Strafford District Society. He has been a
Representative and Senator in the State Legislature, and in 1837 was
elected a member of the 25th Congress of the United States. In 1845
he was appointed by the Executive of the State one of the Trustees of
the N. H. Asylum for the Insane.
Dr. Farrington was married, in 1827, to Mary D., eldest daughter of
Mr. Joseph Hanson of Rochester, and has four children living; three
sons and one daughter. Formerly he had students in medicine, among
whom were Dr. Joseph H. Smith, now a successful practitioner in
Dover, Dr. Timothy Upham, an eminent physician, late of Waterford, N.
Y., and a son of the Hon. Nathaniel Upham, late of Rochester, also
Dr. Alfred Upham, now a physician in the city of New York.
Dr. Farrington has had an extensive business in his profession
for twenty-five years, and has performed many difficult surgical
operations.
_Dr. Calvin Cutter, Dr. Theodore Wells, and a Dr. Turner_ from
Massachusetts, went to Rochester and tarried a short time in 1832 and
1833, and then returned to their native towns.
_Dr. Rufus K. Pearl_ was born at Farmington, Feb. 6, 1815, attended
Medical Lectures at Bowdoin and Dartmouth Colleges, and studied
medicine with Dr. Wight of Gilmanton. He commenced practice in
Rochester in 1840, and being out of health, he left the profession,
and has gone into trade in the village of that place.
_Dr. John W. Pray_ is the son of Dr. Samuel Pray of Rochester,
with whom he studied medicine. He was born in Rochester, August,
1814, attended Medical Lectures at Dartmouth College, commenced the
practice of his profession in Barrington, in 1840, and continued at
that place three years, when he returned to Rochester and went into
practice with his father.
_Dr. Richard Russel_ moved from Great Falls village to Rochester,
about the year 1841, and resided in town about three years, and then
returned to Great Falls, in 1844. It is not known when he began the
practice of his profession, nor what was his education.
_Dr. Jeremiah Garland_ was born at Strafford, Sept. 23, 1815, and
commenced the practice of his profession at Rochester, in 1844.
He attended Medical Lectures at New York, in the old medical and
surgical institution, and obtained the degree of M. D. at that
institution. He studied medicine with Drs. Chadbourne and Haynes of
Concord.