Who is Durgin?

Sally Blanchard is a sixth-generation descendant of George Abbott and Hannah Chandler by this path: Stevens Blanchard → John Blanchard → Sarah Abbott Blanchard → Nathaniel → George

Charlotte Helen Abbott’s “Early Records of the Blanchard Family of Andover” contains this entry for Sarah (Sally) Blanchard the daughter of Stevens Blanchard and Sarah Hall: “Sarah, b. 1788; m. a Durgin.” Who is Durgin and is it possible to determine what became of Sarah Blanchard and Mr. Durgin? Thanks to the wonders of the War of 1812 pension files, it is possible to answer those questions.

SARAH “SALLY” BLANCHARD, b. at Canterbury, NH, 3 Apr 1788; d. at Point Au Roche, NY, 27 May 1873; m. at Northfield, NH, Oct 1809, LEVITT C. DURGIN, b. at Canterbury, 21 May 1787 son of Joseph and Abigail (Hoyt) Durgin; Levitt d. at Beekmantown, NY, 14 Apr 1842. Sarah and Levitt were parents of at least five children. They had a grandson Levitt C. Durgin who was killed at the Battle of Gettysburg 3 July 1863.

Sally Blanchard was one of two children of Stevens Blanchard and Sarah Hall. Sally’s father died when she was four years old. Her mother remarried to Obadiah Mooney, and they were the parents of seven children. Levitt C. Durgin was the fifth of eight children of Joseph Durgin and Abigail Hoyt.

Sally Blanchard’s mother and step-father, Sarah Hall and Obadiah Mooney relocated to Beekmantown by 1820. Several of the children also made this move including Sally Blanchard’s brother Parker Blanchard, and her Mooney half-siblings Stevens, Obadiah, Hercules, and John. Sally Blanchard and Levitt Durgin married in Northfield, New Hampshire and at least their first two children were born in New Hampshire. They then relocated to Beekmantown.

Levitt C. Durgin served as a private in Captain William Wheeler’s Massachusetts militia during the War of 1812 enlisting 25 September 1814 and discharged 6 November 1814. He enlisted at Rumford, Maine and was discharged at Portland, Maine. Most of his military service was performed at Portland. In her application for a widow’s pension, Sally Durgin stated that as Sally Blanchard she married Levitt C. Durgin at Northfield, New Hampshire in October 1809. After their marriage, the family resided for most of the time in Beekmantown, New York. The pension file also contains Levitt’s date of death and references the death of the widow Sally, although the date was uncertain. One page of Sally's pension application is below.

Several members of this Durgin family are interred at the Point Au Roche Cemetery in Point Au Roche New York including Levitt Durgin, his wife Sally, and their children Fannie, Sarah, Stephen, and Mary Ann. Stephen’s wife Deborah is also buried there.

The younger Levitt C. Durgin was the son of Stephen and Deborah Durgin. He was born in 1843 within a year after the death of his grandfather and namesake. Levitt enlisted at age 18 on 25 May 1861. He enlisted at Boston for a period of three years. Although born in Beekmantown, Levitt had been in Lowell in 1860 apparently on some type of apprenticeship. In May 1863, he was at the Battle of Chancellorsville where he was “slightly” wounded in the arm and the leg. He was killed in action at the Battle of Gettysburg 3 July 1863. The record of his death is below.