Compiled by Russell Bastedo
State Curator
1998

Theodore Atkinson was the son of a provincial official. He graduated from Harvard College, Class of 1718, and after college was commissioned a lieutenant and served at Fort William & Mary, at Portsmouth. In 1720 he was appointed clerk of the Court of Common Pleas, and in 1724/5 he was appointed a Commissioner from the Governor of New Hampshire to Canada, where he met with the Marquis de Vauudreuil, a son of Louis XIV of France, about boundary and Indian problems.

In the mid 1730s, Atkinson Married Hannah Wentworth (1700-1769), a daughter of Lieutenant Governor John Wentworth and widow of Samuel Plaistead (d. 1732). In 1741 he was appointed provincial secretary, and he was appointed a colonel in the provincial militia. He held this latter post until 1750, when he was appointed to represent New Hampshire at Albany, New York. The Albany meeting marked a meeting of delegates from all the colonies (except Virginia, whose governor could not attend); meeting with representatives of the Six Nations they tried to establish new relationships with England. But their Albany Plan of Union (1754) was rejected not only by the mother country but by colonial legislatures who feared a loss of individual colonies' powers in a plan of union. The failure of this Plan of Union led, twenty years later, to the American Revolution.

Atkinson by now had had considerable administrative experience, having served as provincial secretary since 1741. Following te Albany Plan of Union meetings (1750-1754) he was appointed Chief Justice of New Hampshire (1754), while he continued to serve as provincial secretary. He was able to have the latter position transferred to his son, Theodore Atkinson, Jr. in 1761, and his son served as provincial secretary between 1762-1769. But in 1769 Theodore Atkinson Jr. died of tuberculosis and his father was asked to resume his previous position. He served as provincial secretary until the American Revolution (1769-1775). He also became Major General of the New Hampshire militia in 1769.

Theodore Atkinson lost all his positions during the American Revolution. He had served the town of Portsmouth for many years as sheriff and tax collector, and at his death at age 82 years, he left 200 Pounds Sterling to the Episcopal Church of Portsmouth. The income from his bequest was to be used to provide bread for the poor.

Location: Legislative Office Building Lobby
Portrait by U.D. Tenney, 1878, after 1760 original by Blackburn (original at Worcester Art Museum.