Compiled by Russell Bastedo
State Curator
1998

Theodore Atkinson, Jr. Secretary of the Province of New Hampshire, 1762-1769.

As the only son of Theodore Atkinson, Sr., Theodore Junior (1737-1769) was foreordained to be an important person in New Hampshire's provincial history. "Because of his father's civil offices, he was placed at the head of the [Harvard College] Class of 1757, which he led onto Cambridge Common in a body to greet the Judge when he returned from the Albany Congress [1754]. He could not, however, endure the food in college Commons, and after being fined for extensive unauthorized absences was allowed to board elsewhere, provided that he did not eat supper. The Immediate Government resolved to enquire at his boarding place to make sure that he kept his agreement….." (Sibley's Harvard Graduates, vol. XIV, 1756-1760).

After graduation Theodore worked in Boston for about two years, probably in the warehouse of his merchant uncle Samuel Wentworth (Harvard College 1728). He also rode out to visit his uncle's thirteen-year-old daughter, Frances, which caused something of a scandal. The girl was carefully guarded against her suitor.

When Theodore Junior returned to Portsmouth his father arranged for his title of Secretary of the Province to be transferred to his son, provided it could be done cheaply. Theodore Senior also made his son the grantee for some fifty New Hampshire towns, on both sides of the Connecticut river. Prior to January 1762, Theodore Junior was appointed Collector of the Customs at Portsmouth, and in February 1762 he became Secretary of the Province. In May 1772 he married Frances, and Copley's portrait may date from this time. The English Privy Council ordered his appointment as Councilor in 1763; the young man finally took his seat in 1765, possibly because his father did not want to pay a high fee for the honor.

Theodore Junior had several sickly years and finally died of "a consumption", possibly TB, in 1769. He was aged thirty-three. Ten days after his burial his widow married John Wentworth, who was New Hampshire's last Royal Governor and Surveyor of the King's Woods in North America (1769-1775).

Location: Legislative Office Building Lobby
Portrait by U.D. Tenney, 1878, after 1763 original by Copley