Compiled by Russell Bastedo
State Curator
1998

The space allocated to Governor Berry (1796-1894) exceeds that of any other governor. That is not because of Governor Berry's merits or demerits as a governor, but because Governor Berry's career as governor coincides with major changes in the American political system. After decades of tension between pro- and anti-slavery wings of the party, the Whigs could no longer function as a political party. They disappeared, leaving a major gap to be filled.

The Democrats too had great difficulty bridging the passions of the slavery issue. The War Democrats almost brought down the Democratic Party as a whole, severely weakening it as a functioning political entity.

Into the breaches caused by these seismic difficulties to the two major political parties there stepped a number of smaller parties, the most important of which (in New England) were, for a brief period, the Free Soil Party, and then the Republican Party. Both were new during the 1850s; one party survived for only a few years, while the other party is still with us today. The political careers of Governor Berry and immediately succeeding governors of New Hampshire were directly impacted by these events, and it seems fitting to briefly discuss them at this point.

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Nathaniel S. Berry (1861, 1862). Born in Bath (ME); Bristol and Hebron (NH) tanner. In state politics from 1828.

Nathaniel Berry had little formal education. He was apprenticed as a tanner in Bath (NH) at an early age, and was in business as a tanner, first at Bristol (1820/36), then at Hebron (1836/57). He married in 1821, joined the Methodist church (1823), and began his political career as a state representative from Bristol (1828, 1833/4, 1837). He was elected to the State Senate (1835/6) and was a delegate to the Democrats' national convention of 1840 which chose President Martin Van Buren as their candidate for a second term. In the campaign the Whigs' William Henry Harrison defeated Martin Van Buren in a campaign so harrowing that Harrison died of exhaustion after only one month in office. Vice President Tyler succeeded Harrison as president, but the Whig Party was in a shambles from which it did not recover.

From 1840 on, Berry acted as an organizer for a fledgling political group which ultimately became the Free Soil Party. Disgusted by the Democrats' politics and the 1840 political campaign, Berry cut his Democratic Party roots and became the Free Soil Party's 1846 candidate for governor of New Hampshire. He was nominated each year 1846/50 by the new party and lost each time, but the Free Soil Party grew stronger in every race.

The party organized as a national party in 1848, committed to stopping the spread of slavery into new territories won from Mexico in the Mexican War (1846/8). Former President Martin Van Buren of New York was the Free Soil candidate for president. The party platform stressed, in addition to no expansion of slavery, a commitment to a homestead act, and to a tariff with which to pay for internal improvements.

The Free Soil Party was a combination of anti-slavery Whigs and New York State Democrats, both of which were pro- Van Buren, and members of the former Liberty Party. In the national election the Whigs carried New York State and the result was that Mexican War hero Zachary Taylor became president. Taylor owed his victory to Van Buren and the Whigs, and they prevailed upon Taylor to make conservative New York Whig politician Millard Fillmore his vice president. When Taylor died of cholera a year later, Fillmore became President of the United States (1850/3). Martin Van Buren, acting as kingmaker, had made the Free Soil Party a power.

Berry lost every race as the New Hampshire Free Soil Party's candidate for governor 1846/50. H stayed active politically as associate justice on the Grafton County Court of Pleas (1841/50), and as Grafton County Judge of Probate (1856/61). He was also justice of the peace for twenty-three years.

Meanwhile the Free Soil Party lost momentum and direction after 1850, when the 1850 Compromise was promulgated and signed. The Party made New Hampshire's John P. Hale their Presidential candidate in 1852, and he attracted 150,000 votes. By 1854 the Free Soilers had been incorporated into what would become the Republican Party.

As a new Republican, Berry was nominated for governor by the New Hampshire Republican Party in 1861. The first national Republican party candidate, Abraham Lincoln, had been elected in 1860, and the Civil War was underway. Berry was reelected in 1862, and his efforts were all associated with war needs. His government enlisted and equipped fifteen infantry regiments, three companies of sharpshooters, four companies of cavalry and one company of heavy artillery. He led twenty-two governors in support of the war, delivering their joint address to President Lincoln at the Altoona (PA) Conference (1861). Berry did not run for reelection in 1863.

Location: State House, Second Floor
Original portrait by Adna. Tenney; Presented by Governor Berry and Secretary of State Allen Tenney, 1862