Compiled by Russell Bastedo
State Curator
1998

Benjamin F. Prescott (1877-1879). Born Epping; Concord lawyer, newspaper editor. In state politics from 1859.

Benjamin Prescott (1833-1895) attended Pembroke Academy (1848/9), Phillips Exeter Academy (1850/2) and Dartmouth College (1853/6). He read law with Henry A. and Abel M. Bellows of Concord and was admitted to the New Hampshire Bar in 1859. Prescott practiced law only briefly, however. During the Civil War years he was associate editor of the Independent Democrat, the state's principal anti-slavery newspaper and strongly pro-Lincoln in its editorial views.

Prescott's involvement with state Republican Party politics began early in his adult career. As a new lawyer in Concord he became secretary for the Republican State Committee and he held that position for fifteen years (1859/74). He served as secretary for the New Hampshire College of Electors (a/k/a Electoral College) in the six national elections of 1860/80. Sharing in the Republican's control of state and national politics, Prescott was appointed the special New England agent of the U.S. Treasury Department (1865/9), and served as New Hampshire's Secretary of State (1872/3, 1875/6). In 1877 he was the Republicans' candidate for governor; he won, and won reelection in 1878.

In 1876 the state held a Constitutional Convention, at which eleven of thirteen amendments submitted were ratified. It was at this time that biennial elections replaced annual ones, and also when March (Town Meeting) elections for state office were shifted to the first Tuesday in November to match the federal election day.

Prescott is remembered not for these changes in the state constitution, however, but for his efforts to collect some 270 portraits and sculpture busts of notable figures in the state's history. His energy and long-term commitment to this project enriched the art collections of not only the Statehouse, but also the New Hampshire Historical Society, Dartmouth College, and Phillips Exeter Academy. Additional gifts of likenesses of noted jurists and other personages were almost certainly stimulated by Benjamin Prescott's example.

Prescott garnered many historic honors during the years around the 1876 Centennial, when interest in the nation's past was at a peak. He was made president of the Bennington (Vermont) Battle Monument Association (1876). He was elected Vice President of the New Hampshire Historical Society, and made a fellow of the Royal Historical Society of London. He served as a trustee of the New Hampshire College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts (1874), and became a Trustee of Dartmouth College (1878). He wrote two books about his activities: Portraits of Governors, Judges, Senators and Other Public Men of New Hampshire (1874); and Stars and Stripes: the Flag of the United States of America: When, Where and By Whom Was It First Saluted? (1878). In retirement he was elected Delegate-at-large to the Republican National Convention of 1880, and he was chairman of the New Hampshire delegation which nominated James. A Garfield for president. (Garfield, elected on the thirty-sixth ballot, was assassinated six months after the election by a frustrated office seeker, and Vice President Chester A. Arthur became President). Prescott was also appointed to the State Board of Railroad Commissioners (1887-retired 1893). He died February 21, 1894.

Location: State House
Portrait by U.D. Tenney, 1879; Presented by Governor Prescott