General Gilman Marston (1811 - 1890)
Born at Orford (NH); died at Exeter (NH).
Lawyer, congressman, Civil War general, U.S. Senator.
Watercolor by W. C. Kimball (unlocated 1998).
Presented to the State by friends of Marston, 1885.

Gilman Marston graduated from Dartmouth College (1837), and from Harvard law department (1840). He was admitted to the Rockingham County (NH) Bar in 1841, at Exeter.

Marston served in the New Hampshire legislature (1845-49, 1872-73,1876-1888). He was a delegate to two state constitutional conventions (1850, 1876). In 1859 Marston was elected (as a member of the new Republican Party) to the U.S. House of Representatives (served 1859-63,1865-67). His congressional service was interrupted by the Civil War, however. Appointed colonel of the 2nd New Hampshire Volunteers (mustered June 4, 1861), Marston had his arm shattered at First Battle of Bull Run a few weeks later. Marston refused amputation of his arm, and he recovered to lead the 2nd NH Volunteers at the battles of Williamsburg, Fair Oak, Malvern Hill, and Fredericksburg (all VA). After the December 1862 battle at Fredericksburg military operations were suspended for the winter season, and Marston returned to his congressional duties in Washington, D.C.

In June 1863 Marston accepted appointment as Brigadier General of U.S. Volunteers (an appointment first offered in October 1862), and a month later he led the 2nd NH Volunteers at the Battle of Gettysburg (PA), July 1-3, 1863. After Gettysburg, where more than sixty percent of the 2nd NH Volunteers were killed, wounded or missing, Marston took his remaining troops, plus surviving regiments of the 12th NH Volunteers, and the new group was assigned to establish and guard a new camp for war prisoners at Point Lookout (MD). This duty began July 26, 1863, three weeks after the Battle of Gettysburg; it concluded April 18, 1864, when Marston, with an additional command of a brigade of 18th New York troops, helped assault Drury’s Bluff (VA). Marston’s force moved on to the ferociously fought Battle of Cold Harbor (VA), where in half an hour Marston lost five hundred troops. The survivors then moved on to join the siege of Petersburg (VA), and then to the James River, where Marston became ill. He quit the army on sick leave, and was reelected to Congress by New Hampshire voters in March 1865. Marston resigned his military commission after the burning and evacuation of Richmond (VA), April 3, 1865.

Marston returned to Exeter (NH) after the war. He practiced law. In 1870 Marston was offered appointment as the first governor of Idaho Territory, but he declined. Marston remained active in New Hampshire politics, and he returned to Washington, D.C. to fill a short vacancy in the U.S. Senate (March 4 – June 18, 1889). He died in 1890.

Marston returned to Exeter after the War, and to the practice of law. In 1870 he was offered appointment as first governor of Idaho Territory, but declined. He filled a short vacancy in the United States Senate (March 4 - June 18, 1889), but otherwise remained at Exeter until his death in 1890.

Location: Present Whereabouts Unknown