New Boston Historical Society
New Boston, New Hampshire
Charles Peirce

Charles Peirce and his Chicken Farm
by Dan Rothman for the New Boston Beacon 3/2026

When I moved to New Boston in the 1980s, I could hike up Joe English Hill past the wild blueberries to sit in an Adirondack chair someone had placed at the top of the cliff. I could see the Manchester airport in the distance and, on a clear day, the Boston skyline. I write about this in the past tense, as the Space Force no longer likes people exploring the hilltop, for security reasons I suppose.

If I'd looked straight down from the top of the cliff in 1936, I'd have seen an old farmhouse to which Charles Peirce had just moved to go into the poultry business. You may ask: who was Charles Peirce, and what became of his farm?

Hazel-and-Charles-Peirce
Hazel and Charles Peirce - 1939

Bea Peirce, who worked at the Whipple Free Library for many years, was the first to tell me the story of how her father-in-law Charles had his house and land taken by the government soon after World War II began. It seems that the U.S. Army Air Corps needed somewhere for its pilots to practice bombing and strafing. New Boston was sparsely populated at the time and our town was only a few miles from Grenier Field, the military airstrip that later became the Manchester airport. The airmen could use Joe English Pond as a target for their bombs, and if they missed the pond, the 300-foot tall granite cliff would provide a nice backstop.

Charles and Hazel Peirce owned 68 acres at the base of that cliff from 1936 until 1942, when the government seized their property and insisted they move away. The Peirces and their neighbors were paid below-market prices — after all, there was a war on.

Wigwam
The Peirce farmhouse at the base of the Joe English cliff in 1941

In 2026, Grace Peirce saw my web page about the New Boston bombing range and sent me some photos I hadn't seen before. Grace is Charles's granddaughter and one of four children of Greg and Bea Peirce. Grace and I corresponded by email and phone to complete this narrative of Charles's life.

Charles Hiscox Peirce was born in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1897. His father George delivered milk in Lowell from his horse-drawn wagon. Charles's mother Ella Hiscox had emigrated from England with her family to work in the Lowell mills.

George-Peirce-milk-wagon
Charles's father George delived milk in Lowell from this wagon, c.1884

Charles's first wife Evelyn Pearson was also an English immigrant. She worked as a twister in a woolen mill, processing wool yarn. Census records describe Charles as a loom fixer and designer in the mills. Evelyn died young a few years after their son Greg was born. Charles then married Hazel Mae Leary, and they moved with their child to the house below Joe English Hill.

Why did a couple from Lowell move to New Boston to raise chickens and eggs? We don't know for certain, but we do have a theory. My wife Lisa studied old Town Reports and found that the farm to which the Peirce family relocated had been owned previously by John T. Ullom, the minister of a Methodist church in Lowell. Grace believes that her grandfather Charles Peirce may have been the organist in Ullom's church. Reverend Ullom died soon after the Peirces moved to New Boston – perhaps he gave or sold his property to Charles just before he died.

Charles-Peirce-and-friend
Charles Peirce (left) with eggs and his friend Milton Hadley in 1937

Grace's photos show a contented Peirce family living in their New Boston farmhouse, where Hazel had a son Carl in 1940. Then came the attack on Pearl Harbor, and government agents arrived to tell them to leave. The Peirces had no choice.

Grace's father Greg Peirce was fifteen years old when his parents Charles and Hazel lost their farm. Greg had skipped a couple of grades in the New Boston school, so he graduated in 1942 and went to Georgia with his neighbors, the Whites. He attended Georgia Tech, then returned to New Boston to work for Don Byam on his River Road farm. That's where Greg met Don's daughter Beatrice, and there have been Peirces in New Boston ever since. Charles Peirce died in Georgia in 1943, a year after his farm was taken, at the age of 45. The death certificate indicates he had a coronary occlusion. The family believes the cause of death was a broken heart.

View
The chicken farm in 1941 seen from the cliff top - the house is hidden in the trees.
The abandoned Peirce farmhouse, known as the Wigwam, burned in 1951 in a fire of suspicious origins.