April 12, 1917: Six days after the United States declares war on the Axis powers, the Legislature passes a law prohibiting walkouts, strikes and lockouts in New Hampshire industries that produce war material. A state Committee of Public Safety is established to report any union or other radical activity to federal agents based in Concord.
April 12, 1827: On Fast Day, Rev. Nathaniel Bouton, 27, delivers the first temperance sermon in Concord. Bouton's words at the Old North Church ignite local participation in a social movement that will last more than a century. Bouton asserts in his sermon that he has investigated and found that “the use of ardent spirits in Concord” is “universal.” He claims that the 1,400 men in Concord consumed nearly 14,000 gallons of liquor in 1825. The Concord Temperance Society will be formed three years later. By 1843, nearly half of the city's adult residents will have signed a prohibition pledge.
April 12, 1861: On a gray, drizzly morning in Concord, the telegraph at the Eagle Hotel brings news of the attack on Fort Sumter.
April 13, 1945: Responding to the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt the previous night in Warm Springs, Ga., John G. Winant of Concord, the U.S. Ambassador to England, says: “The greatest American of our age is dead.”
April 13, 1984: The school board in Danvers, Mass., hires away Concord School Superintendent Calvin Cleveland. During his six-year tenure in Concord, Cleveland was best known for an effort to close three neighborhood elementary schools. One, Millville School, did close. The other two, Dewey and Eastman, survived the cut.
April 14, 1865: At 5 p.m., Congressman Edward H. Rollins, a Concord Republican, stops by the White House to seek a pass for a constituent to visit his wounded son in an army hospital. President Lincoln comes downstairs to oblige Rollins, writing a note to the secretary or war. It is the last official business Lincoln will conduct before going to dinner and the theater – and possibly the last time he will sign his name. After Lincoln is assassinated at Ford's Theatre, Rollins keeps the dated, signed note.
April 14, 1993: The Concord Fire Department, generally in the business of extinguishing fires, starts one: Environmentalists hope a controlled burn on 10 acres of grass at the Concord Airport will improve conditions for the endangered Karner Blue butterfly.
April 15, 1861: Three days after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, the first call for troops reaches Concord by telegraph from Washington, D.C., at 8 a.m. Friends rush across to the Phenix Hotel to awaken Edward E. Sturtevant, a popular police officer and former printer. Sturtevant rushes to the State House and, fulfilling his fondest wish, becomes New Hampshire's first Civil War volunteer.
April 15, 1865: At 2 a.m., the telegraph at the Eagle Hotel brings news that President Lincoln has been shot. At 7:22 a.m., Lincoln dies in Washington. Word spreads quickly in Concord, and crowds gather in the streets. At 9 p.m. many drift to former president Franklin Pierce's mansard-roofed home on Main Street near Thorndike Street. A lantern illuminating his face, Pierce expresses his “profound sorrow and regret,” telling the crowd: “My best wishes to you all and for what we ought to hold most dear – our country – our whole country.”
April 16, 1965: After a major organizing and fund-raising effort by, among others, Dudley Orr, Russell Martin, Malcolm McLane and figure-skating Police Chief Walter Carlson, construction begins on the ice hockey rink that will become the Everett Arena.
April 16, 1967: The governor and Executive Council approve the state's acquisition of 224.5 acres of marshland off Hoit Road in East Concord for a fish and wildlife preserve.
April 17, 1882: President Chester Arthur appoints William E. Chandler, a prominent Republican politician, lawyer and journalist from Concord, secretary of the navy.
April 17, 1885: Thomas Samon, who killed a woman in Laconia, stuffed her body in a trunk and wheeled it away, is the first man executed at the new state prison. A prison historian describes Samon as a dull man who spoke with a nasal tone and had one blue eye and one brown eye.
April 18, 1809: Isaac Hill, 21, publishes the first issue of the New Hampshire Patriot. He bought the American Patriot from William Hoit earlier in the year and changed its name. Hill's Patriot will become a mighty organ for Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Party, propelling Hill to a U.S. Senate and New Hampshire's corner office.
April 18, 1861: During a week of cries for non-partisanship and a rush to volunteer for military service, the Independent Democrat of Concord reports: “Concord is full of the war spirit.”
