John Gilman, was born Sept. 8, 1749, it is supposed in the State of New Hampshire, and among her rocky hills and pastures he passed his life as a farmer, dying at last in Carroll County.

His son Andrew, first opened his eyes to the light of day Oct. 5, 1798. on a New Hampshire farm, and after attaining manhood chose the honorable calling to which he had been reared, and which had been that of his forefathers from generation to generation.

He married Dolly Pike, likewise of New Hampshire birth, born in Coos County, April 5, 1802, and they commenced their wedded life in the wilds of Coos County, where he had bought a tract of timber land, which be proceeded to clear and prepare for cultivation. The country round about was sparsely inhabited, and for some years Portland, Me., 100 miles distant, was the nearest market. Mr. Gilman improved a farm, and there spent his declining years, dying in 1848.

 He was a man of sound common sense, a hard worker, just and kind in his relations to others, and in his death the community where he had spent so many useful, busy years was deprived of a good citizen. His estimable wife spent her last years with her daughter in Carroll County, N. H., where she died in 1885. There were six sons and one daughter born to her and her husband, namely; Joseph, John K., Fanny E., Jeremiah and his twin brother Andrew, George and Pike. Jeremiah and his brother John were the only members of the family who settled in the West. John died in Nebraska City in 1886.


Jeremiah C. Gilman was born Nov. 8, 1834, at the home of his parents in the beautiful town of Bartlett, and there amid the grand old hills of his native State he was nurtured to a vigorous manhood. He was educated in the district school, and resided on the old homestead assisting in the farm work until 1854.

In that year he and his brother John left the shadow of the White Mountains to seek a home and fortune on the broad prairies of the Far West, more than a thousand miles away. They went by rail to Rock Island, Ill., then the western terminus of the railway, and crossing the Mississippi on a ferry boat to Iowa, took passage on a stage for Ft. Des Moines, and from there to Greene County, where they identified themselves with the early settlers. They laid out a town, which they called Kendrick, and erected a steam sawmill and a corn cracker, which they operated there for one year, and then moved it to Warren County, where they managed it until 1857, then sold it, and in December of that year moved on to Nebraska.