Spouse of Nathaniel3 Caverly (Thomas2, Moses1)
Abigail Daniels was born 17 November 1763, daughter of Joseph and Elizabeth (Hall) Daniels. She married Nathaniel Caverly, son of Thomas and Keziah (Holmes) Caverly, on 27 April 1791 in Barrington. She died in Barrington, Strafford County, New Hampshire 21 August 1845 and was buried in the Nathaniel Caverly Family Cemetery in Barrington.
Abigail and Nathaniel had eight children: Nicholas, Joseph, Nathaniel, Abigail, Ephraim, Catherine, Elizabeth, and Sophia.1
Abigail died at the age of 81 years and 9 months of a brain fever epidemic that devastated the Caverly family in August and September 1845. Her husband Nathaniel and grandson Nathaniel Caverly Jr. succumbed to the same illness.
Below are excerpts from the Journal of Reverend Enoch Hayes Place, a Free-Will Baptist minister and spiritual advisor to the Caverly family. Reverend Place attended the family and gave the sermon and eulogy at Abigail's funeral:
Saturday, August 23, 1845 : Went with my wife to Barrington, and attended the funeral of Sister Abigail wife of Mr. Nathaniel Caverly, aged 81 years 9 months and 4 days.
I only addressed the mourners in a low voice, and prayed as two more of the family were dangerously sick one with brain fever. The remains were carried to Strafford Ridge their former place of residence. I have visited several thousands of sick people, but never saw a more resigned happy soul than Mother Caverly. She has been a devoted Christian for several years during her last sickness of three months. She manifested the most perfect resignation to the divine will, and often such ecstasies of joy, and a desire to be with Christ in heaven, so that her face shown with piety, and the consolations of holy joy.
Her husband has been sick nearly as long, and probably will soon follow her. Several others of the family have been sick but are better except the one last named, and our much esteemed Brother Nathaniel Caverly Jr. who was seized with a brain fever on Thursday night last, and will probably die soon.2
Thursday, August 28, 1845: We went to Barrington to see Brother Nathaniel Caverly Jr. and found he had deceased on Tuesday night last, and that I had been sent for to preach at his funeral. We arrived at this house of Sorrow, and death about ten A.M. where a multitude soon assembled, and were addressed in the most feeling manner from Lamentations 1, first part of the 12th verse: ’Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look around and see. Is any suffering like my suffering that was inflicted on me…’. Elders M. Clark and H. Brock were present. Brother Clark closed the meeting by prayer.
Over 200 persons followed in the funeral procession, beside the bearers, and attendants.
The body of the aged grandmother who was buried on the 23rd was re-enterred, and carried to Barrington, so that both coffins were visible at the same place to the relatives, and gazing multitude, all of whom were more or less affected at the sight.3
References:
1 Nathaniel Caverly Family Bible, in the possession of Lynne Rhodes, a copy of whose records are in the R. Stanton Avery, Special Collections Department, New England Historic Genealogical Society, Boston, Massachusetts.
2 William E. Wentworth, Journals of Enoch Hayes Place, 2 vols. (Boston, Mass.: NEHGS and NHSOG, 1998), 1:743.
3 Wentworth, Journals of Enoch Hayes Place, 1:744-5.
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