New Boston Historical Society
New Boston, New Hampshire
Minister — Sherburne Mace, Maid of Honor — a Leland girl?
Groom — Hazen Saltmarsh, Bride — Dorothy Leland
Bridesmaids — more Leland sisters and their friends
A "Tom Thumb" Wedding — New Boston 1926
by Dan Rothman for the August 2025 issue of the New Boston Beacon
The 99-year old photograph was labeled "Tom Thumb Wedding — New Boston 1926" and someone had written on its reverse the names of most of the children, which makes it extra-special. The photo had been given to the Goffstown Historical Society years ago by Clara Mace. Recently Jen Brown decided it belonged in New Boston and brought it to our museum.
I will confess that I'd never heard of a Tom Thumb wedding before, but there've been hundreds of them ever since General Tom Thumb married Lavinia Warren in 1863. The General, whose real name was Charles Stratton, and his bride Lavinia were little people, both less than three feet tall. They performed worldwide before President Abraham Lincoln and Queen Victoria, and their wedding in a New York City church in front of 10,000 people was arranged by their manager, P.T. Barnum.
The many Tom Thumb weddings which followed were typically performed by children of three to seven years of age, often as fundraisers. A 1921 program set the price of admission at 35 cents for adults; children under 12 were free.
The minister you see performing the 1926 New Boston wedding was 5-year-old Sherburne Mace of Goffstown. All the other actors were from New Boston, including the top-hatted groom, who was Hazen Saltmarsh (age 6), and his bride and bridesmaids, most of whom were the Leland sisters, ages 4 to 7.
When I looked up Sherburne Mace in a genealogy database to find out exactly when he was born, I discovered that his mother Clara was born in Glover, Vermont, where my wife's family has lived for generations. I emailed the photo to my sister-in-law Joan, who is a volunteer at the Glover Historical Society. Joan knew all about Tom Thumb weddings, and she sent me photos from one that was held in Glover as a church fundraiser. I can tell you that Glover children are not nearly as cute as the ones in our New Boston photo.
Mr. & Mrs. Thumb and Commodore Nutt
Daisy Dopp, who lived in Glover, wrote of the night a little coach drawn by black ponies got stuck in the mud on its way over the Sheffield Heights. The Thumbs and their coachman were made welcome by the Dopps, spent the night at their farmhouse, and gave the family complimentary tickets to the show.
"Commodore" George Washington Morrison Nutt, who was born in Manchester, NH, was the best man at the Thumbs' New York wedding. He'd met Lavinia first, and he was head-over-heels in love with her, but she preferred the General, who was older if not taller. The Commodore was related to the Boyes family of New Boston; Robert Boyes was one of our town's proprietors in the 1730s and 40s.
You may wonder — what became of the children in the New Boston photo? In real life, the "groom" Hazen Saltmarsh married Dorothy Whitehouse, a woman from Somerville, Massachusetts, where his parents Paul and Ruth Saltmarsh had lived before coming to New Boston. Hazen lived to be almost 100.
The "minister" Sherburne Mace married a woman named Ada Whitehouse, who wasn't related to Hazen's wife Dorothy Whitehouse, as far as I can tell.
As for the Leland sisters, for many years they helped their father Willie operate the New Boston telephone switchboard that was in their High Street home until 1956 — someone had to connect calls all hours of the day and night. By 1947 all four Lelands were married; none to men from New Boston.
