The following biography of Jonathan Fletcher was published anonymously at findagrave.com.   I am not the author.

 

 

FLETCHER, JONATHAN, the centenarian, was born in Loeminster, Mass., Aug. 29, 1753. He came to Walpole in 1780, when he was twenty-seven years of age and purchased fifty acres of land of Gen. Benjamin Bellows (to which his son afterwards made additional purchases) built himself a cabin in the wilderness and lived on the same place seventy-three years, where he died having attained to the unusual age of one hundred years five months and four days. The census of 1840, disclosed the fact that there were but twelve persons living in the State, who were one hundred years old and upwards, therefore Mr. Fletcher, at his death was not only "one in a thousand," but one in twenty-four thousand. He is the Methuselah of our town, as no other person is known to have lived to that extraordinary age, although quite a number have approximated to it. He was in build a slender man, rather undersized, with a thin chest and somewhat stooping in carriage towards the close of his life. He was out a short time in the Revolutionary struggle but never in any engagement He was industrious when it was day, frugal in expenditure, temperate in habits, unobtrusive in demeanor, kind in his family and cheerful in disposition.He voted at every presidential election, and was punctual at town meetings, and in later years was honored with a seat in the desk, near the town officials, on account of impaired hearing. He was fond of reading and read much, having read the Bible through twenty-nine times in twenty-seven years, as he told his son. Watts' hymns were frequently read and from some of them he derived much consolation. When the Cheshire railroad was being constructed hefelt afraid that he might not live to the time of its completion; bunt he did and stood in his doorway with dimmed eyes and .streaming locks which had been silvered by the frosts of ninety-six winters and witnessed the fiery steed with a long train pass over the ground where sixty-nine years before he felled the trees to build his first cabin. What must have been his musings, imagination only can paint. He retained his faculties, with the exception of hearing, to the last, and was as well as usual the day before he died. In the evening, while thefamily were unconscious of any special change, he calmly peacefully and without a struggle passed away.  

Source: Walpole As It Was and As It Is by George Aldrich, The Claremont Manufacturing Co., Claremont, N.H., 1880, pages 253-255.

 

 

 

 

Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 01 March 2020), memorial page for Jonathan Fletcher (29 Aug 1753–2 Feb 1854), Find A Grave Memorial no. 95140212, citing Walpole Village Cemetery, Walpole, Cheshire County, New Hampshire, USA ; Maintained by Dave Morey (contributor 47731375) .