Just off Mt. Road in Warner, onto Quimby Road, lies a mostly unmaintained path in Salisbury near the Warner line, historically known as the Watson District after its first European settlers.
Watson Yard is located off Quimby Road, along a trail on private property owned by David Connors. The yard is overgrown, and recent vandalism has resulted in stolen headstones. A footstone dated 1863 and some broken stones remain.
Approximately 300 yards north of Watson Yard on Quimby Road are the Quimby Gravesites. Although two Quimbys are said to be buried there, there are no markers or clear evidence of the graves. Further research on the names of the Quimbys is needed.
Note: Due to recent vandalism at Watson Yard, property owner and resident David Connors asks visitors to contact him beforehand for security and courtesy reasons.
Watson Yard, located on the Watson homestead, requires further research to uncover the connection between the Watsons, Trues, and Straws buried there.
RE: Alma Wells: Abijah’s son was Daniel Watson, m Sarah Palmer; they had a daughter named Miriam F. b Dec 26 1808 m Dec 1832 to Benjamin Wells of Sutton. Miriam died in Minnesota Nov 28, 1873. Alma Wells is possibly Daniel’s and Sarah’s granddaughter.
RE: According to John Dearborn’s The History of Salisbury, Caleb Watson was a member and Deacon of the Free Will Baptist Church, part of the Great Awakening Movement of that day.
RE: Mrs. Sarah Watson, nee Sarah Quimby, was likely born about 1759, Weare, NH, married 1780 in Weare, NH, and died Jan 25, 1830.
Just before July 4, 2011, Jim Minard from the Salisbury Cemetery committee visited the Watson Graveyard and made an educated guess about the location of Caleb Watson’s grave using the Salisbury Cemetery Records. Evidence suggests Caleb was a Revolutionary War soldier who served with Robert Rogers, earning him the honor of a flag, which was placed. David Connors led a tour of the area, showing Jim, Madeleine Minard, and Rose Cravens remnants of the once-thriving Watson and Quimby farm settlement, as well as the Salisbury Mountain Schoolhouse #10. Signs of extensive past grazing areas marked by rock walls are still visible.
The cemetery covers a surprisingly large area for the mere 10 grave sites mentioned in the Salisbury Cemetery book, which also lacks dates for the stone fragments discovered. Mr. Connors recalls that a victim of the 1821 Tornado, with the last name True, was buried in the Watson graveyard. Records show a boy around 11 or 12 with that surname died from injuries in the event, possibly making him the one buried here.
Quimby Road, the westernmost part of the old South Range Road, used to serve as a direct route for settlers traveling from the Watson District near Mt. Kearsarge to Smith’s Corner, a once-thriving community now reduced to grazing land in the Federal Flood Plain. Today, access to Quimby Road is only possible from the Warner side.
A big thank you to David Connors. Without his guidance, it would have been easy to overlook these sites, especially with the area being so densely forested once more.
The list compiles data from Priscilla Hammond’s 1933 study of tombstones at The Watson Graveyard, located off Quimby Road near Mt. Kearsarge.