By Muriel Bristol | February 28, 2021
Moses K. Cowell was born in Lebanon, ME, February 22, 1823, son of Ichabod and Rebecca (Clark) Cowell. (Date arrived at by computation from death record).
Ichabod Cowell, a farmer, aged sixty-one years (b. ME), headed a Lebanon, ME, household at the time of the Seventh (1850) Federal Census. His household included Rebecca Cowell, aged fifty-six years (b. ME), Moses Cowell, a farmer, aged twenty-five years (b. ME), and Sewell Cowell, aged twenty-two years (b. ME). Ichabod Cowell had real estate valued at $1,500, Moses Cowell had real estate valued at $500, and Sewall Cowell, had real estate valued at $500.
Ichabod Cowell, a farmer, aged seventy-three years (b. ME), headed a Lebanon (“Lebanon Centre P.O.”), ME, household at the time of the Eighth (1860) Federal Census. His household included Rebecca Cowell, aged sixty-six years (b. ME), and Moses Cowell, a shoemaker, aged thirty-four years (b. ME). Ichabod Cowell had real estate valued at $1,000 and personal estate valued at $200, while Moses Cowell had personal estate valued at $100.
Moses Cowell, of Lebanon, ME, aged thirty-five years (b. ME), registered for the Class II military draft in 1863.
Ichabod Cowell, a farmer, aged eighty-three years (b. ME), headed a Lebanon, ME, household at the time of the Ninth (1870) Federal Census. His household included Rebecca Cowell, aged seventy-five years (b. ME), and Moses Cowell, a farm laborer, aged forty-four years (b. ME). Ichabod Cowell had real estate valued at $500 and personal estate valued at $225, and Moses Cowell had personal estate valued at $1,000.
Young Acton, ME, diarist Ida Isadore Reynolds (1860-1946) mentioned Moses Cowell as being a customer of her seamstress mother, who made him a pair of pants in May 1873 (Heirlooms Reunited, 2019).
Saturday, May 3, 1873: Snowed. Mother made Moses Cowell’s pants. Mr. Hilton here. Edward did not go away.
She encountered him again in his capacity as physician, in February 1874, when he treated her for catarrh.
Tuesday, February 24, 1874: Fair and Cold. I had a very bad pain in my side. I knit some. Father not very well. Mother got a bad head ache. She spun Five skeins of yarn. Moses Cowell here. He left me some medicine to Purify my blood and some for my throat and some powder to blow down my throat. This is all for Catarrh. Clara Prescott and Enoch Sherman here.
M.K. Cowell appeared in the Milton business directories of 1875, 1876, and 1880, as a Milton Mills physician.
Moses K. Cowell, aged fifty-one years (b. ME), headed an Acton, ME, household at the time of the Tenth (1880) Federal Census. Moses K. Cowell owned his house, free-and-clear. His household appeared in the enumeration between the households of Gilbert H. Welch, a farm laborer, aged twenty-nine years (b. ME), and Margarette Ploude, keeping house, aged fifty-seven years (b. Canada).
M.K. Cowell appeared in the Milton business directories of 1881, 1882, 1884, 1887, and 1889, as a Milton Mills physician.
Moses K. Cowell, M.D., reported to the NH State Board of Health on his contagious disease cases in Milton Mills in 1888.
Milton Mills. MOSES K. COWELL, M.D. Typhoid Fever – Four cases, one fatal; two, with the one fatal, in town; one in Lebanon, Maine; one in Acton, Maine. Polluted water in all cases, to which I attribute the disease. Diphtheria – Three cases, none fatal; two in town, one in Acton, Me. Bad sanitary conditions in all cases. Think polluted water the most common source of the disease (Clarke, 1888).
Moses K. Cowell, a physician, aged seventy-six years (b. ME), headed an Acton, ME, household at the time of the Twelfth (1900) Federal Census. Moses K. Cowell owned his house, free-and-clear. His household appeared in the enumeration between the households of Francis Coffrin, a farm laborer, aged seventy-one years (b. NH), and Edward J. Brierley, a grocer, aged fifty-one years (b. MA).
Moses K. Cowell appeared in the Milton directories of 1902, and 1905, as having his house at the Acton bridge, in Milton Mills.
Moses K. Cowell died of senile gangrene in Acton, ME, July 8, 1905, aged eighty-two years, four months, and six days. (Dr. W.E. Pillsbury signed his death certificate).
References:
Clarke, Arthur E. (1888). Report of the State Board of Health of the State of New Hampshire, 1888. Retrieved from books.google.com/books?id=DZ4_GY2UvBcC&pg=PA44
Find a Grave. (2016, June 9). Moses K. Cowell. Retrieved from www.findagrave.com/memorial/164165614/moses-k-cowell
Heirlooms Reunited. (2019, January 29). May Entries in the 1873 Diary of Ida Isadore Reynolds (1860-1946) of Acton, Maine; Future Wife of John Jotham Shapleigh (1856-1923). Retrieved from www.heirloomsreunited.com/2019/01/may-entries-in-1873-diary-of-ida.html
Wikipedia. (2020, December 26). Catarrh. Retrieved from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catarrh
Milton Observer 