Daniel Smith of Townsend was engaged to Mary Adams of Townsend. On the morning of November 28, 1786, on his way to his work chopping, he met the said Mary Adams and gave her this apple.
The first tree cut fell upon him and killed him.
She had not eaten the apple so kept it in remembrance of him. It finally dried up instead of decaying.
The fly leaf which accompanies the apple gives the date and age of said Daniel Smith (“aged twenty one years two months and ten days”).
This story has already been published at least twice. It appeared in the Townsend Historical Society Newsletter in Jan-Feb 1993, as written by Ed West, and was reprinted in the Spring 2019 newsletter “Harbor View.” The apple and its story was gifted to the THS in 1982 by Miss Dorothy Page of New London, Connecticut. Miss Page was a relative of Mary Adams. The story above was written by Ed West.
