The newspaper articles detail the events of the murder, but what was the full story?
Wendell Foss was born in 1813 and had a farm on Foss Mountain Road in Eaton by 1850, with his first wife Rebecca (Townsend) Foss. Together they had two children, one (Newell) who survived to adulthood. A year after Rebecca’s death, on February 11, 1873, Wendell married Octavia, daughter of Lewis and Almira (Black) Wentworth of Brownfield. She was 32 years younger than him. Together they had twins, Mertie and Ernest, in 1874.
Harville Wentworth was the son of Samuel Jr and his first wife Mercy (Gowen) Wentworth. Samuel Jr. and Lewis Wentworth were brothers, which made Harville and Octavia first cousins. They grew up about a half a mile away from each other. After both Mercy and Lewis died, Samuel Jr married Almira (Black), meaning that by the time of the murder, Harville and Octavia were also step-siblings.
Harville and his wife Marion (Gatchell) had been married for four years and had no children. They lived with Harville’s father and step-mother, Samuel and Almira, on Center Conway Road, a property later owned by Dr. Howard Fobes. When Octavia fled her abusive husband, she was likely seeking her mother, but Harville was the one who dealt with Wendell’s anger when he arrived, with disastrous consequences.
The diary of Eliza (Wentworth) Merrill mentions the ordeal multiple times, including saying that Octavia had ruined herself and was the cause of a great deal of sorrow. It’s horrible to imagine such a comment directed at a victim of domestic abuse, versus the abuser and murderer. Octavia filed for divorce on January 12th, 1886 on grounds of extreme cruelty. While she may have been living with Wendell in March when he was out on bail, likely she felt this was the safest course of action at the time. She later married Isaac Thompson on 10/2/1887 and they primarily lived in Bartlett, New Hampshire. Wendell Foss served just four years at the state prison for the murder of Harville Wentworth and then returned to his farm in Eaton. He died there in 1894.
