...as a guest of the marriage of Sarah SHERMAN to Samuel DUNCAN in the west room below. [General Sloan’s House, built in 1801] DUNCAN belonged by descent to the Scotch-Irish people of central Massachusetts, was a wheelwright by trade, a very intelligent and ingenious man, but became addicted to drink to his utter downfall. Their son, the late Dr. Samuel DUNCAN, was one of the most intellectually gifted boys ever born and bred in this town, and became correspondingly accomplished in the medical profession. He had, however, in early life the roving trait, that carried him to sea in the service of the United States Navy. His only son, at about the same age and under circumstances in many respects similar, but with much less in the way of excuse, manifested the same trait and was led transiently into gross wrong-doing.
