Eunice Merrick

Biography

1759–1800

Eunice Mirick, whose surname also appears as Merrick, was born on August 31, 1759 to Caleb Mirick and Eunice Jones. Her birth is recorded in Princeton, in the hills of central Massachusetts. She grew up in a large family whose children extended from the 1750s into the early 1770s. Her elder brother Joseph had died in infancy before she was born; younger sisters and brothers followed her, including Sally, Lucinda, Polly, Fidelia, and Caleb.

On January 24, 1792, at thirty-two, she married Ephraim Russell of Stow. Their marriage joined her Princeton family to his established connections in Littleton and Stow. Their son John was born at Stow on August 23, 1794.

Eunice died on August 20, 1800, eleven days before her forty-first birthday. John was still five. Her marriage had lasted a little more than eight years, and she died before her father, Caleb, whose death followed in 1803.