This is a transcription of the Almira R. (Andrews) Harriman of Concord and Warner, NH biography from New Hampshire Women: A Collection of Portraits and Biographical Sketches of Daughters and Residents of the Granite State, Who are Worthy Representatives of their Sex in the Various Walks and Conditions of Life, The New Hampshire Publishing Co., Concord, NH, 1895, page 179.
Almira R. (Andrews) Harriman
IN the retirement of pleasant homes in Concord and Warner, Almira R. (Andrews) Harriman divides the seasons of her latter years. Warner is the town of her nativity, where, as the daughter of Noah Tyler and Sally Bean Andrews, she was born, November 8, 1819. Nurtured amid healthy influences, she grew up to be a brave, modest, amiable woman, of mental culture, well-poised judgment, and a congenial spirit, conducive to happy companionship. She had adaptation to the work of instruction, and won success as a teacher. In 1844 she became the wife of Walter Harriman. She was the grace and strength of his home, that home in which the husband, amid all his high achievements and honors in civil and military life, ever found his best enjoyment. Though her retiring disposition has always strongly prompted the avoidance of publicity, yet she has lent a graceful compliance with social requisitions reasonably made upon her, as the wife of a distinguished orator, general, and governor. During the dark days of the Civil War, when husband, son, and brothers were at the perilous front, she bore her part in the trying hours with that undaunted courage which was conspicuous even in her childhood. With an unfaltering faith in the triumph of the Union cause, she lighted up the gloom of many a home, and cheered by her presence the hearts of Union men around the midnight campfire. With the quiet service of affection–that supreme thought and purpose of her life–has abounded a wisdom, whose salutary counsel has ever been sought and prized by all within her range of influence. Self-forgetfulness is the key-note of her existence. With her, the chief privilege and pleasure of living has been in serving others.