Historic Clock Among Museum’s Current Exhibits
CHERRY VALLEY—The Cherry Valley Museum officially opened for the summer season on Memorial Day Weekend. Among its new displays are the Campbell clock, a priceless artifact of Cherry Valley’s Revolutionary War history.
The clock was made by James Allen of Kilmarnock, Scotland in 1728 for the James Campbell family shortly before they migrated from Northern Ireland to New Hampshire. They settled in Cherry Valley in 1741.
At the time of the Cherry Valley Massacre, in 1778, the clock was located in Auchinbreck, the home of James’ son, Col. Samuel Campbell. A servant and one of the Campbell sons removed the clock works from the case and buried them in the woods shortly before Auchinbreck was burned in the raid. The mechanism was retrieved in 1790 and a new case was built in Albany.
The clock has passed down from generation to generation in the Campbell family and is still keeping time. William Campbell Waldron and his wife, Maybette Waldron, donated it to the Cherry Valley Museum in January. They believed that the clock belonged to Cherry Valley.
“Words cannot describe the joy of receiving this clock for Cherry Valley,” said museum Curator Barbara Bell in a release. “It is nearly 300 years old and is a magnificent historical artifact.”
The Cherry Valley Museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Memorial Day weekend through October 15. To learn more, call (607) 264-3303 or visit the museum’s Facebook page.
