Title	Mr.
Last Name	Pierce
First Name	Thomas
Middle Name	H. B.
Maiden Name
Nick Name
Place of Birth	Fayette, ME
Date of Birth	1840-11-22
Place of Death	Dexter, ME
Date of Death	1909-09-20
Publication	The Eastern Gazette 9-23-1909, p.5
Obituary	Thomas H. B. Pierce. Early Monday morning, the 20th instant, at his home on Pleasant street, Thomas H. B. Pierce, Esq, for thirty-nine years a well-known lawyer and highly respected citizen of Dexter, passed peacefully away. Born November 22, 1840, in Fayette, Maine, the youngest of the three children of the late Storer and Charlotte Pierce, he was the last survivor of his family. His youth and early manhood were spent in Readfield, Maine, where he pursued his academic studies at Maine Wesleyan Seminary, and his legal studies with Asa Gile and Emery 0. Bean, Esquires, and where in 1865 he was married to Miss Mary V. Brackett of Dexter, who, with a daughter, Mrs. Harry L. Tillson, and a son, Edward B. Pierce, both of Dexter, survives him. In 1866 he was admitted to the bar at Augusta, and was engaged the three following years in the practice of his profession in Wilton, Maine. In September, 1870, he removed to Dexter, where he has since resided, engaged continuously in the practice of law, although during several years a considerable share of his time was given to newspaper work, first as editor of the Dexter Gazette, and later of the Eastern State, which he made, especially in its literary pages, a publication of rare merit. Under his direction the paper attained a large and widely-extended circulation. Mr. Pierce was an eager reader of good books and an ardent lover of the finer and higher things in literature, of which his knowledge was both discriminating and extensive. He was himself a writer of no mean order, whose work extended beyond the ordinary newspaper paragraph and editorial into the domain of fiction and that of verse. An ardent, practical and consistent prohibitionist, his abilities as a writer and lawyer were often enlisted in the service of the cause. While he cared little for old creeds and dogmas and was free from any form of theological cant, he was a deeply religious man who exemplified in his life the real Christian virtues, especially that of minding his own business. A close student of his profession, he was painstaking in the preparation of his cases, and resourceful and persistent in their trial. When he believed he was right, he would yield only to the decision of the highest tribunals. During the war for the Union he rendered his country patriotic service as a volunteer soldier in the 3d Maine Regiment of Infantry, which was raised and originally commanded by Col. Oliver 0. Howard, afterwards major general in the army of the United States. A good citizen and high-minded man, his influence was always in favor of those things which are good, clean, pure, and wholesome. His death is a great loss to the moral forces in this community, and he will be sadly missed by those actively engaged in the work of making the world better.