Is he the first African American elected to public office (in 1783, 1785 and 1795) both before and after the adoption of the Constitution of the United States?

Is he an exemplar of the traditional New Hampshire public official who serves his community as "town father," constable, assessor, defender and justice of the peace?

Richard Alperin, the man who now lives on the land Cheswill farmed in Newmarket, New Hampshire introduces him as follows:

In 1995, a man named Erik Tuveson wrote a thesis for his Masters Degree in History while attending The University of New Hampshire. The title of the thesis is A People of Color "Race and Racial Identification in New Hampshire 1750-1825".

The first part of the thesis is about Wentworth Cheswell (sometimes spelled Cheswill). Wentworth, the son of Hopestill Cheswell, built his home where my home now stands in 1768. My house is the 3rd house on the foundation. The 2nd house was built by his grandson John W. Smart in 1866. Edwin S. Carpenter purchased all 125 acres in 1899 from the executor of Mr. Smart's estate. After a barn fire destroyed part of the grandson's house in 1912, Mr. Carpenter built my house in 1913, and moved the grandson's house over to a side street about 200 feet away.

Wentworth Cheswell's grandfather was a black slave (Richard Cheswell) who purchased 20 acres of land in 1716 (after he somehow gained his freedom). This deed is the earliest known deed in New Hampshire showing land ownership by a black man!

If you have the time to search on Google, search the name "Wentworth Cheswell" in quotation marks (or my name "Richard Alperin") and you should find a plethora of websites with information about him, including local newspaper articles showing what I've done to raise awareness of this amazing African American who was formally educated at a 4 year private boarding school from 1763 to 1767.

Wentworth was all but forgotten about, and his family graveyard on South Main Street near my home was neglected and in horrible condition. I spent the next 4 years with help from the New Hampshire Old Graveyard Association restoring the graveyard. I applied to the State to have a historical marker erected (which was just erected in October of 2007), and I received an award from The New Hampshire Preservation Alliance for "Outstanding restoration and stewardship" of The Cheswell Graveyard in May of 2008.

If you click on the following link(or copy and paste it into your browsers address bar) you will see an article printed in The Washington Post dated June 7th, 2008. After you read that article which claims that John Mercer Langston, is the first black man to be elected to a public office in the United States, please click on (or copy and paste) the second link. This second article is from a website called "History News Network" a website run by George Mason University in northern Virginia near Washington,DC.

The Washington Post article was investigated by George Mason University. They have concluded that the Washington Post Article is incorrect.The first African American elected to public office was in fact Wentworth Cheswell of Newmarket, New Hampshire! Imagine that! In little Newmarket New Hampshire, national history was made!

Now we have the first African American president elect! The highest public office in the country! Not many people are aware that Wentworth Cheswell paved the way for Barack Obama to possibly become the President of The United States, when he became the first African American elected to a public office prior to The American Revolutionary War!

What Richard Alperin is referencing is that Chewell was elected town constable in 1768, at the age of 22, just a year after having left college, under the Acts and Laws of His Majesty's Province of New Hampshire in New England.