A former hermit in New Hampshire whose cabin in the woods burned down after nearly three decades on the property that he was ordered to leave has been charged with trespassing there once again, turning a shed that survived the fire into a makeshift home outfitted with a wood stove.
There had been an outpouring of support for David Lidstone, 81 — better known as “River Dave” — since he was arrested in July last year and accused of squatting on property owned by a Vermont man.
His cabin burned down in August while he was jailed.
Photo: AP
Lidstone was a local celebrity to boaters and kayakers on the Merrimack River before his property dispute caught the attention of the masses, bringing in more than US$200,000 in donations to help him start a new, law-abiding life.
Lidstone, who was grateful for the support, had secured temporary housing as he figured out where to live next and believed that he could not go back to being a hermit.
However, he returned to the site in Canterbury in late November, turning the shed into a home.
He was arrested on a trespassing charge on Dec. 14 and faces a court hearing in March.
“Sometimes, you have to stand up for what is right,” Lidstone told reporters in a telephone interview from the site on Tuesday. “I’m 81, I’ve got nothing to lose.”
Lidstone is a logger by trade who chopped his firewood and grew his food in the woods along the river.
The property, undeveloped and mostly used for timber harvests, has been owned by the same family since 1963.
Lidstone had claimed that years ago, the current owner’s father gave his word — but nothing in writing — allowing him to live there.
In the summer, he was jailed on a civil contempt sanction and was told that he would be released if he agreed to leave the cabin following a property dispute that goes back to 2016.
The landowner, 86-year-old Leonard Giles, of South Burlington, Vermont, wanted Lidstone off the property.
“We’ll let the court address it,” Lisa Wade, an attorney for Giles, said on Tuesday of Lidstone’s arrest.
In the summer, both sides agreed to arrange for Lidstone to collect his cats, chickens and possessions at the site.
Lidstone also was given permission to hire a surveyor to give him “peace of mind,” Judge Andrew Schulman said.
As of Tuesday, Lidstone said he was unable to get someone to come out to survey the land yet.
A fire destroyed the cabin on Aug. 4, hours after Lidstone defended himself during a court hearing.
He was released from jail the next day after the judge ruled that he would have less incentive to return to “this particular place in the woods,” now that the cabin had burned down.
Canterbury Fire Chief Michael Gamache said that the fire was caused by accident.
He said a representative of Giles who was starting to demolish the cabin on Aug. 4 disabled solar panels, which still had electrical charge in them.
He also used a power saw to cut into metal supports that held the panels onto the roof.
Either action could have created sparks to start making things smoke.
“What can I say, Dave is where he is happiest the most,” Jodie Gedeon, a kayaker who has known Lidstone for years, wrote on Facebook. “He loves to be in nature and what you’d call a free bird... We are still planning to build or purchase a home in the spring.”
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS