Fire destroyed a one-story home at 8 Old Hill Road in Bow yesterday, three days before the house was scheduled to be auctioned following foreclosure.

The green two-bedroom house, owned by John and Marilynn Plummer, sits on top of a hill past the Grappone Toyota dealership on Route 3A, just over the Concord line. John Plummer said he walked outside about 7:30 p.m. to put a box in a storage shed near the house when he turned and saw flames.

"My wife was holding the cats saying, 'We got a fire. We got to leave,' " he said.

The couple's two children, ages 5 and 7, escaped to a neighbor's house across the street. Neighbors tried to help Marilynn Plummer retrieve two of the family's six cats inside the home, but the fire quickly engulfed the right side of the home, shattering the windows.

"When the glass exploded, it just carried (the fire) through the house," said John Hicks, a neighbor.

Firefighters also tried to enter the building, but the fire spread too quickly. An hour after firefighters received the call, the fire burned below the roofline and in the back of the building. Water from the hoses rushed down the hill, freezing on the road and on the front of the firefighters' boots. The sheets of ice made it difficult for firefighters to work around the site.

The police blocked Old Hill Road at Route 3A. The fire reached two alarms, and firefighters from Bow, Concord, Hopkinton, Hooksett, Dunbarton, Loudon, Henniker, Chichester, Allenstown and Epsom responded. Fire officials were investigating the cause of the fire last night.

John Plummer, 39, said he had lived at the house for 10 years and that his wife grew up there. He used to work as a custodian for the Bow School District but has been unemployed since July. His wife, who also goes by the name Marilyn Lull, works at the state Department of Revenue, he said.

The family planned to stay with a relative last night.

The house, a 1940s wood shingle building, covered 1,230 square feet on one acre, according to Bow town appraisal information. The home and the land together were assessed at $101,500.

According to a public notice published in the Union Leader last month, the house was scheduled to be sold at auction Friday "for breach of the conditions of the mortgage."

Asked about the house's ownership last night, John Plummer said, "We thought maybe we'd sell it, but we didn't want to have to do that."

By JOELLE FARRELL

Monitor staff