One year ago, Larry Regan stood before a table in the fluttering light of electric candles and read a poem that had helped him through the grief of losing his wife. Each of the candles was labeled with the name of someone who died in 2024 while unhoused or having a history of homelessness.
Regan, a Red Sox fan, Jeopardy devotee, golfer and U.S. history buff, received an apartment on Pleasant St. last summer through the Concord Coalition to End Homelessness. He had spent three years living outside in the capital city, and once he received housing, he saw himself as “one of the lucky ones.”
On Thursday night, at this year’s homeless memorial day vigil, the names of 72 people who passed away this year across New Hampshire were read aloud over the toll of a bell. Like in years prior, members of the crowd placed candles bearing the deceased’s names on a white-clothed table.
One of those candles was for Larry Regan. He was 53 years old when he died in May.
“I had a friend ask me the other day when I mentioned this, ‘Are they mostly people who die of drug overdoses?'” said Sierra Hubbard, who helped organize Thursday’s service. “No. What they die from is experiencing homelessness.”
“It’s being hit by a car because you’re walking down the street. It’s freezing to death. It’s carbon monoxide poisoning in a tent. It’s a fire in an RV,” Hubbard continued. “These are the circumstances of being unhoused, and that is the cause of death.”
A few towns haven’t yet reported the number of homeless individuals who died in their boundaries this year, but even without the complete count, the number of these deaths statewide is up from 54 last year.
It was an especially heavy year of loss in Concord: 19 of those remembered were local residents, up from 12 last year.
They included Daniel Virgin, 81, who was proud of his Native American heritage and loved to watch wrestling, and Michael Schilz, who was discovered in a shed across from the state prison.
Curtis Ayer, an artist who left his mark underneath bridges and overpasses in the city, was found deceased near the Interstate-393 bridge. David Browall was killed when a fire consumed his RV at the Steeplegate Mall. Tim White died of carbon monoxide poisoning as he slept in his tent beside his partner.
Michael Davis Jr. had been a home visitor for the Community Action Program before he lost his housing again. Built “like Andre the Giant,” he was forced to live in his car, where he passed away.
Elaine Adams, 59, and Elisabeth Benoit, 43, were struck by cars on Loudon Road in August and October. Adams had a ritual of morning coffee at the Bean and Bakery, and Benoit was remembered as a “diva” who loved dressing up and painting her nails.
Their families and friends joined a crowd of several dozen at the State House plaza on Thursday. They sipped hot chocolate, leaned their heads on one another’s shoulders and gripped their hands together tightly.
A tinkerer and mechanic whose family described him as a summer day personified, Browall, who died in his RV, had been close with Savannah Boucher.
“Every day, I find something that reminds me of him, just him living within things,” Boucher said. “I don’t know how to explain it.”
The weather turning cold again means Deborah Eckland is feeling the loss of her brother, Glenn Chrzan, anew.
Cold, like the morning when he walked out of Catholic Medical Center in Manchester and never made it back to the Helping Hands shelter. Cold, like the 47 days she spent scouring the city for him.
The vigil is held annually around the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, a reminder of the toll that long, dark, cold winters can take on those living outside.
This winter, the coalition and The Friendly Kitchen, with support from the city and county, have teamed up to provide 24-hour warming centers on days with harsh weather.
Eckland brought with her a sign, like ones she had carried with her on those daily search trips. Alongside photos of Chrzan were photos of Tim Russell , who was found dead at his Memorial Field campsite while his name sat at the top of the list for an apartment, and Rodney Moody, a pillar of Concord’s unhoused community who had been a close friend.
Eckland shared a long, tight hug with Tim’s mother, Becky. His younger brother, James, held the candle bearing Tim’s name high in the air, lingering there before he placed it on the white tablecloth.
State databases recorded around 350 unhoused people in Merrimack County this fall, the vast majority of whom live in Concord. That number has ticked up slightly over the last year.
Between 2023 and 2024, homelessness declined by about 8% in New Hampshire, a statewide report found. That number based on the annual point in time count, which attempts to identify the number of people experiencing homelessness in a community on a single night in January. Figures aren’t yet available for 2025.
The vigil remembers those who died while experiencing homelessness as well as those who were housed but had a history of homelessness.
Like Regan, Richard Kenney died not long after becoming housed in Concord. So did John McCormack Sr., a Willie Nelson look-alike and sincere, tenacious friend whose son remains homeless in Concord. That was also the case for James McNamara, who was 20 years old, a young man described as truly, deeply funny – not just in the normal way.
Alongside loved ones, the vigil was a heavy moment for local service providers.
Connor Spern is the head of the state’s Ending Veteran Homelessness Project and a former outreach worker with the Concord Coalition to End Homelessness.
“Moody was the first person whose name I knew in this community,” Spern said through tears. “And he was the first person who knew mine.”
Moody’s “intentionally” grumpy demeanor belied a cheeky sense of humor and a protectiveness for others that earned him a reputation as a mentor and the “mayor” of Concord’s unhoused community. He died in his sleep after a period of declining health at the age of 55.
It’s been just a month since Danielle Lemay, 33, died at her campsite in Concord. Lemay was colorful, from her hair to the book of doodles she kept, but she was weighed down by the loss of her partner, Trent, three years ago.
Eve Toth, the housing stabilization and street outreach manager with the Community Action Program, spoke with Lemay a day before her death.
“Even in pain, she found a way to make me laugh,” Toth said. “May she finally be at peace and reunited with Trent.”