Hannah E. Snell was born around 1841 in New Hampshire to Aaron and Mary Snell. Her father was a farmer who owned $1,000 of real estate and $230 of personal property by 1860. She grew up and attended school in Barnstead, New Hampshire. She married Joseph H. Prime on September 29, 1862. He spent the next three years serving in the Union army, and they corresponded throughout the war. By 1870, they were living in Barnstead. He was working as a farm laborer, and she was working for a woolen mill. They owned $800 of real estate and $150 of personal property. The couple had no children. Joseph died on October 14, 1911, and she passed away of chronic myocarditis on September 12, 1920.