THE Stated Meeting of the Society for this month, postponed by vote of the Council, was held, by invitation of Mr. Henry Herbert Edes, at No. 62 Buckingham Street, Cambridge, on Thursday, 4 May, 1922, at eight o’clock in the evening, the President, Fred Norris Robinson, Ph.D., in the chair.
The Records of the last Stated Meeting were read and approved.
The President announced the death, on the seventeenth of April, of Richard Middlecott Saltonstall, a Resident Member.
The President appointed the following Committees in anticipation of the Annual Meeting:
To nominate candidates for the several offices,—Messrs. Samuel Williston, Morris Gray, and William Cushing Wait.
To examine the Treasurer’s accounts,—Messrs. John Eliot Thayer and John Lowell.
Dr. Charles L. Nichols spoke of Samuel Danforth’s Almanack for the Year 1647 as the earliest perfect almanac now in existence printed in British America, and the only book with the imprint of Matthew Day. He called attention to the arrangement with the month of March as the first page of the Calendar and to the mention in the “Chronological Notes” of the discovery of the “Chrystall Hills” in 1642 by Darby Field—that is, the White Mountains in New Hampshire. This unique almanac was originally owned by the Rev. Samuel Haugh of Reading, then by Judge Samuel Sewall, and is now in the Henry E. Huntington Library of San Gabriel, California.
Mr. Samuel E. Morison read extracts from two commonplace-books kept by Ephraim Eliot,73 and exhibited two prints. Of one of these, made by Nathaniel Hurd in 1762 and representing an episode in the career of the notorious Seth Hudson, the following account is copied from one of the commonplace-books:
Compiled by Eph Eliot in conformity to the picture.
In the year 1762, there appeared in Boston, a curious character who called himself Doctor Hudson74—gave out that he was a Dutchman—that he was possessed of a large fortune, & was travelling for his amusement. He dressed very gaily—tried to push himself into genteel company & though rather expensive in his appearance, he shewed but little money & displayed no resources—he was well watched. After some time a bad fellow was detected in putting off a note purporting to be from the treasurer of the province, which proved a counterfeit. His name was Howe.75 He confessed that he was a partner in villainy with Doctor Hudson, & that they had been privately engaged in making up a number of the province notes, which were in high credit in this & the neighbouring provinces & sold readily at an advanced price. The Doctor was also taken into custody—they were tried & convicted; and ordered to the pillory & whipping post. It was a very mortifying thing to the Doctor—but excited the attention of the people greatly. Their exposure in the pillory was accompanied with a collection of an immense crowd & immoderate exultation. Mr Nathaniel Hurd, an eminent engraver, put out a caricature print of the exhibition, which excited much attention. Hudson was represented in the pillory & at a short distance was Howe stripping near the whipping post by the side of Jack Ketch, to whom he addressed himself with “here’s a back for your whip shillaly”—who answers, “& on my shoul here is a whip.” A gentleman who stands by the pillory, asks Hudson “Doctor, How does the physic work?” & is told “Faith it has brought me to a stool.” The devil is represented flying towards him, exclaiming, “This is the man for me.”76 The Doctor is supposed to address the multitude in the following speech, which is printed below the above described representation—viz. (author unknown).77
Engraved for The Colonial Society of Massachusetts from an original owned Miss Mary Lincoln Eliot
H-ds-n’s Speech from the pillory
What mean these crowds, this noise & roar?
Did you never see a rogue before?
Are villains then, a sight so rare?
To make you press & gape & stare?
Come forward all who look so fine,
With gain as illy got as mine.
Step up—You’ll soon reverse the show;
The croud above—and few below.
Well, for my roguery here I stand,
A Spectacle for all the land
High elivated on this stage
The greatest villain of the age
My crimes have been both great & many,
Equal’d by very few—if any,
And for the mischief I have done,
I put this wooden neckcloth on.
There’s Howe his brawny back is stripping
Quite callous grown by frequent whipping
In vain you wear your whip-cord out—
You’ll ne’er reclaim that Rogue so stout
To make him honest, take my word,
You must apply a bigger cord.
All ye who now behold this sight
That ye may get some profit by’t,
Keep always in your mind I pray
The few words that I have to say
“Follow my steps—and you may be
“In time, perhaps, advanc’d like me—
“Or like my fellow Lab’rer—Howe
“You’ll get at least a post, below.
In front of the print is the representation of a medallion, on which is a profile of Hudson, dressed in a bag wig, with a sword under his arm, (as he generally appeared before his detection) partly drawn from the scabbard, with the words “Dutch Tuck,” on the exposed part of the blade.
The print thus described by Mr. Eliot was published on March 12, 1762, and is here reproduced from an original owned by Miss Mary Lincoln Eliot, a granddaughter of Mr. Eliot. An examination of the Boston Evening Post for the early months of 1762 discloses the following references to Seth Hudson and Joshua Howe:
At the Court of Assize, &c. held at Charlestown last Week, one Joshua Howe, of a Place called Westmoreland, in the Province of New-Hampshire, was convicted of procuring and keeping in his Possession sundry Tools for counterfeiting Dollars, with Intent to use them for that End, and for soliciting and tempting divers Persons to be concerned with him therein, and for counterfeiting the Province Treasurer’s Notes, &c. He was sentenced to be set in the Pillory one Hour, to be whipped 20 Stripes, and to pay a Fine of £.20.—And upon another Indictment against him for counterfeiting Dollars (of which Crime he was some Years ago convicted) he was sentenced to be committed to the House of Correction, and there kept to hard Labour for the Term of 20 Years. (February 1, 1762, p. 3/3).
On Tuesday last Joshua How received 20 Stripes, and stood in the Pillory one Hour, at Charlestown, agreeable to that Part of his Sentence mentioned in our last Monday’s Paper. (February 8, 1762, p. 3/1.)
On Thursday Night last the noted Dr. Seth Hudson, who has been for some Months past confined in the Gaol in this Town on Suspicion of counterfeiting the Province Securities, had well nigh made his Escape from thence, but being discovered he was prevented. (February 8, 1762, p. 3/2.)
Last Friday Afternoon at the Superior Court held here, came on the Trial of the noted Dr. Seth Hudson and Joshua How for counterfeiting the Province Treasurer’s Notes, which Fact was proved so plain against them by the Testimony of the Evidences, that the Jury, without going out of Court, bro’t them both in guilty: Several other Indictments were found against the said Hudson for Crimes of the like Nature, for which we hear he is to be tried this Week:—The Court House being too small for the Concourse of People that came to hear the above Trial, the Court was adjourned to one of the largest Meeting-Houses in this Town, where the greatest Number of People attended that was ever known at any Trial in this Place before. (March 1, 1762, p. 3/1.)
At the Superiour Court held here last Week, the noted SETH HUDSON, having been convicted on four several Indictments of counterfeiting the Province Treasurer’s Notes, was sentenced to be set in the Pillory one Hour, to be whip’d 20 Stripes, to suffer one Year’s Imprisonment, and to pay £. 100 as a Fine to the King, upon each Conviction: The corporal Punishment to be inflicted four Times also.
—His Confederate Joshua How, who was convicted of the like Crime on two Indictments, was sentenced to be set in the Pillory one Hour, to suffer one Year’s Imprisonment, to be whip’d 39 Stripes, and to pay £. 100 Fine on each Conviction. (March 15, 1762, p. 3/1.)
Friday last, just after Hudson and How receiv’d their Sentence, appeared in Public, a humourous Copper Plate Print, representing the Punishment of two Criminals. . . . On the right of the Profile is display’d a Whipping-Post, with the Apparatus thereto belonging, near which Hudson’s Fellow-Labourer Mr. How, is described as stripping, and turning his head sideways to his dear Brother the Whipper, and saying, “Here’s Back for your Whip, Shilaly!” [Shilaly is a Nick-Name given to the Whipper] to which the exquisitely droll Shadow of Shilaly replies “By my Shoul here’s Whip!”—Under the Picture are four Paragraphs of satirical witty Verse, applicable to the Subject, (intitled, “H-ds-n’s Speech from the Pillory”) which afford a few humbling Considerations to those concealed Criminals, who are conscious of being comparatively guilty of Crimes similar to those for which Hudson and How justly suffer.
[The above humourous Piece may be had of Nath. Hurd, Engraver, near the Exchange, and of the Printers hereof. (March 15, 1762, p. 3/1.)
Mr. Samuel C. Clough made the following communication:
Some time ago Mr. Tuttle called my attention to a newspaper article regarding a piece of property in Boston the owners of which were unknown. That this particular piece of land had remained unbuilt upon for over two hundred years was no news to me, but the publicity relating to this fact awakened my interest as to its reason and origin.
This land forms a hollow square on the northeasterly side of Creek Square, in the rear of an estate numbering 80 to 88 Blackstone Street, owned by one of our associates, Mr. George Nixon Black. The entire block is bounded by North, Union, Marshall, Hanover, and Blackstone Streets. It is of interest to note that there are several landmarks still in existence within these limits, that the northerly abutter was formerly John Hancock, and in the near neighborhood stood the Old Feather Store, Triangular Warehouse, and Faneuil Hall. The streets surrounding this block have undergone various changes to conform to modern times, but the old square has remained unchanged for nearly two centuries. The location of this particular piece of land is indicated on the accompanying chart, and was originally covered by the water of the harbor; hence its origin and formation are due to the circumstances relating to its development.
This chart shows the conditions existing prior to 1640, and before a time when any attempt was made to improve them. The leading merchants had their houses near the center of the town or in the vicinity of the head of State Street. Referring to the chart, it will readily be seen that very little of the shore line between the present Milk and Hanover Streets was free of marsh land, and that it was very irregular on account of the several creeks and coves. The opportunity of landing or shipping goods was very limited, and naturally restricted to those merchants who had suitable wharf rights.
Within thirteen years after the settlement of Boston, three enterprises were started which led to the development and formation of this section of the present city. On May 29, 1643, Valentine Hill with Governor Winthrop commenced the project of digging Shelter Creek south of the present State Street and making suitable provision for wharfing. On November 29, 1641, Valentine Hill and his associates were granted all the waste ground in Bendalls Cove, now Faneuil Hall Square. On July 31, 1643, Henry Symons, George Burdon, John Button, John Hill, and their partners, were granted “All that Cove on the Norwest side of the Causey leading toward Charleton,” for the purpose of damming the high tide in such a manner as to operate mills for grinding corn. The “Causey” or causeway ran along the easterly shoreline of the cove, on a parallel line northwest to the present Salem Street. This project gave the mill proprietors the privilege of cutting through the marsh between the cove and a creek on the line of the present Blackstone Street, thus bringing their interests into union with those of the Bendalls Cove proprietors. The spur of land and marsh on the northwest side of the present North Street formed a natural dividing line between these two enterprises, and we will turn our attention to their development.
ENGRAVED FOR THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS
As early as 1637, John Lowe was granted a piece of marsh which afterwards became his houselot on that site known to the Bostonians in the last century as “Simmons’s Oak Hall.” John Hill and Henry Symons built their homes near the corner of the present North and Union Streets. A large portion of the marsh east and north of Hill and Symons was granted to Richard Bellingham on the “quiet resignation of all claim unto the waste before his house.” This marsh extended from the present Union Street, its northerly boundary line running on a slant line to the rear of the present No. 48 North Street. From this line it embraced all the land to the present North Street excepting those lots before mentioned of Hill, Symons, and Lowe.
It was stipulated in the first grant to the Mill Cove proprietors, that they should have a strip of marsh 60 feet wide throughout, and by a later grant 33 feet of marsh were added. Through these grants, John Milom, who seems to have been the most active proprietor, became invested with a strip of marsh on the southwesterly side of the Mill Stream, between the present Hanover Street and North Street, excepting a broad creek which extended westerly toward Union Street. This fell to the share of another proprietor—William Franklin. The westerly line of the creek was about 80 feet east of the present Union Street, and a portion of his marsh extended further west, including the present Marsh Lane, which was the private entrance to Franklin’s wharf.
Bellingham disposed of his land fronting to North Street in lots and sold the entire marsh in the rear to James Everill. Everill sold the lower portion in form of a triangle to Joshua Scottow in 1650. In 1651 Scottow purchased half of Franklin’s creek and marsh. It was Scottow who developed this creek and made it suitable for mercantile purposes, and for many years it was known as Scottow’s Dock.
One of the first mills built by the Mill Cove proprietors was located on a site corresponding to about No. 79 Blackstone Street, which required a crosswork to retain the tide water. This was ordered to be removed in 1649, but the westerly portion probably established the southerly line of Franklin’s first wharf.
William Franklin lived at the upper corner of the present Exchange Street and Adams Square. By a deed unrecorded, he sold all of his wharf property to Samuel Bennet of Lynn, who conveyed the same to William Brown and George Corwin, both merchants of Salem, in 1665 and 1666. James Russell, of Charlestown, who married Abigail, the daughter of George Corwin, came into possession of one-half of the Franklin property. The other half he purchased of William Brown in 1686.
In 1703 Russell sold the property to David Jenner in two portions which were divided by the broad passage now known as Creek Square. The upper portion included a part of the Crawford Range Co. and the present Marsh Lane. The lower portion comprised all wharfing, warehouses and tenements, northeast of the broad passage, with the Mill Creek on the northeast and Scottow’s Dock on the southeast. Jenner conveyed the property in half portions to Jeremiah Allen and James Barnes in 1703 and 1704. In the description of these deeds no information is given that will determine the outline of the wharf to the east and south, it simply says “swinging around on the Mill Creek and Scottow’s Dock.”
In 1706 Allen and Barnes sold the entire property to Adino Bulfinch in three separate parcels: first, the portion west of the broad passageway; second, a warehouse and wharf butting on Thomas Winsor; and third, a tenement, lean-to, and wharf, bounded northwest on the warehouse, northeast on the Mill Creek, and southeast on Scottow’s Dock. In the same year (1706) Bulfinch mortgaged the third parcel to Thomas Willis of Medford and in this instrument we find the following clause:
And it is hereby Mutually, Covenanted, agreed & Consented unto by and between the sd. Adino Bulfinch and Thomas Willis, parties to these present for themselves, their heirs and assignees in the manner and form following anything herein contained to the Contrary Notwithstanding, That is to say that about Thirty one foot and an half of Land or Wharf of the above granted premises reaching as far as the middle of the sd. well lying on the South Easterly side of the said Bulfinche’s land and before the Message or Tennement of the said Ground hereby granted at Eight foot distance from the said Tennement, and so ranging down the aforesaid breadth of Thirty one foot and an half to the Dock and broad passageway together with the said Well shall forever hereafter lye in Equal and perpetual Common between the sd. parties and their heirs and assignees without Inclose for the use and accommodation of the housing and Lands there both of the sd. Bulfinch and Willis and for the passing and repassing into, out of and from the same, with Cart, Man or otherwise by and through a Gateway of about 10 foot meant to be made at as against the aforesaid broad passage. . . .
And also that the sd. Thomas Willis his heirs or assignees shall not at any time or times hereafter build, Erect or set up any thing against that part of the South East side of the sd. Bulfinche’s Warehouse which comes out about nine foot and three Inches beyond the front of the sd. Tennement hereby sold.
In 1708 Thomas Willis conveyed the southeasterly portion, there being three distinct tenements, to his son Stephen Willis. The last reference to this clause appears in a deed in 1761 when a portion of the estate was conveyed to one of the heirs, Thomas Parker. In this deed the original conveyance of Franklin to Bennet is also mentioned. In 1785 the Parker heirs sold a portion to Thomas Dillon and another portion to Samuel Whitwell. In this last conveyance we find a blacksmith’s shop, which is probably the one standing there to-day, which seems to be in violation of the clause made in 1706. The restricted area is indicated on the last chart. This chart also shows the cut made on the southwesterly side of Blackstone Street when it was widened in 1834.
Mr. Morison also exhibited a satirical print which is thus described by Mr. Eliot:
In the beginning of the year 1768, when the measures of the British government were assuming more & more of a threatening appearance, the house of Representatives of Massachusets voted to send a circular letter to the legislatures of the several provinces, upon the alarming state of affairs with the mother country. This measure gave so much umbrage to his majesty, the King, that he sent out orders to Governor Bernard, peremptorily to demand that the said vote &c. should be rescinded, & obliterated. This demand being judged unreasonable, after debate, a vote was passed not to conform to it. Seventeen members only voting for it, & ninety two against. These numbers therefore were used in a political manner—Seventeen being called the Tory number—and the glorious Ninety two, as it was called, was denominated that of the Whigs.78 The seventeen members were branded with the name of Rescinders, & were held up to view in a contemptuous manner. In order to render them more contemptable, Paul Revere, (afterwards Colonel of a regiment in the service of the Commonwealth of Massachusets, but then a Silversmith & Engraver) issued a caricature print, headed with the words—
A Warm Place—Hell.
The delineation was, a monstrous open jaw, resembling that of a shark, with flames issuing from it, & the devil with a large pitchfork driving the seventeen rescinders into the flames—exclaiming “Now I’ve got you—a fine haul, by Jove.” As a reluctance is shown by the foremost man, at entering, who is supposed to represent the Hon. Timothy Ruggles Esq. of Worcester,79 another devil is drawn with a fork, flying towards him, crying out—“push on Tim.” Over the upper Jaw is seen in the back ground, the Cupola of the province house with the Indian & bow & arrow, (the crest of the province arms). In this house was the Governor’s residence.
A copy of this print fell by accident into the writers hands—some time since. He enquired the particulars of Col. Revere respecting it. The Colonel was then eighty years of age, & observed that he had seen a copy of it for forty years—was pleased to find that one was in preservation & offered to buy it. He said that he was a young man, zealous in the cause of liberty when he sketched it80 & had forgotten the circumstances—but this he did remember, that while he was doing it, the famous Doct Church81 (then considered a leading whig, though he afterwards proved defective) came into his shop & seeing what he was about, took a pen & wrote the following lines as an accompaniment. The Colonel then delivered them with much pathos exactly as they are on the print.
ENGRAVED FOR THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS
Engraved for The Colonial Society of Massachusetts from an original owned by Miss Mary Lincoln Eliot
“On brave Rescinders! to yon yawning cell,
“Seventeen such miscreants, sure will startle Hell.
“There puny Villains damn’d for petty sin,
“On such distinguish’d Scoundrels gaze & grin.
“The out done Devil will resign his sway,
“He never curst his millions in a day.”
He was asked to call over their names, but could recall only the above named Timothy Ruggles, & Doctor Robert Calef82 of Ipswich, whom he had particularized in the print with a Calfs head.
Our reproduction of this print is from a copy also owned by Miss Mary L. Eliot.
Mr. Julius H. Tuttle submitted two papers relating to the New Hampshire Grants, now Vermont:
The following papers by Charles Phelps,83 which are submitted with the kind permission of Dr. James Lincoln Huntington of Boston, a descendant whose family owns the ancient Phelps homestead in Hadley, are of interest in connection with the Massachusetts and New York claims to these Grants. It may perhaps be possible to identify the fifty townships referred to in the Massachusetts claim, which Mr. Phelps was struggling so hard to establish.
I
For Mr. Charles Phelps, Jr., in Hadley pr Favor of Mr. Warner of Hadley.
June 5, 1774.84
Having arrived at Boston, Monday night after I left your house, and Waiting upon Councillor Bowdoin,85 and Mr. Adams,86 the General Courts Committee, appointed to draw up the State of this Province, Claim and Right to those 50 Townships etc. It was in manner finished, Mr. Adams Red it to me for my Consideration thereof: I desired to have it Prepared and Finished against fryday that week, ready to Present it to the General Court for their Perusal, Previous to my throwing in a Petition to have them immediately Prosecute all those measures and prepare all those matters Necessary for the preparing a Successfull Transmit of our Claim, Petition, and Remonstrance, to the King and Council. For the Reanexing them Lands to this Province, which measures to be so undertook and gon through with, would take up near 8 months Do what we could, before they would be accomplished, and that altho the sentiments of administration at home, are at present so bad, that it would not do at all, now to Send the Petition for the reanexing of them Lands yet, never-the less, that was not aney reasonable objection, against the Performing now Everything Necessary, and keeping all the Performances therefore untill the Circumstances of things were altered in favour of the Petition and then send Immediately for the Recovery thereof with all the Prerequisits therefor ready in the archives of the Court—for many important Reasons therefor I adduced, gained the opinion of all I discoursed with of both Houses to assist me in the Petition I preferred for that Purpose—I thought best to Enter the Petition at the Council Board obtained the favorable reception thereof after its being red at the board they Called upon me for the State of the Claim or title of the Government which was ordered Last Session to be Drew etc I presented it but it was not signed they said then I carried it Back to the Committee for Signing: they had no Commission from the Province attested by the Secretary87 in form as they ought to have of ye appointment wherefore could not attest it regularly before the Commission was made out by the Secretary these caused a delay 2 Days then the Governor88 last Satterday noon adjourned the General Court over to Salem Next tuesday to sit there where and when the Court must meet—Now I must improve my time Every way for advantage against the sittings of the Court there where I must attend. I waited upon Governor Hutchinson at the Castel with an address to his Excellency to do in all the Possible favor he can when he arrives at England and when our Petition and the matter there of shall be sent there for Consideration of the King and Council the Governor tells me if I gow over to England in behalfe of the Inhabitants of them Lands he will Do all he Can for their good Consistant with his Circumstances and advises the People by all means to send over a Petition for their reliefe and Settlement of their title and he thinks they will succeed, he advised me to apply to Governor Gage as soon as possible for his assistance in the Premisses and to heare of Him what Lord Dartmouth told him about those lands before he left England and the favor the People had Shewen them alredy by the Board of Trade there and having Waited upon Governor Gage for that Purpose he assures me to assist me and the People on them Lands and the Government of the Bay (the Circumstances of all which I Disclosed to him) to the utmost of his Powers, and told me many things from Lord Dartmouth very favorable for the People and the Success my Petition met with at England to Stop New York Protest89 and if application is properly made both Governors tell me they think Releife for them will be obtained by King and Council.
Governor Hutchinson has advised me to a method for my Security and the People Particularly if the Province Do nothing further for our Help as yet or never shall Effectually apply for a reunion with this Government and he hear assured me he will yeald me all his kind assistance if I should go there whilst he is there unless his Majestys assignation Does not Necessarily Prevent him Doing it otherwise he tells me I may Depend upon his assistance and favor and he Encourages my going if the People on the Lands Can Raise ondly one Hundred Sterling for me in a method he has kindly Continued for me if this Government Do Nothing to Encourage me which under the Present Situation of things I Cant See any Grate Likely hood of their Doing anything at present of Sending a Petition for the Reanexing of them Lands to it. I have opened the affair of my new Petition which the Council have Lying before them for the Premisses to Major Hawley90 whereupon he assures me he will Do all he Can to assist me and Several of the Leading Gentn of the Honorable House of Representatives have Expressed their Sincere Desire of having my new Petition answered and promise me using their Influence for my obtaining the Prayer thereof. But Colonl Bowen fiercely opposes me and I supose Some others are of His mind So that it remains very Precarious whether I can Get my Affairs Completed to my mind as proposed things are in such a bad State at Home against this Province.
Butt all this Does but Employ my mind with greater assiduity more Vigour and resolution to do Something for a Particular or Generall Benefit I am not in the Least Intimidated or Sunk under Discouragement but are Determined I will if Possible Drive through all opposition thrown in my way for I all ways Knew nothing Short of Doing all I Possibly were Capable of would Effect the business but I apprehend by what one of the Gentn of the Honorable board told me I shall be favored by the board in my affairs and I hope I shall by the House
for if I find out it will Rub hard at the House I shall insist upon having the Board and House forming them Selves in one Grand Committee and I Permitted to have a full Hearing before them upon the floor of the House for it as a matter of such Vast Consequence I have a Good Plea to be heard at Large in that manner and then I have an apprehension I can Convince the whole Court that my new Petition and my plan therein is Converted in such a manner that it Will Necessarily appear to a Demonstration to be the Best Way that can be taken to obtain the End Designed in the opinion of Every one that Can Comprehend it.
I am very sensible of my Weakness and Inability to Perform a task So Difficult & Grate against Such Discouragements and opposition the Case is attended with having no more Influence than I have in that Grand Assembly many of which always Suspicious of an Importunate Solicitor being moved from his own Private Interest to Gain an Emolument to himselfe and Family rather than the Common utility of the whole
Hower things may turn If I do all I can I shall have nothing to Lament for my not doing my best to accomplish the Scheem but on failure I Shall therefore With a Humble resignation to the Disposition of Infinite Wisdom Submit this and all other affairs and the Event Waite for in a Way of Duty alone is the Sentiment and Resolution of your loving Father
C. P.
My Love to you, your Worthy, tender hearted and most kind and affectionate mother, your Dear Spouse, your Brothers and Sisters etc. At Present Im in Health Hoping you all are So too; not Knowing when I can return, wishing of You and them all Possible Happiness and tranquility; tho’ She your once With Endearment and fillial Affection Esteemed it your Honour, and Delight, to Address, with the Endearing Appelation of Mother, Lamentably Destitute of Both.
My Good friends, Mr. John Adams and Mr. Wm Pynchon91 have got my Case continued from Last March Court to next July Court the week after Commencement before Judgement can be given against me therefore then I must have the money to pay to prevent Execution
Yesterday I went to the Castel again to present my Last address to Governor Hutchinson and Get his Assistance Promised me if I ask it in the Premisses and take my Leave of Him and Wish him a good Passage to England and Safe arrival there and the Happiness of his Majestys favor Whome he has Promissed him to pay him well for his going home to receive further pledges of His Princes favour and a Pension there Equal to His Sallery Here as Governor.
A Number of Gentn went over from Boston to the Castle to take their Leave of Him92 and Wish him a Good and Comfortable Passage & Safe arrival there and His Kind admittance Into the Presence of His Majesty who ordered Lord Dartmouth to send him the Special marks of His favor and his Invitation to set off for England as soon as possible that he may receive him Into his Royal Presence as the Governer Hutchinson told me with his own mouth, and a Grate Deal besides he Disclosed to me Which I Cant Let you know by Letter.
The Ship fell Down to the Castle yesterday in which the Governer takes his Passage for England with one Son and one Daughter having one Son there alredy as he told me himselfe
C. P.
For my Dear and Well beloved Son Charles Phelps in Hadley
Wishing all Happiness and the Enjoyment of Every Domestick Blessing in that Peacefull family Where He Exhibits that filial affection so Much to His Kind Mothers Satisfaction.
II
To the Honorable Council of the State of Massachusetts Bay
Having the fore part of June Last Set out upon my Intended Journey to Boston but being taken Ill upon the Road unable to proceed wrote Largely upon the Important Subject of my Intended theem when I should arive and Sent It by a young Gentn Who promised me he woud faithfully Deliver it to the Honorable Artemas Ward Esqr with his own Hand. Since which I have had no Intelligence thereof nor of anything being done in Consequence of it; living so far in the Inland woods from Roads Leading to Boston But Mr John Clark rides post from Boston to Northfield weekly therefore should be Glad to have the Secretary93 or one of His Clerks send me Intelligence of what acceptance those matters had with the Honorable Board if any & whether any thing has been Done upon them Petitions by Either House of the Honorable Legislature and send it by Mr Clark to my son Charles Phelps at Hadley as he passeth through that town Every week.
And if there has no notice been taken thereof by the Legislature I should be Glad to know that also, however I Shall think it very Strange that matters of So much Importance of such vast Consequence to Government in General as well as what Grately affects so many respectable Petitioners many of whom are Gentn of fortune Honor & Influence at Court that the Court Can Suffer the Intrest of their Constituants of So much Worth to the whole Government to Lye so Long unnoticed & wholly neglected after so many pressing motives to Induce the Legislature to take it Into their most Serious Consideration & publish Some resolves that the world may know it is an object they Intend In proper time to obtain the acquisition of however Long it has Lain in the ashes of ministerial opposition formerly & now Lies under the obstruction of hot Bloody & all Distressing Civil Wars since those in such Struggles for part of the object by Vermont & New York State for it will be almost an unpardonable Crime in me to Suffer the Intrest of so many Hundreds of my worthy & most respectable Constituents neglected when they all view it of such a benefit to Government also to have their affairs soon brought upon the Carpet by me therefore I beg I may receive Intelligence hereof by Mr Secretary Avery or his Clerk—by the means above mentioned which is the safest I know of.
To Close shall beg Leave ondly to Sugest that as the Struggles between New York State and Vermont riseth higer and higer very fast Governor Clinton has Sent an Express Lately to Congress of those matters of Disturbances & Information of Vermont upon his Subjects & yr property Living on the 50 townships &c in Consequence whereof Congress Sent a Committee up at Bennington to Inquire Into the truth of facts between the two Contending parties & report to Congress what they find for an adjudication Decisive respecting Vermont at Least as we all Soposed and as those matters would naturally open to a Sceen of Important transaction which might very much affect the rights of Massachusetts to those 50 townships which Covers near 50 miles of County north & Southrd. the one halfe of the bredth of the Bay State; and Consequently must necessarily affect their Intrest & right of Soil beyond New York State west; the very Lands reffrd to in that Important Petition I sent Last June to Boston affore sd it was thought necessary for me to attend that Committee of Congress at Bennington in respect to my Constituants Rights &c as well as the Rights of the Bay thereto Least something Disadvantageous to my Constituants &c might Ensue relative to matters of Such vast Importance & Delicacy which my Constituants Expect I Should be always upon my watch & guard in the premises in their behalfe and accordingly exerted by a watchful policy of a neglect in my selfe if I should omit I gave the Committee of Congress an account of what my Constituants had done both relative to the 50 townships & those Lands west of New York State and the incontrovertable rights of the Bay State to the same as fully as I was able as far as was pertinent on that occation of their coming &c And as matters then opening between the portion of New York & Vermont rendered it necessary that the Committee might Know the Ingratitude & Baseness of Vermont officers &c in favor of New York & how Inconsistant they were to Justice and the rights of 2 States and their Treasonable Information & premeditated Conspiracies against their alleigence to New York authority and Government & Contrary to resolves of Continental Congress &c But Some Disturbances having Since fallen out between the two Contending Governments officers & subjects of New York State & Vermont which made it Necessary for the County Convention under New York authority to meet and they having so met Determined to send an agent for the County of Cumberland to Lay open their Abuses from Vermont before the Legislature of New York State and by their Joynt Assistance with the County; Petition Congress by sd agent, to resolve against Vermonts faction any Longer to exist or their obstruction of the authority of New York State and that Vermont Should no Longer be Suffered to Exist to the perpetual vexation of the People and that the authority of New York be in full Erected without any Controul from Vermont &c And altho in the room of a better I being appointed their agent yet I shant have it in my Province or within the Duty of my agency to Say anything of the right of the Bay &c because the Bay in their Legislative Capacity put in no Claim Either to Jurisdiction or Soil & if they Did it would be a matter very Different in its Nature & opperation to what I are to solicit which is that New York States authority be Exercised free of any molestation from Vermont throughout that District of Country as it was at the Commencement of this War or at the Declaration of Independence & because we all Conclude Congress wont Enter into the Consideration of the Disputes that may arise about the Limmits or Jurisdiction of Different States whilst it is not settled whether the Independence & Sovereignty of the united States of America be admitted by Grate Britan & so long as they maintain the Hottest war against america for our setting up Independance & Sovereignty against Brittan. But nevertheless I are of the opinion & beg Leave again herewith to offer it that it is perfectly Consistant with the Justice prudence & wisdom of the massachusetts Honorable Legislature to resolve their aincient and Continued Claim be Sent to Congress Respecting the 50 townships & their western territory as Soon as possible if it is not Done Conform to those Petitions herein before mentioned sent Last June to Court as I trust they were Delivered to Councillor Ward94 however all must be submitted to the wisdom of the Standing Guardians of the State to whom of Right those Important matters belong therefore to conclude my address beg leave of assuming the honour of Subscribing my Selfe your Honours
Reproduced for The Colonial Society of Massachusetts
much obliged & most Humble Servant at Comd
Charles Phelps.
July 28th 1779
To the Honorable Council of State in Boston.
Mr. Morison also communicated an early Harvard song, taken from one of Mr. Eliot’s commonplace-books. “Before commencement,” wrote Mr. Eliot, “when the senior class bid adieu to Harvard University, it used to be customary for them to dine together in public, after having a valedictory oration;95 and the following song was annually for many years sung in full chorus—viz.”
Tune Maggie Lauder
Now we are free from college laws,
From commonplace book reason
From trifling Syllogistic rules
And systems out of season;
Nor evermore we’ll have defined
If matter thinks or thinks not—
But all the matter we will mind
Is he who drinks or drinks not.
Copernicus, a learned sage
Who rightly followed reason
Asserts (I now forget the page)
Earth follows Sol each season
Well, be it so, who cares for that
May prove ’tis but a notion,
Yet this is most important still,
To mind the bottles’ motion.
Plenum, vacuum, minus, plus
Are learned words and rare too,
Such terms let Tutors now discuss,
And those who please may hear too.
A plenum in our wine shall flow
With plus and plus behind Sir,
But if our stores grow minus low
A vacuum you’ll soon find, Sir.
Mr. Henry H. Edes exhibited the second volume of the Rev. John Pointer’s Chronological History of England, published at Oxford in 1714, which once belonged to Thomas Prince and bears his autograph as well as the book-plate of the New England Library. It also contains some manuscript notes96 by Prince, and apparently was the book which suggested to him the format of his own book entitled Annals of New England, which is almost an exact copy of Pointer’s volumes.
Mr. Albert Matthews communicated the following paper, written by Mr. Clifford B. Clapp of the Henry E. Huntington Library of San Gabriel, California:
CHRISTO ET ECCLESIAE
I
If the unquestionable dignity of a device borne by Harvard College for two and a quarter centuries could yet be enhanced, it would become our duty to bear such testimony of its age and honorable connections as could be given from late researches. For many years it has been assumed that the motto “Christo et Ecclesiae” was adopted about 1690 to 1694, during the presidency of Increase Mather, as part of the effort to preserve the power of the established Congregational Church. This is mere conjecture, the meagre records affording no proof.97 Whatever may be the truth on this point, there has been stated merely a possible occasion for the adoption of the motto, but not a source from which it was derived. Investigation has apparently not heretofore been carried further back.
It is now possible to state that whatever inspiration the sons of Harvard have drawn from her dedication “to Christ and the Church” they undoubtedly owe in some measure to the influence of an earlier university, which adopted “Christo et Ecclesiae” at its foundation about a hundred years earlier than Harvard adopted it. They undoubtedly owe it in some measure to a great teacher who never heard of Harvard, but who was a strong guide for some of her pioneers, who never saw New England (although his heart was with her), but whose children’s children have formed influential branches of our population from Harvard’s earliest days to the present time.
To the Academy of Franeker, the second Dutch university, founded in 1585, and to the influence of Dr. William Ames, Harvard owes her motto. For truth she must in any case stand, and for the reiteration of “Veritas” with “Christo et Ecclesiae” we must be thankful; for Christ and the Church she chose to stand, and there has never been cause to regret it.98 It is strange that no notice has ever been taken at Harvard of the connection with Franeker and Dr. Ames.99
The University of Franeker was founded in 1585 by the Estates of Friesland, a province of the Netherlands in the extreme north between the Zuider Zee and the North Sea. As soon as the University or Academy was established, the Stadtholder and Deputies brought it to public notice by issuing a proclamation, or “Programma” as it was called, beginning, “Guilielmus Ludovicus Comes Nassavise . . . Salutem,” and dated at the end “Franekerse MDLXXXV. xv. Iulij.” This proclamation stated the purposes and method of the University. In the course of it occurs a statement, memorable for Harvard College, as follows:
. . . ad quem; & hoc Programmate discipulos euocare & elicere voluimus, ut hue se lubentes sistant: & studia Vtrorumque, cœptaque Nostra, quæ vno Academiæ complectemur nomine, cum solenni Nominis Divini Invocatione, piaque ceremonia, non Palladi aut Musis, sed Christo & Ecclesiae publicè dedicabimus.100
Engraved for The Colonial Society of Massachusetts from W.B.S. Boeles, Frieslands Hoogeschool in het Rijhs Athenaeum to Franeker, 1878, i.384
That “Christo et Ecclesiae” was a solemnly adopted motto and not a mere ejaculation of the Frisian Deputies is proved by its insertion in the Statutes of the Academy, the “Statvta Academiæ Franequerensis,” dated at the end, “Franequeræ Frisiorum, tertio Calendas Aprileis, Anno cic ic lxxxvi.” Lex I of the “Statvta” reads:
Literis et pietati Academia publica Christo Ecclesiæique dicata Franequeræ Frisiorum publice adaperta in usum patriae exterorumque esto.101
Nor was the dedication allowed to stand in printed documents only; it was also placed above the chief portal of the building. The city plan of Franeker as it existed in 1664102 shows the Academy to be in the southwest part of the city, near the “Wester” or “Harlinger Poort,” fronting westerly on the Vijverstraat. This street apparently got its name from the pond or artificial body of water surrounding the Castle on the west side of the city and adjacent to the moat encircling the whole city. A view made of the picturesque buildings as they were in 1622,103 when outwardly little changed from their condition in 1584, shows a court or area planted with trees, surrounded by the Academy buildings on the east, south, and west, with a church, formerly the “gasthuiskerk” or “hospital church,”104 at the left or north. The building at the east, behind the area, contained the library, “collegiekamer,” etc.105 Against the church and opening on the area was a north gallery; to the right or south was a south gallery and rooms devoted to administration; and along the Vijverstraat front, extending from these rooms to the church, was the long low west gallery. Through this gallery there had been made a door or portal with a gable raised above the roof of the gallery. The position of this portal and the fact of its embellishment with arms and inscriptions lead to the inference that it was the chief entrance to the Academy. On this gable, or what was probably the most obvious point in the University structure, and therefore as true a proclamation to the public as that of paper and ink, appeared the dedication “Christo et Ecclesiae.”106
It thus appears that the dedicatory motto was considered by the Estates of Friesland to be of enough significance to be published in the initial proclamation of the University, in the very first of its statutes, and over its chief portal. That it was a dedication of consequence to the authorities of the institution is also to be shown.
One of the professors at the Academy was Johannes Maccovius, or Jan Makowsky as he was known in his native country, Poland, where he was born in 1588. He entered the University of Franeker in 1613 and became professor of theology there in 1615, and there he remained until his death in 1644. Of this man we read: “Theologically he was a rigid Calvinist of the extreme supralapsarian school, and theses of a corresponding character, defended in 1616 by one of his pupils, involved him in a controversy with his colleague Sibrandus Lubbertus which was settled only by the Synod of Dort in 1619.”107 Other authorities state that it was his scholastic method that caused the disturbance in the church.108 In 1525–1526 Maccovius was again involved in controversy, and a public indictment was drawn against him by certain of the professors at Franeker. He had embittered the life of Lubbertus, and he was not on good terms with many of his associates.109 But while the particular brand of Calvinistic doctrine upheld by him was not that of the men who held the balance of power at Franeker, this was not the only charge against him; the other was an impeachment of his morality. It is natural that the theologians at that time should combine the issues of piety and morality, and charge defects of character against false doctrine. The fame that brought many students to the Academy to study under Maccovius was probably the reason for his being maintained there. But his influence with the students was considered the very worst. He was branded as a man of altogether barbaric character, whose life was nothing more nor less than continual impiety. He encouraged the students in irresponsibility, and once, when he rode with three students to Haarlingen, he drank so much strong liquor on the way that in his attempt to return to Franeker he did not realize that he had been imposed upon until he was within the gates of Bolsward.110 The indictment or “complaint” was written by Sixtus Amama, signed by him and three other professors, and addressed to Johannes Saeckma, a prominent lawyer, and official, and one of the curators of the Academy. The signatories were all men of eminence in their profession.
The complaint was headed “Klagten over Prof. Joh. Maccovius,” was dated at the end “XXII Junij 1626,” and was signed “T. A. Observantissimi, Joh. Hachtingius, . . . S. Amama, . . . G. Amesius, . . . A. Verhel.” After the signature of Ames appears the following: “Quamvis de omnibus & singulis non sim certus, rem ipsam tamen ex Academiae et Ecclesiae re esse confirmo.” The first part of the text, being as much as is necessary to this article, is as follows:
Amplissime & Magnifice Domine, Nihil equidem illibentius facimus, quam hoc ipsum, quod odioso delationis titulo fortassis indigetabunt alij. At cum, proh dolor! nimis verum sit, quod querimur, & magis verum, quam ut a quoquam negari possit id, quod nunc in T. A. sinum evaporavimus, confidimus tuam A. nequaquam in malam partem accepturam, quod non odium privatum, non affectus ullus reprehensibilis, sed odium impietatis & egregij publici studium nobis extorsit. Christo et Ecclesiae dicata haec Academia est. Christo & Ecclesiae sacramentum dixisti vos, quibus ea cura demandata est, ne quid detrimenti capiat. Eodem sacramento nos obligamur, quibus docendi & regendi provincia delegata est. Et quod ad nos attinet, plane in ea sumus sententia, non satisfacere nos huic sacramento, nisi T. A. significemus rursus, quantum detrimenti res Academicæ patiantur ex eo, quod tot jam annis publico stipendio non in Professione aliqua profana, sed sacra, alatur homo moribus plane barbarus, qui id solum agit ut barbaros & profanos mores in Academiam invehat, discordias accendat, qui in omnium bonorum nomen et famam grassatur, cujus denique universa vita nihil aliud est, quam continua impietas.111
This complaint against Maccovius, in which the dedication of the Academy to Christ and the Church was reiterated and the position of Maccovius declared inimical to the purpose implied in this dedication, is not the only evidence that the dedication was taken to heart by the leading authorities. Just before the sending of the complaint, Amesius (our Dr. Ames), one of the signers, was installed as Rector Magnificus of the Academy. His inaugural address was upon the motto “Christo et Ecclesiae,” and he chose this theme particularly because of the trouble in the Academy.112 After mentioning several illustrious Athenians upon whom his mind appropriately dwelt upon such an important occasion in the Academy, Demosthenes, Aeschines, Lysias, and Pericles, he said: “Ego vero altioris ordinis virum intelligo, non Atheniensium tantum, sed & omnium gentium Doctorem, Apostolum Paulum.” And then he went on to the beginning of his subject, in these important words:
ENGRAVED FOR THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS FROM A COPY IN THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY
Quemadmodum enim ille in Areopago dicturus, explicandam elegit inscriptionem cujusdam aræ, cujus titulus Ἀγνώϛῳ Θεῷ, Deo ignoto: sic etiam & ego vobiscum hoc tempore communicare decrevi, quæ mecum sum meditatus de inscriptione Academiæ nostræ, Christo & EcclesiÆ; Christo, non Deo quidem ignoto; nec tamen satis noto. Fertur hue animus eo magis, quod inscriptionem ipsam neglectam, obscuratam & semideletam observem, quod quidem si casu ab operarius barbaris factum sit, renovationem aliquam postulat: si vero imbrobo consilio factum appareret, piaculo magno expiari deberet, notari utrunque juvat, & quasi malum omen omnibus votis averti.113
And, later in the same oration, with intensity of feeling he brought forth words almost of invective, when he declared that, with affairs as they were, the Academy would stand dedicated, not to Christ and the Church, but to Bacchus and the Bacchantes. Maccovius was suspended for three years from his position in the Academic Senate.114
It thus appears that “Christo et Ecclesiae” was used in a measure as a spiritual and moral trumpet call by the party at Franeker which may be supposed to have held or represented the equilibrium at that time, and in particular by William Ames, when Rector Magnificus of the institution, a man for whom devotion to an ideal meant a conscientious life of action in keeping therewith. And now, to recapitulate, the motto was by five different methods published to the world during the first half century of the existence of the Academy or University of Franeker: in its preliminary announcement; in its first law of government; above its chief portal; in a controversial document drawn up by some of its most important professors; and in the inaugural address of one of its most famous authorities. Should it not therefore have come to the notice of Harvard College, founded soon after the events last detailed by men immersed in the knowledge of the religious action of those times and particularly interested in the Netherlands because so many had been compelled to go there from England?115
II
Nevertheless, is it safe to assume that the true origin of the motto has been discovered here in this Dutch university, or even that there was any one single origin? Was not the spirit of the Crusaders that of warfare for Christ and the Church? Was not an ideal of the theologians of the seventeenth century and an idea commonly dwelt upon by synods and writers, and above all a very natural sentiment, that of devotion to Christ and the Church? It seems almost unnecessary to declare the truth of this. But, even if such be shown to be the case, it cannot be held to detract from the significance of the crystallization of the ideal into a motto, and of a special source from which that ideal, so crystallized as it is shown to have been, was taken for adoption by Harvard College. It does not seem necessary to discuss at any length the reasons for adopting the motto. The inspiration to be drawn from it, the sentiment attached to it, must have been more compelling than anything having to do with the politics of church or state. Massachusetts people needed no motto to strengthen their resolution in opposition to the royal control of Charles and James; nor could they have expected to use the motto as a compliment to William III. The declaration for Christ and the Church, with the emphasis on the first part of the motto, might have been considered the proper protestation against Church of England presumption. But probably Ecclesia, in the last part of the motto, attained recognition in the seal as an expression of the broad catholic devotion of liberal minds, since Ecclesia was the universal or truly catholic church, the word having signified the church from the days of the primitive Christian congregations in Greece.116 Tradition, whether embodied in the “Ecclesia” of sixteen centuries or in the “Christo et Ecclesiæ” of one century, must have sufficiently influenced those of the sterner school, the Mathers and others, with their pride of intellect as well as their devotion to maintenance of the sacerdotal type of church; the more so since the later tradition was associated with a man trebly revered as a great name in the church, an associate dearly loved by the fathers, and the stock from which had sprung two strong branches flourishing as preachers in New England.
As for a direct motive, it may have existed in some attempt toward the reformation of manners in the college, some movement for more sobriety and piety among the students, in full remembrance that the Franeker dedication was a heart-felt concern of William Ames and his friends, and that it was used by them almost by way of a slogan, in what they considered a moral emergency.
In spite of the fact that search has been made without avail for another important source for the motto,117 such another one may at any time be pointed out, for it would be surprising if Franeker only among institutions should carry it. It is to be regretted therefore that there have not as yet been produced any letters between Franeker and Harvard, or any paragraph of a seventeenth century diarist, or even an assertion by Cotton Mather, to back up the Franeker origin. It is believed, nevertheless, that the facts to be adduced in place of the desirable documentation do in truth afford ground for a reasonable inference that Harvard owes “Christo et Ecclesiae” to the Academy of Franeker, and that the channel through which the motto was transmitted was the peculiarly intimate personal and intellectual repute of Dr. William Ames.
III
The Academy at Franeker grew out of two movements working together: (1) that toward higher education of youth, through an extension of the teaching provided at the cost of the state,118 and (2) that toward better education of the ministers of the Reformed church. The foundation of some sort of university at Franeker appears to have been contemplated by the Emperor Charles the Fifth, in the early years of the sixteenth century, and the prestige of this plan and its documentary (if unfulfilled) promise had some actual connection with the choice of Franeker as the seat of the Academy or University when freedom from the Spanish power made it practicable to establish it in the manner suitable to Dutch ideals.119
Largely through the influence of Jelle Hotzes van Sneek, better known under the name of Gellius Snecanus, definite steps were taken in a request of the provincial synod at Franeker in May, 1583, and a resolution of the Estates in April, 1584, to provide a seminary or college. Credit for advancing the plan is due to Snecanus and his friend the Deputy Elardus Reinalda, together with Henricus Schotanus, who had been corrector for Plantijn. Schotanus was instrumental in turning the objective of the Deputies from a mere theological seminary to a university. In October, 1584, the Deputies provided definite means, in the appropriating of old convent properties for the contemplated use. The interest of the new Stadtholder, Willem Lodewijk, in the institution gave added assurance of success, and on the 15th of July, 1585, the proclamation (programma or plakkaat) was issued formally announcing this second Dutch university, founded only a little later than that at Leyden. We have seen something of the spirit endeavored in this first announcement. With professorships of Theology, Law, Medicine, Languages, and Philosophy, the institution was formally opened on the 29th of July, 1585.120 While providing fully the means for intellectual education, stress was laid on moral education; and moral education comprehended as much doctrinal as it did ethical standards, the two going hand in hand according to the ideas of that period. Lex VIII of the Statutes stipulates consent to that religion “cujus summa Catechesi Heidelbergensis Belgicæque Ecclesiarum & confessione Belgicæ Ecclesiæ comprehensa est.”121 The Heidelberg Catechism was drawn up principally at the instigation of Frederick III, Elector Palatine of the Rhine. It was welcomed by all but Catholics and extreme Lutherans, was translated into many languages, and became the doctrinal standard of the greater part of the Protestant Church; in the Netherlands conditions were favorable for its reception, and it was adopted at repeated synods. Indorsed at the Synod of Dort, it influenced the Westminster Assembly of Divines. The famous synod convened at Dort or Dordrecht in Holland by the authority of the Estates General November 13, 1618, lasted until May 9, 1619. It consisted of pastors, elders, and theological professors of Holland and deputies from England, Scotland, Switzerland, and parts of Germany. “The Canons of this Synod were received by all the Reformed churches as a true, accurate and eminently authoritative exhibition of the Calvinistic System of Theology.”122 It was thus as a stronghold of Reformed church theology, of religious thought, that Franeker stood before the divines of Holland, and it must have been so to our New England forefathers.
It would be interesting, but it is not necessary or possible here, to go deeper and further into the history of Franeker. The very interesting and valuable work by W. B. S. Boeles,123 without which the present writer must have left this argument lacking some most important details, gives the story of that university until its dissolution in 1811 by Napoleon, and of its successor the Athenaeum at Franeker until its end in 1843. Boeles lists most fully the sources from which the events of that history may be extracted, and among those sources there are some that merit most careful investigation by the scholars of New England, the authorities of Harvard, and the friends of Dr. William Ames.124 The buildings of the institution, previous to its foundation, were occupied by a convent and by a hospital or home for the aged and infirm, and after the Athenaeum’s expiration in 1843 were given up to an asylum for the insane;125 the whole career of the group being devoted to humanity;126 but what their present state is, the writer of this paper is not informed.
IV
Dr. Ames is so well known127 to students of New England history, that it is necessary here only to remind ourselves of the steady development of his influence during his life and to recall a few outstanding facts of his career. He was born in 1576. Among his friends at the University of Cambridge were William Bradshaw, Robert Parker, Daniel Rogers, and John Wilson. His persecution in England and in his Dutch refuge, his debate with Grevinchovius, his association with Hugh Goodyear, the chaplaincy at the Hague, his official advisorship of the Synod at Dort, and his position as successor to Hommius at the school at Leyden, will be remembered. In 1622 he became professor of theology in the University of Franeker, and at the same time was made Doctor of Theology. His fame attracted many students to Franeker. He became Rector Magnificus in 1626. Although poor health drove him and American friends called him, he continued at Franeker until 1633, when he entered that congenial relationship with Hugh Peters and Thomas Hooker at the church in Rotterdam. But at Rotterdam he died, probably November 11th, 1633, in his 57th year.128 He died in the arms of Hugh Peters, and Peters preached his funeral sermon. He is said to have been buried at Rotterdam, November 14th, 1633. But we are not told where his tomb is, and how tended.129
As so often has happened with a great man, when there seemed to be something yet lacking to round out his living career, his influence dead was perpetuated many years through his family, friends, and writings.
There can be no attempt here to mention all the works of Ames, nor to expound any of them. More abiding in their influence than the rest were the Marrow of Sacred Divinity, the Cases of Conscience, the Coronis, and the Fresh Suit against Human Ceremonies. The latter book is said to have made Richard Baxter a Nonconformist. The Cases of Conscience, which has been called Dr. Ames’s best known work, is the fruit of his labors in the field of Ethics, and shows the reason for his being called a “casuist.” He, perhaps first among Protestants, had adopted a method used in the Catholic Church for inculcating the right relationships of motive and action in life. The Cases lived at least a century as a work considered of great value to students. The Coronis ad Collationem Hagiensem, which carries the burden of the theological arguments made by Ames during his earlier years in Holland, was prepared primarily for the Synod of Dort and figured largely in Dutch church history. It has been called his most masterly book. The Marrow of Sacred Divinity, written for Dr. Ames’s students at Leyden, was intended to present the essence or epitome of Reformed church doctrine. As the Medulla S. S. Theologiae it was printed probably first in 1623, then in 1627, and several times later. In 1642 or 1643 the first English translation appeared, printed by order of the House of Commons, probably for the use of the Westminster Assembly of Divines. It was during a decade when several of the works of Ames were put on the market, thus indicating a demand by the controversialists of that period.130 An interesting presumption, involving a proof of the influence of Ames, is that, even though there had been other “Marrows,” this translation entitled The Marrow of Sacred Divinity was responsible for the seven or more similar titles following it within ten years.131
V
It is well known that the family of Dr. Ames emigrated to America and were in difficult circumstances, receiving aid both in Holland and in Massachusetts through the influence of Hugh Peters.132 A mystery exists regarding the disposition of the learned doctor’s library, at that time a valuable one to theological readers. This library would have cost him a considerable sum,133 perhaps more than he could afford, and it must have been with the purpose of providing funds for his widow and children that it was catalogued, as if to be sold, at Rotterdam in 1634.134 Whether it was sold, or whether it was brought to New England as has so often been stated, is unknown.135
Dr. Ames’s daughter Ruth was sought in marriage by Hugh Peters,136 but was married instead to Edmund Angier, merchant, of Cambridge, Massachusetts. From this couple sprang some notable lines of descendants. A daughter, Ruth, married Samuel Cheever,137 son of Ezekiel Cheever and minister at Marblehead. A son, the Rev. Samuel Angier,138 we shall speak of later. He had several children, among them Sarah, who married the Rev. John Shaw139 of Bridgewater, whose grandson Lemuel Shaw140 was for thirty years Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. A son of Samuel Angier, John,141 for half a century minister at East Bridgewater, married Mary Bourne, and their daughter Mary married in 1767 the Rev. Ephraim Hyde142 of Rehoboth. This union will be mentioned again. Oakes Angier, son of the Rev. John Angier and brother of Mrs. Hyde, married Susannah Howard, and their daughter Susanna married Oliver Ames of North Easton, from whom have descended Oakes Ames,143 Governor Oliver Ames, Frederick Lothrop Ames,144 and the late F. Lothrop Ames145 the donor to the Harvard Club of the portrait of Dr. William Ames.
The history of Dr. Ames’s family forms a tie between Ames himself and the present generation, and his immediate descendants likewise linked him with the rulers of state, church, and college a half century after his death. With Angiers and Cheevers living among them, they must often think of him. But there were also men who had been in contact with Dr. Ames, some most intimately, who came to New England and exercised a pronounced influence here. Bare mention is enough of two square-pegs who failed to fit their positions: Nathaniel Eaton the first head of Harvard College, who had been a pupil of Ames;146 and Richard Brown of Watertown, who had helped him when he went out of England into Holland.147 There were, however, several strong men acting as apostles of his fame; among them Brewster, Winthrop, Peters, Hooker, Cotton, Wilson, and Parker, as well as, for a time, John Phillip. Brewster printed one, at least, of his books.148 With Governor Winthrop he was in correspondence. Thomas Parker of Ipswich and Newbury was son of Robert, who left England with Dr. William Ames and who with Ames is said to have had a pronounced influence on John Robinson.149 Thomas Parker became acquainted with William Ames at Leyden, where he received the degree of M.A. in 1617. The theses then defended by him are appended to some editions of Ames’s answer to Grevinchovius. He became assistant to Nathaniel Ward at Agawam in 1634, and in 1635 helped to found Newbury. He had a long life, dying in 1677. John Woodbridge was his nephew. John Wilson, who lived until 1667, spoke of Ames on his death-bed; John Cotton, likewise, in 1652, and Cotton was a man of commanding eminence. Thomas Hooker, the founder of Connecticut, whom we have seen with William Ames and Hugh Peters in Rotterdam, joined with Peters and others to assist Mrs. Ames when she was in need after her settlement in New England.
Hugh Peters ought to be spoken about more at length, for he was the one man preeminently devoted to Ames. Tendering him the last measures of kindness at his death, doing all possible to do for his family in Holland and New England, yearning for a further expression of regard denied him, prefacing more than one of Ames’s works, and at his own unhappy end thinking of Ames, he must have been one of the important agents for disseminating his friend’s reputation in America. He was a man of reason as well as of impulse, with abounding devotion to public welfare and abiding loyalty to his friends.
VI
The personal devotion to Dr. Ames of famous New Englanders was frequently recorded, and notably as late as 1695 by the Mathers. The fruits of his wisdom, also, were cherished, and his influence was felt to be living, not embalmed. The spiritual legacy of Ames was not soon dissipated, and he was actually, not in our theory only, present in the thoughts of Harvard leaders during the period in which the adoption of “Christo et Ecclesiae” must have occurred. If this be shown, we must believe that the inaugural address at Franeker was known, both from tradition and from his writings. It is not unreasonable to assume this, for two reasons. First, the men of the last third of the seventeenth century were no farther removed from the first third of that century than we are from the time of the Civil War, were even nearer in fact by reason of the greater simplicity of those times, and their fathers had told them, indeed Ruth Ames could have told some among them, and Thomas Parker could have told them,150 about an event considered of some importance by Dr. Ames himself. And second, the intellectual meat and drink of those days consisted in theological reading and meditation and discussion of the spiritual side of the lives of their fathers and grandfathers, men whose lives and opinions were the foundation stones of Puritanism. Whenever two or three people got together there was a theological discussion. Samuel Sewall in his Diary in 1715 says: “In the Ferry-boat Mr. Parsons mentioned the perishing of all mankind entirely, whereas some of the Angels fell; not all, if God had not provided Salvation. Spake as if it had been his Notion: I said Dr. Ames mentioned it; which he seemed backward to allow: said he had lost his Books by Sea.”151 The libraries of New England, both college and private, were chiefly theological.152 Many of these libraries contained Dr. Ames’s books; but sufficient for present purposes are those of the Mathers, as given by Mr. Tuttle twelve years ago.153 The list of the books in Cotton Mather’s library shows five works by Dr. Ames, including the Disceptatio Scholastica de Circulo Pontificio. The copy of the latter was bound with the Rescriptio Scholastica ad Nic. Grevinchovii Responsum, as has always been the case with examples seen by the present writer.154 The Disceptatio was published in 1610 appended to Ames’s translation into Latin of Bradshaw’s Puritanismus Anglicanus, but was then entitled Scholastica Disceptatio instead of Disceptatio Scholastica, and at that time the controversy with Grevinchovius had not been held. It is in this Disceptatio Scholastica as published with the Rescriptio Scholastica from 1633 and 1634 onwards that Dr. Ames’s inaugural address on the motto was printed.155 In the list (written by himself) of Increase Mather’s books, there are found twelve of Dr. Ames’s works, including the Rescriptio and therefore presumably the Disceptatio with the address on the motto. Moreover, the Rescriptio appears in the list of works that Increase Mather picked out from President Hoar’s library, at the invitation of his widow, when his own (Mather’s) library was injured by fire. There can be no doubt that the Mathers and other leaders knew of Ames’s inaugural address.
It is easy to cite references to Ames in the New England theological literature of a century and a half. The Mathers, indeed, were almost lavish in their praise of Ames, “that profound, that sublime, that subtil, that irrefragable,—yea, that angelical doctor.”156 Information is readily forthcoming as to Dr. Ames’s place in the tests of the New England ministry,157 and likewise in the required studies at Harvard, where the curriculum in 1690 gave Ames the distinguished honor of being placed by name in the same category with grammar, logic, and science.158 The adoption of the works of Ames in the curriculum of the Collegiate School that later became Yale is significant, since all the founders except one were graduates of Harvard; the Connecticut action involves the certainty that Ames’s works were present in the Harvard curriculum from 1659 to 1681.159
VII
There remains to be dealt with an important evidence of the regard of our fathers for Dr. Ames, the order for painting his portrait. Such a proof of early devotion, enduring for three hundred years, is seen to-day in the two shrines of Harvard men near to their Alma Mater; it is the portrait owned by Harvard College,160 and its copy at the Harvard Club of Boston. Regarding the Ames portraits, some facts are gathered together here for the first time.
Hugo Visscher, in his Guilielmus Amesius, devotes nearly two pages to discussion of portraits of Ames. It is worth while to translate most of what he says:
So far as I know, there exist three portraits of Ames. Matth. Nethenus informs us in the “Præfatio Introductoria” before the edition of the man’s Latin works, that The Fresh Suit, etc., saw the light only after Ames’s death, “cum inserta post praefationem satis longam autoris efiigie.”161 This picture I have not seen. In the copy of the above named work examined by me, the portrait was lacking.
Another engraving may be seen in front of the English translation of Ames’s Medulla, which appeared in 1642 at the charge of “the honorable the House of Commons.” It was done by Will. Marshall and printed “for John Rothwell at the Sunn in Paule: Church yard.” From this engraving the portrait was made that is placed in the front of this dissertation [i.e. his Guilielmus Amesius].
Thirdly, there exists a painted portrait of Ames, which is kept in the town-hall at Franeker. The resemblance of this to the engraving just mentioned is striking. Yet there is a difference. The position of the painted portrait is ¾ left; in place of a book Ames holds a glove and a roll of paper in his hand, of which only the thumb and forefinger are visible. It was painted “A° aetatis 57, 1633,” thus shortly before his departure from Franeker. The name of the artist is not on the painting. The size is 50 by 65 centimetres. The subscription runs: “Dr Guilielmus Amesius Theol. Profr.”
Now whether the engraving from which the portrait in this dissertation is taken [see above] is made after the painting kept at Franeker, or whether there exists still a fourth portrait, I am unable to decide. The probability pleads for it.
Visscher leaves us in doubt which alternative he thinks the probability pleads for.
The Franeker portrait is reproduced facing this page from a photograph of the original acquired in 1921 by the Harvard College Library.162
There is, however, a fourth portrait, the one owned by Harvard College. But it so closely resembles the one at Franeker that we may conclude provisionally that one was copied from the other. Mr. William C. Lane writes me that “the Harvard portrait is a trifle longer, and shows the whole of the right hand, holding gloves and papers, which is partly cut off by the frame in the Franeker portrait. That portrait, also, does not show the inscription on the background, which, on the Harvard portrait, reads: ‘Rev. William Ames, D.D. aetat. 57, 1633.’ The Franeker portrait has the name in Latin on the frame.”163
Engraved for The Colonial Society of Massachusetts from a portrait at Franeker
We should like to suppose that our Harvard College portrait is the original likeness of the learned Doctor. What possibility is there of it?
In the first place, it is not the same as the engraving by Marshall described by Visscher as published in Ames’s Marrow in 1642; nor is it the same as that in the Fresh Suit of 1633. The posture of the latter portrait is half-left; with skull-cap, ruff, and gown, and without showing the hands. It is surrounded within a rectangle by an oval border, with reading: “Guilielmus Amesius S. S. Theol. D. et Professor Franequerae Pientissimus Doctissimus. Ætat. 57. A° 1633,” and is signed G S, which initials have not been identified. Beneath is the following inscription:
Sic fuit (ah, fuit!) Amesius. Quid funere tanto,
Cum grege Papali, Pelagianus ovat?
Quid rides Hierarcha? Viri nos arma tenemus,
Astra animam, tellus ossa, sed os tabula.164
The painted portrait in the Harvard Club was made by Giovanni B. Troccoli, probably about 1897, from the painting owned by Harvard College, and was presented to the Harvard Club by the late F.Lothrop Ames.165 It has always been supposed that the Harvard College portrait is the one that formerly hung in Harvard Hall, of which Mr. Sibley spoke in 1862, commenting on an item in the Account-books of the Treasurers of Harvard College from 1669 to 1752. The item reads, under date of June 2, 1680: “Colledge Dr to money pd Major Tho. Smith for drawing Dr. Ames effigies pr Order of Corporation. £4.4.” Sibley remarked, “This is probably the picture, renovated and restored by Howorth, which is now in the Picture Gallery in Harvard Hall.”166 But if it were indeed true that the Harvard Hall portrait was the one which was done by Thomas Smith, it could hardly be the one now owned by the College, for of the latter it is recorded at Harvard that it was the gift of Ephraim Hyde.
Mr. Charles K. Bolton speaks of Major or Captain Thomas Smith and two portraits credited to him. One is that mentioned in the Treasurers’ Accounts. The other is a painting of his daughter, Maria Catherine Smith. Little is known of Thomas Smith, who is said to have been a navigator, and it has not been explained why he was called Major and later Captain. Mr. Bolton must have been a little suspicious regarding the portraits, for he says:
Harvard College, in 1680, paid £4.4 to Major Thomas Smith for “drawing Dr. Ames effigies,” depicting him with a very florid face, dark skull cap, a broad, white ruff, and a paper (?) in his right hand. As Ames died in 1633, this must be a copy, and does not show Smith’s own style; but in skill it equals the 1670–1680 New England group, unless a restorer has taken undue liberties. A less effective portrait, representing Maria Catherine Smith, was done in 1693 “by her father Captain Thomas Smith,” more in the manner of Huysman’s Catherine of Braganza, than of Curwen, Savage, or Freke. Mr. Clarence S. Brigham, who first called attention to Smith, has been unable to add much to the facts here given.167
The truth is, that the Harvard College portrait does not show Smith’s style because it is not by Smith. Let us trace its history. The earliest mention of it is in the will, proved February 9, 1719, of Samuel Angier, who bequeathed “to my son John the Picture of Dr Ames his gt Grandfather.”168 From this son John Angier, then a student at Harvard College, the picture descended to his son, the Rev. Samuel Angier169 of East Bridgewater. On the death of the latter without children in 1805, the picture came into the possession of his nephew Ephraim Hyde, who presented it to Harvard College. This Ephraim Hyde was the son of the Rev. Ephraim Hyde of Rehoboth who in 1767 married Mary Angier, sister of the Rev. Samuel Angier of East Bridgewater. Thus the Harvard College portrait is traced to the possession of the Rev. Samuel Angier, son of Edmund Angier and his first wife Ruth Ames, who was a daughter of Dr. William Ames. Samuel Angier was born in Cambridge in 1655, the year before his mother’s death, graduated at Harvard College in 1673, was ordained at Rehoboth in 1679, was settled at Watertown in 1697, and was a Fellow of the Corporation from 1700 to 1707170.
Urian Oakes was elected President of Harvard College in 1675, but at first would not formally accept the office, and was not inaugurated until August 10, 1680. On June 2, 1680, the College was recorded as indebted to Thomas Smith for making a portrait of Dr. Ames, and just three months later, September 2, 1680, the daughter of President Oakes, Hannah, was married to Samuel Angier, the grandson of Dr. Ames. The painting was not in the inventory of Edmund Angier’s goods at his death in 1692,171 so that we must suppose Samuel Angier to have had it at that time. The College, poor as it was in those days, would not have been likely to present a portrait to the daughter of President Oakes or to her intended husband; but even if that had been done, why should the painting not be in the style of the painter as known from another portrait? We must infer that something like this happened: Samuel Angier, departing for Rehoboth in 1679, found that he could not get along without Hannah Oakes. The intimacy of Oakes and Angier, already close and thus cemented, called especial attention to the Ames portrait, which Angier would take away with him. It thereupon was proposed that a copy should be made of the painting, so that there might be one at Harvard College. What became of the copy? It may have been destroyed in the fire of 1764. Probably the removal of Dr. Ames from Franeker to Rotterdam was the cause of the painting of two portraits, one of which is ours. The significance of the interesting conjunction of events in 1680, which we cannot believe to be independent, is that Dr. Ames, not his books only, but the man, was an outstanding figure in the minds of the Harvard College leaders in 1680.
As he looks down upon us nearly two centuries and a half later, and we try to find in his features whatever we have most read into his character, whether dignity, piety, learning, or that friendship and kindness that gained him the friendship and kindness of others, let us regard him with friendship rather than distant acquaintance; let us admire his ability and courage rather than merely his name and fame. Let us accord him some sort of devotion which, if not on the same ground as that of our fathers, will at least show our appreciation of his “intention for New-England,” of the blood-tie that binds him to some among us, and of the position he held long after his death as mentor to the great ones of our Colony, but particularly as that link which enables us to lengthen the years of our motto, adding to our idea of it whatever nobility is resident in honorable tradition.
For at the end of this research (which ought to be but the beginning of another), what we hope has been accomplished is the gathering and polishing of some facts hitherto scattered and obscured tending to show that the motto “Christo et Ecclesiae” on the Harvard seal came to Harvard from a sister institution at Franeker, whose position in the world of religious letters marked her in the eyes of Harvard men; and came to Harvard, perhaps, because the name of Ames familiar here was associated in the minds of some of the leaders with an event back in the annals of Franeker when Ames used “Christo et Ecclesiae” as a call to the members of the Academy to stand right with their consciences. Of Franeker, this more may be said, that her Academy was founded in the year of Frisian independence, and that her students began the agitation resulting in Dutch aid to us during the American Revolution.172 We should be grateful to Friesland, therefore, for her Academy at Franeker and for the dedication.
1. This and the following letters quoted in this article are from the volume marked “Hollis Letters and Papers 1718 to 1774” in the Harvard College Library. Some of them were printed in part and inaccurately by Quincy in his History of Harvard University (1840).
2. College Book iv. 75–76.
3. Joshua Gee, born in Boston in 1698, graduated from Harvard in 1717, and was Librarian 1721–1722. He resigned at the time the above vote was passed. In 1723, he was ordained pastor of the Old North (Second) Church as colleague of Cotton Mather. He died in 1748. He was instrumental in founding a library for the use of his church.
4. College Book iv. 80.
5. Catalogus librorum Bibliothecæ Collegij Harvardini quod est Cantabrigiæ in Nova Anglia. Bostoni Nov-Anglorum: Typis B. Green, academiæ typographi. MDCCXXIII.
6. John Whiting, born in Lynn January 20, 1681, graduated from Harvard in 1700 and was Librarian from 1703 to 1706. He was ordained minister in Concord in 1712 and remained there until his death in 1752.
7. College Book iv. 2.5.
8. Nathaniel Gookin, born in Cambridge April 15, 1687, graduated from Harvard in 1703, Librarian 1707–1709. In 1710 he became the minister at Hampton, N. H., where he died in 1734.
9. College Book iv. 36.
10. College Book iii. 26.
11. London: 1709. 6 vols. 8vo
12. London: 1720. 2 vols. 4to.
13. London Feb. 21. 1723/4
Recd by Capt Barlow
96. Catalogues of the College library to be distributed
|
6. to Governour Shute |
|
|
12. to Mr Henry Newman |
|
|
12. to Mr Ieremy Dummer |
|
|
30. to Mr Daniel Neale |
|
|
30. to Mr Tho. Hollis |
- 6. to Iohn Chamberlaine Esqe I sent my man with them but he brought them back with Answer, he was dead about 4 Months.
- Thomas Hollis hath distributed alreddy 18. Viz
|
Mr Harris |
Mr Iohn Hollis |
|
Mr Evans |
Mr Thomas Hollis Iunr |
|
Mr Standen of Neuberry |
Mr Richard Solly |
|
Mr Samuel Holden Marchant |
Mr Ellis |
|
Mr Stork |
Mr Ioseph Burrows |
|
Mr Colman |
Dr Meade |
|
Dr Callamy |
Mr Isaac Watts |
|
Dr Avery |
Mr Edward Wallin |
|
Dr Hinch |
18. deliverd |
|
Mr Hunt |
8. Remains in hand of Tho Hollis— |
I hope in the sequell you will reape the fruite
London Feb. 24. 1723/4
14. May 16, 1724.
15. History of Harvard University, i. 526.
16. Jeremiah Dummer, a graduate of Harvard in 1699, had been sent to London as colonial agent in 1710. Several years before the date of this letter, he had, apparently under the influence of Cotton Mather, endeavored to divert Hollis’s bounty from Harvard to the newly established college at New Haven.
17. William Dummer, then Lieutenant-Governor.
18. Rev. Jeremiah Hunt, of London, friend and adviser of Hollis.
19. Lethered was captain of a ship by which Hollis frequently sent letters and packages to New England.
20. Thomas Guy (1645?–1724).
21. For the teaching of French at Harvard College before 1750, see our Publications, xvii. 119–120, 216–230.
22. P. Bayle. Dictionnaire Historique et Critique. Rotterdam: 1720. 4 vols, folio, was among Hollis’s earlier gifts.
23. John Hancock, Librarian 1723–1726, was born in 1702, and graduated in 1719. He was minister at Braintree from 1726 until his death in 1744. He was the father of Governor John Hancock.
24. College Book iv. 102.
25. The Librarians of Harvard College 1667–1877 by Alfred Claghorn Potter and Charles Knowles Bolton. (Bibliographical Contributions, no. 52.) Cambridge: 1897.
26. James Diman, a graduate of 1730, was Librarian from 1735 to 1737. From this year until his death in 1788, he was pastor of the Second, or East, Church in Salem.
27. Edward Wigglesworth, first Hollis Professor of Divinity.
28. College Book iv. 180–181.
29. Id. iv. 188.
30. Id. iv. 225.
31. Logically the moral should read: “. . . and when they perceive that the falsehood will be discovered, then they should remember this child and . . .”—Note by the translator.
32. 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xvii. 340–352: F. B. Dexter, Historical Papers (1918), pp. 102–115.
33. In the form of Cambridge degrees (“A.B.” rather than “B.A.”, etc.), the compiler has followed the Book of Matriculations and Degrees, 1544–1659 (1913); Cantabrigieases Graduati, 1659–1800 (1800); and Graduati Cantabrigienses, 1800–1864 (1864).
34. It has been stated that the Rev. John Woodbridge of Andover and Newbury studied at Oxford, and that Sir Henry Vane the younger of Boston attended Magdalen College, but their matriculations are not of record. John Prince of Hull, though his matriculation is not recorded, doubtless was a student at Oxford about 1626–1628.
35. Cf. Calendar of State Papers, Colonial, 1574–1660, p. 112.
36. The Richard Harris who died at Cambridge, Mass., on August 29, 1644, is sometimes identified with the Richard Harris who matriculated at New College, Oxford, in 1636; but this is an error, since it has recently been proved that the Richard Harris of New College was living in 1662.
37. New Hampshire Provincial Papers, vii. 47.
38. The text in substantially the same form is found in the Corporation Records, College Book, vii. 120–121.
39. College Book, vii. 112, 113.
40. Rev. Joseph Sewall (H. C. 1707).
41. Rev. Edward Wigglesworth (H. C. 1710).
42. Thomas Hubbard (H. C. 1721).
43. College Book, vii. 113–114.
44. College Book, vii. 114–115.
45. Rev. Charles Chauncy (H. C. 1721), John Winthrop (H. C. 1732), Rev. Andrew Eliot (1737), Rev. Samuel Cooper (H. C. 1743).
46. College Book, vii. 117.
47. College Book, vii. 118.
48. Rev. Nathaniel Appleton (H. C. 1712)
49. College Book, vii. 119.
50. There is a notice of George Frost (1720–1796) in Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography.
51. H. C. 1715.
52. The original Stoughton College, built in 1698, taken down in 1781.
53. On June 3, 1669, the Overseers directed how this gift should be disposed of: see College Book, iii. 53–54.
54. Theodore Atkinson (H. C. 1757). He was a son of Theodore Atkinson (H. C. 1718).
55. Henry Sherburne (H. C. 1728).
56. vii. 47.
57. New Hampshire Provincial Papers, vii. 51.
58. Id. vii. 53–54.
59. New Hampshire Provincial Papers, vii. 54.
60. Id. vii. 55.
61. College Book, vii. 132.
62. New Hampshire Provincial Papers, vii. p. 67. But the Editor states that “this letter cannot now be found.”
63. Rev. Andrew Eliot (H. C. 1737).
64. The books given by the Province of New Hampshire no longer occupy an alcove by themselves, but are distributed according to subject. The book-plates, however, still bear the Latin inscription as above, indicating their source.
65. Theodore Atkinson (H. C. 1718).
66. Harvard College Papers, ii. 112.
67. Benning Wentworth (1696–1770) graduated from Harvard College in 1715 being one of eighteen graduates and ranking fifth, according to the social standing given to students at that period.
68. In the charter the name of the town is spelled as is the governor’s surname, but it has come down in history as Barnard, and suggests the query whether the accepted spelling does not follow the phonetic form of the governor’s name at that period. Some of the governor’s contemporaries wrote his name Barnard, which would give weight to the theory that Bernard in colonial days was pronounced so as to sound like Barnard.
69. Though then residing in Cambridge, Holyoke was a Bostonian by birth.
70. Probably an error for Byfield Lyde.
71. It is an interesting fact that there is in Boston to-day a man named Benning Wentworth who is a collateral descendant of the New Hampshire governor, and he has a son also named Benning Wentworth, thus carrying on the name of this sturdy colonial figure.
72. Mr. Eliot (1761–1827; H. C. 1780) was the son of the Rev. Dr. Andrew Eliot (H. C. 1737). For other extracts from the same source, see our Publications, xviii. 54–62, 77–78, xix. 290–295.
73. Seth Hudson was born in Lexington, but later lived in Marlboro.
74. Joshua Howe was born in Sudbury, but at the time was living in Westmoreland, n. H.
75. In the New England Magazine for July, 1832 (iii. 1–7), is an account of Nathaniel Hurd, the first of two unsigned articles called “Early American Artists and Mechanics.” Perhaps these were posthumous papers by Mr. Eliot (who died in 1827); but if not, then the author had access to Mr. Eliot’s commonplace-book, for the description of the Hudson print is almost word for word identical with the description in our text. Cf. p. 49 note 1, below.
76. This sentence in the New England Magazine reads: “The Doctor is represented as addressing the multitude in the following speech, which is said to have been written by the celebrated wit and poet, Joseph Green” (iii. 6). Joseph Green was in the Harvard class of 1726.
77. On February 4, 1768, the House appointed a committee to prepare a circular letter, and on the 11th the committee reported a letter to the House. On June 21 Gov. Bernard sent a message to the House requiring it “to rescind the resolution . . . in consequence of which a circular letter had been sent to the several assemblies upon the continent.” On June 30th the House, by a division of 92 to 17, refused to rescind the resolution. See our Publications, viii. 95 note 1. The number 92, like Wilkes’s number 45, at once became famous, and the two were often coupled together, as in the following amusing passage: “We are pleased to hear from a neighbouring Colony, that the glorious Cause of Liberty is adhered to in the strictest Manner; that it has a Tendency to reconcile all intestine Party Disputes, and unite every Sect and Denomination in Religion: As an instance of this Truth, a Gentleman of the Presbyterian Persuasion aged just 45, was on Sunday last married to a Quaker Lady of great Fortune, of the same Age; it is also remarkable that this Gentleman is her 45th Suiter; they are determin’d to name their first Son Forty-Five and their first Daughter Ninety-Two” (Boston Gazette, January 30, p. 3/2).
78. Timothy Ruggles (1711–1795; H. C. 1732) was of Hardwick, not Worcester.
79. The second of the two articles referred to above (p. 41 note 1), printed in the New England Magazine for October, 1832 (iii. 305–314), is an account of Paul Revere. The description there given of the plate of “A Warm Place—Hell” is almost word for word identical with the description in our text. But the first two sentences in this paragraph read thus in the New England Magazine: “A copy of this print fell by accident, many years ago, into the hands of a gentleman of our acquaintance, who inquired the particulars respecting it of Colonel Revere” (iii. 309).
80. Benjamin Church (H. C. 1754).
81. As Revere was born December 21, 1734, nearly half a century must have elapsed between the making of the plate and Mr. Eliot’s talk with Revere. Hence some inaccuracies in Revere’s statements might not unreasonably be expected. Thus “Dr. Robert Calef” is an error for Dr. John Calef: see our Publications, viii. 95, 96 note, 97 note.
There is another possible inaccuracy of a more serious nature. Did Revere “sketch” the print, as he claimed? At the bottom of the plate are the words: “Pubd Accord’g to Act by M Darly”—the M and D in the last name being run together in a monogram. In his Life of Colonel Paul Revere (1891, i. 60 note) Elbridge H. Goss, misled by the monogram, stated that the name was “Marly.” In Bryan’s Dictionary of Painters and Engravers (ed. G. C. Williamson, 1903, ii. 11) the name is given as “Matthew Darby.” In S. Redgrave’s Dictionary of Artists (1878, p. 115) is a notice which reads in part as follows:
“DARLY, Matthew, engraver. He kept a shop in the Strand in the latter part of the 18th century, and was better known as a caricaturist than an engraver. . . . He . . . is known to have produced altogether about 300 caricatures, and to have thriven upon the personalities of the day. In 1778 he advertised his ‘Comic Exhibition,’ admittance 1 s. For a time he resided in Bath.”
In Musgrave’s Obituary (ii. 142) appears this: “Darley, Matt., chalcograph. 1775. (MS.).” See also the Dictionary of National Biography.
In a letter to the Editor dated Oxford, October 1, 1922, Dr. Morison writes:
“With the aid of Sir Charles Firth, and his extensive collection of satirical prints of the eighteenth century, I think I can suggest a solution of the question of the authorship of ‘A Warm Place—Hell.’ Matthew Darly was designer, engraver, and printseller at the same time, with a shop at 39 Strand, of which a print, engraved by himself, is minutely described in the Catalogue of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum, Satires, 1883, iv. 784–786. He was in the habit of engraving designs for other people, in some cases adding his name to that of the artist, in others omitting the latter, and in others (as in a famous one, ‘The Scotch Hurdy-Gurdy,’ executed for George Townshend in 1762) using pseudonyms for both. For instance, I find in the Firth collection three small volumes of octavo prints bound in one, with the engraved title ‘24 Caricatures by Several Ladies Gentlemen Artists &c. Pubd by M. Darly, Strand . . . 1771,’ and two folio volumes of similar character. Wherever such prints are signed by Darly, the signature is the same as in ‘A Warm Place—Hell.’ [That is, the M and D are run together in a monogram.]
“Consequently I suppose that Paul Revere did design this print, but that he sent it to Darly to be engraved and published. The local touches of the Province House Indian and ‘Push on Tim’ and the pig’s head, would seem to preclude the supposition of its design by a London artist.
“I did not find in the Firth collection any of Darly’s own designs of a political nature—he designed mainly characters—which makes it all the more likely that he did this plate on order.”
An examination of the Boston Gazette for the last half of the year 1768 fails to disclose any allusion to the caricature.
82. Charles Phelps (1717–1789) was born in Northampton, removed to Hadley about 1743 and thence to New Marlboro, Vermont. His first wife, who died in 1777, was Dorothy Root. His son Charles Phelps, Jr. (1744–1814), married Elizabeth Porter; and his daughter Dorothy married Lemuel Warner. See S. Judd, History of Hadley (1863), pp. 552, 590.
83. The date June 5 is clear: see p. 54 note 2, below.
84. James Bowdoin (H. C. 1745).
85. Samuel Adams (H. C. 1740).
86. Thomas Flucker.
87. Thomas Gage.
88. This word is not plainly written, but is probably “Protest:” see Documentary History of New York, iv. 885–886; H. Hall, History of Vermont, p. 186.
89. Joseph Hawley (1723–1788; Yale 1742).
90. H. C. 1743.
91. Hutchinson left June 1, 1774: cf. our Publications, xvii. 86 note 2; T. Hutchinson, Diary and Letters, i. 152. This portion of the letter must have been written June 2.
92. John Avery (1739–1806; H. C. 1759).
93. Artemas Ward (1727–1800).
94. For a brief account of “The Beginnings of Class Day,” from which it appears that “before 1750 we find class officers, a class oration, a class dinner, and a baccalaureate sermon,” see the Harvard Graduates’ Magazine for June, 1914, xxii. 580–581. The earliest known class dinner took place on May 1, 1764. Mr. Kittredge points out that this song is merely an adaptation of George Alexander Stevens’s “Nunc est Bibendum:” see his Poems, Comic, and Satyrical (Oxford, 1772), pp. 16–18.
95. The autograph reads: “T. Prince. Boston. July 12. 1731.” Of Prince’s notes, only one need be copied. Under date of August 1, 1714, Pointer says: “Died Queen ANNE of blessed Memory, . . . One of the Best of Queens that ever sat upon the British, or any other, Throne, whether we consider Her Exemplary Piety towards God, Her extensive Liberality to the Church, or her unparallel’d Conduct in the State” (ii. 764–765). In the margin is this comment: “Most foolish, stupid, mad & wretched conduct for ye 4 last years of her Reign.”
96. The only safe assertion at the present time, according to Mr. Matthews, is that the statements on this matter made by President Quincy (History of Harvard University, i. 23, 48, 49 and note, 474, 612), upon which reliance has hitherto been placed, are untrustworthy, and his references to records incomplete and inadequate.
97. The seal is thus interpreted by President Charles F. Thwing: “But apart from specific results the College stood in the community as a monument to the worth of mind. Its seal set forth the ultimate value of truth, a value which a new and a democratic community is in grave peril of forgetting. Its seal also declared ‘Christo et Ecclesiae,’ an ideal which a society obliged daily to toil for daily bread is liable to lose. The college, therefore, represented the continuity of learning and the preciousness of the scholastic and educational tradition. It embodied the supremacy of character as the purpose of spiritual idealism. It stood for life and not for living. It embodied the old cardinal virtues of justice, temperance, and fortitude, and the new cardinal virtues of hope, faith and charity” (History of Higher Education in America, 1906, p. 47).
98. The coincidence of the mottoes of Franeker and Harvard was first noticed, in modern days, by the Rev. Dr. William Fairfield Warren, President Emeritus of Boston University, when in 1858 he was preparing the material for his book, “In the Footsteps of Arminius.” President Warren placed the motto on the verso of the title-page of the Boston University Year Book in 1874 and thereafter for more than thirty years, crediting it to its source in the Franeker Program, confident, as he says in a recent letter, “that the discovery would be pleasing to the authorities of Harvard, and to all lovers of intercollegiate fellowship in good traditions.” The present writer arrived at his knowledge and theory independently.
99. This “Programma” is given in W. B. S. Boeles, Frieslands Hoogeschool en het Rijks Athenaeum te Franeker (1878–1879), i. 431–434, after a copy of the original in the Academy archives which was badly printed by Schotanua (“dat o. a. bij Schotanus zeer slordig is gedrukt”): cf. i. 15 note 2. It is also given in Benthem’s Hollaendischer Kirch- und Schulen-Staat (1698), pp. 18–25. There are variations between the two versions. The passage quoted is from Boeles, i.433; Benthem, p. 24. Boeles has “ad quern; & hoc;” Benthem, “ad quern & hoc.” Boeles has “qua! vno Academia; complectemur nomine;” Benthem, “qua; uno Academics nomine complectimur.” There is a copy of Boeles’s work in the Boston Public Library.
100. The Statutes are given in Boeles, i. 435–445.
101. This plan is reproduced as a frontispiece to Boeles’s first volume.
102. This view is reproduced in Boeles, i. 384, from which the illustration facing page 60 is taken.
103. The name is apparently a relic of the former use of the buildings as a home for the aged and infirm (see Boeles, i. 399); cf. Oxford English Dictionary, under “hospital.”
104. Boeles (i. 397–399) gives a fuller description. For “Platte Grond der gebouwen van het Athenaeum,” see Boeles, i. 394.
105. Boeles (i. 396–397), citing Vriemoet, says:
“Op die nieuwe poort waren de wapenschilden gebeiteld van Friesland, van den Stadhouder en van Franeker, voorts het symbulum Fvndamentvm Dei stat firmum, de Latijnsche tekst van Jesaja XXXI: 4, 5, en, boven in den gevel: Christo et Ecclesiæ.”
106. New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge (1910), vii. 109.
107. M’Clintock and Strong, Cyclopædia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature (1882), v. 616; J. H. Kurtz, Text-Book of Church History (1888), ii. 214.
108. Visscher, p. 70; Boeles, ii. 93. Regarding Lubbertus, Professor of Theology, see Boeles, ii. 29–34.
109. Charge IX in the “Complaint,” Boeles, i. 481; Visscher, p. 65.
110. The “Complaint,” addressed to Saeckma, is printed in Boeles, i. 479–483: see also Visscher, p. 65. For an account of Saeckma, see Boeles, ii. 5. He was probably called “Tua Amplitudo,” Your Greatness, a mode of address proper for one in his position of Curator.
111. This address is in Dr. Ames’s Disceptatio Scholastica de Circulo Pontificio. A copy of the edition of Leyden, 1633, the first to contain the inaugural address, is in the Prince Collection in the Boston Public Library. From this copy, the title-page and pp. 93–95 are here reproduced in facsimile. The pamphlet consists of: Title, p. [1]; Lectori, p. [2]; Prefatio, pp. 3–6; Text, pp. 7–140. Pp. 93–107 contain the “Oratio Inauguralis.”
The Disceptatio Scholastica de Circulo Pontificio was also published at Amsterdam in 1644. This edition, of which there is a copy in the Boston Public Library, consists of: Title, p. [1]; Lectori, p. [2]; Præfatio, pp. 3–5; Text, pp. 6–105. The Inaugural Oration is on pp. 56–64.
In the same volume with each of these editions there is bound a copy of Dr. Ames’s Rescriptio Scholastica&Brevis Ad Nic. Grevinchovii Responsum, immediately preceding the Disceptatio. In the Prince volume it is dated 1634; in the other it is dated 1658. It is possible that copies of the 1644 edition of the Disceptatio, together with copies of other of Ames’s works of various dates, were bound together in 1658 to make up the edition of his Latin works then published, and that there was no new edition of some of these as generally supposed.
112. Disceptatio Scholastica (1633), pp. 94–95.
113. Regarding Maccovius, see New Schaff-Herzog, vii. 109; Boeles, ii. 90–94; Visscher, 64–71. The Henry E. Huntington Library has a list, furnished by the Library of Congress, of references to Maccovius other than those cited by Schaff-Herzog.
114. “As the Puritan divines of New England were earnest Calvinists, they were in closer touch with the great teachers at Franeker and Leyden than with any equal contemporary group in Oxford and Cambridge, Eng. . . . There could hardly fail to come [to Harvard College] letters or pamphlets bearing the Franeker University seal, with its motto ‘Christo et Ecclesiae.’” (Letter of Rev. Dr. W. F. Warren to Mr. Matthews, April 1, 1921).
115. Oxford English Dictionary; Rev. Robert Shaw, Exposition of the Confession of Faith of the Westminster Assembly of Divines (1846), pp. 284, 286–287.
116. In the theological literature of the seventeenth century the exact combination of words under discussion is not merely rare; it is almost impossible to find, either in Latin or in English. Nor is it easy to find in book titles, two examples only having come to the writer’s notice out of any period: one, a part of a title of a work in manuscript by Matthew Sutcliffe, Dean of Exeter (died 1629); the other very recent. The motto has not been found in an examination of the following standard works, in which personal and corporate mottoes are recorded: W. S. W. Anson, Mottoes & Badges; Chassant & Tausin, Dictionnaire des Devises; C. N. Elvin, Handbook of Mottoes; Fairbairn, Crests; A. C. Fox-Davies, Book of Public Arms; Mrs. Bury Palliser, Historic Devices, Badges, and War-Cries. The nearest that have been found are: Pro Christo, Ecclesia et Grege (Francois Grolleau, Eveque d’Evreux); Pro Deo et Ecclesia (Bishop de Parham). In this examination the mottoes of the English universities and colleges have been seen, but not all of the Continental.
117. According to W. E. Griffis, all the Dutch universities grew out of the public school system, whence the name “Hoogeschool” (Nation, October 14, 1909, lxxxix. 350–351).
118. Boeles, i. 1–23.
119. i. 15.
120. Boeles, i. 436.
121. Rev. Archibald A. Hodge, Commentary on the Confession of Faith (1869), p. 28.
122. See p. 60 note 3, above.
123. Boeles, vol. i. pp. xiii–xviii, “Ongedrukte Bronnen” (unprinted sources), consisting of a mass of documents and correspondence in the provincial archives at Leeuwarden, the record office of the court of justice at Leeuwarden, the Town Hall at Franeker, etc. |Nos. 27–28 in Boeles’s list are collections of letters to or from Franeker professors, noted as in the “archief Gabbema” in the keeping of the “Friesch Genootschap,” and in the possession of “Mr. C. Baron van Breugel Douglas, te’s Hage.” Among the latter are letters referred to as concerning William Ames. The furniture of the Senate chamber was in 1845 taken for use in the Franeker council chamber; the portraits for the walls of the same building, the Town Hall (Boeles, i. 399).
124. Boeles, i. 399.
125. i. 400, quoting Mr. A. Telting.
126. See Guilielmi Amesii . . . Opera . . . Cum Prarfatione introductoria Matthiæ Netheni (1658); Hugo Visscher, Guilielmus Amesius: Zijn Leven en Werken (1894); Niceron, Mémoires pour servir a l’Histoire des Homines Illustrées, xxxvii. 273–286. Among the biographical dictionaries, see in particular Kippis’s Biographia Britannica, the Dictionary of National Biography, and the Encyclopaedia Britannica (eleventh edition). Also cf. Professor Kittredge’s “Note on Dr. William Ames,” in Publications of this Society, xiii. 60–69.
127. Nethenus; Visscher, pp. 76–77. The date is usually given November 1, which was undoubtedly Old Style. J. Browne quotes from Quick: “He died in ye year 1633, and in ye 57th of his age the Lord translated him from ye church militant unto ye church triumphant. He was a man of a robust body, of a good and strong constitution. He was of middle stature, a quick and ready wit, of a most accurate and exact judgment, rare and exquisite learning, eloquent as the Spartans, not as ye Asiaticks, singularly pious towards God, and truely charitable towards his neighbors” (History of Congregationalism in Norfolk and Suffolk, p. 69 note).
128. Increase Mather wrote: “Dr Amess Tomb might have had yt Inscriptn on it, wnh Scipio by his will appointed to be His, Ingrata patria ne ossa mea quidem habes” (Diary, in 2 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xiii. 339). See also the Latin verses by Reinerus Neuhusius headed “Tumulo Reverendi et Clarissimi Viri D. Guilielmi Amesii. S. S. Theol. D. et Profess.” (Quoted by Visscher, p. 217.)
129. Several of these works will be found in the Stationers’ Registers.
130. The Marrow of Christianity; The Marrow of Modern Divinity; The Marrow of Many Good Authours; The Marrow of Divinity; The Marrow of Ecclesiastical Historie; The Marrow of the Bible; and the Medulla Theologiae Moralis. Two of these are themselves famous books. All were printed after The Marrow of Sacred Divinity.
131. Peters wrote almost immediately after the death of Dr. Ames to the city of Rotterdam asking aid for the widow. He secured the publication of Ames’s Lectiones in CL Psalmos Davidis and dedicated it to the city, which on April 29, 1635, paid Mrs. Ames 200 gulden for it. (Visscher, p. 78.)
132. There were about 570 titles in the library. Allowing for copies of his own works and of those of his friends, we may suppose him to have purchased over 500 works. He presented some books to the library of the Academy at Franeker. (Catalogus Librorum Bibliothecae Publicae quae est in Academia Franequeranae, ed. A. Savois, 1713, pp. 10, 58). He probably gave copies of his own works to his associates.
133. Catalogvs Variorum & insignium Librorvm Clariss. & celeberrimi viri D. Gvilielmi Amesii SS. Theologiae Doctoris, & Professoris olim in illust. Acad. Franekerana. Amstelodami. mdcxxxiv.
134. The statement that the library was brought to New England has been repeated by a dozen or more authors, early and late. Increase Mather wrote in 1695 in his preface to Johannes in Eremo (Magnalia, 1855, i. 245–246): “Long before that, Dr. Ames (whose family and whose library New-England has had) was upon the wing for this American desart.” Cotton Mather (Magnalia, i. 236) said of Ames: “but he was hindred by that Providence which afterwards permitted his toidow, his children, and his library, to be translated hither.” Neal added the assertion that Ames’s books were the first furniture of Harvard College, and from that time to the present the fact of the library’s advent here has been accepted as truth. Mr. Julius H. Tuttle discussed the question in the Publications of this Society (xiv. 63–66), seeing certain reasons for crediting the statement of Neal. But there is as yet absolutely no proof that the library was brought; and such facts as we have are rather against the probability.
135. The evidence regarding this practically unnoticed incident, including its relations to Peters’s engagement to Deliverance Sheffield, is found in the Winthrop Papers (i. 100, ii. 199–201). Inspection of one of the manuscripts shows a misreading of a name in the printed version; the identity of Ruth Ames is clear.
136. H. C. 1659.
137. H. C. 1673.
138. H. C. 1729.
139. H. C. 1800.
140. H. C. 1720.
141. Yale 1759.
142. (1804–1873).
143. H. C. 1854.
144. H. C. 1898.
145. Dictionary of National Biography, vi. 337.
146. Hubbard, General History of New England, p. 187.
147. Ames’s Rescriptio ad Responsum N. Grevinchovii Contracta (1617). There is a copy in the library of the Society of Mayflower Descendants: see G. E. Bowman, in Mayflower Descendant, July, 1921, 99, 103, and frontispiece.
148. Dictionary of National Biography, xv. 270–271; Mather, Magnalia, i. 47; 2 Massachusetts Historical Collections, v. 187; B. Brook, Lives of the Puritans, ii. 237–239.
149. The theses defended by Thomas Parker were one of the causes of the trouble between Maccovius and other theologians at the Synod of Dort. Ames tried to support Maccovius, but they continually disagreed. It is probable, then, that Parker was interested in the dispute between Ames and Maccovius in 1626. Parker lived at Newbury until 1677. He was related to important men in the colony and was a teacher of Judge Sewall.
150. iii. 63 (October 19, 1715).
151. Cf. the late Thomas G. Wright’s Literary Culture in Early New England (1920).
152. The Libraries of the Mathers, in Proceedings American Antiquarian Society, xx. 269–356.
153. The Disceptatio is not appended to the Harvard College Library copy of the Rescriptio of Harderwijk (1645), but it is appended to the Trinity College Dublin copy of the same edition.
154. See page 64 note 2, above.
155. Magnalia, i. 236.
156. Charles Chauncy (170.5–1787), Seasonable Thoughts on the State of Religion in New-England (1743), p. 417.
157. A Particular Account of the Present Stated Exercises Enjoyned the Students (Harvard College Papers, i. 31; printed in C. Meriwether’s Our Colonial Curriculum, 1907, pp. 55–56).
158. E. Oviatt, Beginnings of Yale (1916), pp. 174–183, 199; Thwing, History of Higher Education in America, pp. 68–71.
There are in the Yale University Library manuscript transcriptions of a tract by Ames on natural philosophy, one being by the Rev. William Partridge (Harvard 1689), minister at Killingworth from 1691 to 1693 (Warham Mather’s copy), and the other by the Rev. John Clark (Harvard 1690), pastor at Exeter, N. H. (Letter from Miss Anne S. Pratt, Yale University Library, March 5, 1921.) We may judge that this tract was in use at Harvard College in 1688–1690, and that there were not printed copies available for continued use by all the students.
159. At the time of the original writing of this paper, the portrait hung in Memorial Hall.
160. There are copies of the Fresh Suit, 1633, with the portrait, in the Boston Athenaum and in the Boston Public Library.
161. The photograph was obtained through the kindness of Mr. William Phillips, our Minister to the Netherlands. So far as is known, the Franeker portrait is here reproduced for the first time.
162. Letter of March 29, 1922.
163. The portrait by “G. S.” in the Fresh Suit, 1633, appears on the recto of a leaf on the verso of which is printed a note about Dr. Ames signed “Published by S. O.” That leaf is bound in different places in different copies of the Fresh Suit. In the Boston Athenasum copy, one has to turn over more than a hundred pages before reaching the leaf; and in the Boston Public Library copy, it is bound still farther toward the back of the book. This portrait was reproduced in “Lives of Eminent & Remarkable Characters, . . . in the Counties of Essex, Suffolk, & Norfolk” (1820), the title of which is somewhat blindly given as “Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk Characters” in F. O’Donoghue’s Catalogue of Engraved British Portraits (1908), i. 43. Presumably it is also the portrait reproduced in 1899 in W. E. Griffis’s article on “The Pilgrim Press at Leyden” (New England Magazine, N. S., xix. 561).
There seems to be some confusion and uncertainty in regard to the portrait by Marshall and that by “G. S.” O’Donoghue states (Catalogue, etc., i. 43) that the Marshall portrait forms a frontispiece to the Fresh Suit, 1633; but this is clearly a mistake. Visscher, as quoted in our text (p. 78), says that the Marshall portrait appeared as a frontispiece to the Marrow, 1642. Possibly that date is an error for 1643. At all events, that portrait is found as a frontispiece to a volume in the Harvard College Library which contains the Marrow, without date on its title-page, and Conscience with the Power and Cases thereof, dated 1643. Preceding the Marrow is a general title, reading: “The Workes of the Reverend and Faithfull Minister of Christ William Ames Doctor and Professor of the Famous Vniversity of Franeker in Friesland. Translated out of Latine for publike Vse. Published by Order. London Printed for Iohn Rothwell, and are to be sold at his shop, at the Sun in Pauls Church-yarde, 1643.” Very likely, therefore, the portrait was used with each separate pamphlet published in 1643, even when the general title is lacking. Underneath the portrait, in the Harvard College Library copy, is this inscription:
The Pourtracture of the Reverend and worthy Minister of God, William Ames D.D. sometime of Christs Colledge in Cambridge. And Professor of Divinity in the Famous University of Franeker in Friesland. Will: Marshall sculpsit.
Printed for John Rothwell at the Sunn in Paules Church yard
164. Letter of Mr. Ames to Mr. Matthews, April 25, 1921.
165. 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, vi. 340.
166. The Founders (1919), i. 2–3.
167. Middlesex Probate Records, xv. 295.
168. H. C. 1763.
169. Sibley, Harvard Graduates, ii. 426–427; J. N. Arnold, Vital Records of Rehoboth, p. 202; New England Historical and Genealogical Register, xlv. 145; Vital Records of Bridgewater, ii. 199.
170. Middlesex Probate Records, vii. 403–405.
171. W. E. Griffis (Nation, October 14, 1909, lxxxix. 350–351).
172. Our Publications, January, 1922, xxiv. 318–435.
173. Our Publications, January, 1922, xxiv. 349, 350.
174. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, xiii. 457; Massachusetts Archives, clxxi. 104, 369, clxxii. 59.
175. To the courtesy of Dr. William B. Bartlett of Concord, a great-grandson of Dr. Josiah Bartlett, we are indebted for permission to copy and print the log.
176. Wyman, Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 64–65.
177. Isaac Foster (1740–1782; H. C. 1758).
178. Memoirs of Members of the Social Circle in Concord, Second Series, pp. 172–174.
179. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, i. 729.
180. See J. Thacher, American Medical Biography, i. 150–151; 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, i. 323–330 (sketch by Richard Frothingham); T. F. Harrington, Harvard Medical School, i. 234–237; H. A. Kelly and W. L. Burrage, American Medical Biographies, 1920, pp. 67–68 (sketch by Dr. Albert N. Blodgett). Frothingham asserts that Bartlett “entered Harvard College, but, owing to the confusion of the times, left it to become a student with Dr. Isaac Forster.” Bartlett’s name is not found in the list of temporary students printed in our Publications (xvii. 271–285), and the statement is probably an error. Among the references given at the end of Dr. Blodgett’s sketch is “Oration by Robert T. Davis.” This reference is misplaced and properly belongs to the sketch on a previous page of Governor Josiah Bartlett (1729–1795). Dr. Davis’s oration is printed on pp. 21–38 of a pamphlet entitled “Unveiling of the Bartlett Statue at Amesbury, Massachusetts, July 4th, 1888.” Dr. Blodgett also says that our Dr. Bartlett “corrected the mistake of . . . colonial writers regarding the year of arrival of Gov. Winthrop at Charlestown with fifteen hundred persons, which had been given as 1630, to the true date, 1629, as shown by the original town records of Charlestown.” Dr. Blodgett is here merely repeating a statement made by Dr. Bartlett himself in 1813 (see 2 Massachusetts Historical Collections, ii. 163 and note); but, needless to say, Dr. Bartlett was mistaken on this point, having been led astray by an erroneous entry.
181. There is neither heading nor pagination in the original. Names of vessels are not, except occasionally, underscored in the original, but are here printed in italics for convenience. It has not been thought necessary to print in italics other words that are underscored in the original.
182. Richard Whellen.
183. See C. W. Brewster, Rambles in Portsmouth, ii. 259.
184. Ammi Ruhamah Cutter (1735–1820; H. C. 1752).
185. Perhaps Capt. James Collinson: see G. Williams, History of the Liverpool Privateers (1897), p. 211. The Alfred is listed in that work (p. 667), but its capture is not mentioned.
186. Francis Horton.
187. Capt. John Birket: see American Vessels captured by the British during the Revolution and War of 1812 (1911), p. 6.
188. John Harris.
189. Capt. John Cathcart.
190. Capt. John Edmunds (Edmands, Edmonds).
191. Capt. Benjamin Lovett.
192. William Jackson: see W. L. Clowes, Royal Navy, iv. 70, 111.
193. Capt. John Bolton: see American Vessels, etc., p. 55.
194. This name is obscure: perhaps “King.”
195. This name is obscure: perhaps “Buckley” or “Bukley.”
196. Capt. Timothy Parker.
197. Capt. John Carnes.
198. Capt. Nathaniel Brookhouse.
199. Capt. Silas Devol.
200. This name is obscure.
201. Perhaps identical with John Guliker (Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, vi. 947).
202. Mr. Mayo’s paper will be printed in full in the Granite Monthly for February 1923.
203. Cf. J. W. Dean, Capt. John Mason (Prince Society), pp. 41, 43.
204. Brewster, Rambles about Portsmouth, ii. 78, i. 131; Granite Monthly, v. 194, x. 218.
205. Quincy, History of Harvard University, ii. 491.
206. John Wentworth to Durand & Bacon, July 17, 1769.
207. Collections New Hampshire Historical Society, ix. 306–310.
208. Id. ix. 336–337, 343–344, 350–351
209. L. S. Mayo, John Wentworth, pp. 73–86.
210. Record of the Royal Society (London, 1912), p. 357.
211. Manuscripts of the Earl of Dartmouth, ii. 400.
212. 2 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, ii. 296, 299.
213. New Hampshire State Papers, viii. 313.
214. Brewster, Rambles about Portsmouth, ii. 83.
215. Farmer and Moore, Historical Collections, ii. 204–207.
216. Kingsford, History of Canada, vi. 464–468; Short and Doughty, Documents relating to the Constitutional History of Canada, ii. 698–704.
217. Kingsford, History of Canada, vi. 468–471, vii. 198.
218. Mr. William A. Hayes 2nd, of Cambridge, owns an engraving of Peter Livius which bears the following inscription:
Peter Livius, now Chief Justice of Quebec.
Bonus atque fidus
Judex honestum praetulit utile
Et per obstantes catervas
Explicuit sua Victor arma.
219. Letter cited from Rass, Die Convertiten seit der Reformation, Freiburg, 1871, x. 341–358. I have not succeeded in finding a copy of this letter in French.
220. In the preface to the English-Portuguese edition, Lisbon, 1788, the editor and translator refers to the Conversion as having already passed through four editions in London. (See p. 138 note c, below.)
221. I am much indebted to Mr. Worthington C. Ford for procuring for me the opportunity of examining this edition before it came into the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and also for photostats of title-pages of several other rare editions. The second London edition and several other editions were given to the Massachusetts Historical Society by our associate Mr. John E. Thayer.
222. In the Paris first edition the letter is signed and addressed: “Thayer, A Paris, ce 1 Mai 1787, Au Seminaire de S. Sulpice.” “à M. Nathaneal Thayer, Boston.”
223. In the English edition this sentence reads only: “he has thought proper to render it publick.”
224. Conversion, Paris edition, p. 4
225. The London second edition has nine sections only. In the London fifth edition (1788), the sixth edition (1791), the Dublin edition (1809), and the Hartford edition (1832), the letter has a postscript. In the Paris first edition it is found in substance, but not exactly, in the twenty-first section.
226. This edition was translated from an English edition, prior to the London fifth of 1788, and has the title-page and preface in both languages, as well as the text.
227. This edition contains an amusing footnote in elucidation of Thayer’s reference to his birthplace: “(b) Boston, Nevv London, schöne befestigte Stadt in Nord-America, in Neu-England, nebst einem guten Hasen an dem Meer von Canada. Sie treibt einen großen Handel nach Barbados, mit Stockischen, Bretern, Eisen, wöllenen Tuch und Leinwand. Sie wird in denen Charten unrecht Bristow genennet” (pp. 43, 44).
228. A personal search among antiquarian book-dealers and in libraries in Florence and Rome, including the Vatican library, failed to locate a copy. In fact only one copy was found in any language, the Paris first edition in the Biblioteca Vittorio Emanuele, Rome.
229. I am indebted to M. Aegidius Fauteux, Librarian of the Bibliotheque Saint-Sulpice, Montreal, for the information in regard to this edition, as well as for other most valuable information. The collation of the edition is: Title-page, 1 leaf; Thayer’s Account, unsigned, undated, pp. [3]–29; Lettre où l’on rapporte ce que Mr. Thayer a fait de plus remarquable depuis son départ de Rome pour Paris, jusqu’à son embarquement pour Boston, et depuis son arrivée dans cette ville jusqu’à présent. A Paris, ce 28 Septembre, 1790, pp. 30–63. M. Fauteux states that this letter is not signed, but from internal evidence it appears to have been written by the Rev. Mr. Nagot; and adds, “The text of the letter shows that the author was the Superior of Le Petit Seminaire of Paris at the time of Mr. Thayer’s arrival in that city from Rome and we know that the Superior from 1783 to 1789 was Mr. Nagot. In 1789, Mr. Nagot was appointed Director of the Grand Seminary and he occupied that position until his departure for America on April 21st 1791.”
230. Following Thayer’s letter to his brother is a single leaf signed “J. Thayer, Paris Mars 3 88” apparently the end of a letter, of which the preceding leaf or leaves are lacking. It refers to conditions in the city of London, and to his practices as a Catholic when there.
231. Father Connolly published an “Historical Sketch of the Rev. John Thayer” in the United States Catholic Historical Magazine (ii. pp. 261–273).
232. See p. 138 note e, below.
233. See p. 139 note 1, below.
234. See p. 140 note o, below.
235. The remaining footnotes, a–aa, will be found on pp. 137–140, below.
236. In the absence of Dr. Morison, the introductory paragraphs and the footnotes have been prepared by the Editor.
237. Our Publications, xviii. 54–62, 77–78, xix. 290–295, xxv. 40–43, 47–50, 57–58.
238. Apparently the only account of Amos Windship that has hitherto appeared in print is that found in Sherman Leland’s Leland Magazine (1850), where we read:
“He was educated at Harvard University, and graduated with the class of 1771, . . . He was a physician and surgeon. He received his medical education under the instruction of Dr. Ezekiel Hersey, a physician and surgeon of considerable eminence in Hingham, Mass. He commenced his professional course in Boston, Mass., and after continuing in practice there for a few years, engaged as a naval surgeon on board the United States frigate Alliance, of the squadron under the command of Commodore John Paul Jones, and continued in the active service of his country in that capacity, until the close of the war in 1783. When the relations of peace were established, he visited England, and while there became a member of the London Medical Society, and was appointed a corresponding fellow. After a short residence abroad, he returned to the United States. He received the degree of M.D., from Harvard University, and resumed his practice in Boston. He continued in the discharge of his professional duties there for a series of years, and then removed to Wellfleet, Mass., where he died in 1811. He was highly esteemed in his professional and social relations” (p. 171: cf. pp. 170, 172, 177–178).
For Windship’s degree of M.D., and the true date of his death, see p. 144 notes 3 and 5, below.
239. Holliston Vital Records, p. 155.
240. Holliston Vital Records, p. 357. Administration on his estate was granted to his widow Mercy, February 25, 1754 (Middlesex Probate Files, no. 25316). In an inventory of the same date the “Real Estate about Seventy Acres of Land & The Buildings” were valued at £1800. In an account dated June 16, 1760, made by commissioners of whom Daniel Emerson was one, occurs this item: “To the Widow for Lying in of a Posthumous Child, and her Care of that Child Years; and her Care of another Child 3 Years, & Charge of its Sickness £240.” Nathaniel and Mercy Windship had several children besides Amos, though he is the only child mentioned in the Leland Magazine.
That Nathaniel Windship, the father of Dr. Amos Windship, was a descendant of Edward Winship (1612–1688) of Cambridge is a reasonable supposition, but the line of descent has not hitherto been determined. Edward Winship (1612–1688), the emigrant, had a son Edward (1654–1718). This Edward had, among other children, Edward (1684–1763), Ephraim (1688–1757), and Nathaniel (1690–1721). The third Edward had a son Jonathan (1719–1784), who had a son Amos born December 19 and baptized December 30, 1750 (Lexington Vital Records, p. 90): see the next paragraph but one. The Nathaniel Winship who was born in 1690 married Rebecca Pierce February 11, 1714 (Cambridge Vital Records, ii. 430), died in 1721, and on March 6, 1722, administration on his estate was granted to his widow Rebecca (Middlesex Probate Files, no. 25313). Nathaniel and Rebecca (Pierce) Winship had a son Nathaniel who was born December 27, 1716 (Cambridge Vital Records, i. 775). On June 6, 1728, Rebecca (Pierce) Winship was married to John Manning (id. ii. 431). On November 26, 1733, “Guardianship of Nathaniel Winship in his seventeenth year son of Nathaniel Winship late of Cambridge . . . decd is committed (at his own Election) to Ephraim Winship of Lexington” (Middlesex Probate Files, no. 25315). The guardian thus appointed was the youth’s uncle Ephraim Winship (1688–1757). On March 13, 1738, a committee was appointed to settle and divide the estate of Nathaniel Winship (1690–1721), it reported April 1, and on April 10 the “doings” of the committee were accepted. Two-thirds of the real estate were “assigned to the within named Deceas’d his only Son Nathaniel Winship, & to his heirs and assigns for ever; and the said assignee is order’d to pay the Charges of this Settlement . . . and to pay to his Sisters” certain sums (Middlesex Probate Files, no. 25313). The place of residence of Nathaniel Winship is not given in this document; but on April 12, 1738, “Nathanael Winship of Lexington cordwainer” sold a certain piece of land (Middlesex Deeds, xxxix. 558). On May 28, 1742, “Eli Jones of Holliston” sold to “Nathaniel Winship of Sudbury . . . cordwainer” sixty acres of land in Holliston (id. lxvi. 336). On May 16, 1744, “Nathaniel Winship of Holliston” and Mercy Leland were married at Sherborn (Sherborn Vital Records, p. 148). On July 29, 1745, “Eli Jones of Holliston” sold to “Nathaniel Winship of the same Town . . . Cordwainer . . . about Eight acres” of land in Holliston (Middlesex Deeds, lxvi. 337). On September 14, 1749, “Nathanael Winship of Holliston Cordwainer” and five of his uncles—among them Edward Winship (1684–1763) and Ephraim Winship (1688–1757)—sold a certain piece of land in Cambridge (id. xlix. 288). (Cf. id. xxv. 233, 708, xxix. 141, xli. 468, 469, liv. 506.) The deeds from Eli Jones to Nathaniel Winship were not recorded until November 15, 1766. After the death (1753) of Nathaniel Windship, his widow Mercy married (apparently in 1763) Ralph Day of Sherborn. Exactly how Amos Windship came into the possession of his father’s real estate in Holliston does not appear, but on August 21, 1766, “I Amos Winship of Sherborn . . . student In Consideration of two hundred and forty pounds Lawful money paid me by Hachaliah Bridges of Holliston . . . do hereby give grant sell and convey” unto the said Bridges “One certain Tract of Land in said Holliston with the Buildings,” the tract containing sixty-eight acres of land. One of the witnesses was Ralph Day, presumably Amos’s step-father. The deed was acknowledged by Windship and was recorded on November 15, 1766. (Middlesex Deeds, lxvi. 340–341.) It will be noted that Amos, a full year before he entered Harvard, describes himself as “student;” and also that the sale took place on the very day that Amos—making allowance for the difference between Old Style and New Style—came of age. See p. 150 note 1, below.
It is clear, then, that Dr. Amos Windship’s father was the Nathaniel Winship who was born at Cambridge December 27, 1716, and who lived successively in Lexington, Sudbury, and Holliston. (Cf. Paige, History of Cambridge, p. 696, and Hudson’s History of Lexington, ii. 767, where this identification is suggested but not worked out.)
With regard to the Amos Winship, son of Jonathan Winship (1719–1784), who was born December 19, 1750, there has been much confusion. Writing of him in 1899, J. P. C. Winship said: “It is reported that he was a graduate of Harvard College” (Historical Brighton, i 149). In 1868 Hudson (History of Lexington, p. 270) merely gave the date of birth of this Amos. In the 1913 edition of Hudson’s History (ii. 769), this Amos Winship is stated to have been our Dr. Amos Windship; but, as is abundantly proved in these footnotes, this identification is an error. This Amos Winship married Mary Wyman October 29, 1782 (Cambridge Vital Records, ii. 430), and had, among other children, Sally Wyman, baptized June 1, 1783 (Paige, History of Cambridge, p. 699), and Amos, born in 1792. Paige says that Sally Wyman Winship married Cyrus Holbrook September 28, 1800, but this is an error, for C. Holbrook’s wife was not Sally Wyman Winship but Sarah Winship (Cambridge Vital Records, ii. 430). As a matter of fact, Sally Wyman Winship and Dexter Dana were married by the Rev. Dr. John Lathrop October 20, 1799 (Boston Records, xxx. 242). The name of Amos Winship, the father, is not found in the Boston Directory for 1789, but in later editions we read: “Windship Amos, victualler and tavern-keeper, Corn Court, S. side the Market” (1796); “Winship Amos, butcher and tavern keeper, Corn court” (1798); “Winship Amos, tavern-keeper Com court” (1800). He died November 12, 1801: “Mr. Amos Windship Mt. 51” (Columbian Centinel, November 14, p. 2/3). Administration on the estate of “Amos Windship late of Boston Victualler” was granted December 8, 1801, to his son-in-law Dexter Dana (Suffolk Probate Files, no. 21571). An inventory dated December 13, 1802, mentions a pew in the New Brick, another in the meeting-house of the third precinct in Cambridge, and land in Cambridge. (Cf. Middlesex Deeds, cxix. 429, cxxi. 303, cxxv. 320, cxxx. 530, 542.) A document dated February 21, 1803, mentions his widow Mary, and another dated August 29, 1803, his only son Amos. On February 21, 1803, Mary Winship was admitted guardian to her son Amos, but on November 11, 1806, was succeeded by Josiah Bridge, who was discharged November 3, 1813 (Suffolk Probate Files, no. 21853). In or about September, 1803, Mary Winship was married to the Rev. Joel Foster (1755–1812; Dartmouth 1777) of East Sudbury, now Wayland (Wayland Vital Records, p. 123; Cambridge Vital Records, ii. 430). Her son Amos Winship died December 18, 1815: “On Monday afternoon, Mr. Amos Windship, aged 23 years. His funeral will be from his brother-in-law’s, Mr. Dexter Dana’s house, No. 64 Cornhill, to-morrow afternoon” (Columbian Centinel, Wednesday, December 13, p. 2/3). Administration on his estate was granted December 18, 1815, to his mother Mary Foster (Suffolk Probate Files, no. 24810).
Jonathan Winship (1719–1784), the father of Amos Winship (1750–1801), and Nathaniel Windship (1716–1753), the father of Dr. Amos Windship (1745–1813), were first cousins. Consequently the two Amoses were second cousins. As both Amoses lived during certain years in Boston and are both mentioned in the Boston Records and elsewhere, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between them.
241. “Guardianship of Amos (at his own Election) a Minor in the fifteenth year of his age Son of Nathaniel Winship late of Holliston . . . is granted . . . To Daniel Emerson of said Holliston Cordwainer” (Middlesex Probate Files, no. 25317). On March 16, 1766, administration on the estate of Daniel Emerson, cordwainer, was granted to his widow Hannah (id. no. 6944). He died December 4, 1765 (Holliston Vital Records, p. 312). Daniel Emerson was at various times town clerk, treasurer, and selectman of Holliston (A. Morse, Genealogical Register of the Inhabitants and History of the Towns of Sherborn and Holliston, 1856, pp. 81, 331, 333).
242. See p. 150 note 1, below.
243. The statement in the Leland Magazine that Windship “received the degree of M.D., from Harvard University, and resumed his practice in Boston” conveys a wrong impression. The degree of M.B. was first conferred by Harvard in 1788, and that of M.D. in course in 1795. Previous to 1811, six M.B.’s had received the degree of M.D. in course. In 1811 the degree of M.D. was “granted to graduates of that year and to earlier graduates who had not been admitted to it” (Quinquennial Catalogue, 1920, p. 695; cf. our Publications, xii. 312–321). It was not until 1811 that Windship became an M.D.
F. S. Drake stated in 1878 that Amos Windship, “also a distinguished physician, a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, was surgeon of the ‘Bonne Homme Richard,’ Capt. John Paul Jones” (Town of Roxbury, p. 208). Amos Windship was not a graduate of Edinburgh, though his son Charles Williams Windship took the degree of M.D. at Glasgow in 1797.
244. See p. 162 note 2, below.
245. Both in the Leland Magazine and in the Quinquennial Catalogue, the date of Windship’s death is given as 1811. The date in the text has been obtained from the town clerk of Wellfleet.
246. The Leland Magazine gives her name as Mary Bell, but presumably that is an error for Desire Bell, which is the name found in J. Cunnabell’s Genealogical Memoir of the Cunnabell, Conable or Connable Family (1886), p. 33. Mr. Eliot (p. 154, below) speaks of Windship’s “Brother in law Deacon Daniel Bell.”
Daniel Bell and Abigail Cunnabell were married August 3, 1710, and had many children, the eldest being Daniel. The father died June 9, 1750, his will (dated February 12, 1749, proved June 19, 1750) being in Suffolk Probate Files, no. 9559.
The second Daniel Bell was born May 4, 1711, was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company, was twice married, and died March; 26, 1767. “Thursday last died here, after a long Indisposition, Capt. Daniel Bell, a Gentleman well respected among us for his Faithfulness and Honesty” (Boston Gazette, Monday, March 30, 1767, p. 3/1). By his first wife, Miriam Gore, whom he married March 12, 1733, he had three children: Miriam, Abigail (wife of Joseph Ridgway), and Sarah (wife of John Callender). By his second wife, Desire Barker, whom he married December 13, 1750, he had two children: Daniel and Desire. In his will (dated December 8, 1766, proved April 3, 1767: Suffolk Probate Files, no. 14007) he mentions only these five children. On April 3, 1767, the two youngest, Daniel and Desire, described as minors above fourteen years of age, were placed under the guardianship of their mother. (Suffolk Probate Files, nos. 14008, 14009.)
The third Daniel Bell was born December 28 and baptized December 31, 1752. On April 20, 1775, he married Mary Greenleaf, daughter of William and Mary (Brown) Greenleaf, by whom he had nine children, the youngest born a few days after his own death. (J. E. Greenleaf, Greenleaf Family, 1896, p. 213.) It was this Daniel who was the deacon. “April 16, 1786. The pastor communicated to the church a letter from Mr Daniel Bell, resigning the office of a deacon in the church, of clerk to the society and one of the members of the standing committee, upon which The Church Voted, That Mr Bell’s resignation be accepted, and that the thanks of the church be returned to Mr Bell for his many faithful services in the office of a deacon” (Records of the Church in Brattle Square, 1902, p. 39). He died October 15, 1791: “In this town Mr. Daniel Bell, Merchant” (Columbian Centinel, October 19, 1791, p. 3/2); and administration was granted to his widow November 22nd, one of her bondsmen being Charles Williams (Suffolk Probate Files, no. 19838). Five of the children are mentioned in the will of their grandmother, Mrs. Desire Williams.
Whether Desire Bell, the sister of Deacon Daniel Bell (1752–1791), was older or younger than her brother does not appear; nor is it known when or where she married Amos Windship, but the marriage must have taken place about 1772. Nor is it known when she died.
After the death of Capt. Daniel Bell (1711–1767), his widow Desire (Barker) Bell married Charles Williams, though when or where is not known. It must have been before July 30, 1772, on which day Desire Williams signed a deed as the wife of Charles Williams: see Suffolk Deeds, clxx. 187. Mr. Williams was a collector of taxes in Boston in the years 1782, 1784–1790, and was rechosen in 1791, but declined to serve. He was a prominent man at King’s Chapel, and. later at Christ Church. He died in June, 1793: “In this town, Mr. Charles Williams, Æ.61.—He was a man of unspotted integrity and universal benevolence” (Columbian Centinel, June 29, p. 3/2). He was buried in Christ Church July 1st, the record describing him as “Paralitic” and giving his age as 59. His will (dated May 4, 1787, proved July 9, 1793: Suffolk Probate Files, no. 20185) mentions no children and makes his wife executrix, one of her bondsmen being the Rev. Dr. William Walter. See p. 156 note 3, below.
By his marriage to Mrs. Bell, Charles Williams became the step-father of Deacon Daniel Bell and the step father-in-law of Amos Windship; no doubt it was for him that Windship named his oldest son; and for many years Windship and Mr. Williams were closely associated. On first being chosen a collector in 1782, Mr. Williams proposed “Dr Amos Windship & Daniel Bell Mercht as his Bondsmen.” Presumably this Daniel Bell was the deacon, Mr. Williams’s stepson. Windship was again a bondsman in 1787–1790. (Boston Records, xxv. 184, xxvii. 29, 67, 100, 132, 133.)
Mrs. Desire Williams, successively the widow of Daniel Bell (1711–1767) and Charles Williams, died April 10, 1798: “Yesterday, after a long confinement, which she bore with exemplary patience and fortitude, Madam Desire Williams, widow of the late Mr. Charles Williams” (Columbian Centinel, April 11, p. 3/1). The Christ Church records give her death as due to “Grad. decay,” her age as 70, and the date of her burial as April 12. In her will (dated May 2, 1796, proved April 17, 1798: Suffolk Probate Files, no. 20847) she mentions her grandchildren Charles Williams Windship, Desire Windship, and Sarah Windship; Mary Bell, “widow of my late son Daniel,” to whom she gives the “tomb under Stone Chapel;” her five grandchildren, the children of Daniel (1752–1791) and Mary (Greenleaf) Bell; and her pew in Christ Church, which she gives to the wardens; and names the Rev. Dr. William Walter as one of the executors. If the age of Mrs. Williams is correctly given, then perhaps she was the Desire Barker, daughter of Barnabas and Hannah (Turner) Barker, who was born April 25, 1728, and is said to have married “—Bell” (B. Newhall, Barker Family of Plymouth Colony and County, p. 79). In a deed acknowledged by her April 10 and recorded April 19, 1794, Mrs. Williams describes herself as “Desire Williams of Boston . . . Widow of Charles Williams, and late Widow, Executrix, & Residuary Legatee of Daniel Bell late of said Boston” (Suffolk Deeds, clxxviii. 93).
247. All three children are mentioned in the will of their grandmother, Mrs. Desire Williams. Charles Williams Windship was born July 22, 1773 (Faculty Records, vi. 51); was at the Boston Public Latin School (Catalogue, 1886, p. 118); on July 8, 1789, at the visitation of the public schools, delivered an oration “On the Progress and Advantages of a Good Education” (Massachusetts Centinel, July 11, 15, xi. 135, 140); graduated at Harvard College in 1793, having a Commencement part (Faculty Records, vi. 186); received the degree of M.D. from Glasgow University in 1797; and died at Roxbury August 27, 1852. (New England Historical and Genealogical Register, vii. 103; F. S. Drake, Town of Roxbury, p. 208). He was twice married: first to Catharine May, daughter of Col. Joseph May (1760–1841); and secondly to Martha Ruggles Zeigler. Col. Joseph May and Elizabeth May, the second wife of Dr. Amos Windship, were first cousins, being grandchildren of Ebenezer May (1692–1752). Charles May Windship (1809–1865; H. C. m 1829) was a son of Dr. Charles Williams Windship. (For Dr. C. W. Windship, see Suffolk Deeds, cxc. 150, cxci. 45, cxcii. 45.)
Desire Windship was born in 1777, was twice married, and died in 1843. (Leland Magazine, p. 177.) She was married to her first husband, Warren Hall, at Christ Church on September 6, 1798.
Sarah (or Sally) Windship is stated in the Leland Magazine to have been born in 1780, to have married Charles Stuart, and to have died in 1830. The date of birth would seem to be an error, since the Alliance sailed from Boston January 14, 1779, and on its return reached Boston August 16, 1780 (G. W. Allen, Naval History of the American Revolution, ii. 371, 529): hence Mrs. Windship could hardly have had a child born in 1780. Perhaps the Sally Windship, daughter “of Amos Windship,” who was baptized at the Brattle Square Church June 9, 1776, was the daughter of Dr. Amos Windship.
248. The marriage intention was recorded April 8, 1784 (Boston Records, xxx. 453), but when the marriage took place is not known.
Ebenezer May (1692–1752) had, among other children, Samuel (1723–1794), Ephraim (1728–1797), and Moses (1730–1798). Samuel May (1723–1794) was the father of Col. Joseph May, whose daughter Catharine was the first wife of Dr. Charles Williams Windship. Moses May (1730–1798) had a son Perrin May (1767–1844). Ephraim May (1728–1797), who married Zibiah Cravath, left eight children, among them Zibiah (wife of Stephen Gore), Elizabeth (bom September 11, 1758), Sarah (wife of Deacon William Brown), John Cravath, and Eunice. Curiously enough, the date of her birth (September 11, 1758) is all that is said about this Elizabeth May in the May Family (1878, p. 6). But that she was the Elizabeth May who became the second wife of Dr. Amos Windship is proved by her father’s will. Ephraim May died May 28, 1797: “On Sunday last, Ephraim May, Esq. of this town. Æt. 69. It would be a criminal neglect of real worth, not to notice the distinguished virtues of the deceased. As a man, as a christian, as a member of civil and domestic society, and in every relation which he sustained, he adorned humanity, did honor to religion, and was greatly useful; having served his generation according to the will of God, he now rests from his labours” (Columbian Centinel, Wednesday, May 31, p. 3/2). In his will (dated May 26, proved June 13, 1797: Suffolk Probate Files, no. 20726) he mentions “my beloved Daughter Elizabeth Windship,” and appoints “my three sons in law, Stephen Gore, William Brown & Amos Windship with Amasa Davis Esq and my nephew Jos. May all of Boston” to be his executors. When administration was granted, the third was described as “Amos Windship Mercht.” Windship signed an inventory dated June 27, 1797, and an account dated August 24, 1797; but thereafter he apparently took no share in the management of the estate. An account “of Amasa Davis & William Brown acting Executors,” dated October 21, 1799, contains this item: “1798 July 2 pd Dr A Winships a/c for attendance and medicines 21.72.”
In her will (dated November 15, 1798, proved January 15, 1799: Suffolk Probate Files, no. 21004) Eunice May appointed her brothers-in-law Stephen Gore and William Brown her executors, and bequeathed a certain sum “in trust for the following purposes that the said Brown & Gore . . . shall put said sum to Interest and pay such Interest as the same may become due to my sister Elizabeth Windship for her sole and separate use during the life of her Husband Doctr Amos Windship and upon his Death that my said Trustees pay the said principal sum to the said Elizabeth Windship if then living or if not to such of her Children present & future as may be then alive for her or their use forever, and in case of the Death of the said Elizabeth before her said husband that they then pay the said principal sum to such of her Children as may be living and I order that her separate receipt alone shall be a discharge to said Trustees for said interest during the continuance of her marriage with her said husband.”
249. On May 14, 1804, John Cravath May Windship, “a minor more than 14,” and Lettsom Windship, “a minor under 14,” were placed under the guardianship of Perrin May, who was a first cousin of the children’s mother; and Elizabeth Windship and Charlotte Windship, “under 14,” were placed under the guardianship of William Brown, Jr., presumably a son of the children’s mother’s sister Sarah (May) Brown. (Suffolk Probate Files, nos. 22142–22145.) Doubtless John Cravath May Windship was named for his mother’s brother, John Cravath May; and Lettsom Windship for Dr. Lettsom. Lettsom Windship’s name is wrongly given as “Letsone” in the Leland Magazine, and as “Letson” in the index to the Suffolk Probate Files.
The papers filed with Ephraim May’s will contain interesting information in regard to the last days of Amos Windship’s second wife and her children. Among them is the following, from an account dated June 11, 1804:
Dr the Estate of Mrs Eliza Windship decd in a/c with Wm Brown as the actg Exec to ye will of E. May Esq decd
|
1803 Dec. 20 to March 26, 1804 |
At this date I settled with Mrs Windship in full |
|
|
I paid repairs on her house in Hanover Street |
10.91 |
|
|
March 26 “ |
To Cash enclosed her at Exeter pr Order & Receipt |
100.00 |
|
April 3 “ |
To Cash paid Stage hire and my Journey & expences to, at, and from Exeter, to take care of her children & property after her decease |
16.72 |
|
To Cash paid her funeral expences and apparel for her Children at Exeter |
54.38 |
|
|
To Cash paid sundry debts showed in Exeter & for support of her children till they wu’d return to Boston |
51.07 |
|
|
May 12th |
To Cash paid Stage hire and apparel for her children |
26.44 |
|
To Cash paid at Probate office in Boston |
2.50 |
|
|
To Cash paid Dr Amos Windship from the proceeds of furniture, sold at Auction in Exeter |
50.00 |
|
|
To Cash lent Charles Windship for his note on Int. |
50.00 |
|
|
$362.02 |
It is obvious that Mrs. Windship’s death took place between March 26 and April 3, 1804, and the exact date is given in the Columbian Centinel of April 11: “In Exeter, N. H. suddenly, on the 27th ult. Mrs. ELIZABETH WINDSHIP, daughter of the late Ephraim May, Esq. of this town” (p. 2/3).
John Cravath May Windship was born January 7, 1789 (Faculty Records, vii. 394), and was baptized at Christ Church in the same month; was at the Boston Public Latin School (Catalogue, pp. 136, 137); graduated at Harvard College in 1809, having a Commencement part (Faculty Records, viii. 220); studied law and began practice at Rapides, Louisiana, where he died in 1814.
Elizabeth Windship was baptized at Christ Church March 10, 1793, and married Joseph R. Folsom of Bucksport, Maine.
Lettsom Windship was born in 1795 and died at sea in 1818.
Charlotte Windship, born in 1798, married Joseph Cowdin, and died in 1820.
The documents cited seem to show that Dr. Amos Windship was looked somewhat askance at by his relatives. It is true that he was an executor of the will of his father-in-law Ephraim May, but he served actively only a few months; he is not even mentioned in the wills of Charles Williams and Mrs. Desire Williams; the bequest of his sister-in-law Eunice May to his wife and her children was so tied up that he could not touch it; when his second wife died she was described not as his wife but as the daughter of Ephraim May, and her children were placed under the guardianship not of their father but of her relations.
250. The marriage intention was recorded January 21, 1808 (Boston Records, xxx. 498), but the marriage did not take place until March: “MARRIED]—In this town, . . . Dr. Amos Winship, to Mrs. Abigail Lawrence” (Columbian Centinel, March 16, 1808, p. 2/3). Cf. p. 170 note 1, below.
251. The dates of births, baptisms, and marriages thus far given have been derived (except where otherwise specified) chiefly from Records of the Church in Brattle Square, and from Boston Records, vols, xxiv, xxviii, xxx. Other allusions to Dr. Amos Windship will be found in Boston Records, xxvii. 63, 64, 228. The Amos Winship referred to in Boston Records, xxii. 297, 447, was probably Amos Winship (1750–1801), the second cousin of Dr. Amos Windship. In the same volume (pp. 233, 238) the firm of Bell & Winship is mentioned. The names of Charles Williams, Daniel Bell, and Dr. Amos Windship are constantly associated in deeds and other documents.
252. There appear to be no references to Windship, while an undergraduate, in the Corporation Records or in the Overseers’ Records, and only three in the Faculty Records. On November 27, 1767, is this entry (Faculty Records, iii. 64):
|
Change of chambers |
Agreed also that Ballantine junr & Windship live in Massachusetts No 4. |
The second occurs under date of June 10, 1768, in the hand of President Holyoke (iii. 87):
Winship Amos Springf. Suff. Aug. 22. 1746. 21.3
In the margin is written, in another hand, “left College Aug./68.” The age “21.3” has apparently been altered from “22.3,” though possibly it is “22.3” altered from “21.3.” As previously stated (p. 141 note 4, above), Windship was born August 19, 1745. Hence the year “1746” is certainly an error. The date “Aug. 22” may be due to the fact that in the eighteenth century it was a common blunder to turn Old Style into New Style by adding twelve instead of eleven days. Precisely what town is meant by “Springf. Suff.” as the place of residence is uncertain. A year before entrance Windship had been living in Sherborn (see p. 141 note, above).
The third and last entry is again in the hand of President Holyoke: “Memo Winship deld up his Chamber. Jul. 27. 1768” (iii. 89).
The list of Freshmen placed on June 10, 1768, contains 56 names, that of Windship being 48. In an alphabetical list of “Hebrew Gram̄ars deld to the Freshmen Sept. 1767” (iii. 55) occur 55 names, that of Windship being lacking. From this fact, and from the further fact that his age at admission is given us three months over 21 years, it is reasonable to infer that he did not enter College until November, 1767; and if so, then he remained in College about eight months.
253. Nathaniel Tracy (H. C. 1769): see Harvard Graduates’ Magazine, xxv. 193–197.
254. Dr. Bela Lincoln (1734–1773; H. C. 1754) of Hingham. In the Leland Magazine it is stated that Windship studied under Ezekiel Hersey (H. C. 1728) of Hingham, who died December 9, 1770. (Cf. our Publications, xix. 284.) The following document (Suffolk Deeds, cxix. 13) is dated April 11, 1770, and was acknowledged April 4, 1771:
I Amos Winship of Hingham . . . Phyn In consideration of the sum of Sixty three pounds L M: by me received of Bela Lincoln of Hingham . . . M.D: before the sealing hereof, . . . Do Grant Bargain sell and Convey unto the said Bela Lincoln . . . all the Right and Title that I have or may have to a Reversion in the estate of my late honored father Nathaniel Winship deced whether real or personal estimated at Eighty pounds Lawful money and now improved by my mother Mercy Day. To Have and To Hold the said granted premises unto the said Bela Lincoln . . . And I the said Amos Winship . . . do hereby covenant with the said Bela Lincoln . . . in manner following that is to say that at the sealing hereof I am the sole owner of said granted premises . . . provided always . . . that if I or my heirs Exors or Admors or any of them shall pay the said Bela Lincoln . . . the sum of Sixty three pounds L M: on or before the first day of June Anno Domini one thousand seven hundred and seventy two then this deed with a bond bearing even date with this Instrument shall be void . . .
Amos Windship
255. His name was Kendrick: see p. 171, below.
256. “Winship, Amos (Mass). Surgeon’s-Mate Hospital Department, 1776–1777” (F. B. Heitman, Historical Register of the Continental Army, 1914, p. 600). Cf. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, xvii. 623. Under date of December 23, 1775, Ezekiel Price notes in his Diary: “Last evening, Dr. Winship stopt here. He is from Newport” (1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, vii. 222). This may or may not have been our Dr. Amos Windship.
257. Benjamin Church (H. C. 1754).
258. Here Mr. Eliot’s memory was somewhat at fault. John Adams sailed from Boston February 13, 1778, on the frigate Boston, commanded by Capt. Samuel Tucker. He left the Boston at Bordeaux April 1 and reached Paris April 8, 1778. (Diary, Works, iii. 94, 118, 120, 121.) It was in the following year that the Alliance was ordered to bring Adams back, and Adams actually spent several weeks on board of her, when his vessel was changed to the French frigate Sensible. Adams left Passy March 8, 1779; reached Nantes the 12th; left there the 21st, and on the 22nd wrote: “This day we arrived safe on board the Alliance, . . . The frigate lies at St.-Nazaire, where are several French vessels of war, but none so large as the Alliance.” On May 10 the Alliance set sail for L’Orient, arriving there the 12th; and on June 17 Adams wrote that the “Captain of the Sensible, sent his canot on shore for me and mine, and here I am in full possession of my apartment. Sailed about three o’clock in company with the Bonhomme Richard, Captain Jones, the Alliance, Captain Landais,” etc. (Diary, Works, iii. 192, 194, 199, 200, 210). Adams wrote in his Diary, May 11, 1779: “Dr. W. told me of Tucker’s rough, tarry speech about me, at the navy board: ‘I did not say much to him at first, but—and—my eyes, I found him after a while as sociable as any Marblehead man’” (iii. 200).
259. “This day Dr. Winship arrived here [Paris] from Brest” (February 12, 1779, J. Adams, Diary, Works, iii. 191). A letter from Windship to Franklin dated Brest, April 1, 1779, is owned by the American Philosophical Society.
260. “I was obliged to leave Joseph Stevens sick of the measles at the tavern. This was a painful circumstance to me, although I took all the precautions in my power, by speaking to . . . Captain Landais, and Dr. Winship, to look to him, and engaged a careful woman to nurse him” (April 22, 1779, J. Adams, Diary, Works, iii. 195). Dr. Lawrence Brooks, surgeon of the Bon Homme Richard, is several times mentioned in Adams’s Diary (iii. 202, etc.).
261. In J. H. Sherburne’s Life and Character of John Paul Jones, Windship’s name is wrongly given as “Arnold Winship” in the 1825 ed., p. 146, and in the 1851 ed., p. 140, but appears correctly as “Amos Windship” in the 1851 ed., p. 367. Cf. Logs of the Serapis—Alliance—Ariel (ed. J. S. Barnes, 1911), p. 20. He is also wrongly called “Arnold Winship” in the Calendar of John Paul Jones Manuscripts in the Library of Congress (1903), p. 315.
In the first part of the “Memorial, to justify Peter Landai’s Conduct during the late War” (Boston, 1784), Landais refers to “the Surgeon of the Alliance” (p. 23), and prints a certificate signed by Windship “On board the ship Alliance, October 21, 1779” (p. 46); but there is no allusion to the episode of rowing from the Alliance to the Bon Homme Richard related by Mr. Eliot.
262. The Alliance was built at Salisbury on the Merrimac in 1778 (G. W. Allen, Naval History of the American Revolution, i. 336). The Bon Homme Richard was originally “an East Indiaman called the Due de Duras, . . . was fourteen years old, unsound, and a dull sailer” (ii. 442), but Jones accepted her, though changing her name.
263. Sir Joseph Yorke (1724–1792), created Baron Dover in 1788.
264. The Alliance reached Boston August 16, 1780: see p. 147 note, above.
265. For Deacon Daniel Bell (1752–1791), see p. 145 note 1, above.
266. Dr. John Coakley Lettsom (1744–1815), though never in this country, had many American correspondents.
267. When Windship’s first wife, Desire (Bell) Windship, died is not known: see p. 145 note 1, above.
268. Elizabeth May (1758–1804): see p. 147 note 1, above.
269. Windship’s name is not found in Foote’s Annals of King’s Chapel, and it seems likely that Mr. Eliot confused him with his step father-in-law, Charles Williams. Mr. Williams owned a pew (as early as 1775) and a tomb in King’s Chapel and was vestryman in the years 1784–1786. On February 20, 1785, it was voted to make changes in the Liturgy, the committee for that purpose consisting of the two wardens and of seven other members, one being Mr. Williams. The committee made its report on March 28, and on June 19 the proprietors voted, twenty yeas to seven nays, Mr. Williams being one of the latter, that “the Common Prayer, as it now stand amended, be adopted.” On November 17, 1787, Mr. Williams signed a protest against the ordination of Mr. James Freeman, which, nevertheless, took place the next day. A few days later the wardens prepared a vindication of the proceedings of the society, in which they stated that Mr. Williams “voted for many of the alterations” in the Liturgy. (Foote, Annals, ii. 323, 327, 328, 331, 381, 387, 391, 392, 393, 600, 608, 619.)
270. It has already been shown that the relations between Mr. Williams and Dr. Windship were very close. Both were wardens of Christ Church, the former in 1789–1791, and also before 1789 and after 1791 he was a vestryman. In September, 1787, Windship subscribed £1.10.0 “towards glasing the windows;” in July of the same year Mrs. Windship gave eighteen shillings towards a certain object; in December, 1792, Windship gave twelve shillings for a stove. On May 28, 1787, he was chosen a warden, and was rechosen March 24, 1788. On December 21, 1789, he was chosen a vestryman. On October 21, 1790, he was one of those who “agree and Consent that the Revd Dr Walter should be settled the minister of said Church (Provided) a Reconciliation would take place in the Proprietors and all others that had thoughts of joining said Church;” and he was appointed on a committee of three (one of the other two being Charles Williams, then a warden) “to wait on those Gentlemen belonging to Christ Church in Cambridge to know whether they will relinquish the Revd Dr Walter to Christ Church in Boston.” On April 5, 1791, Windship was appointed one of three auditors of the wardens’ accounts. This was a curious selection, since Windship’s own accounts while warden were for years in a disputed state and apparently no settlement was ever made. Entries relating to his accounts are found under dates of September 26, 1791; May 29, June 17, December 4, 1792; April 11, 1793; January 3, 1794; and April 6, 1795. From June 4, 1787, to December 19, 1788, most of the entries in the Proprietors’ Records are in the hand of Windship. A reference to Dr. Amos Windship, overlooked in the Index, is in 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xv. 170.
271. About 1790: see p. 166 note 2, below.
272. Major John Pitcairn’s brother was Dr. William Pitcairn (1711–1791), and his son was Dr. David Pitcairn (1749–1809). For notices of them, see W. Munk, Roll of the Royal College of Physicians, ii. 172–174, 353–357; The Gold-Headed Cane (ed. Munk, 1884), pp. 112–144; Dictionary of National Biography.
273. Presumably either Robert Newman or Alexander Davidson. On December 19, 1788, Newman was severely reprimanded by Windship; and on April 20, 1789, Davidson was chosen sexton, though his term of office is somewhat uncertain.
274. In T. J. Pettigrew’s Memoirs of the Life and Writings of the late John Coakley Lettsom (1817) are several letters in which Dr. Windship is mentioned and one interesting one in which he is referred to but not named. This letter, dated July 11, 1791, was written by Lettsom himself, and in it he says:
“To-day I received a letter from America, mentioning some honours conferred upon me. These, however, are of little moment; but, what pleased me more, a bust of Washington is now on the Thames. I have not yet seen it, though I long for the pleasure. My library at Grove-hill is about 45 feet long. I am ornamenting it with busts, among which Washington must be conspicuous. Speaking of America, the progress of it is astonishing. . . . My correspondent, who is an American, says, that he himself is struck with amazement at the progress of this new continent, and he is no party man. . . .
“Thou must remember the affair of Bunker’s Hill last war, when Major Pitcairn fell. A friend of mine, lately at my house on a visit from Boston, was a particular acquaintance of the Major’s, and this officer was beloved by all parties. My friend loved him as a father, although he is an American born and bred. The Major received 30 balls through his body. He was brought into Boston, and buried in the King’s church, in a vault by himself in a close coffin, in his regimentals, and is at this moment in a perfect state. I informed Drs. Pitcairn, the brother and the son, of the circumstance, who requested my friend to send the Major to England, and I hope and believe he accompanies my bust of Washington. Brave officers and humane, however adverse you once were, you have (I trust) void of animosity traversed the Atlantic! As history will record you as heroes, may politic oblivion render you associates and friends, in those calm shades where refined intellect alone can enter and associate! In that state, divested of all human follies and animosities, may the glorious virtues which actuated you, survive and flourish in a clime, where virtue alone unites the Christian heroes of all nations and all degrees!”
275. Exactly when Windship was elected does not appear, but apparently it was as early as 1788: see p. 160 note 1, below.
276. Dr. John Warren (1753–1815; H. C. 1771). Though Dr. Warren was a classmate of Windship’s, there appear to be no references to Windship in Dr. Edward Warren’s Life of John Warren, M.D. (1874).
277. Dr. Aaron Dexter (1750–1829; H. C. 1776). In the “List of the Members of the Medical Society of London. For the Year 1791” (London, 1791), occur the names of “Amos Windship, M.D. Boston, Massachusels,” and of Drs. Aaron Dexter, John Warren, and Benjamin Waterhouse, as Corresponding Members.
278. Probably Amasa Dingley (H. C. 1785; d 1798). He was usher of the South Grammar School in 1786–1789: see Boston Records, xxv. 325, xxvii. 80, xxxi. 153, 175. Cf. Catalogue of the Boston Public Latin School (1886), p. 20.
279. The diploma could not have been sent before 1790, while the description was sent in or before 1788: see p. 160 note 1, below.
280. See p. 160 note 1, below.
281. “ARTICLE XXXII. History of a Case of incisted Dropsy, with a Dissection, by Amos Winship, of Boston, Massachusett’s, M.D. and C.M.S. in a Letter to J. C. Lettsom M.D. Read March 31, 1788.” (In Memoirs of the Medical Society of London, 1794, ii. 372–376.) The patient was a young woman who “began to have hydropic swellings of the abdomen” early in 1786 and died on October 14 of the same year. “After the trial of powerful diuretics and cathartics, deobstruent medicines without advantage, the paracentesis was performed by Dr. Cheever of this place.” Since Windship mentions Dr. Cheever, doubtless Mr. Eliot was right in saying that Windship “probably had no idea of its being published.” See also the next note. It will be observed that Windship is labelled “M.D.” At that time he had no degree of any sort: see p. 162 note 2, below.
282. Abijah Cheever (1760–1843; H. C. 1779). “History of a case of incisted dropsy, with a description of the several cysts, as communicated to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Jan. 31, 1787. 14 pp., 1., 1 pi. 18°. [Boston, n.d.]” This title is taken from the Index-Catalogue of the Library of the Surgeon-General’s Office, United States Army, ii. 867. There should be a copy in the Boston Medical Library, but the volume containing the pamphlet cannot now be found.
283. See p. 162 note 2, below.
284. Dr. John Fothergill (1712–1780). There is no allusion to this alleged plan either in Pettigrew’s Memoir of Lettsom or in Lettsom’s “Life of Dr. John Fothergill” prefixed to Lettsom’s edition of Fothergill’s Works (1784) and published separately the same year.
285. Drs. Dexter, Warren, and Waterhouse.
286. Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse (1754–1846; M.D. Leyden 1780; h M.D. Harvard 1786).
287. Dr. Benjamin Haskell (H. C. 1789).
288. Theft was not an uncommon charge against students in the eighteenth century.
289. See p. 162 note 1, below.
290. See p. 159 note 2, above.
291. At a Corporation meeting held June 9, 1790, the following action was taken:
“7. Whereas Mr Amos Windship has represented that he was admitted a Member of this University in the year 1767, but, being under the direction of his Guardian, was induced to dissolve his connexion therewith at the commencement of his Sophomore year, and has petitioned to be admitted to the degree of Master of Arts; and whereas a number of respectable Gentlemen, who were his Classmates, have represented him as a person of such character and acquirements as to deserve the honor for which he petitions, and to have his name inserted in it’s place in his Class, and pray that his request may be granted: Therefore,
“Voted, that the degree of Master of Arts be conferred on Mr Amos Windship, and that his name be inserted in the Class to which he belonged.
Degree of A.M. to be conferred on Mr Windship.
“8 The medical Professors having represented by a written Memorial, that Mr Amos Windship Physician, desirous of obtaining the honor of the degree of Bachelor of Physic, has complied with the requisitions contained in the medical Institution of this University so far as to have attended two courses of Lectures in their respective branches; and that upon private enquiry they find him capable of passing such an examination, as is prescribed in said Institution; and that, in their opinion, he is duly qualified for the degree of Bachelor of Physic; but at the same time having represented, that he passed an examination publickly for an appointment as Surgeon and Physician in the late Continental army, and bore a Commission as Surgeon of a Frigate in the American service, by virtue of which, he supported the rank of Seniority in the naval Line; and also, that he has been honored by an election into the Medical Society of London; and in consideration of his age and all the circumstances aforesaid, the medical Professors having humbly suggested to the Government of the University the propriety of dispensing with the public examination, usual on these occasions, and conferring the degree on the specialty of the case,
“Voted, that the public examination be in this case dispensed with, and that Mr Amos Windship receive the degree of Bachelor of Physic, at the next Commencement, upon his complying with the other requisites of the medical Institution.”
Degree of M.B. to be conferred on Mr Amos Windship.
And under date of July 21, Commencement Day, is the entry: “N. B. Mr Amos Windship was admitted to the degree of Master of Arts and also Bachelor of Physic agreeably to the votes 7th & 8th at a meeting of the Corporation on June 9, 1790” (College Book viii. 296–297, 299). On June 17th the Overseers “concurred” the Corporation votes of June 9 (Overseers’ Records, iv. 48–50).
Amos’s allusion to his guardian, under whose direction he was “induced to dissolve his connexion” with the College, is amusing, for his guardian had died in 1765 (see p. 144 note 1, above) and he was himself twenty-two years old when he entered Harvard.
On one point only was Mr. Eliot at fault in his account of Windship’s degrees. I t was unusual, but not unprecedented, for a student, after leaving College without taking a degree, later to receive a degree and be placed in his Class in the Triennial Catalogue. “A curious fact to which, apparently, attention is now called for the first time is that the Quinquennial contains the names of several men who never received the A.B. degree at all. Three instances may be given.” Then follow those of Ebenezer Hartshorn (1732), George Erving (1757), and Amos Windship (1771). (Our Publications, xviii. 339 note.) But probably no Harvard man except Windship failed to take the A.B. degree and yet succeeded in collecting three other degrees, no one of which was obtained as the result of an examination. For his degree of M.D. in 1811, which was, so to speak, an accidental one, see p. 144 note 3, above.
In the 1791 Triennial Catalogue appears “Amos Windship Mr 1790 M.B.” The fact that he was a Corresponding Member of the Medical Society of London escaped the notice of the authorities, but attention having been called to the oversight, perhaps in a modest way by Windship himself, in the 1794 Triennial appeared “Amos Windship Mr 1790 M.B. S. M. Lond. Soe. Cor.” And this impressive entry, with the addition of “M.D. 1811” in 1812, continued down through the 1885 edition. The date of death (1811: error for 1813) was first attached to his name in 1845.
292. “Windship & Janes, druggists, S. side of the Market” (Boston Directory, 1796). Cf. Suffolk Deeds, clxii. 91, 128, clxxxii. 29, clxxxiv. 71; and see p. 168 note 1, below.
293. William Montague was born at South Hadley September 23, 1757; served in the Revolution from May 8 to July 16, 1777, from August 17 to November 29, 1777, and from July 15 to October 10, 1780 (Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, x. 686); entered Dartmouth College in the Sophomore Class, graduating in 1784; began service at Christ Church as reader November 27, 1785; was ordained priest at Philadelphia by Bishop William White July 1, 1787; and died at Dedham July 22, 1833.
294. Rev. Dr. William Walter (1737–1800; H. C. 1756).
295. See p. 165 note 1, below.
296. Here a few lines have been omitted by the Editor.
297. The actual facts in regard to this episode are shown by the following statement, based on an examination of the records of both Christ Church, Boston, and Christ Church, Cambridge, kindly furnished by Mr. Merritt:
When Mr. Montague made his visit to England in June, 1789, he was serving as rector of Christ Church, Boston, under a three years’ contract. This contract expired, during his absence, on October 16, 1789. He returned to Boston in August, 1790, and officiated at Christ Church for the major part of the period from August 22, 1790, until May, 1791, though not under a regular contract. Undoubtedly his long absence had alienated the feelings towards him of a considerable portion of the congregation.
In September, 1790, a committee was appointed to confer with the Rev. Dr. William Walter, then located at Shelburne, Nova Scotia, and ask if he would become the minister of Christ Church. But Dr. Walter had already entered into negotiations with Christ Church, Cambridge, and in December, 1790, informed the Boston church that he was so committed that he could only comply with their request by uniting the duties of both churches, and discharging them in part by an assistant. He also suggested that Mr. Montague should officiate alternately with himself. Eventually this plan was carried out and on May 26,
1791, the proprietors of Christ Church, Boston, agreed that Dr. Walter should serve both churches as their minister, and on June 2 Mr. Montague was elected as assistant. A salary of £60 was voted for the year from Easter, 1791, to Easter,
1792, to be divided between the two ministers.
In November, 1791, Dr. Walter’s connection with Christ Church, Cambridge, was terminated on account of his having taken up his residence in Boston, although his arrangement with the church had stipulated that he should live in Cambridge.
Conditions eventually became unbearable for Mr. Montague, and on March 12, 1792, he wrote the proprietors asking to be released on account of the friction existing in the church, and stating that he did not wish to officiate on the two remaining Sundays under his contract. In this letter he referred to the actions of “those who call themselves the Doctor’s friends” and specified “the unchristian and abusive conduct of some towards me,—their constant endeavor to injure my Character and good name, the dearest possession a man in public life can have—their indecent behavour during the time of most solemn acts of devotion when I am officiating unbecoming the character of civilized beings much more of the disciples of the meek and lowly Jesus.”
The proprietors replied to this request at their annual meeting on Easter Monday, April 9, by electing Mr. Montague as rector by a vote of fourteen as against five for Dr. Walter. Mr. Montague took some time to consider the matter with the idea of trying to see if the opposing factions in the church could be reconciled. But he was apparently unsuccessful, for on May 12 he definitely declined the position, prompted by the desire of acting solely for what seemed the best interests of Christ Church. On May 29, 1792, Dr. Walter was unanimously chosen rector, and filled the office until his death, December 5, 1800.
So far as the records indicate, the relations between the two clergymen were not unfriendly, but the trouble appears to have been caused by the acts of Dr. Walter’s adherents. Although Amos Windship’s name is not mentioned in the records in this connection, it seems not unlikely that he was a principal mover in the matter.
298. Again Mr. Merritt supplies a note:
It is possible that the explanation as to why Dr. Windship became discredited by Dr. Walter may be found in a memorandum which is in the Christ Church Account Book No. 2, or Treasurer’s Ledger, in the handwriting of James Sherman, then senior warden. The page (numbered 30) is headed “Pew N° 30, Doctor Amos Windship,” and the memorandum reads:
This May Certifie all Whom it may Concern That the above Pew N° 30 was from the first settlement of Christ Church in Boston devoted wholy to the use of His Excelence the Governor and other Gentlemen and so continued untill August 1791 at which time this Ledger was in the Possession of Doctor Amos Windship who had borrowed it of James Sherman Senr Warden of said Church in order to settle his account with the Revd Mr Montague he the sd Windship kept it near a month and when returned ‘Governors Seat’ as it stood above and as it was before was erased and ‘Dr Amos Windship’ as it now stands was wrote in its Stead with the account under it which account was brought from folio 91 which was erased about the middle of the leaf, for which I the Subscriber as Warden and for the Honor of said Church was obliged to Lay the Same before the Attny General and what followed may be seen by turning to a Meeting of the Proprietors of said Church Monday September 26th 1791
James Sherman
Dr. Windship had calmly transferred himself, and his account with the church, from a less prominent pew to the front pew on the floor on the right-hand side of the centre aisle. Both pages 30 and 91 in the Account Book show by a noticeable discoloration of the paper that he had removed the original entries with some form of acid.
At the meeting of September 26, 1791, Mr. Sherman informed the proprietors of the facts, as above stated, saying that for the honor of the church he had been obliged to lay the book before the Attorney-General (James Sullivan), who gave him a letter addressed to a magistrate, which, referring to Windship, read in part: “You will have no doubt of the propriety of holding him to answer at the next Supreme Court.” A committee was then appointed to audit Windship’s account with the church.
At a subsequent proprietors’ meeting, October 21, 1791, Dr. Windship made an acknowledgment, in writing, of his fault, admitting the erasure which he said “was an error in judgement (and for which, I am very sorry) and by no means made to injure the Church or any one connected with it.” His confession was accepted by the proprietors, who also wrote: “Your Honor is requested (if it can be done) to put a Stop to the charge alledged against him.”
299. Rev. Dr. John Lathrop (1740–1816; Princeton 1763). Dr. Lathrop was one of Lettsom’s numerous American correspondents. In a letter to Lettsom dated November 10, 1789, Dr. Lathrop wrote: “I think it was in the month of June last, I received your very obliging letter, together with the acceptable present, in books, which you was pleased to make me. . . . Having perused those valuable tracts myself, I put them into the hands of Dr. Windship, agreeably to your request, and also into the hands of other gentlemen of the faculty in my neighbourhood, that they may receive the same pleasure from them which they have given to me.” And again on November 16, 1791: “By our common friend Dr. Windship, I received your very acceptable letter, together with publications, which gave me pleasure and instruction.” (In Pettigrew’s Memoirs of Lettsom, ii. 449, 445.)
300. This was perhaps in or about 1795. At all events, on January 1, 1796, “Amos Windship of Boston . . . Merchant” constituted and appointed “Samuel Janes of said Boston Merchant, my full Agent & Attorney, to act for me in all cases whatsoever . . . In particular the said Janes is impower’d to answer unto & defend all suits or processes for or against me . . . concerning the house & land in Wing’s lane.” (Suffolk Deeds, clxxxiv. 71.) On August 31, 1796, “Amos Windship . . . Physician” sold the house and land in Wing’s Lane, the deed being signed “Amos Windship by S. Janes” (id. clxxxiv. 72). Windship’s name appears as grantor or grantee in several transactions in 1785–1796 (id. cxlviii. 255, clxii. 91, 128, 135, clxxix. 274, clxxx. 133, 202); and he appears as a witness or is otherwise mentioned in other documents from 1764 to 1798 (id. cvii. 120, cxxr. 65, cxxvii. 158, cli. 213, clxi. 241, clxv. 215, 216, clxxiii. 280, clxxxii. 29, clxxxiv. 1, clxxxvi. 102, clxxxix. 274). On June 27, 1793, he was appointed one of three to appraise certain real estate (id. clxv. 215, 216); and on February 22, 1788, was appointed administrator of the estates of John and Thomas Melony (id. clxii. 91; Suffolk Probate Files, nos. 15201, 18986). See also p. 163 note 1, above. The name of an Amos Windship, but whether our Dr. Amos Windship is uncertain, is also found in 1773–1786 (id. cxxv. 65, clxi. 241).
301. Perhaps John Webb Checkley, who witnessed a deed August 31, 1796 (Suffolk Deeds, clxxxiv. 72).
302. “Winship, Amos. Surgeon, 12 September, 1799. Last appearance on Records of the Navy Department, 11 August, 1800” (E. W. Callahan, List of Officers of the Navy of the United States and of the Marine Corps from 1775 to 1900, p. 598).
303. “Solis Abraham, interpreter of foreign languages, Middle street” (Boston Directory, 1796). “Solis Abraham, interpreter of languages, Newbury street” (id. 1798). “Solis Abraham, Hinchman’s lane” (id. 1800, 1803, 1805, 1806). “A. Solis” is found in the “Names of the Inhabitants of the Town of Boston in 1790” (Boston Records, xxii. 469).
304. The Herald was commanded by Charles C. Russell: see G. W. Allen, Our Naval War with France, pp. 81, 162, 187, 221; Callahan, List of Officers, etc., p. 477.
305. Gov. John Taylor Gilman (1753–1828).
306. Windship’s second wife died at Exeter, N. H., on March 27, 1804: see p. 149 note 1, above.
307. This was Abigail Lawrence, whom he married in 1808: see p. 149 note 1, above. In the Boston Directory for 1806 is the entry: “Lawrence Abigail, milliner, 58, Middle Street.” The same entry appears in the Directory for 1807, except that the address is “69 Fish Street.” In the Directory for the same year (1807) is the entry: “Winship Amos, physician, 69 Fish Street.” Thus Mr. Eliot’s statement that Windship was boarding with Abigail Lawrence is confirmed. No Directory was published in 1808. In that for 1809 is the entry: “Winship Amos, physician, 26 Fish street.” That was the last appearance of Dr. Amos Windship’s name in the Directory, but in that for 1810 is found: “Winship Abigail, milliner Ship street.”
Earlier Directories yield some information. In the first (1789) is the entry: “Windship Amos, physician and apothecary, Hanover street, near the Mill bridge.” None were issued in the years 1790–1795, 1797, 1799, 1801, 1802, 1804. In 1796 we find: “Windship, physician, Hanover street, near the Mill bridge.” His name is not in the 1798 edition. In 1800 is the entry: “Winship Amos, physician, S. Bennet street.” His name is not in the issues of 1803, 1805, or 1806. Under the heading “Physicians and Surgeons” in the 1789 edition is “Amos Windship, Hanover-street.” No such heading is found in the 17961806 issues. Under “Physicians and Surgeons practising in Boston” is found in 1807: “Doctor Amos Winship, No. 69 Fish street;” and in 1809: “Amos Winship, Fish street.”
Mr. Eliot’s statement about Mrs. Lawrence is confirmed by the Norfolk Deeds. In a deed (xxxi. 71) dated March 10, acknowledged March 12, and entered March 14, 1808, Mrs. Lawrence is described as “Abigail Lawrence of Boston, Widow,” and Amos Windship was a witness. In later deeds she appears as Abigail Windship, wife of Dr. Amos Windship. Cf. xxix. 204, xxx. 181, 202, xxxii. 236.
308. Inadvertently written “her.”
309. He died at Wellfleet June 26, 1813: see p. 144 note 5, above.
310. Rev. Dr. John Eliot (1754–1813; H. C. 1772), an older brother of the writer of the sketch.
311. J. G. Shea (Life and Times of the Most Rev. John Carroll, p. 315) gives the number as “fifty or sixty.” The Very Rev. William Byrne (Memorial History of Boston, iii. 515) estimates them at about one hundred. The Rev. Peter Ronan (Memorial Volume of the One Hundredth Anniversary Celebration of the Dedication of the Church of the Holy Cross, Boston, p. 53) says there were about one hundred.
312. Suffolk Deeds, lxxvi. 129.
313. Selectmen’s Minutes, October 10, 1784: “Revd Mr. Croswell having applied to the Selectmen for liberty for his Congregation to meet with him at the South Grammar School for the purpose of preaching during the Winter Months—their Building being much out of Repair, Liberty was accordingly granted, on condition that any damage that shall arise, be made good” (Boston Records, xxv. 254).
314. Snow (History of Boston, p. 340), 1784; Dearborn (Boston Notions, pp. 332, 333), 1784; Rev. J. M. Finotti (Bibliographia Catholica Americana, p. 224), 1788; Shea (Life of Carroll, p. 314), 1788; Kenney (Centenary of the See of Boston, p. 190), between 1784 and 1788. Ronan (Memorial Volume of the One Hundredth Anniversary Celebration, p. 53): “The nucleus of the first Catholic parish in Boston was formed according to some authorities in 1784 and according to others in 1788. We can take our choice of dates.”
315. I am indebted to M. Ægidius Fauteux, Librarian of the Bibliotheque Saint-Sulpice, Montreal, for the information that “Letters preserved in the Archives of the Archbishopric of Quebec show that prior to his founding of the Holy Cross Church in Boston La Potherie had tried to secure a position in Canada. In a letter of October 6th 1788, he asks the bishop of Quebec for the favor of being admitted in his diocese and he boasts of his attachment to his duties, of his zeal, etc. The bishop’s answer was a flat refusal. On March 1st following (1789) he wrote the bishop of Quebec, that his situation having changed in Boston, he believed it was his duty to remain in that city, as an instrument in the hands of God to extend his blessings to that part of Northern America.”
316. William A. Leahy, in History of the Catholic Church in the New England States, i. 17 note 1
317. The entry is undated, but the previous entry is of November 6, and the following one is of November 13. See also 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, iii. 308.
318. Now known as Cap Haitien.
319. Massachusetts Centinel, August 23, 30, September 3, 17, 24, October 1, 1788; Independent Chronicle, August 28, September 4, 18, 25, October 2, 1788. The name of the commander is also written as Senneville, Saineville and Saneville.
320. Address “To the Publick,” p. 3. This pamphlet was probably issued late in February or early in March, 1789: see p. 190 note 2, below.
321. The American Catholic Historical Researches (vol. xxi.) contains a list of “Chaplains of the French in the American Revolution” compiled from “Les Combattans Francais de la Guerre Amdricaine, 1778–1783,” Paris, 1903. (Reprinted as a Senate document, Washington, D.C., 1905.) The compiler identifies the Abbé de la Poterie as the priest mentioned in two entries: in fleet of Comte de Grasse, “L’Hector, 1781–2, . . . Abbe Poterie, secular” (p. 3); in fleet of Comte de Ternay, Le Neptune, February 1780–June 1783, “Abbe Potterie [secular priest]” (p. 4). “Abbé Poterie, of L’Hector and the Le Neptune, became the founder of the Church in Boston” (p. 5). “Abbé La Poterie was the founder of the church in Boston, but not otherwise with a creditable record” (p. 6).
322. Address “To the Publick,” pp. 2–4.
323. The second edition of the Dictionnaire de la Noblesse which he cited was published in fifteen volumes, Paris, 1770–1786. A third edition in nineteen volumes was published at Paris, 1863–1876. In this edition material which had appeared in supplementary volumes in the second edition is distributed in its proper place in alphabetical sequence.
324. Dictionnaire de la Noblesse, 3rd ed., iii. 634. This is the first appearance of the title, Sieur de la Poterie.
325. Id. iii. 635.
326. Id. xvii. 900, 901.
327. History of the Catholic Church in the New England States, i. 18; Memorial Volume of the One Hundredth Anniversary Celebration, p. 54.
328. Herald of Freedom, January 8, 1790, p. 1/1.
329. Monday, November 3, 1788, p. 3/3.
330. P. 3/3–4. “All Saints Day” should of course have been written All Souls Day. This notice is inserted in the news columns but is placed between quotation marks. Judging from its style it was probably communicated by La Poterie himself.
331. Id.
332. Massachusetts Centinel, December 16, 1789, p. 2/2.
333. Address “To the Publick,” p. 4.
334. Id. p. 4.
335. Herald of Freedom, December 22, 1788, p. 2/1.
336. John Carroll, born Upper Marlborough, Maryland, January 8, 1735; admitted to novitiate as a Jesuit, 1753; ordained priest, 1759; took the four solemn vows and became a Professed Father, February 2, 1771. On June 6, 1784, Pope Pius VI confirmed his appointment as Superior of the Missions in the thirteen United States of America and conferred on him power to administer confirmation; on November 6, 1789, Carroll was appointed Bishop and on August 15, 1790, consecrated as the first Catholic Bishop in the United States at Lulworth Castle, England, by the Right Rev. Charles Walmesley; 1808, Archbishop; December 3, 1815, died at Baltimore. (Shea, Life of Carroll; Catholic Encyclopedia, iii. 381–383.)
337. Joseph Philippe Letombe. Described in Boston Directory, 1789, as “Letombe, Mons. Hon. Consul of France, Oliver’s-lane.”
338. Pastoral Letter, dated February 22, 1789, pp. 2 and note, 3.
339. La Poterie’s capacity for self-advertisement is shown even in the Boston Directory for 1789, where he occupies about double the space allotted to anyone else: “Poterie (de la) Claude, Roman catholic priest, vice-prefect, and missionary apostolic, rector of the church in south Latin School-street, dedicated to God under the title of the Holy Cross, Oliver’s lane.”
340. Address “To the Publick,” January 29, 1789. See p. 190 note 2, below.
341. Pastoral Letter, February 22, 1789. See p. 190 note 2, below.
342. “To the Publick;” the pamphlet of four pages. See p. 190 note 2, below.
343. The pamphlet opens with the words: “On the Fourth of February ult. 1789, a Frenchman by the name of LOUIS ABRAHAM WELSH, born and baptised in the parish of Saint Hyacinthus, of the Cabesterre, Island of Guadaloupe . . . being on his death-bed.” A copy of this pamphlet in the Belknap Papers, in the Massachusetts Historical Society, pasted into a folio scrap-book, is followed by a printed circular letter, without signature but dated March 3, 1789, and addressed to the Rev. Jeremy Belknap. It apparently was employed as a cover, though whether it had contained this special pamphlet, or not, cannot be accurately determined. La Poterie had evidently had it printed to send with appeals for aid. It reads:
Sir, YOU will readily discover, in the writing, which M. the ABBE de la POTERIE has the honour to send you, here inclosed, the spirit and sentiments which animate him; and how weighty and very important the motives are by which he is actuated, since they have for their object, the Divine Worship, the greatest Glory of GOD, and the Salvation and Advantage of Mankind. To interest your benevolence and your goodness in his favour, needs only the trial which he desires you to make of him, with that generous heart and sensible soul, which is the distinguishing character of all good Christians.
Boston, 178
(Transcribed from an undated copy in the Harvard College Library.)
344. Shea, Life of Carroll, pp. 314, 315.
345. This reference is probably to the first inauguration of President Washington, April 30, 1789.
346. Herald of Freedom, Friday, April 24, 1789, p. 3/3.
347. Belknap Papers, ii. 123.
348. Herald of Freedom, January 15, 1790, p. 1/1. I am also indebted to M. Fauteux for a copy of the following letter which La Poterie sent the Bishop of Quebec under date of May 16, 1789. It was evidently written soon after his return to Boston from Baltimore:
“Messieurs les Jésuites du Maryland ont de très vastes projets pour faire revivre dans les Etats-Unis leur Société sous le nom de Clergé d’Amérique, et meme de s’élever aux dignités épiscopates en ce continent. Les depenses necessaires pour s’efforcer d’y parvenir sont cause que l’Etablissement Catholique de Boston, dont j’ai eu l’honneur de vous ecrire au commencement de mars dernier, ne recevra aucun secours de leur part.
“Je suis cependant dans la plus criante necessity, et un writ obtenu par quelque ouvrier pour se saisir de ce qui est dans l’Eglise me force a ne l’ouvrir que le dimanche. Je crois qu’avec une cinquantaine de guinees je pourrais faire attendre tout le monde et me mettre hors de presse.
“Au nom de Jesus Christ Pauteur et le consommateur de notre foi, je sollicite avec empressement ce foible secours de votre tendresse paternelle; et je supplie votre clergé de me l’accorder du moins en emprunt.”
349. Rev. William O’Brien, born in Ireland, 1740; took his theological course at Bologna; labored in Philadelphia until September, 1787; appointed pastor of St. Peter’s Church, New York, November, 1787, where he served until 1807; died May 14, 1816. (United States Catholic Historical Society, Historical Records and Studies, i. 200, 201.)
350. Shea, Life of Carroll, p. 315. Cf. Rev. Thomas Hughes, History of the Society of Jesus in North America, Documents, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 688: letters calendared of Father Carroll to Rev. Charles Plowden, May 8 and July 12, 1789. These letters are quoted at some length in the United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 102, 103. Under May 8, 1789: “I have been grossly deceived by one from whom I expected much, and who opened his ministry in Boston. He is a Frenchman, calling himself La Poterie, and procured indisputable recommendation, but has turned out a sad rascal.” Under July 12, 1789: “Some time ago, I was much pleased with the letters, (which were written in the language of an apostle,) of a French priest, who had wandered to Boston. I received several letters of strong recommendation, testimonials, etc., all which joined to his own sentiments of submission, induced me to grant him faculties for a short time.” After referring to his beginning services in Boston, Carroll stated that “he proceeded to make some publications which soon convinced me of his imprudence. He soon after discovered himself to be of an infamous character. His faculties are revoked, and he now proceeds to every abuse of me as a Jesuit, aiming at nothing in all my manoeuvres, but to re-establish the Order here under title of American Clergy. . . . His name is La Poterie. Luckily the French corps diplomatique here are well acquainted with his character.” Some months later, December 2, 1789, the Rev. William T. Thorpe wrote from Rome to Dr. Carroll in regard to La Poterie’s earlier history, stating that he belonged to the diocese of Angers in France, and that he had an income from his family of over £100 sterling a year; that he had disgraced his name and his character in various countries, and had been expelled from the diocese of Paris; and that both at Rome and at Naples he had run away from the city without paying for his lodgings. (American Catholic Historical Researches, xvii. 136.)
351. Bibliographia Catholica Americana, p. 224.
352. Herald of Freedom, January 8, 1790, p. 1/1.
353. Id. “Massone and Garraux, bakers, Middlecot-street” (Boston Directory, 1789).
354. Herald of Freedom, January 8, 1790, p. 1/1. The other items in the “Estimate of Debts” were:
|
Mr. Bell, Carpenter, for three windows in the Church and two shutters, |
£3.00.00 |
|
Capt. Brown, Providence, |
2.08.00 |
|
Messrs. Bazin and Poignand, No. 16 Cornhill for locks in the vestry and sanctuary |
0.18.00 |
|
Mr. John Bright, Upholsterer, Marlborough-Street, for furniture in the Church |
2.01.11 |
|
Capt. Alexander Mackay, Kilby-Street, |
3.11.11 |
|
Mr. Joseph Howe, Tinman, Marshals Lane, for boxes for holy oil, |
1.10.00 |
|
Mr. Samuel Bangs, Kilby-Street, |
2.02.00 |
|
Mr. Daniel Rea, painter, for an inscription, in gold letters in the Chapel |
2.08.00 |
|
Mr. Edward Hayes, Cabinet Maker, for 6 picture frames, representing the creation of the world, |
0.06.00 |
|
Mr. Benjamin Guild, at the Boston Book-Store |
2.10.00 |
355. Courier de Boston, Du Jeudi, 11 Juin, 1789, in an article headed “University de Cambridge.”
356. Herald of Freedom, June 19, 1789, p. 1/1. A similar advertisement appeared in the Boston Gazette of June 29, p. 4/3.
357. Massachusetts Centinel, December 16, 1789, p. 2/2.
358. Herald of Freedom, January 8, 1790, p. 1/2.
359. Life of Carroll, p. 315. M. Fauteux very kindly has sent me a copy of an address which was published by La Poterie in the Gazette de Montrdal of October 29, 1789. This proclamation appeared in French, and also in English as follows:
Montreal, 29th Oct. 1789
The Abbé de la Poterie founder of the first Roman Catholic Chapel at Boston, which he there dedicated to God under the invocation and title of the Holy Cross the 1st November 1788, being just arrived from Quebec in this City, and now on the eve of his departure from this Province of Canada, intending to Boston and from thence to Europe, has the honor to present his most humble respects and thanks to those benevolent people who have shewed themselves eager to lighten the burthen of his troubles, by opening their souls to the dictate of sensibility, and pouring into his heart numerous comforts of every species. He will implore without ceasing the Father of Mercies to shower down every kind of blessing on a country, in which he would have willingly settled: Hoping that the most constant prosperity, the most unalterable peace and fidelity to our holy and august Religion will eternize the happiness of those who live in it. O Happiness of Heaven the only true and permanent one, object of our wishes, term of our sighs and end of our exile, be thou the generous reward of all my benefactors! If thro’ necessity and with regret I leave them for the present, I shall ever preserve in my heart the sweet Hope of seeing them again in the mansions of everlasting Felicity. Yes, grant Heaven! that after the painful Pilgrimage thro’ this valley of tears and tribulations we may all arrive at the Harbour of Salvation, in the Land of the Living, where we shall be no longer subject to vicissitudes or contradictions.
La Potherie, French Clergyman
360. See sketch of Louis de Rousselet, pp. 191–211, below.
361. I am again indebted to M. Fauteux for permission to print the following letter, addressed to the Bishop of Quebec, from a manuscript copy in the Bibliothéque Saint-Sulpice:
Boston, 2 Janvier 1790
monseigneur.
Au milieu de vos pieuses occupations, oserai-je supplier votre Grandeur de les interrompre un moment pour me faire la grace de répondre à celle-ci.
Depuis peu est venu dans cette ville un Ecclésiastique nommé la Poterie, suspendu au mois de juillet dernier par notre digne supérieur, qui publie partout avoir été singulièrement bien accueilli par votre Grandeur, ainsi que par tout votre respectable Clergé, qui dit de plus qu’il étoit pour jamais dans le cas de mériter votre confiance dans toute l’étendue de votre juridiction si les lois du Canada n’y étoient pas contraires, comme étant Ecclésiastique français, qui dit encore avoir reçu de votre Grandeur ou de tout autre Ecclésiastique dans l’éntendue de votre juridiction tout ce qui est nécessaire pour célébrer les Saints Mystères, jusqu’aux saintes huiles même dont il se dit porteur. Comme cet Ecclésiastique au mépris de la suspension a osé depuis la fin du mois de novembre commencer de célébrer les Saints Mystères en deux ou trois endroits de notre Amérique, j’ose supplier votre Grandeur de vouloir bien se donner la peine de me répondre à celle-ci à l’effet de connoître clairement la vérité; si votre Grandeur daigne en même temps me donner quelques instructions sur la conduite qu’il a tenue en Canada, elle obligera bien réellement celui qui a l’honneur de se dire avec un très profond respect, Monseigneur, votre très humble et très obéissant serviteur. Louis de Rousselet, prêtre Missionnaire Apostolique et Curé de l’Eglise Cathédrale de Boston.
The reply to Father de Rousselet’s letter was as follows:
quebec, 1er mars 1790
Votre lettre du 2 janvier au sujet de Mr. de la Poterie, n’est parvenue que hier. L’absence de Monseigneur I’Eveque et le prompt départ du Mr. qui a apporté la lettre m’oblige de vous répondre moi-même à la place de Sa Grandeur.
Mr. de la Poterie a été trés mal reçu ici parce qu’il n’avait rien qui attestat la légitimité de son émigration et depuis nous nous sommes beaucoup félicité de l’avoir mal reçu, car il a causé ici bien des peines comme nous avons sçu qu’il en avait causé à Monseigneur Carroll. II n’a pas eu le moindre pouvoir Ecclésiastique, méme de dire la messe. Et pendant qu’il étoit à Québec, j’ai moi-même fort veillé à ce qu’il ne la dit pas. S’il a recu des omements de quelque particulier pour dire la Sainte Messe ou les Saintes huiles, c’est sans autorité.
Qu’il ne dise pas que c’est la qualité de Français qui l’en a sevré, c’est surtout parce que nous l’avons, dès le commencement, regardé comme un aventurier. Pendant qu’il a demeuré à Québec, (je ne sais ce qu’il a fait à Montréal) il ne s’est point du tout conduit selon les avis qu’on lui donnait; il a même fait imprimer des écrits assez impertinents contre Monseigneur l’Evêque. Quand il s’est enfin déterminé à partir, nous y avons contribué de notre bourse avec bien du plaisir car nous étions fort fatigues de sa présence.
362. Literary Diary, iii. 375, 376.
363. P. 3/2. This notice, which appears in the news columns under the heading of “Providence, December 12,” is inserted between quotation marks, and was in all probability communicated by La Poterie himself.
364. It was advertised in the Providence Gazette of December 12 (3/3) as: “Just received, and for Sale by the Printer hereof, Price One Shilling and Sixpence. . . .” This was repeated in the Gazette of December 19. In Boston it was advertised in the Herald of Freedom, Tuesday, December 15, 1789, (3/3): “This day is Published, (Price 1/6) and now selling at the Boston Bookstore No. 58 Cornhill, A Pamphlet &c. . . .” The advertisement was repeated in the issues of December 18 and 22. In both papers the notice was signed: “By a Friend to good Government.” I have not succeeded in locating an advertisement in Philadelphia. The imprint on the title-page reads: “Printed in Philadelphia, 1789. [Price Half-a-Dollar].” It looks as if La Poterie had brought the books along with him, and placed them on sale in Providence and Boston.
365. “Ricci, Lorenzo, General of the Society of Jesus, b. at Florence 2 Aug. 1703; d. at the Castle of Sant’ Angelo, Rome, 24 Nov., 1775” (Catholic Encyclopedia, xiii. 33).
366. “. . . my Intention was . . . to put the People of America on their Guard, by a true State of Facts respecting that Class of Men who are every Day attempting more and more to gain FOOTING in this Country” (p. 28).
367. Herald of Freedom, January 8, 1790, p. 1/1–3. The charge of being a Jesuit, which he hurled against de Rousselet, was probably only rhetorical effervescence. The fact that his name does not appear in the Rev. Thomas Hughes’s very comprehensive list of Jesuits and ex-Jesuits in America (History of the Society of Jesus in North America, Text, ii. 678–704) would seem to be sufficient evidence that he was not one. The Rev. William O’Brien was a Dominican (Shea, Life of Carroll, pp. 310, 323, 429, 430). La Poterie’s actual target, of course, was Father Carroll, who was a Jesuit. In the Resurrection of Laurent Ricci, he uncovered his real grievance in a recital of alleged instances of “Arts and Ambitions” of Jesuits. “In erecting the Chapels opened at New-York and Boston, by foreign Ecclesiastics, they have occasioned and been guilty of the most shocking Offences, in Order to remove them, under various Pretences, and appoint others in their Room. . . . At Boston, they have lately given a great Deal of Trouble and Uneasiness to the French secular Priest, who had sacrificed his Fortune-Means, and his whole Zeal for the august Ceremonies of that holy Religion, and when, through the Liberality of the Bostonians, his Labours were going to be crowned with Success, by the peaceful Establishment of his Chapel, they thought proper to step into his Place, by sending to supplant him, a sly and artful Subject,—the Slave of Jesuitism” (Resurrection of Laurent Ricci, pp. v–vi).
368. Herald of Freedom, January 8, 1790.
369. Herald of Freedom, Friday, January 15, 1790, pp. 1/1–3, 2/1.
370. Id. p. 1/3. Baury de Bellerive was a prominent figure in a controversy with the French Consul over a question concerning supplies furnished to the French squadron which came to Boston in September, 1789. The Herald of Freedom during the month of December, 1789, contained a series of charges and countercharges relating to the affair.
371. See sketch of John Thayer, pp. 211–229, below.
372. Herald of Freedom, January 19, 1790, p. 2/3.
373. Massachusetts Centinel, Wednesday, December 16, 1789, p. 2/3. Under date of September 7, 1790, Bishop Carroll wrote from London to Father Plowden at Lulworth Castle that “Today likewise I had a letter from Cardinal Antonelli. . . . In the latter part he informs me of his having received a letter full of complaints and invectives against me from La Poterie; which he and the Congregation utterly disregarded, and only felt indignation against the writer.” (Hughes, History of Society of Jesus, Documents, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 689.) This may indicate that La Poterie was then in Europe, though it is equally possible that his letter was written from the United States or the West Indies. B. U. Campbell (United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 103) states that “he departed for the West Indies.”
374. Life of Carroll, p. 315, note 4.
A bibliographical note on La Poterie’s writings is appended:
- 1 To the Publick. Broadside of two columns; dated January 29, 1789; printed by S. Hall. MHS. BPL. HC.
- 2 Pastoral Letter. Pp. 24. “Given at Boston, in North-America, under our hand, and the seal of our arms, the 22nd of February, Quinquagesima Sunday, anno salutis, 1789.—Signed, La POTERIE, Vice-Prefect and Apostolick Missionary, Curate of the Holy Cross at Boston.” (P. 9.) Pastoral Letter, pp. [1]—9; The Order of the publick Offices, and of the Divine Service, during the Fortnight of Easter, pp. [10]–16; An Abridged Formula of the Priest’s Discourse, pp. [17]–24. MHS. BPL. BA. HC.
- 3 To the Publick. Pp. 4, n.d., probably end of February or early in March, 1789; signed “La Poterie, Vice Prefect &c.” Contains “list of Credentials,” pp. 3–4. MHS. BPL. HC.
- 4 The Resurrection of Laurent Ricci; or, A True and Exact History of the Jesuits. [Device] Printed in Philadelphia, 1789. [Price Half-a-Dollar]. Pp. 28. Title-page, 1 leaf; Dedication, To the New Laurent Ricci in America, 1 leaf; A well-meant CAUTION to the UNITED STATES of AMERICA, on the Danger of admitting that turbulent Body of Men called JESUITS among them, pp. [v]–vi; To all Christian Congregations of the United States of America, particularly Roman Catholics. A true and exact History of the Jesuit Refugees, residing in Maryland and Philadelphia. Pp. [7]–28. BA. This was advertised in the Providence Gazette, December 12 and 19, 1789, and in the Herald of Freedom, Boston, December 15, 18, and 22, 1789.
As La Poterie’s last two communications to the Herald of Freedom are very characteristic of the man, and contain quite a full account of his experiences, they are also noted:
- 1 Herald of Freedom, Friday, January 8, 1790, p. 1/1–3. To the Impartial Public, p. 1/1–2; Advertisement, p. 1/2–3. MHS. BPL.
- 2 Herald of Freedom, Friday, January 15, 1790, pp. 1/1–3, 2/1. To the Impartial Public and particularly Roman Catholics. MHS. BPL.
375. Very Rev. William Byrne, in Memorial History of Boston, iii. 515.
376. Rev. Arthur T. Connolly, in United States Catholic Historical Magazine, ii. 265.
377. Shea, Life of Carroll, p. 389. Shea, as is shown by his citations, followed B. U. Campbell, who, in 1849, contributed to the United States Catholic Magazine a series of articles on the Early History of the Catholic Church in Boston. Campbell wrote: “The next pastor at Boston was Rev. Louis Rousselet, a Frenchman also, and by an unfortunate coincidence, also under censures of his former bishop, when he arrived in this country. This, however, was unknown to Dr. Carroll, and, as Rousselet was well recommended and spoke English, he was appointed pastor at Boston, with the expectation that he would soon be joined or succeeded by Rev. Mr. Thayer, whose return from Europe was daily expected. Some unfavorable reports as to the conduct of Mr. Rousselet induced Dr. Carroll to dismiss him in 1790, or early in 1791” (United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 103). Mr. Campbell stated that he had drawn on an article on the early history of the Boston Church which appeared in the Catholic Observer for 1847. I have not been able to locate a file of the Observer for that year.
378. The Rev. John Carroll was elected Bishop in May, 1789. (R. H. Clarke, Lives of the Deceased Bishops of the Catholic Church in the United States, i. 67.) See also p. 178 note 4, above.
379. Columbian Centinel, February 2, 1791, p. 4/2.
380. See p. 188, above.
381. Massachusetts Centinel, Saturday, December 26, 1789, p. 3/1.
382. Massachusetts Centinel, Wednesday, December 30, 1789, p. 2/3.
383. Diary, i. 133. The “uncomfortable situation” possibly was due to the destruction of the pews on the preceding evening.
384. See sketch of John Thayer, pp. 211–229, below.
385. Boston Gazette, Monday, January 11, 1790, p. 3/3.
386. Massachusetts Centinel, Saturday, April 24, 1790, p. 3/1.
387. Diary, i. 161, 165, 182.
388. Columbian Centinel, September 15, 1790, p. 4/1. The letter is prefaced with the heading: “Extract of a letter from the Right Reverend John Carrol, Roman Catholick Bishop of Baltimore, to the Congregation of the Church of the Holy Cross, in Boston.”
389. Columbian Centinel, February 2, 1791, p. 4/2. This letter is followed by a copy of the powers:
Joannes, Episcopus Baltimori, Rev: Dom. ac fratri, Ludovico de Rousselet, Sacerdoti, salutem in Domino Sempiternam. Cum Soepe institerint Catholici Bostonienses, ut unum aliquem sibi Pastorem constituerem, te carissime frater, de cujus virtute, zelo, prudentiâ et doctrina, tarn ex plurimis, quae mihi exhibuisti documentis, quàm ex vitæ tenore abundé constat, ad illud manus designo, Deum que enixe precor, ut illud et tibi et aliis Salutare fiat. Signed,
JOANNES, BALTIMORI EPISCOPUS
Baltimori, die 1 Junii, an 1790.
True copy, from the originals in our hands.
|
MAMEY MASSON, |
|
|
PATRICK CAMPBELL, |
The words soepe and manus are obvious misprints for saepe and munus.
390. Columbian Centinel, September 15, 1790, p. 4/1.
391. Diary, i. 188. The last sentence in this entry is somewhat ambiguous, but in all probability the pronoun “he” refers to Thayer. Bentley followed his career with interest and makes frequent references to him in his Diary. At this time it appears as if Thayer was prepared to accept the situation as outlined by the Bishop. In the Columbian Centinel, Saturday, July 10, 1790, this notice appeared: “Mr. Thayer will preach tomorrow and the following Sunday, at eleven o’clock in the morning, and at six in the evening. He will also preach at 6 o’clock on Tuesday and Thursday next. After which six discourses he will probably be absent the greatest part of the season” (p. 3/3). He may have had in mind the mission to the Penobscot Indians, which was under the nominal care of the Boston Church.
392. Diary, i. 192.
393. Thayer is said to have “secured from the Perkins family, the owners of the old Huguenot chapel, a lease of the building.” (Connolly, Historical Sketch of the Rev. John Thayer, United States Catholic Historical Magazine, ii. 266. Cf. Memorial History of Boston, iii. 515; and p. 219, below.) I have been unable to ascertain the owners of the property at this time.
394. I.e. p. 262 of the Ms. Diary, or p. 192 of the printed Diary.
395. Diary, i. 194.
396. Columbian Centinel, September 15, 1790, p. 4/1–2.
397. Columbian Centinel, September 15, 1790, p. 4/1.
398. Columbian Centinel, September 18, 1790, p. 3/3. In view of Thayer’s controversial propensities in press, pulpit, and private life, his statement may fairly be called disingenuous. Bentley, who evidently followed the controversy with interest, noted on Monday, September 20, that “The matter of the Catholic Church in Boston is debated in the Boston Papers. Thayer appeared in the Centinel of last Saturday, bids defiance to his enemies, refuses to give any satisfaction in the Gazette” (Diary, i. 196).
399. Columbian Centinel, October 2, 1790, p. 4/1.
400. Thayer, however, did present his side of the case to the Bishop in two letters written in September and October, 1790, which are preserved in the Baltimore Archives. Whether they were received by the Bishop while in England, or only on his return to Baltimore, cannot be stated. (See p. 219 note 5, below.)
401. “Arrived . . . In the Brig Hope, from Guadaloupe, the Treasurer of that Island, his Lady, and family came passengers” (Massachusetts Centinel, Saturday, May 29, 1790, p. 3/1).
402. “Died, on the 4th Instant, at Dedham. Mr. Breckvelt de Larive (a French Gentleman) late Treasurer of the Island of Guadaloupe, and its Dependencies; who came (with his Family) into this Country, for the Benefit of his Health” (Boston Gazette, November 8, 1790, p. 3/2). Also noted in the Columbian Centinel, November 10, and Independent Chronicle, November 11.
403. “The Rev. Mr. Lewis de Rousselet, Pastor of the Roman Catholick Congregation, in this town, will sail to-morrow, on a visit to the Penobscot tribe; he hopes to be back in a few weeks, and will be very happy to gratify the great desire many gentlemen, his friends, have to learn the French and Spanish Languages, to open his Day and Evening School, the 15th of November next, in his House, Union-street, No. 23. N.B. Prayers will be read every Sunday, at said House, where any who are well-disposed may attend” (Columbian Centinel, October 20, 1790, p. 3/2).
404. Boston Gazette, November 8, 1790, p. 3/2.
405. November 10, 1790, p. 2/4.
406. November 24, 1790, p. 3/2.
407. Columbian Centinel, Wednesday, December 1, 1790, p. 3/2.
408. Trinity Church Records. Ms. copy in Trinity Church.
409. Id.
410. P. 3/2.
411. Belknap Papers, ii. 240, 241. Dr. Belknap evidently utilized one shot for two targets.
412. Herald of Freedom, December 28, 1790. On the 7th inst. the ship Sampson, Captain Moore, arrived at Baltimore from London. In her came “the Right Rev. Doctor John Carrol, lately consecrated Bishop of the Catholic See in America” (p. 3/1).
413. P. 1/3–4.
414. P. 4/2.
415. Pp. 192, 195, above.
416. P. 4/1.
417. The Boston Gazette of February 28, 1791, contained the following entry from the proceedings of the Massachusetts House of Representatives under date of February 21: “A petition from a number of French, Irish and American Catholics, praying for the use of the Representatives Chamber in the recess of the Court, they being destitute of a place of worship. Read and committed to Mr. Breck, Mr. Gardiner and Mr. Bacon” (p. 2/2). Unfortunately the original of this petition is not to be found among the State Archives, and it cannot be ascertained whether it was presented by the followers of de Rousselet, or not.
418. “THE Rev. John Thayer, of this town, is arrived in Philadelphia. It is supposed he there intends to follow the trade of Convert-Making” (Herald of Freedom, May 13, 1791, p. 3/1).
419. P. 3/1.
420. Herald of Freedom, Friday, June 3, 1791, p. 3/3. Cf. Columbian Centinel, Saturday, June 4, 1791, p. 3/1.
421. John Hancock.
422. Bentley recorded May 27, that he “Was introduced by Mr Clarke to Dr Carroll, Bp. of the Catholics in America, whom I found to be an intelligent & very agreeable man.” On May 29 he noted: “An invitation from Mr Barrell of Boston to dine on Tuesday next with Bp. Carroll.” (Diary i. 262.)
423. Columbian Centinel, Wednesday, June 8, 1791, p. 3/2. Cf. Herald of Freedom, June 7, 1791, p.3/1. Bentley noted June 8: “Dr Parker of the Episcopal Church in Boston, for the first time, an example from any person of his Communion, officiated at the Artillery Election. The people would not consent that the service should be in his own Church, but at the usual place. He read a prayer composed for the occasion, introduced with the passages of scripture used in his own Liturgy” (Diary, i. 263, 264).
424. Isaiah Thomas’s Almanac for 1791, interleaved, in possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society.
425. Belknap Papers, ii. 263. On Tuesday the 14th, Dr. Parker preached the annual sermon before the Humane Society at Trinity Church. “Among the auditory we observedjhis Excellency the Governor, the Right Rev. Bishop Carroll, and many respectable and distinguished characters” (Herald of Freedom, June 17, 1791, p. 3/3).
426. Life of Carroll, p. 391.
427. United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 149, 150.
428. Life of Carroll, pp. 391, 392.
429. United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 165.
430. P. 1/3. Bentley recorded in his Diary June 22 that “Mr Thayer was in Town in the triumph of his appointment at Boston, & victory over his rival, Rousselet”. (i. 268).
431. Life of Carroll, pp. 392, 393. Cf. Military Operations in Eastern Maine and Nova Scotia compiled from Journals and Letters of Col. John Allan, pp. 314, 315.
432. As a matter of fact Bishop Carroll had probably by this time planned to send to the Indians a French priest, Father Francis Ciquard, who had accompanied the Rev. Dr. Matignon to this country, arriving in Baltimore in June, 1792. At about the same time that Dr. Matignon took charge of the Boston Church, Father Ciquard went to the Indian Mission. (United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 165.) It is not made clear in Col. Allan’s letter whether the new priest who had come among the Passamaquoddy Indians was de Rousselet, or a priest from Canada. Probably the latter, however, for de Rousselet must have been well known to Allan. The letter serves to show that in the summer of 1792 de Rousselet was still at the Indian Mission, and also that Thayer’s hostility to him and to his service in New England had neither ceased nor diminished.
433. American Catholic Historical Researches, xvi. 120. In Col. Allan’s Report on the Indian Tribes in 1793, he wrote that a “clergyman arrived among them in October, 1792, a man who appeared well qualify’d for the mission” (Military Operations in Eastern Maine, etc., p. 315). This was undoubtedly Father Ciquard.
434. “Married] at Olympia, (Roxbury) by the Rev. Mr. Rousselet, M. J. J. Madey, of Martinique, to Madame de Cornet* . . .” (Columbian Centinel, Wednesday, September 12, 1792, p. 3/2). This marriage notice, but without the footnote, appeared also in the Independent Chronicle of September 13, p. 3/3.
435. This incident is particularly noteworthy because by this time Dr. Matignon had virtually superseded Father Thayer at the Church of the Holy Cross. If there was any justification for the aspersions which have been cast on the Abbé de Rousselet and his character, it is highly improbable that he would have been selected to perform this marriage by good Catholics, and with the approval of the French residents, or that such action would have been sanctioned by Dr. Matignon.
436. See our Publications, xxiv. 296–299.
437. T. Coke, History of the West Indies, ii. 396, 400; B. Edwards, History of the West Indies, iii. 470–474; Biographie Universelle, xx. 131, 132.
438. Shea, Life of Carroll, pp. 315, 316; Campbell, United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 103. Campbell draws a graphic picture of de Rousselet and a number of the Royalists being thrown into prison together, when he stated that he was a suspended priest, but that under the circumstances his powers were sufficient for confession and penance, but that he himself must die without the sacraments. This would give the idea of a deposed, or degraded priest, but I can find no evidence to warrant it. The fact that after the establishment of Thayer as the sole priest in Boston, de Rousselet went to the Indian Mission, presumably with the sanction of the Bishop, would seem to imply that his case was entirely different from that of La Poterie, and that there was no stain on his ecclesiastical character. If he had come under the condemnation of Dr. Carroll, or any other Bishop, it is not conceivable that Thayer would have failed to sound it abroad.
439. Memorial of the Thayer Name, p. 181.
440. Account of Conversion, etc., Baltimore, 1788, pp. 3–4.
441. Ezra Stiles, Literary Diary, ii. 369.
442. I am indebted to the Rev. Anson Phelps Stokes, late University Secretary, for information regarding this broadside, which is a manuscript copy of the original. The entry cited in the text was added to the catalogue by the late Franklin B. Dexter. Thayer’s name has not been found in the broadside catalogues subsequent to 1774. Bentley, who knew both Thayer and his family, spoke of him as “educated at Yale College” (Diary, i. 135). See also Yale Quinquennial Catalogue, 1910, p. 385.
443. Mr. Albert C. Bates, Librarian of the Connecticut Historical Society, has kindly sent me the following note from a copy of Thayer’s Account of his Conversion which was formerly in the possession of Noah Webster (Yale 1778) the lexicographer, and is now in the Watkinson Reference Library: “John Thayer was a Classmate of mine, & a charity scholar, with some genius, but an impudent lying, obstinate temper—N. Webster.”
444. A rather scurrilous review of Thayer’s Account of his Conversion in the American Magazine for September, 1788 (pp. 738, 739), contains the statement that Thayer went to New Haven recommended to the President and tutors who examined and admitted him to the College. Some gentlemen of the town boarded him and the College gave free tuition. He subsisted on charity until the last year of the usual term of residence, when he was guilty of some disorderly conduct and dismissed in disgrace. He pretended to have been honored with a B.A. degree.
This story appears to be purely imaginative. Thayer refers to his family as being in easy circumstances (Account of Conversion, p. 3), and it is highly improbable that he would have received an honorary degree in 1779 if he had been dismissed in disgrace in the previous academic year. President Stiles makes no allusion to any such circumstance, although he referred to him in very unflattering terms after his conversion: “[April] 11. [1791]. In the Eveng visited by Mr. Thayer the Romish Priest; born at Boston a Protestant, commenced his Life in Impudence, Ingratitude, Lying & Hypocrisy, irregularly took up preachg among the Congregationalists, went to France & Italy, became a Proselyte to the Romish Church, & is returned to convert America to that Chh. . . . Of haughty insolent & insidious Talents” (Literary Diary, iii. 416).
445. Account of Conversion, p. 4.
446. “Thayer, John. Chaplain, Capt. Lieut. William Burbeck’s co; engaged Aug. 11, 1780; discharged May 18, 1781; service 9 mos. 9 days; company raised for defence of Castle and Governor’s Islands and commanded by His Excellency John Hancock. Roll sworn to at Boston” (Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, xv. 540).
447. Account of Conversion, p. 4.
448. M. J. Spalding, Sketches of the early Catholic Missions in Kentucky, pp. 78, 79.
449. Belknap Papers, iii. 260. Letter endorsed by Jeremy Belknap: “Dr Franklin’s Letter to his Sister about John Thayer” (iii. 261).
I am indebted to the American Philosophical Society for a copy of the following letter of recommendation (Franklin Papers, xxii. 37) from Mrs. Collas (a daughter of Mrs. Mecom) to Dr. Franklin:
cambridge June 6th 1781
My dear and ever Honord Uncle
The bearer of this is Mr Thayer, a young Gentleman Educated at Newhaven Collage, has been Some time a candidate for the Ministry and Chaplian at the Castle, is now going to france, has impertuned me for a letter of introduction to you, which tho I am but very little acquainted with him I could not refuse after making every reasonable apology, his views I am a Stranger to, I am happy in the oppertunity of thanking you for your kindness to Mr Collas when a prisoner and in France Mamma was well three weaks ago, the Gentleman is waiting, and I have only time to assuer you of my filial regard and that I am with respect, veneration, and love
Your ever affectionate and dutifull Neice
Jane Collas
[Endorsed]
His Excellency Benjan Franklin Esqr
Paris
In the same collection (Franklin Papers, xxiii. 128) is a letter to Franklin from John Thayer himself, dated Paris, December 20, 1781.
450. The Venerable Benott-Joseph Labre, born 26 March, 1748, died at Rome 16 April, 1783. (Biographie Universelle, xxii. 323, 324.)
451. Manifesto di un Cavaliero Christiano convertito alia Religione Catholica. (Account of Conversion, p. 12.)
452. Account of Conversion. Cf. Rev. Arthur T. Connolly, Historical Sketch of the Rev. John Thayer (United States Catholic Historical Magazine, ii. 261–273); Shea, Life of Carroll, p. 388.
453. Life of Carroll, p. 388. While at the Seminary Thayer paid a visit to Mrs. John Adams at Auteuil, described by her in a letter dated January 18, 1785:
“he began to question Mr. Adams if he believed the Bible, and to rail at Luther and Calvin; upon which Mr. Adams took him up pretty short, and told him that he was not going to make a father confessor of him, that his religion was a matter that he did not look upon himself accountable for to any one but his Maker, and that he did not choose to hear either Luther or Calvin treated in such a manner. Mr. Abbé took his leave after some time, without any invitation to repeat his visit” (Letters of Mrs. Abigail Adams, 1848, p. 228).
454. Life of Carroll, p. 388. Mr. Thayer entered the Seminary October 18, 1784, and was ordained priest on Saturday, June 2, 1787. On the following day, Trinity Sunday, he celebrated his first Mass in the church of St. Sulpice. (Letter of Rev. Francois Charles Nagot, Director of St. Sulpice, cited in Rass, Die Convertiten seit der Reformation, x. 345–347.)
455. Benjamin Franklin recorded in his private Journal, under date of July 1, 1784, a call from the Papal Nuncio, who informed him that the Pope, on Franklin’s recommendation, had appointed the Rev. John Carroll of Baltimore Superior of the Catholic Clergy in the United States. In the course of their conversation, the Nuncio “spoke lightly of their New Bostonian convert Thayer’s conversion; that he had advised him not to go to America, but settle in France. That he wanted to go to convert his countrymen; but he knew nothing yet of his new religion himself, etc.” (Works, 1888, viii. 512, 513.)
456. B. U. Campbell, Account of the Early History of the Catholic Church in Boston (United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 103).
457. viii. 103.
458. September 4, 1788, p. 3/2. The communication was dated Portsmouth, August 30. This article also appeared in the Freemen’s Journal, Philadelphia, September 24, 1788. (American Catholic Historical Researches, xiii. 11.) There can be little doubt that the substance of this communication was derived from Thayer himself. The Massachusetts Centinel of September 10, 1788 (p. 2/3), contains a reference to the conversation of a gentleman, lately returned from Europe, with the Rev. John Thayer, who purposes to come back to this country.
459. P. 3/1.
460. Diary, i. 135. Thayer himself stated in a letter to a friend, under date of July 17, 1790, that he arrived in Boston on January 4. (United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 116.) Bentley’s entry would seem to establish the day of his arrival as Saturday, January 2.
461. “Yesterday the Rev. Mr. John Thayer, who lately arrived from Rome, via France, and is invested with Holy Orders, for the first time celebrated Divine Service in the Roman Catholic Church in this town” (Boston Gazette, January 11, p. 3/3)
462. See sketch of Louis de Rousselet, pp. 191–211, above.
463. See sketch of the Abbs de la Poterie, pp. 173–190, above.
464. The Massachusetts Historical Society possesses a photostatic copy of this letter. It is endorsed: “Mr Thayer Jan 6–1790–complns of Rouselet, wishes him gone sollicits the Supry of the N. E. States.”
465. American Catholic Historical Researches, xxviii. 99, 100, extracted from the Baltimore Archives. The second part of this extract, following the signature J. Thayer, was perhaps written at a later period than the first part, but no date is given and it is cited as printed. The photostatic copy of the letter in the Massachusetts Historical Society shows that the portion of the page following the words J. Thayer, has been cut off. It is possible that the missing portion contained, as a postscript, the second part of the extract cited in the text, since the Bishop’s endorsement on the letter refers to Thayer’s desire for superiority in the New England States, which he had asked for in the second part of his communication.
466. United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 116. The letter was dated July 17, 1790, and was written to the Rev. Francois Charles Nagot. (Rass, Die Convertiten, x. 357.)
467. “Mr Thayer informs the Town, That every Sunday, at six o’clock in the evening, (to begin from to-morrow) he intends preaching a Sermon at the Catholic Chapel in School-Street. As by the General Constitution of these States every one has full right to worship God according to his own conscience, it is expected that no persons will attend who do not design to be serious and quiet hearers. Parents and masters are requested to prevent their children and apprentices from coming to interrupt the attention of those who wish to profit” (Massachusetts Centinel, April 24, 1790, p. 3/1).
468. Diary, i. 161. Bentley replied to Thayer on the 23d, giving the names of some half dozen Catholics in Salem, and stating that he had communicated his letter to two of the Selectmen. In regard to lodgings, he said that if Thayer should call on him, he would furnish all the information in his power, (i. 162.)
469. Diary, i. 165–166. Among the pamphlets were “49 copies of Mr Thayer’s Conversion, . . . 49 Thayer’s Prayers.”
470. i. 182.
471. For a detailed account of the controversy and its settlement, see pp. 196–198, above.
472. Thayer seems at first to have been prepared to accept the situation. The Columbian Centinel, Saturday, July 10, 1790, contained the following notice: “Mr. Thayer will preach tomorrow and the following Sunday, at eleven o’clock in the morning, and at six in the evening. He will also preach at 6 o’clock Tuesday and Thursday next. After which six discourses he will probably be absent the greatest part of the season” (p. 3/3). Bentley recorded on July 27, that “Mr Thayer called upon me, & mentioned his purpose to open a Mass house in this Town. Mr Rousselet having an appointment from the Bishop, & having been publicly received at Boston” (Diary, i. 188).
473. Vol. xxviii of the American Catholic Historical Researches contains two letters from Father Thayer to Bishop Carroll (extracted from the Baltimore Archives), written while the Bishop was abroad. The first was dated September, 1790 (pp. 305–306), the second October 14, 1790 (p. 16), both being in explanation of his position, of the steps which he had taken, and of the existing conditions. They are obviously ex parte statements, confused in their sequence of events, and too long to be quoted in full. His explanation of the obtaining control of the church building is as follows: “On ye next day we applied to ye owner of ye chappel they assur’d us that ye intention in letting Catholics have ye house was rather to oblige ye Irish, whom as a nation they esteemed they knowing them to be more numerous by ye lists produced by both parties & more respectable in point of character, they sign’d & delivered me a lease of ye same; & as they could not get ye keys from Mason [i.e. Masson, the church warden], they forc’d ye door, put on a new lock & gave me ye key; thus I became proprietor, with two others, of ye house” (pp. 305–306).
474. United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 150. The letter was written from Boston, June 11, 1791. See p. 207, above.
475. American Catholic Historical Researches, ix. 42 (extracted from the Baltimore Archives).
476. Columbian Centinel, January 19, 1791, p. 3/1.
477. P. 1/3.
478. Controversy between the Rev. John Thayer, Catholic Missionary, of Boston, and the Rev. George Lesslie, p. iv: see p. 229 note 3, below. Bentley noted on February 4, 1791, that “Mr Thayer the Catholic Missionary, has bid open defiance to all the Clergy of every denomination to dispute with him, & advertised in the Gazette a proposed conference between him & a Mr Leslie. But his antagonist did not appear” (Diary, i. 232).
479. P. 3/3.
480. “Protestantism has not yet opposed the Apostolick Popish Divine. Champion Leslie is slow in his movements and has not yet appeared in Print” (Herald of Freedom, April 12, 1791, p. 3/1). “How happens it that John Thayer, the Popish Champion, still remains unanswered. Where is the Rev. Mis. Leslie hid? Does he dread the whip of Infallibility? Or does not the Missionary fight fair” (id. May 6, 1791, p. 2/2). After his sole appearance in print, the Argus stated September 6, 1791: “THE Rev. Mr. LESSLIE, the writer of the Protestant Bulls, is a slow-worm at composition. Missionary Thayer writes with much celerity, and flounders away where he likes:—Parson L—thinks least said, soonest mended” (p. 3/2). The Argus of August 16, 1791, stated that it would reprint the Thayer-Lesslie controversy as it was desired by a majority of its patrons. It appeared, August 16, 19, 26, 30, September 6, 13, 16, 27 and 30, 1791. The issue of October 4 contained an article by Thayer on the doctrine of Purgatory.
481. P. 3/1.
482. P. 3/2.
483. Controversy, 1793, pp. 40, 41.
484. The Columbian Centinel, July 7, 1792, reproduced a part of Mr. Gardiner’s speech on the Theatre, which contained some slurs on the Catholic religion and on Thayer’s conversion. Thayer replied in the issue of July 11. Gardiner published an assault on Thayer on July 14, in an article signed “Barebones;” and Thayer responded in the issues of July 18 and 21.
485. See p. 229 note 3, below.
486. Neither of the two clergymen made a public answer. Dr. Belknap replied privately that “Mr B. presents his complts. to the Revd Mr Thayer, & acknowledges the receipt of a letter from him which he has put into his file entitled Consideranda” (Belknap Papers, iii. 546 note). (Thayer-Lesslie Controversy, 1793, p. 154.)
487. “Father Thorpe had warned Dr. Carroll, in his letter from Rome, of August 11, 1790, that Thayer would bear watching—’It will be necessary to have a priest of friendly eye over Mr. John Thayer of Boston; his passion for more independence than any Apostle in God’s Church ever had or desired, may involve himself and others in great difficulties’” (Rev. Peter Guilday, Life and Times of John Carroll, 1922, p. 424: quoted from the Baltimore Catholic Archives).
488. Life of Carroll, p. 435. Another Catholic historian wrote that Thayer “excited displeasure by some acts of excessive zeal, and a polemical challenge which he sent to the Protestant ministers so embittered the animosity against him, that Bishop Carrol deemed it requisite to transfer him to another place” (Abbé André J. M. Hamon, Life of the Cardinal de Cheverus, 1839, Translated by R. M. Walsh, p. 49).
489. United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 165.
490. A. T. Connolly, in United States Catholic Historical Magazine, iii. 132.
491. P. 220, above.
492. Historical Sketch of the Rev. John Thayer (United States Catholic Historical Magazine, ii. 261–273).
493. ii. 271.
494. P. 1/4. There is a curious entry in Bentley’s Diary under date of October 28, 1791 (i. 318): “Thayer, ad ecclesiam Romanam ex Protestantibus conversus, mandata ex Episcopo Carrol acceplit, ad labores in Etata Meridienaux. Nos dimittimus, spe illum nunquam redire, nisi animo mitiori, et digniori.” This statement is so at variance with the actual facts at that time that it seems probable it was only the reflection of current gossip.
495. He published his letter to the Rev. Dr. Lathrop in the Massachusetts Mercury of October 1, 1793 (p. 2/3). The preface to the Thayer-Lesslie Controversy pamphlet is dated October 5, and the closing paragraph, October 19, 1793. In the list of unclaimed letters in the Boston Post Office, January 21, 1794, is the name of “Thayer John Rev” (Columbian Centinel, January 29, 1794, p.’ 4/1),
496. American Catholic Historical Researches, xxvi. 82.
497. xxvii. 271 (extracted from the Baltimore Archives).
498. xxvi. 83.
499. xxviii. 24, 25.
500. xvii. 16. At the same time Bishop Carroll wrote the trustees of St. Peter’s Church declining to appoint Father Thayer as an assistant on account of Father O’Brien’s objections. He also wrote to the same effect to Mr. O’Brien, (xvii. 14, 15.)
501. P. 225, above.
502. A Discourse, etc.: see p. 229 note 3, below.
503. P. 2/2. Other preachers in Boston on this occasion, whose sermons were published, were Jeremy Belknap, Jedidiah Morse, and John Thornton Kirkland.
504. Sketches of the early Catholic Missions in Kentucky, p. 81.
505. Life of Carroll, p. 457.
506. Shea, Life of Carroll, p. 454; United States Catholic Historical Magazine, ii. 272; Catholic Encyclopedia, xiv. 557. The Rev. T. E. Bridgett (in A New England Convert, or The Story of the Rev. John Thayer, London, 1897, p. 47) says that “Mr. Thayer came to Limerick about 1811,” but he is unable to account for the years between 1803 and 1811.
507. Cf. American Catholic Historical Researches, xxvi. 367.
508. Catholic Encyclopedia, xiv. 557.
509. United States Catholic Magazine, viii. 151. “On Friday, the 17th February, the Rev. Mr. Thayer breathed his last, at his lodgings in Limerick, in the 57th year of his age.” (Cited from The Orthodox Journal, London, February, 1815.)
510. W. Byrne, in Memorial History of Boston, iii. 519. Mr. Byrne states that “The project of a nunnery and school was first broached by the Rev. John Thayer.”
511. Mr. Byrne says that the Ursuline Convent was first established in a building beside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, on June 16, 1820, and that a school for girls was opened (Memorial History of Boston, iii. 519).
512. Catholic Encyclopedia, xiv. 557. The Encyclopedia, in an article on the Archdiocese of Boston (ii. 705), states in more detail that Mary and Catharine Ryan emigrated to Boston in 1817, and were sent by Bishop Cheverus to the Ursuline Convent at Three Rivers, Canada, for instruction. They made their profession October 4, 1819, and then returned to Boston.
They appear to have been joined later by a third sister, Margaret Ryan, who was received into the Convent at Boston. (B. F. De Costa, Story of Mt. Benedict, p. 2.)
513. Diary, iv. 363.
514. W. A. Leahy, in History of the Catholic Church in the New England States, i. 21.
515. P. 226, above.
516. A list of Mr. Thayer’s publications is appended:
- 1 An Account of the Conversion of the Reverend Mr. John Thayer, lately a Protestant Minister at Boston in North America, Who embraced the Roman Catholic Religion at Rome, on the 25th of May, 1783; Written by Himself. . . . London: M DCC LXXXVII. Frequently reprinted: see pp. 129–140, above.
- 2 Controversy between The Rev. John Thayer, Catholic Missionary, of Boston, and The Rev. George Lesslie, Pastor of a Church in Washington, New-Hampshire. To which are added, several other pieces. [Boston, 1793.] Pp. 167. Dublin, 1809.
- 3 A Discourse, delivered, At the Roman Catholic Church in Boston, On the 9th of May, 1798, a day recommended by the President, for Humiliation and Prayer throughout the United States. By the Reverend John Thayer, Catholic Missioner. Printed at the pressing Solicitation of those who heard it. Printed by Samuel Hall, No. 53, Cornhill, Boston. 1798. Pp.31. This sermon was advertised as “This Day published, and for sale, by S. Hall, No. 53 Cornhill” in the Columbian Centinel, June 6, 1798 (p. 4/2). The proceeds of sale were to be applied to “the building and ornamenting of a place of worship for the Roman Catholics of Boston.” A second edition was published in the same year.
Bentley cites a pamphlet (see p. 219 note 1, above) which he designates as “Thayer’s Prayers.” No copy of this is known to the writer.
517. Winthrop Papers, iv. 421.
518. John Foster (1909), p. 13.
519. Letter-Book, i. 32.
520. See Mr. John H. Edmonds’s exhaustive paper, “The Burgis-Price View of Boston,” in our Publications, xi. 245–262. Mr. Edmonds informs me that the inventory of the estate of Samuel Moale, mariner, dated September 11, 1727, contains the item: “2 Maps 6 Small Pictures Town of Boston,” valued at fifteen shillings: see Suffolk Probate Files, no. 5495.
521. The size of the print, measured to the heavy border line, is 12¾ inches in width by 9¾ inches in height.
522. These are:
No. 1 Fort Hill, 2 South Battery, 3 Long wharf, 4 New South Meeting house, 5 the Old South, 6 The Town House, 7 the old Meeting house, 8 Kings Chappel, 9 Mr Fanevils house, 10 Brattle Street Church, 11 Old North, 12 Bacon hill, 13 New North Brick, 14 New North, 15 Christ Church, 16 Capt Greenough house, 17 Mr Rucks house, 18 N. Battery.
523. These photographs were used as illustrations for Miss Mary F. Ayer’s article on “The South Meeting-House, Boston. (1669–1729.)” in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for July, 1905, lix. 265–267. See also Miss Ayer’s Boston Common in Colonial and Provincial Days, p. 40.
524. Dictionary of Painters and Engravers (1903), i. 263. This is taken practically word for word from Joseph Strutt’s Biographical Dictionary (1785), i. 184. Carwitham is known to Strutt, Bryan, etc., as “J. Carwitham.” On the prints the name appears as “I. Carwitham.” Doubtless he was the John Carwitham who published at London “Various kinds of Floor Decorations represented both in plane and perspective. Being . . . designs for ornamenting the floors of halls, rooms, summer houses, etc.,” assigned in the British Museum Catalogue to the year 1739.
525. Boston News Letter, May 24, 1750. For this reference, I am indebted to Mr. George F. Dow. Cf. Memorial History of Boston, ii. 532; 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xviii. 68–69. Mr. Dow calls my attention to a long advertisement in the Boston Gazette of April 14, 1740, of a machine “lately arrived from Holland by which is presented to the sight a Prospect of Landskips,” etc.—perhaps the same machine as that advertised by Buck, or similar to it.
526. From H. R. Plomer’s Dictionary of Printers and Booksellers, etc., from 1668 to 1725 (London, 1922, p. 43), it appears that John Bowles, printseller in London, was at the “Black Horse, Cornhill; and [in the Strand] over against Devereux Court, without Temple Bar,” as early as 1709, and that Thomas Bowles, print-seller in London, was at “St. Paul’s Churchyard” in the same year.
527. Hezekiah Broad (1746–1823) was of Natick. (Natick Vital Records, pp. 21, 207; Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, ii. 557.)
528. Abner Perry (1729–1813) was of Holliston. (Holliston Vital Records, pp. 119, 340; Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors, etc., xii. 191.)
529. For John Gleason (who was of Framingham) and John Trowbridge, see Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors, etc., vi. 493, xvi. 72.
530. J. T. Adams, The Founding of New England (1921), p. 80.
531. D. de S. Pool, Hebrew Learning among the Puritans of New England, Prior to 1700, in Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society (1911), xx. 81.
532. Cf. the reprint of the Cambridge Platform in W. Walker’s Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism (1893), p. 203. For the Savoy Declaration on the same point, see id. pp. 367–368.
533. W. B. Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit (1857), i. 143.
534. In deference to tradition, I cite this title in its usual English form. H. O. Taylor (Thought and Expression, 1920, ii. 389 note) favors Institute.
535. In Thomas Norton’s translation of Calvin’s Institutes (1611) there is an index of “the places of the Bible” referred to in the text. From this I have drawn my figures.
536. “First six Chapters of the Gospel of John; the whole book of Ecclesiastes, the Prophesie of Zechariah, and many other Scriptures . . . 1 Cor. 11 and 2 Chron. 30 per totum.” “First and Second Epistles of John, the whole book of Solomons Song, the Parables of our Savior set forth in Matthews Gospel to the end of Chapter 16. compairing them with Mark and Luke.” J. Norton, Abel being Dead yet speaketh; Or, The life & Death of . . . Mr John Cotton (London, 1658), p. 17.
This gives the following number of texts:
| New Testament | Old Testament | ||
|---|---|---|---|
|
John |
284 |
Eccl. |
222 |
|
Cor. |
34 |
Zech. |
211 |
|
Ep. John |
119 |
Chron. |
22 |
|
437 |
Sol. Song |
117 |
|
|
572 |
|||
These figures do not include the texts from Matthew, or those from Mark and Luke with which they were compared, since the text does not give a sufficiently definite reference to make possible an accurate count. “Preached through the Acts of the Apostles, Haggai, Zechary, Ezra, the Revelation, Ecclesiastes, Canticles, the Second and Third Epistles of John, the Epistle of Titus, both the Epistles of Timothy, the Epistle to the Romans” (id. pp. 22–23).
| New Testament | Old Testament | ||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Acts |
1006 |
Haggai |
38 |
|
Rev. |
404 |
Zech. |
211 |
|
John |
27 |
Ezra |
280 |
|
Tit. |
46 |
Canticles |
117 |
|
1 Tim. |
113 |
Eccles. |
222 |
|
2 Tim. |
83 |
868 |
|
|
Rom. |
433 |
||
|
2112 |
|||
Adding to these totals those given above, we get the grand totals, Old Testament 1440, New Testament 2549.
537. Id. p. 22.
We find Cotton Mather writing that John Cotton “in an expository way, . . . went over the Old Testament once, and a second time as far as the thirtieth chapter of Isaiah; and the whole New Testament once, and a second time as far as the eleventh chapter to the Hebrews” (Magnalia, bk. iii. pt. i. chap, i, § 23). I follow Norton’s statement in preference to Mather’s, first because it is earlier in date and, second, because the insertion of the words “and a second time” after “the Old Testament” seems so likely to have been a mechanical error by confusion of the two parts of the sentence.
538. I. Mather, The Life and Death of . . . Mr. Richard Mather, reprinted in Collections of the Dorchester Antiquarian and Historical Society, iii. 53–54, 89.
Tabulating the texts we get:
| Old Testament | New Testament | ||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Genesis |
1120 |
Matthew |
489 |
|
Psalms |
11 |
Thess. |
28 |
|
Zech. |
211 |
Peter |
61 |
|
Sam. |
25 |
Luke |
127 |
|
Psalms |
19 |
Rom. |
39 |
|
Prov. |
33 |
Tim. |
83 |
|
Isaiah |
44 |
Jude |
25 |
|
Ep. John |
13 |
||
|
1463 |
865 |
||
539. B. Wendell, Cotton Mather (1891), p. 287.
540. These figures were compiled in the course of my work upon a doctoral dissertation, “The Life and Works of Increase Mather.” The number of Scriptural references for each book of Mather is given in the notes to this thesis, which is now in the Harvard University Library. In view of the number of references involved, it is probable that there are some errors in my figures, but they have been verified sufficiently so that I am confident that there are no mistakes great enough to invalidate the conclusions drawn from them.
541. I. Mather, Wo to Drunkards (Boston, 1673), p. 33.
542. I. Mather, Renewal of Covenant (Boston, 1677), Preface.
543. C. Mather, Parentator (Boston, 1724), p. 232.
544. Cotman is quoted in Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, i. 158.
545. C. Mather, Parentator, pp. 176–177.
546. See pp. 249–250 below.
547. There were two Joseph Willards in the class of 1765—one, born December 29, 1738, in Biddeford, afterwards President of Harvard College from 1781 until his death in 1804; the other, born January 7, 1742, in Grafton, later minister in Mendon and in Boxborough, where he died in 1828. Both names are contained in the list of Freshmen as “placed” in the Faculty Records, February 5, 1762, though this “Admittatur” is dated “6to Cal. Maij 1762” (i.e. April 26). Which Joseph wrote out this copy of the Laws does not appear by the inscription, but a comparison of the writing with President Willard’s hand as found in a volume of Problems in Spherical Geometry and Trigonometry, written out when he was a Senior in College, makes it perfectly clear that these Laws were written by him. The fact that they are bound up with two official copies of the Laws of 1767 also points in the same direction.
548. In the Corporation Records, November 18, 1760, there is a vote, “That Caryl who hath wrote the College Laws according to revisal of them by the Comtoe appointed for that Purpose, be allowed for the Service one Dollar p Day.” This might be taken to indicate an earlier revision, but as no other references to such a revision are to be found at this time, I conclude that the copy written out by Caryl (Benjamin Caryl, H. C. 1738) was simply one in which recent changes in detail were incorporated.
549. Adam Winthrop (H. C. 1767).
550. 1 Thomas Fleet died July 21, 1758. He left no will, but letters of administration were granted to his son William on December 15, 1758, and the inventory of his estate is dated June 1, 1759. The five slaves were valued as follows:
|
Negro Woman Named Venus abot 33 years old 25 00 0 |
25 |
00 |
0 |
|
|
D° |
Boy Abram 3 years old |
6 |
13 |
4 |
|
D° |
Girl Jenny 6 years old |
16 |
00 |
0 |
|
D° |
Boy Pompey 14 years old |
40 |
00 |
0 |
|
D° |
Boy Ceasar 11 years old |
33 |
06 |
8 |
In an account rendered August 31, 1759, it is stated that £4 were received in cash “for Negro Girl Jenny above the apprist.” (Suffolk Probate Files, no. 11882.) On June 8, 1715, Thomas Fleet married Elizabeth Goose.
551. This paper will appear in the Transactions of a future meeting.
552. In memory of her father, Mr. Andrew McFarland Davis •
553. F. Freeman, History of Cape Cod, ii. 311–312.
554. House Journal, p. 269.
555. Massachusetts Archives, ccix. 153. This document is the resolve of May 9, signed “Saml Freeman Speak’ P. T.” And below is written: “In Council May 10th 1776 Read & nonconcured Perez Morton D Secry.”
556. William Cooper (1720–1809), a representative from Boston, and long its town clerk.
557. House Journal, p. 276.
558. The resolve of May 10 was printed in the Boston Gazette of May 13, p. 2/2, and in the New England Chronicle of May 16, p. 2/2.
559. See appendix, no. 3
560. See appendix, no. 6.
561. See appendix, no. 4.
562. See appendix, no. 7.
563. See appendix, no. 5.
564. See appendix, no. 8.
565. Here the word “Watertown” is erased.
566. Boston Gazette: see appendix, no. 4.
567. See appendix, no. 1.
568. Colonel James Otis (1702–1778), at one time Speaker of the House, was the father of James Otis (1725–1783) the Patriot and of Joseph Otis (1726–1810).
569. See appendix, no. 2.
570. See appendix, no. 11. It should be stated, however, that no record of a town meeting except the one referred to (October 12, 1774) has been found dealing with this subject. The Boston Committee of Correspondence, organized on November 2, 1772, sent their letter to the towns under date of November 20 (Boston Records, xviii. 93, 94). This letter was brought to the attention of the town of Barnstable by a written request of more than ten freeholders. It is probable that trouble was anticipated on this subject, because it was arranged in advance that the annual town meeting held on March 10, 1773, with James Otis as moderator, should be adjourned to March 22 after having adopted a vote appointing James Otis, Daniel Davis, Edward Bacon, Nymphas Marston, and Cornelius Crocker a committee “to take under Consideration The Request of a Number of free holders who have Set forth that our Liberties are Encroached upon & Also our Rights as Stated by the Committee of Correspondence of the Town of Boston & the infringements of the Same and make Report at the adjournment of this Meeting.” It is probable that this committee did not agree and that it contained a majority of loyalists. At the adjourned meeting on March 22, Eli Phinney, Joseph Otis, Ebenezer Jenkins, and David Smith were added to the committee. This addition of numbers left the committee of nine with four probable loyalists and four probable patriots, the sentiments of the ninth member being unknown. The meeting was then adjourned without action on this matter, and after two intervening meetings, also without action, a special town meeting was held on May 18, with James Otis as moderator. At this meeting Edward Bacon was elected a representative “by the Major Vote of the Electors present;” and—
“The Committee appointed to take into Consideration the Request of a Number of Freeholders Respecting our Rights, etc. & Report Reported which Report was Accepted by the Town.
“Voted that the above Sd. Report be for Instructions to our present Representative.
“Voted that the town Clerk Deliver an attested Copy of the Sd. Report to Sd. Representative and that he Cause the Same to be printed in the publick Newspapers.”
Accordingly the report, though not recorded in the town records, was printed in several Boston newspapers, among them the Boston Evening Post of May 31, 1774, p. 4/3. The report did not recommend the appointment by Barnstable of a committee of correspondence. If, therefore, Joseph Otis’s charge was a just one, it would seem that it was through the influence of Edward Bacon that the report did not make such a recommendation. The report here printed is taken from the Boston News Letter of June 3, 1773 (p. 1/3):
Proceedings of the Town of Barnstable.
‘THE Freeholders of the Town of Barnstable, legally assembled by adjournment the 18th day of May 1773, to take into consideration the Report of a Committee chosen agreeable to the request of more than ten Freeholders, Inhabitants of said Town, the said Committee reported as follows (viz.)
‘THE Committee appointed to take into consideration the request of more than ten Freeholders, Inhabitants of the Town of Barnstable, requesting said Town to take into consideration the several matters of grievance therein mentioned, and to act and do thereon what the Town might think proper to be done, &c.—beg leave to report, as their opinion, that when and so often as the good people of this Province are unjustly burdened by any Acts of the British Parliament, or by any Measures that may be adopted by the Bang’s Ministers and carried into execution, subversive of their Rights either civil or religious as well as those Burthens and Innovations, of which they at present so justly complain, they have a just right with a decent firmness to remonstrate against them, and humbly to petition their most gracious Sovereign through the representative body of the people for redress of the same, which your Committee apprehend to be not only a constitutional Measure; but also to have been the invariable Usage of this people from the first granting the present Charter, and even from the first settlement of this Country. We are also of opinion and are even well assured that the representative body of the people not only in the late but also in former Assemblies exerted themselves as Guardians of the Rights and Liberties of the People for the time being in drawing up, passing and entering on their Journals from time to time firm and manly Resolves against the unconstitutional Infringements that have been made on our Rights & Privileges as generally comprehended in a Pamphlet published by order of the Town of Boston; and have also often remonstrated against such Infringements & Innovations to his most gracious Majesty, and also petitioned him from time to time for Redress; to which Petitions we hope to receive Answers of Peace. We also offer it as our opinion that it would be highly expedient for this Town to instruct their Representative to use his utmost Endeavor in a constitutional Way for redress of all Grievances, and for supporting us in our just Rights and Privileges and also that some faithful Person be chosen as Agent for this Province to appear for us at Great-Britain at this time of our Distress and Danger.
JAMES OTIS, per Order.
Which Report was accordingly accepted and the Town voted that a Copy of said Report and the Proceedings thereon be delivered to the Representative for his Instructions, and that he cause the same to be printed in the publick News-Papers.
The above is a true Copy of the Report and Proceedings thereon.
Attest. JOSIAH CBOCKER, Town-Clerk.
It is apparent that the loyalists had their way, for the resolution advocated petition to the king rather than preparations for resistance.
It is remarkable, however, that the same issue of the Boston News Letter published the complete vote of the House of Representatives on May 28 for the appointment of a Committee of Correspondence for the colonies, in response to a suggestion of the Virginia House of Burgesses, and that Edward Bacon voted “Yea,” there being 113 members present and only four dissentients.
The pamphlet referred to in the committee’s report is the one printed under the title: “The Votes and Proceedings of the Freeholders and other Inhabitants of the Town of Boston, In Town Meeting assembled, According to Law. [Published by Order of the Town.] To which is prefixed, as Introductory, An attested Copy of a Vote of the Town at a proceeding Meeting.” It contains the meeting of November 2, 1772, pp. [iii]–iv; the meeting of November 20, 1772, pp. [l]–29; A Letter of Correspondence, to the other Towns, dated November 20, 1772, pp. 30–36; and Appendix, pp. 37–43.
571. See appendix, no. 2.
572. C. F. Swift, Cape Cod (1897), pp. 173–174, 184. News of the battle of Lexington reached Barnstable April 20: see J. G. Palfrey, Discourse pronounced at Barnstable on the Third of September, 1839 (1840), p. 34. In a letter to George Watson of Plymouth dated April 21, Edward Bacon wrote: “I shall not at this time trouble you with the heart felt distress under which I now groan for the distrest scituation of my dear country, but only to desire you to favor us with the most particular accot of the late dreadful maneuvers that have taken place of late to the northward that has come to yr hand” (2 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xii. 345–346).
573. See p. 277 note 5, below.
574. See p. 273, below, and appendix, no. 13.
575. Sturgis, From Books and Papers of Russell Sturgis (Oxford, 1893), pp. 17–18.
576. See appendix, no. 9. “We hear that the towns of Sandwich and Plimouth have instructed their members to use their influence and endeavors, in the House of Representatives, that Edward Bacon, Esq; be dismissed from the House, from the most plenary convictions that said Bacon has been, during the whole of the present contest, and still is an implacable enemy to the freedom and independence of America; and that some other towns will soon follow the same example” (Boston Gazette, August 10, 1778, p. 3/2). A town meeting held at Plymouth on June 15 passed a vote in practically these exact words (Records of the Town of Plymouth, 1903, iii. 349). Under date of December 7 1770, there is an allusion to Bacon in the same records (iii. 234).
577. House Journal, October 14, 1778:
A Petition and Remonstrance of Joseph Otis, and a Number of others, Freeholders and Inhabitants of the Town of Barnstable, against Edward Bacon, Esq; a Representative for said Town, praying, for Reason offered, that the said Bacon be excluded from the public Councils.
Read and thereupon the House assigned the second Wednesday of the next Session, for hearing the Petitioners in Support of their Petition, and the said Bacon in his Defence thereof. And,
Ordered, That the Clerk serve the Parties with a Copy of this Order, and Mr. Bacon with a Copy of said Petition. (P. 78.)
On October 16 the House adjourned to the first Wednesday in January, 1779, which was January 6.
578. See appendix, no. 13.
579. Cf. J. G. Palfrey, Discourse (1840), p. 39 (where Bacon is referred to without being named); Amos Otis, Barnstable Families (ed. C. F. Swift), i. 27, 226.
580. House Journal, January 13, 1779:
The House proceeded to the Hearing on the Petition of Joseph Otis, Esq; and others against Edward Bacon, Esq; And,
On Motion, Ordered, That Joseph Nye, jun. and Solomon Olis, Esq’rs, of Harwich, in the County of Barnstable, be appointed to take Depositions, at the Expence of this State, to be used in the Hearing on the said Petition.
Then the House assigned Wednesday the third Day of February next for the further Hearing and Consideration of the Matter.
It was moved that the Town of Barnstable be notified of this Assignment, and the Question being put, after Debate thereon, it pass’d in the Negative. (P. 96.) For Solomon Otis, see Note, p. 360, below.
581. House Journal, January 18, 1779:
Upon the Petition of Joseph Otis, Esq; and others, against Edward Bacon, Esq; it was represented to the House that the Parties had agreed that the Depositions and other Papers on both Sides be admitted, and that the Matter should be taken up next Wednesday at 10 o’Clock, or as soon as may be.
The Agreement was in writing under their Hands and delivered to the House.
Whereupon the House assign’d Thursday next at 10 o’Clock in the Forenoon accordingly. (P. 102.)
582. House Journal, January 21, 1779:
Col. Freeman informed the House that Joseph Otis, Esq; and others, Petitioners against Edward Bacon, Esq; and the said Edward Bacon, Esq; had agreed as follows, viz.
That the said Bacon should resign his Seat in the House, and that a new Precept issue to the Town of Barnstable, for the Choice of a Representative, and that the Petitioners withdraw their Petition. Whereupon,
Voted, That the Resignation of the said Edward Bacon, Esq; of his Seat in the House be accepted, and that a Precept be issued to the Town of Barnstable for a new Choice.
Also Voted, That Joseph Otis, Esq; and others have Leave to withdraw their Petition. (P. 107.)
583. See appendix, no. 28.
584. See appendix, no. 22.
585. See appendix, no. 32.
586. House Journal, June 2, 1779:
Edward Bacon, Esq; was returned a member from the town of Barnstable, . . .
A Petition of Daniel Davis, and a number of other inhabitants of the town of Barnstable, praying that they may have a hearing on two former petitions against Edward Bacon, Esq; and that said Bacon may not be permitted to have a seat in the House:
Read, and on Motion Voted, That said Bacon be not admitted to a seat in the House until a hearing is had on the subject matter of said petitions:—
Then the House assigned three o’clock to-morrow afternoon for a hearing accordingly. (P. 14.)
587. On June 1, in the morning, the House “Ordered, That Mr. Bacon be furnished with a copy of the petition against him, from a number of the inhabitants of Barnstable” (House Journal, p. 17). In the afternoon Bacon was admitted to the House, and “The members of the honorable Board”—that is, the Council—“attended agreeably to the invitation of the House,” and the House “then proceeded to the order of the day.”
The petitions above-mentioned were read; upon which Mr. Bacon moved that a further time might be allowed him to collect evidence, and prepare for his defence; after a long debate thereon the question was put, and it passed in the negative, the number of the House being 127, and only 53 voting in favor of the question.
It was moved that this vote be reconsidered, and the question being put it passed also in the negative, the number of the House being 125, and only 61 voting for the question.
A number of depositions addressed by the petitioners were then read and the verbal testimonies of several persons heard:
It was thereupon moved, That a committee be appointed to bring in a resolve for expelling the said Edward Bacon, Esq; from this House; and the question being put it passed in the affirmative by a majority of 95 members out of 100. (Pp. 18–19.)
588. House Journal, p. 19.
589. See appendix, no. 32.
590. House Journal, June 2, 1779:
A petition of Edward Bacon, Esq; praying in substance that the votes of the House passed yesterday, respecting his trial might be re-considered:
Read, and thereupon it was moved that the vote against allowing Mr. Bacon a further time to prepare for his defence, should be re-considered, and a time given him for that purpose; and after debate thereupon, the question was put, and it passed in the negative. Then
Voted, That said petition be dismissed (P. 19.)
591. House Journal, p. 24. “On the 4th day of this inst. Edward Bacon, Esq; of Barnstable, was ‘excluded from the House of Representatives on account of his inimical disposition & conduct towards this & the United States’” (Boston Gazette, June 7, 1779, p. 2/3).
592. For a list of these, see p. 283, below.
593. See appendix, nos. 11, 14–20, 23, 24, 26–28.
594. See appendix, nos. 10, 12, 21, 25, 29.
595. Cf. Massachusetts Province Laws, xvi. 5, 205, 365, xviii. 617, 707, 799, xx. 421, xxi. 513.
The statement that Bacon was a representative in 1780 requires a word of explanation. It will be remembered that there were two General Courts in 1780—one, the last under the State of Massachusetts Bay, which sat from May 31 to October 4; the other, the first under the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, which met on October 25. Bacon was elected to the first of these, but not to the second. For references to Bacon’s activities, see the indexes to vols, iv, v, xvi–xxi, of the Massachusetts Province Laws.
The Massachusetts Historical Society owns three letters written by Edward Bacon: (1) July 15, 1760, to Col. James Otis, “Respecting the Nova Scotia french Now with us” (signed also by Daniel Davis); (2) November 25, 1762, to Joseph Otis, about gurry; (3) March 29, 1771, to Joseph Otis, about the settlement of an estate.
596. See appendix, no. 12.
597. See appendix, no. 35. With the case of Deacon Edward Bacon may be compared that of Deacon Thomas Foster of the First Church in Plymouth. In the former case, the charges were brought by Deacon Bacon against certain of his brethren. In the latter case, the charges were brought against Deacon Foster by certain of his brethren. The charges came under four heads, the fourth as follows: “His Political Conduct & Practices are, we think, just matter of Offence, as therein he discovers a Willingness to have his Country enslaved—& is frequently found to be an Advocate for ye Destructive Doctrines of Passive Obedience & Non Resistance.” The charges were discussed at various meetings from March 12, 1775, to July 17, 1776. On the last date, “It being urged, that he [Foster] looked upon the Brethren, who were opposite to him in political Sentiments, to be Rebels, & of Consequence deserving ye Punishment of such; & he not denying or retracting his former Sentimts & declaring that he did not think it expedient to tell wt his Thôts were on yt head,—& not being willing to make any recantation, The Church Voted almost unanimously (20 Members present, all but 2 Voted) that they could not contentedly communicate with him at ye Lords Table.” Deacon Foster desiring further time “to think upon the affair” and a fuller meeting, “the Church readily consented that the meeting be adjournd for further time for mutual Deliberation, without proceeding to any formal Suspension of him from Communion.” Deacon Foster died on January 23, 1777, before final action had been taken. See our Publications, xxii. 346–348, 349–352, 353.
598. The donation was reported at the meeting in November, 1836. (1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, ii. 62.) At the meeting in April, 1837, Joseph Willard, the Recording Secretary, “Reported an abstract of the late Dr. Freeman’s papers” (ii. 80). This report is headed, “Memorandum of contents of Box of late Rev Dr Freeman, sent to the Soc after his decease—accords to directions in his life time.” The portion pertinent to the present paper is as follows:
“30 A file consisting of petitions & depositions in the matter of Edward Bacon Esq of Barnstable—1779—as a member of the H Rep of Masstts—and against his holding his seat—being unfriendly to the Revolution (These are original documents belonging to office of Secy of State).”
I am indebted to Mr. Julius H. Tuttle for finding Joseph Willard’s original report, which is referred to but not printed at ii. 80 note.
599. At the meeting in June, 1879, the committee to which the Council had referred the papers in question reported that “there is so much probability that they all (with the exception of the draft of Mr. Bacon’s speech), either are or should be the property of the Commonwealth,” that it recommended a vote giving the papers to the Commonwealth, and accordingly such a vote was passed. (1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xvii. 117–118.)
The documents are printed in the appendix to this paper, nos. 9–12, 14–34.
600. See appendix, no. 32; and cf. p. 276 note 2, above.
601. See appendix, no. 33.
602. See appendix, no. 31.
603. Dr. Freeman may have obtained the papers from one of his relatives, of whom at least four were members of the General Court that sat from May 27, 1778, to May 31, 1779. The Rev. Dr. James Freeman (1759–1835; H. C. 1777), who was born in Charlestown, was fifth in descent from Samuel Freeman (1638–1712), who was born in Watertown and removed to Eastham. (Freeman Genealogy, pp. 354, 356–357, 389, 405–406.) The Rev. Dr. James Freeman was also related to the Daniel Davis (1713–1799) who is so often mentioned in these documents. This was through the marriage of his sister, Lois Freeman, to Daniel Davis, Jr. (1762–1835), a son of Daniel Davis (1713–1799).
Barnabas Freeman (1737–1781), a representative from Eastham, was fourth in descent from the above Samuel Freeman (1638–1712). (Freeman Genealogy, pp. 366, 379–380.) Hence the Rev. Dr. James Freeman and Barnabas Freeman were second cousins once removed.
Samuel Freeman (1743–1831), a representative from Falmouth (now Portland), was fourth in descent from the above Samuel Freeman (1638–1712). (Freeman Genealogy, pp. 369, 383–386.) Barnabas Freeman and Samuel Freeman (17431831) were first cousins. This Samuel Freeman, besides being a representative, was clerk of the House and also Speaker pro tempore. One of the papers is signed by him in the latter capacity (see p. 265 note 3, above), and his name occurs in other documents.
Dr. (or Col.) Nathaniel Freeman (1741–1827), a representative from Sandwich, was fifth in descent from Edmund Freeman (d 1682). (Freeman Genealogy, pp. 72, 120–125.) It was he who informed the House on January 21, 1779, of the agreement that had been reached between Edward Bacon and his opponents: see p. 274 note 2, above.)
Solomon Freeman (1733–1808), a representative from Harwich, was fifth in descent from Edmund Freeman (d 1682). Solomon Freeman and Dr. Nathaniel Freeman were third cousins. (Freeman Genealogy, pp. 67, 112–113.) It was this Solomon Freeman who signed the depositions printed in the appendix, nos. 10, 29.
The Rev. Frederick Freeman was the son of Dr. Nathaniel Freeman (17411827). He was born in Sandwich December 1, 1799; was pastor of the Third Church in Plymouth from 1824 to 1833; later took orders in the Episcopal Church; was rector of St. David’s Church in Manayunk (Philadelphia), and at Bangor and Augusta, Maine; and about 1844 returned to Sandwich, where he died September 12, 1883, as I am informed by the town clerk of Sandwich. He was the author of Religious Liberty (1834), The Pastor’s Plea for Sacred Psalmody, Yaradee (1836), A Plea for Africa (1838), Africa’s Redemption the Salvation of our Country (1852), History of Cape Cod (1858–1862), Freeman Genealogy (1875), and Civilization and Barbarism (1878), some of which (due to the fact that his name appears on the title-page merely as “F. Freeman”) are not found under his name in catalogues. (Freeman Genealogy, pp. 120, 204–206.) In 1833 was published at Plymouth a pamphlet entitled “Abuse of Pastoral Influence. A Sketch of Mr. Freeman’s Pastoral Intercourse with Mrs. Cotton, previous to the Formation of the Robinson Church in Plymouth—1830, to which are added some Remarks.” The lady was Phoebe Cotton (widow of Thomas Jackson Cotton), who on April 16, 1822, was dismissed from the First Church to the Third Church: see our Publications, xxiii. 573. There is no author’s name on the title-page, but at the end the pamphlet is signed “Lemuel Stephens,” who was a brother of Mrs. Cotton.
When his father died, the Rev. Frederick Freeman was twenty-eight years old. He must, therefore, even if he had not consulted the Bacon papers in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society from 1836 to 1879, have known about them.
604. After this paper had been sent to the printers, Mr. Albert Matthews called my attention to some extracts which are of such interest that they are printed in the appendix: see no. 36, below.
605. See Freeman, History of Cape Cod, i. 430–452. Freeman (ii. 424–429 notes) also quotes an account written by Abraham Holmes in 1834.
606. Like the other justices and militia officers, Edward Bacon was obliged to sign certain declarations: see pp. 341, 344, below. On September 28, 1774, the Body of the People “Voted, That the chairman ask the town clerk of Barnstable, present, whether that town has discovered its attachment to the cause of the country, by choosing a representative more disposed to serve the country than the late one”—that is, Edward Bacon. “The chairman called upon the clerk to reply, and was informed that they had elected Daniel Davis, Esq.; upon which the Body testified their approbation by giving three cheers” (Freeman, i. 443).
607. See appendix, no. 12.
608. Writings of Samuel Adams, iii. 1–2. In a letter to James Warren of Plymouth dated January 10, 1775, Samuel Adams alludes to “the new-made Colonel, Justice Bacon” (1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xiii. 205). The following item, dated June 26, is taken from the Massachusetts Spy of July 1, 1773: “PROMOTED.] Edward Bacon, Esq; colonel of a regiment in the county of Barnstable” (p. 2/3). Cf. John Adams’s Works, ii. 320.
The heading of each document, printed in small capitals, is not a part of the document, but has been inserted for convenience.
609. The allusion is probably to Charles Paxton, who was born in Boston in 1708 and died in England in 1787 or 1788: see Boston Records, xxiv. 53; Musgrave’s Obituary, iv. 370; Gentleman’s Magazine, January, 1788, lviii. 83; Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, lvi. 343–352; Sabine, American Loyalists, ii. 153–155. In the last named work (ii. 474) there is a very brief notice of Edward Bacon. By the patriots, Charles Paxton was frequently alluded to as “Charles Froth.”
610. The records of this meeting were printed, with substantial accuracy, in the Boston News Letter of January 12, 1775, p. 2/2–3. That they were brought to Boston by Edward Bacon appears from the following extracts:
A correspondent observes, that nothing more plainly discovers the weakness of the cause of the Tories, than their great exultation at the blind imperfect exaggerated and unattested account of the late transactions of the town of Barnstable published in the anile Gazette of last Thursday—Like drowning men they catch at a straw. We have to say that good Mrs. Draper’s account of the matter is very little to be depended upon, and even allowing it to be true, it amounts to very little—A certain Placeman of that Town put into Office as some Priests were of old, for a morsel of bread, has indeed been hard at work there for some time, and has posted thro’ all the snow to the Capital, blowing like a Porpoise, to bring his own account of his own most important services, to them that hold the Bag—but time reveals the truth of all things; and when this shall appear, we believe the few insignificant Tories of Barnstable will hardly be able to save their B A C O N. (Boston Gazette, January 16, 1775, p. 3/2. “Good Mrs. Draper” was Margaret Draper, publisher of the Boston News Letter. Cf. Boston Gazette, January 30, p. 3/3.)
Last week a rare Flitch of B A C O N was sent by the tories of Barnstable to their suffering brethren in this town; good Mrs. Draper gave some imperfect account of this first donation to the tories; immediately upon its reception it was suspected to be tainted, and upon examination it was found to be totally unsound; the tories, however, such are the straits to which they have been reduced, fed deliriously upon it for several days together; . . . (Massachusetts Spy, January 26, 1775, p. 2/3. Cf. Boston News Letter, February 2, p. 3/3; Massachusetts Spy, February 9, p. 3/1.)
You may possibly have seen in the papers some curious resolves of the town of Barnstable, which were effected by one Bacon, a magistrate there, who procur’d one of the pamphlets written by Doctor Cooper of New York, which he read to the inhabitants and told them that Doctor Cooper of this town wrote it, and perswaded ‘em likewise that all the Sons of Liberty here were falling off in the same manner. As soon as he had obtain’d the resolves, he hasted up to town with them, and carried immediately to the press, since which he has tarried here with other refugees. Last week, the town of Barnstable, convinc’d of their error, had a meeting and pass’d a number of resolves entirely abrogating all of the other that were in the least derogatory to the cause of freedom; and execrate the author of their deception. (Letters of John Andrews, January 29, 1775, in 1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, viii. 398.)
The two Coopers alluded to in the last extract were the Rev. Dr. Myles Cooper (1735–1785), President of King’s College (now Columbia University), and the Rev. Dr. Samuel Cooper (1725–1783; H. C. 1743) of Boston.
611. For Harrison Gray, Treasurer and Receiver General of the Province from 1753 to 1775, see our Publications, xiv. 320–350.
612. Henry Gardner (1730–1782; H. C. 1750) was chosen Receiver General by the first Provincial Congress on October 28, 1774 (see Journals Massachusetts Provincial Congress, p. 38).
613. Massachusetts Broadsides, no. 1988 (Massachusetts Historical Collections, lxxv. 274).
614. Boston Gazette, July 8, 1776, p. 3/1.
615. For the sake of convenience, the names attached to the protests and depositions are arranged alphabetically. The name of Joseph Otis heads this list.
616. Boston Gazette, July 29, 1776, p. 1/1
617. The name of Joseph Otis heads the list.
618. New England Chronicle, July 11, 1776, p. 3/2.
619. Boston Gazette, July 8, 1776: see no. 4.
620. Daniel Davis (1713–1799) on May 30, 1776, was made a Councillor: see House Journal, pp. 5,
621. Boston Gazette, July 29, 1776, p. 1/2.
622. New England Chronicle, August 8, 1776, p. 2/1.
623. Massachusetts Archives, cexxii. 502a–b.
624. The name of Joseph Otis heads the list.
625. The following is from the Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 503:
In the House of Representatives June 1, 1779
To William Hickling of Boston and his Wife—Greeting
You are hereby required forthwith to make your appearance before the House of Representatives to give evidence of what you know relative to the subject matter of a Petition of a number of Inhabitants of the Town of Barnstable against Edward Bacon Esq Representative of that Town
Hereof you are not to fail
By Order of the House of Representatives
Samll Freeman Clerk
626. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 507a.
627. Id. ccxxii. 512a–c.
628. See no. 31.
629. James Otis the Patriot.
630. William Molineux (1718–1774): see Nellie Z. R. Molyneux, History Genealogical and Biographical of the Molyneux Family (1904), pp. 167, 169–174. He died October 22, 1774, a longish obituary notice being in the Boston Gazette of October 24, 1774, p. 3/2.
631. William Dennie (1726–1783): see H. M. Ellis, Joseph Dennie and his Circle (Bulletin of the University of Texas, no. 40, July 15, 1915), pp. 10–12.
632. For a memoir of Dr. Thomas Young (1731–1777), see our Publications, xi. 2–54. Dr. Young left Boston for Newport, R. I., on September 13, 1774 (xi. 36 and note).
633. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 516c–f.
634. Cf. Freeman, History of Cape Cod, ii. 316–318.
635. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 508b–c.
636. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 509a–b.
637. On March 30, 1780, a committee was appointed by the First Church, Plymouth, to discourse with a certain member, “endeavouring to bring him to a Sense of his Sin & Duty; he having absented for more than a twelve Month, both from Meeting & from ye Ordinance of ye Supper—upon no other Reason (as he informd ye other Cornittee) than because the people of ye Town in general treated him with Contempt—calling him a Tory &c” (our Publications, xxii. 355).
638. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 508a.
639. Perhaps “1776,” but if so it should be “1775.”
640. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 510a–c.
641. On this occasion Edward Bacon, Jr., came out, his service being thus described: “Private, Capt. George Lewis’s co., Col. Freeman’s regt.; marched on an alarm at Bedford, Dartmouth, and Falmouth, Sept. 6, 1778; service 5 days” (Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolution, i. 410). There is no allusion to this alarm in “A Statement of some of the Principal Facts, which took place in the Revolutionary War, in and about the County of Barnstable, on Cape Cod,” an eight-page leaflet printed in 1831. But accounts will be found in the Boston Gazette, September 7 (p. 3/1), 14 (p. 3/2); Independent Chronicle, September 10 (p. 3/2), 17 (p. 3/2); Independent Ledger, September 14 (p. 3/1), 21 (p. 3/2); D. Ricketson, History of New Bedford (1858), pp. 73, 278–299.
642. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 511a.
643. Id. ccxxii. 511a.
644. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 511a–b.
645. Id. Ccxxii. 507a. Id. ccxxii. 507b reads:
To the Honle the House of Representatives of the Massachusetts State The Deposition of Brigr Otis & others Taken and Seald up By me
Solomon Freeman
Justice Peace for the County of Barnstable
646. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 504d–f.
647. The name of Daniel Davis heads the list.
648. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 514a–b.
649. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 514c.
650. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 514c.
651. Lord Howe and Sir William Howe. Their declaration of September 19 was printed in the Boston Gazette of October 21, 1776, p. 2/1.
652. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 515d–f.
653. See “The French at Boston during the Revolution” (Proceedings Bostonian Society, x. 9–75).
654. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 516a–b.
655. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 513a–g.
656. The top of the sheet is marked “N° 1.”
657. Samuel Crocker (6 1732) and his brother Cornelius Crocker (b 1740): see A. Otis, Barnstable Families, i. 223 ff.
658. The second sheet of paper, marked “N° 2,” begins with this word.
659. See pp. 315 note 2, 317 note 2, above.
660. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 517a–c.
661. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 504a–b.
662. The name of Daniel Davis heads the list.
663. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 518a–c. The identity of this Edward Davis has eluded research.
664. Sir Robert Pigot (1720–1796).
665. John Hancock.
666. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 505a–b. See the next note.
667. Massachusetts Archives, ccxxii. 506a–d. At first glance, nos. 32 and 33 do not appear to be in the same hand; but a closer examination of the two documents and a comparison of them with the three letters of Edward Bacon already referred to (see p. 277 note 5, above), make it reasonably certain that both are in the hand of Bacon. No. 33 is hastily scribbled, while no. 32 is written in a more formal manner.
668. Here about seven lines are crossed out. Not all the words can be read, but certain of them—“I humbly hope for pardon when I repeat the Ease and happiness I now feel Compared with the feelings before a former House when I had been Repeatedly informed that some of the members, worthy members had in Company out of Doors prejudged and Condemned your unhappy Respondent as inimical unheard”—prove that the speech was delivered (or written to be delivered) in June, 1779.
669. January 13, 1779: see p. 273 note 4, above, and Note, p. 360, below.
670. Here a word is undecipherable.
671. Id. ccxxi. 257.
672. Id. ccxxii. 463.
673. Cf. A. Otis, Barnstable Families, i. 227–228.
674. Boston Evening Post of October 31 and November 7, 1774.
Attention has already been called to the fact that Freeman “concealed the names of tories who were disciplined in 1774 by an orderly assemblage known as the Body of the People” (p. 281, above). “The letters A. B., and so on,” wrote Freeman, “we employ not as initials, but use them alphabetically to designate different cases. Both the names and the initials of those suspected of toryism will be uniformly suppressed in this connection;” and he offered a lengthy apology for such a procedure (History, i. 437 note). The extracts in no. 36 enable me to identify most of the persons whose names were suppressed by Freeman.
675. An error for J. Pitcher.
676. This answer is signed by thirteen of the eighteen justices. The names of the other five are given in a declaration printed later: see p. 341, below.
677. Shearjashub Bourne and David Gorham. Both were among “the Gentlemen of the Law” who addressed Hutchinson on May 28, 1774: see Boston News Letter, June 2, p. 1/2.
Bacon was not an addresser of Hutchinson. But when Hutchinson became Governor in 1771, the justices of the Court of General Sessions of the Peace and Inferior Court of Common Pleas for the County of Barnstable drew up an address which on July 15th was “presented to His Excellency by Edward Bacon, Thomas Smith, and Isaac Hinkley, Esq; a Committee of said Courts” (Boston Evening Post, July 22, 1771, p. 1/2). This, of course, carried no implication of toryism, for it had long been customary to salute a new governor in that way.
678. The allusion is to Chillingsworth Foster, one of the justices. In February, 1768, the House adopted a circular letter to the other colonies. On June 21 Gov. Bernard sent a message to the House requiring it, “in his majesty’s name, to rescind the resolution of the last house of representatives, in consequence of which a circular letter had been sent to the several assemblies upon the continent” (Hutchinson, History of Massachusetts, iii. 195). On June 30 the question was put, “Whether this House will Rescind the Resolution of the last House which gave Birth to their circular Letter,” and, the question being then put, “the Members severally giving their Voice Yea or Nay, it pass’d in the Negative by a Division of 92 to 17” (House Journal, p. 89). Among the seventeen rescinders was Chillingsworth Foster, then a representative from Harwich. (See our Publications, viii. 95 note 1.)
679. Thomas Gage.
680. Edward Bacon, David Thacher, and Barnabas Freeman were “the late representatives” from Barnstable, Yarmouth, and Eastham, respectively (Massachusetts Province Laws, xviii. 799). Barnabas Freeman is Freeman’s S. T. (History, i. 450).
681. To this point, the extracts are taken from the Boston Evening Post of October 31, p. 3. What follows is from the issue of November 7, p. 4.
682. Shearjashub Bourne is Freeman’s C. D. (History, i. 438).
683. David Gorham is Freeman’s E. F. (History, i. 438).
684. Thomas Bourne is Freeman’s U. V. (History, i. 451).
685. Benjamin Fish, Benjamin Toby, and John Jennings are Freeman’s G. H., I. J., and K. L., respectively (History, i. 447, 449, 451).
686. Benjamin Bourne is Freeman’s W. X. (History, i. 452).
The identity of several persons to whom Freeman assigned letters escapes detection. A confession was drawn up to be signed by A. B. of Barnstable, who had threatened to cut down the liberty pole, but he could not be found (History, i. 437, 439, 441, 443). M. N, who was accused of saying he wished Boston was burned and Rochester in hell, “confessed that he had said words to this effect in a passion, expressed sorrow, and asked forgiveness of all. This gave satisfaction” (History, i. 448–449). O. P. and Q. R. were apparently concerned in cutting down the liberty pole in Sandwich; Q. R., “being the witness that informed and exposed the transaction, was excused;” what became of O. P. is not stated (History, i. 449–450). Y. Z. was one of those who made an assault on Dr. Nathaniel Freeman (History, i. 456, 461).
687. An error for “Blish.”
688. W. V. Wells, Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams, i. 497.
689. A political skit on “Massachusetts Faith,” printed in the Boston Evening Post of April 19, 1773, has these words: “And to compleat our Creed, we are bound to believe that . . . Dr. Y―g is a Saint and true Believer” (p. 1/1).
690. Perhaps Melatiah Bourne (1722–1778).
691. New Windsor, N. Y.
692. Boston Evening Post, October 25, 1773, p. 2/2.
693. Page 2.
694. Cf. our Publications, xviii. 349.
695. x. 417–418.
696. Cf. our Publications, xviii. 326 note 1.
697. W. Cushing, Initials and Pseudonyms, ii. 81.
698. D. D. Addison, Life and Times of Edward Bass (1897), p. 148.
699. Rev. Samuel Parker to Rev. William White, June 21, 1784: “Since the War two Clergymen have settled in this State, Revd. Mr. Lewis, who was Chaplain in Burgoyne’s Regiment of light Dragoons, left that Service and came to this Town in 1778 and settled at Christ’s Church; The other, the Revd. Mr. Fisher, who came from Annapolis in Nova Scotia in 1780 and settled in Salem” (Journals of General Conventions, in. 57).
700. I am indebted to Mr. Albert Matthews for several extracts and references
701. The words “commander of the Brigantine belonging to this State” are interlined in a different hand.
702. The Henry and Ann.
703. “The Prize above mentioned we learn arrived at Townsend at the Eastward the middle of last week” (Boston Gazette, Monday, October 7, 1776, p. 3/1). The Council Records of October 9, 1776, contain an “Order to Mr Timy Parsons to deliver Prize sent into Townsend to Capt. Souther.” The prize was sent to Townsend and was later taken possession of by Timothy Parsons, “Agent for the Eastern District, and by him removed to Wiscasset” (Council Records, xix. 265). The Continental Journal of October 24, 1776, contained the following advertisement, which was repeated in the issues of October 31 and November 7:
State of the Massachusetts Bay, Maritime Court, Eastern District. To all whom it may concern. A Libel is filed before me, in behalf of this State, and the officers, marines and mariners belonging to the armed brigantine Massachusetts, against the brigantine Henry and Ann, burthen about two hundred and fifty tons, Robert Tarrah late master, and her appurtenances and cargo. And for the tryal of the justice of the said capture, a maritime court for said district, will be held at Pownalborough, east precinct, on Thursday the fourteenth day of November, 1776, when all persons concerned in said brigantine, Henry and Ann, may appear and show cause, if any they have, why the said brigantine, her appurtenances and cargo shall not be condemned.
Timothy Langdon, Judge of said Court.
The final disposition of the prize is learned from an advertisement in the Continental Journal, November 14 and 21, 1776:
On Friday, the 22d November Instant, Will be Sold on the Wharfe of Richard Derby, Esq; at Salem. Two Hds. Queen’s Ware—2 Casks English Peas—20 Saddles, Bridles &c,—200 lb. Gun-Powder—20 very neat Carbines—2 Rifled Barrel do—20 large Cutlasses—20 very neat Pistols—20 Suits Soldier’s Cloaths . . . Also, The Brig Henry and Ann, about 300 Tons Burthen, English built, almost new, and extremely well found, and is justly esteemed one of the best Vessels taken during the present War. N.B. She will be put up precisely at 12 o’clock. By order of the Agent
W. Price Bartlett, Auctioneer.
704. Massachusetts Archives, cxcv. 289–290a.
705. This is clearly an error for Boxford.
706. Massachusetts Archives, clix. 459–460.
707. Samuel Holten also was ordered to draft the letter to Richard Derby (Council Records, October 3, 1776, xix. 259).
708. Council Records, xix. 258. The remainder of the order relates to sending soldiers and sailors to jail in Salem.
709. This “Captain Luke” was John Leche, commissioned March 4, 1775, Captain in the Sixteenth, or the Queen’s Regiment of (Light) Dragoons under command of Burgoyne. (W. C. Ford, British Officers serving in the American Revolution, 1774–1783, p. 108.)
710. Council Records, xix. 267.
711. The removal to Boxford did not follow very closely on the order of the Council of October 3. On October 30, “The Committee of Correspondence, Inspection, and Safety of the Town of Salem” addressed a complaint “To the honourable the Council of the State of the Massachusetts Bay:”
We find by an order of the honourable Board that Captain Leche, of the Light Dragoons, and the Chaplain, Mr. Lewes, were to have been sent to Boxford, after the Sheriff had taken their parole, and the common dragoons were to have been delivered to the Committees in this County, to be let to work; but that order remains unexecuted in every part, and for that reason many persons here are uneasy. . . . There is the greater reason for this uneasiness with regard to Leche, Lewes, and Peers, because neither of them has given the parole ordered by Congress. We therefore pray your Honours to give immediate orders relative to these prisoners, as well as the former. In behalf and by order of the Committee,
Tim. Pickering, Jr., Chairman.
The Council thereupon ordered Daniel Hopkins, Esq., to be a committee to take this letter under consideration and report what was necessary to be done (American Archives, 5th Series, iii. 421, 422). On October 29, 1776, Captain Leche addressed a letter from Salem to the Honourable Colonel Harcourt, Queen’s Light Dragoons, stating that “He and Mr. Lewis had been made prisoners of war on the 22nd ultimo” and desiring Col. Harcourt’s interest to get them exchanged (Manuscripts of the Earl of Dartmouth, in Historical Manuscripts Commission, 14th Report, Appendix, Part x, p. 465).
712. Sidney Perley, History of Boxford (1880), p. 231.
713. In the register baptisms are numbered consecutively, and here Mr. Lewis carried on Dr. Byles’s numbers. His own first baptism, September 27, 1778, is numbered 1.
714. Massachusetts Archives, cxcix. 385. This letter is entirely in Heath’s handwriting.
715. Massachusetts Archives, clxix. 48.
716. Council Records, xxii. 368.
717. Jacob Bailey (H. C. 1755) was born in Rowley in 1731. In 1758 he was licensed to preach by an Association of Congregational Ministers assembled at Exeter, New Hampshire. In the following year he became a convert to Episcopalianism, being influenced in his new choice by the Rev. Dr. Henry Caner and Dr. Sylvester Gardiner. He was ordained in England in 1760 and served the Church in Maine until 1779, when he received permission from the General Court to remove to Nova Scotia. He died at Annapolis, N. S., July 26, 1808. (C. R. Batchelder, Eastern Diocese, i. 41–4.)
718. There were a number of hiatuses in Bailey’s manuscript, indicated in the text by brackets. In view of the date of Heath’s letter it seems probable that the editor of Bailey’s manuscript placed the extract under the date of July 31 by error, owing to the mutilated condition of the manuscript.
719. Collections Protestant Episcopal Historical Society, ii. 357, 358.
720. Massachusetts House Journal, p. 51.
721. Id. p. 66.
722. W. S. Perry, Historical Collections, iii. 599–601.
723. The French at Boston during the Revolution, in Publications Bostonian Society, x. 22, 23.
724. Perry, Historical Collections, iii. 601.
725. “In 1778 the French Congregation, as it was then called, received from the American Government leave to use this church, which had been closed since the breaking out of the war, and it came very near being lost to our communion” (Rev. Henry Burroughs, Historical Account of Christ Church, Boston, 1874, p. 28). Mr. Burroughs followed the Weeks account cited in the text and enlarged a little on it.
726. See p. 173, above.
727. The French at Boston during the Revolution, in Publications Bostonian Society, x. 22, 23.
728. There are no vestry records from September 6, 1774, until November 6, 1778. In the treasurer’s ledger, following the last payment to Dr. Byles, for the year ending April 16, 1775, is this memorandum: “N.B. From the above date to July 29th 1781, by reason of the Church being a long time shut up & the depreciation of the Money at Various periods, & no Ballance belonging to the Church, the Accounts was not continued in the usual way.” The first entry in the ledger after the above statement is of April 7, 1782. As to the proprietors’ records it can be said that the annual meeting on Easter Monday seems to have been kept up all through the clerical interregnum, but practically nothing was done except to elect wardens and vestrymen for the ensuing year. In addition to the election on Easter Monday, April 8, 1776, the wardens and a committee of three were “desired to supply the Pulpit of this Church in the best manner they can.”
729. Written above “Samuel,” crossed out. The church officers at this time did not seem to have a clear idea as to what Mr. Lewis’s name really was. At the proprietors’ meeting in the following year, March 27, 1780, it was voted that the contribution which was to be taken up should be for “the benefit of The Revd Mr Saml Lewis.”
730. On July 18 [Thursday], 1776, the wardens and vestry of Trinity Church, Boston, voted that Mr. Parker should omit the State Prayers from the Liturgy. On July 14 the wardens and vestry of St. Paul’s Church, Newburyport, requested their rector, the Rev. Edward Bass, to omit them, and he assented under date of July 16. (Addison, Life of Edward Bass, pp. 154, 155.)
On July 20 the General Assembly of the State of Rhode Island enacted “that, if any Person within this State, shall under Pretence of Preaching or praying, or in any Way or manner whatever acknowledge or declare the said King (of G. Brit.) to be our rightful Lord & Sovereign, or shall pray for the Success of his Arms, or that he may vanquish or overcome all his Enemies, [he] shall be deemed guilty of a high Misdemeanor.” (Extract from Newport Mercury, July 22, 1776, in Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles, ii. 27, 28.) Stiles commented: “This was passed on Saty last. And instantly thereon the People of the Chh. of England in Newport cried out of Persecution, went and removed all their Prayer Books &c. & shut up the Church; And had no Service in it last Lords day [July 21], tho’ Mr Bisset their Parson was well & walking the streets” (Literary Diary, July 24, ii. 28).
In Philadelphia action was taken immediately following the Declaration of Independence. “The Liturgy of the Church of England was used, without alteration, until the 4th of July 1776: on which day, after the independence of the colonies had been declared by congress, a resolution was adopted at a meeting of the vestry of Christ Church and St. Peter’s, that in consequence of that event it would ‘be proper to omit those petitions in the liturgy wherein the king of Great Britain is prayed for, as inconsistent with the said declaration;’ and the rector and assistant ministers were requested to omit such petitions. No other change took place until the convention of 1785” (B. Wilson, Memoir of the Life of Bishop White, 1839, p. 136). At that time the Rev. Dr. Peters was the rector and the Rev. William White (later first Bishop of Pennsylvania), an assistant.
The colonies to the southward went a step further, however, and the Virginia Convention, on July 5, 1776, voted that the State Prayers should be omitted from the Liturgy, and resolved “That the following Prayer shall be used, instead of the Prayer for the King’s Majesty, in the Morning and Evening service: ‘O Lord, our Heavenly Father, high and mighty King of Kings, Lord of Lords, the only Ruler of the Universe, who dost from thy throne behold all the dwellers upon earth, most heartily we beseech thee with thy favour to behold the Magistrates of this Commonwealth, and so replenish them with the grace of thy Holy Spirit, that they may always incline to thy will, and walk in thy way. . . .’” Also in the Litany, a petition was added: “That it may please thee to endue the Magistrates of this Commonwealth with grace, wisdom, and understanding” (American Archives, 4th series, vi. 1614, 1615). In regard to this action the Right Rev. W. S. Perry wrote: “The Convention of Virginia, on the day following the Declaration of Independence, altered the Book of Common Prayer to accommodate it to the new condition of things. These alterations almost exclusively related to the supplications for those in authority, and throughout the State this requirement of the assembly met with little or no opposition from clergy or people” (The Church Review, 1887, 1. 63).
The Convention of Maryland took action earlier, and on May 25, 1776, after reciting that the king was prosecuting a cruel and unjust war against the colonies, and that the people of this province cannot with sincerity pray for the success of his arms, it was “therefore Resolved, That every prayer and petition for the king’s majesty, in the book of common prayer and administration of the sacraments and other rites and ceremonies of the church, according to the use of the church of England, except the second collect for the king in the communion service, be henceforth omitted in all churches and chapels in this province, until our unhappy differences are ended” (Proceedings of the Conventions of Maryland, 1774–1776, Baltimore, 1836, p. 156). The Convention displayed quite a touch of humor, whether conscious or unconscious, in excepting the second Collect, to which the sturdiest patriot of that time could have responded “Amen” with a clear conscience. It reads: “Almighty and everlasting God, we are taught by thy holy Word, that the hearts of Kings are in thy rule and governance, and that thou dost dispose and turn them, as it seemeth best to thy godly wisdom; We humbly beseech thee, so to dispose and govern the heart of George thy Servant, our King and Governor, that in all his thoughts, words, and works, he may ever seek thy honour and glory; and study to preserve thy people committed to his charge, in wealth, peace, and godliness: Grant this &c.”
The earliest instance, known to me, of an alteration in the Liturgy to accommodate it to the changed conditions, occurred at Christ Church, Cambridge, on Sunday, December 31, 1775, but it must be said that this was the act, not of a clergyman, but of a layman, Major William Palfrey, then aide-de-camp to General Lee. Palfrey wrote to his wife a letter dated January 2, 1776, but which the Rev. Mr. Hoppin, formerly rector of Christ Church, after an examination of the original manuscript, concluded was probably written on the 1st and a fair copy made on the 2nd. (Nicholas Hoppin, Historical Notice of Christ Church [Cambridge], 1858, p. 50.) “What think you of my turning parson? I yesterday, at the request of Mrs. Washington, performed divine service at the church at Cambridge. There was present the General and lady, Mrs. Gates, Mrs. Custis, and a number of others, and they were pleased to compliment me on my performance. I made a form of prayer, instead of the prayer for the King, which was much approved. I gave it to Mrs. Washington, at her desire, and did not keep a copy, but will get one and send it to you.” The prayer reads as follows:
“O Lord our heavenly Father, high and mighty King of kings and Lord of lords, who hast made of one blood all the nations upon earth, and whose common bounty is liberally bestowed upon thy unworthy creatures; most heartily we beseech thee to look down with mercy on his Majesty George the Third. Open his eyes and enlighten his understanding, that he may pursue the true interest of the people over whom thou, in thy providence, hast placed him. Remove far from him all wicked, corrupt men, and evil counsellors, that his throne may be established in justice and righteousness; and so replenish him with the grace of thy Holy Spirit that he may always incline to thy will and walk in thy way. Have pity, O most merciful Father, upon the distresses of the inhabitants of this Western World. Succeed and prosper their endeavors for the establishment of peace, liberty, and safety. To that end, we humbly pray thee to bless the Continental Congress. Preside over their councils, and may they be led to such measures as may tend to thy glory, to the advancement of true religion, and to the happiness and prosperity of thy people. We also pray thee to bless our Provincial Assemblies, magistrates, and all in subordinate places of power and trust. Be with thy servant the Commander-in-chief of the American forces. Afford him thy presence in all his undertakings; strengthen him, that he may vanquish and overcome all his enemies; and grant that we may, in thy due time, be restored to the enjoyment of those inestimable blessings we have been deprived of by the devices of cruel and bloodthirsty men, for the sake of thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord” (Life of William Palfrey in Sparks, American Biography, Second Series, vii. 405, 406).
731. June 21, 1784, Parker wrote the Rev. William White: “As no Alteration except that of omitting the Prayers for the King and Royal Family has taken place in the Churches in general in these States, I am desirous of knowing how the Churches at the Southward manage in this affair, that if possible a Uniformity as far as the civil government of each State will permit may be maintained” (Journals, General Conventions, iii. 58).
732. “One of our old Prayer Books has paper pasted over the ‘State Prayers,’ and was probably used by Mr. Lewis” (Rev. H. Burroughs, Historical Account of Christ Church, 1874, p. 28). The Rev. C. W. Duane wrote: “Doubtless one of our most interesting relics comes from his hand. This is one of the old Prayer Books, the gift of George II., having the prayers for the King and the Royal Family pasted over or so altered as to make it conform substantially to our present Book. We thus catch a glimpse of the way in which Liturgical services were conducted some ten years before the American Prayer Book was finally adopted” (Historical Sermon on the one hundred and seventy-fifth Anniversary of Christ Church, pp. 8, 9).
733. See our Publications, xix. 318–323, where it is surmised that the hand alterations in this Prayer Book were made by the Rev. William Montague, minister at Christ Church, 1785–1792. This surmise has since been fairly well verified by finding in the treasurer’s ledger a payment to Mr. Montague, entered under June 7, 1791, for “3 Books Alteration prayers” and under January 1792, for “2 book alterations prayers.” The only weak link in this chain of evidence is that it is not stated whether the books so altered were folios or not. Under July 27, 1792, Mr. Montague was credited with payment for “8 books alteration prayers in folio.” These latter alterations were probably made by insertion of the “partial folio” of 1792, printed by Thomas and Andrews, and advertised for sale in the Columbian Centincl of June 27, 1792. (Our Publications, xix. 325–326.) It should be said that prior to June, 1792, there was in existence no portion of the American Prayer Book printed in folio, so that alterations in a folio Prayer Book in 1790 or 1791 must of necessity have been made by hand. Four of the five folio books still in the possession of Christ Church were altered either by the partial folio of 1792, or the first full folio edition of the Prayer Book published in 1795 by Hugh Gaine in New York, or by a combination of both folio editions.
734. Journals of the Conventions in Massachusetts, 1784–1828, p. 5.
735. W. S. Perry, Sketch of the Episcopal Church in Portland, Maine (1863), p. 12. See also Batchelder, Eastern Diocese, i. 65.
736. Journals of the Conventions in Massachusetts, 1784–1828, p. 5.
737. In the treasurer’s ledger under date of October 22, 1784, is the record: “Cash p’d Mr. Graves Journey, 1.10.0.” Payments for service by him on Sundays are entered on October 25, 31, and November 15. The records also show that Thomas Fitch Oliver was paid for one Sunday, on November 8.
738. During his six years of service at Christ Church Mr. Lewis performed 264 baptisms, 73 burials, and 138 marriages.
739. The Independent Chronicle of Thursday, December 2, 1784, p. 4/1, advertised a “List of Letters remaining in the Post-Office, Boston, November 22, 1784.” Under the letter L was the name, “Lewis Stephen, Rev.”
740. F. Dalcho, Historical Account of the Protestant Episcopal Church in South Carolina (Charleston, 1820), p. 381.
741. Id. p. 435.
742. Minutes of the Vestry of St. Helena’s Parish, South Carolina, 1726–1812 (ed. A. S. Salley, Jr., Columbia, S. C., 1919). Although the imprint reads 1919 the book was not actually published until 1923.
743. Vestry Minutes, p. 168.
744. Pp. 169, 170.
745. Vestry Minutes, p. 171.
746. P. 174. 1705 is an obvious clerical error for 1785.
747. Mary Greene was born October 1, 1768. I am indebted to Miss Mabel L. Webber of the South Carolina Historical Society for information regarding the marriage of Mr. Lewis and the birth and baptism of his son. The Society possesses a copy of the St. Helena’s Parish register. Daniel John Greene was a member of the vestry when Mr. Lewis was called to St. Helena’s, and was elected a church warden April 17, 1786. He had also served as a warden in 1771 and 1777.
748. The god-parents on this occasion were “Col. Ed: Barnwell and Lady, and Mr. Daniel John Green.” The parish register shows that Mr. Lewis had two more children: William Bower Lewis, born March 13, 1788, died September 29, 1790; Elizabeth Mary Hooper Lewis, born October 29, 1789.
749. Dalcho, Historical Account, p. 475.
750. P. 474.
751. P. 478.
752. Vestry Minutes, pp. 186, 187.
753. P. 196.
754. Vestry Minutes, p. 197.
755. I am indebted to Miss Ellen H. Jervey, Librarian of the College of Charleston, for supplying this extract from the City Gazette.
At the time of the death of Mr. Lewis the church appears to have been indebted to him to the amount of £388.11.1, equivalent to more than two and a half years’ salary. On July 5, 1791: “It was agreed this day that the church wardens do pay into the hands of Mrs Lewis Executrix of Revd Mr Lewes, notes of hand of the several persons who are in arrears for Interest Money due on their Bonds, and that a discharge be taken for the said Ballce due to him of £388.11.1” (Vestry Minutes, p. 207). More than two years later, Mrs. Lewis having remarried in the meantime, “Mr Jno Grayson presented a power of attorney from Mrs Mary Wall Executrix to the last Will & Testament of her late husband Revd Step. C. Lewes, demanding payment of the Vestry for the dett due to her late Husband.—Mr Grayson proposed Receivg Bonds in payment on Consideration the Vestry agreed to pass to him
|
Danl Stevens’ Bond of £155. and £14.9.4 Int is |
£169. 9. 4 |
|
also John Joyners Bond Bond of £67. and £5.1.6 Int is |
72. 1. 6 |
|
£241.10.10 |
which Bonds are delvd. to him in part of said debt so oweing, the Ballce In said Este, to remain a further time till a full and final adjustment of accots can take place” (p. 212). The matter dragged on for a number of years. In April, 1808, the vestry “Resolved that the Church Wardens are hereby directed and authorized to liquidate the demands of the heirs of the Revd. mr. Lewis against the Church and to settle the same either by an assignment of Notes due the Church or in money as they can best arrange it” (p. 257). The last record appears under date of October 1, 1810, when “Doct Findley presented an order from Mrs Wall late widow of the Revd Mr. Lewis for $86.93 3/4100—the same was immediately Paid” (p. 266).
756. These notes have been incorporated in Mr. Bowles’s paper on “The Loyalty of Barnstable in the Revolution:” see pp. 265–345, above.
757. F. Freeman, History of Cape Cod, ii. 310 and note. The passage quoted will be found in Gordon’s History, London (1788), i. 423; New York (1789, 1794, 1901), i. 276.
758. Our Publications, xiv. 360 note 1.
759. In a letter to James Bowdoin dated London, May 18, 1770, Gordon said:
“I am coming over to America. Intend sailing with my wife & servant maid for Philadelphia or N. York, the latter end of July or beginning of August, but am not certain where I shall settle” (1 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, vii. 294). The preface to his “Plan of a Society for Making Provision for Widows, by Annuities for the Remainder of Life,” is dated “Roxbury, May 20th, 1772.” “We are assured,” said the Boston Evening Post of July 6, 1772, “that the Rev’d Mr. William Gordon, late of London, who has officiated for a Year past, at the New Meeting House, belonging to the 3d Precinct in Roxbury, has accepted of the Church and Precinct’s Invitation to the Pastoral Charge. We hear he is to be ordained this Day” (p. 3/1). In the same paper of July 13 there is an account of Gordon’s installation, followed by this paragraph:
“The Notice given, both as to the Day and Time of Day when this Solemnity was to be performed, was designedly very short, in order to prevent those Riots and Irregularities that too often happen upon such Occasions; and the Design was fully answered, insomuch as that there was not the least Appearance throughout the whole Day of any thing but the greatest Decency and Order” (p. 1/3).
In the sketch of Gordon in the Dictionary of National Biography, it is said that “In 1772 he was pastor of the third church at Roxbury,” and that “He was afterwards pastor of a congregation at Jamaica Plain.” The writer of the sketch was in error in supposing that these were separate parishes, as they were one and the same parish. The Third Parish was organized on December 11, 1760 (F. S. Drake, History of Roxbury, p. 420) and incorporated on April 25, 1772 (Massachusetts Province Laws, v. 176–177). What was the Third Church of Roxbury is now the First Congregational (Unitarian) Church of Jamaica Plain.
760. F. S. Drake, History of Roxbury, pp. 420–423.
761. Journals Massachusetts Provincial Congress, pp. 189, 291, 393.
762. Both of these sermons were printed, as also (in 1775) “A Discourse preached In the Morning of December 15th 1774,” a Thanksgiving sermon.
763. Four letters by Gordon, addressed “To the Freemen of the Massachusetts-Bay” and dated March 25, April 2, 9, and 17, 1778, were printed in the Independent Chronicle of April 2 (p. 1), April 9 (p. 2), April 16 (p. 1), and April 30 (p. 4). They were in criticism of the proposed Constitution that had recently been submitted to the voters. In his first letter Gordon said: “The Constitution, gentlemen, is submitted to your consideration—but how? In the lump—take or reject the whole—no alteration is proposed. Neither is it preceded or accompanied with a declaration of rights—the only instance of the kind upon the Continent.” On April 4 a committee was ordered in the House “to consider whether the Publication in the last Independent Chronicle, signed William Gordon, merits the particular Notice of the General Court, and report what is proper to be done.” Later in the day “a Report of the Committee of both Houses respecting Doct. Gordon” was read, considered and referred “to Monday next.” On that day (April 6) the report passed both Houses. (House Journal, pp. 216, 217.) The resolve reads:
“Wheras the Revd Doctr Gordon, (Chaplain to both Houses), by a publication under his signature in the Independent Chronicle of the 2d Inst has grossly reflected upon the General Court as having acted a legerdemain part in assembling the late Convention for forming a Constitution of Civil Government, & misrepresented their conduct in that important business: Therefore
“Resolved that he be immediately dismissed from the service as Chaplain to both Houses of Assembly & that the Secretary serve him with a copy of this Resolve” (Massachusetts Province Laws, xx. 345).
In his History of Roxbury Drake stated that Gordon “attacked, in a most pungent manner, Article V of the proposed Constitution of Massachusetts, a matter that, as a foreigner, it would have been more prudent for him to have let alone. This article, published on April 2, 1778, was immediately followed by his summary dismissal from his office of chaplain to both houses of the Legislature” (p. 402). This is not quite accurate. Article V provided that “Every male inhabitant of any town in this State, being free, and twenty-one years of age, excepting Negroes, Indians, and Molattoes, shall be entitled to vote,” etc. (Independent Chronicle, March 19, 1778, p. 1/2). Gordon’s criticism of that article is found in his second letter, which was written April 2 but not published until April 9. “The complection of the 5th article,” he wrote, “is blacker than that of any African; and if not altered, will be an everlasting reproach upon the present inhabitants; and evidence to the world, that they mean their own rights only, and not those of mankind, in their cry for liberty.” In his fourth and last letter Gordon thus speaks of his dismissal:
“Whether the General Court have proceeded wisely or fairly, in dismissing me from their service, as chaplain, for some questions or paragraphs in the first letter, let the world judge, when told, that they had no positive direct proof of my having wrote it, neither having inquired of the printers if they received the original from me, nor called upon me to know whether I avowed it—and that they never gave me the opportunity of offering what I might have had to say in my defence, wherefore they should not take that mode of censuring me.”
764. Cf. our Publications, xvii. 116–118. Under what title these were printed at Cambridge cannot be stated, since no copy is known.
Two years earlier there had been printed “An Abstract or [sic] the Lawes of New England, As they are now established. London, . . . 1641.” This code was drawn up by the Rev. John Cotton, but, “though often confused with the genuine Body of Liberties, it is well known to historical scholars that Cotton’s Laws were never actually in force” (id. iv. 295, 297). The Abstract was probably printed from an imperfect manuscript preserved in the collection of the Duke of Bedford, at Woburn Abbey, but Mr. Worthington C. Ford is convinced that “there is not a stroke of Cotton’s writing in these pages”—that is, in the pages of the manuscript in question. Probably they were prepared by some scrivener. In short, Cotton was not responsible for the printed title. Mr. Ford further thinks that the Abstract printed in 1641 “is nothing more than Moses’s Judicialls, and dates from 1636 rather than from 1641.” The reference is to a manuscript in the hand of Cotton, in the Massachusetts Archives, entitled “How far Moses Judicialls bind Massachusetts].” See Mr. Ford’s article on “Cotton’s ‘Moses his Judicials,’” in 2 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, xvi. 274–284. The 1641 Abstract was reprinted by William Aspinwall in London in 1655, when it bore a title which reads in part: “An Abstract of Laws and Government. . . . Collected and digested into the ensuing Method, by that Godly, Grave, and Judicious Divine, Mr. John Cotton, of Boston in New-England, in his Life-time, and presented to the generali Court of the Massachusets.” (Cf. our Publications, iv. 298.) It will be observed that “New England,” as found in the 1641 edition, disappears from the title of the 1655 edition.
The Body of Liberties, prepared by the Rev. Nathaniel Ward and adopted in 1641, was first printed in 1843 from a manuscript owned by the Boston Athenaeum which is entitled “A Coppie of the Liberties of the Massachusets Collonie in New England.” See 3 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 216–237.
765. Cf. our Publications, xix. 14 note 9.
766. Political State of Great Britain, January, 1715, ix. 81. Cf. our Publications, xiv. 360 note 1.
767. Historical Register, 1716, i. 359. Cf. our Publications, xvii. 92 note 7. “Jeremiah” Dummer is an error for William Dummer.
768. Political State of Great Britain, August, 1716, xii. 156. Cf. our Publications, xvii. 92 note 7.
769. Boston Gazette, June 14, 1773, p. 1/2–3.
770. New England Weekly Journal, February 9, 1730, p. 2/1.
771. Boston Gazette, June 14, 1773, p. 1/2–3.
772. The word “imprint,” as here used, includes colophons.
773. Cf. our Publications, iv. 297–480.
774. Cf. our Publications, iv. 201–289.
775. Most of my examples are taken from a series of articles on “Early American Imprints,” in which Dr. Samuel A. Green described six hundred books printed at Cambridge or Boston in the years 1643–1700: see 2 Proceedings Massachusetts Historical Society, ix. 410–533, xi. 19–22, xii. 273–279, 380–423, xvii. 13–75. Three (1649, 1651, 1656) are taken from Robert F. Roden’s The Cambridge Press, 1638–1692 (1905).
776. The earliest extant seal of Harvard College is appended to a testimonial dated July 3, 1701. The outside legend reads: “Sigillvm: Academiae: Harvardinae: Nov: Ang:” See our Publications, xx. 204, where the seal is reproduced in facsimile.
777. Massachusetts Province Laws, v. 179–180, 295–296, 737–738. My attention was called to the Marine Society at Salem by Mr. Stephen W. Phillips.
778. Could Mr. Freeman have lived until 1902, he would have been delighted with an inscription on a tablet in memory of Simon Willard (1604–1676) in that year set into the wall of Canterbury Cathedral. In this inscription are references to “the British Colony of New England, America, 1634,” to “the British Forces,” and to “the American Commonwealth.” See our Publications, xii. 134.
779. See “The Harvard College Charter of 1672,” in our Publications, xxi. 363–402.
780. In a letter to Governor Dudley dated January 20, 1708, Increase Mather wrote: “I am afraid that you cannot clear yourself from the guilt of much hypocrisy and falseness in the affair of the college. In 1686, when you accepted of an illegal arbitrary commission from the late K. James, you said, that the cow was dead, and therefore the calf in her belly; meaning the charter of the college and colony” (1 Massachusetts Historical Collections, Hi. 126).
781. Full particulars of the charters will be found in the Introduction to Volume xv of our Publications.
782. Cf. p. 254, above.
783. The precise meaning of the terms “Fellows of the House” and “Fellows receiving salaries,” as here used, is somewhat uncertain. But apparently “Fellows of the House” meant Fellows of the Corporation, and “Fellows receiving salaries” meant Tutors.
784. In each of these charters, thirteen Fellows are named and in addition “the two senior Tutors residing at the College for the time being.”
785. In each of these charters, thirteen Fellows are named and in addition “the two senior Tutors residing at the College for the time being.”
786. Ewer Papers, i. 60 (New England Historic Genealogical Society). The original has no heading.
787. Of the Fellows named in the charter, Joseph Belcher died April 27, 1723, and Henry Gibbs died October 21, 1723. Hence, as Leverett became President on January 14, 1708, the document must have been drawn up not before January 14 or after April 27, 1723. It seems likely that the earliest date is February 5: see p. 395 note 2, below.
788. Rev. Peter Thacher (H. C. 1671; d 1727).
789. The fourteen Fellows were:
- Rev. Nathaniel Appleton (H. C. 1712; d 1784); Fellow, 1717–1779.
- Rev. Joseph Belcher (H. C. 1690; d 1723).
- Rev. Simon Bradstreet (H. C. 1693; d 1741).
- Rev. Benjamin Colman (H. C. 1692; d 1747); Fellow, 1717–1728.
- Rev. William Cooper (H. C. 1712; d 1743).
- Rev. John Danforth (1677; d 1730); Fellow, 1697–1707. Henry Flynt (H. C. 1693; d 1760); Tutor, 1699–1754; Fellow, 1700–1760.
- Rev. Henry Gibbs (H. C. 1685; d 1723); Fellow, 1700–1707.
- Rev. John Hancock (H. C. 1689; d 1752).
- Rev. Thomas Prince (H. C. 1707; d 1758).
- Rev. Joseph Sewall (H. C. 1707; d 1769); Fellow, 1728–1765.
- Rev. Benjamin Wadsworth (H. C. 1690; d 1737); Fellow, 1697–1707, 17121725.
- Rev. Edward Wigglesworth (H. C. 1710; d 1765); Fellow, 1724–1765. Rev. William Williams (H. C. 1705; d 1760).
Of these, Henry Flynt was at once the only layman and the only Tutor. Appleton, Colman, Flynt, and Wadsworth were already Fellows when the charter was draughted. This leaves one Fellow unaccounted for. Thomas Robie (chosen a Tutor in 1714) had been elected a Fellow in 1722, but resigned on February 5, 1723, and the vacancy was not filled by the Corporation until June 4, 1723. Either, then, Leverett wished for some reason to drop Robie from the Corporation; or, more probably, the charter was not drawn up until after Robie’s withdrawal.
790. Edward Hutchinson, though not a graduate, was Treasurer of the College from 1721 to his death in 1752.
791. Here the words “Order the” are apparently crossed out.
792. Evidently intended for “Purchasing.”
793. Cf. T. W. Davids, Annals of Evangelical Non-Conformists in Essex (1863), p. 156.
794. The India china punch-bowl, from winch the brew was drunk, was given to the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1871 (1 Proceedings, xii. 174–176, 178, 180). The house was in Cornhill, part of which formed the alley leading to Brattle Street.
795. Cf. Wyman, Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, i. 319–323.
796. Both men kept journals during their imprisonment, the original manuscripts of which were left by Mr. Edes to this Society.
797. In the preface to her Annals of the Harvard Class of 1852, published in 1922, Mrs. Edes acknowledges her indebtedness to her husband, “to whose meticulous care in the reading of the proof and constant encouragement under the many difficulties that have arisen, in addition to the incentive of his interest, the volume is indebted for anything of value that it may hold.”
798. On Commencement Day, June 27, 1906, President Eliot conferred this honorary degree upon Mr. Edes, characterizing him as “Henry Herbert Edes, New England antiquarian and annalist, accurate reproducer of a reverenced past.”
In a letter to Mrs. Edes dated February 8, 1923, Dr. Eliot wrote: “I hope your husband realized how much I admired his historical and antiquarian learning, and his devoted labors in both subjects. For years I noticed his memorial zeal on behalf of the First Church of Boston, and marvelled at his success year after year in commemorating on its walls former members of the Church long dead but living again through his untiring exertions. His numerous historical and biographical writings will long keep his memory green.”
799. For this list of Mr. Edes’s writings, I am indebted to Mr. Albert Matthews. It is divided into two sections: the first includes separate publications and papers and documents printed elsewhere than in the Transactions of this Society; the second includes the papers printed in our Publications. In some cases titles and dates have been supplied by the compiler.
800. One hundred copies of this pamphlet were printed in a manner showing that Mr. Edes’s taste in typography was early developed.
801. Besides the papers fisted in the text, between 1868 and 1908 Mr. Edes contributed various notes, chiefly genealogical, to the New England Historical and Genealogical Register: see xxii. 197, 353, 463, xxiv. 426, xxv. 90, xliv. 209–210, 212–213, xlv. 338–339, lv. 445–446, lvi. 90, 408, lviii. 203, lxi. 396, 399, lxii. 383–384.
802. Several of Mr. Edes’s papers were issued in reprints, but it has not been thought necessary to specify these. Other references to Mr. Edes’s activities will be found in the indexes to the several volumes.
803. Our Publications, xx. 104–108, 280–285.
804. Bulletin of the Boston Society of Natural History, No. 31, December, 1922, p. 4.
805. Magnalia (1702), bk. ii. ch. ix. § 5, p.’27.
806. James L. Kingsley, Historical Discourse, delivered by request before the Citizens of New Haven, April 25, 1838, Note A, p. 75. The blunder about Morton is also found in E. Yale, The Yale Family (New Haven, 1850), p. 18, cf. pp. 23–26, 29–32; American Journal of Education, December, 1850, v. 715–721; Savage, Genealogical Dictionary (1860), ii. 97; in 1888 in the notice of Theophilus Eaton in the Dictionary of National Biography; and in 1904 by a former associate of ours in our Publications, viii. 341 note 2. When the last mentioned volume was published, Dr. Dexter called my attention to the error.
807. See the notice of Morton in the Dictionary of National Biography
808. Historical Papers (1918), p. 84.
809. New England Historical and Genealogical Register, January, 1899, liii. 82–83. See also Rodney H. Yale, Yale Genealogy and History of Wales (Beatrice, Nebraska, 1908), pp. 86–122.
The Thomas Yale who died in or about 1619 was a son of David Yale, in whose will (dated August 15, 1625, proved June 16, 1626) is a bequest “to David Yale, Thomas Yale and Anne Yale, children of Thomas Yale, my eldest sonne late deceased, twentie pounds a yeare.”
810. An inventory of his estate is dated August 27, 1619.
811. This error is found in T. Clap, Annals or History of Yale College (1766), p. 29; J. Savage, Winthrop’s History of New England (1826, 1853), ii. 217 note; J. L. Kingsley, Sketch of the History of Yale College (1835), p. 18; E. Yale, Yale Family (1850). In 1862 Savage (Genealogical Dictionary, iv. 666–667) mentioned both theories, but inclined to the correct one. The same work contains a puzzling statement. Savage asserts that “Dr. Stiles positively says” that Elihu Yale was the son of Thomas Yale, but gives no reference for the assertion. So far as I can ascertain, Dr. Stiles nowhere mentions Elihu Yale’s father. The explanation of the puzzle appears to be as follows. In 1826 (as noted above) Savage had made the same statement, quoting an extract from Abiel Holmes’s Life of Ezra Stiles (1798), p. 386. The extract is found in a footnote on that page, in “A Sketch of the History of Yale College” which fills pp. 383–402 of the Appendix, doubtless written by Holmes. The passage quoted by Savage is by Holmes placed within quotation marks. Hence, presumably, Savage concluded that it was quoted by Holmes from Stiles. As a matter of fact, the extract printed by Holmes is taken, with omissions and slight changes, from Clap’s Annals, pp. 29–30. Savage, therefore, should have said not “Dr. Stiles” but “President Clap.”
812. Cf. our Publications, xviii. 207–209.
813. Yale Biographies and Annals, i. 290–291.
814. Our Publications, xxii–xxiii.
815. xxii. 240. The sermon on the occasion by the Rev. Nathaniel Eells was printed in 1729 as “A Sermon Preach’d at Taunton, Feb. 21. 1728, 9. At the Ordination of the Reverend Mr. Thomas Clap.” That February 26, the date given in the Plymouth Church Records, is the right date is proved by a notice of the ordination which was printed in the New England Weekly Journal of March 17, 1729, p. 2/1. This begins, “Taunton, Febr. 27. Yesterday the Reverend Mr. Thomas Clap was Ordained Pastor of this Church.”
816. S. H. Emery, Ministry of Taunton, i. 294.
817. Vol. xxii. p. lii
818. B. Kingman, Epitaphs from Burial Hill, p. 4.
819. Another possible misunderstanding may be pointed out. “Why,” it is reasonable to ask, “may not the ‘Senior’ in ‘Smith Senior’ (or ‘Smith S r’) refer not to the individual Smith but to the class of which he was a member?” The reply is that during the period when the system of placing was in vogue, a member of the Senior class or of the Junior class was almost invariably called “Senior Sophister” or “Junior Sophister,” respectively. As it happens, two cases in point occur in the extracts here quoted. In one, dated April 30, 1730, there is reference to “Fogg Sen’ Sophister,” meaning Jeremiah Fogg of the class of 1730. In the other, dated June 5, 1731, “Saml Gardner Junr Sophister” is mentioned, meaning Samuel Gardner of the class of 1732. (See pp. 426, 427, below.)
820. Ipswich Vital Records, i. 315, 317.
821. College Book, iv. 120.
822. Hopkins Book, p. 4.
823. College Book, iv. 132, 138.
824. iv. 141, 151.
825. Wadsworth’s Diary, p. 58.
826. Id. p. 70.
827. Id. pp. 71, 80.
828. Id. p. 62.
829. College Book, iv. 84. This gift was announced to the Corporation on April 1, 1723
830. iv. 95. On the same day there was voted to “Rogers £3. Rogers 2 nds £8. Rogers 3 tlus £3. . . . out of the College revenue at Large” (iv. 95). These were, in the order named, Daniel (d 1785), Daniel (d 1782), and Samuel.
831. iv. 99.
832. iv. 342. Madam Saltonstall’s letter, as copied by President Wadsworth, is signed “M. Saltonstall.” There is in the Harvard College Papers (i. 150) a letter dated April 22, 1725, and addressed “To Reverd Mraers Wadsworth & Coleman,” the signature to which is somewhat obscure, as well as a few of the words. In his Calendar to those papers, the late William G. Brown wrote: “N. Saltonstall to President Wadsworth & Reverend Mr. Colman. Clause of Governor Saltonstall’s Will bequeathing £100 to Harvard. . . . The writer of the above letter was probably Nathaniel Saltonstall, H. U. 1695.” In my opinion, the letter is signed not “N. Saltonstall,” but “M Saltonstall”—i.e. Madam Mary Saltonstall, whose husband had died the previous autumn (September 20, 1724). On March 17, 1725, “A Letter from the Honble Maddam Saltonstal of New London dated March 3d 1724/5 being Layd before the Corporation informing them of a Donation of one hundred pounds to Harvd College by the Late Honorble Gov’ Saltonstal her Husband Voted—That Mr Wadsworth & Mr Coleman be desired to write a Letter of Thanks to Maddam Saltonstal entreating her to send a Copy of the clause in the Gov’s Will referring to said Donation” (College Book, iv. 101). The letter of April 22, 1725, is in part as follows:
“The Post yt brought yr letter has been sick, wch acot’s such a delay, yt I Recd it but last night; have acording to yr desire Inspected ye Clause of ye will: wch is only this It: I give to harvard Colledge one hundred pounds in bills of Credit; or money as it Passes wn pd & ye it be pd in a year after my decease: . . .
“I am asham’d my Poor scribles shod apear before Ye gentlemen of ye Corporation. . . .”
There cannot be the least doubt that the letter was written in reply to the one which Wadsworth and Colman had been requested to send Madam Saltonstall on March 17, and consequently that the writer was Madam Saltonstall herself. I t is to be remembered that from the death of John Leverett on May 3, 1724, to the inauguration of Benjamin Wadsworth on July 7, 1725, the College was without a President.
833. iv. 141
834. iv. 151.
835. iv. 155.
836. Faculty Records, i. 20. The exact date of placing is not given, but the names are recorded between meetings of September 30 and November 26, 1728.
837. This line has a course been inserted by me.
838. College Book, iv. 136.
839. iv. 143.
840. iv. 151. There is in the margin a reference to “p. 152”—that is, College Book, iv. 152.
841. iv. 152. The reference is to iv. 151.
842. Faculty Records, i. 22. The Oliver in question was Peter Oliver (H. C. 1730), afterwards the famous Chief Justice of Massachusetts.
843. Faculty Records, i. 36.
844. Under the heading “Special Bill to Buy Land. Gov. Baxter explains Proposal to obtain Fort McClary, at Kittery,” the following appeared in the Portland Press Herald of March 4, 1924:
“In explanation of a news report that a bill has been introduced in Congress to deed to the State of Maine certain land at Fort McClary, in Kittery, Governor Baxter today made the following statement:
“‘In 1808 when Maine was a part of Massachusetts the Massachusetts Assembly ceded to the U. S. Government 1.87 acres of land in Kittery for “fortification purposes.” The Federal Government also bought from private owners a larger tract adjoining this small piece, and constructed fortifications thereon.
“‘These fortifications have been abandoned for many years by the U. S. Government and under a recent Act of Congress the State of Maine has purchased the site for public park purposes. The small piece of land, of 1.87 acres, however, as it had been ceded for a special purpose, could not be sold by the TJ. S. Government and it becomes necessary to have a special act drawn and introduced in Congress ceding this back to the State.
“‘In order to clear up the title, Governor Baxter drafted an act of Congress and forwarded it to Senator Hale, who has consented to introduce it and follow it through the channels of Congress so that the State will hereafter own the entire Fort McClary project.
“‘This will clear up all titles and give the State of Maine the entire area, to be developed from time to time as funds are available.’
“The State was already in possession of Fort Kent, and Fort William Henry at Pemaquid. The restored castle of the latter fort contains a State Museum, with many objects of local historic interest, the greater part of which have been found in the surrounding ruins of the four forts which have existed on this spot.
“Fort Western has been purchased and restored by Hon. William H. Gannett, and his son, Guy Gannett, Esq., and presented by them to the City of Augusta. The remaining Block House of Fort Halifax is at present the property of the Maine Central Railroad.”
845. The following is taken from the Brunswick Telegraph of September 3, 1869:
“The people were gathering from all quarters to witness the ceremonies appointed for the day,—and they came on foot, in carriages, in boats, yachts, vessels of various sizes, in fact in whatsoever could be made available for the occasion.
“‘Long Cove’ or School District no. 17, came in an Ox team drawn by five yokes of Oxen. The wagon was fitted for, and bore 65 passengers. It was provided with a cotton awning, cotton being strung around its sides, and was literally entwined with flowers.
“A second wagon, with a booth of green boughs, and drawn by two yokes of oxen, also transported a large company to the spot.”
846. Pine-Tree Coast (1891), p. 227
847. Mr. Johnson was one of a committee, of which the Rev. Henry E. Dunnack (State Librarian) and Mr. William D. Patterson (State Commissioner) were the other two, to raise funds for carrying on excavations at Pemaquid during the summer of 1923.
Mr. Johnson expressed himself as not unmindful of the great amount of research already done by members of the Maine Historical Society, and the valuable results to be found in its Publications and in those of the State.