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Brief History
of the
Church of the Holy Trinity
Middletown, Connecticut
Catharina 5 Edwards
GEN
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01214 4496
GENEALOGY 974.602 M588BR
1
A Brief History
of the
Church of the Holy Trinity
Middletown, Connecticut
With Biographical Sketches
By Julia Ann Brazos
-
The Stewart Press Middletown, Conn. 1943
Dedicated in Loving Remembrance
of
EDWARD CAMPION ACHESON
Sixth Bishop of Connecticut
and For Twenty-three Years Rector of this Parish
2
"I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course. I have kept the faith."-II Timothy 4:7
"My marks and my scars I carry with me to be a witness for me, that I have fought His battles Who now will be my rewarder . .. So he passed over, and all the trumpets sounded for him on the other side."-Pilgrim's Progress
THE RIGHT REV. EDWARD CAMPION ACHESON
.
1
THE RECTOR'S FOREWORD
IT is a great pleasure to have the privilege of writing a brief word about the History of our Parish.
Miss Julia A. Brazos, who so graciously undertook the task at the request of the rector and vestry, is remarkably fitted for such an undertaking. She has worked hard and long and I think our people ought to know this has been entirely a "labour of love" on her part.
In preparing the history, Miss Brazos has contributed not only her time and energy but a wealth of information stored up from a lifetime association with the parish. She writes therefore with the freshness and intimacy of one who has always been a loyal, first-hand observer.
The book will serve as an admirable sequel to the History of the Parish which was prepared under Dr. Parks' rectorship near the close of the last century. The importance of providing such a record cannot be overestimated and I am confident the book will receive the wide reading it so richly deserves.
I'm sure I express the feelings of everyone in the parish when I say we are deeply grateful to Miss Brazos and to all who assisted her.
PREFACE
A MOST heartening note in undertaking the writing of this history has, from the beginning, been the voluntary offers and loans from members of the parish, of all sorts of material bearing on the past history of the church: minutes of meetings, booklets, reports, old anniversary sermons, newspaper clippings, programs, old copies of the Parish Visitor, etc. The fact that so many in the parish are treasuring these records of the past has strengthened in me the hope that there might be a considerable number who would welcome a bringing together of scattered mater- ial in a completion of the history of the church.
It is obviously impossible for me to list all the sources of in- formation to which I am indebted. For the resumé of the early history of the parish, I have drawn freely from Mrs. E. W. N. Starr's excellent history, as I have from other printed accounts. I gratefully acknowledge my indebtedness to several of the clergy in this diocese and to those in other dioceses with whom I have corresponded and who were most helpful in their cooperation. To all who loaned me material or gave me word of mouth informa- tion I wish to express my sincere gratitude.
To the rector, to Mr. Emery, to Mrs. Acheson whose rich and accurate memory has been of the greatest help, to Miss Helen Hall, Miss Adah Bielby and my sisters, Minnie and Alice Brazos, I am especially indebted: for reading manuscript, for valuable sugges- tions and information, for verifying statements, or for other help without which this little volume would never have been written. I would like also to acknowledge my appreciation of the valuable contribution made by Dr. Floyd W. Adams in preparing the illus- trations for the history. Some are his photographs of old photo- graphs, while the excellent one of the interior of the church was taken by Dr. Adams himself. Certain records compiled by Mr. Wesley K. Cramer have also been of great help to me.
J. A. B., April 1943
CONTENTS
Early History . 11
The Rev. Samuel David McConnell .
22
The Rev. A. Douglas Miller
28 31
The Rev. J. Lewis Parks
The Right Rev. Edward Campion Acheson 36
The Rev. Frank Flood German
49 54
The Rev. Clyde Daniel Wilson .
William Butler Davis
59
Joseph William Crosley
61
Berkeley Divinity School and Holy Trinity
64
Clergymen-Natives of Middletown-Members of the Parish Who Served in Other Fields
66
Three Additional Church Organizations
74 77
St. Andrew's Mission
. 80
. Old Records 84
87
Rectors and Clergy in Charge of the Parish, and Lay Readers 89 92
Community Service
Gifts and Memorials 98
Memorials and Improvements Suggested by the Rector 110
Present Church Organization 112
The Present Staff 113 .
Wardens and Vestry
117
·
. 118
.
All Saints' Mission .
Rectory Buildings
Our Heritage .
1
EARLY HISTORY
M ANY years ago a devoted member of the parish, Mrs. E. W. N. Starr, wrote an excellent and comprehensive history of the Church of the Holy Trinity, covering the period from its early beginnings to the coming of Dr. J. Lewis Parks as rector June 8, 1883.
At the request of the rector and the vestry, the present writer consented to take up the history where Mrs. Starr left off and bring it up to date. But, inasmuch as the personnel of the parish has naturally changed greatly in the past sixty years and that there are many entirely unfamiliar with the early history of the church, it was decided to include in this account a brief resumé of the early history of the church and also some account of the lives of Dr. McConnell and Dr. Parks.
At the last General Convention of the Church, held in Kansas City, October 1940, it was voted to contribute the sum of $300,000 to the Church of England, so hard pressed in carrying on its mis- sion work and in repairing and rebuilding churches damaged or destroyed by German bombs. The sum was given as promised and the American Church is continuing this help. This gift of money to the English Church is in recognition of the great assistance Eng- land gave the churches in America in colonial days. This aid func- tioned through the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, or the S. P. G., as it was commonly called. It sent clergymen over here, paid the salaries of these and of ordained American clergy, furnished books for their reading, and in various other ways helped to keep the struggling churches in the colonies going.
It is directly to this society, the S. P. G., that the Church of the Holy Trinity in Middletown, Connecticut owes its beginning. While we do not know definitely the exact date when services in accordance with the ritual of the Church of England were first held here, there is very little doubt that the Rev. James Wetmore conducted such services here, occasionally, as early as 1730. The Rev. Mr. Wetmore, a native of this town, was born of Congrega- tional parents December 31, 1695. He was a grandson of the Rev.
11
Samuel Stow, the first minister in charge of the old North Church here. Mr. Wetmore was graduated from Yale in the class of 1714. He studied for the ministry and in 1718 was called to North Haven, Connecticut, and in the fall of that year, was ordained in the First Congregational Church in that place. As pastor, he continued his labors there for four years, when he became convinced that the ordination under which he was ministering was invalid, whereupon he, with Dr. Cutler, Rector of Yale College, and Dr. Johnson, Pres- ident of King's College (now Columbia) of New York in 1721, declared publicly their belief in the Divine origin and perpetual obligation of the Episcopacy.
As soon after this declaration as arrangements could be per- fected, Mr. Wetmore sailed for England, where he was ordained priest in London July 1723. He was assigned by the S. P. G. as assistant at Trinity Church, New York City and in June 1726 he was appointed by the same society rector of the church at Rye in Westchester County, New York. It was while holding this position in Rye that, on his occasional visits to his relatives in Middletown, he held services here.
In his report to the S. P. G. Mr. Wetmore writes from Rye October 3, 1745, "I was three weeks ago at Middletown, Connecti- cut, the place of my nativity which I used to visit annually while my father lived there, and have not only preached among them and baptized many children and some adults, but taken pains in conver- sations with my relatives and acquaintances to give them just no- tions of religion and beget in them a liking for the Church of Eng- land; and I am rejoiced to see very hopeful prospects of a good church gathering in that place, chiefly promoted by some brethren of mine." The services first conducted by Mr. Wetmore were held in the home of his nephew, Ichabod Wetmore, whose house stood on the north side of Washington Street, a little west of where the Vermont Lodge now stands.
That the foundations laid by Mr. Wetmore were sound and deep is shown by the fact that when the Rev. Ebenezer Punderson, an itinerant minister of the S. P. G., came to Middletown to hold his first service here in the summer of 1739, he found "a group of one hundred sober-minded people" adherents of the Church of England. In Dr. William A. Beardsley's history we find that to- wards the end of 1742 thirty families at Middletown desired to be
12
No. 1 "CHRIST CHURCH," MIDDLETOWN, CONN. Built 1755 Demolished 1835
mentioned to the Venerable Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in hopes of future favors. The Rev. Ichabod Camp of Dur- ham, a graduate of Yale, who had been ordained priest of our Church in England, was appointed in 1749 by the S. P. G. as the first missionary to Middletown. Our records show that in 1764, the church received twenty pounds sterling from the S. P. G. for its support, and it is probable that this help was continued to an even later date.
On Easter Monday, April 16, 1750, the parish was organized and wardens and vestrymen elected, and it was not until about this time that services were held here regularly, either by a layman or by an ordained priest. On July 19, 1752, the Rev. Ichabod Camp, who had previously served as a lay reader, now became the first regular rector of the newily organized parish and it was largely through his efforts that the building of a church edifice was finally accomplished.
The Church in the colonies at this time was, of course, the Church of England and every clergyman at his ordination had taken a solemn vow of allegiance to the King of England. Middle- town, like all New England, was strongly Puritanical and the church here was looked upon with distrust and unfriendliness, as Episcopal churches elsewhere were. Later, as the relations be- tween the colonies and the mother country became hostile the Church was in a bad way. Many churches were obliged to close their doors; the clergy were persecuted and in many cases were in danger of their lives.
For some time before the appointment of Ichabod Camp as rector, a movement had been on foot here in Middletown to build a church, but the little group met with great opposition from both the officials and the citizens of the town before they could se- cure a site. After repeated refusals, a swampy piece of ground a little north of the head of Union Street, on what is now the South Green, was reluctantly assigned to the church. Steps were taken immediately to drain the land and to prepare the foundation of the church building, and at last, in 1755 a frame structure, fifty feet long and thirty-six feet wide, to be called Christ Church, was com- pleted. Its entrance porch with tower faced the west with the chancel at the east end. So far east of the present Green was it placed, that when the roadway for the Middlesex Turnpike was built the foundation walls were badly weakened and, eventually,
15
necessitated its removal at an earlier date than would otherwise have been necessary.
The bell which was hung in the steeple of the church was owned jointly with the Presbyterian Society and was used as a common bell by the town until it was broken and useless and, later, when a new bell was being considered, there is on record a note dated January 4, 1779, which states that, "The church will have no further connection in a bell with the said society." Many years later John Alsop, a member of a family noted in the history of the church for its generous support of all its undertakings, gave a bell to the church, the one still in use.
In the year 1786 property consisting of about an acre of land, a dwelling house and other buildings on the southwest corner of Church and South Main Streets was purchased for a glebe, or church property, by Christ Church for £200. This sum was sub- scribed by thirty-two persons, among them the names of Alsop, Mortimer, Wetmore, and Starr appear as members who subscribed for half of the funds necessary for the purchase. The society of Christ Church bound itself, "to use the principal arising from the sale of the Glebe for the purchase of real estate in conformity with the intention of the original donors of the property as soon as an advantageous purchase could be made; and, in the meantime, to lend the money to proper persons on good security and to use the interest therefrom arising for the benefit of the church." In 1809 this glebe, land and buildings, was sold to Thomas Mather for $1,500.00.
The Rev. Mr. Camp, after a rectorship here of eight years, was succeeded by Abraham Jarvis, a native of Norwalk and a graduate of Yale. He came to Middletown as a lay reader in 1761. Early in 1763, by tax and subscription, a sufficient sum was raised by the parish to defray his expenses to England for ordination. He received both orders, deacon and priest, in February 1764 and soon after sailed for home. Aug. 1, 1764 he was appointed rector of our church and continued to serve as such for a period of thirty-five years, with the exception of the interim when he went to England for his ordination. In 1797 Mr. Jarvis was chosen bishop, the second bishop of Connecticut. He continued to serve as rector here for two years after his consecration when he resigned and
16
No. 2 "CHRIST CHURCH," MIDDLETOWN, CONN. Built 1834 Altered for Russell Library 1873
moved to Cheshire and, later to New Haven where he died in May 1813 at the age of seventy-five.
At the time the first services were held in Middletown, there were no resident bishops of our Church in this country and all candidates for holy orders had to go to England for ordination or consecration, a long, expensive, and dangerous journey in those days. The consecration of Samuel Seabury, Bishop Jarvis' prede- cessor, November 14, 1784 in Aberdeen, Scotland was the beginning of the American Episcopacy in this country, and it was in our church here in Middletown, Christ Church, August 2, 1785 that Bishop Seabury met his clergy for the first time in this country. The next day in the same place four men were admitted to the dia- conate and on the following Sunday, August 7, 1785, one man was advanced to the priesthood. It was here in Middletown then that both orders of the ministry of our Church were administered for the first time in North America.
In 1834 the congregation of Christ Church, having outgrown the small building on the Green, a new edifice was erected on Broad Street on the corner of Court Street. The old building on the Green was demolished in 1835. The new edifice was a handsome, substantial, brownstone building and served the parish well for nearly forty years; then it, too, was outgrown and sold to Mrs. Frances A. Russell for $15,000 and was given by her to the city of Middletown November 13, 1875 to be altered and used as a public library.
In order to carry out certain provisions, as requested by the will of Mrs. Martha Mortimer Starr, a most liberal benefactor of the church, who died in 1848, the name of the church was changed by an act of the Legislature several years after her death, from Christ Church to what is now its legal name-The Church of the Holy Trinity. Among her bequests Mrs. Starr left a large tract of land bounded easterly by Main Street and extending westerly to Broad Street, the lot on which our present church building stands. On this land the house in which she had lived was located. It was afterwards moved up on to Broad Street to be used as a rectory.
In the seventy-seven years that elapsed from the resignation of Bishop Jarvis in 1799 as rector of the parish till August 1876 when the Rev. Dr. McConnell began his ministry here, the church was served by a succession of clergy whose names and terms of
19
office will be found in another section of this history. Some of that time the church was irregularly served, and most of the rector- ships were for short periods with the exception of that of the seventh rector, the Rev. Birdsey G. Noble who served fifteen years and that of the Rev. Frederick J. Goodwin, the thirteenth rector, who served the church from August 24, 1845 till his death in 1872, a period of twenty-seven years.
Under Dr. Goodwin's leadership the church grew steadily. In a sermon preached on the twenty-fifth anniversary of his rector- ship, he states that the number of communicants had increased four- fold during his ministry. The church on Broad Street built in 1834, was proving inadequate for the growing congregation and Dr. Goodwin bent every effort towards the erection of a new and larger church. June 20, 1870 a special parish meeting was held to consider the subject and Bishop Williams, having been invited to be present, addressed the group and gave his cordial approval to the project. It was voted to build the new church at a cost of not less than $55,000 on the lot on Main Street bequeathed to the parish by Mrs. Martha Mortimer Starr and called the Parsonage Lot. Dr. Goodwin worked unceasingly for the accomplishment of this undertaking. He lived to see the cornerstone laid but died before the building was consecrated November 4, 1874. The records state that there can be no question that his anxiety, labor, zeal, and self- denial connected with the building of the edifice in which we now worship shortened his life. Dr. Goodwin was greatly beloved not only by his parishioners but by the townspeople as well. Our beautiful church is truly a memorial to him. A lovely stained glass window was placed in the new building to perpetuate his memory. It bears the inscription :
He shall speak unto his people. In loving memory of Frederick Jordan Goodwin D.D. Rector for twenty seven years of this parish
There is also a memorial tablet to him in the vestibule of the church.
The main part of the building was occupied for the first time for public worship Easter 1874. Bishop Williams officiated and
20
preached the first sermon delivered in it. Through the efforts of Dr. Joseph Alsop sufficient money was raised so the debt on the church was cleared and it was consecrated later that year, on November 4, 1874 with thirty clergy in the chancel.
Dr. Goodwin died February 29, 1872. He was succeeded by the Rev. Walter Mitchell who had been his able assistant for about three years and who was elected rector April 2, 1872 and served the parish as such for four years. It was during Mr. Mitchell's rectorship and largely through his efforts that the work at All Saints' was started, a project which had been dear also to Dr. Goodwin's heart.
The Rev. Mr. Mitchell was succeeded in turn by the Rev. William F. Nichols who served as assistant rector for two years and later was consecrated bishop of California. Mr. Nichols was succeeded by the Rev. Samuel D. McConnell of Watertown, this state.
21
THE REV. SAMUEL DAVID McCONNELL, S.T.D.
1845 - 1939
-
A FTER the resignation of The Rev. William F. Nichols whc had served the parish for two years as an assistant, the Rev. S. D. McConnell of Watertown, this state, was called to become rector of the parish. The Rev. Mr. McConnell was born August 1, 1845 in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania. He was graduated from Washington and Jefferson College in 1868 with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. In 1887 the University of Pennsylvania con- ferred on him the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity. In 1897 Hobart College gave him the degree of Doctor of Civil Law, and later his alma mater conferred on him the degree of Doctor of Laws.
Dr. McConnell served the parish from August 13, 1876 to February 1, 1882. Although his rectorship was a comparatively short one the church prospered greatly under his ministry. He had a very pleasing personality, was an eloquent preacher and an emi- nent scholar, and possessed a wonderful knack of making and keeping friends.
He had, also, a very interesting family. His wife, Annie Bliss McConnell, who died in 1920, was a writer of some distinction and while living in Middletown wrote a novel, "Half Married", with the scenes laid in and about Middletown. While a new rectory was being built, the rector's family had lived in a stone building on the site of the present D.K.E. Fraternity house at Wesleyan, and some of the scenes are laid in this building. Prominent members of the choir, and of the congregation, as well as other townspeople figure in the cleverly written romance. It contains interesting incidents connected with a "shad bake" down the river which was attended by people well known in the community. It is understandable that
22
THE REV. SAMUEL DAVID McCONNELL
for a time, "Half Married" was easily a "best seller" in Middle- town. The McConnell's had two sons, neither of whom is now living: Ellicott, later an officer in the United States Navy, and Guthrie, a physician and a major in the United States Army in World War I. Ellicott never married. His brother Guthrie left a widow and three children.
Important changes in the management of the financial support of the church were made during Mr. McConnell's ministry. From early times it had been the custom to dispose of the sittings in the church by public auction held annually on Easter Monday, a "land- lord and tenant" plan, the most desirable pews going to the highest bidder. Dr. McConnell urged that this plan be abolished and that, instead, each family pledge a fixed amount for the annual support of the church. This method of voluntary giving, a radical change from the old plan for raising money for the support of the church, was adopted and resulted in an increased income. The plan is, virtually, the one still in use except that, instead of there being one pledge made for the family, now each member is asked to make a personal pledge. Another important change in the management of church affairs which was put into practice during Dr. McConnell's rectorship was the abolishing of the annual election of a rector.
The church school increased greatly in numbers under Dr. McConnell's guidance, as did the two missions and all other parish activities. The records state that with his coming a new era seemed to have dawned for the parish. So strenuous did the work become that, although Dr. McConnell had had an assistant for most of his term of rectorship, in attempting to cover the arduous and increas- ing work in the parish his health was seriously undermined and he had to take a prolonged vacation. While Dr. McConnell was absent from the parish, Bishop Williams, Dr. Coit, and Dr. Binney of Berkeley conducted the church services, and gave time to other branches of the work so that parish activities went on with little interruption.
During Dr. McConnell's rectorship, in 1881, a new rectory was built. He had occupied it only a few months when he received an urgent call to St. Stephen's Church in Philadelphia. Because of his recent severe illness, and on the recommendation of his doc- tor, he accepted the call much to the sincere regret of his people, for he was greatly beloved. Dr. McConnell was loath, too, to sever
25
his connections here. That he always cherished a warm interest in his old parish, is evidenced by the fact that, after the hurricane of '38 which caused so much devastation in this area, Mr. Wilson received a letter from Dr. McConnell, then living in Easton, Mary- land, and in his nineties, asking if our church building had suffered serious damage.
Dr. McConnell remained at St. Stephen's Church, Philadelphia until May 1, 1896, when he became rector of Holy Trinity Church in Brooklyn, New York. In 1903 he left there to become rector of All Souls' Church in New York City. Because of ill health, he resigned this position in 1904 and bought a farm on the Eastern Shore at Easton, Maryland, where he lived in retirement, doing occasional preaching, lecturing and writing, until his death January 11, 1939. Upon his death, his body was cremated and an urn con- taining the ashes was placed on the wall behind uniform tablets of his two sons in St. Stephen's Church, Philadelphia. A memorial ser- vice for Dr. McConnell was conducted at St. Stephen's on the Sun- day after the following Easter by the then rector of the church, Dr. Vincent C. Franks. Among those present were the Hon. Roland S. Morris, late ambassador to Japan and a long time vestryman of St. Stephen's, and also Dr. McConnell's nephew, the Rev. David M. Steele D.D., for thirty years rector of an adjoining parish. Dr. Steele says of his uncle, "He was a very great and a very good man and during most of my life, while he was practically father to me, he used often to refer fondly to the days of his rectorship at Holy Trinity Church in Middletown."
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