USA > Connecticut > New London County > New London > Annals of St. James's Church, New London : for one hundred and fifty years > Part 1
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Gc 974.602 N42ha 1235096
M
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
3 1833 01177 5811
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ANNALS
OF
ST. JAMES'S CHURCH
NEW LONDON,
TW-
FOR ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS.
BY ROBERT A. HALLAM, D.D., Rector.
" QUORUM MAGNA PARS FUI.".
The Church ress : M. H. MALLORY & CO., HARTFORD, CONN.
I873.
INTRODUCTION.
1235096
I HAVE been often asked to write the history of the parish; and for some years have entertained an indefinite purpose of complying with the request. The parish is very ancient,-the oldest but two of the parishes in the diocese. It deserves such a tribute, and presents ample materials for one; and by no one could the work be more suitably performed than by myself. Its child by my birth, my bap- tism, my confirmation, and my first communion, in my early days, and now for a longer time its rector than any other of its ministers, it seemed naturally to ask this service at my hands, and it is performed as a labor of love and of duty.
Its One Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary is at hand. Founded in 1725, in 1875 it will be one hundred and fifty years old. To that point of time I designed to bring down its history, and by the occurrence of that date to regulate my work; but life and opportunity are to all men uncertain, and my failure of health has of late said to me very signifi- cantly, " That thou doest, do quickly ; " "Work while the day lasts, the night cometh." To defer the task under these
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iv
INTRODUCTION.
circumstances, was to risk the opportunity of performing altogether. Hence, I determined to set about it without further delay, and have acted on that determination. This book is the result. I send it forth without apology. I deprecate no criticism. I solicit no praise. It is a simple unvarnished story of the past, with no higher aim than to set forth things as they have been and are, without conceal- ment and decoration, avoiding at once a tedious minuteness and a vague generality of statement; in one word, to tell the truth so far as the sources of information within my reach would supply me with material. That it is absolutely without error cannot be supposed,-ancient men and things have grown dim with time, records are imperfect, traditions are obscure, conjecture has to supply the place of certainty, and inference of results not positively known. Truth alone has been aimed at, and, as I believe, has, in all important particulars, been attained. The faded images of forgotten things have been revived, and the men and deeds of times long past stand before us, so far as may be, as they were.
I will simply say I have done this work as well as I could. My sources of information have been the records of the parish, which, happily, are extant from the year 1725 down to the present time, though the earlier portion of them are somewhat disconnected and fragmentary. I have derived much help from Miss Caulkins' "History of New London," a work of great and faithful research, and trust- worthy impartiality. I have also derived some assistance from the recollection of the accounts of aged persons, whose memories stretched back into the past, and who were
V
INTRODUCTION.
the contemporaries of my early days, but who have now vanished from among men., I now commend my book to the parishioners of St. James's Church, trusting that it may prove a fresh incitement to gratitude for the past, and of hope and courage for the future, and praying that He, with- out whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy, may increase and multiply upon them His mercy, that they may so pass through things temporal, that they fail not finally to obtain the things eternal.
ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
THE settlement of New London began in 1646. Miss Caulkins, in her excellent history of the town, denominates the 6th of May, 1646, its natal day. The leader of the first company of settlers was John Winthrop, the second of that name, the son of that John Winthrop who was Governor of Massachusetts, and who acted so conspicuous a part in the early history of that colony. The second John, the founder of New London, was afterward Governor of Connecticut, and the worthy deeds done to the country by the father and the son, have made their names justly illustrious among the founders of New England. The memory of this distin- guished family is perpetuated in the name of the town of Groton, opposite New London, which derives its name from a town of that name in the county of Suffolk, England, which was the original seat of the Winthrop family. The
first settlers of New London, anticipating great things from the noble expanse of deep and navigable water on which they had planted themselves, called the river, Thames, and their settlement, New London, hoping, perhaps, in due time, to rival the great city of their fatherland,-a hope of which time has furnished, as yet, but a slender fulfilment. The country had previously been occupied by the Pequots,
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
a fierce, warlike, and powerful tribe, who had acquired_the ascendancy in Eastern Connecticut, and exercised dominion over all the Indians east of Connecticut River by virtue of conquest or the spread of their own race. Hence, previous to the adoption of an English name, the English settlement was denominated Pequot, and the estuary of the Thames, which forms its capacious and beautiful haven, Pequot har- bor. A few miserable remnants of this once proud and potent tribe, and the subordinate bodies of Mohegans and Niantics, still linger, in poverty and degradation, in the land of their fathers, on reservations which they lack energy and industry to cultivate and improve.
Among the first settlers of New London, no trace is to be found of any attachment to the Church of England. A second company of settlers came, in 1650, from Gloucester, Mass., bringing with them their minister, the Rev. Richard Blinman, a clergyman in the Orders of the Church of Eng- land, who had been ejected for non-conformity from his cure at Chepstow, in the county of Monmouth. He is reckoned the first minister of New London, and seems to have comprehended in his charge all the inhabitants of the place. But neither he nor his people manifested any attach- ment to the Church from which a misguided conscience had led them to withdraw. For the accommodation of this new party of settlers, a new piece of land was taken up south- west of the town lot, which was called Cape Ann Lane, from Cape Ann, Mass., one of the two points within which Massachusetts Bay is included; a name which it still re- tains, though it remains even yet thinly settled, and has ever been an inferior and unimportant portion of the town. But neither in Winthrop's company, nor among the follow- ers of Mr. Blinman, is to be found any indication of attach- ment to the ancient Catholic Church of the English race. To find any such trace, we must pass over a period of a
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
little more than a half century. There are no extant indi- cations of the presence in New London of any avowed members of the Church of England until 1723, when a child of William and Mary Norton was baptized there by Mr. Pigot, the missionary of the Propagation Society in Stratford and the parts adjacent, by the name of John. This took place on the 17th of April in that year. In the year following, October 25, 1724, the Rev. Samuel Johnson baptized Sarah, infant daughter of the same parents; and in recording this baptism in his Parish Register, Mr. John- son makes this note: "N.B .- Mr. Talbot baptized Lau- zerne, son of Richard and Elizabeth Wilson, at New Lon- don, October 15, 1724." Thus it appears that John Norton was the first person episcopally baptized in New London, and these are the earliest signs of the Church's presence here. One would fain know more of William Norton and Richard Wilson who thus stood in the van of the now-lengthened train of their successors ; who they were, whence they came, whence they derived their knowl- edge of the form of faith so generally spoken against among those around them. But no such information is now to be obtained. The name of William Norton appears among those who subscribed to the erection of a church in 1725, and is appended, with those of others, to a letter addressed to Dr. McSparran on the subject, in 1726. But who he was, or how he came to be a Churchman, does not appear. And of Richard Wilson nothing is known but the record of the baptism of his son by the extraordinary, and, certainly, very un-Puritan name of Lauzerne. All honor to their memories. It appears, thus, that the attention of the mis- sionaries of the "Society for the Propagation of the Gos- pel" had thus early been directed to New London as a suitable field for their pious labors, and that they sometimes visited it, and gave it a portion of their services; but I*
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
whether statedly or only occasionally, I have not been able to ascertain.
Earlier than this, however, a circumstance occurred, which, though it is not known to have had any immediate bearing upon the introduction of the Episcopal Church into New London, is an interesting fact in the ecclesiastical history of the town. In 1702, the Rev. George Keith, originally a Quaker, who had taken Orders in the Church, and the Rev. John Talbot, who is supposed to have been, and not with- out reason, a bishop among the non-jurors, but who never assumed episcopal rank, or is certainly known to have exe- cuted episcopal functions in America, undertook, under the direction of the Propagation Society, an extensive expedi- tion through the country. The only place in Connecticut visited by them was New London. Of this visit Mr. Keith, whose account of their tour is extant, writes thus in his journal : "September 10, 1702 .- The next day we safely arrived at New London, in Connecticut Colony and Govern- ment, which stands by a navigable river. September 13, Sunday .- Mr. Talbot preached there in the forenoon, and I preached there in the afternoon, we being desired to do so by the minister, Mr. Gurdon Saltonstall, who civilly enter- tained us at his house, and expressed his good affections to the Church of England. My text was Rom. viii. 9. The auditory was large and well affected. Colonel Winthrop, Governor of the Colony, after forenoon services invited us to dinner at his house, and kindly entertained us, both then and the next day." Thus it appears that the text of one of the first two Episcopal sermons ever preached in New London, probably in Connecticut, was this: "But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His; " a not unpleasing preface to that protracted course of Christian teaching which has suc-
II
ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
ceeded it, with a faithful maintenance of the same precious doctrine.
The "Mr. Gurdon Saltonstall," of Keith, is that Gover- nor Saltonstall famous among the early chief magistrates of Connecticut, who, on being chosen Governor, resigned his pastorate at New London, and filled prominent positions in civil life till his death, in 1724, retaining his residence in New London, where he had been pastor, though he had en- tirely withdrawn from the exercise of all clerical functions. Such transformations were not uncommon among the Puri- tans of New England, and seem to have done no violence to their conceptions of the ministerial office. This same Governor Saltonstall it was who presided in the conference and debate on Episcopacy at Yale College, on the occasion of the defection of Rector Cutler and Dr. Johnson ; an event which filled the Congregationalists with astonishment and dismay. "I suppose," says President Woolsey, in his " Historical Discourse," "that greater alarm would scarcely be awakened now if the theological faculty of the college were to declare for the Church of Rome, avow their belief in transubstantiation, and pray to the Virgin." And Quincy, in his "History of Harvard University," says of it : " This event shook Congregationalism throughout New England like an earthquake, and filled all its friends with terror and apprehension." It is worthy of notice that a large part of the numerous descendants of Governor Saltonstall, probably a majority of them, have belonged to the Episco- pal Church, and among them have been numbered several of its ministers. The late Rev. Gurdon Saltonstall Coit, D.D., of Bridgeport, preserved among us the ancestral name.
In the interval between the visit of Keith and Talbot, and the first successful steps toward the erection of a church, the materials for a congregation of the Church of England had been gradually gathering, from what sources and by what
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
agencies cannot be clearly ascertained. There are no records extant that clearly set forth the facts. It is be- lieved, however, that the introduction of the Church here, and its early growth, were, to a great, perhaps a principal, extent, the result of the relation of the place to the British Government. Its advantages for commerce and navigation, and the expectation of its growth and importance on this account, soon brought in a class of residents who had no sympathy with the prevailing Puritanism of New England, and who, being, from office or decided preference or convic- tion, attached to the Established Church, desired an oppor- tunity to worship God according to her seemly and vener- able forms. The offices they held, as the English law then was, compelled them to be Churchmen nominally; and, no doubt, many of them were such on deeper and more spiritual grounds. They were not Puritans at home, and were not in sympathy with the Puritanism which they found dominant here. " Cælum non animam mutant, qui trans mare currunt."
Churchmen came here Churchmen, and naturally sought to provide themselves with the institutions and services which Churchmen love. Of those whose names appear in connection with the first steps toward the formation of a congregation, and the erection of a church here, several are known to have been Englishmen; and perhaps it is safe to infer that others, whose origin is unknown, were such also. At any rate, none of them can be traced by their name to the company of Winthrop or of Blinman. I think we are warranted in believing that the Church in New London grew up out of the wants of a class of its inhabitants who had been drawn thither by commerce or business, and who, having brought their Episcopal predi- lections and preferences with them, were glad to bring them into action as soon as an opportunity was presented. Neither Narraganset on the east, nor Stratford on the west,
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
planted the seed. Both gladly lent their aid to cheer and strengthen the growing blade when it began to shoot forth. The first founders of the parish, then, were English, not of the Puritan stock.
It is evident, moreover, that the young shoot starting into life and growth at New London, did not wholly depend for its nurture on the care of Dr. McSparran. Dr. Johnson, at Stratford, still continued to care for it, and extend to it a measure of his active service. In a letter to the Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, of the date of June II, 1724, he says: "I have since preached in New London, where I had sixty hearers, and where there is a good prospect of increase if they had a minister." And, in a postscript to a letter written August 14, 1725, he writes : "New London people are likewise going to build with all expedition. I have got considerable subscriptions, and a piece of ground to set it on." Hence, it is evident that he continued to interest himself in the rising parish, and exert himself in its behalf. So that while there is no disposition to derogate from the value of Dr. McSparran's services, it may well be doubted whether he does not rather overstate matters in calling himself, in so unqualified a way, its founder. Nearer and more accessible than any other min- ister of the English Church, they naturally resorted to him for advice and help. This he willingly afforded them, and the more readily because, by a matrimonial alliance, he was connected with some of their ablest friends and supporters.
The notices of their affairs are, however, too fragment- ary and disconnected to be easily framed into a continuous narration. Not till after the completion of the church, and the establishment of a missionary, do the records of the parish assume a continuous shape, and afford materials for an unbroken narrative.
The Rev. James McSparran, D.D., was, in these early
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
times, the missionary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Narraganset, embracing, in his field of labor, the country west of Narraganset Bay, all the southern and western part of Rhode Island, which was settled by many families of wealth and culture attached to the Church of England, who lived in a style of elegance and profusion exceptional among the first settlers of New England. To these people Dr. McSparran ministered many years, and extended his ministrations over a wide extent of country. A church was built on a beautiful eminence overlooking the bay, and thither the people from the country round, in every direction, far and near, resorted for their customary worship.
This building, though a wooden structure, being fash- ioned in the firmest and most durable manner, with the antique fidelity and care, was subsequently removed to the village of Wickford, a few miles distant; and though no longer used for the services of the congregation, is occasion- ally occupied, and seems capable, with a small amount of care, of surviving the changes and chances of a century to come.
The services of Dr. McSparran began to be extended to the incipient parish at New London, some time in the earlier part of the eighteenth century ; but at what precise date they began, and whether on his own motion or by invi- tation-whether they were stated or regular, as a recognized portion of his missionary labors, or merely occasional, as circumstances called them forth-it seems now impossible to ascertain. There are, in the old register book of the Nar- raganset Church-the Tower Hill Church, as it was some- times called-a few entries of official acts of Dr. McSparran in New London, that indicate his presence and ministrations there from time to time. That Johnson and Pigot were there from the western part of Connecticut, and baptized children on two or three occasions at least, we have seen,
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
and, in all probability, there were other ministrations of theirs of which no records remain.
But to neither of these sources, the Narraganset nor the Stratford mission, can the origin of the Church in New London be properly traced, though both aided in fostering and strengthening it to the extent of their power. The Church was rather the offspring of the early commercial importance and promise of the settlement. Of those whose names remain as the active founders of the congregation, most are known to have been Englishmen, who were members of the Established Church before their coming, and were never Puritans or Puritanically in- clined. Early in the century, vessels began to be built and fitted out at New London, and an active trade was carried on with Newfoundland and the West Indies. There was a port of entry here, and a collector of the customs. The gentlemen by whom this maritime and commercial business was carried on were Churchmen, for the most part, by whom the ministers of their mother Church were gladly welcomed and assisted; and, as their numbers grew and their means increased, the idea of erecting a church, and making provision for the regular maintenance of Episcopal ministrations, sprang up and strengthened, till it reached consummation. Miss Caulkins, in her history, after describ- ing .the early mercantile adventures and achievements of the place, and the English influence by which they were pro- moted, adds : "The residence of these English families in the town was not without its influence on the manners of the inhabitants, and their style of living. These foreign residents gradually gathered around them a circle of society more gay " (she means less puritanically precise and aus- tere), "more in the English style, than had before been known in the place, and led to the formation and establish- ment of an Episcopal Church." This is the true story of our
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
beginning. The nucleus of the Church was English, made up, not of Puritans converted to Episcopacy, but of English- men, to whom the Church of England was their natural mother, whom they had loved and honored from their childhood, and gladly welcomed when she presented her- self among them. Of this Church of the fatherland, mis- sionaries from the east and west alike contributed to establish, encourage, and strengthen; but they cannot be said to have introduced it in New London.
The first decided movement toward the very desirable object of giving the incipient congregation a local habitation and a name, was made in the summer of 1725. And here the ancient records of the parish first begin to throw light upon our researches. The earliest paper extant in our pos- session, is one which bears date June 6, 1725, and is the engagement of sundry persons to pay the sums annexed to their names, for the erection of a church. It runs as fol- lows :
COLONY OF CONNECTICUT, NEW LONDON, June 6, 1725.
Wee, The Subscribers, doe oblidge ourselves To pay the Rev. Mr. James Mc Sparran, or to his Substitute, he being Treasurer, The Particu- lar Sums affixed to our names, for the Building and Erecting a Church for the Service of Almighty God according to the Liturgie of the Church of England as by Law Established. And doe further oblidge ourselves to pay the sd Sums as the Treasurer shall have occasion for the same.
John Merritt, · £50 John Bennett, £3
Peter Buor, .
50 James Tilley,
. IO
John Braddick,
25 George Smith, . . 3 John Gidley, .
IO Nathaniel Hay, . 20
James Stirling, 25 James Packer, 5
Walter Butler,
IO Giles Goddard,
5
This engagement was not acted on directly. The reason of the failure or postponement, which ever it may have been, is now undiscoverable. But that the purpose was not abandoned, but, apparently, only deferred to be put into a
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
more practical and effective form, appears from a second paper, drawn up a few months later, which, as it was fol- lowed by the accomplishment of the object it contem- plated, has been considered the true beginning of the parish. Accordingly, September 27, 1725, is considered the parish birthday,-the day it began to have that visible being in the world which has now continued, without breach or interrup- tion, through all the vicissitudes and trials of a century and a half. This second document is as follows :
NEW LONDON, September the 27th, 1725.
Whereas Sundry Pious and Well Disposed Gentlemen in and around New London, in the Colony of Connecticut, being Earnestly Desirous of Erecting a Church for their more convenient and Decent Worshipping of God, according to the Usage and Liturgie of the Church of England as by Law Established, Did Subscribe to the payment of Sundry Sums Towards Erecting and Furnishing a Church in said Town of New Lon- don, as by a paper Bearing date June Sixth, 1725, may Appear, Reference thereto being had ;
In order, Therefore, to begin and Carry on ye Building of said Church, The Following Gentlemen, viz., John Shackmaple, Peter Buor, Esq., Maj. John Merritt, Capt. Jas. Sterling, Mr. Thoms Mumford, and Mr. William Norton, have formed, and doe by these Presents Incorporate and form Themselves into a Standing Committee to Agree for, Buy, Sett up and finish said Building, as well as to Purchase a convenient Place to Erect said Fabric upon, and Themselves Do Oblige Every Several Sum and Sums Contributed by well Disposed Christians for that good Work faith- fully to lay out and Expend According to the Consent, Voice and Direc- tions of the Major part of Said Committee at their Several Meetings; In Witness whereof, the Gentlemen to these presents have Voluntarily and Unanimously Affixed their names ye Day and Year above written.
JOHN SHACKMAPLE. PETER BUOR. JOHN MERRITT. WALTER BUTLER. JAMES STERLING. THOS MUMFORD. WILLIAM NORTON.
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ST. JAMES'S, NEW LONDON.
Along with this document is another of the same date, as follows :
NEW LONDON, September 27th, 1725.
The Major part of said Committee being present at the House of John Shackmaple, Esq., Proceeded to choose a Treasurer to receive and Pay out such sum or sums as are to be drawn out of the Treasurer's hands by an Order or Orders under the hands of a major part of so many of the Gen- tlemen as shall be present at such meeting whence such order or Orders shall Issue; and further, it is agreed that such Treasurer as shall be chosen by said Committee shall have full Power and Authority to con- stitute one or more to Act for or under him in said affairs, that said Com- mittee may, upon any failure of said Treasurer, proceed to a new choice of a New Treasurer, as well as upon ye Demise, Removal, or Refusal of any member to act, proceed to a new choice of a new member in the room and place of any Dead, Removed, or Refusing member.
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