USA > Connecticut > Connecticut as a colony and as a state; or, One of the original thirteen, Volume I > Part 27
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The growth of the college necessitated the erection of new buildings to provide proper accommodations for the students. The foundation of a brick structure was laid in the spring of 1750, and completed in the fall of 1752, being named Connecticut Hall; it was one hundred feet long, forty feet wide, contained three stories, and an attic which was re-
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modeled in 1797 into a fourth story; the building had thirty- two chambers and sixty-four smaller rooms. The expenses of the erection of the hall were defrayed partly from the pro- ceeds of a lottery, and partly from money arising from the sale of a French prize captured by a privateer of the colonial government.
At this time the revivals of George Whitefield were caus- ing great religious commotions in New England; churches were becoming divided with violent controversies; and Presi- dent Clap issued a declaration, signed by himself and mem- bers of the faculty, denouncing Whitefield's teaching,-thus causing the college to become an object of jealousy, giving offense to many and conciliating none. The faculty and stu- dents had attended public worship with the first ecclesiastical society of New Haven ; but the preaching of the minister not being in conformity with the orthodoxy of the college of- ficials, the president and fellows in 1746 determined to estab- lish a professor of divinity as soon as they could secure suf- ficient support. This was again agitated in 1752, and was sanctioned by the General Assembly, October 1753. The following November the president and fellows adopted reso- lutions, basing their government on the Assembly's catechism and the confession of faith which was part of the Saybrook platform. At the request of the corporation the president commenced preaching to the students in the college hall, pending the selection of a professor of divinity; this was the cause of loud complaints, as it was contended that the college was within the limits of the first ecclesiastical society of New Haven, and the formation of a religious society within the college walls was irregular and illegal. President Clap was equal to the occasion ; he issued a pamphlet in which he main- tained that the college had a legal right to the privileges of
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a religious society, in accordance with the views of the found- ers of this institution. Sufficient funds having been obtained in 1755, Rev. Naphtali Daggett was chosen to fill the new theological chair. For several months after his installation he preached half the time in the church of the first society of New Haven; but at the succeeding commencement the cor- poration refused to continue this arrangement, and the pro- fessor of divinity preached in the college hall until the erec- tion of a chapel. Thus a distinct religious society was formed within the college. A residence was finished for the profes- sor of divinity in 1758, at the cost of £285 sterling.
The college was now on a sound basis, owing to the firm- ness and perseverance of the president in filling the chair of divinity, and causing the corporation to pass the act endors- ing the Assembly's catechism and confession of faith. This had, however, created dissatisfaction among the clergy and laity throughout the colony, and the General Assembly was petitioned to establish a commission of visitation to inquire into all the affairs of the college. This was opposed by the president with vigorous arguments: he contended that the General Assembly had no more control over the college than over any other persons and estates in the colony; that while he acknowledged that the Assembly had been great bene- factors, they were in no sense of the common law to be con- sidered founders or visitors. The legislature refused to take any action in the matter, and it never has been a subject of public agitation since.
Additional buildings were required at this time, owing to the increase of students, partially due to their wish of avoid- ing military impressment during the French and Indian wars. The foundation of the chapel was laid in April 1761; it was to be a brick structure fifty feet long and forty feet wide,
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From the painting by R. Moulthrop.
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with a steeple and galleries. It was opened in June 1763, the third story being used as a library; the expense of the building was £715 sterling. The first president of Yale Col- lege, who had, by his talents and high reputation, advanced the institution to a distinguished rank, resigned his position at the commencement of 1766, owing to dissatisfaction in the faculty ; he lived but a few months after his abdication. The corporation elected as President Clap's successor Rev. James Lockwood of Wethersfield; but he refused the position, and Professor Daggett was chosen president pro tempore.
In September 1770 the professorship of mathematics and natural philosophy was established, and Rev. Nehemiah Strong became the first occupant of the chair, entering upon his official duties in December of that year.
At the request of the General Assembly, the laws in 1772 were published in the English language. The college also received from the State in 1776 an appropriation of £100 towards the support of the tutors for one year. For eleven years President Daggett discharged the presidential duties in connection with those of professor of divinity; he resigned his executive office in April 1777, but continued the duties of his professorship until his death in 1780.
The corporation, at a meeting held in September 1777, elected Rev. Ezra Stiles to the office of president. He had graduated at Yale in 1746, and three years later was ap- pointed to a tutorship, which office he retained six years. At the time of his election to the presidency of Yale College, Dr. Stiles was pastor of a congregation at Newport, Rhode Is- land. His people had become greatly attached to him, but the Revolution had scattered the members, and their min- ister had received an urgent call to settle at Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Stiles took plenty of time to consider this change
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in his affairs, and it was not until March of the following year that he notified the corporation that he would accept the presidency. His formal inauguration took place July 8, 1778, and the installation ceremonies were held in the college chapel; at the time the office of president was conferred on him he was likewise made professor of ecclesiastical history.
The number of undergraduates in 1778 was 132. The faculty, besides the president, consisted of a professor of divinity, professor of mathematics and natural philosophy, and three tutors, (the latter positions discontinued in 178 1 for lack of funds). The vacancy caused by the death of Profes- sor Daggett was filled by the choice of Rev. Samuel Wales of Milford; the professorship was never intended to be other than that of scientific theology, but at the installation of Dr. Wales the pastoral care and charge of the college church was committed to him. Hon. Philip Livingstone of New York in 1746 laid the foundation of a fund for the support of this professorship, which had been augmented by a donation from Mr. Gresham Clark of Lebanon. The bequest of £500 by Dr. Daniel Lathrop of Norwich, in 1728, was the largest contribution up to this period that had been received from an individual donor. Rev. Richard Salter, in 1781, deeded to the corporation a farm in Mansfield, which was sold for $2,- 000, and the funds arising from its sale expended in promot- ing the study of Hebrew and other Oriental languages. An- other benefactor of Yale was Rev. Samuel Lockwood, who in 1739 donated £100 for an addition to the philosophical apparatus; this department of the college had but a limited supply of materials, consisting, at the commencement of the school at Saybrook, of a pair of globes and a few of the most common mathematical instruments. Subscriptions were ob- tained in 1734, and a reflecting telescope, a microscope, a
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barometer, and various other articles were purchased; a com- plete set of surveying instruments was presented about this time by Joseph Thompson of London, England; and a few years after, Isaac Watts donated a pair of globes. An elec- trical apparatus and an air pump had been in possession of the college since 1749, and President Clap bequeathed an as- tronomical quadrant. Dr. Lockwood's donation was increased by other contributors to £300, and a complete equipment for the department was purchased in London; the reverend gen- tleman at his death bequeathed $1, 100 to the library fund.
It was not until 1780 that the corporation of the college consisted entirely of Yale graduates; out of the whole num- ber of fifty-six rectors and trustees, there had been four rec- tors or presidents, and twenty-eight trustees or fellows, grad- uates of Harvard. Notwithstanding that the patronage of the college was not sufficient to guarantee its self-support, it was deemed necessary in 1782 to erect a brick hall, sixty feet in length and forty feet in width.
President Stiles, who was well acquainted with the differ- ent controversies that had arisen respecting the constitution of the college, was favorably inclined, for the threefold rea- son of encouraging subscriptions, patronage, and assistance in counsel, that leading civilians of the State should be asso- ciated with the fellows in the management of the affairs of the college. Various plans were proposed, but they did not receive general approval, the difficulties arising from the fact that the legislature could not determine the compensation the State could afford the college for sharing in its internal gov- ernment.
The General Assembly had given an annual grant, and at various times had made appropriations, amounting in all to about £250 a year. By their charter the corporation chose
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the fellows and their successors, which were limited to minis- ters, thus creating a jealousy which embodied itself in legis- lation. In 1784 four petitions were represented to the Assem- bly, asking for legislative interference to alter the col- lege charter or to establish a new college under State patron- age. Continued appeals of the corporation to the Assembly for financial aid were regularly refused; it being urged by the opponents of the college that it was controlled by bigotry and opposed to all improvements in education, and hence un- deserving of public support.
At the session of the General Assembly in October 1791, a committee was appointed to confer with the college officials in reference to its needs and financial condition; the com- mittee made a favorable report, and submitted a plan pre- pared by the treasurer of the college. The national gov- ernment having assumed the State debts, it was proposed that the amount outstanding from unpaid taxes should, as collected, be devoted to the improvement of the college; this did away with the most important objection of the oppon- ents of the college, as it did not require the levying of a new tax. The Governor, Deputy Governor, and the six senior Assistants in the council, were to become trustees or fellows, and with the presiding officer and present board were to constitute the corporation for the government of the college. This proposition passed the legislature with hardly any opposition, and was accepted by the corporation in June of the same year. By the increased income secured by legislation,-which, including an additional sum voted in 1796, amounted to over $40,000,-the corporation was en- abled to re-establish the chair of mathematics and natural philosophy, and in October 1794 Joseph Meigs was elected to the professorship.
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Many of the students were obliged to lodge in the town for want of room in the college; which subjected them to unprofitable, idle, and vicious connections, having a ten- dency to introduce unsteady and disorderly conduct. The committee of the legislature had recommended the erection of another building, the foundation stone of which was laid April 15, 1793, and it was finished in July 1794; the struc- ture was one hundred and four feet long and thirty-six feet wide, and in commemoration of the union of civilians with the old board of fellows, it was named Union Hall.
The death of President Stiles occurred May 12, 1795. Owing to the illness of the professor of divinity, and the va- cancy in the chair of mathematics and natural philosophy, his responsibility had been greatly increased. As a scholar Dr. Stiles was familiar with every department of learning: he had acquired great familiarity with the Latin language, and was a proficient in Hebrew and Oriental literature. He was also an able administrator, and under him the college flourished more than at any former period. The number of students increased; the long controversies in reference to the constitution of the college were settled; it was the object of his constant solicitude, and to promote its interests he spared no effort. The college from its foundation had always been under the influence of Congregationalism; the original trus- tees were ministers of that denomination, their successors con- tinued to be of the same persuasion. In the first century of its existence the president was always a clergyman, and out of one hundred and ten tutors but forty-nine were laymen. That theology was the fundamental study of the college is shown by the fact that up to 1750, there were graduated 306 clergymen against 336 laymen. Up to this time, 2,372 followers of Hemingway's footsteps had entered
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the portals of the college, and of these over one-fourth were educated during the presidency of Dr. Stiles. The alumni of the first century of Yale College were largely confined to the natives of the State; but in the second century of her exist- ence she was to become more of a national than a local insti- tution in her influence and teachings. That by their individual achievements in the paths of education, the ministry, and national affairs, her graduates reflected glory upon their Alma Mater, is amply evidenced by the history of the pe- riod.
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CHAPTER XXV CONNECTICUT SETTLEMENTS IN PENNSYLVANIA
B Y the middle of the eighteenth century, Connec- ticut had begun to feel overpopulated. Ban- croft estimates its population at this time as 133,000; in the absence of developed manufac- tures, this was a fairly close settlement at that period, for a district of 4,800 square miles, largely uncul- tivable. We need not accept too literally the politic report of the secretary of the colony to the home government in 16So, when Connecticut had about 12,000 inhabitants, that in this "mountainous, rocky, and swampy" province most of the arable land was taken up, and the remainder was hardly worth the labor of tillage; but certainly with eleven times that number there were few good farms to be had, and new lands were needed for the overspill. The eyes of Con- necticut men were turned in two directions: to the north, toward the New Hampshire Grants, where their settlements presently resulted in the Green Mountain Boys and the appli- cation of the Beech Seal to the New York surveyors, and ultimately in the State of Vermont; to the west, toward the unsettled lands granted in Connecticut's charter, extending between the forty-first and forty-second parallels to the Pa- cific.
Unfortunately, in the latter direction two other grants lay across its path : New York, which had settled its territory too far west to be disturbed; and Pennsylvania, whose limits ran to the 43d parallel or the head of Delaware River, but which had not settled the portion within the Connecticut lim- its at all, it being still unbroken wilderness roamed over by the Delawares. This grant was eighteen years subsequent to the Connecticut charter, dating from 1681 : did it or not re- voke the prior grant to Connecticut of the same lands? The point was so far from coming under a clear principle of law
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that the best legal talent of England was divided: Pratt (later Lord Camden) for Pennsylvania being matched against Thurlow, Wedderburne, Dunning, and Jackson for Connecticut. It was agreed that had the district been occu- pied by effective Pennsylvania settlement, the prior Connec- ticut right could hardly have been pleaded; but not a white man had so much as a clearing or a cabin upon them, and it was held that the Crown could not re-grant the same territory so soon-that is, before the first grantees had had a reason- able time to effect occupancy.
This legal problem was not the only one at issue, however : there were two others, a political and an equitable one. Po- litically, if a later Crown grant to territory covered by a prior one were invalid, nothing but an internecine civil war all over English America could decide the conflicting rights; if valid, no colony had any rights at all against the caprice of the Crown. In practice, neither of these extremes would be likely to occur, and common sense and compromise would set- tle all; but the case of the New Hampshire Grants as well as Wyoming makes it evident that this could not be securely depended on. On the ground of equity, how long might a proprietary keep a huge mass of territory unsettled waiting its own pleasure? The Penn heirs in nearly three- quarters of a century had not settled a man on this, had no present intention of doing so, did not wish it settled ex- cept as a future feudal estate; claimed nothing but a right of pre-emption, and preferred to keep it as an Indian game forest rather than have white men take it up in freehold. Connecticut wished to make it a civilized land and increase the strength of America at once. It is not necessary to up- braid the Penns for clinging to their alleged rights; but Con-
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necticut had as good a case in law and in politics, and a better one in equity.
Thus urged by need and fortified by law and a good con- science (law not yet invoked, but fully assured), the Con- necticut people took vigorous steps to explore their lands and prepare an occupation that would bear down all antagonism. There was no attempt at stealth. In 1753 the Connecticut Susquehanna Company was organized, with 840 proprietors, subsequently increased to 1,200; "an unofficial movement of the whole colony," it has been styled. Advantage was taken of the Albany Congress of the colonies, called to frame a plan of union for defense ; and there, on July 11, 1754, the representatives of the company made a treaty with some of the Iroquois chiefs for a tract of land on the east bank of the Susquehanna, for the sum of £2,000 New York currency, or $5,000. This was turning the Pennsylvania proprietors' guns against themselves, to their wild indignation and alarm. Anything more worthless in law or equity than the Iroquois title to this tract cannot be imagined; but the Penns had estopped themselves thoroughly from disallowing it. An Indian title even to lands actually hunted over by the tribe was valueless, for reasons already cited; and the Iroquois had not even that vague claim to these lands, they having been occupied since our knowledge by the Delawares, whom the Iroquois had cowed into an acknowledgment of liability to be scalped if they opposed the latter. To account this the same as a civilized suzerainty,-or rather above any civi- lized suzerainty, which gives no right to sell vassals' property above their heads,-conferring a power to dispose of weaker tribes' lands on savages who could not convey a title even to their own,-was an absurdity of which Connecticut's pre- vious history shows that it was free; though it had always
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recognized an Indian occupancy right, to be fairly bought out. But from Penn down, his family had obstinately main- tained exactly this,-that Indian ownership and the Iroquois "suzerainty" over the Delawares were in all respects on a footing with the correspondent civilized relations. This was probably a politic recognition of facts much more than any real difference of sentiment or judgment : they were forced to buy off the Iroquois, or expose the settlement to massacre by the most terrible Indian power in America; and of course were bound to maintain the validity of the title they had pur- chased. At any rate, they clung to the fiction, and as late as 1736 made a treaty with the Iroquois by which the latter agreed not to sell any of their (including the Delawares') lands to any one but Pennsylvania. Now, eighteen years later (ominous period, the exact priority of the Connecticut to the Pennsylvania grant), the savages, as might have been expected, sold to the first substantial bidders what they wished. It adds the last touch to this bargain that while eighteen sachems (eighteen is the mystic number of Wyo- ming) concluded it and took their beaver-skin full of money, others, won over by the Pennsylvanians, declared that the former were drunk (which need not be doubted) and had no right to make the sale anyway (which of course under Indian law was true). This illustrates the value of Indian titles, which no one in the tribe was competent to grant, and which conveyed nothing that could be defined as against any other tribe. There seems no doubt, however, that so far as the heads of one tribe of savages had any right to convey title to the lands used by another tribe and owned by neither, the Connecticut company had bought the title; assuredly they had bought under the sanctions upheld by Pennsylvania for over seventy years. Subsequently another corporation was
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formed in Connecticut, the Delaware Company, which bought with similar validity the title to the lands west from the Delaware to the east line of the Susquehanna Company's purchase. But it was always a minor appendage to the lat- ter.
The Pennsylvania proprietors were indignant at this in- vasion of their pre-emption rights; and induced not only the Delawares to protest against their dispossession, contrary to the accepted Pennsylvania theory, but as above said, induced some of the Iroquois chiefs to deny the right of the others to sell. They also called in the services of the great William Johnson (later Sir William) to debar the Connecticut men from possession; with the famous interpreter Conrad Wei- ser, and others. Be it noted, however, that they still ex- pressed no purpose to settle the lands, but only to keep them for the Indians; and their Mohawk allies declared that they would not sell the lands to any one-they wished to preserve them for "their western Indians." But in May 1755 a com- mittee of the Susquehanna Company petitioned the Con- necticut Assembly for permission to apply to the Crown to be erected into "a new colony or plantation." Permission was given : it was evidently understood that the purpose was not to enrich Connecticut as a colony, but only to provide ulti- mately a new Connecticut where its citizens could feel at home and prosper. The outbreak of the French and Indian War prevented any actual settlement for a couple of years ; but in 1757 the first was made on its lands by the Delaware Company, at Cushutunk on the Delaware, and within the next few years several hundred settlers gathered there. Meantime the Pennsylvania proprietary was in intense excite- ment, and the question of ejecting the invaders of its preserve became its burning one even above the war. Northampton
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County, the nearest organized jurisdiction, issued procla- mations and notices to the intruders to evacuate the lands; and the proprietors appealed to England,-on which Con- necticut countered by sending Col. Dyer, the eloquent pro- moter sought after by the Windham frogs, to plead its case. The Council was bewildered, and the Connecticut set- tlement struck its roots ever deeper.
The real lines, however, for the long-drawn battle, prac- tically ended by the horrible Indian-Tory massacre of the Revolution, were laid in 1762. The agents of the Susque- hanna Company had selected for settlement the beautiful Wyoming Valley : a part of the Susquehanna Valley some twenty miles long by three or four broad, embracing rich bottoms a mile or even two back from the river, surrounded by ridge on ridge of mountains up to a thousand feet high. About two hundred male emigrants were sent on to lay the foundations of a colony, by making clearings, sowing grain, etc. They fixed on a spot near the river, below the present town of Wikesbarre; and early the next spring returned with their families and household goods. The season was a good one, and the harvests abundant; but three enemies of over- whelming force were lying in wait for their destruction. The Pennsylvania militia had concerted plans to eject them and destroy their harvests; the Delawares were brooding over their dispossession, and resolved to massacre the settlers de- spite the Iroquois ; and the Iroquois themselves, having spent the money, had no intention of allowing the settlers to occupy the lands for which they had paid it-not the only case of the kind. The blow of the first, however, was a little forestalled, from accident or design, by that of the second, precipitated by the third, who did not wish their agency to be apparent. The chief sachem of the Delawares, Tedeuscung, had become
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