USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Cornwall > Historical records of the town of Cornwall, Litchfield County, Connecticut; > Part 43
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BY REV. DR. S. J. ANDREWS.
MAJOR-GEN. JOHN SEDGWICK.
A graveyard lone among the hills, The headstones old and gray ; Mossgrown and blurred the words that tell Of those long passed away.
Here, in the silence of the morn, Is heard the leaping rill ; At evening shade, from hidden glade The plaintive whippoorwill.
Here woodbirds sing their joyous songs, The wild flowers bloom around, The morning sun, the evening star Shine on each grassy mound.
Here lay we down our soldier brave, The greensward on his breast, Where nature with her many tongues Doth speak of peace and rest.
Should rest where earliest life began, And its young powers revealed ; Where love had woven deathless bands, And not on battlefield.
Nor yet beneath the marble dome Amid the city's din; But 'mid the scenes he loved so well, With his own kith and kin.
And here shall soldier pilgrims come, The veteran bent with years, To stand beside his chieftain's grave, In silence and with tears.
And children from their hillside homes, When comes the breath of spring, Shall gather early blooming flowers, And here their garlands bring - Ah! sweeter far than trumpet's blare To hear the children sing.
So rest thee in thy lonely grave And wait the joyous hour - When He, the conqueror of death, Shall loose thee from its power. And then may'st thou His banner bear In resurrection might, A leader of the heavenly host, In armor clad in light.
9
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HISTORY OF CORNWALL.
CORRECTIONS FOR FIRST EDITION.
Pages
6 For 92° read 90°, in survey.
12 M. Samuel Abbott, for 1792 read 1742.
16
.. Walker read Waller.
17 *Tarrydiddle.
.. Dwight read Stiles.
19 Gen. Chas. F. Sedgwick gives another version : " Nature from her exhaustless store Threw rocks and stones and nothing more."
24 Loyal read Tryal. ..
30 John Boudinott read Elias, who edited Cherokee Phenix; hence erroneous tradition.
31 Erase " Japanese."
51 For David read Joseph Bellamy. .. Josiah Stephens read Hopkins.
53
53 Elias Birdsey read Ebenezer.
53 Darius Everest read Daniel.
53 Seymour Morris read Morey.
53 Nathaniel Swift probably Col. Heman.
Insert 1782 as date of settlement of West Cornwall.
57 92 For northern read southern section.
100 David read Joseph Bellamy.
100
.. 1826 read Jan. 10, 1827.
152-166 The descent of the Rogers family from the Smithfield martyr is questioned.
16I For Mr. James read Mrs. James Wadsworth.
161 .. Heaton read Rev. Mr. Hooker.
166 Erase "with his second wife."
175 For later read earlier.
18I 1787 read 1758.
IQI
.. 1810 read 1816.
192 .. Shame read Brave British boys.
193 mariners read masons.
197 Hotchkiss read Hotchkin.
.6 Theron read Brewin Beach.
20I 203 Insert Rev. Geo. Christie d. 1826. 210 See page 316, Ist Ed., for correct statement.
2II For old read new Cornwall Hollow Cemetery.
212 Insert after Ethan Allen, b. in Litchfield.
212 For Daniel read Joseph Allen.
21.4 This account of Capt. John Jeffers is not sustained by record. My father, who was nineteen when he died, knew him well and gave current tradition. Robert Baldwin has his saddle bags. His father was Capt. John Jeffers of French wars.
216 For Cream Hill read Canaan.
225
225 Insert Pendleton after Edward; also b. March 2, '24, d. April 4, '70. Transpose Edgar Elias to read Elias Edgar.
237 For 1850 read 1860.
237 Insert about - C. B. Furnace closed 1890.
* As to "Tarradiddle," not Tarrydiddle, page 17, it appears in the records century before last, and is not a corruption but itself a good old English word. (See Little Classics, Vol. I, page 58, etc.)
467
CORRECTIONS FOR FIRST EDITION.
Pages
2.13 For Ann read Anne.
243 .6 Thos. Marble read Mattle.
2.13 Kingstead read Ringstead.
243
66 Goshen read Northern Pa., later to.
214
.. Congregational read Presbyterian.
261
.. Lucretia read Lucetta.
262 Abigail, d. 1791, read July 2, 1799.
266 his, third line from bottom, read her.
269 Butler read Jasper Pratt.
271
Mary Ann read Anna Aurelia.
272
.. Kingwood read Ringwood.
283
.. Sexton read Seaton.
284
St. Edmundsbury read Bury St. Edmunds.
285 April 12th read April 23d.
285 1723 read 1724.
285
.. 14 in same line read 15.
287 289
.. after Guilford read Aug. 13, 1758.
291
Benjamin d. ae. 84 read 85.
292
Benjamin d. 1846 read 1847, ae. 85 ; his wife d. ae. 94.
293
.. Herman L. Vaill, 1842, read 182.1.
293
66 Clarissa Maria and Frances Gold Lovell exchanged middle names.
293
Insert after Boudinott, she d. and he m. 2d, Miss Delight Sargent of Vermont. Insert after Elizabeth, Sedgwick.
29.4
..
Elisha Sill, Feb. 14, 1788.
29.
6 Thomas R., Jr.
295
66 66 Hezekiah, he d. Feb. 22, 1847. Rachel d. April 27, 1836.
297 J. D. Cleveland, d. June 19, 1899. 66
299 For birth of Edmund Harrison. 1868, read 1768. 6. Records, headline, read Residents.
303
304 Danbury read Duxbury.
310 Julius read Julius L. Insert Sarah Sedgwick d. Aug. 18 or 28, 1758.
315
316 For 1869 read 1866.
317 William Adams read John.
333 E. Sole read Soule.
337 Insert in Index, Brewster, 272.
294
1766 read 1769.
>
REV. SAMUEL SCOVILLE. Courtesy of Dr. R. W. Raymond, Editor of Life of Mr. Scoville.
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APPENDIX.
Appendix.
THE 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BUILDING OF THE MEETING HOUSE AT NORTH CORNWALL OF THE 2D ECCLESIASTICAL SOCIETY IN CORNWALL, AND SERVICE IN MEMORY OF THE REV. SAMUEL SCOVILLE, AUG. 24, 1902.
ORDER OF EXERCISES.
Doxology. Invocation.
Psalter: 103 Ps.
Hymn: "Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah."
Scripture readings :
Regarding the Church Eph. 5: 25-27.
( 1 Pet. 2: 9.
Ps. I; Ps. I19: I-2.
Regarding a good man ( Matt. 5: 6-9. Rev. 22: 14. Prayer.
Solo by Miss Ada Sterling: "The Homeland."
Hymn: "Jesus, Lover of My Soul."
Sermon by the Rev. Dwight M. Pratt, D.D.
Prayer.
Personal estimate of Rev. Samuel Scoville, by Hon. Theo. S. Gold. Letter from Rev. Wm. B. Clarke, read by Dea. T. S. Gold.
Letters from Rev. J. A. R. Rogers, D.D., and Rev. Chas. J. Ryder, D.D., read by Rev. D. M. Pratt.
Addresses on the perpetuation of Mr. Scoville's spirit of devotion to native place and the old home church, by Sec. Dwight L. Rogers of the Boston Y. M. C. A. and Prof. Edward C. Baldwin of the University of Illinois.
Hymn: "In the Christian's Home in Glory."
Benediction.
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HISTORY OF CORNWALL.
A SERMON
BY THE REV. DWIGHT MALLORY PRATT, D.D., PASTOR OF WALNUT HILLS CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, CINCINNATI, OHIO, AT THE SEVENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE ERECTION OF THE PRESENT EDIFICE OF THE NORTH CORNWALL CHURCH, ALSO IN MEMORY OF THE LATE REV. SAMUEL SCOVILLE, A BELOVED SON OF THE CHURCH, AUG. 24, 1902.
Text : Eph. 5: 25-27. Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it, etc.
Ps. I: I-3. Blessed is the man who walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. . His leaf also shall not wither and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
According to God's chronology seventy-five years are as nothing. According to human reckoning they constitute a long period of time. With few exceptions, those who witnessed the erection of this edifice have all been transferred to the church in- visible. One honored deacon survives to tell the story of those early days. The great multitude have joined the innumerable caravan and moved on to the mysterious realm beyond.
It was a goodly company that built this temple of Zion and threw their energies into the construction of Christ's spiritual kingdom here. In simplicity of life, in sturdiness of character, in independence of spirit, in fidelity to Christian ideas, in family re- ligion, and personal piety, they were worthy representatives of their Puritan and Pilgrim ancestors, who through heroic endurance and victorious sacrifice won for themselves and their children the spiritual liberties which former ages had failed to secure.
It is easy to idealize the past. Filial love delights to attribute goodness and greatness to those who have gone before. And in many respects it is not possible to exaggerate the virtues of our fathers. They lived for God. They were true to principle. They made religion supreme. They exalted the Kingdom of Christ above the kingdoms of this world. They made the church the central and most important institution in the social fabric. Family religion was far more characteristic of the former genera- tion than of this. The average New England house was a nursery of intelligence and religion. No age or continent ever produced
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APPENDIX.
finer specimens of cultured Christian manhood than the generations immediately preceding this. The children of the Pilgrims in less than two centuries, and practically in one, have built a nation out- stripping in material splendor and power all the empires of the past. They have filled a continent with churches and colleges. They have built cities and mastered industrial science. They have pro- duced keener intellects, more inventive skill, more genius for dis- covery and conquest and growth, than any other race or nation on earth. The present age is an eloquent tribute to the goodness and greatness of the age that produced it.
It is not to be supposed that all the men of the past generation were saints or heroes. Many of them were exceedingly common- place and provincial. Many of them lived narrow and restricted lives. Many of them were materialistic in their aims and petty in their conceptions of manhood. Yet the representative spirit of the past age was noble. Its religious vitality, in spite of its circum- scribed environment, gave it a wide outlook. It had much of the prophetic fire and the prophetic statesmanship. We of the present age may look upon the life of our fathers as primitive, and upon their horizon as limited, but we can never escape the fact that they were, in the largest and best sense, empire builders. They knew the secret of manhood and national greatness, and because they were loyal to their convictions, we of this generation are the in- heritors of vast opportunity and blessing.
It would be an old story to rehearse the wonders of the past seventy-five years. Were our fathers to awake from their long sleep and witness the transformations of the past century, they would scarcely recognize this as the old quiet and staid planet on which they once lived. Instead of isolation, they would find the ends of the earth united through miracles of marvelous achieve- ment. They would find continents spanned with highways of steel and roaring with the sound of a ceaseless traffic; they would see oceans converted into highways of commerce, and distance and time annihilated by electric power. They would find the nations united by a brotherhood of common interests and common hopes. They would find the great capitals of the world - London, New York, San Francisco, Yokohama, and St. Petersburg-more closely united than the neighboring villages of their boyhood. They would look upon the splendors and realities of this age as a miracle,
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HISTORY OF CORNWALL.
a dream, a fairy-land. Nothing would surprise them more than in seeing the people of the earth thinking the same thoughts, using the same science, employing the same inventions, and coming more and more to the same ideals of life.
Since the corner-stone of this sanctuary was laid, the world has made more progress in every realm of thought and achievement than during all the previous milleniums of history. We of the present age can hardly comprehend the miracle of passing events. We are losing our capacity for surprise. We are wondering where the speed and momentum of modern progress are to lead us. We have also begun to shrink from the possibilities of the immediate future, knowing that if all these marvels do not issue in spiritual blessing, they will land humanity in some awful catastrophe of carnage and crime.
We do not mistake material splendor for prosperity, or think that because we have mastered the secrets of nature we are a more virile and godly race than our fathers. I am thoroughly an opti- mist. I believe the Kingdom of Christ is making rapid progress in all the earth. I do not allow the sins of the present age nor the appalling greed of accumulated power to make me pessimistic as to the outcome of the Kingdom of God on earth. I believe the great financial and social evils of the present will yet be mastered, and that out of the storm and stress and uncertainty of this hour, this generation or a later generation will emerge to a nobler man- hood and a more vital Christianity.
I believe this not merely because of my inherent faith in the gospel, but because that faith came to me out of a godly past. This church has stood for high ideals in days gone by. Many of us can remember back over at least half of its history, and can call to mind the noble men and women who sought to build a church and a community that would represent the best that mankind can know. The grandest monument to their integrity is not found in yonder cemetery, but in those who have reproduced their piety here among these hills or in far-off portions of the earth.
The older we grow and the richer becomes our experience of the grace of God, the more we appreciate the home of our child- hood and the worth of those who first directed our feet in the path- way of the divine life. The benediction of their piety, of their parental love, of their unwavering consecration, rests upon us today.
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APPENDIX.
All in our lives that is worth the having and all that gives abiding and growing satisfaction came out of such parental love and such Christian instruction.
To reproduce their spirit, their purpose, their altars of prayer and praise, is to make the best of all contributions to the age in which we live.
We cannot, today, enumerate the good men and women who have gone forth from this church to bless the world. Their names are already recorded in actual history written and published here. This church, like all the rural churches of New England, has done a work which can never be estimated by the arithmetic of earth. Men and women in goodly numbers have gone forth from these households to do valiant service for Christ in high places, in busi- ness, in professional life, and in the sacred calling of the ministry. In their work this church itself has wrought, and in their life this church has reproduced its own.
Since our last annual summer reunion another of her noblest sons has passed away. This anniversary service may well be made a memorial of him. Samuel Scoville was a characteristic Corn- wall boy. He well represented the product of these hills. He loved the soil on which he was born. He loved the people among whom he lived ; with whom he played in childhood ; with whom he shared the joys and experiences of mature life. Forty years of ministry in other and larger places never weaned his love from boyhood scenes or diminished his affection for friends of days gone by. Never have I seen a more beautiful love for home and for the old church home than his. He was a born lover. He loved the hills, the lake, the woods, the country air, the out-of-door life, the work on the farm, the school, the people, the church. He loved everybody and everything - provided it was good. The very life of the country worked itself into his blood and brain and heart. The bloom of boyhood rested on his cheek at sixty. He never lost it till the very last. He was never sick. He carried the sweet- ness and joy and strength and elasticity and hopefulness of boy- hood on into mature life. He was the youngest man at sixty-five I ever knew. He swam the lake and roamed the hills with as much zest at three-score as at twenty. The annual vacation, with its home-coming and renewal of early joys, was an ever-increasing delight. He loved Cornwall and Cornwall loved him. The
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HISTORY OF CORNWALL.
people were proud of him as a boy, and especially as a college boy and theologue and young pastor. They always anticipated with pleasure his home-coming. The largeness of his sympathy, his open-heartedness, his utter freedom from the conventional and formal, his frank, familiar, friendly way with every one, made him a universal favorite. He was one of the most fraternal and neigh- borly men ever born among these hills. Tall, handsome, virile, athletic, manly, enthusiastic, he was in form and feature, in spirit and expression, as noble a son as Cornwall ever produced.
Nor were his attractiveness and power the mere outcome of natural grace. Samuel Scoville was a Christian. As a boy he gave himself with unreserved heartiness to Jesus Christ. His mature love always retained the sweetness and sincerity, the en- thusiasm and winsomeness of his early consecration. He loved Christ. This love was the passion of his life. Many a time have I stretched with him upon the grass, in the friendly warmth of those August days, and chatted with him of our common interests and hopes. He was delightfully unreserved with his trusted friends and in the intimacies of familiar converse opened most freely his innermost heart. And it was a heart singularly free from evil thought or purpose. He was ever dwelling upon his work, ever planning to do some one a good, ever wishing that he might lead the unconverted to Christ,
This was peculiarly his attitude towards his native place. He was constantly contriving how he might bring some good to Corn- wall; how he might awaken in his fellow-townsmen more enthu- siasm for their local institutions and interests ; how he might culti- vate neighborly fellowship and affection, and bring the people closer together in mutual love and helpfulness. He was the mov- ing spirit in our summer picnics and annual reunions. He was eager to see the old homes preserved and prospered. He sought to awaken in all who had gone forth from Cornwall a growing love for native place. He did all in his power to encourage sons and daughters, visitors and friends to make their annual pilgrimage here. Beautiful and rare was his devotion to the old home, and during the last week of his life he was constantly speaking of the things he wished done or the improvements that ought to be made. As a community of neighbors and friends we owe an unspeakable debt of gratitude to this large-hearted, brotherly man. We miss
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APPENDIX.
him today with an oppressive sense of loneliness and loss which words cannot express. The feeling of deep bereavement is not limited to the family circle. We all are burdened with grief. We all find it difficult to keep the tears from coursing down our cheeks in view of the place in our beloved circle made vacant by his death.
I do not wonder that he wished to be buried in Cornwall. His heart was among the hills and with his kindred and boyhood friends. His life work was elsewhere; his most abiding attach- ment here. His death was serene and confident. Beautifully was it described in the following poem by Dr. R. W. Raymond, superintendent of the Plymouth Sunday-school :
Erect, alert, undaunted still. The weary, wounded veteran stands, Waiting to hear the Captain's will, And heeding nought save His commands.
In vain we whisper through our grief, "Lay down thy weapons; take thy rest ! Behold the Angel of Relief Approaches at thy Lord's behest !"
"Not so," he saith ; "I pledged my Lord In youth the life Hle gave me then ; And only at His own clear word Will I surrender it again !"
Then through the night his lips were dumb; But as the dawn dispelled the shade, The voice he knew said plainly "Come!" And in glad silence he obeyed.
Thou knowest, Lord, Thy soldier true; For Thou, Thyself, didst set him free, When he had fought the good fight through, And kept the faith once pledged to Thee.
The story of his life contributes a rich chapter to Cornwall history. His boyhood on the farm, the joyousness and nobility of his college life at New Haven, his acquaintance with the Beecher family, his trip to Europe, romantic courtship, happy marriage, his enthusiastic and successful pastorate of twenty years at Norwich, N. Y., his equally long and affectionate pastorate at Stamford, his call as assistant pastor of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, made famous by the fame of his father-in-law, Henry Ward Beecher,
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HISTORY OF CORNWALL.
the marriage of his children, the annual visits to Cornwall, his love of kindred and friends, and his devotion to the Kingdom of God - these are all familiar to the people of this church and will make his name conspicuous among the honored men who have had their birthplace here.
We thank God for the testimony of his life. We thank God for the contribution he made to the spiritual unity and good fel- lowship of this church. He was a harmonizer, a unifier. His sympathies were democratic and his spirit fraternal. His long pas- torates are substantial proof of this. No other than a strong per- sonality can remain for twenty years pastor of a large church in these eager, restless days. He gripped his people with a manly and unselfish love. His hold was a personal hold. He was always a lovable man, and the tonic of his good cheer, the youthfulness of his strength and enthusiasm, and, withal, his neighborly kind- ness and sympathy will make his name dear to the generation that knew him in the intimacies of Christian love.
We ought to take heart today under the inspiration of such a life. Bereavement must not be permitted to become discourage- ment. Each generation has its particular work to do and God knows best when that work is done. The present ought to gain incentives from the past. These hills have still their contribution to make to the integrity and strength of our national life. This honored and historic church has still its part to play in the spiritual upbuilding of Christ's Kingdom on earth. Fathers and mothers here have still their family altars to rear and children to nourish in the grace and love of God. He that builds a noble life does the noblest work of which man is capable on earth or in heaven. He that contributes a consecrated child to the world does more than can be done through the possession of wealth or the accumula- tion of power. As long as vital piety is nourished among the hills and the fountain of life here is kept pure, the great cities of the nation will replenish their strength and revitalize their wasting life. When the country ceases to be the reservoir of spiritual power the metropolis is doomed, and our Christian civilization itself falls into decay.
Beloved, do not underestimate the greatness of your work. Could we know the men today who are conducting the vast enter- prises of this modern age in business, in government, in education,
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APPENDIX.
in science, in religion ; could we trace the origin of the men who are foremost in the pulpits and universities and commercial activi- ties of this great land, we should find that the noblest among them and the greatest in number were country boys, who gained their muscle and their brain, their sturdy manhood and their capacity for leadership, on the farm and in the rugged experience of hard and wholesome work.
Work is the best educator in the world, and the children on a farm, whose parents are consecrated to God and who nourish them in the discipline and admonition of the Lord, have an oppor- tunity and training which no city can give.
To build a Christian home and a Christian church is a work unsurpassed in opportunity and glory on earth.
That which absent sons and daughters enjoy most when they revisit the old home and the old church is the memory of the Chris- tian love and Christian instruction which made them what they are and gave them their joyous outlook on life.
We of other scenes and other vocations, yet one with you in interest and affection, beseech you to keep the altars of your faith warm and glowing with the fire of an unquenchable love. Make your hearthstones radiant with the piety of your fathers. Make the old church vital with the hopefulness and energy of an undy- ing consecration. Let there be Pentecosts here as in days gone by. Revivals are not dependent upon numbers, but upon the faith and fidelity of the consecrated few. The larger world of enterprise and power may yet feel the touch of your life. Your sons and daughters shall yet prophesy, and see visions, and dream dreams, and receive the gift of the Spirit's power. Be true to your inheri- tance. May the next seventy-five years reproduce the glory and grace of the past seventy-five. May these annual reunions witness to the growing oneness of this favored fellowship.
The memory of bygone days, of a godly ancestry, of the mira- cles of grace wrought here in many a home and in many an indi- vidual life, makes this a hallowed hour.
God bless this historic church.
God bless the homes represented here, and through them the generations still unborn. This is our prayer today, and could we hear the voices of the sainted ones who have gone before, this would be their prayer, uttered in earnest and loving unison with ours.
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HISTORY OF CORNWALL.
PERSONAL ESTIMATE OF REV. SAMUEL SCOVILLE.
BY HON. THEO. S. GOLD.
The occasion that calls us together is one of sad memories. The name Samuel is not unfamiliar in my own family. I had a great-grand- father Samuel Wadsworth; also that was my father's name. I had an uncle Samuel, and a neighbor Samuel Scoville, but the man whose life and death we honor this day was known in our family by the pet name of "Our Sam." Can any name be more expressive of our esteem, of our respect, affection, love, than this, familiar and ripen- ing through years of intercourse with him as neighbor, pupil, and friend, sharing each other's joys and sympathizing in sorrows.
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