USA > Connecticut > New London County > Lisbon > Historical sketch of Lisbon, Conn., from 1786-1900 > Part 2
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highly organized into a mental and physical strain liable to break them down. The first pastor of the Newent Church was sensitively or- ganized, previously showing with other citizens the trouble wrought everywhere by a currency lessening in value, and worn down by labor for nearly thirty years, and harassed by the dissensions here, the last of these strains nearly prostrated him. A biographical work affirms that "after thirty years he became deranged." The eccle- siastical council, however, which in compliance with his own request convened here with reference to dismissing him, did not regard him as deranged. The question was formally put to them as one having legal bearings, whether Mr. Kirkland was sane, and having been an- swered affirmatively by the council, it ought to settle that matter.
Mr. Kirkland's pastoral connection in Newent was dissolved on the 4th of January, 1753. He was afterwards a pastor in Gro- ton from 1755-8. After his release there he came back to Newent and here on the 17th of May, 1773, he died ; his ministry covering nearly fifty years. He had six daughters and five sons.
Between April, 1753, and September, 1756, the Newent Society, after they had been temporarily supplied by the preaching of Henry Willes, from the West Farms pastorate, voted that six other can- didates should be invited to preach to them as candidates for settle- ment, or as one of the votes expressed it, "to preach to us as a min- ister of the gospel upon trial." Those persons as specified were Mr. Packer (Elijah Packard). Mr. John Curtiss, Rev. (Ebenezer ? ) Mills. "the worthy Mr. Benjamin Chapman," "the worthy Mr. Noah Wadham," and "the worthy Mr. Peter Powers." The last named received due invitation from the Church and from the Society and accepted the charge.
Ordination of Rev. Peter Powers, who graduated at Harvard College, 1754. Had as classmate John Hancock of Boston, L.L.D. Seven churches, including the one at Mr. Powers' home, Hollis, N. H., and one at Mrs. Powers' former residing place, Sutton, Mass., met the 2d of December, 1756. by due summons and its record of action is thus, viz. : The council being opened by praver, then pro- ceeded to the examination of the s'd Mr. Powers respecting his min- isterial qualifications ; who approved himself to the satisfaction of the council ; and at the same time there was a confession of faith ex- hibited (agreeable to the confession of the faith of the churches) and also a church covenant. mutually signed by Mr. Powers and the bretheren of the church. Thus the ordination was accordingly per- formed on s'd day-December 2. 1756.
(Signed)
BENJAMIN LORD, Moderator.
Mr. Powers' ministry in Newent commenced with certain favor- able indications. The Parish now included no Indian clans, the heirs of poor Knight Owanoco-Uncas' Son-having, after his own ex- ample, fallen into a low condition, had in 1745 sold the Indian reser- vation to Newent citizens. The dwindled number of Indians re- maining within the parish had quit the aboriginal way of living;
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many of them were rural laborers, domestic servants, some becom- ing church members, and reputed as Christians. A quit-claim given to Newent, 1752, of, as the words are, the "land where their meet- ing-house now stands" had freed the parish of its liability to lose by proscription what before it doubtfully held by prescription. Turbulence in the community was subsiding. On the other hand, Mr. Powers' ministry here was from first to last attended by many unfavorable things. The material and the moral resources of all the New England colonies were largely drawn upon by the mother country's military operations, directed against the French, the events of which made Canada an English colony. Con- necticut in particular did its full share of the hard work and bore its full share of the heavy burdens involved. As elsewhere in Con- necticut. so in Newent. Worshippers were taxed by Newent parish and in default of payment otherwise were made to undergo distrain- ing pressure. The Pastor and others like-minded could not make their aversion to this odious established infringement on personai preferences, and conscientious convictions, effectual, towards the adoption of a different practice.
When Rev. Mr. Kirkland's pastoral relation to Newent ceased there were twenty-nine male members of the church. The number of male members who, at the time of Mr. Powers' ordination, sub- scribed to the church's covenant was twenty. During his ministry the church received into its membership seventy-four persons -- males twenty-five, females forty-nine. The working power of the church was later diminished by the formation in 1761 of a new parish called Hanover, the seventh in Norwich, to which parish the incor- porating act assigned nearly half of Newent's territory and some- what of territories from Canterbury and Scotland parishes. Par- ticulars of the matter are found in the Newent's Society's records. and in the ancient documents preserved in the State's library. There also was, as the same authorities show, another matter agitated through the latter half of Mr. Powers' pastorate here : the question whether or not a new house for worship should be built in Newent. and the more distracting inquiry "where shall a new house for that purpose be set?" These questions were followed by discussions. proposals and counter-proposals, petitions and counter-petitions. with application to the County Court and to the Colonial General Assembly, all, as to result. in vain. The Society waxed not. mean- while the Church waned. The Pastor. a man as brave as he was tender hearted, and as wise as he was faithful, was impoverished. It was appointed him, though at this time he did not know it. to reap a rich spiritual harvest, where before him no spiritual reaper. and no spiritual sower had been.
Mr. Powers' dismissal from Newent occurred June 20. 1764. He went from Newent to Haverhill. N. H., afterwards he was set- tled as a Pastor in Maine, where he died. About this time broad- spread and well-founded discontent with England's misrule of her American colonies was manifest. The patriot was watching with
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fear the gathering clouds of the great political tempest, which was soon to burst forth, menacing ruin to Liberty, dear to him as his life. It was the era marked by the Stamp Act, 1754.
In the year 1766 the eighth church in Norwich, called Hanover, was founded. The Separatists and church had become as sheep without a shepherd, Mr. Willoughby, after supervising them for two or three years, and after visiting England as an agent of Sepa- ratists generally, had re-crossed the ocean and having gone to another denomination. preached at Bennington, Vt. The Separatist house of worship was for sale in 1768 and probably the Newent Separatist church about that date was disbanded. There is a proba- bility that a few became Baptists : a few others of them may have joined the Eighth Society in Norwhich at Portipang, a section of West Farms. A considerable number of Newent people, once mem- bers of the disbanded church, also some Hanover people, who had been members of the Brunswick church, were afterwards received into the Newent church. During the changes which marked these vears there came more of quiet to the Newent society. Discordance in opinions was lessening and harmony of feeling was increasing through the community.
A meeting of the Newent society was held January 12, 1769, wherein a vote was taken and sixteen of the prominent citizens of Newent openly subscribed their names and their pledges to pay for the current year, all taxes of the Separatists which might be as- sessed upon them : providing, such persons appear to be sober and conscientious persons.
Thirteen months later, in February, 1770, we find as follows : "At a meeting of the inhabitants of ye Society of Newent, in ye town of Norwich, legally warned and held in said Newent, ye fifth day of February. 1770. Capt. Jeremiah Kinsman. Moderator, voted to proceed to build a new meeting house at the stake or place affixed by the County Court for that purpose, and the money to be raised by way of subscription, as has been proposed to pay ve cost of building said house : and we do agree to proceed forthwith to pro- vide oak, and pine boards and other stuff necessary for the work ; and next winter to get the frame and then proceed as fast as we can with conveniency to finish s'd house."
At the same meeting these gentlemen were appointed a com- mittee "to survey the Society's land called the meeting house lot, where ye old meeting house now stands, with full power and author- ity to make sale of ve same to ye best advantage and ve money to be improved for the purpose of building a new meeting house in this Society." "On ye 27th day of November, 1770, the Society unanimously concurred in the call which the church, 20th October. 1770, had given ye worthy Mr. Joel Benedict to become its pastor." Measures including a proposition to provide land "for a parsonage" were soon after adopted. The frame of the new house of worship was set up on its new glebe by two days' labor, Tuesday and Wednesday, 29th and 30th May, 1771.
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Notes of hand were given 19th March. 1772, the largest by Dr. Joseph Perkins "for finishing ye meeting house." Mr. Kirkland, the first pastor of the church had died the week next preceding the one in which this second church building near to his dwelling house was raised. The site of the new building is the same which is now the site of the Newent church. The architect and builder of the edifice (No. 2) was Captain Ebenezer Tracy of Newent.
SETTLEMENT OF MR. JOEL BENEDICT
AS THIRD PASTOR OF NEWENT CHURCH.
Letters having been sent for the purpose to seven churches in New London and Windham Counties an ecclesiastical council was convened and Mr. Benedict, after reception as a member of the church, was ordained 21st of February, 1771. In the sermon preached by Mr. Hart he says, addressing the church : "Happy after all your divisions and trials to see this day! Thrice happy if you continue steadfast to the end. Take heed therefore that ve fall not out by the way. Love one another, love your pastor, but love Christ above all. Esteem your minister highly for his work's sake, assist him with your prayers, receive the counsel of God from his mouth, practice it in your lives, and follow him in all things wherein he fol- loweth Christ." Mr. Benedict ( Gr. C. N. J., 1765) always holding amicable relations with his flock, spent a few years here with success. In his letter, which conveyed to the church his acceptance of their call to its pastorate, was expressed his apprehensions that "A num- ber should fall away from their engagements." so that as he ex- pressed it "you should think it too great a burthen to raise the stip- ulated support." What he then mentioned and suspected occurred. The last years of his ministry in Newent were those in which his congregation, in common with all American citizens, felt most se -- verely the pressure brought on them by the revolutionary war. The records of the church for those years. 1779-82, show that "thro" the difficulties of the present time, by reason of the heavy taxes for support of the war, there was so great a failure in the Society in furnishing the pastor with sufficient maintenance that he had of necessity sold his dwelling-house and was obliged to part with land and was driven to secular business for his support. The church having a desire to continue the connection "were not able to make up the deficiencies of the people." and although the Society on the day when a council was in session and considering whether or not he should remain pastor here declared itself "willing to endeavor" to raise by subscription means of providing "a parsonage lot and a house for Mr. Benedict" the council averse to the Society's ex- pressed "desire" for his continuance in Newent. vet consented to his dismissal on the 30th of April. 1782. The children of Dr. Benedict and Sarah Mckown were four sons and seven daughters.
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From 1784 Dr. Benedict was Pastor of the church in Plainfield, where, as its pastor, he died in 1816.
For a period extending from 30th October, 1782, to 31st Octo- ber, 1788, the Society records contain no entries whatever and the church records as to that period and a year or two next after are almost as void.
It is, however, unquestionable that Newent received its propor- tion of the secular prosperity which the whole nation obtained after the close of the contest by which its independence was established. And an era of good was at hand when, having for seventy years had so much disquiet, Newent with Hanover became, in 1786, Lisbon. Two years before this Newent parish, August 25th. 1784, appointed Captain Jabez Perkins. Captain Elisha Morgan, and Captain Ezra Bishop as a committee to forward a subscription for the purpose of creating a permanent fund in aid of the parish of the Society of Newent in the town of Norwich. This committee prepared an in- strument which recited that "in the present circumstances of said So- ciety. no method can be devised so likely to lay a sure and lasting foundation for supplying and supporting a minister in said society as that of raising a bank or fund so large as that the annual interest thereof shall be sufficient to pay the yearly salary that shall be here- after agreed upon." This instrument was subscribed to by sixty persons, the sums severally subscribed ranged from £2 the minimum to fro the maximum, including one of that amount, with three of £60. The total amount in 1873 of this fund was Ten Thousand Dollars.
The Society's pecuniary account with the Rev. Joel Benedict was not settled till 8th of June, 1792, when by paying £31 to him and getting a discharge in full from him the settlement was accom- plished.
SETTLEMENT OF REV. DAVID HALE. JUNE 2, 1790.
Rev. David Hale was settled as the fourth pastor of Newent church, which had now become the first church of Lisbon. When his predecessor. Rev. Joel Benedict, was settled in 1771 as the third pastor of this church, the church was still in Norwich.
This first church of Christ in Lisbon on the 21st of December, 1789, called Rev. David Hale to the work of the ministry among them. Mr. Hale having, by a letter dated May IT. 1790, accepted the call, an ecclesiastical council was summoned to meet 2d June, 1790, and he was inducted into that work by installation.
As Mr. Hale had from early infancy been reared under the ministry of the Rev. Dr. Joseph Huntington, of Coventry, it is not remarkable that Dr. Huntington, being presiding officer of that council, both preached the sermon and gave the charge to the pastor on that occasion. It may, however, be worthy of remark
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that after the council had "Proceeded to examine s'd pastor elect respecting the principles of his faith" which doubtless he set forth distinctly and fully, "the council voted satisfied": Mr. Hale, as the minutes of the Council relates, signified his approbation of the prin- ciples of the congregational churches. That approbation is notice- able, because at that time efforts were for a second time made, es- pecially in Connecticut, to make little of congregational principles, and the foremost congregational minister in this State accustomed himself to join with others in styling the congregational churches Presbyterians. It is noticeable because Mr. Hale had, in an adjacent State out of New England, been ordained by Presbyterian ministers, he having settled in Suffolk County on Long Island previously and brought testimonials from Presbyterians there to this church in Newent. This Rev. David Hale was a distinguished member of a very distinguished family and deserves a more extended notice on that account. He was born in Coventry, 14th December, 1761, grad- uate Yale College 1785, died in his native town Ioth February, 1822. He was a son of Richard Hale. Among his earlier ancestors was a Robert and a John. John Hale had a son, Samuel Hale, who resided in Newburyport. Mass., whose oldest son was Richard Hale. He removed to Coventry, Conn., married Elizabeth Strong of that place and there died 1802, aged eighty-five years. He and his wife Eliza- beth had twelve children, of which the third, Joseph Hale, an officer of the Revolutionary army, was father of Mary, the second wife of Rev. Levi Nelson, who spent the whole of her married life in Lisbon. She died May 2d, 1851, aged sixty-eight years. Her father's brother, Enoch, was the third son of Richard, graduate Yale Col- lege 1773; was first pastor of the church in Westhampton, Mass., and a member of the convention for the amending the constitution of Massachusetts, and he was father of Nathan Hale, LL.D., who was graduated W. C. 1804, once editor of the Boston Advertiser, and one of whose sons is the Rev. Edward Everett Hale, graduate H. C. 1839. a pastor and editor in Boston, and a well-known author. Still a sixth son of this Richard Hale and Elizabeth Strong was Nathan, a grad- uate Y. C. 1773, a teacher and a captain in the American War for Independence, whose amiable and heroic spirit. graced with Christian devotion, shone so lustrously when with needless cruelty he was, by British military orders, executed 1776 as a spy. His last words were "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country."
It was this ninth son of Richard, David, brother of the patriotic martyr, that became the fourth pastor of the Newent church. He had, in connection with other preparation, probably studied for the ministry with the Rev. Dr. Wales, Professor of Theology in Yale College. He was approved by the New Haven Association 1787.
David Hale was dismissed at his request on the 27th of April. 1803. His virtues are recorded as very many in loveliness. While his pastorate in Lisbon continued he conducted a boarding school in his own home with much success as long as his health proved suffi- cient.
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His pastorate was given up only after his health failed, from physical inability. He continued to live in Lisbon and owned a house which he built 1795 and which afterwards was sold to the Society for a parsonage. The price paid was $1, 100: it is still the parsonage. Rev. Mr. Hale, after his release from school and church, became a magistrate and a representative of the town of Lisbon. In 1806 he removed again to his native town Coventry, and was there made Deacon in the first church and a justice of the Court of Common Pleas.
Judge Hale, on the 19th of May, 1790, married Lydia Austin, of New Haven, a daughter of Samuel Austin, and the only child of this marriage was named David. This David Hale, son of the Rev. David Hale, was born in Lisbon, 25th April, 1791, and died at Fred- ericksburg, Va., 20th of January, 1849. He received his education at his father's boarding school and otherwise he was trained to mer- cantile business, first in Coventry and subsequently in Boston, in which latter place he became first a merchant and later a manufac- turer. In these pursuits he had limited success ; from 1827 till his decease he was with Gerald Hallock as editor and founder of the Journal of Commerce, a daily newspaper in New York. He wielded a ready pen, was equal to the emergencies as they arose, etc. The record here speaks much about his benevolence in giving and doing much good for Christian work. He published a tract written by his pastor, Rev. Joseph P. Thompson, D.D., LL.D., entitled "Mem- oirs of David Hale." This David Hale, who was born in Lisbon, married on the 18th of January, 1815, his cousin Laura, born 30th of August, 1789 : she died 25th of July, 1824. She was a daughter of Richard and Mary ( Wright) Hale, of Coventry. He married again on the 22d of August, 1825, Lucy S. Turner, from Boston. He had by the former wife two daughters and two sons and by the latter four daughters. His second daughter Lydia was born 27th of May, 1818: died 18th of October, 1846. She had married, April 23, 1838, T. T. Devan, M.D., a missionary to China, in which country she died. Her older sister, Mary Hale, born March 11, 1816; married May 27, 1839, N. Stickney, of Rockville, Conn. Richard Hale, the oldest son, born May 24, 1820; married October 28, 1844, Miss Julia Newlin.
David Austin Hale, next son, born September 3, 1822; mar- ried September 3, 1849. Miss M. I. Simonds, of Athol, Mass. Lucy Turner Hale, first daughter by second wife, born July 9, 1826; mar- ried. May 20, 1846, Stephen Connover, Jr .. of New York.
Laura Hale born August 22. 1828, married December 21, 1848, J. W. Camp, of New York.
Charlotte Hale, born April 6, 1832, married Mr. Charles B. Richardson. He is dead: she resides at Wellesley. Mass. The youngest daughter, Martha Louisa Hale, born August 5. 1834; died January 8, 1836.
The Lisbon first church ( Newent) was gradually reinforced so long as the pastor continued able for ministerial work.
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The church next invited Mr. David B. Ripley to become its pas- tor 9th of December, 1803. The Society on the same day-non-con- curred.
REV. LEVI NELSON'S SETTLEMENT.
The church, September 13, 1804, unanimously gave, and the Society two weeks subsequently concurred in giving. Mr. Levi Nel- son an invitation to be their pastor and minister. Mr. Nelson ac- cepted the invitation. An ecclesiastical council was convened and were satisfied and voted unanimously to comply with the desire of the church and Society. He was thereupon regularly ordained pas- tor of the first church in Lisbon, December 5, 1804. Mr. Nelson had recently been engaged in missionary service under direction of the Missionary Society of Massachusetts, of which State he was a native. The letters missive from the Lisbon church requested the assistance of two churches in that State at his ordination. The pas- tor and two delegates of one of those was present, together with pastors and delegates from seven churches in parishes in the vicinity of Lisbon. It would seem that the transactions of that ordination day were unusually impressive to all who, as actors or otherwise, were concerned in them. While the members of the council were passing to places reserved for them in the congregation assembled the choir's jubilant voices uttered in choral strain this assurance :
"The hill of Zion yields A thousand sacred sweets Before we reach the heavenly fields Or walk the golden streets.'
(The same hymn was sung again at the fiftieth anniversary of Mr. Nelson's settlement. ) The introductory ordination prayer was by Dr. Samuel Nott, of Franklin, who, as his historian says, at eight years of age a blacksmith's apprentice, at twelve an assistant in his father's business of tanning and shoc-making, and at nineteen a mason, had then been twenty-two years a pastor of the church in Franklin. Once he barely escaped alive from fire when six years old. His remarkable career is well known to all the older people of that vicinity. The writer very well remembers his impressive ap- pearance. dressed in knee breeches, long black stockings, large silver shoe buckles, when in his presence to be examined for fitness to teach a district school : or when he came to visit the same school, and was as punctual as his large silver bull's-eye watch would permit, to gov- ern the official examination. He lived to almost one hundred and his pastorate exceeded seventy years. At Mr. Nelson's ordination the sermon was preached by the Rev. David Long, who, little older than the pastor-elect, had then been for three years a pastor at Mil- ford, Mass. The consecrating prayer was offered by the Rev. Joel Benedict, who had been a former pastor of this church and at this
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tinie had been pastor for twenty years at Plainfield, where he died after a long service in the ministry.
The laying-on of hands upon the head of the candidate was by Dr. Benedict, and Dr. Joseph Strong, who had then been pastor for twenty-six years of the first church in Norwich, where his life ter- minated with a pastorate of fifty-six years.
The Moderator of the Council, Dr. Levi Hart, of Preston, now Griswold, had been settled there then forty-two years. His life closed there with a record of almost forty-six years.
The Scribe of the Council. Dr. Andrew Lee, had then been pastor of the Hanover church thirty-five years. His death occurred there after sixty-four years' pastorate over the second church in Lisbon ( Hanover), now Sprague.
Dr. Hart, a son-in-law of the eminent Dr. Bellamy, gave the charge to Mr. Nelson.
The right hand of fellowship was by Dr. Lee. The concluding prayer was by Dr. Strong, of Norwich, who, with Dr. Lord, had led such a long and useful life in that vicinity. It is marvelous to see how many of the clergymen settled in this immediate neighborhood were blessed with such long lives among their people. Half century celebrations were very common in those early days-many times the ministers preaching to an audience who were wholly unknown to them at the commencement of their careers.
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