History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 121

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1317


USA > Connecticut > New London County > History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 121


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Oct. Session, 1704 .-- " This court doc order that the plantations of Leb- anon, Mansfield, Canterbury and Plainfield, be listed as other townes and plantations in this colonie are, and for performance of snid worke, doc appoint the selectmen and constablo or constables in each planta- tion, forthwith upon receit hereof, to demand and take the rateable estate reall and personall, as the lawe directs, in their respective planta- tions, and perfect said lists with all convenient speed, and transmit the same to the Colonie Secretary, to be inrolled in the publick records in order to be transmitted to the Treasurer, that thereby he may give forth his warrants for the levying their shares of the Colonie charge."


Whereupon, and without any other authority or permission whatever, the towns chose one or two rep- resentatives, who at the next session walked boldly into the General Assembly and took their seats among the members unchallenged and unquestioned, repre- sentation being the common right, resulting insepar- ably from taxation,-a right settled by the universal custom from the beginning, not only in this colony, but in every colony in New England, and probably the other colonies. In this right Lebanon chose William Clark, who took his seat in the next session, May, 1705, of the General Assembly at Hartford.


It was in this custom in New England that the great "war-cry of the Revolution" had its roots and nerves. "No taxation without representation" rang out as the popular key-note everywhere when the mother-government of England attempted to tax them without any representation in Parliament. But it is not strange that this popular cry had so little effect upon the British rulers. They had but little ac- quaintance with our local customs from which it sprang, and from which it derived its peculiar po- tency. It was a new cry to them, in which they could see but little reason, and they considered it and treated it as only an empty and senseless clamor, set up merely to screen what they deemed the un- ruly spirit of an unjustifiable and uncalled-for re- bellion.


Five-mile Purchase in 1692 .- The Mohegan lands lying northerly from the New London settle- ments and extending up into Windham and Tolland Counties were claimed and held jointly by Uncas and his two sons, Owaneco and Attawanhood, alias Joshua. The grant of land to Norwich in 1659 was made and signed by all three of these as grantors. Upon the


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death of Attawanhood his claim to these lands fell to his son and heir, Abimeleck ; and though it does not appear that any actual division of these lands was ever made between these Indian chiefs, yet they had practically each selected a particular range or territory, over which they claimed and exercised a more special and individual right to make grants. These ranges, however, had no well-defined bound- aries or extent, and the grants frequently overlapped and conflicted with each other. The special range claimed by Attawanhood, and afterwards by his son Abimeleck, extended over Colchester, Lebanon, and Windham, and most of the early grants in Colches- ter and Windham, and many in Lebanon, were made by Attawanhood, alias Joshua, or by his son Abim- eleck.


The " Five mile purchase," in Lebanon, was made in 1692 from Owaneco by Samuel Mason, of Stoning- ton, Benj. Brewster, of Norwich, John Stanton, of Stonington, and John Burchard, of Norwich, and the deed, bearing date Sept. 6, 1692, is signed by Owaneco alone. This grant was stoutly contested by Abime- leck and others holding under him, on the ground that Owancco had no right to make grants in this territory ; and the parties becoming involved in per- plexing lawsuits, appealed to the General Assembly for an adjustment of their claims. But the Assembly looked with disfavor upon these large land-grants, which the Indian sachems and chiefs had made to favored friends and land speculators, as being against good public policy. They thought it wiser and better that the lands should be kept free and unsequestered, and open to the purchase of actual settlers in such quantities as they might need for their own use. To gain the favor of the Assembly by conforming to this policy, and thereby to secure the title of their pur- chase, Mason, Brewster, Stanton, and Burchard, by their deed dated Jan. 4, 1700, conveyed the whole of it in fee to fifty-one persons, including themselves, for the sole use and benefit of the grantees and their heirs and assigns, as proprietors in common.


But still litigation was continued by Abimeleck and others claiming under him, and the progress of the settlement was impeded thereby until 1705, when, on application by the inhabitants of Lebanon, the Gen- eral Assembly, at the May session, approved and con- firmed the deed of Owaneco to Mason and others, dated Sept. 6, 1692, and also the deed of Mason and others to the fifty-one grantees, dated Jan. 4, 1700; and vested the title forever in the said fifty-one grantees, and their heirs and assigns, as proprietors in common. And this, of course, ended all further liti- gation, and put the controversy to its final rest. The fifty-one grantees named in the deed of Mason and others, dated in 1700, are as follows (Mason having probably died between 1700 and 1705, his right was vested in his heirs), viz. : Samuel Mason's heirs, John Burchard, Sr., John Burchard, Jr., Jabez Hide, John Stanton, Benjamin Brewster, Joseph Parsons, Daniel


Clark, Sr., Daniel Mason's heirs, Hezekiah Mason, James Buttolph, Jedediah Strong, Thomas Hunt, Caleb Chappel, William Clark, John Woodward, Jr., John Brown, John Morgan, Samuel Fitch, John Mason, John Calkin, John Baldwin, Samuel Hunt- ington, Joseph Bradford, Exercise Connant, John Avery, John Burroughs, Nathaniel Fitch, Joseph Fitch, George Webster, Edward Culver, James Dean, Richard Bushnell, Thomas Adgate, John Dewey, Micha Mudge, Josiah Dewey, Sr., Nathaniel Dewey, John Woodward, Sr., Richard Lyman, Sr., Samuel Hutchinson, Joseph Marsh, Joseph Thomas, John Webster, Joseph Pumcry, Josiah Dewey, Jr., John Gillett, Thomas Root, Stephen Lee, John Hutchinson, Joseph Burchard.


It is a curious fact that nearly a third of these Christian names are John, and more than half of them commence with the letter J. Fortunately the town was already named, or it might have been called Johnstown.


Indian Schools .- There was also another school, besides the one mentioned in Mr. Hines' address, ex- isting here in Lebanon from 1743 until 1768, of far wider influence and renown than the Nathan Tisdale school, and which, on its removal to New Hampshire, was there established and incorporated as Dartmouth College, that well-known institution deriving its first inception, its birth and origin, and its original and special purposes and objects from this town.


In 1735, Elcazer Wheelock, a clergyman of fine talents, of earnest character, and of devoted piety, was settled over the Second Congregational Church, in the north part of the town of Lebanon. Like many other ministers of the day and afterwards, he had several young men in his family, whom he taught the higher branches of English and in the classics.


In December, 1743, a young Mohegan Indian, about twenty years of age, whose name has since become more famous than that of any other of the tribe, un- less, perhaps, the first Uncas, applied to Mr. Wheelock for admission among his scholars. Samson Occom was born in 1723 at Mohegan, and grew up in the pagan faith and the rude and savage customs of his tribe. During the great religious awakening of 1739- 40 he had become convinced of the truth of Chris- tianity and deeply alarmed for his own lost condition. For six months he groaned in the gloom of his dark- ness, but then light broke into his soul, and he was seized with an irresistible impulse to carry this great light to his benighted race, and to become a teacher to his lost brethren, and with his heart swelling with this impulse he now stood before Wheelock, asking to be instructed for this great work.


It was not in the heart of Wheelock to resist this appeal, and he at once admitted him to his school and family with open arms, and in the spirit of his mis- sion. Occom had already learned the letters of the alphabet, and could spell out a few words, and such was his zeal and devotion to study that in four years


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HISTORY OF NEW LONDON COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.


he was fitted to enter college ; but his health had been so impaired by intense application, and lacking also the means, he never entered .. Leaving school, he re- turned to his tribe, preaching and teaching salvation through Christ alone with power and effect, support- ing himself meantime, like the rest of his tribe, by hunting and fishing, and the rude Indian arts of making baskets and other Indian utensils, and occa- sionally teaching small Indian schools, but during all this time still pursuing his own studies in theology and Bible literature.


In this mission he visited other tribes. In 1748 he went over to Long Island, and spent several years there among the Montauk, the Skenecock, and other tribes, preaching and teaching with great success. At one time a great revival occurred under his labors there, during which many Indians were converted. Aug. 29, 1759, he was ordained by the Suffolk Presby- tery of Long Island, and was ever after regarded as a regular member of that ecclesiastical body.


The case of Occom and its instructive results at- tracted wide attention from the first start, and Mr. Wheelock determined to open his school to other Indian youths who desired to engage in and be fitted for the same work, and in a short time it became exclusively an "Indian School" for missionary pur- poses, so that by 1762 he had more than twenty In- dian students preparing for the conversion of their countrymen.


This new movement attracted the carnest attention of the leading clergymen and Christian philanthro- pists throughout all New England and the Northern colonies. To all who looked with anxiety for the conversion and civilization of the aborigines of this part of North America this school was long consid- cred the brightest and most promising ground of hope. Notes of encouragement came pouring in from various sources throughout all the New England colonics, from ministers' councils, from churches, and from eminent leaders and philanthropists, with money contribu- tions, cheering on the movement, and all aiming to increase the numbers in training, and to give to the school a wider sweep in its influence. Probably no school in this or any other land or age ever awakened so wide-spread and intense an interest or seemed freighted with such a precious and hopeful mission as did then this little parochial school, kept in the obscure parsonage of a country minister.


In 1765 a general conference of the friends of the school was held, at which it was determined to send Samson Occom to England to show to our English brethren there what Christianity had done for him, and what it could do for the natives of North Amer- ica, and that Rev. Nathaniel Whitaker, of Norwich, should go with him, to enlist co-operation in the cause and to solicit contributions in its aid. Occom was then forty-three years old, well educated, and spoke English clearly and fluently. His features and com- plexion bore every mark of his race, but he was casy


.


and natural in social manners, frank and cordial, but modest in conversation, and his deportment in the pulpit was such as to command deep attention and respect. He could preach extemporaneously and well, but usually wrote his sermons. Such, then, was this son of the forest, and such his sublime mission to the English mother-land,-to convert the natives of a pagan continent to Christianity and civilization through the ministry of pagan converts of their own race.


His appearance in England produced an extraordi- nary sensation, and he preached with great applause in London and other principal cities of Great Britain and Scotland to crowded audiences. From the 16th of February, 1766, to the 22d of July, 1767, he deliv- ered between three and four hundred sermons, many of them in the presence of the king and the royal family and the great nobles of the land. Large con- tributions were taken up after each of these dis- courses ; the king himself gave two hundred pounds, and in the whole enterprise seven thousand pounds sterling were collected in England and about three thousand pounds in Scotland.1


This success resulted in transferring Wheelock's Indian school to New Hampshire, which it was thought would be a better place for an Indian semi- nary, as being more retired and less exposed to dis- turbing influences than the more thickly settled col- ony of Connecticut. It was then incorporated as Dartmouth College (taking its name from the pious and noble Earl of Dartmouth, whom Occom's mission in England had warmly enlisted in the cause, for the special object and purpose of educating and training Indian youths for the ministry and missionary work of their race ; but after the death of Eleazer Wheelock, its founder and president, and especially after the death of his son, John Wheelock, who succeeded him as president, its original and distinctive character as an Indian seminary gradually changed until it be- came, as it still remains, assimilated in character and purpose with the other colleges of the country ; and so the glowing dream, the fervid zeal, and the san- guine hopes and expectations of its great-souled founders faded away.


In 1771, a Mohegan Indian, named Moses Paul, was tried at New London and condemned to death for the murder, in a drunken brawl, of Moses Clark. A large assembly of English and Indians collected to witness the execution. At the request of the prisoner, Sam- son Occom was appointed by the authorities to preach a funeral sermon in the presence of the poor wretch, as was the custom of the time, just before he was launched into eternity. Upon his own coffin, in front of the pulpit, sat the doomed man. Next around him were scated his brethren of the Mohegan tribe, the audience filling the rest of the church, a great crowd


1 McClure's " Life of Wheelock," pp. 16, 17, and De Forrest's " Ilistory of Connecticut Indians," p. 459.


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surrounding it, and a military company acting as guard.


The sermon is still preserved in the library of the Connecticut Historical Society at Hartford [Pamph- let No. 225] ; the text from Romans vi. 23: " For the wages of sin is death ; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."


It is not eloquent, it is not grand oratory, but it is something higher than eloquence, and in its sad and solemn moaning over the degraded and lost con- dition of his race, in their pagan darkness, their wickedness, the awful consequences of drunkenness, their besetting sin, it has all the moving power and pathos of a Hebrew wail.


The first part of the discourse dwells at length upon the peculiar meaning and significance of the term death, as used in the text, its endless and eter- nal character, and was addressed to the audience at large, and rising with the vastness of the idea, he exclaimed, "Eternity ! O Eternity! Who can meas- ure it? Who can count the years thereof? Arithmetic fails ; the thoughts of men and angels are drowned in it. How shall we describe eternity? To what shall we compare it? Were a fly to carry off one particle of this globe to such a distance that it would take ten thousand years to go and return for another, and so continue till he had carried off, particle by particle, once in ten thousand years, the whole of this globe and placed it in that distant space, just as it is now here, after all this eternity would remain the same unexhausted duration ! And this eternal death must be the certain portion of all impenitent sinners, be they who they may, Negroes, Indians, English, or what nation soever; honorable or ignoble, great or small, rich or poor, bond or free, all who die in their sins must go to hell together, 'for the wages of sin is death.' "


He next addressed the doomed prisoner upon his coffin, pointed out to him the enormity of his crime, and how by drunkenness, and by despising the warn- ings and counsels of Christian teachers, he had been led to it; explained to him the way of salvation, urg- ing him with pathos and earnest energy at once to accept it, and like the dying thief upon the cross be- side the crucified Saviour, to throw himself upon the mercy of that same Saviour, and so, even at the elev- enth hour, escape eternal death.


He then turned to the Mohegans present: "My poor kindred !" he exclaimed, "you see the woful con- sequences of sin by seeing this, our poor, miserable countryman, now before us, who is to die for his sins and his great crime, and it was especially the sin of drunkenness that brought this destruction and un- timely death upon him. There is a dreadful woe de- nounced from the Almighty against drunkards ; and it is this sin, this abominable, this beastly sin of drunkenness that has stript us of every desirable com- fort in this life. By this sin we have no name or credit in the world; for this sin we are despised, and


it is right and just, for we despise ourselves. By this sin we have no comfortable houses, nor anything com- fortable in our houses, neither food, nor raiment, nor decent utensils; we go about with ragged and dirty clothing and almost naked, most of the time half starved, and obliged to pick up and eat such food as we can find; and our poor children suffering every day, often crying for food, and we have nothing for them, and in the cold winter shivering and crying, pinched with cold. All this comes from the love of strong drink. And this is not all the misery and evil we bring upon ourselves by this sin, for when we are intoxicated with strong drink we drown our rational powers, by which we are distinguished from the brute creation ; we unman ourselves, and sink not only to a level with the beasts of the field, but seven degrees beneath them; yea, we bring ourselves to a level with the devils ; and I don't know but we make ourselves worse than the devils, for I never heard of a drunken devil."


He closed his discourse with a fervid exhortation to his Mohegan brethren to break off from their sins, and especially from their besetting sin of drunken- ness, by a gospel repentance; to "take warning by the doleful sight now before us," and from the dread- ful judgments that have befallen poor drunkards. "You that have been careless all your day now awake to righteousness and be concerned for your never-dying souls." Fight against all sin, and espe- cially against your besetting sin, "and above all things believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall have eternal life, and when you come to die your souls will be received into heaven, there to be with the Lord Jesus and all the saints in glory, which God in His infinite mercy grant, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen."


In 1786 he gathered a few Mohegans and several other Indians from other tribes in Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Long Island, and went with them to Oneida County, N. Y., and there formed the nucleus of the clan afterwards known as the Brother- town tribe among the "Six Nations." He continued as their minister, acting also as a missionary among the Six Nations, until his death, which occurred in July, 1792, more than three hundred Indians follow- ing him mournfully and tearfully to the grave.


Another young Mohegan, Joseph Johnson, educa- ted in Wheelock's school, became also a preacher of great power and influence. He was sent early as a missionary to the "Six Nations" of New York, and afterwards co-operated with Occom in the establish- ment there of the Brothertown clan. At the breaking out of the war of the Revolution the Six Nations, a powerful and warlike Indian confederacy, were at first much inclined to favor the English side, and to become the allies of the British forces of Canada, and to this end were strongly tempted by the insidious wiles of British emissaries, backed by the glittering display and lavish use of British gold.


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HISTORY OF NEW LONDON COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.


Against this danger both Johnson and Occom exerted the whole weight of their great moral powers and their wide influence, the former especially ap- pealing for help, in averting this impending danger, to Governor Trumbull and other friends here, and to the Assembly. His zeal and patriotic efforts attrac- ted the attention of Gen. Washington, and while at Cambridge, directing the siege of Boston, he wrote him a letter with his own hand, dated Feb. 20, 1776, thanking him for his patriotic and important services, and in closing he says, "Tell the Indians that we do not ask them to take up the hatchet for us unless they choose it, we only desire that they will not fight against us. We want that the chain of friendship should always remain bright between our friends, the Six Nations, and us. We recommend you to them, and hope by spreading the truths of the gospel among them it will always keep the chain bright."


CHAPTER LI.


LEBANON -- (Continued). ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.


The Meeting-house War-The First Church-Church in Columbia- Goshen Church-Exeler Church-Baptist Church-Christian Church, Liberty Hill-Ministers-College Graduates.


Meeting-house War. - There was a long and troublesome controversy, which belongs more prop- erly to the ecclesiastical than the civil history of the town, the seeds of which had their birth at the very first commencement of the settlement, and continued their disturbing influence for more than a century, culminating in 1804 in an event that attracted a wide notoriety throughout the State, and which has been animadverted and commented upon in terms derog- atory to the fair fame of the town. But we are fully persuaded that most, or all, of this unfavorable com- ment has arisen from a lack of apprehending the whole case, or of misapprehending the main facts and circumstances relating to it, and that a full and fair statement of these facts will lead to a much more favorable opinion and charitable judgment con- cerning it.


When the settlement of Lebanon was first com- menced, in 1697, it was agreed by all the proprietors and settlers that a broad street, or highway, and com- mon, nearly thirty rods wide (now Town Street), should be first laid out, and home-lots of forty-two acres each staked off and allotted upon each side of it; that at or near the centre, midway between the south line of their purchase and the most northern of the home-lots, a choice lot should be reserved for a minister's lot, and a meeting-house built on the wide highway and com- mon, nearly in front of the minister's lot, and a few rods distant from it (where the church now stands), and that this location for a meeting-house should be


"fixed and established forever," the object being to prevent any trouble from arising in the future in con- sequence of new-comers, who might so settle in differ- ent parts of the plantation as to change the then centre of population and travel, and therefore desire and claim a removal of the meeting-house to a new location.


In 1700, William Clark and Deacon Josiah Dewey, two of these settlers, bought of Owaneco and others a large tract of land north of the Lebanon "5 mile pur- chase" and adjoining it, which they desired and pro- posed to annex to the Lebanon plantation. This was objected to by the Town Street settlers, from a fear that the Clark and Dewey settlers, uniting with some of the more northerly of their own, would soon be clamorous for a removal of the meeting-house nearer to them. To allay this fear Clark and Dewey agreed to lay out a street for a village and for a meeting-house thereon, stating that their purchase was large enough for a society by itself, and that the agreement about the location of the Town Street mceting-house should never be violated or disturbed. These terms and con- ditions were satisfactory, the new tract was annexed to Lebanon, the new street laid out, and a location fixed for a meeting-house upon it, and the place has ever since been known as " the village."


In 1724 the society voted to build a new and larger meeting-house on the old location, but there was so much opposition to this vote that no action was taken upon it; and when, soon after, in 1727, the society of Goshen was set off from the southwesterly part, the difficulty between the First Society and the northerly settlers about the location of their meeting-house was thereby increased, because this setting off of Goshen Society left the location still farther from the common centre of population and travel. Application was then made to the General Assembly for relief, and to appoint a committee to fix a location. A committee was appointed in 1731, who, after visiting the place and hearing the parties, fixed the location upon the old spot, as being in accordance with the original agree- ment of the first settlers that it should remain forever there.




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