USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Warren > The Congregational church, Warren, Connecticut, l750-1956 > Part 2
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10
For nine years this was the only church in the community, save only the unorthodox Moravian mission ; but it was a long Sabbath day's journey for the Paines by the Lake, the Strongs on the College Farm, the Curtisses on "Above-All", or the Carters by the "Flat Rock"-a journey that must be made afoot or on horseback, through forest and marsh, along rough Indian trails. In 1750, therefore, petition was made to the General Court and, permission was granted for the establish- ment of a new ecclesiastical society. The new society was to be known as "The Society of East Greenwich in the Town of Kent", in honor of His Majesty King George II, who lived in the manor of East Greenwich in the County of Kent, England.
[ 11 ]
On July 13, 1750, in the home of John Finney,* the new So- ciety held its first meeting. Nathaniel Swift, Jonathan Brown- son, and Benjamin Sackett were elected a Society's Commit- tee to proceed with the organization of the church, while Jonathan Sackett and Jeremiah Fuller were appointed a com- mittee to supply the church with preaching.
The Society, it must be noted, was a fundamental part of early Congregationalism. It was the Society, not the Church, that was incorporated and thus able to transact business. Women might be members of the Church but not of the So- ciety ; conversely, men might be members of the Society and have a controlling voice in the management of the Church without ever taking upon themselves the obligations of church membership. Many years were to elapse before this cumbersome two-headed system could be abolished in the older Congregational churches, and the change often involved knotty legal problems.
Further development proceeded slowly. Numerous meet- ings were held and additional committees were appointed. Possible candidates were considered but for one reason or an- other eliminated. At first, committees met in the homes of in- dividual members, but after 1754 they were generally held in the new schoolhouse. It was probably in the home of Jona- than Sackett, which stood near the present Sackett home- stead, that the organization of the Church was finally achieved six years after the Society had come into being.
But the great day arrived at last-September 22, 1756- the day for the "gathering" of the new church. Surely every man, woman, and child who could possibly be there was present in the little log schoolhouse, twenty-seven feet long by twenty-four feet wide, which had been built only two years be-
*The John Finney house stood about two miles west of the present vil- lage center. The old house was torn down about 1860 and a new house built. The place, now known as "Sky Ridge", is the property of Kenneth Cheney.
[ 12 ]
fore on a hilltop about a mile from the present village center .* Eighteen persons, twelve males and six females, stood before the congregation and solemnly covenanted "to give them- selves to God through Jesus Christ to be forever the Lord's- to attend publick worship and sealing ordinances-to maintain brotherly love, and to live in subjection to the Government and Discipline Christ has established in his Church".
This was indeed a solemn covenant, and its obligations were not taken lightly either by the covenanting members or by the Society which had the responsibility of enforcing its provisions. Here is the roll of honor in the order in which the names were signed: Thomas Carter, Jonathan Sackett, Nathaniel Swift and Abiah his wife, Nathaniel Fuller and Mary his wife, Joseph Smalley and Jemima his wife, Abel Comstock, Nathaniel Tupper and Elizabeth his wife, Benjamin Hutchens, Jonathan Sackett, Jun., Daniel Marsh, Olive Finney, Justus Sackett, Jerusha Bliss, and Elizabeth Finney.
The Rev. Joseph Bellamy of Bethlehem preached the ser- mon, attested the signatures to the covenant, and declared the infant organization to be "a church of Christ". No greater or more orthodox sponsor could have been desired.
By the close of the year ten more had "owned the cove- nant": Hannah, wife of Jonathan Sackett, Jr., Ebenezer Loomis, Perez Partridge and Judith his wife, Moses Palmer, Daniel Lee, Rachel, wife of John Finney, Elizabeth, wife of Deodatus Curtis, Mary, wife of Eleazer Curtis, and Priscilla, wife of Israel Holmes. This made a total of twenty-eight, sixteen males and twelve females.
A notable group, indeed. Yet one cannot help asking why here, as in all the early churches, the list of members thus gathered is so brief. Why were the names of so many "free- men", prominent in the community, missing from the church roll ? No doubt there were some, even in this church-minded
*This schoolhouse stood on the top of the hill west of and across the road from the house now owned by the Lourias.
[ 13 ]
age, who were too much occupied with their own affairs and too little concerned with religion to ally themselves with any religious movement. There may have been some whose con- duct, in the eyes of the community, did not justify their being admitted to the privileged order. But there were others, members of the Society in good standing, men who paid the taxes levied by the Society upon its members as well as those levied by the General Assembly for the maintenance of reli- gion in the Colony, men who were even then serving upon committees for the establishment of the church and the selec- tion of its ministers, yet who did not take upon themselves the obligations of church membership. Why not? Did some of them fear that, in spite of their good works, they were not among the "elect"? Did some have doubts about the harsh theology of the period Were some hesitant about promising absolute obedience to "the Government and Discipline Christ has established"-a Government and Discipline (with capital letters) which in the light of later events seems sometimes to have been imposed more by the Society than by Christ and occasionally with a minimum of "brotherly love"? The dis- tinction in these early days between the church and the So- ciety (always with a large "S") is a distinction never to be forgotten; but the important fact is that at long last the Church of Christ in East Greenwich in the Town of Kent had been gathered and was now ready to play a vital and honor- able part in the future life of the community.
The following year Jonathan Sackett and Jeremiah Fuller were again appointed a committee to select a minister and treat with him "consarning settling amongst us". As a result, the Rev. Silvanus Osborn was called to be the first minister. Mr. Osborn was a graduate of Princeton, a college that had been founded only ten years earlier in order to train men for the Presbyterian ministry .* It is worthy of note that from
*The terms "Congregational" and "Presbyterian" were used in early days almost interchangeably, or even together as "Presbyterian Con- gregational".
[ 14 ]
the beginning the Congregational church has stood for an educated ministry. Both Harvard and Yale were founded, in the early days of their respective colonies, for the purpose of training Christian ministers; and wherever the church has gone, there the school and the college have gone also. In the Congregational tradition religion and education have marched hand in hand, and the infant church in Warren was no excep- tion in the qualifications it expected of its first minister.
Mr. Osborn's salary was to be thirty pounds the first year, thirty-five the second, forty the third, and fifty pounds, or about two hundred fifty dollars, for the rest of his life. He was evidently a man of sincerity and unflagging devotion to the welfare of his people, "an orthodox, plain, sensible preach- er", wrote Mr. Starr, "who was willing to spend and be spent to promote the cause and kingdom of his Lord and master" and "there were numbers savingly converted under his minis- try." He lived, however, only fourteen years after his instal- lation, dying in 1771 at the age of forty-one. His widow, Abi- gail, daughter of Stephen Noble of New Milford, though wooed by a certain Mr. Starr, married the Rev. Jeremiah Day of New Preston, declaring, as the story goes, that she preferred to walk by Daylight rather than Starlight. President Day of Yale College was one of their sons.
The church had been gathered, a minister had come to dwell among his people, but for ten years longer the school- house served as the place of meeting for both Church and Society. We find a record that "Warnings for Society meet- ings should be set upon a white oak tree near the south east corner of Zepheniah Crouch his house and on the chestnut staddel [small tree or sapling] near the southwest corner of the schoolhouse".
Nearly thirty years had passed since Stephen Paine planted himself by the Great Pond, years filled with arduous toil. New homes dotted the hills and valleys of East Green- wich in the Town of Kent. New settlers had arrived and a new generation was growing up. About 1750 another group
[ 15]
had arrived from Hebron, among them being the Thomas Carter whose name leads the list of original church members with at least ten of his fifteen children. There is a tradition that an earlier Carter, also from Hebron, had explored the wilderness and selected a site for a clearing ; but, returning some time later with his family, he was unable to locate the spot that he had selected. The Carters settled in the north- eastern part of the town near the "Stone Threshing Floor", a large flat rock to which the farmers often brought their grain for threshing. Population, with all these newcomers, now far exceeded the capacity of the little schoolhouse, and the building of a true meeting house could no longer be post- poned.
Accordingly, meetings were called and committees ap- pointed. In 1776 Justus Sackett was sent to the General Court "to git a committee to Stake A place to Set sd house". Another committee was appointed "to apprise the specie that are Subscribed and Brought for Building s'd house", for as yet there was no common standard of currency, the shilling and the pound varying at different periods and among the differ- ent colonies. Eventually, however, the Society "Excepted of the Doings of the meeting house Committee", and the work of building could proceed.
There was considerable rivalry between the inhabitants of the northern and the southern parts of the town, and when it was decided "to sit the meeting house" in the center, the sec- tions vied with each other to see which could bring the larger corner stone. "The South" won. There were many difficui- ties, chief among them being the scarcity of money; but by December, 1767, the building, though not completed, was far enough advanced to be used for a meeting of the Society.
It stood on the hill, slightly forward of the present build- ing, a plain, unpainted structure, without steeple or bell, and looking more like a respectable barn than like a meeting house. There were doors on the east, south, and west sides,
[ 16]
and the pulpit was set high on the north side, with stairs lead- ing into it from the west. Over the pulpit was a sounding board, an important adjunct, apparently, of the early meeting house, though why it was needed in so small a building is something of a mystery. There was also a gallery. There was no chimney for, though families had spacious fireplaces in their own homes, such comfort in the House of God would have been considered sacrilegious. One writer has said,* "Of a cold morning the breath of the worshipers would seem like smoke from a hundred furnaces as it came in contact with the frosty atmosphere."
At first, probably, temporary seats were used, perhaps merely logs or boards set on stumps or kegs; but in the fall of 1768 a beginning was made in the building of pews-square or "box" pews, accommodating one or more families, the occu- pants seated facing one another. It was voted "that the Decon Seet Should be built according to the Discribtion that Decon Lee has Discribed". It was not until 1781 that pews in the gallery were completed. And the following year it was voted "to fill up the vacancies of glass in the windows with wood or glass". Did small boys throw stones in 1782 ?
"Seating the Meeting House" was the responsibility of the Society ; and it must have been a difficult business, requir- ing great tact and judgment and often resulting, doubtless, in spite of the most conscientious efforts, in resentment and hurt pride. It was voted "to give the Rev. Mr. Osborn the use of the pue nex East of the Great Door as long as he remains our minister"-a particularly chilly spot, one would think ! Joseph Smalley and Daniel Lee were the first two deacons, and their seats were probably at the front, underneath the high pulpit, where they might keep a watchful eye upon the congregation.
*The New England Meeting House, an address by the Rev. Noah Porter, President of Yale College, written in 1882, reprinted by the Tercenten- ary Commission in 1933.
[17 ]
[ 18 ]
PLAN OF THE FIRST MEETING HOUSE, 1767
WEST DOOR
STAIRWAY
SOUTH DOOR
PULPIT
EAST. DOOR
LIST OF PEW HOLDERS IN OLD MEETING HOUSE, 1816
Rev. Peter Starr
Phineas Peck
John Talmadge
Augustus Coleman
Jonathan Reynolds
Benajah Mallory
Isaac Sturtevant
Eli Booth
Youngs Elliott
Newcomb Carter
Heman Bissell
Swift Eldred
Aaron Mallory, Jr.
Ward Carter
Polly Mallory
Elias Carter
Eseck Carter
Salmon Weston
Samuel Gilbert
Jedediah Calhoun
George W. Curtis
Charles Everett
Abel Fuller
Justus Sackett
Amasa Strong
Sherman Hartwell
Jemima Hopkins
George Starr
Anna Beaman
Darius Webb
Stephen Strong
Enoch Taylor
Lemuel Brownson
Moses Sackett
John Eyles
Austin Fuller
Ethiel Peet
Seymour Hopkins Platt Starr
Ahijar Wedge
Lyman Norton
Benjamin Sackett
Alanson Morgan
Benjamin Carter
Daniel Morgan
Samuel Eldred
Isaac Bates
Eben Strong
Arnold Saunders
Augustine Curtis
Ruth Jones
Amos Fowler
Anna Wilcox
Adonijah Carter
James Beardsley
Judah Eldred
Ira Stone
Josiah Finney
Abner Welch
Ebenezer Tanner
Josiah Webb
Adijah Fuller
Newton J. Morris
George Batterson
David Taylor
John Buell
Elias Taylor
Lois Eyles
Aaron Mallory
Abigail Morris
Isaac Hawes
Mariah Strong
[ 19 ]
Mariam Buck Abigail Morris Rachel Beardsley
Abigail Robbins
Benjamin Seelye
Samuel Swan
Nathan Wood
Rufus Swift
Molly Carter
Isaac Sturtevant
Joseph Mencrow
Elnathan Hall
Joel Potter
Daniel Smith
Dan Carter
Wid. Gaylord
Asahel Wedge, Jr.
Alfred Brownson
John Taylor
Seth Morse
James H. Taylor
Lysander Curtis
Lucinda Curtis
Homer Sackett
Nathaniel Swift, Jr.
Milton Curtis
Isaac Hazen
Buell Carter
Elias Merwin
Betsey Swift
Abel Osborn
Joseph Bennett
Thomas Ward
Salmon Brownson
Asa Ward
William Bradley, Jr.
Abigail Morris
Peter Pickett, Jr.
Jonathan Todd
Edson Abbott
William Beardsley, Jr.
Peter Kidney
Edmund Saunders
Joseph Carter
Alexander Sackett
John Carter
Samuel Weston
Samuel Carter
Daniel Beeman
Widow Palmer
Joseph Taylor
Rhoda Strong
Abner Everett
Joseph Peters
Aaron Coleman
Reuben Fox
Abel Fuller
Nathaniel Swift
Eben Strong
Newton J. Morris
Aaron Sackett
Josiah Webb
Enoch Hawes
Levi Shove
Ebenezer Tanner, Jr.
John Welch
Adonyrum Carter
James Wickwire
Allen Tanner Julius Swift
Desire Morse
Rebecca Hopkins Keziah Bliss Seth Shove
[ 20]
The tithingman, who was elected at town meeting and whose duty it was to keep order in the meeting house, likewise sat facing the congregation, ready to use his tithingrod whenever it might be necessary to awake a sleeping parishioner or ad- monish a restless child. Adjustments in the seating were often necessary, perhaps to satisfy the complaints of dis- gruntled parishioners. For example: "Voted to move Mr. Samuel Palmer and Mr. Simon Babcock be moved across the alley west and Esq. Sackett and Capt. Carter to the East side of the Great Door and one moved out of that Pue to the west side of the Door and Joseph Carter Jun. Alexander Sack- ett and Sylvester Finney to the South East Piller Pue and Braddock Carter Phillips Strong jr and Able Comstock jr to the first Body Pue from the Great Door to the West Side." It was voted "that boys shall be seated above 12 years of age and girls all above 10 years of age", and after the gallery pews were completed young women were granted "the Right hand Pew in the Gallery". Truly, seating the meeting house must have been an ordeal to daunt the bravest deacon!
The congregation stood during the long prayer. Services were held both morning and afternoon, each service lasting two hours or more. The time must often have seemed inter- minable, especially in winter, and children doubtless watched eagerly, their elders perhaps a bit guiltily, for the turning of the hour glass. One concession was made to the women, namely the privilege in cold weather of carrying footstoves, small tin-lined boxes which held live coals.
During the intermission those who lived at a distance might repair to near-by houses to warm themselves, eat the lunches they had brought, and refill their footstoves in pre- paration for the long afternoon service. This arrangement presented difficulties both for the guests and for hospitable families in the neighborhood; and in 1797 it was voted "to give liberty to the inhabitants of the town to errect Sabbath Day houses or horse sheds" .- evidence of consideration for both man and beast. The Sabbath Day houses were small
[ 21 ]
houses on the green, usually with two rooms and two fire- places opening into a common chimney. On Sunday morning some boys would be delegated to arrive early, build the fires, and have the rooms ready for later arrivals. Here families could eat their mid-day lunches in company with their rela- tives or friends. There was an advantage not mentioned in the official minutes; for people widely scattered, with few means of communication and with little leisure, these Sabbath Day gatherings offered a welcome opportunity, not only to discuss the morning sermon, but also to hear the latest reports of the town and to exchange items of neighborhood gossip. Truly, the Sabbath Day houses met a many-sided need.
In all Congregational churches the building was, in fact as in name, a "Meeting House", being used for secular as well as religious gatherings, and especially for town meetings. These meetings always opened with prayer, either by the minister or by a deacon. On election day the minister would nominate a man for office, a deacon would second the nomination, and then the freemen, led by the minister, would file solemnly toward the pulpit and deposit their ballots. Indeed, a Connecticut law required the minister to advise his congregation which candi- dates for office were safe and godly men. It is not strange that elections were usually unanimous. The women, of course, stayed home and baked "election cake".
Mr. Osborn's pastorate ended in 1771, thirty-three years after the first settlement in the town. It had been a generation of significant achievement; homes had been established, the wilderness had been conquered, a school had been started, a church had been gathered. During the fourteen years of Mr. Osborn's ministry a meeting house had been erected, a hun- dred ninety-one infants had been baptized, and eighty-five persons had been received into membership-no small tribute to the faithfulness and ability of the first pastor.
Governor Bradford had written of Plymouth a century and a half before: "All great and honourable actions are ac- companied with great difficulties, and must be both enterprised
[ 22 ]
and overcome with answerable courages". The generation now passing had planted a new community in the heart of the wilderness; the new generation must guard that community as it developed into maturity. The older generation had ex- tended the boundaries of a British colony ; the new generation was to play its part in transforming thirteen British colonies into one free and independent nation. Great difficulties were still to "be enterprised and overcome", but the children of the hardy and resolute pioneers of 1738 could be depended upon, like their fathers, to meet whatever problems or hardships might arise with "answerable courages".
[ 23 ]
CHAPTER III. A CRITICAL HALF CENTURY REV. PETER STARR, 1772-1829
T O the Rev. Joseph Bellamy, who had presided over the gathering of the church fifteen years before, the people turned again when a new pastor was needed. Dr. Bellamy, whose pastorate in Bethlehem covered a period of more than fifty years, was one of the most renowned theolo- gians of his day; and to his home in Bethlehem came young men, usually graduates of Yale, who desired additional train- ing for the ministry. Among the "Young Sirs" in this pioneer divinity school was Peter Starr of Danbury.
This young man was now twenty-eight years old. His father, a prosperous landowner in Danbury, had died in Peter's infancy, leaving him the youngest of six children. Neverthe- less, the boy had entered Yale at the age of sixteen, graduat- ing in the class of 1764. For a few years he taught school, studying theology meanwhile with the Rev. Daniel Brinsmade of Washington, and then he enrolled in Dr. Bellamy's training school. He now became a candidate for the pulpit which Mr. Osborn's death had left vacant.
One's imagination is challenged by the scene as the young student for the first time ascended the pulpit stairs and faced a critical congregation. Keen eyes observed every detail: his dignified black costume, his spotless neckcloth, the new wig which we know from an old account book had cost fifteen shillings, or about nine dollars; and keen minds weighed his every word, alert to detect any departure from orthodox theo- logy. But he must have passed the ordeal successfully for he continued as student preacher for twenty-two Sundays.
[ 24 ]
REV. PETER STARR
Probably on certain occasions Dr. Bellamy himself was present, together with some of his students, or even the entire class, conspicuous in their black coats and hats, to observe and criticize the sermon. This ordeal also he survived, and upon his ordination in 1772, Mr. Starr was given a unanimous call, a call to which he signified his "chearfull acceptance and com- pliance therewith, hoping by the grace of God to serve you faithfully therein"; and faithfully indeed he served for fifty- seven years.
Peter Starr's pastorate covered a critical half-century in the life of the nation, for it embraced the Revolution against Great Britain, the gradual welding together of the colonies, the adoption of the Constitution, the organization of the government, and the War of 1812. Conversation between ser- vices in the Sabbath Day Houses was not limited to town gossip or the young parson's latest sermon; there were topics of greater importance to be discussed.
Communication between the various parts of His Majes- ty's realm might be difficult; nevertheless, news from Massa- chusetts Bay spread with surprising rapidity throughout the Colony of Connecticut; and the inhabitants of Kent, like the people of every other town, were filled with indignation and alarm. As early as 1770 it was voted in town meeting: "That we are opposed to having European goods imported under the present condition of things". And four years later a Commit- tee of Correspondence was appointed "to receive the generous donations of the inhabitants of the town of Kent-and to transmit the same to the committee of correspondence or selectmen of Boston for the relief of the poor in Boston", and this committee was instructed to correspond with similar com- mittees in other towns. The militia reported to the training ground in Flanders for military training under Capt. Joseph Carter, and the young minister, like practically all his Congre- gational brethren throughout New England, urged his people to act boldly in the cause of freedom.
[ 25 ]
The honorable part that Connecticut played in the Revo- lution was due in large measure to the fact that her governor, Jonathan Trumbull of Lebanon, was the only one of the thir- teen governors who had been elected by the people and who was therefore under no obligation to the British Crown. In answer to Washington's call of distress during the terrible winter in Morristown, a wagon train from Lebanon passed through Litchfield on its way to Newburgh, carrying two hundred barrels of flour, one hundred barrels of pork, and one hundred barrels of beef, and gathering supplies as it moved along. "No other man", said Washington, "than Governor Trumbull could have procured them, and no other state than Connecticut would have furnished them." The people of East Greenwich, many of whom had come originally from Lebanon and were doubtless his personal friends, would not have been deaf to Governor Trumbull's call.
Probably the pastor read from the pulpit the order dated May first, 1775, less than two weeks after Concord and Lexing- ton :
"Jonathan Trumbull, Esq.
Governor of the Colony of Connecticut
To Eleazer Curtiss Jun, Greeting
"I do hereby authorize & impower you, by Beat of Drum or otherwise, to raise by yourself or other Officers of your Com- pany, by Inlistments, a Company of able bodied, effective Vol- unteers, within this Colony, to consist of One Hundred Men, including Officers, for the Defence of this Colony, during the Pleasure of this Assembly not exceeding seven months; and the Colonels of the respective Regiments of Militia, & the several Officers thereof are required to afford you all proper Aid and Assistance; and the Captains in the several Regi- ments are hereby required to master their respective Com- panies, when requested by you, for the Purpose aforesaid
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.