USA > Connecticut > New Haven County > East Haven > The evolution of an old New England Church, being the history of the Old stone church in East Haven, Connecticut > Part 5
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AN INDEPENDENT CHURCH AND ITS FIRST PASTOR.
sense of their opportunity and responsibility. Associated with such leaders as the Reverend Joseph Noyes, of New Haven, the Reverend Samuel Whittlesey, of Wallingford, the Rev- erend Isaac Stiles, of North Haven, the Reverend Nathaniel Chauncy, of Durham, and others, the East Haven pastor found a keen test for his talents. In this distinguished company of divines he was a leader, held in high honor and respect.
At the ordination of the Reverend Philemon Robbins, of Branford, on February 7, 1733, Mr. Hemingway offered a prayer and charged the candidate. The Reverend Samuel Whittlesey, of Wallingford, preached the sermon, and the Reverend Isaac Stiles, of North Haven, extended the right hand of fellowship.29 Nine years later, when Mr. Robbins, who had become an adherent of the more liberal theology, accepted an invitation to preach in the Baptist Church in Wal- lingford on Sunday, January 6, 1742, Mr. Hemingway30 joined with Mr. Stiles in sending a letter of protest. Dis- senters from the standing order found no sympathy with the North Haven and East Haven pastors, and any action which condoned and encouraged division met with their stern rebuke. Through their fidelity to the strict Calvinistic theology and consociated Congregationalism, and their superior abilities, they, with the Reverend Nathaniel Chauncy, of Durham, became prominent figures in the religious and ecclesiastical affairs in the colony.
In the General Consociation, too, Mr. Hemingway was to make his influence felt. The General Consociation of Con- necticut was born in Hartford in conformity with the plan for consociated churches and associated ministers as provided by the Saybrook Synod, its membership to consist of dele- gates from the local associations, and its meetings to be held annually. It became the custom of the General Association
29 T. P. Gillett, Past and Present of the Congregational Church of Bran- ford, p. 13.
30 C. H. S. Davis, History of Wallingford, p. 270.
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THE EVOLUTION OF AN OLD NEW ENGLAND CHURCH.
to have an election sermon preached at each of its meetings; and in 1740 Mr. Hemingway was the preacher, the meeting being held in Hartford. His sermon, The Favour of God the best Security of a People, and a Concern to Please Him Urged, was from Proverbs XVI : 7.31 King George's War, or the War of the Austrian Succession, as it was known in Europe, was just beginning (1739-48), and the military prepa- rations being carried on induced the preacher to admonish his fellow clergymen to seek the pleasure of God.
In 1743 Mr. Hemingway was moderator, the Association meeting in Fairfield.32 This great honor could not have been bestowed on one of mediocre gifts; for it carried the connota- tion of distinction and placed its holder as virtual head of the Congregational ministers of the colony. Having been chosen special preacher at one of the annual meetings of the General Association, and having been elected moderator three years later, Mr. Hemingway must have been an eminent leader in the affairs of the church, and no inferior pulpit orator, his abilities fully recognized by his colleagues.
Mr. Hemingway and his parishioners had no sympathy with dissent of any kind. In the beginning of the eighteenth cen- tury the Congregational church in Connecticut was without a competitor. Congregationalism held the field alone; there was not a single church in the colony outside of the established order. The Quakers, Baptists, and Rogerines were few in numbers and without the privilege of organizing themselves into "church state." The founding of the Baptist church in Groton, in 1705, was the first break in the Congregational solidarity ; but others were soon to follow.
Some people in Stratford were of Episcopalian sympathies, and at their invitation the Reverend George Muirson, a mis-
31 The sermon was printed. The only known copies now on file are in the Yale and Harvard Libraries.
22 L. Bacon, Contributions to the Ecclesiastical History of Connecticut, p. 143.
X
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AN INDEPENDENT CHURCH AND ITS FIRST PASTOR.
sionary of the Anglican Church at Rye, New York, crossed the Connecticut border in 1706 to administer the rite of baptism. Sixteen years later the Reverend George Pigot located at Strat- ford as the resident missionary, and the next year founded Christ Church, the first Episcopal Church in the colony.33
At the Yale College commencement in 1722 President Tim- ) othy Cutler, Reverend Daniel Brown, an instructor, Reverend Samuel Johnson, of West Haven, and Reverend James Wet- more, of North Haven, publicly renounced their ordination and affiliation with the Congregational body in favor of the Episcopal. They fully expected to be retained in their respec- tive positions, but, to the contrary, their resignations were accepted without being presented.34 Several other ministers in the colony entertained the same sympathies, but seeing the cool reception given to President Cutler and his colleagues they decided it would be better to remain where they were. Rev- erend Samuel Johnson was the only one who returned to Con- necticut. In 1724 he succeeded Mr. Pigot in Stratford, and in 1754 he was appointed President of King's College, now Columbia University, New York. President Timothy Dwight mentioned him as the father of the Episcopal Church in Con- necticut, and "perhaps the most distinguished clergyman of that order who had settled within its limits." Timothy Cutler, after receiving Episcopal ordination in England, became the rector of Christ Church, or "The Old North Church" as it is now known, in Boston, in 1723, and continued in this office until his death in 1765.
The Reverend Ebenezer Punderson, pastor at North Groton, withdrew from the Congregational Church in 1728, and sailed for England to receive holy orders. In 1732 the Reverend
38 Benj. Trumbull, Vol. I, pp. 405-6; S. Orcutt, History of Stratford, Vol. I, pp. 317-19; E. Edwards Beardsley, History of Episcopal Church in Con- necticut, Vol. I, pp. 20-31.
34 L. Bacon, Contributions to Ecclesiastical History, p. 266; E. Edwards Beardsley, Vol. I, pp. 32-61.
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THE EVOLUTION OF AN OLD NEW ENGLAND CHURCH.
X John Beach, pastor at Newtown, and the Reverend Samuel Seabury,35 the supply pastor at Groton, did likewise. All three subsequently returned to Connecticut as Anglican missionaries.
X
Dissent from the standing order was springing up in every section of the colony. East Haven was one of the few villages in which there was absolute unanimity of belief. Mr. Hem- ingway and his parishioners were strict Calvinists in theology and strict Congregationalists in matters of church polity.
X
Early in the eighteenth century a decline in the austere religious and moral life of the people was everywhere apparent. The church services had become formal, so that pure legalism was the religion of the times. Small revivals, entirely local in character, had here and there aroused the dormant religious nature of men in the different Connecticut towns, but they were of short duration and due to some particular misfortune, such as an epidemic of sickness.
During the winter of 1734, Jonathan Edwards began to preach from his pulpit in Northampton, Massachusetts, the sermons which started the tremendous revival known as the Great Awakening, "The spirit of God began extraordinarily to set in and wonderfully to work amongst"36 the people, so that many were the souls who became converted. In March of 1735 the revival spread throughout Massachusetts and Con- necticut,37 and finally throughout all New England.38
Accounts of the thrilling evangelistic activities were com-
35 Grandfather of the Reverend Samuel Seabury, the first Bishop in Con- necticut. See L. Bacon, Contributions, p. 266.
36 J. Edwards, Narrative of Surprising Conversions, pp. 23-5.
37 "There was a considerable revival of religion last summer at New Haven old town, as I was once and again informed by the Rev. Mr. Noyes, the minister there, and by others: And by a letter which I very lately received from Mr. Noyes, and also by information we have had otherwise, this flourishing of religion still continues, and has lately much increased: Mr. Noyes writes, that many this summer have been added to the Church, and particularly mentions several young persons that belong to the principal families of that town." J. Edwards, Narrative, pp. 31-2.
38 Joseph Tracy, The Great Awakening, p. 13.
X.
AN INDEPENDENT CHURCH AND ITS FIRST PASTOR. 51
municated by the Reverend Benjamin Colman, pastor of the Brattle Street Church in Boston, to some of his friends in England, and at their request for further information Edwards wrote his Narrative of the Surprising Work of God. This treatise was circulated everywhere in Great Britain and Amer- ica, causing a renewal of interest to be felt in the evangelistic movement.
The Reverend George Whitfield, an English clergyman, having been invited to visit New England by Mr. Colman, arrived in Newport, Rhode Island, in September, 1740, to begin an evangelistic tour of the country. He was at the height of his fame as a preacher, though only twenty-five years of age. His intense conviction, unbounded fervor, and match- less eloquence made him an orator of tremendous power. It was customary for the New England ministers to preach from closely written manuscripts which they held in their hands, and very often quite close to their eyes. Mr. Whitfield used no manuscript to hold him down, so without restraint he could rise to sublime heights of oratory. His reputation as a preacher of limitless gifts and powers, excelling in forensic abilities, had gone before him, and people flocked from every- where to hear his stirring message. Everywhere he went he was greeted by eager and anxious people39 ; churches were taxed to their utmost capacity. It seemed as if no one could resist him.
In the middle of October he journeyed to Northampton to call on Edwards, and after a week's visit he started on his trip through Connecticut. Everywhere he was received with open arms; everywhere crowds gathered to hear him; everywhere "the hearers were sweetly melted down" as they listened to his passionate appeal. Enthusiasm knew no bounds: a religious mania had taken hold of Massachusetts and Connecticut, such as had never been known before. The Great Awakening had
39 Joseph Tracy, pp. 93-4.
×
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THE EVOLUTION OF AN OLD NEW ENGLAND CHURCH.
surely come. Journeying through East Windsor, Hartford, Wethersfield, and Middletown, spending a few hours in each place to preach a fiery sermon to an eager throng, he arrived in New Haven, where he remained three days before going on to New York. 40 He had aroused New England to an incom- parable pitch of religious fervor, centering all thought and speech on matters of religion.
A period of intense evangelistic activity followed his brief visit. The Reverend Gilbert Tennent, of New Jersey, con- ducted a series of meetings in Boston, after which he toured Connecticut. Jonathan Parsons, of Lyme, Benjamin Pomeroy, of Hebron, Joseph Bellamy, of Bethlehem, and Jonathan Ed- wards, of Northampton, Massachusetts, began itinerant evan- gelistic work throughout the two colonies. They visited town after town, preaching as they went, and everywhere large, enthusiastic crowds gave them hearty welcome. So great was the excitement that there were times when all business closed and the whole community surrendered itself to a religious ecstacy. At the revival meetings there was shouting and wailing, sobbing and swooning. The excitement was so great that men wept and women fainted. At Bridgewater, many cried out "under a sense of their sin and danger; some hope- fully converted, and some transported and over-borne with a sense of the love of God."41 During the protracted meetings in Lyme "great numbers cried aloud in the anguish of their souls. Several stout men fell as though a cannon had been discharged and a ball had made its way through their hearts. Some young women were thrown into histeric fits."42 In the neighboring town of East Lyme, "some had fits; some fainted ; and it was observable that God made use of the concern in some to create a concern in others."43 It was in Enfield that
40 Benj. Trumbull, Vol. II, p. 153.
# Joseph Tracy, p. 130.
42 Ibid., p. 138.
43 Ibid., p. 15I.
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AN INDEPENDENT CHURCH AND ITS FIRST PASTOR.
Jonathan Edwards preached his sermon on Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, and the weeping and wailing became so loud and boisterous that the minister had to ask the people to be still so he could be heard.44
Such enthusiasm could not help but attract those of mediocre talents, and give rise to a host of imitators who possessed all the faults and few of the virtues of their leaders. In Con- necticut many pastors left their parishes to enter upon evan- gelizing tours, going from place to place mimicking Whitfield, Edwards, Tennent, Bellamy and others. Without invitation they intruded into parishes to awaken the people from their spiritual slumbers and accuse the pastors of being unconverted.
The Reverend James Davenport,45 of Southhold, Long Island, itinerated through Massachusetts and Connecticut, denouncing the local ministers and stirring up trouble wher- ever he went. He arrived in New Haven in September, 1741, and shortly thereafter publicly denounced Reverend Joseph Noyes, the pastor of the First Church, declaring him to be unconverted. In consequence a division was created, the dis- contented ones withdrawing and forming the White Haven Society, or what is now the United Church,
Opposition to the revivals in general began to grow quite pronounced. The Reverend Charles Chauncy, pastor of the First Church in Boston, was the leader of the opposition, and his attack on the entire evangelistic movement entitled, Thoughts on the State of Religion in New England, was a most capable summary of the unfortunate results. So for- midable became the opposition that New England was soon divided into two parties; those who favored the revivals were known as the "New Lights," and those opposed were known as the "Old Lights."
N.S.
A.B.
Itinerant preaching had caused so much disturbance and had
44 Benj. Trumbull, Vol. II, p. 145.
45 A great-grandson of the Reverend John Davenport, first pastor of the New Haven Church.
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THE EVOLUTION OF AN OLD NEW ENGLAND CHURCH.
proven so obnoxious in Connecticut that the legislature, in October, 1741, called a "General Consociation of the churches in the Colony, consisting of three ministers and three mes- sengers (laymen) from each particular consociation," to settle conditions on the basis of love and charity and promote "the true interest of vital religion." The General Consociation met in Guilford in November and voted to forbid itinerant preach- ing, at the same time declaring that no minister should preach or administer the sacraments in another's parish unless invited to do so. In May of the following year the legislature passed a law providing that any pastor intruding into another parish would forfeit his right to collect a salary, and would be liable to be put under bonds.
During the years immediately following the evangelistic activity of the Great Awakening there were formed "Strict Congregational" or "Separatist" churches in many of the smaller towns, principally in the eastern part of the colony. During the revivals their emotions had carried them away into ecstasies, causing them to adhere to a more literal interpreta- tion of the Bible and more fanatical beliefs regarding the prac- tice of religious rites. They declared their absolute freedom from the Saybrook Platform and Half-Way Covenant, at the same time registering their sincere aversion to an educated ministry and prepared sermons, and stoutly affirming their faith in the validity of visions as proof for genuine religious experience. The authorities of the commonwealth compelled them to pay taxes for the maintenance of the state church and generally oppressed them. With persistent opposition from without, accompanied by poverty and their own fanaticism within, their churches soon fell into disruption and discord and ultimately into disintegration, so that in less than two decades they had practically disappeared, many of their mem- bers joining with the Baptists.
When Whitfield made his second appearance in New Eng- land in 1644, Mr. Hemingway united with the other ministers
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AN INDEPENDENT CHURCH AND ITS FIRST PASTOR.
in the New Haven County Association in issuing a declara- tion of protest against him.46 The Old Lights had gained strength and stood their ground against a repetition of the revivals. The faculties of Harvard and Yale issued state- ments in opposition to him, and protests emanated from numerous ministerial associations. On February 5, 1745, the Hartford North Association adopted resolutions against him, and on February 19, the New Haven Association declared "We can no wise approve his Itinerancy, in going from County to County, from Town to Town, and from one Place to another, under the pretence of preaching the Gospel ; whereas we cannot understand that he hath any orderly Call thereunto, whatever Plea he may make of his having a special Mission and Commission from Heaven to do so. It is our judgment that the said Mr. George Whitfield should not be allowed to preach anywhere or to have Communion; and we do hereby publish and Declare, that it is our Purpose and Determination, that we will not admit the said Mr. Whitfield into any of our Pulpits, nor receive him to Communion in any of our Churches; and that we will Caution the People under our Charge against going to hear him any where, 'till he hold forth Repentence according to Gospel Rule, and bring forth Fruit meet for Repentence."
Mr. Hemingway was an ardent Old Light, and with him the revival movement found no favor at all. His signature is the second on the declaration of the New Haven County Associa- tion against Mr. Whitfield. Although three great revivals had taken place in New Haven (1736, 1739, 1741), there are no indications that the East Haven Church had any part in them or was in the least affected by them.
With the close of the Great Awakening, Mr. Hemingway's ministry was drawing to its conclusion. For fifty years he
46 Reverend George Whitfield made three later trips to New England- 1754, 1764, 1770. On the last trip he died in Newburyport, Massachusetts, September 30, 1770. See Robert Philip, Life and Times of George Whitfield.
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THE EVOLUTION OF AN OLD NEW ENGLAND CHURCH.
had continued in the pastorate of the East Haven Church, loved, honored, and respected by those for whom he had given his life in faithful service. When his death occurred, October 7, 1754, there were but two ministers in the colony whose pastorates were longer-Timothy Edwards, of Windsor, and Anthony Stoddard, of Woodbury.47
His estate was valued at £6,556. In his will, which was dated April 21, 1746, provision was made for bequeathing £20 to the church, "for the Support of the Lord's table amongst them"; £5 to his daughter, and all the rest to his wife with the stipulation that at her death the real property was to go to his daughter's children by her first marriage.48 As the library of a minister constituted one of his principal assets, it is indeed peculiar that no mention was made of books.
41 F. B. Dexter, Graduates of Yale College, Vol. I, p. 26.
4º A tradition in the family is to the effect that his daughter did not fare better because her second husband was a member of the Church of England. See F. B. Dexter, Yale Graduates, p. 25. Lydia Hemingway, daughter and only child of Reverend Jacob Hemingway, was married to Hezekiah Pier- pont, son of Reverend James Pierpont, of New Haven, on February 9, 1736. Two children were born to this union : Jacob, born February II, 1737, and John, born May 21, 1740. Hezekiah Pierpont died in 1741. Sarah Pier- pont, sister of Hezekiah, married Jonathan Edwards, July 28, 1727. On March 2, 1745, Lydia Hemingway, widow of Hezekiah Pierpont, was married to Captain Theophilus Morgan, of Killingworth, who had been married to Elizabeth Sherman, of Newport, Rhode Island, but from whom he was divorced. Theophilus Morgan and his second wife, Lydia, lived in the Old Stone House, in Guilford, from 1745 until 1748, when they moved to Killing- worth. Three children were born to them: William, born June 1, 1746, Mary, born May 7, 1751, and Amelia, born December II, 1755. Theophilus Morgan died November 22, 1766. Lydia died May 27, 1779. See Pierpont and Morgan Genealogies.
A
.
REV. NICHOLAS STREET
CHAPTER III.
THE PASTORATE OF NICHOLAS STREET.
Mr. Hemingway was succeeded in the pastorate by Nicholas Street,1 a graduate of Yale College in the class of 1751. He was invited to preach as a candidate in March, 1755, and on July 5 he was called to settle in the work. His ordination took place on October 8. In theology he was a strict Calvinist of the Old Light party, as was his predecessor.
The French and Indian War (1754-63) had started before the death of Mr. Hemingway, and hostilities were in progress when Mr. Street entered upon his pastoral duties. East Haven, loyal to the mother country, furnished a number of men for the British army, several of whom were lost in battle or through sickness contracted during the campaigns.2
It was the custom for the early New England minister to settle in a parish for life. He was known as the "Parson" or the person of the parish. He was practically the only college graduate in the community ; and because of his superior learn- ing his opinions were sought on matters of civil administra- tion as well as on matters of religion. He was by far the most influential and respected man in the community. To be wife to such a man of consequence was a privilege to any maiden.
Mr. Street, like Mr. Hemingway, was teacher of the village school, and it was to one of his pupils, Miss Desire Thompson,"
1 The great-grandson of the Reverend Nicholas Street, pastor of the church in New Haven. He was born in Wallingford, Connecticut, February 21, 1730, the fourth son of Captain Elnathan and Damaris Street. See Street Genealogy, pp. 38-9; also F. B. Dexter, Yale Graduates, Vol. II, pp. 271-3. 2 Jacob Moulthrop, David Moulthrop, Adonijah Moulthrop, Jacob Robin- son, Benjamin Robinson, Thomas Robinson, Jr., David Potter, John Mallory, Abraham Jocelin, Samuel Hotchkiss, James Smith, Samuel Russell, Stephen Russell, Asa Luddington, and Benjamin Russell. S. Dodd, East Haven Register, p. 75.
3 Daughter of Moses and Desire (Hemingway) Thompson.
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THE EVOLUTION OF AN OLD NEW ENGLAND CHURCH.
that he was married on December 6, 1758. The bride was but thirteen years of age, and there is a tradition that she often had to be called from her play to come into the house and wash the dishes. As time went on the duties and responsi- bilities of being wife and mother were too severe for one so young and tender; for in less than seven years she was gone, leaving her husband and three daughters to mourn her loss. That her death was lamented by Mr. Street is obvious from the inscription he had carved on her tombstone :
"Here my Desire lies Reposing 'neath the dust ; Here all but virtue dies Whose memory cannot rust."
Mr. Street's second wife was Hannah, daughter of David Jr., and Hannah (Punderson) Austin, whom he married April 24, 1766, and by whom he had five sons and two daughters. At her death, thirty-six years later, he recorded in his diary, "Oct. 9, 1802, died Mrs. Hannah Street my amiable consort of a billious disorder much lamented aged 61."
Troublesome times throughout the colonies filled the second half of the eighteenth century; for America it was a period of universal chaos. In addition to the strain and turmoil of two wars, the French and Indian and the Revolution, with their subsequent periods of reconstruction, there was the reaction from the stricter forms of Calvinism and from the excitement caused by the evangelistic activity of the Great Awakening. It was a trying time for even the strongest of souls. Nevertheless, perfect harmony existed among the com- municants of the East Haven Church, and in spite of the general unsettled conditions great progress was made. How fortunate it was that such a wise and able man as Mr. Street should be the leader during those years !
A break with the old theology was inevitable. Silently smouldering in the very heart of the standing order was the
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THE PASTORATE OF NICHOLAS STREET.
spirit of reaction from the rigid Calvinism "of the Mathers and the Cottons." The opportune time was rapidly approaching for the Universalists and the Unitarians-the two liberal churches in America-to rise from their seclusion, assemble their forces, and form their own denominations. Their early adherents were largely men of Calvinistic antecedents, and would have gladly remained in the church of their childhood, had they not been driven out. But the old school was deter- mined to hold its own, guarding against any encroachments that might alter its sacred dogma, and fighting all liberalizing tendencies with inflexible obstinacy.
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