USA > Connecticut > The history of Connecticut, from the first settlement of the colony to the adoption of the present constitution, vol. I > Part 38
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At the time of the union of New Haven and Connecticut there were in the colony only seventeen hundred families, or between eight thousand and nine thousand inhabitants. To preach to this small number, the services of about twenty ministers were put in constant requisition. This would make on an average one preacher to eighty-five families. In several of the new plantations, thirty families maintained a minister ; and out of the large towns, forty families was thought to be a good congregation.t When it is remember-
* Trumbull, i. 284 ; Cambridge Platform, ch. xvi .. + Trumbull.
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HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
ed that most of these clergymen were gentlemen of uncom- mon powers of mind, of elegant manners, and thorough-bred scholars, in an age when scholars were rare, it will be seen that no people have valued religious instruction more than our fathers did, and that seldom if ever in the history of the world has a people been more faithfully taught. At no time since that day has there been such a class of educated gen- tlemen in New England as were the emigrant pastors of Connecticut. The generation of clergymen who succeeded them, were of course their inferiors in education, as the institutions of a new country are less thorough than those of an old one.
I have said that the qualifications for church-membership caused many dissensions among the churches. As it has been thought important to give these disputes a prominence in times past, that seems not to have belonged to them ori- ginally, I am hardly at liberty to pass them by without some notice. They possess an interest to the antiquarian that the general reader has never yet found in them, and those honest men who have collected and perpetuated them in books, as they were known to be friendly to the fame of the state, have evinced, it must be admitted, not only a desire to tell the whole truth, but a noble indifference to the opinion of the world and a confidence in the greatness of those men whose characters could bear to be set in so unfavorable a light and still elicit the admiration of posterity. I doubt if there can be found in the history of any other people so many industrious proclaimers of the ecclesiastical bickerings and neighborhood, nay family quarrels, of the founders of its institutions, as have been set forth by respectable writers, who have spent their lives in trying to do honor to Connecti- cut in this apparently equivocal way. I say, apparently equivocal, for doubtless the time will come when such minute details of the imperfections of human nature will be regarded with more indulgence than now, as they will be seen to have indicated a transition from the dead calm of formalism, to
455
REV. HENRY SMITH.
the lively, healthful atmosphere of religious toleration, and philosophical inquiry.
The first of these controversies, as has been stated in a former chapter, originated at Wethersfield, and might never have happened had Mr .. Phillips, the pastor of the first emi- grants, been induced to accompany them to Connecticut. They had at first no settled minister, and for several years were in a state of confusion that was beyond the reach of their best spiritual advisers, until the sagacious Davenport suggested that as they could not live together they should separate. This good counsel led to the settlement of Stam- ford, and could not have been continued beyond the spring of 1641, when Mr. Coe and Mr. Ward, with their party, re- moved from Wethersfield. The particulars of this quarrel can hardly be known at this remote day, as no documentary memorial of it is known to exist.
In 1641, and after Prudden, Sherman, and Denton had all preached to the people, and in time had sought other and more quiet fields of labor, the Rev. Henry Smith entered upon his duties as the first regular pastor in Wethersfield. He was a gentleman of good family, and he is, aside from the interest that he excites in us as the patriarch of one of the best sustained and most accomplished families in New England, entitled to our regard as a gentleman of uncommon culture, refinement, and firmness. He probably arrived in Boston in 1637, as he and Mrs. Smith were admitted into the commun- ion of the church at Watertown on the 5th of December, of that year .* At what precise period he removed to Con- necticut, is not certainly known, but he was a resident there at the time of the division of the lots on the east side of the Con- necticut river, in 1639-40, as he received a farm of consider-
* Mr. Smith brought over from England, among other articles of value, a silver tankard with his family coat of arms, beautifully engraved upon it. This venerable piece of silver, probably two hundred and fifty years old, is still in excellent con- dition, and is now in the hands of his great, great, great grandson, Wm. Mather Smith, Esquire, of Sharon, the only son of His Excellency, John Cotton Smith, the last charter governor.
456
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
able size at that time, which descended to his son Samuel .* He did not find his task in Wethersfield a very easy one, as there were still left some restless spirits in his church and congregation. He was, from the beginning of his ministry, the victim of suspicions the most unfounded, and accusations the most bitter.
In 1643, an application was made to the General Court, involving charges against him that were found on investiga- tion to be false.t His ministry terminated with his death in 1648.
Just before the decease of Mr. Smith, died Mr. Thomas Hooker, the pastor of the church in Hartford. No minister in New England possessed such unbounded sway over popu- lar assemblies as did this truly wonderful man. He was born at Marshfield, in the county of Leicester, England, in the year 1586, and graduated at Emanuel College, Cambridge, at a very early age. He was soon promoted to a fellowship there, and was not long in acquiring a high reputation for learning and ability. He was called " the light of the New England churches," and well merited the appellation ; for in his clear manner of setting forth the truth, his intimate ac- quaintance with the doctrines of the bible, his bold eloquence and the pungency of his illustrations, he had few equals and no superiors in New England. Hooker was to Connecticut what Cotton was to Massachusetts, and what Davenport was to New Haven. They were all men of such marked traits
* Dr. Chapin's Hist. of Glastenbury, p. 34.
t The committee appointed by the General Court to investigate these charges, reported on the 13th of April, 1643. This committee, among other things, say, -- " We find also that many of those who put up their names for removal, were not induced thereunto by any dislike or engagement they have in the present quarrels, but for want of lots and other considerations."
On the 10th of November of the same year, the General Court ordered that- " Mr. Chaplin, for divulging and setting his hand to a paper called a declara- tion, tending to the defamation of Mr. Smith, is fined £10.
" Francis Norton, for setting his hand to the said writing, is fined £5.
" John Goodridge, for setting his hand to said writing, 40s.
" Mr. Plum, for preferring a roll of grievances against Mr. Smith, and failing of proof in the prosecution thereof, is fined £10."
457
REV. THOMAS HOOKER.
of character, that perhaps no one could assign to any one of them the highest place. Davenport might be compared, in his opposition to the passions of the people and in the solidity of his character, to one of those sheer promontories that the mariner sees as he sails along the New England coast, defy- ing the storms and frowning down upon the white waves that recoil from its base; Cotton, to a limpid river flowing between steep hills that feed its current with the unfailing resources of bubbling springs gushing out of the natural fis- sures of the rocks, while they crowd it into a channel that allows it more depth than surface, with here and there a basin among the more lofty and retreating mountains, that expose, indeed, a broader area where the warm beams of the sun-light may bathe themselves, yet take away nothing from the boldness of the shore; Hooker, to the same river further on in its course, its volume increased by the tributaries that drain larger and wilder regions-sometimes turbid, too, with the added violence of the spring floods, having a strength and vastness of sweep always self-sustained and convincing. Hooker was not only the most attractive pulpit orator in New England, but he was equally distinguished by the fer- vency and pathos of his prayers, which, we are told, were like Jacob's ladder " wherein the nearer he came to the end, the nearer he drew to heaven." He was well skilled in the governing motives of men, and on that account was much consulted in matters relating to church discipline and the general management of ecclesiastical affairs. In his chari- ties he was very munificent. His chief conflict was with himself, in striving to subdue the irregularities of a tempera- ment naturally vehement and impetuous. In his domestic and social relations he was very happy, and few men have been more deeply loved.
In person, Hooker was tall and elegant, his features classi- cal, his eye thoughtful yet piercing, his voice rich and of great compass, and his manner graceful and majestic. He possessed physical as well as moral courage in a high degree. Even Mason was overawed by the noble bearing of this
458
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
soldier of the cross when following the little army, that was about to go in search of the Pequots, to the brink of the river that he might dismiss them with his benediction, his eye flashed as he bade them "in martial power to fight the battles of the Lord and of his people."
He died at Hartford, of a fever, on the 7th of July, 1647, in the 61st year of his age. "I am going to receive mercy," said the patriarch to a friend who stood by his bedside ; then closing his eyes tranquilly, a smile playing about his lips, he took his leave of a world that satisfies least of all a soul of such boundless energies and such an ethereal mould .*
Aside from Davenport, the founder of New Haven, that place was for many years distinguished for the wisdom and ability of its clergymen. Of these Hook, Street, and Pier- pont are among the most eminent. James Pierpont was born at Roxbury, Massachusetts, in 1659, graduated at Har- vard in 1681, and was ordained at New Haven in 1686. Descended from an illustrious family, and gifted to a high degree with intellectual endowments, eloquent speech, a graceful person, handsome features, and manners the most courtly and winning, he appears to have been from early youth too intently occupied with the mission of saving the souls of his fellow men, ever to think of himself. I suppose, of all the clergymen whose names belong to the early history of New England, Pierpont was the most lofty and pure in his aspirations, and of the most spiritual temper. With none of the sternness of Davenport, without the despondency of Wareham, and free from the impetuous moods that proved such thorns in the pillow of Hooker, his words, like the live coals from the altar in the hand of the angel, " touched and purified the lips" of those who listened to his teachings. His moral nature was so softly diffused over his church and people, that they appeared to lose themselves in the absorbing element, as dark forms seem sometimes in
* See Biography of Rev. Thomas Hooker, by Rev. E. W. Hooker, D.D.
.
459
REV. JAMES PIERPONT.
pleasant summer days, to dissolve in an atmosphere of liquid light .*
* 1. Robert de Pierrepont, who came to England with William the Conqueror, and possessed estates in Suffolk and Sussex, amounting to ten knights' fees-all of which he held of William, Earl of Warren.
2. William de Pierrepont, son and heir, (time of William II.)
3. Hugh de Pierrepont, son and heir, (time of Henry II.)
4. William de Pierrepont, owner of the Lordship of Halliwell, in Lancashire.
5. Sir Robert de Pierrepont, knight.
6. Henry de Pierrepont, of Holbeck, Woodhouse, county of Nottingham.
7. Sir Henry de Pierrepont, of Holme Pierrepont, in the right of his wife, Annora, sole daughter of Michael Manvers, Lord of Holme. He died A. D., 1291.
8. Sir Robert de Pierrepont, of Holme Pierrepont, governor of New Castle, married Sarah, daughter of Sir John Hering, knight, of Derbyshire, 1308.
9. Henry Pierrepont, of Holme Pierrepont, only son and heir, married Mar- garet, daughter of Sir Wm. Fitz Williams of Emly, knight.
10. Sir Edmund Pierrepont, son and heir, knight, married Joan, only daugh- ter of Sir John Monboucher, of Nottinghamshire, knight. He died in 1370, and was buried at Holme Pierrepont.
11. Sir Edmund Pierrepont, son and heir, married Frances, daughter of Thomas Kingsman. He was knighted in 1422.
12. Sir Henry Pierrepont, son and heir, married Ellen, daughter of Sir Nicholas Langford, knight.
13. Henry Pierrepont, only son and heir, married Tomasin, daughter of Sir John Melton, of Ashton, Yorkshire.
14. Sir Francis Pierrepont, knight, son and heir, married Margaret, daughter of John Burdon, Esq.
15. Sir William Pierrepont, son and heir, married Jane, daughter of Sir Richard Empson, knight. He was knighted in 1513.
16. Sir George Pierrepont, son and heir, married Winnifred, daughter of Wil- liam Thwaites, of Essex. He was knighted in 1547, and died 1564 .*
17. William Pierrepont, of Brereton, Lancaster county, son and heir, married Elizabeth.
18. James Pierrepont, who died at Ipswich, Mass.
19. John Pierrepont, born in London in 1619 ; admitted a freeman in Massa- chusetts in 1652; representative in 1672; died Dec. 7, 1682. He married Thankful Starr, and had five sons, viz., Benjamin, Joseph, Ebenezer, James, and John.
20. Rev. James Pierpont, of New Haven, born in 1659; and died in 1714.
* Sir George Pierrepont, had a son Robert (older than William,) who was created Earl of Kings- ton in 1628. His lordship's last male descendant, Evelyn Pierrepont, second duke of Kingston, died in 1773 without issue, when the honors and estates ought to have descended to the heirs of William, who were then and still are in America. Instead of this, however, they went to the nephew of the Duke, Charles Meadows, Esq., who assumed the surname of Pierrepont, and was created Earl Manvers.
460
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
The next great controversy in order of time, and one of the most important that ever occurred in New England on account of its duration, the bitterness of feeling by which it was characterized, and the exalted character of the men who participated in it, was that which commenced in the first church in Hartford about the middle of the seventeenth century. It appears to have originated in a difference of opinion between the Rev. Samuel Stone, pastor of that church, and Mr. William Goodwin, its ruling elder, on some nice points of congregationalism. It was claimed that per- sons had been baptized and admitted to the church in an informal manner, and without the proper qualifications ; though Dr. Mather intimates that it was difficult, even at the time of the controversy, to ascertain what were the pre- cise points of variance. The dispute, however, spread like a contagion, until nearly all the churches in the colony be- came more or less affected by it. The local and secular affairs of societies, towns, and of the entire commonwealth, were to a great extent influenced by the all-absorbing topic of thought and conversation. The General Court frequently interposed its advice and orders, with a view to quiet the agitation, and ecclesiastical bodies as often met to consider and decide upon the merits of the controversy ; but for a long time without avail. About the year 1640, in conse- quence of the death or removal of many of the princi- pal belligerents, both the church and state, so long the vic- tims of discord, were again restored to comparative good order.
Among those who were disaffected with Mr. Stone and steadfastly adhered to Elder Goodwin throughout the contro- versy, were Governor Webster, Mr. Cullick, Mr. Bacon, and Mr. Steel, all leading men both in the church and in the colony .*
By this time the church at Wethersfield had again become ripe for dissensions. Probably within two years after the death of Mr. Smith, but at what precise date is not known,
Trumbull, i. 296, 301.
461
CONTROVERSY AT WETHERSFIELD.
[1656.]
the Rev. John Russell was called by the church and ordained there, so far as appears, without opposition. The first part of his ministry was quiet and seemed to promise well for the future. But the Hartford controversy gradually ex- tended into his church, and some other elements of a very combustible character, were made to feed the flame. Among other things, Mr. Russell appears to have been a witness in a law suit, and to have testified in a way that was severely animadverted upon by Lieutenant John Hollister, a promi- nent member of his church. Mr. Russell held the same views with Mr. Stone of Hartford in relation to church gov- ernment and discipline, and without giving the offending member an opportunity to have a hearing, or even the bene- fit of a vote of the church, he privately excommunicated him in 1656, and afterwards refused to give his reasons for such a summary proceeding when they were demanded by Mr. Hollister .* Had Mr. Russell been anxious to test the practical workings of his plan of church government, he could hardly have chosen a more favorable subject than one of Captain Mason's military officers-a gentleman of un- doubted probity, an experienced member of the General Court, and a man not likely to be outdone by Mr. Russell, in the steadiness of his purposes and the obstinacy of his resist- ance. Besides his own natural force of character, Hol- lister had married a daughter of Richard Treat, Esquire, t one of the most formidable opponents in the colony, and could bring into the quarrel an array of names that the General Court would hardly treat with contempt.
The whole town was of course thrown into a state of excitement at this unusual war waged by a clergyman against a member of his church. A petition was prepared and signed by the excommunicated member, four other male and six female members of the church, and thirty-eight others, probably all members of the society, many of whom (as will be seen by referring to the subjoined note and docu-
* Dr. Chapin's Hist. of Glastenbury, p. 35 ; Cothren's Hist. of Woodbury. + Chapin, 185.
462
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
ment,* ) were men of high position-praying the Court to relieve the applicants from the burden of a minister who had "taken a scandalous and grievous oath, acknowledged by
* In this singular paper, a copy of which is here given, it will be seen that the church members signed by themselves, first the individual aggrieved, followed by the other male members ; then the female members, with Mrs. Treat, the wife of Richard and mother of Governor Treat, at the head, and next to her, Mrs. Hollister, her daughter, the wife of the principal applicant. These male and female names are separated with as much decency as their owners would have observed in the meet- ing house on the Sabbath. The remaining signers were not church members.
"To the right Worshipful, the Governor and Deputy Governor, the Worship- ful Magistrates, and Deputies, assembled at Hartford in This Honored Court, your humble petitioners wish increase of all felicity. August 17th, 1658.
"We, inhabitants of Wethersfield, are necessitated to implore the aid and assistance of this Honored Court, and thereafter by right of an order made last March ; for Mr. Russell, as we conceive, is not our settled and approved minister : First, He having sent us a writing, in the Spring, to provide for ourselves lest we be destitute, and we having professed, we look upon ourselves as free by answer of our committee, nor can we close with him, and are afraid to venture our souls under his ministry, he having given so great a scandal to the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ by such a grievous oath, acknowledged by himself to be ambiguous, rash, and sinful, and what more may be made evident. Therefore, we, your humble petitioners, humbly crave that we may not be held in bondage, but may use our liberty in procuring a minister who may be faithful in the administrations of the Gospel, and inoffensive in his conversation ; otherwise, we, your humble pe- titioners, shall be forced to undergo whatever inconvenience or damage may come upon us or ours, for we think him altogether unfit for our comfort. And we, your humble petitioners, humbly crave your help, for we profess it lies as a heavy burden upon our consciences, and we know no rule that he should compel us to it. And if your humble petitioners find acceptance and relief, you will more engage us to all loyal subjection to you, so humbly we take our leave of you, and rest yours to be commanded.
[Members of the church.]
John Hollister. Thomas Wright, Sr. John Deming, Sr. John Edwards, Sr. Richard Smith, Sr.
Alice Treat. Joana Hollister.
Mary Robbins. Margaret Wright. Rebeccah Smith. Dorothy Edwards.
[Not members of the church.]
Thomas Curtis. John Chester.
Samuel Boardman.
Thomas Standish.
John Kilbourn. Richard Treat.
John Nott.
Thomas Lord.
Thomas Wright, Jr. John Riley. Richard Smith, Jr.
James Wright.
[Not members of the church.]
John Deming, Jr. Thomas Gilbert. Thomas Williams. John Sadler, John Belden. Emanuel Buck. Hugh Wells. John Harrison. Benjamin Crane. Mathias Treat. William Colefoxe. Philip Goffe.
463
THE WETHERSFIELD CONTROVERSY.
[1658.]
himself to be ambiguous, rash, and sinful," who had himself cut asunder the ties that had bound him to the church, and who still remained " a heavy burden upon their consciences."
[Members of the church.]
[Not members of the church. ]
[Not members of the church.]
James Wakeley.
Joseph Smith.
Michael Griswold.
George Wolcott. Thomas Wickham.
Nathaniel Graves.
John Wadhams.
James Treat. Samuel Wright. Jonathan Smith.
John Curtis.
James Boswell.
Henry Crane. Lewis Jones.
Mr. Hollister was a native of Bristol, England, and emigrated to New Eng- land about the year 1642. In 1643, he was admitted a freeman at Weymouth, Massachusetts, and was a representative in the General Court of Massachusetts, at the session immediately following. In June, 1644, he was a member of the jury of a particular court held at Hartford, he having a short time previous to that date, become a resident of Wethersfield. He attended as a deputy to the General Court of Connecticut for the first time, at the September session of the last named year, a post to which he was subsequently re-elected fourteen times. In October, 1654, Mr. Hollister was appointed by the legislature a member of a committee "to press men and necessaries in each town," for the expedition to the Narragansett country against Ninigret. Three years after, he was placed on the committee with the deputy governor and magistrates, " to attend any occasions as to the state of the commonwealth in reference to the Indians." Divers other legislative and popu- lar appointments evince the high respect with which he was regarded both by the people and by the authorities of the colony. When he first came to Con- necticut he bore the prefix of "Mr.," which was superseded in 1657 by the military title of " Lieutenant." He died in 1665.
Mr. John Deming, Sen., was a juror of the particular court at Hartford in March 1643, and in December, 1645, was a member of the General Court from Weth- ersfield, an office to which he was chosen at twenty-five semi-annual elections. He was one of the patentees named in the charter of 1662. Among his de- scendants, who are numerous and highly respectable, I may name with honor the late Julius Deming, Esq., of Litchfield.
Thomas Wright, Sen., was descended from John Wright, Bishop of Bristol, Winchester, and Litchfield. He was a cousin of Mr. Nathaniel Wright of Lon- don, one of the assistants of the first General Court of Massachusetts, before the government was removed to Boston. He first appears in New England, at Swamscott, (now Exeter,) in company with Col. John Wheelwright, 1629. It appears by the deed given by the Sagamores to Col. Wheelwright and others, that Mr. Wright was one of his company. In 1640 he was admitted a freeman at Exeter. In 1643, Sept. 4th, his name next occurs as one of the jurors of a particular court at Hartford. For some years previous to his death, he was a deacon in the church. The descendants of Thomas Wright are very numerous. He
.
464
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
Meanwhile that nothing might be wanting to the success of the petition, Hollister was again returned a member of the Court,* that he might present it and advocate it with such earnestness as only an interested party could be expected to do.
At the session of the Court held on the 18th of August, 1658, Hollister presented the petition and obtained an order that Mr. Russell should give the reasons for his conduct towards "ye Lieut. Hollister." Those reasons were to be delivered to Hollister or be placed in the hands of a mes- senger of his who should call for them at the elder's house. In case this order should not be complied with, Messrs. Sam- uel Wells and Samuel Boardman were ordered " seasonably
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