USA > Connecticut > The history of Connecticut, from the first settlement of the colony to the adoption of the present constitution, vol. II > Part 46
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* Miss Caulkins regards him as the James Roger, who came to this country in the Increase, in April, 1635, in company with the Chittendens, Bucks, Kilbourns, Warners, Stones, and Marvins.
t The records of the New London County Court, under date of April 14, 1685, contain the following entry : " John Rogers, James Rogers, Jr., Samuel Beebee,
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THE ROGERENES.
The offenders were fined, imprisoned, set in the stocks, and whipped, but all without avail. It was calculated that John Rogers, after his professed conversion, passed one-third of his life in prison. It is particularly noticeable, however, that this strange sect were not punished for their religious senti- ments or opinions, but for flagrant outrages against the laws of the colony.
Such were the victims of this so-called persecution, which has been thrown in our teeth with such an annihilating air of triumph by the traducers of those who founded our state, and built up its history. That errors were committed under this and kindred statutes, and that in individual cases, bad passions and wicked motives may have carried on a syste- matic plan of persecution under the sanction of legal forms, will not be disputed. We all know that this is done even in our day, and will be until the coming of Him whose right it is himself to reign without committing the government of men to a delegated authority.
Jr., and Joana Way, are complained of for profaning God's holy day by servile work, and are grown to that height of impunity as to come at several times into the town to re-baptise several persons ; and when God's people were met together on the Lord's day to worship God, several of them came, and made great disturb- ance, behaving themselves in such a frantic manner, as if possessed with a dia- bolical spirit, so affrighting and amazing that several women swooned and fainted away. John Rogers to be whipped fifteen lashes, and for unlawfully re-baptizing to pay £5. The others to be whipped."
Samuel Fox, prosecuted for catching eels of Sunday, said that he made no dif- ference of days ; his wife Bathshua Fox, went openly to the meeting-house to proclaim that she had been doing servile work on their Sabbath ; John Rogers accompained her, interrupting the minister, and proclaiming a similar offence.
At one time, Rogers trundled a wheel-barrow into the porch of the meeting- house during the time of service ; for which, after being set in the stocks, he was put into prison and kept for a considerable time. While thus in durance, he hung out of the window a board containing the following proclamation :
" I, John Rogers, a servant of Jesus Christ, doth here make an open declara- tion of war against the great red dragon, and against the beast to which he gives power ; and against the false church that rides upon the beast; and against the false prophets who are established by the dragon and the beast ; and also a proc- lamation of derision against the sword of the devil's spirit, which is prisons, stocks, whips, fines, and revilings, all which is to defend the elevation of devils." See Caulkins' Hist. of New London, 211, 212.
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HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
When in 1665, the commissioners of Charles II., visited Connecticut, they reported that the colony would " not hin- der any from enjoying the sacraments and using the common prayer book, provided that they hinder not the maintenance of the public minister."* There was, however, as we have seen, no organized episcopal church in Connecticut, until about the year 1723, though divine service had been per- formed in Stratford, according to the forms of that church, for some years anterior to the date designated. In 1727, within four years of the first organization of the first episcopal church in the colony, and probably in response to their first application for relief, it was enacted by the legislature, that "if it so happen, that there be a society of the church of England, where there is a person in orders according to the canons of the church of England, settled and abiding among them, and performing divine service, so near to any person that hath declared himself of the church of England, that he can conveniently, and doth, attend the public worship there, whatever tax he shall pay for the support of religion, shall be delivered unto the minister of the church of England." Those who conformed to the church of England, were at the same time authorized to tax themselves for the support of their clergy, and were " excused from paying any taxes for building meeting-houses." In 1729, the quakers and baptists were exempted, on certain conditions, from paying taxes for the support of the congregational ministry, and for building meeting-houses. +
The law of 1727, was modified by several successive acts, each being designed for the benefit or relief of dissenters.
It is further urged that the fathers of the state believed in the crime of witchcraft. This accusation is true. They did enact a statute prohibiting that crime, borrowed from the Hebrew code, and from the laws of England. This is its concise form :
* Hutchinson, 412.
t See early statutes ; also Prof. Kingsley's Historical Discourse, at New Haven, 1838.
533
GOODWIFE KNAPP.
" If any man or woman be a witch, that is, hath or con- sulteth with a familiar spirit, they shall be put to death."
But what was the practical operation of the law ? From a careful examination of the records of New Haven colony, it does not appear that there ever was even a conviction for that crime, within that jurisdiction; much less was there ever an execution. So far from this being the case, those records contain strong presumptive evidence that the courts in that colony and the public sentiment there, were not fa- vorable to such accusations. The New Haven archives give us the only evidence which now exists that there ever was an execution for witchcraft in the Connecticut colony. The fact is mentioned incidentally, in the trial of Roger Ludlow, Esq., for having slandered the wife of Thomas Staples in charging her with being a witch. In the testimony elicited during the trial, reference is made to the execution of Good- wife Knapp .* There may have been other instances, but our records do not furnish them ; and no parole or traditionary proof that can now be relied upon, leads the mind to any cer- tain conclusion, that human life was sacrificed in the colony under the sanction of this law, on any other occasion. Ann Cole was convicted, but was she executed ? Let the anti- quary and the tradition-hunter decide. Mather tells us she was. How did he know it, and why was the fact so public in Boston, and yet so obscure in Hartford, that not even a tradition of it remains ?
But suppose there were in the course of a hundred and fifty years, two executions, or even ten, would that prove that our institutions were illiberal ? The wise and philoso-
* Thus, Ludlow charged Mrs. Staples with having caused the body of Good- wife Knapp, to be examined " after she was hanged;" Susan Lockwood said she was " present at the execution of Goodwife Knapp ;" Elizabeth Brewster testified that " after Goodwife Knapp was executed, as soon as she was cut down, she the said Knapp, being carried to the grave-side, Goodwife Staples with some other women went to search the said Knapp," for witch marks; and that Goodwife Sta- ples declared that the deceased was no witch.
Allusion was also made at the same trial to the conviction of " Goodwife Bas- sett ;" and our colonial records refer to the conviction of Mercy Disborough ; but I find no reason to believe that either of them was executed.
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HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
phical Cudworth, one of the brightest gems of the English church, and almost as free from bigotry as Paul, said in 1678, that those who did not believe in the existence of witchcraft, "could hardly escape the suspicion of having some hankering towards atheism." James I., James II., Queen Elizabeth, Lord Bacon, Lord Coke, Sir Walter Raleigh, Lord Mans- field, and Lord Hale, all believed implicitly in it. Hale sen- tenced more than one poor wretch to death for familiarity with the devil, long after our fathers had abandoned the su- perstition ; and Sir William Blackstone, as late as the period of the American revolution, embodied the remark in his ex- cellent Commentaries upon the laws of England, that " in general there has been such a thing as witchcraft." Indeed, the English statute punishing that crime, remained unre- pealed until the ninth year of the reign of George II., after the ashes of Goodwife Knapp, and Ann Cole, if she too was a victim, had been mingled with the elements for the period of a hundred years. While our fathers were hesitating and doubting if such a crime existed, England, Scotland, Ger- many, and Massachusetts, were sending hundreds of withered women and enthusiastic men to the ducking-stool and the gallows.
It is said that laws were enacted both in New Haven and Connecticut, compelling people to attend upon public worship on the Sabbath. Before our ancestors are charged with blame, it would be well to inquire whether this was exclu- sively a puritanical measure. If the objector will turn to the act of the 35th of Elizabeth, entitled an act "to retain the queen's majesty's subjects in their due obedience," he will find that " any person or persons, above the age of sixteen years, which shall obstinately refuse to repair to some church, chapel, or usual place of common prayer, to hear divine ser- vice, established by her majesty's laws and statutes, in that behalf made"-or shall " advisedly or maliciously move or persuade any other person" from attending-" or be present at any unlawful assemblies, conventicles, or meetings, under color or pretence of any exercise of religion contrary to her
535
SUMPTUARY LAWS.
majesty's said laws and statutes"-and shall be convicted thereof, they "shall be committed to prison, there to remain without bail or mainprize, until they shall conform and yield themselves, to come to some church, chapel, or usual place of common prayer, and hear divine service according to her majesty's laws and statutes aforesaid." The offender not conforming, he was obliged to " abjure the realm," and "if he return without her majesty's special license," he " shall be adjudged a felon, and shall suffer, as in the case of felons, without benefit of clergy."
Can the caviler find a more stringent law on this subject, in the statute-book of Connecticut ?
But we are told that the laws afford evidences of bigotry and ascetecism, and that sumptuary statutes were passed of a narrow and bigoted sort ; that the people feared the devil, and that the inhabitants were compelled to attend public wor- ship. It is indeed true, that they were a stern self-denying people, and that they fasted often and prayed much ; but fast- tings and austerities of life, were not confined to them or to their religious tenets. In many things they were bigoted and abstinent, but these extremes are believed to be better than a laxness of moral principle, and a too great indulgence in those extravagancies which sap the foundations of the hu- man constitution, and make men prematurely old. If these things were faults, they were what our ancestors used to call " good faults." With regard to sumptuary laws, they passed some strict ones, but they were all on the side of virtue and morals, all conducive to the greatest good of the greatest number; not fences for the deer-parks of a lazy aristocracy, to keep the people shut out from the best lands of the coun- try, and punish them by death or banishment if they hap- pened, in attempting to satisfy the cravings of hunger, to bend a cross-bow beneath the branching oaks of some lord of the manor, or unstop the rabbit warrens of some beer-bloated country squire. As regards the devil, it is possible to fear him too much, but it is believed that if the present generation were more afraid of that dignitary, and regarded him more
536
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
as a reality, and less as a myth, it would be quite as well with them in the end.
The following statute contrasts well with the English " Game Laws" at that era :
" Whereas great loss and damage hath befel this colony by reason of wolves, which destroy great numbers of our cattle, therefore for the encouragement of such as shall labor to destroy them,
" It is ordered by this court, that any person that shall kill any wolf or wolves, within six miles of any plantation in this colony, shall have for every wolf by him or them so killed, eight shillings out of the public treasury of the colony. And every Englishman shall have eight shillings more paid him out of the town treasury, within whose bounds the wolf was killed ; provided that due proof be made thereof, and also that they bring a certificate under some magistrate's hand, or constable of that place, unto the treasurer; provided, also, that this order intend only such plantations as do contribute with us to public charges, in which case they shall make pay- ment upon their own charge."
"It is also ordered by the authority of this court, that what person soever, English or Indian, shall take any wolf out of any pit made by any other man to catch wolves in, whereby they would defraud the right owner of their due from the colony or town, every such offender shall pay to the owner of the pit twenty shillings, or be whipped on the naked body not exceeding six stripes."
But it is objected that the old fathers of the colony passed a statute prohibiting lying. That this statute has been much complained of by modern critics, is not surprising. Indeed, if it were to be re-enacted and again put in force, it would be of such sweeping application as to be intolerably oppressive. But even in this respect, Connecticut was in no way singular. Moses had done the same in his day ; and Alfred, when he was laying the foundations of the greatest empire of modern times, made it punishable, not by whipping, or the stocks, but by a still more thorough penalty-cutting out the liar's tongue.
537
CIVIL AUTHORITY PARAMOUNT.
To come nearer home, the quaker colony of Pennsylvania, the Roman catholic colony of Maryland, and the episcopal one of Virginia, all passed a law similar to that of Connecticut, and equally rigid. There are some old fashioned people left in the world yet, who honor them for it.
It would be easy for any lawyer of ordinary capacity to examine the civil and criminal code of Connecticut, and con- trast it for liberality, simplicity, and moral tone, with most of the other modern codes of the world. Whoever attempts to cast reproach upon the laws of such a people, will be met with startling analogies, let us rather say, painful contrasts, pungent repartees. He will find that he is handling tools with sharp edges and barbs, that readily enter his flesh, but are plucked out with difficulty and pain.
The laws of Connecticut, like her first constitution, were made to pass through Roger Ludlow's mint .* They received his stamp and of course bore the image of the bird of free- dom, as well as the clusters of the three vines. The great object of these laws, as might have been expected, was, to take care of the people; to do justice and to execute judg- ment between man and man. One of the very first statutes which was passed, and which was embodied in the first edi- tion of our public acts, shows a wisdom and a kind of second sight, prophetic of the general equality and religious tolera- tion of the constitution of 1818. It is as follows :
" Forasmuch as the peace and prosperity of the churches, and the members thereof, as well as civil rights and liberties, are carefully to be maintained-
"It is ordered by this court, That the civil authority here established, hath power and liberty to see the peace, ordi- nances, and rules of Christ, to be observed in every church according to his word ; as also to deal with any church-
* As early as April, 1646, Mr. Ludlow was desired by the General Court, " to take some paynes in drawing forth a body of lawes for the government of this commonwealth." In May, 1647, the court ordered that Mr. Ludlow "should, besides the paying the hyer of a man, be futher considered for his paynes." The code appears to have been " concluded and established" in May, 1651. See J. H. Trumbull's Records, i. pp. 138, 154, 509.
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HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
member in a way of civil justice, notwithstanding any church. relation, office, or interest, so it be done in a civil and not in an ecclesiastical way, nor shull any church censure, degrade or depose any man from any civil dignity, office, or authority, he shall have in the colony."
Here we see the axe laid at the root of ecclesiastical do- minion, as such. The civil authority is not only to be sepa- rated from the ecclesiastical, but it is declared even in church matters to be paramount to it. It took a long time to bring the people to recognize a practical equality of all religious sects, but the seeds were sown and could not perish in the ground.
The laws of Connecticut have always been distinguished for their simplicity, their certainty, their mildness, their adap- tation to the conditions of the humblest classes, and the cheapness with which they have meted out justice to the aggrieved. The tribunals of the state have been famed for the learning and impartiality of the judges, and, thanks to our common schools, for the intelligence and manliness of our jurors. To dwell at length upon this topic, would require a separate treatise. Our whole statute laws are yet printed in a single octavo volume.
Painted b . Suche
Proxy de power by cheap.
RT. REV. SAMUEL SEABURY , D.D.
I'm .. . Histor
CHAPTER XXIV.
EPISCOPACY IN CONNECTICUT.
IT would be interesting to trace the history of the episco- pal church throughout the American colonies, from the earli- est settlement of Jamestown down to the time when the re- ligious establishment of Connecticut gave place to the Consti- tution of 1818. But it is impossible to depart from the limits of the State, though by doing so we might the better estimate its influence upon the rest of the continent.
In the town of Stratford still stands a small church with its high arched windows, in the style of architecture that marks that denomination of Christians, with its square tower standing out from the main body of the building, surmounted by its small belfry and shapely spire rising above the trees, that shade the sunny slopes and swelling mounds which relieve the vil- lage of Stratford from the dreary level that often marks the conflict of the ocean with the shore. This church was erect- ed in 1746, and is now more than a century old. The aged men who helped to build it, and who were present at its con- secration, could distinctly remember the first establishment of episcopacy in Connecticut, and some of them had partici- pated in the exciting warfare consequent upon it. It has been before said, that from almost the first settlement of the colony, there had existed in it an established religion which belonged to the government, and was as firmly upheld by it as any branch of the civil machinery. One of the provisions in behalf of this establishment, was embodied in the statute of which the following is an extract :
" It is ordered by the Authority of this Court, That every inhabitant shall henceforth contribute to all charges both in church and colony whereof he doth or may receive benefit, and every such inhabitant, who shall not voluntarily contri-
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HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
bute proportionably to his ability, with the rest of the same town, to all charges both civil and ecclesiastical, shall be compelled thereunto by assessment and distress, to be levied by the constable or other officer of the town, as in other cases, and that the lands and estates of all men, wherever they dwell, shall be rated for all town charges, both civil and ecclesiastical, as aforesaid, the lands and estates where they shall lie, and their persons where they dwell."
This provision remained substantially the same until 1727. With the exception of the opposition of the persons called " Quakers, Ranters, and Adamites," the established religion was supported in the colony with almost entire unanimity for many years. But it is impossible that the opinions of any one generation should be locked up in a vault strong enough to keep them from age to age in their primitive con- dition. Dampness will gather around them and steal away their vitality, violence will break open the doors that imprison them, and set them free, or their deliverance will be left to the more slow but equally sure action of the rains and frosts, which will soften and crack asunder the mortar and the stones, until, if the key does not drop from the arch, there will be found many seams and crevices in the walls for the entrance of the winds. So it had been in the old world, and so was it in the new.
There were, very early in the eighteenth century, a few men in the colony, who were descendants of the first emigrants, and who sympathised with the causes that had in- duced their fathers to remove to this continent, who yet adhered to the forms of the English church, and believed that their favorite institution, when severed from political connec- tions and left to her own sphere of religious action, had little sympathy with the cruelties and oppressions that had been charged upon her. They began to find the payment of rates to support a form of religion that they did not approve, to be very irksome, and although it was in accordance with the order of things established in England, yet they felt that as our in- stitutions were new, they ought to be more flexible. They
541
MR. MUIRSON.
[1706.]
pleaded, too, the precedent of the emigrants themselves, who had left England for the enjoyment of liberty of conscience, and claimed that all the descendants of those men, more especially those who were born upon the soil, had a right to pay their money for the support of such a religious organization as they deemed fitted for their own consciences. But they could not fail to be aware, that in bringing about this charge, they must struggle with the spirit of the age, and that the contest, if not ultimately doubtful, would be at least a protracted one. About seventy years had passed away since the settlement of the colony began, when the "Society for propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts," an episcopal organization, established at Rye, in the colony of New York, the Rev. Mr. Muirson as a missionary. A few individuals at Stratford, some of whom were highly respectable, had for some time been dissatisfied with the prevailing mode of worship in Connecticut, and were glad that they could have for a near neighbor, a clergy- man who administered the sacraments and adhered to the ceremonials of the church as they recognized it to exist.
Not long after Mr. Muirson had been stationed at Rye, an earnest application was made to him in behalf of these per- sons, begging him to visit Stratford, and preach there, and baptize such as might desire to receive that rite at his hands. Some time during the year 1706, Mr. Muirson yielded to these solicitations, and in company with Colonel Heathcote, a gentleman who, with himself, had the cause of the English church much at heart, repaired to Stratford on this errand. Of course they could not expect that their coming would be regarded with very much indulgence by the puritan ministers and elders of the town and neighborhood, who used such ar- guments as they could to prevent their families and friends from attending upon religious services so different from their own. Perhaps this very effort excited the curiosity of the people to a still higher pitch, to witness the new ceremonies, and it is almost certain that it stimulated those whose minds were already made up, to a still more ardent and firm resolve.
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HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
The whole affair was managed so prudently by Mr. Muirson, and such zealous exertions were made by those who had in- vited him, that a large number of persons, probably as many as seventy or eighty, were induced to assemble, and see and hear for themselves. The result was, that seventy-five per- sons, most of them adults, were baptized.
This was the first time that any attempt had been made to introduce episcopacy into Connecticut.
In April, 1707, Mr. Muirson, with his friend, Mr. Heath- cote, again visited Stratford. He preached there, and also at Stratfield, and performed the baptismal rite in both places. The congregational ministers and magistrates did not interfere with him in any other way, than by attempting to persuade the people not to attend upon his ministrations. This opposition had the same effect that it had done before, in stimulating the efforts of the zealous, and in quickening the activity of those who were charmed with the novelty of the forms of the church. After this, Mr. Muirson made several visits to Connecticut, and labored earnestly with those who were willing to listen to him.
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