USA > Connecticut > The story of the Diocese of Connecticut : a new branch of the vine (Espiscopal Church) > Part 8
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 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51
·[ 72 ].
WORSHIP
The same note of indifference often was discernible in the tone of devotion and worship. There was a deplorable tendency to cold formalism, probably due in part to a disgusted reaction against the enthusiastic excesses of revivalism in the Great Awaken- ing. In the midst of that excitement Henry Caner of Fairfield lamented that the popular temper was "generally rather faulty in the other extreme, a cold Laodicean disposition, an inconsiderate neglect of the great duties of religion, a visible deadness and for- mality,"8 which worried him and prevented the success he desired.
Some of the difficulty could be traced to the large number of recent converts who were not familiar with the requirements of the Prayer Book. Many seemed unfamiliar with the services and behaved awkwardly in church. The shocked feelings of the clergy were well expressed by Matthew Graves of New London, who confided to the Society: "I cannot, from their behaviour in Church, conclude that ever they had an orthodox minister among them, as my manner of performing seems strange to them; so does their religious deportment to me, but I'll endeavour to perform it."9
The clergy sometimes tried to remedy the situation by mak- ing slight changes to accommodate their hearers, especially when there were many non-Churchmen in the congregation. Graves wanted to modify the liturgy to promote his missionary work out- side New London. He frequently officiated in houses where not one Episcopalian was present and nobody knew the responses. What should he do; how could he "personate minister and hearers?"10 He thought that while he should strictly follow the liturgy in churches, he should have the Society's permission to make some changes for house meetings with Dissenters, by saying the responses himself after the Lord's prayer and in other places.
Even Doctor Johnson, who was a stickler for liturgical con- formity, felt that he had to make concessions. For the use of families of country people he made some slight additions and variations in the prayers, and published them with his sermon at the opening of the new church in Stratford. Although he was merely following the example of "devotional writers of good credit,"11 he was criticized and so sent a copy of his work to the Society for their opinion.
Somebody complained to the Society that the Connecticut
·[ 73 ].
clergy generally were taking liberties with the liturgy. After a diligent inquiry, Doctor Johnson dismissed the report as groundless, and was assured by his people that none of the clergy or lay- readers, who took the services in his absence, had made the least variation. One told him that he had sometimes added a few words in the prayer after the sermon, following "a great example he heard in London."12 On an extremely cold day the first lesson or some of the latter part of the liturgy might have been omitted, or a minor change might have been introduced into a collect.
HOLY DAYS
The Connecticut clergy obviously were sticklers for liturgi- cal strictness; also for special services and holy days. They gen- erally found their people woefully ignorant of the Church year, and tried to persuade them to live according to the Christian calen- dar. It was hard work, especially during the Awakening, when zealous evangelists affected to despise all special services and days, and accused the Church of mere formality. One can imagine what the Congregationalists in Norwich must have thought when Mat- thew Graves, on a visit to the new church, read the service of "churching" a mother after childbirth. What must they have said about William Gibbs in Simsbury, who gave regular instruction on the observance of feasts and fasts, especially in teaching and catechizing the children!
The clergy tried to observe all the Prayer Book holy days. Richard Mansfield of Derby made it a point to officiate in several nearby towns without Episcopal ministers, "especially on holy days." Although the Congregational ministers raged against it, the Church kept Christmas with pomp and circumstance, and even Dissenters flocked to service on that day, at least from curiosity.
According to Samuel Peters, the rector at Hebron, one of the neighboring Dissenting preachers ordered a fast on Christmas Day, and another spent the preceding Sunday in trying to prove that the celebration of Jesus' birth was "Popery and prelatic tyranny, a destroyer of consciences."13 A justice of the peace, who owned a plot of land near the church yard, used to show his contempt by working diligently there on Church feast days. But in New Haven, Bela Hubbard found his church crowded on the chief festivals, and many of the congregation were not Episcopalians.
·[ 74 ].
MUSIC
Although anyone might be inspired by the special service and decoration of a feast day, he would generally find the music in the church little if at all better than in the meeting-house. There were no hymn books as we know them today, and the re- quests of the clergy for books show that the old reliable for singing the psalms was the time-honored and tasteless version of Tate and Brady.
Until long after the Revolution, in many parishes, no hymns were used and there were no organs. Stratford led the way but not until 1756, when the parish purchased for £60 the first organ in Connecticut, importing it from England through Gilbert Delbois of Boston. John Benjamin, the first organist, played the instru- ment for twenty-two years, and it was used until 1879. The second organ, brought to St. Paul's at Wallingford in 1762, also was imported from England. Even in supposedly cultured New Haven, Trinity Church did not have the "rare luxury" of an organ until 1784.
In spite of sporadic efforts, music remained poor or in- different until far into the nineteenth century. Laymen with little training conducted the singing. We read that in one parish the choir was conducted by a chair-maker. The congregation gener- ally sat during the singing of the psalm, and rose only for the Gloria Patri. It was hardly a consolation to the few music-lovers that in Congregational parishes the music was seldom any better.
SACRAMENTS
The clergy probably were distressed by the failure of wor- ship and music to meet even their modest standards. They were even more upset when they considered the frequently careless dis- position towards the sacraments. Episcopalians were surrounded by multitudes with little or no respect for sacramental religion, and so were often affected by the popular attitude.
New missionaries, like Viets in Simsbury, were grieved and concerned to find great numbers of their flocks unbaptized, and many even well qualified persons who neglected to receive the Holy Communion. He and others tried to convince them by pub- lic and private teaching, but the stock reply was that the sacra- ments would not save them. If they had true faith, they would
·[ 75 ].
be "saved" anyhow, and if they did not, then they would perish even if they were baptized communicants.
John Tyler in Norwich found that many persons seemed to regard Communion not as a means to grace and salvation, "but rather as a solace for those they imagine to be out of all possibility of perishing" - and so not a pressing necessity - and that for others to partake was a great danger.14 In short, Communion was con- sidered a reward for the elect, the mark of membership in a spiritual aristocracy.
This widespread feeling, the lack of a bishop to administer confirmation, and the duty of the few clergy to spread their services over several parishes, all made it difficult to secure many communi- cants. It was the general eighteenth-century custom, except in some large city churches, to celebrate the Holy Communion only about four times a year. The usual occasions were Christmas, Easter, Whitsunday and Michaelmas. Doctor Johnson, a firm believer in the efficacy of the Holy Eucharist, could celebrate it in each of his churches only once in two or three months.
Baptism also presented difficulties, even to good Church people. Some favored and others opposed omitting the exhortation to the godfathers to bring the child to the bishop to be confirmed. The clergy either omitted it or inserted the words "if there be oppor- tunity," for many people objected that a definite promise would be "a mere jest" when thousands of miles of ocean rolled between them and the nearest bishop of the Church. Doctor Johnson even requested a formal ruling on the question from the Bishop of London.
Especially in the eastern towns, where there were many Baptists and Strict Congregationalists or "New Lights," the trouble was of a different sort. From such neighbors Churchmen some- times adopted the attitude that infant baptism was of no impor- tance because a child obviously could not experience conscious conversion. John Tyler of Norwich wrestled with the gainsayers but apparently without as much effect as he hoped for.
Occasionally a missionary was compelled to withhold Com- munion from a fractious and obstinate parishioner. One of the flock forsook the church in Stamford for no better reason - so the rector said - than mere "personal pique and resentment" against him. Dibblee declined to admit him to Communion until he would
·[ 76 ].
show some evidence of contrition for his abusive and unchristian treatment of his pastor. Jeremiah Leaming of Norwalk attempted to intercede and persuade the stray brother to see the error of his ways, but to no avail.
The clergy often tried to reach out into the community and reclaim those who were leading unchristian lives. They found an astonishing number of them in supposedly straitlaced Connecti- cut. Doctor Johnson soon began to make an impression upon them, and now and then reported to the S. P. G. that he turned people from "very disorderly lives."15
MORALS
The circumstances of colonial life could present some diffi- cult problems in human relations, especially in seaport towns where men were often absent from home for long periods. Jeremiah Leaming once encountered a knotty one. During one of the French and Indian Wars a sailor in his parish was captured and imprisoned with the rest of the crew. When the captain was released, he came home and reported that when he left prison the sailor appeared to be dying. Three years later the wife remarried, but after six years she received a letter from her former spouse, who had been in Jamaica for years without once writing to her. Later the sail- or turned up in town but refused to live with her, because she had children by her second husband. He then went off and was not heard of for four years. The woman and her second husband were "very worthy people," and wanted to receive Communion. Were they living in sin or not? Leaming wanted to know. The problem was too much for him, and through the S. P. G. he laid it before the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury.
The low state of religion and morality was aggravated by the almost continual wars with the Indians, the French, and the Spaniards, and was a constant source of grief and trouble to the clergy. Henry Caner lamented in the 1740's that war had confused his parish and brought in licentiousness and a corruption of man- ners. In the next decade Ebenezer Dibblee mourned that "the sound of the trumpet and the alarms to war, together with a con- cern for the events thereof, principally engross the attention of the people."16
For the underpaid missionaries, the most serious effect of
·[ 77 ].
war was the inflation of the currency. During the French and In- dian War (1755-63), they were really hard-pressed, like poor Samuel Andrews of Wallingford, who was forced to beseech the Society for a gratuity. The burdens of war taxes had so impover- ished his people that he had to accept a lower salary than they had promised. They had even failed to pay all of that and the most he had ever received was a paltry £35 sterling. How some of the clergy managed to support their usually large families is a mystery. Probably their wives performed some miracles, as some clergymen's wives still have to do.
LAY MINISTRY
But neither they nor any other Church women are often mentioned in the colonial records. It was still the fashion to take literally Saint Paul's injunction that women should be silent in church matters, and the rise of women's guilds was still far in the future. And yet the missionaries in their reports mention the good works of women, such as their bequests and their gifts of Com- munion silver, fair linen, and cushions for the pulpit and the desk. Occasionally, women took part in requesting missionaries, but near- ly always as widows. In 1722 Elidia Sharpe, "Widow," signed such a petition with twelve other persons in Newtown, Redding, and Woodbury.
Laymen, on the other hand, played a major part in planting the Church, especially in new places. Before there was any mis- sionary or even a church, they often formed voluntary house con- gregations that were churches in fact if not in name. Missionaries came because the laity wanted them and sent for them. In old parish records are found such entries as "Voted that in the absence of the rector, John Jones shall read the prayers and Isaac Smith shall read a sermon, and David Williams and Hiram Barnes shall assist in tuning the psalm."17
Practically every parish of colonial origin has a record, or at least a tradition, of some man or group of men who were the founding fathers and, next to the priest, were regarded as coun- sellors and guides in spiritual matters. Such men, sometimes for many years, kept the fire on the altar where the missionary seldom came. One recalls how much the Church in Connecticut owes to Colonel Caleb Heathcote, who could even be called its founder.
·[ 78 ].
There was also Samuel Smithson, who came from England to Guil- ford about 1707 with his cherished library, including a Prayer Book which he lent to young Samuel Johnson, with results now well known.
Laymen started the movements to secure missionaries at Newtown, Redding, and Woodbury. At Ripton (Huntington) the pioneers were Daniel Shelton and John Beardsley, Jr., of the family that gave to the Church those noble priests, Eben E. and William A. Beardsley. In Waterbury the prime mover was James Brown, who came from West Haven in 1722 and was a cousin of the Rev. Daniel Brown, one of the Yale converts of that year who died in England on his ordination journey. James was so zealous that his neighbors called him "Bishop." The principal benefactor of the parish in Litchfield was John Davies, a Welshman from Hereford- shire, who named the parish "St. Michael's." His son John origi- nated the church in the old Judea parish of Woodbury, now the town of Washington. There were never enough missionaries to go around, and many congregations were held together by laymen who served as readers and today are unknown.
COLONIAL RELIGIOUS EDUCATION
Laymen frequently were the mainstay of religious educa- tion, which to the clergy seemed to be deplorably lacking in many places. Without it they could never hope to overcome the indiffer- ence to the sacraments which they were forever lamenting. They had to admit that the general level of religious knowledge was higher in Connecticut than in some other colonies, for Episcopalians lived in a society that for generations had been accustomed to take notes on sermons and really read the Bible.
Foreign-born priests were agreeably surprised on Sunday to confront a congregation better prepared to understand them than could be found in most English country places. Theophilus Morris had scarcely settled in West Haven, when he noticed with astonish- ment that the people were "the most versed in casuistry" he had ever met.18 They even read such formidable books as the Arch- bishop of Canterbury's Treatise on Church Government, and the late Archbishop of Dublin's Collection of Cases.
Such people took to learning the Catechism as Moslems to learning the Koran. Many of the missionaries relied heavily upon
·[ 79 ]·
it, and organized regular catechism classes, as James Lyons did at Derby. Henry Caner used the Church's catechism as his heavy artillery against the assaults of "enthusiasm," and divided his pupils old and young into three classes for instruction and examination every Sunday after the afternoon sermon. His success spurred him to greater efforts, and led him to regard catechizing as "an impor- tant part of the pastoral care."19 He repeatedly pressed the So- ciety to send him catechisms for children and copies of Lewis's Exposition of the Catechism and Dr. Thomas Bray's Catechetical Instructions.
Much of the burden of religious instruction fell upon the shoulders of the humble lay-readers and catechists. Frequently they combined the duties of both offices, as did Dr. James Labarie in Fairfield, who assisted the Rev. George Pigot of Stratford. He was an expert, having served as a teacher and catechist in Stepney Parish, London. With a license from Bishop Compton of London, he read services in four congregations, and instructed the people in their homes, or on Sunday at his house in Fairfield. He could get no other work because the Puritans would not have him as a physician "unless upon the greatest emergency." Pigot called him "an excellent preacher," and he soon enlarged the congregation to the point of needing a church and a priest.20
Some strict Churchmen criticized the use of catechists and candidates for orders, feeling that it was an abandonment of ordi- nation. But Dr. Johnson insisted upon it, and his example was fol- lowed by the other clergy, with the approval of the Society and the Bishop of London. They found that catechists and readers were almost indispensable in places where the Church had been recently planted, to sustain loyalty until the Society could afford to send a missionary. The new parish in Fairfield was so served by young Henry Caner, who received a small salary from the Society and justified the appointment by taking Holy Orders and beginning a long and fruitful ministry as a missionary.
That policy in Connecticut was so successful that in 1743 the Society adopted a definite regulation regarding catechists and lay-readers. They informed Dr. Johnson that they would grant ap- pointments to those who seriously intended to be ordained, in or- der to provide for the young men he recommended who had been educated in the colonial colleges and wanted to enter the ministry.
·[ 80 ]·
After ordination they would receive stipends of at least £20 a year, and appointments to places where the people would give them as much more. Among the successful missionaries who began their services as lay-readers and catechists were Ebenezer Thomson, John Tyler, Ebenezer Dibblee, Roger Viets, and Henry Caner. A continual stream of young graduates of Yale kept the ranks re- plenished as fast as the readers graduated into the ministry.
Of course, many readers never took orders or had any inten- tion of doing so, but served for years as eminent laymen. One of them, respected all over Litchfield County, was Captain Jehiel Hawley of Woodbury, who was elected as reader when Christ Church, Roxbury, was organized in 1740. It is reported of him that "His Christian conversation and persuasive manner of gaining the doubting and of winning men to the Church who had ignorantly opposed themselves, brought in fresh accessions . .. " Another noted reader was William Samuel Johnson, son of Dr. Samuel Johnson of Stratford. His father sent him to Ripton Parish (now Shelton) to read services and instruct the young people, and proudly reported that he was successful and that the Church was flourishing there.
It is hard to see how the Church ever could have gained a foothold in many places without these devoted laymen, especially after 1740, when revivalist excesses drove many people away from the Standing Order. The missionaries could not meet all the de- mands upon their services, and came to rely heavily upon readers to keep parishes alive between their infrequent visits. Nearly all the new parishes established after 1740 were served by readers.
Readers and catechists contributed substantially to laying the Church's solid doctrinal foundations, but could not take the place of permanent parish schools. There were no Sunday schools in the modern sense, and Episcopalians usually had to send their children to public town schools, where the influence often was against the Church. Dr. Johnson noticed this obstacle at the very beginning of his ministry, and never ceased pressing the Society to help in supporting parochial schools.
As a result of his efforts, Stratford usually had a Church school, even when the Society could not afford to strain its purse, already thinned by demands for missionaries. At one time the teacher was Thomas Salmon, a warden, whose ability recom-
·[ 81 ].
mended him to all and helped greatly to diminish prejudice against the Church. The parish also patronized poor Mr. Bennett, who had taught briefly for the Congregationalists and had been discharged by them for conforming to the Church. Johnson raised a salary for him and even got subscriptions from some of the Congregational- ists, who candidly admitted that he was the best teacher they had ever had. Somebody was mean enough to try to defeat the plan by writing anonymously to the Bishop of London, pretending to be a Churchman, and arguing that the town already was well provided with schools. Probably he meant the two public schools, of which Dr. Johnson had a very poor opinion.
The need of more missionaries was so great that the year 1733 came before the Society got around to appointing and paying an official schoolmaster for Christ Church. It was worth waiting for Joseph Browne, who served for over eighteen years. He was a saddler by trade but evidently was much more interested in teach- ing, even on the usual salary of only £15 a year. His first schoolroom apparently was in his own home, but it was soon full to overflowing and the parish built a schoolhouse.
Browne strove to follow the official directions to schoolmas- ters, and his regular annual reports may still be seen among the Society's records in London. His was a fairly typical parochial school, with anywhere from thirty to fifty pupils, including both Episcopalians and Congregationalists, and sometimes a few Indians and Negroes. It was open all the year around, excepting holy days, in marked contrast to the "wretched" nearby schools of the Dis- senters, which he said were closed for most of the year. His re- ports, unfortunately, never mention his daily hours or what he taught; but like most Society schoolmasters, he probably stressed the three R's and the Catechism. Over the years he taught hun- dreds of children, and undoubtedly strengthened the Church in Stratford and the neighboring towns.
Browne's last report, in 1751, thanked the Society for em- ploying him for so many years, and announced that he would re- sign as of March 25, 1752. He believed that the charity school was no longer so greatly needed, because the town schools were better supported by law, through funds from the sale of uncultivated public lands. His name soon disappeared from the Society's re- ports, and in time he died and probably was soon forgotten. No
·[ 82 ].
doubt descendants of his pupils are now worshipping in the Episcopal churches of Connecticut. This brief mention of him probably is the only other memorial he has ever had.
Another faithful schoolmaster was Samuel Hutchinson of North Groton. He entered the Society's service about 1745, under the auspices of the Rev. Ebenezer Punderson, and for some twenty years lived up to his promise to "pursue his business with his ut- most zeal." He had devoted himself entirely to teaching for many years before the Society hired him, and was used to hours that must have seemed very long to the children - from seven to five in summer, and eight or nine to four in winter. Attendance slumped in summer, when the children had to help on the farms, and quickened when the harvest was in. His flock rarely numbered more than forty-five, and generally included both Episcopalians and others and a few Indians or Negroes.
Hutchinson bore down hard on the Catechism, which of course delighted Mr. Punderson, who kept a watchful eye on the school and encouraged the children by promising rewards "to Such as Shall be found upon Trial to Say their Responses best." Over the years the school must have greatly raised the level of literacy and religious knowledge in the parish. Among the pupils, the teacher reported, were "many who in all probability would not have had the good opportunity of being so good Readers and Writers were they not assisted with this Christian Benefaction."22
For a few years the Society supported a school in Fairfield by appointing Richard Caner as a teacher, at the request of his brother Henry, the missionary at Fairfield and Norwalk. He served for about six years in the 1740's, until he was appointed as a mis- sionary elsewhere, and taught many poor children in Fairfield and had a catechism class at Norwalk.
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.