USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Leicester > Brief history of Leicester, Massachusetts > Part 4
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The people were also careful to guard themselves against treachery. Too many of the leaders of the Revolutionary movements were here to render the toleration of spies safe, and the people were too much in earnest to bear patiently the opposition of men "inimical" to the cause. In 1774 the selectmen, through Colonel Henshaw, had informed at least one suspected man that his " residedence " would be " pe- culiarly disgustful to the Inhabitants." " And as well- wishers of the peace and order of the town, we think it advisable that you move from hence as soon as may be; as the people, roused with the insults they have' already sustained, will, in all probability, pay yon a visit less respectful than the Intimation you now receive." Three years later Colonel Henshaw was instructed, by vote of the town, to "procure what
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evidenee he may be able of the inimieal Disposition of any inhabitent of this town toward the United States of America, which inhabitent may be so voted to be, in the opinion of the town." One such man was at that time voted, in the opinion of the town, "inimically disposed." In July of the next year it was " Voted that the selectmen be directed to prefer a petition to General Court, that William Manning and family may be removed from this town."
When the Declaration of Independence had been adopted it was, in accordance with the direction of the Couneil, copied on the town records.
These minutes are full of interest and instruction. They show the true character of the people and the power of their deliberation and united aetion. Lord Germaine did not speak without provocation when he said, "This is what comes of their wretched old town-meetings."
According to a report made to the town in 1784, the town paid in bounties, from 1775 to that time, £9268 Gs. (probably equivalent to about $11,000 in eoin) to 244 soldiers. It is estimated that the town raised for the expenses of the war over $18,000, in addition to State taxes. There were twenty-eight requisitions upon the town for soldiers. These were filled by more than 254 men. Beside these were the inen who marehed on the 19th of April and at least thirty who enlisted for three years in 1777 and 1778. Some of these soldiers were veterans of the French wars; others were boys of sixteen years.
It is to be remembered that the population of the town in 1776 was only 1078, and that it deereased during the war. There were in Leieester in 1777 only 212 men over sixteen years of age, and the names on the muster-roll were less than half the number of enlistments and re- enlistments in the quotas of the town. The valuation of the town seven years after the close of the war was only $140,000.
In 1781 the town was divided into ten classes, which were each to furnish their proportion of soldiers upon requisition of the government. So ex- hanstive was the demand that it was necessary to hire substitutes from other places to meet it. The town was repeatedly under the necessity of electing new seleetmen and assessors, on account of the ab- senee of the regular incumbents in the army. Women worked in the fields, because all the male members of their families were in the war, and farmers sold their cattle to raise money for the pay- ment of taxes.
The number of commissioned oflieers from Lei- eester was large, in proportion to the size of the town. Col. William Henshaw, to whom we have already referred, was in command of a regiment in the battle of Long Island. He was with a pieket-guard which was cut off from the main body by a superior foree of Hessians, and cut its way through with great gal- lantry and little loss of life.
Col. Seth Washburn was fifty-two years old when the war began. He was in the battle of Bunker Hill, and afterward, though not in the army, was muster- master for Worcester County and served the eause on several important committees.
Col. Samuel Denny marched as lieutenant-colonel with the minute-men, on the 19th of April, and served as eolonel during the carly part of the war.
Dr. John Honeywood was surgeon and died in the service at Fort Ticonderoga.
Dr. Israel Green was at Saratoga when Burgoyne was taken.
Dr. Austin Flint enlisted, at the age of seventeen, as a soldier and was present at the taking of Bur- goyne. He was afterward surgeon.
Lient .- Col. Joseph Henshaw marched with the minute-men. He afterward served on important committees, conferring with other States.
Capt. David Henshaw was in the service three years.
Capt. John Southgate, Capt. William Todd and Lient. William Crossman were also in the service.
Lieut. Nathan Craig was at the battles of Bunker Hill and Saratoga.
Lieutenant Joseph Washburn was at the battles of Saratoga and Momnouth, and also at Valley Forge. Captain Thomas Newhall was in command of the standing company on the 19th of April, and was muster-master for Worcester County. Captain John Holden served through the war, and was present at the storming of Stony Point. Captain John Brown com- manded a company in the French War, and was in the battle of Bunker Hill as a sergeant. Rev. Benja- min Conklin was probably a chaplain.
Joseph Bass, of the " water service," who resided in Leicester after the war, was one of the heroes of what Irving, in his " Life of Washington," calls the " gallant little exploit " on the Hudson, the at- tempted "destruction of the ships which had so long been domineering over its waters," by means of fire- ships. Washburn, in his history, gives an extended narrative of the affair. Bass had charge of one of the sloops, the " Polly," which was supplied with inflam- mable materials, and which, under heavy fire of ar- tillery, he fastened to the tender of one of the frig- ates, setting it on fire and destroying it with most of the men on board. Bass, with all his men, leaped into the life-boat, and rowed away without injury. The frigates eseaped, but were prudently withdrawn from so dangerous a Ioeality.
Solomon Parsons was severely wounded in the bat- tle of Monmouth. He was shot, his thigh was broken, and afterwards, as he lay upon the ground, he was robbed, stabbed and roughly dragged about by the enemy, and narrowly escaped being run over by cavalry and artillery. He lay all the afternoon of that terribly hot day, in the sun, until he was rescued by Lieutenant Joseph Washburn.
These facts and figures give but a faint idea of the
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burdens and sufferings of the people in the gloomy period of the Revolution, and the strain upon their resources and fortitude. They did not flinch when the time came to test the sincerity and value of their resolutions. They well redeemed the pledge to main- tain the canse of independence at "the risk of their lives and fortunes."
CHAPTER III.
LEICESTER-(Continued.)
State Constitution : Objections, Adoption-Jealousy of Rights-Shays' In- surrection : Causes, Convention, High Feeling, Dispersion of the In. aurgents, Captain Day, Outh of Allegiance-Fine for Non . Representa- tion in the General Court-Slavery in Leicester -- " Instructions "- Jews : Aaron Lopez-Rivera Letter to Colonel Henshaw.
Soon after the Declaration of Independence measures were taken for the organization of a Con- stitutional State Government. These movements were, however, regarded premature and ill-advised. In October, 1776, the town voted that the House of Representatives of this State ought not to institute any new form of government at present, and chose a committee "to show the court why the town objeets to settling a new constitution." Some of these ob- jections stated were that there was no provision for amendment, that the town was not fully represented, that they were not allowed a Representative, and " that a number of the first principal inhabitants" were " in the service." The Constitution first formed was rejected by the people.
In 1779 the town voted unanimously to send two men-Seth Washburn and William Henshaw -- " to frame a Constitution of Massachusetts." These gen- tlemen were prominent in the convention. The Con- stitution was the next year approved by the town, article by artiele, by a large majority.
Struggling against the oppression of the mother country, the people were equally jealous of any en- croachments upon their rights by the government they were seeking to organize and establish. In their various resolutions and other acts in the later years of the last century there is evidence of their determi- nation to seeure a government " of the people, by the people and for the people." They protested against " monopolies." In 1777 they earnestly eondemned the act of the General Court, calling in bills of credit and sinking them in a loan, as "cruel and oppressive" and " grinding the faces of the poor." In January of the next year they raised twelve hundred pounds and loaned to the State. In 1787 they instructed their representative, Samuel Denny, to oppose the excessive tax on farmers and on polls ; also to oppose high sal- aries, as in present circumstances it was not well to "support courtly dignity." They expressed thein- selves as opposed to the "support of commerec," so " as
to prevent their giving due encouragement to our own manufactures." The location of the Legislature ap- pears to have been a subject much agitated, and at the same time the town deelared "the setting of the General Government in the town of Boston is a Mat- ter which the Citizens of this Commonwealth are not generally satisfied with," and advised that its re- moval to some other place be tried by " experience."
The eight years' struggle of the Revolution had hardly ended when the State was threatened with a formidable civil war. It was the natural reaction from the long-continued strain upon the endurance of the people. They had been taxed to their ntmiost limit ; all interests had suffered ; the people were im- poverished ; the currency had depreciated and finally became valueless ; the State had no credit; the con- dition of the Government and of the community was one of bankruptcy; and thousands of suits were brought before the courts, and forced sales were nu- merous. Some of the acts of the Legislature were regarded as oppressive. General conventions were held in the county to confer with reference to these complaints. Two of these were in Leicester. The presence of wise and loyal men like David Henshaw and Col. Thomas Denny was a check upon rash action. When at length the dissatisfaction developed into insurrection, under the leadership of Daniel Shays, the town withdrew its delegates. The excite- ment was intense and the sentiments of the people were divided, some sympathizing with the insurgents and joining their ranks. As in the War of the Roses the parties had their distinctive badges, the insurgents a green sprig and the supporters of the Government a white fillet of paper. The Rev. Benjamin Conklin, loyal to the nation and the commonwealth as in the days of the Revolution, was repeatedly foreed to leave his home and hide himself to eseape seizure by the insurgents in the night.
The same loyal leadership and the same patient devotion to the government which were conspicuous in the Revolution, held the town to a wise and patri- otie course. Every man in town over twenty years of age was by vote required to take an oath of allegi- ance to the State, and the list of those who thus con- plied was to be reported at town-meeting.
The excitement and peril of the rebellion culmi- nated in Worcester, in December, 1786, in an attempt of the insurgent army to prevent the opening of the court. The house of Mr. Joseph Allen, then residing in Worcester, was guarded by a sentinel, who opposed him with a fixed bayonet to prevent him from going to court. Seth Washburn seized the guard and wrested his musket from him. Lineolu, in his "History of Worcester," states that Justice Seth Washburn him - self was also mnet by the guard, and that two friends who " seized the gun presented to his breast " were arrested and detained in custody.
On the memorable 8th of December, the day in which Shays and his army retreated from Worcester
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in a snow storm of such severity and cold so intense that many of his men were overcome and some were frozen to death, Luke Day, one of the insurgent captains, reached Leicester with one hundred and fifty men, but was prevented by the storm from join- ing the main body at Worcester. Scant courtesy did the rebels receive from the sturdy patriots of that day. When this same Day, on his way from Worcester to Springfield on a cold winter day, entered the house of Nathan Sargent and made free to warm himself by the fire and ostentatiously announced himself as Capt. Day, he soon found himself, with hat and sword pre- ceding him, floundering in the snow-drift outside. Several Leicester men participated in the march through drifting snow and were present on the 3d of February when the insurgents, upon the approach of the State forces to their rendezvous at Petersham, fled without the firing of a gun, so completely discomfited that, as Lincoln in his "History of Worcester" expresses it, " had an army dropped from the clouds upon the hill the consternation could not have been greater." Dr. Austin Flint was one of the mumber, having, as he said, volunteered "to help drive the Mobites out."
During all the later years of the century persons who engaged in trade or kept public-honses were re- quired to take a stringent oath of allegiance to the republic.
For many years the salaries of representatives to the "Great and General Court " were paid by the several towns. The town in 1789 was fined for not sending a representative; and in a memorial, an ancient copy of which is before the writer, the town petitioned to have the fine remitted. The memorial bears date of May 10, 1790, and is strikingly illustra- tive of the straits into which the people had been placed. They were still in debt for money borrowed to be loaned "to the Commonwealth " and for the payment of " soldiers," and for the erection of a " House of Public Worship," and they were "at a greater expense than most towns for repairing their roads owing to their hills being wet and rocky."
Slavery has never existed under the Constitution of the State of Massachusetts. There were slaves in the Province till the time of the Revolution, but the Con- stitution adopted in 1780 declared the right of "all men to enjoy and defend their lives and liberties." The number of slaves in Leicester was small; still they were here; Titus and Cain, and Cæsar, and Quashi, and Prymus, and Pompey, and Will, and Pegg, and Jenny, and Dinah, and Prince, and Jethro, the last person buried in the burying-yard by the church ; but they were treated as wards rather than as slaves. They lived, and worked, and ate with the families, in some cases were paid wages, and in re- peated instances were set free. Mr. Ralph Earle not only freed his slave Sharp, but also gave him in 1756 a farm of thirty acres. But slavery, even in its mild- est form, was discordant with the spirit of a freedom- loving people. In 1773 the town gave expression to
its views on the subject in instructions to its Repre- sentative, Mr. Thomas Denny: " And as we have the highest regard for (so as even to revere the name of) liberty, we cannot behokl but with the greatest abhorrence any of our fellow-creatures in a state of slavery."
An interesting episode in the history of the town was the settlement here, in 1777, of a colony of Jews. Mr. Aaron Lopez, who was carrying on an extensive business in Newport, R. I., that year removed to Lei- vester, Newport being then in the possession of British troops; with him came several other Jewish families, There were about seventy persons in all, twelve of them being slaves. He built, on the part of the present Common now owned by the Academy, a house in the central room of which he "kept store," in which, in the words of II. G. Henshaw, Esq., he "carried on a successful trafic in Bohea and Gun- powder teas, serges, calamancos,," and doubtless a variety of other articles. Mr. Rivera had a store on the site of the hotel. "They were too patriotic to refuse in payment for their commodities Conti- nental bills, the currency of the times ; but felt rather serupulous abont holding such treacherous paper over the Sabbath, and were careful to pass it off to the farmers in exchange for neat stock or grain." They were strict in the observance of Jewish law. They carefully observed the seventh day, and also refrained from business on Sunday. A child having incau- tiously tasted of pork, at a neighbor's house, was treated with an emetic, by way of purification.
Mr. Lopez was a man of high character and stand- ing, courteons and affable in manner, of extensive com- mercial knowledge and strict integrity in business, hospitable and benevolent. His style of living was for those days elegant. His stock in trade at the time of his death was valued at $12,000, and his estate at $100,000. Abraham Mendez and Jacob Reed Rivera were other prominent members of the colony, and carried on business, though on a smaller scale. On the 20th of May, 1782, Mr. Lopez, while on his way, in a sulky, to Providence, accompanied by his family in a carriage, was drowned before their eyes at Smithfield, R. I., in Smith Pond, into which he had driven to water his horse. At the close of the war the company returned to Newport, followed by the re- speet and regard of the people, with whom they had found a hospitable and congenial home. After their departure a friendly correspondence was main- tained and probably an interchange of visits. One of the letters remains. It was written by Mr. Rivera to Col. Henshaw, in a clear and beautiful hand, and the whole style and spirit of the letter are indicative of the intelligence and high character of the writer, and of his appreciation of the friendship of the people of Leicester, and of the value of our national institu- tions. " I am happy," he writes, " to find my country- men (the Spanish nation) begin to divest themselves from bigotry, ignorance and indolence, and adopt in
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their room learning, liberty and liberality of senti- ments in religious matters. That system, with prop- per encouragements to arts and sciences, make no doubt, will, in time, enable them to arrive to that state of perfection that will class them with all other civilized and enlightened nations, and enrich that impoverished nation, and 1 am confident to say. great advantages will derive to that nation in par- ticular, and the whole world iu geueral, from the American Revolution."
CHAPTER IV. LEICESTER-(Continued). ECCLESIASTICAL.
The First Church: First Meeting-House, Rev. David Parsons, Controversy wtih the Town, Rer. Darid Goddard, Whitefield und Edwards, Rev, Joseph Roberts, Rev. Benjamin Concilia, De. Moore, Ir. Nelson, Later Pastors, Second Meeting House, Present Meettag-House, Church Music, Bible Reading, Sunday-School Parish. Friends' Meeting : Origin, Meeting House, Second House, Acts Swift, Intelligcure, Anti-Slavery, Mulberry Grote School, Greenville Baptist Church: Church in Sutton, Pustenx, Dr. Thomas Green, Other Pastors, Sunday-School, One Hundred und Fiftieth Anniversary. Second Congregational Church : Organization, Pastors, Christ Church, Rochdale, Methodist Episcopal Church, Cherry Valley, Centre, Wesleyan Methodist Church, Konuta Catholic Church, St. Thomas' Church, Cherry Valley.
FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH .- The records of the First Congregational Church previous to the settlement of the Rev. Zephaniah Swift Moore, in 1798, are lost, with the exception of a few detached pages. The exact date of organization is unknown. The town was incorporated in 1714, and the farins purchased by the settlers began to be occupied soon afterward. It is not probable that church privileges in some form, and church organization were long neglected. A meeting-house had been built in 1719. It stood on the Common, nearly in front of the present church. It was a small and very plain, rude structure. It had a door in front and one on each end. It was clap-boarded, but not painted. It was withont a porch, belfry, gallery or pews. The windows were small and lighted with diamond-shaped glass. It was sealed to " the great girt," but prob- ably not overhead. Like all the churches of the time, it was without heating apparatus of any kind. Later, individuals built in it their own pews on the "pew ground" or "pew spots." There were comfortless " body " seats, the women sitting on the west side and the men on the east. Galleries were added about 1728. Repairs and modifications were made from time to time, by the addition of pews, placing seats in the galleries, adding in 1743 twelve feet on the back side, putting on a new " ruff," moving the pulpit to the back side, re-covering the house with " the old clap-boards taken off the back side," putting up steps, and in 1754 a sounding-board. In this house the pco-
ple from all parts of the town eamne together to wor- ship God. In it they held their town-meetings and all other public gatherings, and it was here that they earnestly, courageously, eloquently and with states- man-like ability and forethought enunciated the prin- ciples of liberty on which our republic was founded.
The first town action with reference to the settle- ment of a pastor appears to have been taken Novem- ber 28, 1720, when it was voted that Mr. David Par- sons be our Gospel minister. Two days later a call was sent him by a committee. In this letter they write, "Rev'd Sir, we with one heart and consent Do call and Invite you to be our Minister in the Work of the Gospel amongst us, if you see Cause to accept and see your way clear to remove; but alas if we reflect back upon ourselves, we can't but see we are utterly unworthy of so great a Blessing; but if you have such a Blessing to bestow on us, as we hope you will be, we desire forever to praise his name for his Goodness to us ward." He was to "have the forty- acre lot next the Meeting House," and "rights," "as other forty-acre lots," and a salary of sixty pounds, and sixty pounds settlement. As he hesitated to ac- eept on these terms, thirty individuals agreed to add to the amount, so that the salary should be seventy- five pounds, and the settlement one hundred pounds.
Rev. David Parsons was born in Northampton in 1680, graduated from Harvard College in 1705, pastor of the church in Malden twelve years, where he had a church quarrel and lawsnit with the town ; installed at Leicester in 1721, dismissed March 6, 1735, and died in Leicester, where he was buried October 12, 1743. Whitney, in his " History of Woreester County," gives the date of his installation as, "by the best ac- counts now to be had, September 15, 1721," but the town records indicate that he was already pastor early in the year. The town, "reduced to low circumstances by reason of the Indian War," soon found it difficult to comply with the conditions of settlement, and pe- titioned the Legislature for aid, which was granted to the amount of ten pounds. But the salary continued to be in arrears and Mr. Parsons appealed to the Leg- islature, and the town was notified to show cause. This was the beginning of a quarrel which lasted for sixteen years. Within six years the town, which had regarded itself "unworthy of so great a blessing," voted "that the town be willing that Mr. Parsons should remove, and remain out of this town." The town strenuously endeavored for years "to be relieved from Mr. Parsons' bondage," but in those days such an endeavor was attended with insurmountable ditli- culties. Memorials were made by the parties to the Legislature, complaints to the Quarter Sessions and appeals to the General Court. Those who were con- scientiously opposed to Mr. Parsons were released by act of the Legislature from his support upon six months' notice, on condition of providing "an able orthodox minister, generally to dispense the Word of God among them," or attendance and taxation in
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some neighboring congregation. The General Court passed an act releasing the town from Mr. Parsons' support, but the act was vetoed by Governor Belcher. "Six Worcester gentlemen came as mediators," but were unsuccessful. There were differences among the people and changes of town action in relation to the subject. Successive councils were called, one of which sat four days in Watertown, and adjourned to Boston, where it was continued four days longer. The result of this council reproves Mr. Parsons for "any rashness in his words, and hastiness in his actions," and shows that he had been arbitrary, had called the meetings of his opposers a " Mob," had assumed power not belonging to "a pastor according to the constitu- tion of these churches;" that he, with "rash and inju- rious" expressions, had ordered the deacon "out of his seat," and had recognized the minority, composed of his friends, as the church, and received members into the church without due authority. But they judged, "as a former council did," that he had been "shame- fully treated with respect to his support," and de- prived of his "just and full title to lands in Leicester." The communion service had been withheld from his use and that of the church. "They had opposed his going into the pulpit on the Lord's Day," and "set up another in opposition to him," and had withdrawn from public worship to " private assembling." "The like was never done in this land before." He was at length dismissed by a mutual council. This contro- versy with the town, however, continued and he pro- vided that his grave should not be with that of his people, but in his own grounds. The stone stood for many years near the Paxton Road; it for a time was lost, but at length was found in the house upon the place, used as the floor of the oven. It has now found a resting-place in the church building, together with that of Mrs. l'arsous.
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