USA > Massachusetts > Bristol County > Fairhaven > Brief history of the town of Fairhaven, Massachusetts; prepared in connection with the celebration of old home week, July 26-31, 1903 > Part 4
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Mr. Leighton was followed in 1891, by Rev. Don C. Ste- vens, who resigned in 1893 to become librarian of The Millicent
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Library, which position he held about eight years. He removed from Fairhaven after his resignation from that post.
The next pastor, Rev. H. L. Buzzell, was ordained in Fair- haven, Oct. 30, 1893, and remained there until Oct. 1, 1896. Mr. Buzzell spent two years at Bates College and graduated at the Meadville Theological School. He is now pastor of the Church of the Saviour ( Universalist) Nicholson, Pa. The present pastor, Rev. William Brunton, was educated in England and has had several pastorates in that country and in America. Mr. Brunton received a degree from the Harvard Divinity School in 1879. He began work in Fairhaven, Nov. 1, 1896. The closing words on the history of this church bring us to the one event which is most prominent in the church life of the town at this time, the erection of the new church edifice. A loving me- morial to an honored parent, from one who has evidenced in such distinguished ways his regard for his native town. As one re- fleets upon the exquisite beauties of the cathedral in miniature whose walls are rising upon a site already made beautiful by former owners, the mind refuses to deal in terms of material val- nes. These will be recorded by other pens than mine. It is better that we listen to deeper tones which breathe from the senlpture and the tracery, from the softened light and the en- during stone, telling us that the age of religious faction and strife is brightening into a wiser and a better day.
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METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH
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THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH
In the year 1820, a Methodist Episcopal Church was organ- ized in New Bedford and attracted to its services and membership a number of residents of Fairhaven, in which town there was occasional preaching by the minister in charge. In 1829, it was decided, upon request, that a chapel should be erected for the benefit of the Fairhaven members, and the building now occupied by the town as a High School, on Main street, north of the bridge, was built and opened for public worship in June, 1830. The dedication sermons were preached by Rev. Orange Scott and Rev. John Livesey. The society continued to be a branch of the one in New Bedford until 1832 when a distinct organization was formed. On Aug. 30, 1832, the following named persons were chosen as a board of trustees: Joseph Millet, James Tripp, 2nd, John P. Winslow, Joseph P. Swift, Dennis Mccarthy and Warren Maxfield. In the year 1819, the substantial church edifice at the corner of Centre and Walnut streets, erected by the Centre Congregational Church in 1841, was left vacant by the disband- ing of that organization. The matter of purchase by the Meth- odist Episcopal Church was immediately considered and soon affected and the building was occupied that year. Varions im- provements to the house of worship have been made from time to time, the most extensive of all having just been completed in the present year.
The interior of the church has been practically renewed, an addition having been built for the organ, new pews put in, the audience room redecorated and additional space made for parish purposes. A most interesting fact in the history of the house of worship is the return to it of the organ, enlarged and renewed, which was the property of the Centre Congregational Church and which, when that organization was dissolved, was disposed of to the Unitarian Church. After being in the possession of the
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latter society over fifty years the organ returns in this year, 1903, to its original home as a gift. The official appointments to the ministry of this church have been as follows: 1830-31, Rev. William Livesey; 1831-32, Rev. Leonard Griffin; 1832-34, Rev. Nathan Paine; 1834-35, Rev. Lewis Janson ; 1835-36, Rev. Daniel K. Banister: 1836-38, Rev. David Leslie ; 1838-39, Rev. Henry Mayo; 1839-41, Rev. Apollos Hale ; 1841-43, Rev. Isaac Stoddard; 1813-44, Rev. Nathan Paine; 1844-45, Rev. John W. Case : 1845-46, Rev. Daniel Webb, supplied by G. W. Brewster: 1846-48, Rev. Micah J. Talbot, Jr., 1848-49, Rev. Henry Baylies; 1849-51, Rev. Sammel C. Brown: 1851-53, Rev. Horatio W. Honghton ; 1853-55, Rev. Richard Livesey ; 1855-57, Rev. William II. Richards ; 1857-58, Rev. Bartholomew Otheman ; 1858-59, Rev. James M. Worcester: 1859-61, Rev. John B. Husted ; 1861-63, Rev. Edward A. Lyon; 1863-65, Rev. William Livesey : 1865- 68, Rev. Henry I. Smith ; 1868-71, Rev. Frederick Upham, D. D .; 1871-73, Rev. John Gray; 1873-75, Rev. Hopkins B. Cady ; 1875-78, Rev. George De B. Stoddard; 1878-79, Rev. Daniel C. Stevenson ; 1879-80, Rev. Francis D. Sargent ; 1880-83, Rev. George E. Fuller: 1883-84, Rev. E. L. Hyde; 1884-86, Rev. Henry J. Fox, D. D., 1886-89, Rev. William F. Davis ; 1889-91, Rev. W. Lenoir Hood; 1891-93, Rev. Nathan C. Alger; 1893-95, Rev. George A. Sisson ; 1895-96, Rev. William S. Fitch ; 1896-1902, Rev. S. E. Ellis; 1902- Rev. M. B. Wilson.
Frederick Upham, son of Sammel Sprague Upham and Anna Foster, was born in Malden, Mass., Oct. 4, 1799, and died in Fairhaven, March 20, 1891. He received his first appointment in the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1821, officiating as junior preacher on the Scituate cirenit which in- eluded all the towns from Plymonth to Dorchester. He was stationed at different times on Marthas Vineyard, in Sandwich, Bristol, Provincetown, Fall River, Newport, Providence, Taun-
SECOND ADVENT CHRISTIAN CHURCH
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ton and Fairhaven, which town he chose as the permanent place of residence of his old age, and where he resided until his death, honored and revered by the entire community.
On the occasion of his ninetieth birthday, it was stated that he had been nearly seventy years in the ministry, sixty-three of which had been in effective relations with what is now the New England Southern Conference. He was presiding elder from 1837-47, was a member of four general conferences and and received the degree of D. D. from DePauw University in 1855. He was granted superannuated relation in 1883. Dr. Upham married Deborah Bourne whom he survived several years. The only child of Dr. and Mrs. Upham, Rev. Samuel F. Upham, D. D., is well known as a professor in Drew Theological Seminary. The writer regrets that he has not secured a bi- ographical sketch of Rev. Henry J. Fox, D. D., who was pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church from 1884-86. Dr. Fox was born in Hull, England, in 1821, came to America when twenty-three years of age, and spent his latter years in Fairha- ven where he died Nov. 5, 1891. A courteous and kindly man, refined in manner and scholarly in taste, he possessed the affec- tion and esteem of the community and died lamented by a nmich wider circle than that to which his ministerial labor had been given.
THE ADVENT CHRISTIAN CHURCH
The history of Second Advent preaching in Fairhaven dates from the year 1841, when Rev. William Miller, founder of Ad- · ventism, preached in the Christian Baptist Church.
The records of the church have not been carefully preserved and it has been for long periods without a pastor. Regular services have however been held continuously by a faithful con-
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gregation for many years, although at one period no preaching was maintained. The present house of worship on William street, formerly known as Sawins Hall, after being purchased by the society, was dedicated Nov. 10, 1866. It has recently been very greatly improved. Ministers who have served the Church have been Rev. Messrs. J. W. Thomas, G. F. Haines, O. L. Waters, L. F. Reynolds, and the present pastor, Rev. George M. Little.
THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS
During the early days of old Dartmouth and for many suc- ceeding years the influence of the Society of Friends upon its religious and social life was an important one.
This inthience has been very much less in Fairhaven than in other parts of the ancient town. In the city across the river, the Society commanded an inthience and prestige which was never acquired by the Fairhaven Friends. There was no meeting house in the present limits of the town until 1849, when the plain house of worship on Bridge street was erected. The num- ber of worshipers here has always been small.
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FRIENDS MEETING HOUSE, BRIDGE STREET
WHALER OUTWARD BOUND
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CHAPTER IN
COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL HISTORY BY CYRUS D. HUNT
JOHN COOKE, the original settler of Fairhaven, came to Plymouth with his father in the Mayflower.
He was about fifteen years of age when he landed on the shores of America.
As a boy he must have been an active participant in the varied experiences through which the Pilgrims passed.
Embarking at Delft Haven and sailing to Southampton, the return to Dartmouth and again to Plymouth, the abandonment of the misnamed "Speedwell" and the voyage across the tem- pestnous ocean to the shore of the new world, he passed through the terrible sickness of the first winter, when half of the one hundred died.
He must have witnessed the interviews with the Indians and have become conscious of the superiority of the English, which no doubt made him indifferent to the danger to which he and those with him were exposed, by severing his relations with those he left behind when he came to Fairhaven.
John Cooke was a man of note among the first settlers.
He was made a freeman in 1633 ; he was then 28 years old.
The next year he married Sarah Warren, one of the daugh- ters of Richard Warren who came over in the Mayflower.
In 1653, he was a deputy to the General Court, and was appointed by the Court to adjust the disputes between the Dutch
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and English who were clashing in Connecticut. He was deputy at the General Court in 1655 and 1656.
Hle left Plymouth in 1659, and travelled by way of Middle- boro. He had been married twenty-five years and had a family of four daughters. Of these four daughters, one married a Mr. West, from whom West Island was named, another married Thomas Taber, and a third married a Mr. Hathaway.
It is said John Cooke had a great desire to possess islands.
At the time of his leaving Plymouth, cattle, including horses and oxen, cows, sheep and hogs, also fowl, were quite numerous in the colonies, and he no doubt took with him a number of each, as he was reported to be possessed of his share of this world's goods, which, at that time, meant not deposits in banks nor certificates of stocks, but lands and cattle and a spirit of industry to utilize the agricultural products of his lands.
John Cooke and his family formed quite a company, setting forth with his personal property to found a new home in the wilderness ; at that time it must have taken several days journey- ing the 25 miles from the shores of Plymouth to the banks of the Acushnet, where he was to carve out for himself and those who followed him, a new home.
The land through which he travelled was covered with forests which Winslow says were free from bushes as the Indians burned them every year to permit the grass to grow, therefore traveling among them was comparatively easy. The first work of John Cooke then was the cutting down of the trees and clearing the land for cultivation.
That required hard work, and a great deal of it. As one contemplates the miles of stone walls that were built by the early settlers, from the stones gathered from the land to make it suitable · for cultivation, and to form division lines, they speak volumes of the patient industry and long hours of toil that were expended, to clear the land and prepare it for the plow of the husbandman.
The cost of clearing land today by manual labor, the men
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working ten hours a day, gives some idea of the value of cleared land, and furnishes some conception of what the early settlers had to do to put it in condition to be cultivated.
Arriving here, John Cooke selected as his homestead, the land now embraced in the north part of the town. He built his house on that portion of his homestead nearly east of Mr. John II. Howland's house, and to the east of Adams street. About one thousand feet west of his house, towards the Acushnet river, he built a block house as a place of protection from the Indians ; the block house was probably located on that spot, because of its proximity to a spring of water that would afford them a supply. The foundation of the block house was levelled some years ago ; it is just north of Howland road, while the spring is to the south of it.
During King Philip's war, John Cooke, with his family and those living in the vicinity, took refuge in the block house, and were saved from the massacre, but five of his people were killed, among them John Cooke's nephew and his wife.
Mr. John H. Howland, who is the owner of the land on which the block house was built, has generously deeded the historie spot to the Improvement Association of the town, thus emulating the noble spirit that is influencing many of our wealthy men of these times, when more wealth is given in public dona- tions, than could have ever entered the minds of the original settlers that this country would ever possess.
As one stands on the spot today on which his house was located, he sees a beautiful valley lying to the cast, where are nearly fifty houses affording homes to the present occupants of the land. A good deal of it is well cultivated, and affords a pleasing sight. To the west, is seen the Acushnet river upon whose western bank have been created the great cotton mills, the hum of whose busy machinery, with more than a million spindles, can be plainly heard as it spins and weaves the cotton and con-
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verts it into merchantable forms, furnishing employment to many thousands of industrions workmen.
The location is an ideal one, and reflects credit on the judg- ment of John Cooke for his selection.
In view of the industry he was to pursue, -that of agri- culture -- and to security from the Indians, although he probably had little fear of them, it would seem no better location could have been selected for his home than that he chose.
The first employment of the early settlers was farming, and that business, at that time, meant hard and incessant work for the men who cultivated the ground, as well as for the women in the house who cared for the family's wants.
From the settlement of John Cooke, down to the beginning of the whale fishery, farming was the chief business and productive industry of the people, and unlike the farming of today, little machinery was used to aid the farmer in his daily labor. After the importation of cattle, plows were used to break up the soil, and it is said the Indians were amazed to see what an extent of ground could be broken up and prepared for planting by a plow and a yoke of oxen,-yet the plow of that day is described as a clumsy affair. At that time, strong men, capable of endurance, were the necessary requirements, and work from sun to sun the rule.
It is proper to state that the well-to-do farmers of this sec- tion were the most independent class of people that could be found anywhere on the face of the earth. They had come here to be independent, and their conditions permitted the exer- rise of that spirit. They owned the land they cultivated ; that land furnished them the food they required : corn and oats, rye, bar- ley and wheat. Of vegetables, potatoes and onions, squashes and pumpkins; for potatoes, though unknown to the aborigines in this section, were early brought from Virginia and were pro- bably quite plentiful by the time under consideration. Of cattle, each farmer had his oxen and horses, for the latter were suf-
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WHARF SCENE IN WHALING DAYS CARGO LANDED
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ficiently numerous to afford the soldiers a number for calvary during King Philip's war,-and sheep supplied the wool required for clothing, while their cows furnished them with milk, butter and cheese. Some of them even owned their own grist mills and ground their own grain ; even tanned their own hides and made their own leather; thus being able to supply their every want ; the farming then was done by hard work, and it developed a hardy robust class of men who were proud of their inheritance and worthy descendants of a noble ancestry.
The situation of Fairhaven, its riparian rights, its good har- bor and its sinuous shores on the noble bay whose waters abound in edible fish, has had much to do in forming the industrial char- acter and in determining the employments of its people.
Its location attracted such people as found in its surround- ings opportunity for congenial occupations, and moulded those whose previous vocations had been of a different nature, who, yielding to the influence of association, engaged in the business for which the situation of the town was peculiarly adapted : so we find its enterprising citizens early engaged in the whale fish- ery,-and this was the principal business of Fairhaven, until a new and more prolific source of oil was discovered to supply the wants of the world.
Both, William Bradford, the second Governor of Plymouth Colony, whose manuscript was so unexpectedly and fortunately found and brought here to this country from England, and "Mort" in his "Relations", mention the whales they saw in great numbers while lying in the harbor of Provincetown during the months of November and December of the winter of 1620. Mort's "Relations" mentions the great schools of whales as a promising source of employment and of supplies for the oil they would produce, prophetic of the future of this immediate lo- eality.
As an industry, whaling had been engaged in by the Eng- lish as early as Alfred the Great, and the old Northmen followed
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and captured the whales, not only for their oil but also for the food they furnished. The Portuguese were noted for their marine adventures ; they followed the whales along the coast of Africa, and a Portuguese navigator as early as 1486, six years before Columbus discovered America, had sailed down the west- ern coast of Africa and around Cape of Good Hope.
So the prosecution of whaling was not a new industry, but simply improving the opportunity which was presented to the people of this locality.
Whales were numerous within a few miles of this . Goodly harbor", and so soon as this section became settled and the needs of the people permitted, they embarked in the whale fishery. This required the building of vessels, small at first, but gradual- ly larger and larger, as the pursuit of the whales required longer voyages to capture them. The building of vessels required the cutting and hewing of timber, the hauling of it to the ship- yards, the work of blacksmiths, of ship carpenters, of caulkers, and painters ; to fit the ships, rope walks were built and oper- ated ; riggers and sail-makers employed and many coopers re- quired to make the casks to receive the oil that resulted from the trying ont of the blubber of the whales.
Oxford seems to have been the locality selected for the building of the vessels, but after the bridge was constructed 1796-1797, ship building was transferred below the bridge, and many vessels were built along the shore to be sent out in pursuit of the leviathans of the deep.
The last vessels constructed in the town were at Blackler's ship-yard just north of the American Tack Co. works; but the time had come for a change in the industries of the town, not that farming was to be abandoned, but with the introduction of pe- troleum as an illuminant and its use as a lubricant, the demand for whale-oil slackened just as whales were becoming scarcer, and the cost of whale oil more. Whaling attained its greatest importance, as the industry of this town, in 1854, when there
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were, it is reported, some fifty vessels sailing from Fairhaven engaged in the whale-fishery, but, just as after about one hun- dred years were devoted to farming, from 1660 to 1760, so after about a century of whaling, a change was to be inaugurated in the pursuits of the people, and manufacturing was to take the place of that industry in which the people of the town had shown re- markable enterprise, pluck and courage in the proseention of the business, and it had brought to them the wealth that was well earned and was their just reward. This change was hastened by the destruction of many of the whaling ships by the rebel cruisers, built and equipped in England, and sent forth to prey on the defenceless vessels engaged in their peaceful pursuits on the seas. The Florida, Alabama, Shenandoah, and other rebel cruisers, captured and destroyed some 46 whaling vessels, sev- eral of them belonging to this town ; from this serious blow to a profitable industry, Fairhaven never recovered, and her enter- prising men lost the capital invested in whaling. With business prostrated, the people struggled for a time with the adverse cir- cumstances by which they were surrounded, and might, in a measure, have regained what had been lost ; but the progress of events decided otherwise. Petroleum oil could be obtained without fitting ont ships at a great cost, and assuming the risks that attended the procuring of oil from the whale; and the pro- gress of the race had reached such a stage that whale oil would not supply the needs of advanced civilization.
The largest quantity of oil brought into New Bedford during any one year was in 1853, when, statisties inform us, there were 428,000 bbls., which, with the 3,966,500 pounds of whalebone was valued at over $10,000,000. What a contrast with the production of oil today ! For the consumpfive demands, required · for lighting and heating, and for lubricating the machinery, that is being operated in this country, the greatest quantity of whale oil produced, a little more than a thousand barrels a day, would not be sufficient to lubricate the axles of the cars on our railroads
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that carry the millions of passengers, and haul the prodigious quantities of freight that is transported over them.
Whence comes this wonderful fluid that flows up from the wells bored into the earth? Whence its origin and what its permanency? Is it the mother of the coal we now use? And will it continue to supply our wants? No one can contemplate the liquid and think of its use without marvelling at what may be its origin, and what it has done, and what it is doing and is destined to do. Some geologists tell us it is the product of marine animals, millions of whales, perhaps; others that it is generated by the catalytic action between the carbonate of lime which forms the cap rock over the oil sand, and the sulphate of lime that forms its base. Inasmuch as these two minerals contain the necessary elements for forming oil, carbon and hydrogen, the latter theory, it would seem, is the more reasonable; but what- ever its origin, it exists, and its use is producing a revolution in the industrial and commercial world as it has in the domain of finance.
It has supplanted whale oil as an illuminant and lubricant, and is taking the place of coal for generating power.
The great trans-continental railroads, with their lines reach- ing the oil fields of Texas and California, are using the oil to generate steam to drive their giant locomotives as they speed across the continent ; and the big steamships find it a better fuel for their use than the coal it is supplanting. Even one of the enterprising citizens of this town makes use of it to drive his engine to saw wood for the public, when the strike of the miners makes wood a substitute for coal.
The former wealth of Fairhaven, lost by the failure of whaling, is returning, phoenix-like, in other and more beautiful forms, and in industries more congenial, constructive and beneficial.
But we cannot leave the whale industry, which has been the source of this section's wealth and the foundation of its present
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CHIMNEY OF THE PHILIP TABER HOUSE, SOLD TO WILLIAM WOOD IN 1700
OLD WIND MILL - FORMERLY NEAR THE FORT
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prosperity, without paying a merited tribute to the enterprise of the business men who built the ships, furnished them with the supplies and sent them forth on the great ocean in search of the oil contained in the whales; oftentimes the venture was a total loss, for the vessels visited seas that were unknown to the mariner, and no chart pointed out the dangerous reefs or hidden rocks that might lie in their way-and what meed of praise is not due to the brave officers and crews of the vessels that sailed forth on the treacherous seas in search of their prey. Poets have sung of the heroes who fought the battles of the past, and have crowned them with glory for the mighty deeds of valor done by them : but they met beings of their own size and their own kind ; while the whalemen were to meet a foe in his own element, in small boats which he could crush in an instant with his ponderous jaws, or could break in pieces by a stroke of his thikes or a blow of his tail. To approach such an animal in his own domain, to capture and secure hun for commercial purposes, not for glory, nor for conquest of territory, not under the excitement of battle, but calmly and deliberately, required skill as well as great physical courage, that is worthy of the highest praise and deserving of the greatest honor from those who appreciate merit and recognize manly worth.
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