USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > Historic homes and institutions and genealogical and personal memoirs of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, Vol I > Part 3
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These resolutions (which recited every grievance complained of then or thereafter in any of the Colonies ) were read twice in town meet- ing, and unanimously adopted. They were penned by the celebrated Theodore Sedgwick. He was already prominent in national councils, and it is not impossible that the Stockbridge proclamation had a close relationship to the document which was subsequently adopted at Phila-
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delphia, through his association with the leaders of the Congress of 1776.
In this connection it is interesting to note that, when the Declara- tion of Independence of 1776. penned by Thomas Jefferson, was read in a church at Sheffield, a poor slave girl hearing it, said: " It stands to reason that I am free." She sought Mr. (afterwards Judge) Sedg- wick, then a young lawyer, who brought suit to establish her freedom, which the court adjudged upon his plea. These facts were narrated in an address at the Edwards family meeting in Stockbridge in Septem- ber, 1870, by Hon. David Dudley Field, who said this was "the first instance where that famous Declaration was held to mean what it said."
From the time of the Sheffield meeting of 1773 there was no halt- ing. Incidentally it may be mentioned that at the town meeting on February 25. 1775, " the present inhuman practice of enslaving our fel- low creatures, the natives of Africa," was called up, but action was de- ferred, "the subject being under the consideration of the General Court." In the same year, when British aggression had become so pro- nounced as to threaten the virtual reduction of Massachusetts to the condition of a conquered province, when, to quote " The Boston Gazette." " The whole continent seemed inspired by one soul. and that a rigorous and determined one." Berkshire was first to hold a county convention, at Stockbridge, and which body adopted a solemn league and covenant " that we will not import, purchase or consume, or suf- fer any person for. by, or under us, to import, purchase, or consume, in any manner whatever, any goods, wares, or manufactures, which shall arrive in Great Britain, from and after the first day of October next until our charter and constitutional rights shall be re- stored." Shortly afterward a liberty pole in Sheffield was cut down, and, the two doers of the deed being identified, one was compelled to
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pass before a long line of the inhabitants, begging pardon of each one; while the other was tarred and feathered, and in such dire plight was forced to knock at the door of every house in the town and make humble apology. As another instance of the spirit of the times may be noted the fact that, some time before the Declaration of Independence, the people of Pittsfield by vote ordered the erasure of the name of King George from all official insignia, and, as if to show their contempt for that sovereign, coupled with this vote a number of miscellaneous pro- visions, one being against hogs running at large.
This determined spirit of independence was further made mani- fest even in the relations of the county to the provincial authority. For a considerable period Berkshire was practically administered as an independent principality, its inhabitants holding that, by the act of revolution, each political entity had relapsed to entire dependence upon its own inherent powers, that the old provincial charter had been abrogated, and that they would recognize no courts or authority origin- ating in Boston. but would rest upon their own self-government until a state convention should be held and a lawful government organized de novo. To effect the latter end the people of Berkshire took primary action, and it is a well established fact that Jonathan Smith, of Lanes- boro, contributed more than all others to the ratification of the Federal Constitution by the people of Massachusetts and the erection of a stable government. Concerning this important event the commissioners charged with the publication of the Massachusetts Colonial Records wrote recently to Mr. Charles J. Palmer, of Pittsfield : " While all our people seem to have shown a genius for code-making and a wonderful apprehension of the philosophy of Republican government, the honor of being first and most zealous in insisting upon a new constitution, prop- erly and lawfully formed, undoubtedly belongs to the little community
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scattered along the extreme western border of the province along the beautiful and fertile valleys of the Housatonic. And yet how little prominence is given to this fact in our books of history. It is certainly very modest in the intelligent people of Berkshire not to have claimed more than they have for the achievements of their forefathers." Al- though not immediately related to this subject, it is interesting to note that it was owing to the earnest and determined effort of men of Pitts- field that Massachusetts finally removed the remaining relics of the most objectionable Puritan legislation, and gave to all religious bodies absolute independence, and equality in the eyes of the law.
Berkshire performed its full share during the Revolutionary war. Its minute-men marched to Boston on receiving the Lexington alarm. Three of its regiments fought in the battle of Bennington. August 16, 1777. With one of these was Pittsfield's famous "Fighting Parson Allen." When the news of the approaching conflict came to the vil- lage, Parson Allen assembled his congregation in the meeting house and, musket in hand, called upon his people to accompany him to the field. It is claimed for him that he fired the first shot at Bennington on the American side. Berkshire men were present in the campaign culmina- ting in the capture of Burgoyne and his army at Saratoga.
During the war between the United States and Great Britain, 1812-1814, Pittsfield was the rendezvous for the Berkshire county vol- tinteers. There also were congregated the British soldiers captured during the war. The ground occupied by the cantonment then belonged to the United States, and comprised, among other territory, the ground since occupied by the Maplewood Young Ladies' Institute. St. Joseph's ( Roman Catholic) Church, and buildings pertaining thereto.
At the outbreak of the Civil war, Berkshire county responded with cheerful alacrity, as it did to all subsequent calls, and, when the final
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accounting was made, it was shown that it sent to the front nearly six thousand men-nearly four hundred (three hundred and eighty- eight) more than its aggre- gated quota. The county was largely represented in the Eighth Massachusetts Regiment under President Lincoln's first call for sev- enty-five thousand men. The Forty-ninth Regiment was almost entirely made up in the county, which also con- tributed largely to the ranks of the Tenth. Twenty-first, Thirty-first, Thirty-fourth and Thirty-seventh Regi- ments, and to many others in smaller numbers.
One of the most beautiful and impressive soldiers monuments in the United Soldiers' Monument. States is that in the City Park in Pittsfield. The striking figure of the color-sergeant, in bronze, was modeled by the noted sculptor, Launt Thompson. Among the inscriptions upon the granite column, which are peculiarly touching and expressive, are the following :
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" For the Dead, a Tribute."
"For the Living, a Memory."
" For Posterity, an Emblem of Loyalty to the Flag of their country."
It was upon the occasion of the unveiling of this monument, on September 24, 1872, that George William Curtis pronounced one of his most eloquent orations, and his fervent praise is equally applicable to the Soldier of the Union, from whatever town or whatever state :
"Let us be grateful for Greece two thousand years ago, and thank God that we live in America today! The war scattered the glamour of the past and showed us that we, too, live among great virtues, great characters and great men. Through these streets the culture of Greece, the heroism of Rome, the patriotism of our own revolution, have marched before your eyes. These elms, like the trees of Ardennes, have shed their tears in dew drops over the unreturning brave. The ground upon which we stand is consecrated by the tread of feet gladly going! to the noblest sacrifice. And from these throbbing drums and wail- ing horns, still peals the music to which they marched away. They were your sons, Pittsfield and green Berkshire! They were your com- rades, Massachusetts soldiers! They were the darlings of your homes, tender hearts that hear me! And here in this fair figure of heroic youth, they stand as you will always recall them-the bloom of immortal youth upon their cheeks; the divine hope of youth in their hearts; the perpetual inspiration of youth to every beholder. For this is the Ameri- can soldier of the Union; the messenger of liberty to the captive, and of peace to the nation. This is the perpetual but silent preacher of the gospel of liberty and justice as the only sure foundation of states. ' Beautiful on the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth glad tid- ings, that publisheth peace, that said unto Zion, thy God reigneth!' "
In the same park with " the Color Sergeant " is a lofty flagstaff erected by the city at the opening of the Spanish-American war, from which floats, on occasion, a handsome national flag, the gift of the children of the public schools.
How quickly the people of the revolutionary period turned to the arts of peace as soon as war was over, is discernible in the fact that
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education became one of their chiefest concerns. Williams College, without question the most important institution in the Berkshires, from humble and unpromising beginnings rose to the front rank among American colleges. It has not only been a pioneer in more than one field of scholarship and research, but its religious influence has been felt to the ends of the earth. A pertinent illustration is found in the following: It is related that in the early days of the last century the students were accustomed to meet in the fields for prayer. On one occasion a thunder storm drove them to the shelter of a haystack, and. amid the war of elements, there came to some of them the purpose to "preach the gospel to every creature." Several of the students be- came the first and most notable of American foreign missionaries, and the conferences of Williams College students led to the organization of that wonderfully efficient body. the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
Other potent educational agencies were the many academies which early dotted the county, and which were the resort of pupils from New York and Boston, indeed, from all over the land, making Berk- shire the seat of a great share of the influence which has made Massa- chusetts the center of literary and educational activity and helpfulness for the whole land. To quote Mr. Palmer: "Every one of these schools was no mere place for giving the fashionable veneering of the ordinary boarding school, but rather the severe round of training in the Spartan virtues of hard, severe, honest, legitimate toil, and earning every step of advance achieved. And from these schools, as well as from the mountain farms and hillside slopes of the Housatonic, there has flowed a constant stream of manly vigor which has served to re- plenish the wear and waste and strain of many a town and city in every portion of the land." Nor must be overlooked, as a potent educational
THESEADISTHE WORLD
1395,
شباب الله (وائل السامية
JAMES UCHATOS
MARVEI LUDMII
Haystack Monument.
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agency, the libraries which were early established in various towns. The latter contained no flashy novels, but were filled with standard works of history, biography, travels and poetry, and social circles were formed for reading these works. Mr. Hyde, previously quoted, says that young ladies, as they spun wool and flax, would have " Paradise Lost " or Young's "Night Thoughts " or some other book before them, and read as they spun. Many young women committed to mem- ory entire poems, and were well versed in Rollin's " Ancient History " and " Plutarch's Lives," and (remarks Mr. Hyde) " it has been claimed by some, who had an eye on the first half century of Berkshire as well as the last half, that the matrons of the first period were more con- versant with standard English authors than are their daughters and grand-daughters." Pertinent to the same topic is the following from the " Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D. D. : "
" For books to read, the old Sheffield Library was my main re- source. It consisted of about two hundred volumes,-books of the good old fashion, well printed, well bound in calf, and well thumbed, too. What a treasure was there for me! I thought the mine could never be exhausted. At least, it contained all that I wanted then, and better reading, I think, than that which generally engages our youth now- adays,-the great English classics in prose and verse, Addison and Johnson and Milton and Shakespeare, histories, travels, and a few novels. The most of these books I read, some of them over and over, often by torchlight, sitting on the floor ( for we had a rich bed of old pine-knots on the farm) ; and to this library I owe more than to any- thing that helped me in my boyhood. * * I remember the time when there were eminent men in Sheffield. Judge Sedgwick com- menced the practice of the law here; and there were Esquire Lee, and John W. Hurlbut, and later, Charles Dewey, and a number of profes- sional men besides, and several others who were not professional, but readers, and could quote Johnson and Pope and Shakespeare; my father himself could repeat the 'Essay on Man.' 'und whole books of the 'Paradise Lost.'"
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Berkshire was the home of a notable array of professional men- clergymen, lawyers and physicians-who left a deep impress not only upon their own but succeeding generations. At the beginning the set- tlers were for the greater number Puritan Congregationalists. The business of building churches, settling ministers and providing for their support was transacted in town meeting. To quote Alexander Hyde ("Early Life and Customs "), "Pastors were settled for life. With scarecely an exception they were graduates from college, and eminent for scholarship, piety and practical wisdom. They constituted the aristocracy of the county, using the term in its original meaning -government by the best. To them the people looked not only for re- ligious instruction, but for counsel in all matters of education and civil polity." Jonathan Hubbard, the first pastor in the county, was settled in Sheffield in 1735, and died there in 1765. He was settled in the same year John Sergeant was ordained at Deerfield. Mr. Sergeant was succeeded by Jonathan Edwards, pronounced by many to be " the giant intellect of America." After Mr. Edwards was called to the presidency of Princeton College he was succeeded in his pastoral office by Dr. West, a famous theologian, who in the absence of theological seminaries taught numerous divinity students. Dr. West was suc- ceeded by Dr. Field. In 1743 Samuel Hopkins, who was to come to large distinction, was settled at Great Barrington, where he remained until 1770, when he removed to Newport, Rhode Island. There were also famous preachers in the mountain towns. Rev. Thomas Strong settled at New Marlborough, was succeeded by Dr. Alexander, and he by Dr. Catlin, who was author of "A Compendium of Theology." AAdonijah Bidwell, settled at Tyringham in 1750, was another strong figure, his pastorate covering a period of thirty-four years. Clergy- men were settled in central and northern Berkshire about a quarter of
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a century after those in ti . buthern part of the county. The renowned Thomas Allen, the first 'i" field pastor, was settled in 1764. He died in 1810, and was succeede by his son, William Allen, afterward presi- dent of Bowdoin College, .. 1 he by Herman Humphrey, who was later called to the presidency : unherst College. Dr. Hyde was settled in Lee in 1792, and Dr. Sie, 'd at Lenox in 1795.
To illustrate the deep feeling of that day, Mr. Rollin H. Cooke, in his paper on the Rev. John Todd, D. D. (published in the Collec- tions of the Berkshire Historical and Scientific Society, 1899), notes a letter written by that eminent divine, in which he refused to attend the funeral of a friend, on account of having to take part with a Unitarian minister, beginning by saying, "I do believe that Unitarianism is not the Gospel of Christ," and closing: " By acceding to your polite invita- tion I come alongside of a Unitarian minister, and thereby publicly ac- knowledge him to be a minister of Jesus Christ. Sir, in view of the judgment day, I dare not do it." And Mr. Cooke observes: "Yet we criticise the doctrine of papal infallibility."
The lawyers of the county, from its foundation, were ever in the lead in social rank. and more especially in public life. When the county was incorporated (1761) there were only five lawyers in active prac- tice, but they were men of great ability. Among them were Jolin Hug- gins and John Ashley, in Sheffield; Mark Hopkins, in Great Barring- ton, and Theodore Sedgwick, in Stockbridge. The first lawyer in Pittsfield was Woodbridge Little, who began practice there in 1770. David Noble settled in Williamstown about the same time, and Daniel Dewey came in 1790. The last named rose to the supreme bench of the state, and his legal and judicial traits reached to the third genera- tion. Later came to Lenox, Samuel Quincy, a graduate of Harvard, and to Pittsfield. John Chandler Williams. All these and other illus-
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trious lawyers and jurists exerted a strong influence upon the life of the community and upon the jurisprudence of Massachusetts. As early as 1815 a Law Library Association was formed by the members of the Berkshire county bar, to procure law books for use during court sessions. By 1829 the Association had collected upwards of three hun- dred volumes, and it has now grown to more than ten times this num- ber.
The physicians exerted less moulding influence than did the law- yers, but there were men of lofty character and high attainments among them. The early practitioners were generally college graduates and men of broad intelligence. Among them were William Bull and Lemuel Barnard, of Sheffield; John Buck and William Whiting, of Great Bar- rington : Erastus Sergeant, of Stockbridge; John Crocker and Hugo Burkhardt, of Richmond; Oliver Brewster, of Becket, and Timothy Childs, of Pittsfield. Adaptability for the profession seems to have been hereditary in some families, especially the Sergeant, Brewster and Childs families.
Dr. Erastus Sergeant and Dr. Oliver Partridge, of Stockbridge, were appointed in 1785 a county corresponding committee to act in conjunction with the Massachusetts Medical Society, incorporated in 1781. This led to the organization in 1787 of a medical society at Stockbridge, and in 1794 a second county association was formed, but existed only two years. In 1818 the legislature chartered the Berk- shire Medical Society, but its organization was not perfected until 1820. The Pittsfield Medical Society was formed in 1871, and the North Berk- shire Medical Society in 1876.
In 1821 a movement was set on foot for the establishment of a medical school, but plans were long delayed on account of the opposi- tion of the friends of the one connected with Harvard College. The
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Berkshire Medical College was chartered January 4. 1823, and opened its doors September II of the same year, with the following faculty : Dr. H. H. Childs, theory and practice of medicine; Dr. J. P. Batch- elder, anatomy, surgery and physiology: Dr. Asa Burbank, materia medica; Professor Chester Dewey, of Williams College, chemistry, bot- any and mineralogy. Lectures on obstetrics were to be delivered, but the lecturer was not named. In 1821 the old Pittsfield Hotel was bought for school uses, and received about twenty-five students. In 1823 the legislature made the college a grant of $5,000, to be paid in five annual installments. The building used as a lecture room was de- stroyed by fire in 1850, and the legislature made a further grant of $10,000, while the citizens of Berkshire contributed $5,000, and a new edifice was erected, the dedication taking place August 5, 1851. After many vicissitudes the college closed its doors in 1871, selling its build- ing to the town, which remodeled it for school purposes. The sum accruing from the sale, after paying the college indebtedness, was turned over to the Berkshire Athenaeum.
During its forty-four years' existence, the Berkshire Medical Col- lege graduated eleven hundred and thirty-eight doctors in medicine, who held a rank equal to that of those sent out by any American school of medicine of that day. As was observed by J. E. A. Smith (" His- tory of Berkshire County "), "It had a large share in the advancement of medical science and the elevation of medical character. It had at- tracted to Pittsfield, in its faculty and others, persons of culture who had adorned the society of the village while they mingled with it, and left it the better for their presence, and, when it could no longer cred- itably perform the work which was entrusted to it, it gracefully yielded the place to those who could." During the existence of the college voluntary associations were formed among the students for mutual
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literary and professional improvement. In these took part some who achieved a high place in educational life, among them President Mark Hopkins, of Williams College, and Dr. J. G. Holland. Drs. Thayer and Stiles entered upon the publication of the Berkshire Medical Jour- mal in 1861; it greatly intensified the local esprit du corps of the pro- fession, and, though it was continued but one year, left an enduring influence.
The local press is not to be overlooked in epitomizing the influ- ences which were potent in the education of the people and the advance- ment of the interests of the community at large. The first newspaper established was the American Centinel, by E. Russell. The first num- ber appeared December 1, 1787, and its existence was but brief. At that time there were but two other papers in Massachusetts west of Worcester. The Centinel was succeeded by the Berkshire Chronicle, which issued its first number May 8, 1788, Roger Storrs being the pub- lisher. It was only twelve by eight inches in size, but at its thirty-first number was amplified to eighteen by twelve inches. It was ably con- ducted and enjoyed a wide popularity. There was then no postoffice in the county (the first, at Stockbridge, was not opened until 1792), and post riders were irregular, making their trips at long intervals. In January, 1790. the Chronicle announced that " the printer ( Mr. Storrs). ever endeavoring to furnish his customers with the earliest intelligence. had engaged a post to ride weekly from his office in Pittsfield to Spring- field on Mondays and return on Wednesdays, with the papers published in the different States in the Union, when matters of importance (brought) by them will be published by the Chronicle on Thursday, and immediately circulated to the several towns by the different post riders."
In 1827 the people of northern Berkshire determined upon the establishment of a newspaper in that portion of the county, and a
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strong rivalry grew up between North Adams, South Adams and Wil- liamstown, aspiring politicians being the principal factors in behalf of their respective towns. A committee of North Adams people achieved the victory, and in one night brought from Pittsfield a press and types and workmen. From this equipment was produced on February 23, 1827, the first number of the Berkshire American, published by Asa Green, a man of character and a ready writer. The journals thus named were the forerunners of many, some ephemeral, some of permanent es- tablishment, and all contributing in less or larger degree to the develop- ment of the county along material lines, and the upholding of higher standards of education and intelligence.
In various lines the county of Berkshire has ever been an advanced leader in thought and action. Indeed, one writer (Mr. H. M. Plunkett) has said " we claim that more of those first things that draw the chariot of progress forward so that people can see it has moved. have been planned and executed by the inhabitants of the nine hundred and fifty square miles that constitute the territory of Berkshire, than can be credited to any other tract of equal extent in the United States." A student of Williams College, as early as 1806 (long before a railroad had been constructed in the world), broached the idea of a railroad from Boston to Albany. In 1826, through the effort of people of Stockbridge, the scheme was seriously advanced in the legislature, and in the subsequent construction over the Berkshire hills was first demon- strated the practicability of operating railroads on severe ascending and descending grades, as well as upon the level. Here was overcome the steepest grade of the day (eighty-five feet to the mile), and the feat was deemed such a marvel of engineering that the point was visited and studied by railroad builders from Great Britain and various of the
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