USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > Historic homes and institutions and genealogical and personal memoirs of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, Vol II > Part 2
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There was plain living in abundance, and some respectable thinking in this primitive Williams. "Scholarship alone confers distinction " here, wrote an undergraduate in 1801. President Fitch had entire
Hopkins Hall.
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charge of the seniors, and used as text books, Locke in Mental Science, Paley in Moral Philosophy, and Vattel on the Law of Nations. His teaching. perhaps not of the highest, most inspiring order, seems to have been something more than a mechanical, humdrum recitation exercise. Among the early instructors were Jeremiah Day and Henry Davis, the former afterwards president of Yale and the latter president of Middle- bury, and subsequently of Hamilton College. The first full professor in the institution was Samuel Mackay, a native of Canada, who gave instruction in French from 1795 to 1799.
In 1806 a chair of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy was estab- lished, which Professor Gamaliel S. Olds occupied until 1810, when Professor Chester Dewey succeeded him. Both of these men were of a scholarly, intellectual cast. Students could have gone further and fared worse than in their lecture rooms.
The debating societies cannot be left out of the reckoning in any adequate appraisal of this early educational work of the college. At what date the first of them, the Adelphic Union, was organized, it is impossible to determine, as the records were burned in the fire of 1841, which destroyed the Old East College, but it must have been nearly coeval with the institution itself. In 1795 this original organization having become unwieldy, it was divided into two bodies, known then and since as the Philotechnian Society and the Philologian. The Adel- phic Union, which still survives, has been a considerable element in the intellectual life of the college. For a long period members of the branch societies gave two exhibitions annually under its auspices, and many distinguished men pronounced orations before it at commence- ment. Among the orators on its list were Edward Everett, Rufus Choate, Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, Ralph Waldo Emer- son, Henry Ward Beecher and George W. Curtis. Twice at least the
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Union-first in 1855-56 and again in 1868-69-provided courses of public lectures. Dr. Holmes opened the former course with a talk on Lectures and Lecturing.
For some reason that is not now very clear, the branch societies began as secret organizations. They had "tokens" and badges and grips, and the members pledged themselves " on the honor of a gentle- man " to reveal nothing communicated to them in their convocations. The Philologian records previous to October 17, 1817, were destroyed. but the Philotechnian are complete. These records show that the young gentlemen discussed a considerable variety of subjects. At their first meeting the Philotechnians debated the question: Ought the liberty of the press to be suppressed? Then followed discussions on foreign im- migration, novel reading, lawyers, emancipation, universal salvation, the country town as the seat of a college, the utility of religion. the relation of representatives to their constituents, the dismemberment of the union. theaters, a big navy, the conquest of Canada, divorce, quack doctors, the French Revolution, the Louisiana purchase, and the education of girls. These subjects are taken almost at random. A complete conspectus of them would show that the Williams young men of 1795-1815. though buried in the wilderness, were quite alive to the questions and issues of the day.
In addition to the debates a course of lectures, delivered by mem- bers of the societies, was begun in 1797 and continued for a long period. These lectures ranged over a wide field-history, science, philosophy. literature-and afforded an important addition to the educational re- sources of the college. A committee was also appointed at the outset on the pronunciation of words. In case of disagreement the question was to be submitted to President Fitch as the final authority.
Another student organization of large importance goes back to an
Thompson Laboratory.
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early period-the Theological Society, which seems to have been formed in 1805. The earliest surviving records begin August 20, 1809, when a revised constitution was adopted. In the matter of secrecy it followed the example set by the debating societies, the members of it " solemnly engaging " to divulge nothing which might be injurious to the organiza- tion or any of its members. Exactly one-half of the graduates in the four classes for the period 1807-1810 belonged to it. The subjects dis- cussed comprised some of the toughest questions of theology-Is Christ verily God? Did the human soul of Christ exist from eternity? Are we strictly guilty of Adam's sin? Ought a person to be willing to be damned to be saved? These and kindred subjects were canvassed with the greatest interest. In later years there was an occasional lapse from these heroic topics. On one occasion they debated the question whether it was right for benevolent associations to accept gifts from slave holders -an early instance of " the tainted money " discussion.
The Theological Society considered matters of conduct as well as of creed, and did not hesitate to discipline its members. On one oc- casion two of them " acknowledged their faults to the society and were accepted." In 1814 " Plumb, having been previously impeached, and on being found not guilty was acquitted by ballot." During the same year two rather demonstrative sinners were encountered. " Bottwood and Wing," we are told. " were dismembered for refusing to pay their fines, and on account of the disturbance they made. the society wisely adjourned until the next Lord's day evening!"
In 1841 Professor Albert Hopkins, in an address before the Theo- logical Society, dwelt upon the powerful religious influence constantly exerted by it since its formation. "It has held on its way gloriously," he said, " through the changes which have alternately obscured and
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brightened the prospects of the institution and of religion." The so- ciety still exists. though in a modified form.
The first years of the administration were vexed by no very serious internal disturbances. In 1802 there was indeed a minor sort of rebel- lion among the students. the details of which are obscure. The president dealt so successfully with this "insurrection against the government of the college " that he felt confident the present generation would " never burn their fingers again." His hopefulness was hardly justified A much more disastrous affair occurred in 1808. The trouble arose out of the unpopularity of certain instructors and a students' ulti- matum that they must be removed. There was a furious tempest in the little college world which resulted in the resignation of the entire teaching staff except the president, and the suspension of the college for four weeks. It was an unfortunate event, and doubtless contributed to the decline in the prosperity of the institution which began shortly after- ward. The president may not have managed the quarrel in the wisest way. One of his colleagues complained that "he wouldn't draw up hill." Probably he had little relish for that sort of thing.
The college encountered some local political squalls. President Fitch happened to be an ardent Federalist, and a majority of the students seem to have followed his lead. In 1806 the editor of The Pittsfield Sun-a Democratic sheet-attended commencement and was ill pleased with the orations of the young men. "It is with extreme regret," he wrote in the issue of September 13. " that we have occasion to indulge in unfavorable strictures. * The just sentiment of indignation excited by the indecent streams of political virulence which tarnished the annual commencement at this college a few years since had in some measure checked the raging of that political mania which had so long infested the institution. Since that period
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the streams * were evidently less turbid, and promised ere long to fertilize and improve the country through which they were des- tined to flow. The performances of the present year. however, have dashed from our lips the pleasing cup of expectation. And a fresh erup- tion of combustible and noisome matter warns Republicans to beware how they trust the education of their sons on the burning sides of a political volcano." The oratorical grievances of which the editor complained so bitterly were persistent preaching of Federalism, denunciation of the national administration for peaceably compromising "wrongs and in- sults which honor required should only be settled by the sword," ridicule of popular suffrage, sneers at "the voice of the independent freemen of our country," and invocations of
"Some chosen curse, some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven," upon the heads of " exalted characters."
The next week a correspondent countersigned and accentuated the charges of the editor. "At this college," he declared, "youth are taught to be heady, to despise government, and to speak evil of digni- taries. No good Republican will retain any further connec- tion with that society. It may be well for the inhabitants of Berkshire to petition the legislature to make provision for a reformation of such a public nuisance of baneful influence on society, on the morals and taste of our youth." These criticisms, in which there was certainly no excess of reserve, appear to have had some effect. At the next com- mencement the editor found a better state of things. "It furnished," he said, "a happy contrast to many of those which at former periods it has been our unwelcome duty to record." He was happy to find that on this occasion " the temple of science had not been prostituted to the low purposes of calumny and slander." The reformation seems to have gone on apace. " A. B .. " who was present at the commencement of
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1809, wrote to The Sun in a highly complimentary strain. "Instead of being compelled to attend to the hackneyed subjects of the day." he said, " the audience was led by the hand of genius through the fields of science, glory, patriotism and virtue! "
The last four or five years of President Fitch's administration was a period of depression and decline. Various influences no doubt contributed to this condition of affairs-the rebellion of 1808, the down-
Old Observatory.
fall of General F. J. Skinner, a leading trustee of the college and its treasurer from 1793 to 1798, as well as the fact that the question began to be mooted whether a mistake had not been made in the location of the college. How much influence this preliminary agitation for removal may have had in causing the resignation of President Fitch in 1815, is not quite certain. It was definitely asserted in the controversy which followed that the trustees, finding him in the way of their schemes, rudely pushed him out of it. "Berkshire," a prominent figure in the news-
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paper warfare, wrote to The Pittsfield Sun of August 11. 1819. that the public saw with grief and indignation "an old and faithful servant * driven from an institution which he had fostered to meet the buffets of the world and the caprices of fortune. Age, prudent and timid, draws its fragile, weather-beaten bark within shore. But he was piteously thrust to sea. to find his grave in the deep or be stranded on some unknown, perhaps inhospitable shore." This rhetorical "Berkshire " probably did the trustees scant justice. While they may not have been unwilling to have the president retire. they voted to present him with a considerable sum of money, and employed four complimentary adjectives in describing his services to the college.
With the retirement of President Fitch, the little frontier college closed the first chapter of its history. Naturally it might have been ex- pected that the outcome of the experiment would be small and local. That was not exactly what happened. Many of the students of this period did faithful if not conspicuous work in the world. Among them may be mentioned William Cullen Bryant, publicist and poet ; Amos Eaton, lecturer on botany and geology; Nathan Hale, editor and men- ber of the Massachusetts Historical Society; Charles K. Williams, gov- ernor of Vermont ; Henry H. Childs, lieutenant-governor of Massachu- setts : Luther Bradish, lieutenant-governor of New York: Elijah H. Mills, and Chester Ashley, United States senators; Egbert Ten Eyck, Henry C. Martindale, Lewis Bigelow, Aaron Hackley, Samuel R. Betts, Byrum Green, Edward Rogers, Timothy Childs, John C. Clark, Job Pierson. Almon C. Reed, Jonathan Sloan, Samuel F. Vinton, members of the national house of representatives: Rufus Pettibone, chief justice of the supreme court of Missouri; George Morell, chief justice of the supreme court of Michigan: John Birdsall, chief justice of the supreme
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court of Texas ; Daniel Kellogg, justice of the supreme court of Ver- mont ; Charles A. Dewey, justice of the supreme court of Massachusetts ; Alonzo C. Paige, justice of the supreme court of New York; Justin Edwards, president of Andover Theological Seminary; Samuel J. Mills, who with four associates ( Francis L. Robbins, James Richards, Harvey Loomis and Byrum Green), "prayed into existence the embryo of American missions," and many others whose names cannot be set down here. The relation of Mills to the college is in some respects unique. He had become interested in foreign missions before his arrival in Will- iamstown. With a few other students he was accustomed to hold prayer meetings in what is now Mission Park. The burden of these meetings was the condition of the heathen world. On the approach of a thunder storm one hot day in the summer of 1806 these students took refuge under a haystack. The subject of discussion was the practicability of sending the gospel "to the pagans of Asia and to the disciples of Ma- homet." Mills insisted that the enterprise was not visionary but prac- ticable, and prayed while the storm raged that " God would strike down the arm with the red artillery of Heaven which should be raised against a herald of the cross." The essential point is that this out-of-door prayer meeting has a substantial connection with the origin in this coun- try of the great movement for evangelizing the Pagan world, and has been a factor of no little importance in the history of the college. " Williams," wrote a correspondent to The Adelphi in 1831, " has been celebrated on earth and I trust in Heaven, too, as the birthplace of American missions."
Mills and some of his associates formed a secret organization in 1808 for the prosecution of his missionary plans. It survived his gradu- ation in 1809, but there remain little data in regard to its subsequent history. In 1820, an organization was in existence, the first article in
President's House.
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the constitution of which reads: "This society shall be designated . The Society of Williams College for inquiry into the state of missions and the duty of young men to engage in them."" The earliest available record is dated June 7. This " society for inquiry " would seem to be the organization of 1808, if we may trust the historical accuracy of its members in 1833. They voted, September 22 of that year, to call their collection of books the Mills Library, " in honor of the founder of the society and of missions in the Western world." A few months later the name of the society itself was changed to "The Mills Society of In- quiry." In this organization only men who expected to devote their lives to missions were admitted to membership. Undoubtedly the for- eign field was the paramount interest. "The brethren conversed for some time," so the record for December 25, 1825, informs us, " respect- ing the deplorable state of the heathen world." They often conversed upon this topic. Yet home missions were not wholly neg- lected. In 1827 the society appointed a committee to visit the neigh- boring town of Pownal, and to "inquire into the expediency of a Sab- bath School being established in that place." The committee visited Pownal and organized a successful school there.
In 1849 The Theological Society and The Mills Society of In- quiry were united, and the new association became The Mills Theologi- cal Society. Subsequently the organization adopted another name, which it still retains-The Mills Young Men's Christian Association.
President Fitch was succeeded in. the autumn of 1815 by the Rev. Zephaniah Swift Moore, professor of languages in Dartmouth College- a man of more than ordinary scholarship and executive ability. His inaugural seemed " elegant " to the trustees, though they did not take the trouble to print it. Fortunately the manuscript has been preserved. It is a sound, well-built discourse, in which the studies then constituting
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the college curriculum are reviewed and their educational values ap- praised. A fairly cheerful tone pervades it, and he hoped with the aid of his associates to make " this institution eminent among the colleges in New England." There is no reference in it to various disquieting agita- tions which had been rife during the preceding spring and summer. " While I feel deeply impressed," he said, addressing the trustees, " in view of the highly responsible office in which I am now placed * I feel no inconsiderable relief from a confidence that I shall have your counsel, advice and prayers." Whether he would not have been better off without them-we shall see.
This second administration, which continued for six years-the shortest in the history of the college-is distinguished by at least two events of more than common interest. The first of these was a course of lectures delivered by Professor Amos Eaton on the natural sciences. Not only were they in advance of what could be found elsewhere, but they made an epoch in the intellectual life of Williams. The introduc- tory series was devoted to mineralogy, and awakened such interest among the students-these courses were elective-that, by way of preparation for the next series, which took up the flora of the northern states, they actually printed five hundred copies of a " Manual of Botany " which the professor compiled from his "manuscript system," and " gra- tuitously presented to them for publication." They felt that their progress " would be greatly facilitated by a systematic description of vegetables, and, being destitute of such a system," they took this, so far as the present writer is informed, unprecedented step in American col- leges to provide themselves with the necessary apparatus. In this volume a letter addressed to the professor, and signed apparently by every student in the institution, follows the title-page. "We consider ourselves happy," so the letter begins, " in having an opportunity to ex-
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press our gratitude." In ISIS, the student edition of the Manual hav- ing been exhausted, as a call for it sprang up in "almost every part of the northern states," Professor Eaton published a second edition, and dedicated it to the president and faculty of Williams College. "The science of botany," he said, " is indebted to you for its first introduction into the interior of the northern states; and I am indebted to you for a passport into the scientific world. Permit me, therefore, to inscribe to you this Manual as a testimony of that gratitude and esteem which is due to the patrons of science." So powerful was the interest awakened in botany, mineralogy, geology, and cognate studies by this man of genius that they became the dominant intellectual factor in the life of the college, and retained this precedence until the rise twenty years later of Mark Hopkins and his philosophy. The students of Williams College were not alone in their enthusiasm for Amos Eaton. His fame soon spread beyond the Berkshires. In 1818 the gov- ernor of the state of New York, DeWitt Clinton, invited him to give a course of lectures before the legislature-a proceeding absolutely unique in our history. The lectures, which dwelt chiefly upon the relations of geology to agriculture, excited an interest the more immediate result of which was the publication of the Natural History of the State of New York, and a later but none the less veritable one, the establishment of the United States Geological Survey.
The other important event in President Moore's day was the bitter controversy precipitated by the efforts of a majority of the trustees to remove the college from Williamstown to Northampton-a controversy which for the time overshadowed every other interest. As we have seen, the agitation began in 1815, when on the 2d of May the trustees appointed a committee of six to take the subject into consideration. In the following September this committee reported that " under existing
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circumstances and at the present time " the removal was inexpedient. The trustees did not explain. They put forth no statement of the con- siderations which led them to an adverse conclusion. "Plain Dealing." writing to The Hampshire Gasette, November 10, 1818, says that they resolved to give the college further opportunity to satisfy the public "in the place where it had stood since its first establishment. Some of the most respectable men in Berkshire pledged themselves to exert all their powers to raise the college from its degraded condition if they might have opportunity to make the trial."
For some three years the subject does not seem to have been revived in the board. Among the students, however, interest in the matter was not killed by the action of the trustees. At least the question, " Would it be advantageous to have Williams College removed from its present situation? " was debated in the Philotechnian Society, July 24, 1816, and decided in the affirmative, " after an able discussion, with one dissenting vote." How far this decision represented the existing student sentiment we are unable to say. When the trustees met August 6, 1818, they re- ceived overtures from the Academy at Amherst proposing that the col- lege should be moved thither and united with that institution. The proposition was declined, but it seems to have awakened the agitation for removal which had slumbered for three years. A number of Hamp- shire gentlemen, we are told in the next issue of The Hampshire Gasette, met at Northampton, October 22, 1818, to consider the expediency of establishing a college in Hampshire county. These gentlemen showed great interest in Williams College, and chose a committee which was authorized to take such measures as might be expedient to assist the trustees in relocating the institution, if in their judgment " the promo- tion of the cause of literature and religion " shall render a removal de- sirable. The committee was also directed to forward a report of its in-
Jessup Hall.
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vestigations and conclusions to President Moore, to be laid before the board of trustees at their next meeting.
November 10, 1818, the trustees, at a special meeting, reversed all former decisions and voted, nine to three, that it was expedient to re- move the college from Williamstown. They chose a commitee consist- ing of the Hon. James Kent, chancellor of New York, the Hon. Na- thaniel Smith, judge of the superior court of Connecticut, and the Rev. Dr. Seth Payson, of Rindge, New Hampshire-a very respectable com- mittee certainly, and none of its members alumni of the college-who were commissioned " to view the towns of Old Hampshire " and to select among them a new site for the college. The committee did not enter upon their investigations until the following spring. They seem to have made a careful survey of the situation, visiting the various towns interested in the matter and listening to such committees and delegations as might address them. The Hampshire Gasette of May 18, 1819, con- tains an announcement of their decision. "We have much pleasure," wrote the editor, " in stating that the college committee * after a full and patient hearing of the respective towns of Greenfield, Am- herst and Northampton, decided unanimously in favor of Northampton."
It was not until the 23rd of June that the address of the trustees, explaining and defending their course, appeared in the public prints. They dwelt upon the inaccessibility of Williamstown and upon the disas- trous competition of other colleges which had sprung up in the neigh- borhood-a competition threatening to destroy the institution unless something heroic were done. And it must be confessed that they were able to rally a formidable amount of public sentiment in their favor. " Almost every gentleman acquainted with the situation and resources of Williams College," wrote a correspondent of The Pittsfield Sun, " is strongly impressed with the belief that to hold it up where
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