USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Sturbridge > Historical sketch of the First Congregational Church, Sturbridge, Mass. : read at the dedication of the new church, May 11, 1910 > Part 2
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1751 the assessors took from Deacon Fiske five pewter plates and a cow; from Jonathan Perry a saddle and a steer; from John Streeter a kettle and pothooks, and from Mr. Blunt a trammel, shovel, tongs and a heifer. These forcible exactions aroused bitter feeling .* The town records give evidence of angry debates, and also of earnest and diplomatic efforts to reconcile the opposing interests, and soon it came about that ministerial rates ceased to be levied upon those whom the assessors knew to be regular supporters of the Baptist church organization.
In the two years which intervened between the death of the first pastor and the settlement of his successor, it is of interest to note the responsibilities assumed respectively
*A Massachusetts law, originally passed in 1728, and renewed for a period of ten years in 1747, exempted Baptists and Quakers from ministerial rates or taxes, if these dissenters from the Standing Order could show certificates that they were members of and contributing to religious organizations of their own denomination, in the com- munity in which they lived. Certificates for the members of this group of Sturbridge "Separates" had been written by two leading members of the second Baptist Church in Boston, but the Sturbridge authorities seem to have questioned whether these "Sep- arates "were entitled to exemption as regular Baptists. Some details of this contro- versy are to be found in Backus's " A History of New England, with Particular Refer- ence to the Denomination of Christians Called Baptists, " 2d. Ed., p. 94, and notes 1 and 2. The editor refers to "Rev. S. Hall's 'Collection of Papers' in which is included 'The Testimony of a People inhabiting the Wilderness,'"-an account of the begin- nings of the Baptist Church in Sturbridge written by Henry Fisk, brother of Deacon David Fisk.
At least one special town-meeting was devoted to an effort to compose these differences, March 27, 1752. "The Seperats was desird To Sete them Selves in the Body of Seets un the mens Side and the other in the Seets un the womans Side which they Did: the modrator [Moses Marcy] then desiered that thire might be a frindly Conferrance, and to See if by Sum means or other Wee Could not make up the deferance betwen us Without going into the Law: and after a Long debate the Seperats Was askt Whether If the Creators and all the Goods that was Taken from them by Destress for thire Minister Rats in the year 1751 was Returned Would Satisfie them So that we might Live to gether Like Cristen frinds and nabouers they answered it would Satisfie them for that year with Resenable Satisfaction, and no further-then they ware desiered to bring in in writing what would Content them which they Did, accordingly Which was to Return from the years 1749 and one for the year 1748 which was John Streator. It was then Earnestly requested of the Seperats that as wee then did and do now beleve we had a good Righ to do as wee did yet for peace Sake that wee might meet one an- other and agree but this was Refusd by them." The Separates withdrew from the town-meeting after the town had voted not to make restitution of "what had been taken from them for Two years last past." The town chose a committee to "treet further with them," but there is no record of the result of their efforts.
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by the Town and by the Church. The town, at the same meeting which acted in regard to the late pastor's funeral charges, made a grant of half a year's salary, at the old figure, to provide preaching at the center meeting-house, and chose a committee to have the matter in charge. But in later months the town did not hesitate to give very pointed in- structions to this committee. Thus, "After Sum Consider- able Debait" (January 7, 1760) it was "Put to uote by Diuideing the House & the Town all uoted to Direct the Com- mitee to M' Storrs for 4 Sabaths Preaching Saue onlely one Man." A few months later, "After a Long Debate the Question Was put Whether The town would Aply to M' Whetney to preach any Longer with us and it past in the negitive," and again the committee was directed to apply to Mr. Storrs for further service.
Meantime the Church was seeking guidance in its mo- mentous choice. In July, 1760, a fast was held; pastors of neighboring churches were called on for help, and the congregation were bidden to join in "seeking to God in Jesus Christ for light and direction in the settlement of a gospel minister, and to the Head of the Church to fit and qualify one with his gifts and graces for to be a minister of Jesus Christ for us." During the summer months the desired leading seems to have been felt, for when, in an October town- meeting, the question was put "Whether the Town Directed the Committee to Apply To M' Joshua Pain to preach with us a longer time then he has as yet Ingaged for in order for Settlement Tryª By Deuideing the house and it past in the afiremetive to a man 72 being present." In January the Church appointed another day of fasting and prayer "in order to give M' Joshua Paine a call to be our Minister." This call was given unanimously, and a few weeks later, in town-meeting, on the question of concurring with the Church in this action, "thire was ninty three Vots brought in and al for M' Joshua Paine." It was further voted to give him, £200 for a settlement and an annual salary of £66, 13s.,
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4d., while for the expenses attending his ordination there was appropriated £13, 6s., 8d.,-precisely the sum to a penny which had just been appropriated for "schooling the children in Town" for a year! On the seventeenth of June, 1761, upon a platform erected under the brow of this hill, in the presence of a great throng, the Rev. Joshua Paine, was ordained, and then began the longest pastorate which this Church has ever enjoyed, a service of 38 years .*
At about this time there was frequent debate in town- meetings over petitions for permission to build pews in the meeting-house. Thus, in March, 1761, half a dozen men requested "Liberty of Building apue over the mens Stairs," and this was "Excepted upon the same Destrictions of the other pues." Two months later a petition of six men praying " for Liberty to build a pew wher the hind Seat is in the front Gallery for them and Wifes" was "Granted Resarueing
Room in Said pew for a Thything [man]t to Set." In 1762 there was presented a petition signed by fourteen women, "Shewing that the Hind Seat in the Womans Side Gallery is So Low that they Cannot See the Minister and that the other Seats are full and Crouded that so that it is uery un- comfortable Setting." "After Sum Debait" they were granted "Liberty to build a Pew where the Hind Seat is."
The meeting-house, as these requests indicate, was be- coming inadequate, and it was a constantly recurring question whether it was worth while to make any repairs upon it. In 1773 the town voted to build a new meeting-house, but
*Most unfortunately the records for a period of more than thirty years have been lost. It is said that Mr. Paine's house was broken into, and the church book dis- appeared with other things stolen.
tThe tithingman in Puritan New England had other duties than the preserving of order and decorum in the meeting-house. He was supposed to see that everyone went to church, and that there was no travel on the Sabbath except in cases of neces- sity or mercy. Throughout the week, as well as on Sunday, he had a paternal oversight over family life and the orderliness of the community. For a comparison of the tithing- man and the constable, see H. B. Adams, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, Oct. 21, 1881. Tithingmen were chosen in the first Sturbridge town-meetings, and from two to five of these officers were annually elected until about 1840,-long after ministerial rates had ceased to be levied in town-meeting.
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some months later this action was reconsidered and it "was the Mind of the Town to omit for the present Building a new Meeting House." For the next few years the thoughts of the people were engrossed and their purses burdened by the Revolutionary War, so that till peace was made no further projects for building were brought forward. In April, 1783, however, a committee "reported unanimously the meeting- house was so decayed it was not worth Repairing," and May 13, 1783, by a vote of 50 to 13 it was decided to "Build a New Meeting House near the Spot where the Old one Now Stands."
Probably there is not one person in the assembly gathered here to-day, to whom the great white meeting-house which our forebears were then about to build did not come to seem almost as much a natural, an inevitable feature of the Stur- bridge landscape as is Fisk Hill. As a matter of fact, how- ever, at every step in the locating, planning, and building of that meeting-house there arose such a clash of opinions as would seem to indicate that the belligerent energies formerly directed against the British were here finding a new and much- needed outlet .*
Again and again decisions were made by a single vote. In the first place, there was opposition to building any new church, and five times in the two years following the above vote, that question was forced, t the last time (April 11, 1785, -nearly a year after the frame was raised) the question being "whether it was the mind of the Town that the Building Committee should Desist from any further Compleating the
*A reading of the town records at the time of the building of the town hall deepens the conviction that in the days of our grandsires, when building operations were con- cerned, there was a high percentage of "cantankerousness" in the atmosphere of Stur- bridge Common.
tOver-hasty action on the strength of one of these votes seems indicated by a bill presented by Col. Crafts for charges against the Town in 1784. It contains the following interesting items:
"to dinnering Master Paine 1784 when keeping School 56 din.s 1 .. 8 .. 0 for three days Service procuring a Master Workm" for the Meeting house at 18 / receive an order for 9 / 9 . . 0
for Boarding him & horse 2 days-& Liquor 5 . . 0
to 2 dollars paid him for his disapointment 12 . . 0 .
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New Meetting House" this was "pased in the Negetive by a very large Majority."
The second question over which differences arose was as to the precise location for the new edifice. Opinions seemed in irreconcilable conflict. Accordingly, "to Advise where in their Oppinion a Meeting House ought to stand in order to accommodate the Inhabitants," there was chosen a dis- interested committee of distinguished citizens of other towns, to "Senter the Town" and "pitch upon a Spot for the New proposed Meeting House," "the Town to abide by their Judgment." At three different town-meetings the makeup of this committee was changed. The last named upon the records consisted of "Gen1 Putnam of Rutland, Capt Simeon Smith of Ashford, and Edward Rawson, Esq" of Leicester," (March 29, 1784). The dimensions for the new building were debated in town-meeting, determined, reconsidered, and determined again. The first building committee of ten was dismissed at the end of two months and a new one con- stituted, having a minority of the members of the old one; and its makeup was later changed. How the building oper- ations should be financed was another anxious question. After various other projects had been rejected, the town made a grant of £300 to be levied on the "Polls and Estates of the Inhabitants of the Town belonging to the Revd M" Paines Society for the purpose of Building the New Meeting House," and a grant of £600 "to be leuied on the Pews." This was reconsidered later, but seems finally to have been carried into effect, after at least one committee on pew apprais- al had been displaced by another .*
*In an undated document, headed "Estimation Paper, " 72 names are listed, and against each name is written a sum of money which probably stood as a gauge of the man's ministerial tax and as a basis for the allotment of pews in the meeting-house that was soon to be built, in accordance with the vote: "He that paid most for Real & Personal Estate in the last Ministerial Tax, to draw the first Pew." (Dec. 29, 1783.) The sums range from £20-14s-7d down to £4-14s-6d. In two or three cases a son is grouped with his father. That this belongs to the years immediately following the Revolutionary War and that the Rev. Joshua Paine ministered to a branch of the Church Militant is indicated by the fact that this list of 72 names included one Colonel, 12 Captains and 11 Lieutenants,-one in every three bore a military title!
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The massive frame of the new structure had been raised in June, 1784, but it was nearly two and a half years later before the building was ready to be dedicated. As it ap- proached completion, the town authorized the building com- mittee to "call on the Inhabitants of this Town who are Dis- posed freely to afford their service with their teams" to assemble on a stated day in the first week of November "to Wharfe up the New Meeting House,"-an admirable prece- dent in co-operation, which has been followed here within the past few weeks. There yet remained the task of examin- ing the report of the building committee, and the town "went largely into debate over the subject," at three or four town- meetings, finally choosing for this auditing task "a committee from the Baptist Society that were not Interested in the Center Meeting House"; and on the basis of their report, after further debate at several meetings, an adjustment was made. With the sale and removal of the old meeting-house, and with the recording of the certificates of pew ownership in the town book, this enterprise of many years was brought to a conclusion.
During the early years of Mr. Paine's ministry there were constant distractions arising from the events which led up to the separation from England and the Revolutionary War. In the midst of these disturbances, Mr. Paine showed himself a worthy leader of the church militant. He was made chairman of the committee to "Draft Something bind- ing For Every Individual in this Town to sign" pledging strict observance of the Association (the non-importation agreement). On the first Monday in December, 1774, on the training-field there was a great concourse of the "Com- panies of Foot, The Minuet Men, the Troop all belonging to Town; the Company of A. lar™ men, all Marched into the Meet- ing House in good order. Haveing fixed themselves togather, there being Silence & good order . . after Sollem Prayer to God & Singing, the Revª M' Joshua Paine Preached a Sermon from Psalms." Five months before the battle of Lexington, our Sturbridge citizens in town-meeting were
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already providing military stores, when Mr. Paine "Proposed to the Town that He would give one Half Barrel of Powder to the Town as Soon as it could be procura," an offer which was accepted with thanks. When it proved impossible to secure this powder, he made a new proposition; "I find it still my Duty to bare my part in the Calamities that are Common to us," he wrote, and therefore he made the town a present of £100 old tenor, and further offered, on security from the town, to wait one year for what should be due on his salary the following June, "and Longer unless Mortality or Something Extraordinary prevents."
A few years later, June 17, 1778, the town voted "to a man" that some consideration ought to be made to Mr. Paine on account of the appalling depreciation of the Continental currency, and two men were chosen from each school district to collect subscriptions of money or "necessary Articles for the Support of Life for M' Paine." In 1779, when the town was disposed to pay to Mr. Paine the money for which he had offered to wait, a committee reported that "haveing Innumerated a number of articles of Necessaries Provisions &c." . . "upon an everage of the above Mentioned articles According to Calculation the amount is Twenty for one increased Since the year 1775." Accordingly for the £53 which the parson relinquished in 1775 he was paid £1060 in the depreciated currency of four years later. During the later years of his ministry, repeated adjustments of his salary had to be made because of currency changes. Mr. Paine died in the closing week of 1799. The town paid his funeral charges and continued his salary to the end of his fiscal year. In town-meeting a committee chosen to supply the pulpit, was directed to consult Mr. Leonard, the highly respected pastor of the Baptist Society, and during the winter months under his ministrations a united people met once more in the center meeting-house.
The Massachusetts Constitution of 1780 went a long distance toward divorcing Church and State by its requirement
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that "all moneys paid by the subject to the support of public worship . . shall, if he require it, be uniformly paid to the support of the public teacher . . of his own religious sect or denomination, provided there be any on whose instruc- tions he attends." Accordingly, in the town-meetings of the following decade, petitions for the abatement of minis- terial rates "since the Constitution took place" are frequent. In 1782 a committee reported that "all . . who act from principals of Religion mentioned in Sª Requests who have petitioned for abatement of Ministerial Taxes ought of Right to be abated, upon producing proper Certificates as the Law directs;" and they were bidden to bring their certificates to town-meeting where from time to time discrimination was exercised as between different petitioners .*
In the years 1780 to 1800 the relation in which the town stood toward the center meeting-house was ill defined. There was a growing tendency to shift over upon "the Society belonging to the Centre Meeting House" or upon "M" Paine's hearers" the cost of repairs upon the church building; yet in many ways the town acted toward it as toward its own property. Thus, October 30, 1786, the town voted "not
*The following certificates show the form in which liability for Ministerial Rates was determined.
"To the Gentlemen Assessors of the Town of Sturbridge, ---
The following is a list of those persons who have certificated themselves from the Congregational Society in Sturbridge since the Last Returns. (Here follow 20 names.)
A true list from the Records of Sturbridge, Attest, David Wight, Town Clerk. Sturbridge, Oct. 4, 1828.
"CERTIFICATE FOR UNIVERSALISTS.
We, the Subscribers, Edward Turner, public teacher, of the religious sect or de- nomination called Universalists, and of a Society of the same in the town of Charlton, and Jabez Lathe and Ephraim Willard, Committee thereof, do hereby certify, that Maj. Ephraim Morey, Capt. John Boyden, Isaac Hobbs, Lieut. William Bowen, Stephen Jones and Caleb Nichols, are regular members of said Society, and that they pay liber- ally towards the support of preaching, and attend with us when able at our stated times and places for religious worship.
Charlton, August 28th, 1807.
Edward Turner, Jabez Lathe, Ephraim Willard."
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to Build a Powder House," but "to Deposit the Town Stock of Ammunition in the uper part of the New Meetting House, and that there be two Electrical rods provided and put up at the New Meeting House and a good lock and key for the Door leading in the upper part of sª House." A year later the selectmen were directed to store in the same place not only the ammunition but also "the warlike tools" or "in- trenching tools" belonging to the town. In 1799, however, it was voted to remove the town's stock of powder, etc., to an equally felicitous depository for explosives, the hearse house, which the selectmen were instructed to put in "Com- pleat order to receiving the town's magazine."
It was in town-meeting that Capt Wheelock, on his own petition, was given "liberty to take a seat in the elder pew." It was in town-meeting that a committee was chosen in 1791 "to view and mark out the ground for warming Houses and Horse Stables" near the meeting-house,-a sub- ject which kept recurring, but on which nothing was done for years. In 1794 it was voted: "there shall be no Stoves [foot-stoves] left in the Center meeting house after the public worship is over;" any found there "shall be forfeited to the town."
In this same year the aesthetic began to make its appeal. The town voted to "give Liberty to have the porch at the west End of the Center meeting house taken away, and instead thereof to have a Steeple or Bell Cony [balcony?] built," provided this could be done by special subscription "free from Laying any tax upon the town," and the steeple was forthwith erected. Apparently a bell was also secured in 1794 by private subscription. In the first flush of joy over this new acquisition, a committee reported the following schedule of bell-ringing; "The bell to be rung ten minutes at a time three times on each day beginning precisely at the following hours viz in the morning at five of the Clock from the first of April to the first of October and at six o Clock from the first of October to the first of April, & at twelve O Clock
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Old County Road
A
1.
J
Turnpike Road
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-
Turnpike Road
County Road
-O
Horse Sheda
Lors
wall
WaM
Buoying ground
O
wall
Buet's Corner
STURBRIDGE COMMON, IN 1821.
This plot of the Common is here reproduced, on a reduced scale, from the sketch on p. 465, of the Sturbridge Town Records, 1798-1824. It gives an idea of the appearance and position of the Meeting-house when it had three entrance porches, and before it was turned, in 1864, until it faced southwest, instead of northwest, as in this sketch.
The inscription upon the chart is as follows:
" References.
A. Land of Abijah Prouty Containing 12 square rods, which he pro- poses to exchange for the Lot B Containing 11 square rods, belong- ing to the town.
D. Land of Capt. Perez Walker Containing 6 square rods, which he proposes to exchange for the lot C Containing 7 square rods belong- ing to the town.
This Survey was made May 3d 1821, by a Committee appointed by the town for that purpose and exhibits a view of the Common and Bury- ing Ground in the Town of Sturbridge. The Common lying North of the Burying Ground Contains Six acres and Seventy rods including all roads passing over it. This Plat was Laid down by a scale of Eight rods to an inch.
Samuel Freeman Surveyor."
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at noon and at nine at night Except Saturday Evenings and then at Eight o Clock." The schedule for Sundays, Fast Day and Thanksgiving was elaborate. It was further pro- vided: "When the Saxon is notified of a Death he shall toll the bell fifteen minutes and after a pause of one minute if the Deceased be a male he shall Toll one minute [stroke?] if a female two minutes [strokes?] and after one other pause he shall toll the year of the Deceased persons age and shall toll the bell at the interment at town meetings as the Selectmen shall order."
This report was accepted, but the record does not make it plain whether its recommendations were put in practice. A few months later it was voted that the bell be rung "on Sundays and at all public meetings as usual and particularly at Funerals." The inference may be that the other ringings were to be dispensed with. But later, for a number of years, by annual vote of the town the bell was rung "at twelve at noon and nine at night, and tolled for deaths, and on all funeral occasions, and rung for all town-meetings." A clock was another acquisition from some private source, but neither bell nor clock seems to have given satisfaction. Experiments were made in "new-hanging the bell."* Twenty years later the sum of $100 was assessed upon the whole town for repairs on the "Town Bell," but the results were still so unsatisfactory that the town instructed its committee "not to pay any thing for the bell in its present situation," and in 1819 the question was referred to the committee on law-suits, with power to act, whether the town should authorize the commencing of
*In 1807 minor repairs were made upon the frame of the bell carriage, etc. Some receipted bills show that the wages of the townsman who assisted were $1.25 a day while those of the man in charge were $2.00. The bill includes these two items: D C "to boarding Andrew Batchelder four days 1 00 to two mugs of tody 0 40"
The man who furnished the timber-he was for many years Town Clerk-sub- mitted an itemized bill, which had been fully summarized when this separate item was added as an afterthought:
"1₺ mug Todd at Mr. Browns
$0.30"
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action against certain parties named "for the recovery of Damage for a bad Town Bell." Five years later, April 5, 1824, the Town voted to exchange the old bell and clock for "a good new warranted bell of equal weight to the old one, hung & tried before the old bell and clock are delivered." But the clock did not prove salable; eighty years later its dismantled works were still standing in the belfry-tower. For several years a blank dial bore witness to a bad bargain in clocks, until 1831 when it was voted that "the old clock face be painted white with the rest of the house." It was in 1833 that the Revere Bell was obtained, whose clear tones once more gladden our ears.
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