USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > History of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of its prominent men, Volume II pt 2 > Part 29
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A chapel at South Lee has, for several years, been supplied by the
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rectors of St. Paul's Church, of Stockbridge, which also presented it, in 1883, with the organ formerly in use by the parent church.
During Mr. Pynchon's ministry a tower was added to the church in which G. P. R. James, Esq., then residing here, hung a bell, which was replaced in 1878 by a heavier one-the gift of Hon. D. D. Field. The first public clock in town was set in the new tower at its erection. The corner lot adjoining the church was purchased in 1854 by Mrs. J. Z. Good- rich and presented to the society. The old church has been demolished and, by the liberality of Charles E. Butler. Esq .. and family, a new and beautiful fire proof stone structure has been erected. The corner stone was laid August 7th, 1883, by Rev. Arthur Lawrence. It is furnished by the same donors with a costly Roosevelt organ with all the modern im- provements, and a chancel window, designed by La Farge, in memory of Rev. Dr. Parker, has been contributed by his friends. It was consecrated November 12th, 1884.
The increasing number of Methodist families in town caused it, about 1837, to be included in a preaching circuit. They worshiped in the old academy and in the town hall until, in 1883, a small but tasteful church was built on the northwest corner of the old Indian square, which was dedicated in October of that year. Its present pastor is Rev. H. C. Humphrey.
In 1860, the Roman Catholics built a commodious stone church on Elin street, in which a non-resident official ministers once each Sunday. as well as on the occasional service-days of that communion.
Mr. Robert Perry, who died in 1865, bequeathed $1,000 to the Baptist Society of West Stockbridge for a house of worship, its use being made contingent on their raising as much more within a specified time. Unable to meet the condition, that society proposed to the people of Glendale to devote the bequest to building a " Union Chapel" in that village. Money was accordingly subscribed to the amount (including the legacy) of $2.800; a Union Society was organized, and a chapel erected in 1876, on a site given by the Glendale Woolen Company. The legatees-its nominal owners-gave the society a perpetual lease of it. and services are held therein alternarely by the Congregational, Methodist, and Episcopal clergymen of the town. In 1878, Rev. A. Lawrence purchased and gave the society the bell which had before hung in the tower of his own church.
CHAPTER XXX.
TOWN OF STOCKBRIDGE (concluded).
The Revolution .- The Shays Rebellion .- War of 1812 .- Schools .- Libraries .- Laurel Hill Association. War of the Rebellion .- Improvements and Public Benefactions. -- Early Families .- Colonies from Stockbridge .-- Dwellings. Ancient and Modern .- Massacre of 1755 .- Cemeteries .- Indian Monument .- Shade Trees .- Intercommunication .- Manu- facturing .- Public Houses .- Other Public Institutions .- Miscellaneous .- Jonathan E. Field .- Hon. John Z. Goodrich.
W HEN the increasing aggressions of the mother country forced the people of the colonies to decided action, either of submission or antagonism, the citizens of Stockbridge remembered their birthright and promptly asserted it. It was then the largest town in the county. and here assembled, July 6th, 1774, the first county convention called to take action on the oppressive measures of Great Britain. Its deliberations occupied two days. The delegates from this town were Timothy Ed- wards, Jahleel Woodbridge, Samuel Brown, Thomas Williams, and Dr. Erastus Sergeant. Theodore Sedgwick, then a newly established attorney at Sheffield, was secretary. The proceedings belong to the history of the county, but it may be remarked here that the bold, patriotic tone of the final resolves is matched by the self-denial and devotion involved in their practical enforcement.
As events thickened and hostilities threatened, a committee of safety and correspondence was organized, with a corps of minute men, and the town was not unprepared for the consummation of April 19th. 1775. The battle of Lexington occurred on Wednesday, and the tidings borne by relay couriers, reached Stockbridge at noon on Friday. So prompt was consequent action, that on Saturday morning, a large portion of the Berk- shire regiment, under Colonel Patterson of Lenox, took up its march for Boston. The Stockbridge contingent was paraded on Monument Square, and Dr. West, standing in front of the company, invoked the blessing of the God of armies upon the country and upon his parishioners about to hasten to her defense. Two regiments from Berkshire served in the war, and Stockbridge men, enlisted in both, made all the campaigns of the struggle. One of these regiments was stationed in a fort near the Charles-
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town border to protect the provincials on the day of Bunker Hill. The other aided in manning the lines at Roxbury until the evacuation of Bos- ton, when it followed the retreating enemy to New York, and bore part in the battle on Harlem Heights. Individuals from both of them. and from the Indian company also, which attended them, volunteered for the expedition under Arnold through the northern wilderness to Quebec. Among them were Thomas Williams and Jared and Elkanah Bishop. The Indian leader during the war was Captain Daniel Nimbam. The remain- der of the Stockbridge men marched to Canada via Lake Champlain and the St. Lawrence. They fought at the Cedars, were for a short time at Crown Point, and helped to fortify Mt. Independence overlooking Ticon - deroga. They afterward joined Washington in New Jersey. When one of these regiments left New York it numbered 600 men ; when it united with the main army it mustered but 200. Battles, prisons, and hospitals account for the rest. Stockbridge soldiers fought also at White Plains : shared in the conflicts on Bemis Heights and at Saratoga, and witnessed the capitulation of Burgoyne. They crossed the Delaware with Washington, formed a part of his famous surprise party on Christmas eve, 1776, and shared the hardships of the winter at Morristown, New Jersey. As late as October, 1780, they can be traced at the ambuscade and fight at Pala- tine, New York, where one of them, Daniel Churchill, was slain, and Josiah Bradley injured so as to have never fully recovered. The town not only furnished its full quota of men for the Continental army, but. as its records abundantly show, looked after the welfare of them and their families during their service. Of this brief mention must suffice in lieu of ampler details.
The first record of aets bearing directly on the war we find in the town meeting of March 7th, 1775. The Provincial Congress had recom . mended measures of autonomy traversing the royal regime and called for the expression of public opinion thereon. In this town the vote stood-ayes 42. nays 1. At the same time the selectmen were empowered to borrow 968 for the purchase of fire arms, paying the last provincial tax, and reimbursing Thomas Williams and Deacon Samuel Brown for their services in the Provincial Congress. Fifty pounds were also voted to procure ten tents for the soldiers. From this time onward till 1784 inclusive, some mention occurs in the record of nearly every meeting, of men, money, or supplies for the army and for the compensation of its representatives in the Provincial Council. Of the town's care for the families of its soldiers at the front, the following from the record of No- vember, 1777, may be cited as a specimen : " Voted-to supply the fam- " ilies of non-commissioned officers and soldiers belonging to this town who have been engaged in the Continental army." " Voted and grantel ES0 for the above purpose."
In 1778 436 additional was voted for tents and £210 to pay seven nine months' men. In November. 1779, the question was put to vote- " Whether we. the inhabitants of Stockbridge, do acknowledge ourselves
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bound by the doings of the General Court of the State?"-with this re- sult-ayes 66, nays. 0.
In 1780 the town voted to "enlist the men called for by the General Court and pay them twenty shillings per man in silver and gold, in ad- dition to the Government's wages." Also " voted 87.000 for the purchase of beef for the army." This sum looks portentions ; but the deprecia- tion of the currency at this time was in the ratio of 72 to 1. We read. too, of commutations of ready money for "rye at $54, Indian corn at 845. and oats at 827 per bushel."
In 1781 money was voted to purchase 5,874 lbs. of beef for the army.
These are specimen transactions of those anxious years. Mention oceurs of three, six, and nine months', and three years' men ; thirty-four of them were ascertained and noted by the late Miss E. F. Jones in her history of the town, to whose researches the present writer is largely in- debted. The loyalty and services of the Indian portion of the population have been already told.
Tories were scarce in town during the Revolution. In fact, but one pronounced case has been ascertained among its citizens. For him the ardor of his fellow townsmen made it so uncomfortably warm, that, to avoid anticipated and violent correction, he fled for a time to a hiding place among the hills eastward, where he was supported clandestinely by his family, until a larger charity for conscientious scruples softened the asperity of his neighbors to non-intercourse and marked contempt.
Nor were the women of the town at all behind the sternersex in their devotion to freedom. Of this many a tale might be told of their mann- facture of clothing and other necessaries for their kindred on their dis- tant campaigns : of their devices to meet the lack of articles formerly im- ported. as for example, of molasses, by utilizing the juice of cornstalks and pumpkins, and of their personal labors in field and meadow, in ent- ting fuel and gathering crops. The still remembere l " Soldiers Aid So- ciety " of our town in 1861-5 was a modified repetition of the devoted patriotism of the sex in 1775-83.
I cannot conelnde our Revolutionary story without an angelote or two of many in mind illustrative of the sentiments prevalent at that period. One relates to the embargo on tea, which was stringently en- forced here, and verifies the rule by the exception. Rev. Mr. Kirkland was very fond of " the cup that cheers but not inebriates." At this time he spent a portion of the year as missionary teacher among the Oneidas, and on the eve of his stated departure on that service, he invited Rev. Dr. West to a parting supper at his house-that now occupied by Mr. L. Tuckerman. No tea was mentioned in the invitation, and so when, on arriving, the reverend doctor was confronted by the steaming urn on the table with its tempting odor, he was naturally shocked. But the persna- sion of the time and circumstances induced. for once, a compromise of patriotism, and, the doors having been carefully locked, and the curtains drawn, they proceeded to the enjoyment of the tabooed beverage.
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Scarcely had the first sip crossed their lips when a loud knock at the door upset their pleasure and the nrn as well, which, in his attempts to arise and conceal it, the sleeve of the host caught and turned its torrid contents into his own lap. Close fitting small-clothes and stockings proved a poor defense, and for a few minutes the steps and demeanor of the victim were anything but clerical. The alarm proved harmless ; but the expectant Oneidas were probably never enlightened as to the cause of several weeks' delay of their beloved teacher.
The second anecdote involves a sterner story. Early on Sunday morning, August 17th, 1777, the quiet village was startled by three musket shots in rapid succession. On looking for the canse Esquire Woodbridge and Deacons Nash and Edwards were seen in front of the latter's house (near the Soldiers' Monument), each with a musket in his hand. The sight of these paragons of Sabbatical propriety in such circumstances pro- voked much the same feeling as would, at this day, a trio of our reverend clergy prefacing divine service with a game of euchre over the pulpit cushion. But the abnormity of the affair was shortly explained and justified to the fast gathering citizens. A courier, despatched the day before by General Stark, had just arrived, announcing that the British were marching on Bennington, and calling on every able bodied man to hasten to repel the invasion. Anon forth came the yeoman soldiery and hurried northward to the scene of danger. Stark, however, had finally determined to fight with the reinforcements he had received from the upper part of the county ; so that our volunteers had little to do on their later arrival, save to aid in pursuing the beaten foe and collecting the spoils of victory. One of them, Dr. O. Partridge, had the melancholy duty of ministering to the wounded Hessian commander. Colonel Bam. who died in his arms.
Berkshire was so generally involved in the events of the "Shays War" as to render any detailed account of it more appropriate to the history of the county. Stockbridge had its sympathizers with the mal- contents-how numerous is not known. It is certain, however, that a large majority of its citizens sided with the government, and their loyalty provoked the invasion and plunder of the village on the morning of Tuesday, February 27th, 1787. A brief account of it as a local event is all our space will permit in this connection.
General Lincoln, commander of the State forces called out to quell the insurrection, and whose headquarters were at Pittsfield. had de- spatched most of his troops into the northern and eastern sections of the county to break up the haunts of the insurgents and arrest their leaders. To make good their absence, most of the regular militia from the lower towns had marched, on the 26th of February, to Pittsfield. This oppor- tunity was seized by the rebels to gratify their greed and as their cause was on the wane) to secure the persons of prominent men as an aid to better terms with an offended government. Just at day dawn. February 27th, a large party of them, led by Captain Hamiin,
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of Lee, entered the village from the west and halted at the public house. Hence parties were despatched in every direction for piunder and the capture of citizens. Each man wore, as a distinctive badge. a green sprig in his hat, that of the government being a white cockade. The store of Deacon Edwards received their first attention. It was broken open and ransacked ad lib. The strong liquor part of its .stock was primarily preferred to its other contents and appropriated to such an extent as to unfit several of the gang for the further march southward, resumed not long after. The house of Deacon Ingersoll was saved from search by the shrewdness of his wife, who presented the leader with a bottle of brandy. The dwellings of all the prominent men of the village and vicinity were visited, and their owners (most of whom were caught in bed) captured and forced to follow them under a guard of bayonets, and in an attire quite inadequate to the temperature of the morning. Dr. West's house was almost the only one left unmio. lested. Some few of the obnoxious persons they had intendel to seize took alarm just in time to eserpe, albeit bareto: and imperfectly clad, to a temporary hiding place. Against Theolore Sedgwick they had a per- sonal grudge, not only for his ardor in defense of law and order, but also as the leader of a bold exploit not long before, when, with a squad of forty-four mounted men, he dashed upon quadraple that number of them in West Stockbridge, in line of battle, and, with the aid of two flanking parties, routed and captured eighty-four of them with their leader. He was not in town at the time of this invasion, but his law office, contain- ing the wardrobes of several students, was sacked and the unfortunate young barristers added to the number of captives. The plate and other valuables of his mansion had been committed to the care of an old colored servant of the family known as Mum Bet, whose heroic defense of her trust shamed the conduct of many of her betters on that occasion. She played the role of the taunting bravo. Physically impotent. but with the soul of a Judith, she armed herself with a heavy, old-fashioned fire shovel, and took her seat upon a chest which contained her master's sil- ver and papers. When ordered to rise that it might be searched, she ridiculed the robbers in her own lingo for demanding the serntiny of "an old nigger's box" -- soldiers and white men as they pretende I to be. She moreover threatened to strike down the first man who should lay hands on her. She won the contest and saved the silver. A fine horse which they loosed from his stall for the use of their leader threw the first man who mounted him, when Mum Bet ran, opened the gate and drove him out of their reach into the street. Two ardent young men com- ing in from the Lynch district during the plunder of the village, tired upon the marauders and were in turn fired on and parsned into a swamp in which they concealed themselves and escaped. With this exception no personal offense. other than oaths and unseemly language and the hurrying of their captives, was attempted by the invaders.
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These proceedings occupied about two hours, when the spoilers,
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laden with their booty, paraded their prisoners, to the number of forty- one, on the Meeting House square and prepared for their departure. Their march was toward Great Barrington, and to their demurring captives was rendered doubly grievous by the deep snow and the imperfectly broken roads. The relation of the subsequent overtaking, attack. and defeat of the lawless horde and the resene of their prisoners, in the north part of Sheffield, belong elsewhere. Suffice it here to say. that of the two gov- ernment men killed in the fight, one was from Stockbridge-the village schoolmaster, Solomon Gleason-and that the rebel leader, Hamlin, with fifty or sixty of his party-half of them as well as himself-wounded. arrived, that evening, as prisoners, at Mrs. Bingham's tavern in Stock- bridge, the headquarters whence they had issued on their riotous debauch in the morning.
The crisis of 1812 found the people here, as everywhere else in New Eng- land, divided in sentiment upon the war question, the democrats support- ing and the federalists opposing it. Numerically the parties were nearly equal and mutual feeling amounted to acrimony. The measures of JJeffer- son's administration had engendered this alienation, which was carried to an extent unknown to the most heated political contests of later times. It invaded the public school and even the pale of the church. The wealthier men of both parties bought or built dwellings, into which me- chanics were imported from abroad to vote according to the prejudices of their owners ; and one house still stands in the village which formerly was entirely windowless on one side. because its builder would not be debtor for light and air coming from over the premises of a federalist upon which they would open. As an instance of this rancor in religions matters, it may be mentioned that, when, in the autumn of 1814, the ministerial association of the county enjoined a day of fasting and prayer on account of the war, its public observance was not deemed prudent in Stockbridge from threats of interruption.
When, in 1814, the governor summoned the militia of the State to the defense of the seaboard, this town, as having the oldest military organ- ization in the county, was required to send its train band entire, while drafting secured the aggregate in the other towns. One full company of infantry under Captain John Hunt was accordingly paraded. September 11th, and after prayer by Rev. Mr. Swift, left for Boston and a bloodless campaign of six weeks.
Lying on one of the lines of transportation of men and supplies for our northern army, Stockbridge was a place of activity during the three years of hostilities. At one time twelve sleigh loads of sailors. detailed for duty on the great lakes, made a halt here of three days on their route. The whole length of the county highway from Connecticut to Vermont is said to have been dotted with taverns, averaging three miles apart. which government teamsters and officials were sure to patronize for the liquid patriotism found within. During one winter the British General Riall and about thirty other officers, captured on the Canada frontier, were
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quartered here. The limits allowed them were marked by notice-boards along the highways, which in prolonged perambulations, they are said to have taken up and carried before them, so as to keep within their parole obligations. The younger officers added an element of life and sport to the quiet society of the village.
The prices of commodities, of course, went "kiting" during the war: flour commanding $15 per barrel, coarse teas, $10. and the finer $15 per pound.
The date of schools in Stockbridge synchronizes with that of its estab- lished mission already noted. But the earliest educational efforts were, of course, for the benefit of the Indians. In 1760, however, the number of white children warranted an appropriation of $6, 10s. for the establish- ment of an English school. Two years afterward, £20 were voted. and in 1763, £30 were placed at the direction of the selectmen, who were ordered to procure a teacher. In 1764 two school houses were directed to be built, one on the bill and the other in the village, on the present grounds of Mr. F. J. Pratt. In 1769 the Curtisville Distriet was set off, and the East Street in 1774. Gradually the yearly appropriation for schools increased. being $100 in 1783, and $700 in 1800. In 1840 the sum was $1,000; in 1860, $1.200 ; in 1869, $3,500 ; and in 1884, 85,000, which, with the super- added Williams Fund and the State allotment. will aggregate about 85,500. President Kirkland, of Harvard University, gained his first ex- perience as a schoolmaster in one of the districts of the town. In 1799 a two story building, in place of one burned on the same site, was erected in Elm street, in whose lower room the younger pupils were taught, while the advanced scholars constituted a higher school in the upper room. Its catalogue embraces many eminent names besides those of Miss C. M. Sedgwick, with her brothers, Robert. Henry, and Theodore. the Field brothers, and President and Professor Hopkins. This department was incorporated in 1828 as the Stockbridge Academy, and its first principal was Major and Rev. JJared Curtis, afterward for so many years the effect- ive chaplain of the Massachusetts State Prison. Here a class of hardy boys was annually trained for higher attainments at Williams and other colleges. In 1833 another building was erected-now a portion of the high school edifice-in which the academy was continued under different teachers until 1866. By an act of the Legislature, in 1842, the name was changed to Williams Academy, in honor of Mr. Cyrus Williams, who be- queathed a fund of $3,000 for the education there of indigent lads, be- sides an additional donation of a bell and philosophie apparatus.
In 1866 the school districts in the town were abolished : the intention being to concentrate the public educational facilities at the three business centers-the Plain, Curtisville, and Glendale. To complete the plan, an arrangement was effected with the trustees of the academy, whereby its properties and funds should be used in aid of the establishment of a high school to be supported by the town, although the population did not
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compel such institution by statute law. Under the double style of " Wil- liams Academy and Stockbridge High School," it has since flourished.
Out of theabolition of the school districts grew the erection of large and commodions buildings, at Glendale in JSGS; at Curtisville in 1870 ; and on the Plain in 1872-3-all arranged for graded schools. Sectional convenience has, however, hitherto prevented so complete a centralization of educational matters as was at first contemplated : one of the old dis- tricts being still retained and several remotely dwelling scholars instruet- ed in the adjoining towns.
Besides these public schools, numerous others, private, select, or family, have been opened and continued, more or less prosperously. for years, in town, at which pupils, both resident and largely from abroad, have been instructed in the rudimentary and higher branches of educa- tion. Two or three are, at the present, in operation, while facilities for private instruction in languages, mathematics, and music are obtainable also.
In this connection it may be mentioned that of the four students composing the class graduated from Williams College in 1795, three were from this town and the other resided half a mile over the line in Lenox.
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