USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > Granville > History of Granville, Massachusetts > Part 18
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HISTORY OF GRANVILLE
in 1784, when Granville was divided into three parishes, areas for ecclesiastical purposes, it cleared itself up. Then the Middle Parish, by common consent, was considered to be, and to all practical pur- poses was, the owner of the meeting house and still continues to be such.
The Middle Parish organized itself after the pattern of the Town. Its executive officers, three in number, were not called Select- men, but Executive Committee. It had its Clerk, Treasurer, Asses- sors and Collector. It was like a miniature Town, but its entire activities were in the field of religion until 1787 when, for the con- sideration of £6, the Middle Parish accepted a deed from Ezra Baldwin for an acre of land to be used for a cemetery. Thereafter until 1906 it controlled and managed the Parish cemetery. All this brought about a very curious condition. The Parish Committee, who might or might not be members of the church, engaged the preacher, repaired the meeting house, levied taxes and collected them for the purposes of the church. Its Treasurer paid the bills. All the temporal affairs in connection with the church and meeting house were, and are now, in the hands of the Parish, through the Parish Committee, while the spiritual affairs of the church and Parish were conducted by the church. The logical outcome of such an arrangement was that frequently those who were not church mem- bers were, and are, in the position of imposing their will and judg- ment in church affairs upon those who were, and are, church mem- bers. The Prudential Committee of the Church can recommend to the Parish Committee whomsoever they would like to have for a pastor, but they can do no more, and the Parish Committee is under no obligation to be guided by a recommendation of the Prudential Committee. It seems like an awkward and cumbersome arrange- ment. It is an interesting relic of the past.
Now, going back to the affairs of the Church, the Rev. Aaron Booge, who was later to take up the pastorate there, was present to assist in forming the church according to the established order. The original membership list contains twenty-eight names, as follows :
Ebenezer Baldwin Elizabeth Baldwin
Ezra Baldwin Lois Baldwin
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Edith Bates
Marvin Moore
John Bates
Mary Moore
Aaron Coe
David Parsons
Hope Coe
Rebeckah Parsons
Mary Coe
Hannah Robinson
John Cornwall
Timothy Robinson
Elizabeth Cornwall
Achsey Rose
Aaron Curtiss
David Rose
David Curtiss
Caroline Seward
Thankful Curtiss
John Seward
Lemuel Haynes
Jane Spelman
Isabelle Miller
Oliver Spelman
It is interesting to note that the name of the church appears in various forms at different periods in the records of the Parish. At times it is called the First Congregational Society in Middle Gran- ville. At other times it appears as the Congregational Society in the Middle Parish of Granville, but the writer has failed to find any record of any change from the original name: The Second Church of Christ in Granville.
A Prudential Committee was chosen, and having already a meet- ing house, manifestly the next thing was to find a preacher. Strangely enough there was one right at hand, none other than Lemuel Haynes, who was to become famous later as one of the most power- ful preachers of his day.
Few, if any, have had greater obstacles to overcome than Lemuel Haynes had, and few overcame them so successfully. A brief sketch of his life is of vastly more than passing interest. It is a story of handicaps overcome, and the kindly affection of a kindly people.
He was born July 18, 1753, in that part of Hartford, Connect- icut, which is now known as West Hartford. His father was a negro whose name has passed into the limbo of forgotten things, and his mother was a Scotch girl by the name of Alice Fitch. She was employed as a domestic in the family of John Haynes. After the birth of her child she was discharged by her employer, who kept the child, probably much to her relief. For the lack of any other name, the boy was called Haynes, and given the first name Lemuel. In some way not now apparent, David Rose, of Middle Granville, heard of the child and took him as an indentured servant until he was twenty-one years of age. Mr. Rose brought him home to
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HISTORY OF GRANVILLE
Middle Granville on New Year's Day, 1754. It was a real New Year's Day for Lemuel. Mr. Rose was a very devout and strict Christian, and he brought up Lemuel in the best traditions of the time. Took him to church. Sent him to school. Taught him to work. Gave him opportunity to read the very few books available in such a rural community. From his mother Lemuel had inherited traits of thrift and prudence, and such was his dependability that long before his term was up, he had the oversight of no small part of his benefactor's property. In due time he was baptized. When he came home from service at the meeting house on the Sabbath, it was his custom to relate the sermon to Mr. Rose.
There was always on Saturday night at the Rose homestead, a sermon read and discussed. The reading of these sermons soon came to be a part of Lemuel's duties. One night he read a sermon which greatly interested Mr. Rose, who said, "Lemuel, whose sermon was that, Davies', or Watts', or Whitfield's ?" Lemuel did not at first answer, but finally said with much hesitation, "It is Lemuel's." Thus early did he indicate the field in which he was to succeed. After that he was encouraged, not only by Mr. Rose, but also by the entire neighborhood.
He was a member of the Company of Minute Men who marched on the Lexington alarm that April day in 1775. He was also on the Ticonderoga expedition, where he was stricken with typhus fever and invalided home. His time of servitude had expired, but the doors of David Rose's house were always open to him for so long as he wished to stay. He recovered his health and in 1779 was studying Latin with the Rev. Daniel Ferrand, of Canaan, Connect- icut. The next winter he taught school in Wintonbury, now Bloom- field, Connecticut, and studied Greek with Rev. William Bradford. On November 29, 1780, he was examined in theology and languages by a committee which recommended him as qualified to preach. He was then licensed and preached his first sermon in Wintonbury. Having no other home than Mr. Rose's, and being one of the charter members of the Middle Granville church, he was right on the spot when a preacher was needed. He was given a unanimous call to be their first pastor, which he accepted, and at the age of twenty-seven, in spite of all the prejudices caused by ignominious birth, color and
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limited education, he occupied the pulpit of the Middle Granville meeting house, as Dr. Cooley said, "with universal approbation." Such, briefly, is the story of the struggles, the Saturday evening sermons and chimney corner education of one of the foremost preachers of his generation.
Five years he preached to this congregation of his neighbors, and it is said that all ages of people were carried away by his eloquence. His ability was perhaps the only thing which kept his church active and prevented it from being overcome by the general slump in the moral life of the country following the War for Independence.
He married Elizabeth Babbit, of Dighton, Massachusetts, on September 22, 1783, who was at that time teaching one of the schools in Granville, and the wedding was highly approved by all the ministers of the section. The marriage took place in Hartland, Connecticut, and the ceremony was performed by the Rev. Samuel Woodbridge. He was ordained as a regular minister of the gospel November 9, 1785. After a few weeks he received and accepted a call to a church in Torrington, Connecticut. This officially closed his connection with Granville.
After two years at Torrington, he accepted a call to Rutland, Vermont, where he preached thirty years, and was regarded as the leading minister in Vermont. In 1814 he was in New Haven, Con- necticut, and was invited to speak in Dr. Edwards' church. Only the blue bloods went there. President Dwight, of Yale, entertained him over the week end. He then attended, as a delegate, the con- vention of the Connecticut General Association at Fairfield, where he was asked to preach the annual sermon. Twenty years after that, President Humphrey, of Amherst College, spoke of that sermon as one of the most remarkable ever preached in New England. Later he had a pastorate in Manchester, New Hampshire, for two years and then he had a church in Granville, New York, for eleven years till his death September 28, 1833.
Dr. Timothy M. Cooley, in describing this remarkable preacher, said: "The writer of this narrative, though a resident in a different parish in the town, and having opportunity to hear him in com- paratively but few instances, owes more under God to Lemuel Haynes than to any other minister among the living or the dead.
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His sermons are the earliest which I now remember to have heard, and, though preached more than half a century ago, are at this time recollected with a distinctness entirely inapplicable to those of any other preacher. They uniformly left the impression of the majesty of God; the importance of immediate repentance; the awful solem- nity of the judgment day; the attractive loveliness of Christ; and the pleasantness of wisdom's ways .... His delivery was rapid, his voice charming, like the vox argentea of which Cicero makes frequent and honorable mention, his articulation uncommonly dis- tinct, a perennial stream of transparent, sweet, animated elocution, presenting his arguments with great simplicity and striking effect."*
Granville may well be proud of this self-taught and able colored gentleman who grew up in their midst and whose remarkable oratorical ability was fostered and cherished by a kindly people.
After Mr. Haynes gave up the pastoral work in Middle Gran- ville and accepted a church in Torrington, the Rev. William Brad- ford supplied the pulpit for a short time, as he had done for the First Church shortly after the Revolution.
The next minister to be settled in Middle Granville Parish was the Rev. Aaron Jordan Booge, who was born in that part of Farmington, Connecticut, which is now known as West Avon, May 6, 1752, being the eldest son of Rev. Ebenezer Booge, of that place, a native of Scotland. He attended Yale College and was graduated there in 1774. He served in the Continental Army in the early part of the War for Independence, and returning, accepted a call to the church at Turkey Hills, now East Granby, Connecticut. Here he was ordained and installed and served the community about nine years when some trouble growing out of the depreciation of the currency brought about his dismissal.
In the following year he accepted a call to come to Middle Gran- ville and was installed there November 17, 1786. His ministry has been characterized as unsuccessful and very disastrous to the church. He seems to have lacked the necessary tact to harmonize his con- gregation and seems to have been hasty and careless in his duties. One of the chief complaints against him was that he did not do any work toward preparing his sermons until Sunday morning, and then
* Dr. Cooley's Life of Lemuel Haynes, page 66.
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THE CHURCHES
preached without notes or memoranda, and devoted all his time during the week to secular pursuits. That sort of thing never would do with a congregation which studied their Bibles from one year's end to the other, and were as stern as the sternest. Little elements of friction soon came to be large ones and the inevitable result came in 1793 when he was dismissed. One of the results of his happy-go- lucky methods was to make it easier for some of his parishioners to abandon his church and aid in forming the then new Baptist Church, which they did, several becoming charter members of that church in 1790.
For some years he appears to have had no regular charge, but in 1800 he was called to the Presbyterian Church in Stephentown, New York, where he was two years. Then he had two short pastorates in Galway and Martinsburg, New York, but he stayed only a short time in each place. When the 1812 War broke out he enlisted in the army where he remained five years. Then he went to New Lebanon, New York, where his family was and there he spent the rest of his life, dying June 22, 1826. He had four sons and four daughters. One son is buried in the now West Granville cemetery.
Succeeding Mr. Booge, after an interval, came a pastor of a very different type, one whom the entire community loved, Rev. Joel Baker. So well beloved in fact, that he spent the remainder of his life in their service. Born in Conway, Massachusetts, March 7, 1768, (in the History of Conway, published in 1917, the date is given as May) the third child of Deacon Joel and Sarah (Graves) Baker, and a grand-child of Rev. Noah Baker, of Sunderland, Massachusetts, he came to the church in Middle Granville in Janu- ary, 1797, when the life of the church was at a very low ebb. He was not married but he set about remedying that condition at once. One of the attractive young women of his congregation was Olive Curtiss, a daughter of David and Prudence (Bishop) Curtiss, and so great became their mutual regard for each other that they were married in Granville by Dr. Cooley the 30th of the following August. Five children, all sons, resulted from this union, three of whom died early in life and are buried in the now West Granville cemetery.
There is ample proof that he labored diligently and conscien- tiously among his people. Information about him is quite fragmen-
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HISTORY OF GRANVILLE
tary, but it is stated in several places that he was very effective in prayer. He must have been a very kindly and gracious gentleman, who went about doing good, counselling, guiding and leading his flock and helping them to bear their burdens, for the membership of his church increased, and although the church suffered the loss of not a few of its members when the church in West Granville (the West Parish) was established in 1797, so successful were his efforts to build up his church that it became necessary for him to have an assistant before his death. At no other time in the life of this ancient church has such an arrangement been necessary. He was a wonderful exponent of the maxim : A soft answer turneth away wrath. He was one of that remarkable trio of ministers in the three Granville vil- lages, each of whom was gifted in a different way. Dr. Cooley was most effective in preaching, the Rev. Baker in prayer and the Rev. Harrison in singing. In seasons of religious revival they made an unsurpassed team. These same ministers composed the Town school committee from the beginning of their several pastorates until 1810, when the Rev. Harrison found himself in a different town, but the other two remained on the Committee until shortly before their respective deaths.
Rev. Joel Baker died September 1, 1833, universally lamented by his parishioners. The headstone at his grave, which was erected by the church, has for its inscription: "For 36 years the faithful and revered pastor of the church of Christ in this place." Thus ended a noteworthy and successful ministry.
His successor was his former assistant, Rev. Seth Chapin. During the pastorate of Mr. Chapin such extensive repairs were made to the meeting house, as well as the addition of a steeple and bell, that, in the absence of data indicating otherwise, it seems likely the mov- ing of the meeting house must have been done then. It was moved by ox power from where it was built, as hereinbefore stated, to the spot where it now stands. In the course of its journey it was turned a quarter way around, so that it now faces the south instead of the east. It is said that it took one hundred yoke of oxen to move it. How large an area would have to be scoured now to get together that number of oxen? Whether the meeting house was moved at the time above suggested or not, it was moved and the chapel, the
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old Academy building, was built during the pastorate of Mr. Chapin's successor, Rev. Henry Eddy. It is interesting to note that the Parish Committee in 1838 arranged with John Kent to have him ring the church bell, sweep the floors and build the fires in the meeting house, and agreed to pay him $18.00 per year for his services.
In the century and a half or so of its existence, the Second Church of Christ in Granville has been served by many ministers, but by none for so long a period as the Rev. Baker. The pastorates have seldom been five years in length, and the membership has ranged from 28 at the beginning, to 124 in 1804, and now, due to dwindling population, is about thirty.
At first the church had no regular parsonage, but that question kept pressing for attention, and early in 1851 the Parish Committee voted to consider the matter of building a parsonage. Such an enter- prise in the hard times just before the Civil War could only make headway very slowly, so it is not astonishing that it was not till 1864 that the Parish finally decided not to build a parsonage. It then voted "to instruct the Committee to buy the place of Samuel Colton for a parsonage for the Society." The Colton house was the one where Porter T. Frisbie now lives. It was used as a parsonage until about 1925, when it was sold to the present owner. The spectacle shop, which was on the lot with the parsonage, the Parish voted in 1867 to dispose of, but the hardy little building did not meet dis- solution until about 1930.
During the pastorate of Rev. Henry Coolidge (1903-1907) extensive repairs and alterations were again made to the meeting house, among which may be noted the removal of the side galleries and the raising of the floor from the level of the entrance doors to its present level. An item which appeared in one of the newspapers having a local circulation states: "The Congregational society resumed worship in its church last Sabbath after several months absence. The repairs cost nearly $700.00. The interior work had been thorough, including new upholstered seats and a new carpet. The success of the work is largely due to the efforts of the Ladies' Benevolent Society and a gift of $250.00 from Francis B. Cooley, of Hartford, Connecticut. A new cabinet chapel organ is the gift
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HISTORY OF GRANVILLE
of the same donor, who, in these and former donations, has kindly and generously remembered the people of his native town."
About the time when the meeting house was refitted as above noted, or before, the Parish Committee permitted the church to use the Academy building for its social purposes and soon thereafter an addition, which is now used as a kitchen, was made to the building by Nelson M. Frisbie.
There seems to be no doubt but that the present West Granville meeting house is one of the oldest buildings now standing in Town, having been erected in 1778.
The Baptist Church
At the time when Rev. Jedediah Smith was dismissed by the First Church, religion in Granville was in a state of turmoil, and this condition lasted for nearly twenty years. His acceptance of the doc- trines of the Rev. Solomon Stoddard, of Northampton, and particu- larly the doctrine of the half-way covenant and the effect of baptism, had outraged the feelings of the Granville people and had been his own undoing. The excitement of the war tended to overshadow the religious instincts of the people and for a time patriotism seemed to crowd out all other emotions. There was no minister residing in the Town. Religion was at a low ebb. Preaching was intermittent and uncertain. Volumes of sermons by Watts, Whitfield and others were read and studied. There was much argument. Some were for the doctrine of Edwards, with all its punishment and brimstone. Others were at the other extreme with Stoddard, and having been baptized, felt no further obligations in that matter. Also a new group was springing up which agreed with Edwards' idea of baptism, but disagreed with other elements of his belief. Then at last this latter group found itself. The tenets of the Baptist denomination were just spreading over New England, and by a fortunate chance an itinerant preacher of that persuasion came to Granville and preached a sermon, very probably at the home of Deacon David Rose, for he became converted to their doctrine and when called upon by the authorities of the First Church to cease the practice of "that pernicious doctrine," declined to do so and was thereupon promptly excommunicated.
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That was the beginning. Others who sympathized with him and gave him comfort and encouragement were also barred from the First Church. Hardship and persecution seem to be what is needed to make a new religious cult prosper. Thus it happened in Gran- ville. These outcasts were looked down upon and decried in every possible way and on every possible occasion. The writer came upon this entry placed opposite a name in a church record book: "Gone to the Baptists." The tone seemed to be very much like "Gone to perdition."
Thus they struggled along until 1789 when they began to talk about forming themselves into a regular Baptist Church, and a call to that end was sent out to neighboring Baptist Churches to come and organize them. On January 15, 1790, delegates came from Westfield and Suffield, organized a council and after mature delib- eration duly authorized the petitioners to form a church. On Febru- ary 17, 1790, they organized the First Baptist Church of East Granville, commonly spoken of as the Baptist Church, and on the roll of the twenty-five original members the name of David Rose, who had been excommunicated by the First Church of Christ in Granville, like the name of Abou Ben Adhem, led all the rest.
Here are the names of that undaunted little group who had the courage of their convictions.
David Rose
Thomas Steadman
Aaron Spelman
Samuel Steadman
Oliver Spelman
John Root
Stephen Spelman
Sibyl Barlow
Elijah Spelman
Deborah Spelman
Noah Fairnum
Lois Spelman
Jesse Miller
Lucina Spelman
Justin Cooley
Hannah Spelman
Joy Handy
Desire Fairnum
Timothy Spelman
Martha Gillet
Benjamin Stowe
Sarah Rose
Lemuel Crossman
Mary Steadman
Elizabeth Gillet
This little church began its existence under quite difficult circum- stances. They had no pastor to lead them; they had no meeting house wherein to worship; none of their members was very well off in this world's goods; the membership was very widely scattered;
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HISTORY OF GRANVILLE
their cause was unpopular and the general economic condition of the country was very low. The times were hard and they had a hard time. However they went forward, and not back. They had preach- ing when and where they could. Intermittently, to be sure, but according to their beliefs, and in such private houses as were open to them. They struggled along as best they could, until conditions improved somewhat, and in 1798 they secured a minister of their denomination to settle among them. This was the Rev. Christopher Miner, who served them faithfully for ten years. His efforts re- sulted in increasing the church membership more than 150 per cent. In 1810 the number of members had risen to 82. The next year one of their members, Thomas Spelman, was licensed to preach, but did not settle here. Then came on the 1812 War, with its succeeding depression when struggling was again the order of the day.
There were those among them who began to talk of the need for a meeting house, but times were difficult and they could not see their way clear. Then in 1816, after much discussion, all those members who lived in the then new town of Tolland were dismissed to form a church of their own in that Town. This was a pretty hard blow. It reduced the number of their members very greatly and postponed the matter of a meeting house for several years, but fortune was not wholly adverse. In 1817 one of their members, Silas Root, was ordained to the ministry and duly installed as their pastor. He must have been a man of boundless courage, for in the eighteen years of his service he was the principal factor in the church, and kept the little band going forward in spite of all discouragements. The best picture of the man is had in the words quoted in the record of their centennial celebration in 1890. "If the results of his labors could be chronicled, it would be apparent that he constituted the main- spring which kept the machinery of this church in motion. This good man lived upon his own farm and wrought in support of himself, and preached to the people. His salary ranged from twenty to fifty dollars per year. I had in hand one subscription list amounting to sixteen dollars and forty-six cents for the year. One man's sub- scription was seventeen cents; another's twenty-five cents to be paid in work; another's fifty cents to be paid in goods. This man, under God, pulled the church through trying times; supported a family of
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