USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Gloucester > Memorial of the celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Gloucester, Mass. August, 1892 > Part 3
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In accordance with the resolution adopted by the City Council we would suggest that the celebration cover two days, one to be devoted to historical matters, an address, poem, banquet, and ball ; the other for a grand procession, military and civic, and which shall include tableaux of historic interest, and such other matters as may suggest themselves to the committee having charge. If it is the desire of the citizens to celebrate this event no time is to be lost in preparing for it as it will require at least a year's time to look over the records
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OF THE TOWN OF GLOUCESTER, MASS.
and write up the historical address. Your committee having been requested to report an estimate of the cost of this undertaking beg leave to say that in their opinion such a celebration as our people would desire to see, and which would reflect credit upon our municipality and place us in the first ranks of our sister cities, would cost at least ten thousand dollars, and we would here recommend that five thousand dollars be appropriated by the city with the expectation that a like sum will be subscribed by the patriotic and public spirited citizens of Gloucester and the sons and daughters of the old town who are now absent in other States. In order to determine the question as to whether the city should celebrate this event or pass it by your committee offer the following resolution : ---
Resolved, A joint committee shall be appointed clothed with full power and authority to arrange all the details necessary for a proper observance of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of Gloucester, said celebration to take place during the year eighteen hundred ninety-two and to cover two days.
The question was again brought before the city government at a meeting of the Common Council, held Tuesday evening, May 26, 1891, when an order was adopted for a joint select committee, consisting of his Honor the Mayor, one alderman, the president of the Council, and two councilmen, who should devise ways and means for the proper observance of the event, said committee to have full powers to act, except that they could contract no city liability, and Messrs. William F. Moore, of Ward Three, and Nathaniel Babson, of Ward Five, were appointed on the part of the Council.
By the Aldermen, the order was tabled at the meeting of May 26, and at their next meeting, June 19, 1891, was amended by striking out all reference to contracting city liability, and Alderman D. Somes Wat- son, of Ward Three, was added to the committee. The same order as amended again coming before the Common Council, at its meeting of June 19, the whole question was again laid upon the table.
The next action taken was with reference to the request of the Fourth of July Committee that a joint special committee be appointed to represent the city in all arrangements making for the celebration. The request was granted and Mayor Andrews, Aldermen Watson and Charles H. Gamage, President William H. Pomeroy, Councilmen William H. Perkins, William F. Moore, and Henry P. Dennen were appointed.
At a meeting of the Council, July 7, 1891, the following order was introduced, but after some discussion laid upon the table : -
Whereas, At a mass meeting of the citizens and taxpayers of Gloucester
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TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTIETHI ANNIVERSARY
a strong sentiment was expressed in favor of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of our town, and
Whereas, We believe that a proper observance of the same would be of lasting and permanent value to our city, we would recommend that an appro- priation be made by the City Council to help defray the expenses of carrying out the above, provided that an equal amount at least be raised by public sub- scription, provided that a surplus of money remains in the contingent account at the end of the present financial year after paying all obligations incurred by the several departments of the city which are then due. It is therefore
Ordered, That an amount of money not exceeding five thousand dollars ($5,000) be appropriated for a proper observance of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of Gloucester, one half of the amount so raised to be expended under the direction of a joint special committee to consist of his Honor the Mayor and two aldermen, and the President of the Common Council and three councilmen, in conjunction with the permanent Memorial Committee appointed at the mass meeting; the balance to be expended under the direction of the former and the Executive Committee appointed at the mass meeting; the same to be charged to the contingent account, if the amount to the credit of said account amounts to said sum at the end of the present financial year. If the amount of money to the credit of said contingent account amounts to a less sum than five thousand dollars, then the whole of said sum so remaining to the credit of said account be appropriated for said purpose and charged to said account.
The subject of the celebration did not again come before either board of the City Council until the closing meetings, held Monday evening, Dec. 28, 1891, when the Finance Committee recommended that the sum of five thousand dollars be transferred and carried forward to the year 1892, for the purpose of celebrating the Anniversary, and the recommendation was adopted, and the sum carried forward.
In his second inaugural, delivered before the City Council Mon- day, Jan. 4, 1892, Mayor Asa G. Andrews again referred to the celebration as follows : -
TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY.
The present year will witness the celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of Gloucester as a town, and those of us who have read and studied the history of its early settlers can but admire the pluck, heroism, and indomitable will displayed by those men and women who first trod our shores, and whose descendants, many of them, at least, are still among us. As the time approaches to commemorate this event, and the busy notes of preparation are heard on every hand, I have faith to believe that there is not a person living in this ancient and historic
Edward Dolliver, Treasurer.
Henry Center, Auditor,
CITY OFFICIALS, 1892.
Sidney S. Sylvester, City Marshal.
Freeman Putney, Superintendent of Schools. John J. Somes, City Clerk, (Chairman Invitation Committee.)
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OF THE TOWN OF GLOUCESTER, MASS.
place who does not desire to see this celebration, one which will reflect credit not only upon our citizens, but upon the municipality we represent.
To celebrate this event properly will require money, and I have every assurance to believe that our public spirited citizens will respond liberally when asked to do so. No man wants to see a celebration that he will be called upon to defend, after it has passed away, but all want to have such an observance of the occasion that they can speak of it with pride and satisfaction.
There can be but one celebration of our two hundred and fiftieth anni- versary, and I hope to see displayed by every citizen and by you, gentlemen of the City Council, that liberality and hearty cooperation which has dis- tinguished the sons and daughters of old Cape Ann upon other occasions of a similar nature. It will be the only opportunity for some time, at least, to bring our merchants face to face with thousands of people from other places, possibly all over the nation, and from the mother country, to show to them our products by land and sea, our rock-bound coast, our magnificent harbor, with its shipping, the finest in the world; our delightful scenery, which at the time of the celebration will be in its full beauty ; and, above all, the warm-hearted generous spirit shown by our citizens toward those who shall become our guests upon this occasion. Lastly, if we but do our part, thousands of dollars will pass into the hands of our merchants, and thousands of voices will, in after years, speak the praises of this, one of the best cities in the State. I confidently look for everyone to do what he can to push forward this event in our history, which many a city or town would give largely of their means to celebrate. It is the golden opportunity of a city two hundred and fifty years old.
At a meeting of the Council, held Feb. 2, 1892, an order was adopted for a Joint Special Committee, which was concurred in by the aldermen at their meeting of Feb. 5, 1891, the committee being appointed as follows : his Honor Mayor Andrews, Aldermen Charles H. Gamage, Erastus Howes, Adam P. Stoddart, Archibald N. Donahue, Harvey C. Smith, Nathaniel Maddix, Jr., Alvah Prescott, George H. Morton ; President Nathaniel Babson, and John A. Hawson, Percy W. Wheeler, B. Frank Ellery, Maurice F. Foley, and Edward S. Currier of the Council.
At a meeting of both boards, held June 7, 1892, an order was adopted, turning over to the treasurer of the Anniversary Committee the sum of five thousand dollars, brought forward from 1891, for the purposes of the anniversary celebration, less the sum of three hundred dollars which was reserved for the use of the mayor.
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TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTIETHI ANNIVERSARY
THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.
Within a week of the time the Executive Committee was selected and appointed, its first meeting was held at the city clerk's office, City Hall, Wednesday evening, July 8, 1891, nearly every member being present. Then and there the active preparations were commenced which culminated in the successful celebration.
The date of the celebration was fixed for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, Aug. 24, 25, 26, 1892, with a reunion of the absent sons and daughters Tuesday evening, Aug. 23. at City Hall.
The chairmen of the different committees were early at work, and by the middle of the summer of 1891, had organized. At the second meeting of the Executive Committee, steps were taken which would bring several of the ships of the " white squadron " to Gloucester Harbor during the celebration.
It was early determined that the second day of the celebration should be made memorable by the civic, military, and trades procession, and invitations were issued to the Eighth Regiment, M. V. M., Massachusetts Naval Battalion, the Boston Lancers, and Battery A.
At the seventh meeting of the committee, Nov 11, 1891, delega- tions were present from the various lodges, secret and fraternal, the Grand Army, Sons of Veterans, and the churches, beside the different social organizations, who all promised cooperation and assistance.
From time to time the Finance Committee reported, and it was early evident that generous subscriptions from the people of Glouces- ter, absent sons and daughters, and others, added to the amount which the city would appropriate, would in the aggregate amount to a sum sufficient to place the celebration on a broad financial basis. Still the Executive Committee were anxious that no money should be wasted, and no appropriation was voted without careful consideration. So well was the financial part managed that although the expenditures were heavy, after paying every bill the Committee had over two thou- sand dollars on hand. A full financial statement will be found in a subsequent chapter.
Thirty-nine meetings of the Executive were held up to October, 1892. For many months one was held weekly. The average attend- ance at these meetings was surprisingly good. The best of feeling was always manifest, and a determination that no effort was too great which
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OF THE TOWN OF GLOUCESTER, MASS.
could in any way add glory to these festal days of the old town. That the celebration was the great success is due, in a great measure, to the untiring efforts of the Executive Committee, as well as to the willing labor of the different sub-committees, all working with a generous impulse for the common cause, - the welfare of Gloucester.
Mr. Fred W. Tibbets was added to the committee at its first meeting and made assistant secretary. Mr. Sylvester Cunningham resigned as chairman of the Ball Committee, and Mr. William A. Homans, Jr., was elected in his place. Mr. Charles H. Gamage resigned as chairman of the School Children and Children's Entertain- ment Committee, and Mr. Xenephon D. Tingley was elected. Mr. William Thompson resigned as chairman of the Fishermen's Race Committee, and Mr. Horatio Babson was elected. Mr. David M. Hilton resigned as chairman of the Construction Committee, and Mr. William A. Homans, Jr., was elected, and Mr. D. Somes Watson resigned as chairman of the Committee on Halls and Tents, and Mr. George Douglass was elected.
Program.
AUGUST 21, SUNDAY.
MORNING. COMMEMORATIVE SERVICES, CHURCHES.
AUGUST 23, TUESDAY.
EVENING.
REUNION, ABSENT SONS AND DAUGHTERS, CITY HALL.
AUGUST 24, WEDNESDAY.
MORNING. PARADE, FIRE DEPARTMENT.
AFTERNOON. LITERARY EXERCISES AT THE TENT.
AFTERNOON. ATHLETIC EVENTS, BRIDGE STREET OVAL.
EVENING. BANQUET, CITY HALL.
AUGUST 25, THURSDAY.
MORNING. GRAND MILITARY, CIVIC AND TRADES PARADE.
AFTERNOON.
MAYOR'S LUNCHEON, CITY HALL.
EVENING. RECEPTION AND BALL, CITY HALL.
AUGUST 26, FRIDAY.
MORNING. FISHERMEN'S RACE.
AFTERNOON.
REGATTA OF YACHTS, HARBOR.
EVENING.
FIREWORKS, WESTERN AVENUE.
1225940
Sunday, August 21.
RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES.
OBSERVANCES OF SUNDAY.
TT had been planned that union religious services should be held Sunday evening at City Hall. This being found impractical, each society held commemorative services Sunday morning. To each society the day brought lessons from the celebration, of peculiar significance. To each church came many former worshippers, journeying from their distant homes to join in the festivities of the anniversary. The obser- vances of the day may be said to have commenced the events of anniversary week.
THE FIRST CHURCH.
To the historic church of the First Parish (Unitarian), a large audience gathered, the occasion being the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of their organization in 1642. The church was elaborately decorated with potted plants, flowers, and green. The music was of a high order and significant to the day. The sermon by the Rev. D. M. Wilson of Quincy was replete with historical statement and deduction.
The order of service follows : -
ORGAN VOLUNTARY.
ANTHEM. "Jubilate Deo." - Dorr.
INVOCATION.
SOLO. " He maketh wars to cease." -Chadwick. Mr. Bruce. SCRIPTURE READINGS.
HYMN No. 840. Congregation.
PRAYER.
RESPONSE. " Still, still with Thee." - Gerrish.
MOTET. " Remember thy Creator." - Rhodes. HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
Rev. Daniel Munro Wilson, of Quincy, Mass.
HYMN. " O Lord, hear our prayer." - Hartel.
HYMN NO. 478. Congregation. BENEDICTION.
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DISCOURSE.
" Zebulon shall dwell at the haven of the sea ; and he shall be for a haven of ships." GEN. xlix. 13.
" It was planted in a good soil by great waters, that it might bring forth branches, and that it might bear fruit, that it might be a goodly vine." EZEK. xvii. 8.
IN any account of the institutions of Gloucester we must reckon with the influences of the great sea. The salt breath of it, the mystery and power of it, and the sadness of it have interfused themselves with the life of the people and are potently with us in the celebrations of this day and week. We can no more exclude the sea from our thought than we can from our sight when we walk the ways of this town. Was it not the far extension of this cape into the great sea, reaching out like a hand to welcome and harbor mariners, which led to its early discovery and early settlement? It enticed, it seems likely, the first Englishmen who set foot on the soil of Massachusetts, from that ship of Gosnold's which in 1602 sailed from headland to headland along our shores. It invited that romantic and tireless adventurer, Capt. John Smith, to bestow upon it the name of the Turkish lady-love who had so nobly befriended him, - a name to be supplanted only by that of his Queen at the command of Prince Charles. Later, the fame of its convenience for fishing made it, next to Plymouth, the place most thought of on our Massachusetts coast, and led to the enterprise of the Dorchester company, which, in the fall of 1623, left the fourteen men at the point now called Stage Fort, to establish a settlement. From the Pilgrims across the bay a party joined them the next spring, and this beginning led on to the planting at Salem and Boston. Thus a true hand of welcome Cape Ann proved to be, beck- oning to the multitudes of earnest men and women who sought on these shores liberty to worship God, and reaching out far into the sea to guide them into the bosom of the land.
Then, also, with the wealth of the sea the prosperity of the town has ebbed and flowed. The Lord, in this matter, took a hand, as Minister Chandler firmly believed. " The scaly herds and finny tribes, moved by God's guidance," he wrote, " come voluntarily to the hooks and are drawn from their native element." This is a comforting assur- ance to the tender-hearted residents of this place who may be troubled at the thought their support is at the expense of the suffering of the lower creatures.
FIRST PARISH (Unitarian) CHURCH, Middle Strect, erected 1738. Present church, erected 1828.
Rev. Daniel Munroe Wilson, D. D., preacher of anniversary sermon, 1892.
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OF THE TOWN OF GLOUCESTER, MASS.
But in a more deep and subtile way has the influence of the sea entered into the lives of the inhabitants of Gloucester. All the perils of the ocean and that power the sea has to produce sadness and a sense of the solemn mystery of existence, has been exerted upon these people through the generations.
" And though the land is thronged again, O sea ! Strange sadness touches all that goes with thee, - The small bird's plaining note, the wild sharp call, Share thy own spirit : it is sadness all."
Profound reverence results from this, and a quick responsive sympathy .. The whole character is attuned to a deeper and tenderer note. We see the manifestation of it especially in the history of this ancient church. The sad spirit of the sea early subdued the stern Calvinism of the Puri- tan. He was no cruel bigot here. There is not a single stain of blood upon the records. How could the eyes which were full of tears for husbands, sons, brothers, and friends, who had gone out into the deep never to return, gleam fierce and fatal upon witch and Quaker? Was there not mourning enough in the sea without causing it in a neigh- bor's dwelling? A quiet, trustful piety was in their hearts, and our Quaker poet, who knows well
" The white-walled hamlet children of this ancient fishing town,"
can sing, with no dark memory to restrain, of their life,
"Inward, grand with awe and reverence."
The worst in the way of superstitious violence they attempted was to shoot at spectral Frenchmen with silver buttons.
Thus modified by the close relation of its people to the great sea, the history of this First Church in Gloucester is the history of religion in New England. Here, as in any of the other older settlements we may trace the development of the spiritual life of a people vigorously and freely manifested under the democratic forni of congregationalism.
What other form could be so well adapted to a new endeavor to live the Christian life simply and directly? What other form is so consonant with free political aspirations ?
This grand new Republic of ours was in that Puritan church which in all its activities was of and for and by the people. Congre- gationalism, exercised first by the Christian disciples in the simplicity of their earliest efforts, is, for efficiency, contesting in the realm of . spiritual things with the clerical hierarchy which in its various forms.
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TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY
derived rather from Roman imperialism than original Christian prece- dents. The Reformation in England brought these two forms of church administration into direct opposition. State-church and sep- aratism, episcopacy and the congregation of equals, fought it out at first with words and then with arms. When the Pilgrims, most radical of separatists, fled to these shores in hope of establishing their church way unmolested, their opponents sent over ministers to "advance the dignity of the Church of England and the laudable use of the book of common prayer." Undisturbed possession of this new land by either faith was not to be permitted. Stage Fort, in Gloucester Harbor, was the scene of an early incident in this contest.
For two years Pilgrim and prelatist worshipped there in distinct and separate camps. The settlers who were landed by the ship of the English Dorchester Company in 1623 were loyal to the established church. More joined them the next year, and it seemed as though a church with a bishop was to be established here opposite the church without a bishop at Plymouth. In that same year, however, the fishing party from the Pilgrims arrived in Gloucester Harbor. Each faction erected its own " great house," and when the Sabbath came there was exhibited for the first time on New England shores, the spectacle of hostile denominations, settled in the same place, engaged in separate and unfriendly worship. On the Sabbath the Pilgrims piously exhorted one another and aimed their shafts, each tipped with a text, at the popish practices of the English Church. Meanwhile, the churchmen joined in the " decent " services of the prayer-book, read fervently the petitions for the king, the bishop, and all in authority, and in their hearts desired to be delivered from the sin of fanatical separatism.
For about two years this state of things continued, the prelatists in 1625 receiving for their encouragement the support of the notorious John Lyford. This minister, sent from England to make head against the Pilgrims, had just been ignominiously cast out of Plymouth. He not only wrote to England injurious letters about them, while pre- tending to be friendly, but sins done in the old world had found him out in the new world. However, he was considered good enough by the English authorities to be sent to Cape Ann to lead fishermen in the laudable use of the book of common prayer, and it is easy to imagine he made the most of his opportunity, and with a rough tongue girded at the party from Plymouth. At this time it seemed uncertain whether the origin of First Church should be in a congregation of the Pilgrims or a church of the English episcopacy. The withdrawal of all the settlers of both faiths, soon afterwards, determined that, for the
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OF THE TOWN OF GLOUCESTER, MASS.
present, it should be in neither. The Pilgrims returned to Plymouth, the others removed to Naumkeag, where, under the lead of the patient Conant, some held on till the arrival of Governor Endicott with that first division of the great Puritan immigration which secured Massachu- setts and New England to the churches of the Congregational order.
After great troubles between the different religious factions Cape Ann was now deserted for some years, save for the presence of the agents of Captain Mason who claimed the territory, an occasional fisherman's crew, and the visit of adventurers like Morton of Merrymount. These nondescripts were, however, numerous enough and repugnant enough to the Massachusetts Colony to call forth an order in 1630 for their expulsion. Perhaps this was in preparation for the regular settlement of the place by good men and true. For tradition informs us that soon after 1630, a son of John Robinson, the large-hearted preacher to the Pilgrim congregation in Leyden, led a company to Cape Ann. At all events there were enough persons here by 1633, wrote Minister Forbes, on the authority of an ancient manuscript, "to carry on the worship of God among themselves -read the word of God, pray to him, and sing psalms."* As early as this, he says, on another occasion, " the first settlers of this town consecrated a house for public worship." Here we have the beginnings of First Church.
Properly it is as early as this that we are to seek for our religious and civic origins. From this time onward the occupation and growth of the place is steady and uninterrupted. Thomas Lechford gives us a glimpse of the condition of things in 1639, when he writes that "at Cape Ann, where fishing is set forward and some stages builded, there one Master Rashley is chaplain." It is evident that the place is peo- pled almost entirely by fishermen. There are no families; no homes in the proper sense of the word. But in 1642 a change is wrought. The Rev. Richard Blynman arrives with several families from the Plymouth Colony. And now with a permanent minister they are to be solidified formally into a " church estate." The exact date of this consummation is not given, nor have we the names of those who signed the covenant, nor the covenant itself. All these facts are lost with the loss of the original records. Early in 1642 it must have been, however, when the church was definitely established.
In those days it was most often the case that the church was
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