USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Salem > Sketches about Salem people > Part 20
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Signed by order of the Provincial Congress.
Jos. Warren, President pro tem.
There was enclosed an appeal to the inhabitants of Great Britain, signed by Warren, and twenty affidavits authenti- cated by notarial certificates in the most legal fashion, all to the effect that the troops fired first and without provocation. Two of these affidavits were from British soldiers, evidently captives; the rest, in some cases signed by fifteen or twenty men, were all by Americans.
When the letters reached Salem on the morning of April 27, the schooner Quero of sixty tons, in ballast, with a daring crew, was all ready to leave. John Derby went on board
6% Force, American Archives, 4th Series, II, 747.
66 Ibid., II, 488.
43
BY JAMES DUNCAN PHILLIPS
with the letters and Captain William Carleton, the sailing master, got up sail. Next morning she had vanished and the sloop of war Lively, which had been hanging around off Marblehead, had not seen her go. Four days before, General Gage had sent his despatches by the ship Sukey, Captain William Brown, but she was a fully loaded ship of two hun- dred tons and not so fast.
Haste was essential, however, and Derby took the quickest route to London. The instruction to land in Ireland was probably merely a blind, and Derby was probably put ashore from an open boat on the Isle of Wight, while the Quero dropped back to Falmouth before entering in England. Any- way, Derby's expense account shows expenses from the Isle of Wight to London, and Hutchinson's diary says he was sup- posed to have come that way, though the King's officers could not discover when, or where his ship was.
Anyhow, he got to London Sunday evening, May 28, with his official despatches, which he at once turned over to Arthur Lee, acting provincial agent, and also copies of the Salem Gazette of April 21 and April 25, with accounts of Lex- ington, probably written by Timothy Pickering. Hutchinson somewhat bitterly remarks that "the conduct of the Boston Leaders is much the same as it was after the inhabitants were killed the 5th of March 1770. They hurry away a vessel that their partial account may make the first impression." Arthur Lee, the provincial agent, pressed the advantage by broad- casting his news far and wide. Those who remember the impression made by the first German account of the Jut- land naval fight in the Great War can easily see how great the advantage was. The Ministry, still in utter ignorance, tried to discount the news. Lord Dartmouth announced May 30, 1775: 67
A report having been spread and an account printed and pub- lished of a skirmish between some of the people of the province of Massachusetts Bay and a detachment of His Majesty's troops, it is proper to inform the public that no advices have yet been received in the American Department of any such event.
There is reason to believe that there are despatches on board the Sukey, Capt. Brown, which though she sailed four days before the vessel that brought the printed accounts is not yet arrived.
67 Essex Institute Historical Collections, XXXVI, 6.
44
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF RICHARD DERBY
Arthur Lee, provincial agent, tartly replied:
London, May 30. As a doubt of the authenticity of the account from Salem touching an engagement between the King's Troops and the Provincials of Massachusetts Bay may arise from a paragraph in the Gazette of this evening, I desire to inform all those who wish to see the original affidavits . . . that they are deposited at the Man- sion House with the Rt. Hon. the Lord Mayor for their inspection.
When the Sukey arrived, her news was pretty stale, and, as the newspapers couldn't see much difference, the American point of view prevailed. The main dispute seemed to be whether the British troops retreated or were routed. The London press sarcastically closed their discussion by remark- ing, "Whether they marched like mutes at a funeral or fled like the relations and friends of the present ministry after Culloden is left entirely to the conjecture of the reader."
Meanwhile it had finally occurred to the Ministry to get hold of Derby and get further details, as he was reported to be en route to Spain for ammunition, but now Derby had disappeared, and by the time they learned that the Quero was at Falmouth, she had also sailed. In fact, her entry at Fal- mouth was probably delayed till Derby was about ready to leave. He simply took a seat in the post-chaise, somewhere outside of London, for Portsmouth and changed into another for Falmouth. On July 19, the Quero reached Salem and entered from Falmouth in ballast, William Carleton, master, no passengers. All quite true, but her important passenger had nevertheless reported to General Washington 68 at Cam- bridge the day before, with secret despatches, and again did not report how or where he got ashore, but probably north of Cape Ann to make sure to avoid the English cruisers. The trip cost £143-9-2} and was duly paid for August 1, 1775. Derby charged £5-0-8 for his expenses in England, but also includes this entry:
To my time in executing the voyage from hence to London and back . Nothing 69
68 See Washington's Letter to Congress, Works, edited by Jared Sparks, 1834, III, 35.
69 Full account, Robert S. Rantoul, "Voyage of the Quero," Essex Institute Historical Collections, XXXVI, 1-30.
45
BY JAMES DUNCAN PHILLIPS
LAST YEARS
Richard Derby was of the aggressive temperament which enjoys a fight and whose spirits rise with the occasion. On May 9, or a few days after the Quero had gone, he wrote an account of Lexington to Daniel Hathorne, captain of his schooner Polly in the West Indies, and, after describing the battle and regretting the losses, he adds:
However they got a dire drubbing so they have not played ye Yankee tunes since. . . . We have no Tories save what is now shut up in Boston or gone off. There has not as yet been any stopping of ye trade so I would have you get a load of molasses as good and cheap and as quick as you can and proceed home.70
It is evident that there was no weakening of spirit, but merely a desire to get his ship home and out of harm's way. As the year wore on, the wisdom and necessity of this became more and more apparent.
The Derby schooner Jamaica Packet under Captain Inger- soll was captured on the way home from Jamaica and carried into Boston, where she was detained till the evacuation and then burned. There were three vessels at Hispaniola under the general charge of Captain Nathaniel Silsbee in February, 1776, and Captain Hallet was sent down in the Nancy with instructions. Captain Silsbee got her loaded and headed back so that she arrived in Portland, Maine, with a valuable cargo which sold at a good profit, but two of the other three vessels sent north were captured, and by the summer of 1776 the house of Derby started retaliation. In June, the schooner Sturdy Beggar, of sixty tons, with six carriage guns and twenty-five men, was sent out, and in September, the Re- venge with twelve guns. The latter had a most successful cruise, and she sent in four Jamaica ships with over seven hundred hogsheads of sugar. Gradually the armed ships in- creased, and of the one hundred and fifty-eight sent out from Salem during the war, the Derbys appeared as owners or part owners of twenty-five and doubtless had shares in many more. 71
As the war progressed, it became evident that these ven- tures were more and more the work of the younger rather than
70 Essex Institute Historical Collections, XXXVI, 16.
11 Peabody, Merchant Venturers of Old Salem, 45.
46
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF RICHARD DERBY
the older Derby. He lived, however, to see the first news of the Treaty of Peace at Paris brought into Salem by the Derby ship Astrea on March 12, 1783, just as the first news of hos- tilities had been taken out by the Quero. Still, his story was drawing to a close. On October 27, 1783, he made his will, and on November 9, just a fortnight later, he died, and was buried in the big square tomb which stands on the left of the path as you enter the Charter Street Burying Ground.
In his will he divided a property worth at least twenty thousand, eight hundred pounds as he valued it, and, as much of it was in houses and lands at values which seem to us absurd, and as there was an unitemized residue, it certainly amounted to well above one hundred thousand dollars and probably above two hundred thousand dollars. He gave to. his widow all the goods and chattels she brought on her mar- riage, his chariot and chariot horses, his slave child Peggy, and one hundred pounds a year. To each of his living daughters he gave the house she had lived in when first married, house- hold goods, a negro slave, and cash to make a total of thirty- four hundred pounds to each, and to the orphan children of Sarah each one thousand pounds in cash and other things to make their total an equivalent amount. He gave his son, Elias Hasket, certain land whereon "his warehouse stands," and to Richard's children "the mansion house, wharf and buildings thereon which I gave to my son Richard late deceased." These were merely specific items which were assigned to certain heirs out of the residue, which was divided into thirds. There is no mention of ships or merchandise and no statement of the full value. Elias Hasket, John, and John Gardner 3d were made the executors, and the will was pro- bated promptly December 3, 1783.
Thus lived a great Salem merchant of the eighteenth cen- tury and the founder of the Derby fortunes. Undoubtedly a man of great energy and ability, he was upright and honorable in all his dealings and a lover of his town and country. The injustice of the British maritime policy made a deep impres- sion on him in his early life as a merchant. He lost heavily through the injustice of the English administrators in the Bahamas and the West Indies, and he bitterly resented an injustice he was powerless to overcome. This point of view
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BY JAMES DUNCAN PHILLIPS
stayed by him, and neither age nor the increasing responsi- bilities of wealth prevented his staking everything on the liberty of his country. From the beginning to the end of the Revolution, the house of Derby never faltered in its support of the wavering fortunes of the colonies. Though primarily a man of business, rather than a man of public affairs, he was sufficiently committed to have lost everything had the Revo- lution failed. Though there were noisier and more con- spicuous patriots than he and his sons, I doubt if any one in the colonies gave more effective and valuable support to the cause along practical and useful lines. It was the energetic and well-to-do men of his type doing their daily tasks effi- ciently in a hundred different ways who supplied the sinews of war that made America free.
NOTES
Affidavit of Elizabeth Hasket, Richard Derby's grandmother, as printed in the New England Historical Genealogical Register, Vol. 29, p. 110, quoted from the Notarial Records of the Essex County Massachusetts Clerk:
Elizabeth Haskitt's oath and certificate Entered May 30th, 1698. Mrs. Elizabeth Haskitt widow formerly the wife of Stephen Haskitt of Salem personally appeared (before me) ye subscriber and made oath that she hath six children living (viz) one sonne whose name is Elias Haskitt aged about Twenty Eight years and five Daughters Elizabeth Mary Sarah Hannah and Martha all of which she had by her husband ye above said Mr. Stephen Haskitt & were his children by him begotten of her body in Lawfull Wedlock being married to him by Doctor Ceanell in Exeter in ye Kingdom of England & whose sd husband served his time with one Mr. Thomas Oburne a chan- celer and sope boiler in sd place & was ye reputed Sonne of - - Haskitt of Henstredge (so called) in Summersetshire in sd Kingdom of England and hav often heard my sd husband say that he had but one brother whose name was Elias Hasket & that he lived in said Towne of Henstredge.
Elizabeth Haskitt
Sworne Salem May ye 30th 1698 before me John Hathorne one of ye Councill & Justice pe & Q in ye County of Essex in his Majties province of ye Massachusetts Bay in New England.
48
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF RICHARD DERBY
PRE-REVOLUTIONARY VESSELS
The colonial trading vessels were all small and lent themselves to the small ventures which were the custom of the times. The col- onies in New England would have found it difficult to collect the outward cargoes for a large ship or to absorb the merchandise which could have been brought back. Few vessels in the Salem trade exceeded one hundred tons. The earliest picture of a Salem vessel is of the schooner Baltick in 1765. The earliest known original paint- ing of a colonial vessel is that of the ship Bethel of 1745, in the pos- session of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Both of the above ships, with pictures of the Quero and the schooner Hannah of 1775, claimed to be the first armed Continental cruiser, are shown in the illustrations of "Colonial Trade and Commerce," by Francis B. C. Bradlee, a very interesting and valuable paper reprinted from the Essex Institute Historical Collections, Volume LXIII.
NON-IMPORTATION AGREEMENT OF THE SALEM MERCHANTS
Salem, Sept. 6. "The Merchants and Traders in this Town hav- ing had several Meetings to consult Measures for the better Regula- tion of the Trade, which at present labours under great Difficulties and Discouragements; and being convinced that a further Importa- tion of unnecessary Goods from Great-Britain would involve the Importers in still greater Difficulties and render them unable to pay the Debts due to the Merchants in Great-Britain, they unanimously VOTED not to send any further Orders for Goods to be shipped this Fall; and that from the first of January 1769 to the first of January 1770, they will not send for or import, either on their own account or on Commissions, or purchase of any Factor or others, who may import any Kind of Goods or Merchandizes from Great-Britain, except Coal, Salt and some Articles necessary to carry on the Fishery. They likewise agreed not to import any Tea, Glass, Paper or Painters Colours until the Acts imposing Duties on those Articles are re- pealed." Essex Gazette, September 6, 1768.
WORKS CONSULTED TOWN HISTORIES
Joseph B. Felt, Annals of Salem.
I, Second Edition, Salem, 1845. II, Second Edition, Salem, 1849. Sidney Perley, History of Salem, I-III, 1924-26.
J. W. Hanson, History of the Town of Danvers, 1848.
SCHOONER BALTIC Type of Pre-revolutionary Salem Vessel
2
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BY JAMES DUNCAN PHILLIPS
Joseph B. Felt, History of Ipswich, Essex, and Hamilton, 1834. Samuel Roads, Jr., History and Traditions of Marblehead, 1897.
SPECIAL ARTICLES AND LOCAL BOOKS
Derby Account Books and Manuscripts at the Essex Institute.
Perley Derby, "Genealogy of the Derby Family," Essex Institute Historical Collections, III, 154-167, 201-207.
Robert S. Rantoul, "Voyage of the Quero," Essex Institute Historical Collections, XXXVI, 1-30.
Francis B. C. Bradlee, "Colonial Trade and Commerce, 1733-1774," Essex Institute Historical Collections, LXIII.
Edward Edelman, "Thomas Hancock, Colonial Merchant," Journal of Economic and Business History, I, 77.
Robert E. Peabody, Merchant Venturers of Old Salem, 1912.
George Francis Dow, Two Centuries of Travel in Essex County, Massachusetts, 1921.
Harriet S. Tapley, Salem Imprints, 1927.
Ralph D. Paine, The Ships and Sailors of Old Salem, 1909.
Freeman Hunt, Lives of American Merchants, "Elias Hasket Derby," II, 1-28, 1856.
GENERAL WORKS
William S. McClellan, Smuggling in the American Colonies, 1912. Lord Sheffield, Observations on the Commerce of the American States, Second Edition, 1783.
Lorenzo Sabine, Report on the Principal Fisheries of the American Seas, 1853.
Thomas Hutchinson, History of Massachusetts from the First Settle- ment thereof in 1628 until the year 1750, 1795.
George Washington, The Writings of. Edited by Jared Sparks. 12 vols., 1834.
John Adams, Works, 10 vols., 1856.
Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, Hartford, 1804.
John Stuart Mill, Political Economy.
Howard Robinson, Development of the British Empire, 1924. John Fiske, New France and New England.
Francis Parkman, A Half-Century of Conflict.
George Bancroft, History of the Colonization of the United States, Fourteenth Edition, 1857.
Timothy Pitkin, Political and Civil History of the United States of America from the Year 1763 to 1797, 2 vols., First Edition, 1828.
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THE LIFE AND TIMES OF RICHARD DERBY
HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS
Essex Institute Historical Collections.
Massachusetts Historical Society Collections (especially 1st and 2nd Series).
The Essex Antiquarian (especially the plan of Salem in 1700 by Sidney Perley).
American Archives, edited by Peter Force, 4th Series.
New England Historical and Genealogical Register.
Note. In all of the above there are many notes, reprints of docu- ments and genealogical comments of great value, but too numerous to list separately.
I am also greatly indebted to Mr. George Francis Dow and to Miss Harriet S. Tapley, who have read the manuscript and helped me with advice and suggestions.
THE GREAT AWAKENING
By REV. THOMAS HENRY BILLINGS, PH. D.
"Monday, September 29, 1740. Set out about seven in the morning. Got to Marble Head, a large town twenty miles from Boston. About eleven preached to some thousands in a broad place in the middle of the town, but not with much visible effect. Rode to Salem and preached there also to about 2000. Here the Lord manifested forth His glory. In every part of the con- gregation persons might be seen under great concern and one, Mr. Clark, a good minister as is granted by all I conversed with, seemed to be almost in heaven. After the exercise was over, I immediately set out and got to Ipswich, another large town sixteen miles (the way we went) distant from Salem. Two or three gentlemen came to meet me, and I and my friends were most kindly entertained at the house of the Rev. Mr. Rogers, a ven- erable old man, one of the ministers of the place. The Lord reward him and all others a thousandfold who re- fresh our bowels in the Lord."1
This is an extract from the journal of Whitefield, the associate of John and Charles Wesley. His visit to America came in the midst of the movement which we are to consider, the revival of religion, usually, because of the extent of its influence, known as "The Great Awak- ening." The movement began in the town of Northamp- ton, in the winter of 1734-35, and was at its height dur- ing the decade from 1740 to 1750. To the people of that day the manifestations that accompanied the revival seemed to be the direct effect of supernatural power. Not all observers believed that this power was of God. Some, and notably the Rev. Dr. Charles Chauncey, pastor of the First Church of Christ in Boston, believed that it was due to the devil. There was no doubt on the part of anybody that the conversions, the emotional and physi- cal disturbances, were supernatural in origin.
The movement spread throughout all the colonies from 1 Whitefield's Journal, London, 1756, page 397.
(1)
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THE GREAT AWAKENING
Maine to Georgia and was by no means confined to this country. Rev. John Cleaveland of Chebacco, now Essex, was an enthusiastic believer and on one occasion, Octo- ber 15, 1743, burst into poetry, which, even if it is not inspired may be quoted to show the extent of the move- ment.2
Many in these latter days Have experienced Jesus' grace. Souls in Europe not a few Find the gospel tidings true.
Britons Isle has catched the flame.
Many love and know thy name
Both in England and in Wales
And in Scotland grace prevails. London, Wilts and Gloucestershire
Feels our Saviour very dear.
Bristol sinners seek the Lord,
And in Kingswood he's adored.
And a few sheep here and there
Are beloved in Oxfordshire.
At New Castle and near York We are told God is at work
And in many sinners hearts
Who're unknown, in various parts. By whatever means he will We are bound to thank him still. And our Shepherd's arms infolds Edinburgh and Glasgow souls Muttel, Kilsyth, Cambuslang Late of Jesus' blood have sang. Carry on your work with power Every day and every hour. Still let thousands in the north Know the great Redeemer's worth. Many Germans walk with God Thru the virtue of Christ's blood Self deny the cross take up. They no doubt with Christ shall sup. What they know not teach them Lord ! Souls they do love thy word.
2 Cleaveland Manuscripts, Essex Ins itute.
3
THE GREAT AWAKENING
In the "Christian History," a periodical issued in Bos- ton at this time, edited by Mr. Thomas Prince, reports were received from England, Scotland and the North of Ireland. Manifestations similar to those occurring in America were common in all districts where the same sort of preaching took place.
The movement in England under John Wesley began one of the most significant social and religious move- ments of the Eighteenth Century, largely because Wes- ley reached a section of the population of England that was at this time neglected and submerged. He thought no human being too degraded to respond to the influence of God and we find this cultivated Oxford gentleman moving by his words great audiences of illiterate, de- graded miners, so low down in the scale of civilization that they were hardly regarded as human. Wesley's organizing genius and his amazing social intelligence led to the permanent uplifting of great masses of the Eng- lish people and to the development of philanthropy and education on a scale such as had never been dreamed of before. In this country the final effect was quite differ- ent, but we must not lose sight of the fact that in all essentials the two movements were one.
In order to understand what took place, it is necessary to enter into a state of mind foreign to most that are likely to read this paper. It was a period when the belief in the supernatural was very real. The witchcraft epi- sode in Salem was still vividly remembered and while men may have believed that the persons accused were for the most part innocent, that was not inconsistent with the belief in the direct interference of evil powers in the life of men. Even where people had lost their belief in supernatural manifestations of evil, they still believed in supernatural manifestations of good. God, or Provi- dence, was a very real factor always to be considered. Again we can hardly estimate the force of their preoccu- pation with the thought of hell. To them, hell was a vivid reality. One of the most popular books of the day was Michael Wigglesworth's "Day of Doom." It is a
4
THE GREAT AWAKENING
long poem reiterating and picturing in vivid detail what hell is like.
For day and night in their despite Their torment's smoke ascendeth Their pain and grief have no relief, Their anguish never endeth,
Who live to lie in misery And bear eternal woe. And live they must while God is just, That He may plague them so.3
A verse from one of their hymns shows the same pre- occupation :
My thoughts on awful subjects roll, Damnation and the dead. What horrors seize a guilty soul Upon a dying bed !
It is hard for us to realize the fear to which such a belief gives rise, and the way in which it may haunt the consciousness of sensitive souls. The mental agony that many persons endured in that day will hardly bear thinking of.
Another one of their fundamental beliefs was that human beings are of themselves naturally depraved. It is easy for us to make a joke of this today, but picture to yourself what went on in the minds of some of these sensitive young Puritans, who believed firmly in the existence of God and the devil and who felt in their own bodies the warfare between good and evil. The devil has always had a close connection with the flesh. Paul cries out, "I am carnal, sold unto sin," and this fiery Puritan of the first century spoke a language that the Puritans of eighteenth century America thoroughly understood. It is not much wonder that we find in many of them a mor- bid fear of the natural. The youthful Bunyan in Eng- land found no peace until he had given up playing tip- cat on Sunday. This was the last stronghold of the evil one in his soul. Puritans in America were the same.
3 Pancoast, "American Literature," p. 64.
5
THE GREAT AWAKENING
This mood of fear and of helplessness was latent in the religion of the day but it was accentuated in the colonies by the experiences through which they had passed, the long struggle with the French and Indians, the feeling of insecurity that the Deerfield massacre gave, the seeming impossibility of gaining a reasoned security. The state of mind is comparable to the 'failure of nerve' in the Greco-Roman world to which Prof. Gilbert Mur- ray assigns a determining place in the religion of a whole era. There was the same sense of helplessness before forces that might destroy life, the same search for mys- tical assurance.
There was, in spite of the belief in hell and in the guilt of the natural, considerable moral laxity. Jonathan Edwards tells of the decay of morals in Northampton. "Just after my grandfather's death it seemed to be a time of extraordinary dulness in religion. Licentiousness for a great many years greatly prevailed among the youth of the time. They were many of them very much addicted to nightwalking and frequenting the tavern and lewd practices, wherein some, by their example, exceedingly corrupted others." One sin to which he greatly objects is the indulgence in what he calls 'frolicks' which so far as I can find out were no more than innocent merry- making. Some observers claimed that Edwards' account of the wickedness of his day is greatly exaggerated. That there was lax morality no one can deny, but there is a tendency in all movements of this kind to darken the picture in order to heighten the effect that the revival produces. The sins that worried people most were on the whole rather trivial and we find even the lax among them willing publicly to confess their sins and undergo humiliation, in order to be even approximately free from the dread of hell. The practice of public confession is only one manifestation of the need that people felt for assurance. In any time of fear men tend to seek some- thing to bolster up their courage and to restore the lost sense of security. The assurance is often based not on a reasoned hope, but on a conviction reached by other than rational means, through some emotional experience.
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