USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > The memorial history of Boston : including Suffolk County, Massachusetts, 1630-1880, Vol. III > Part 19
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1 Tudor, Life of James Otis, p. 155; Sprague,
Annals of American Pulpit, i. 440; Lothrop, History of the Church in Brattle Square.
2 [His letters from Boston during the siege are printed in Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc., 1878, p. 281 .- ED.}
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THE PULPIT OF THE REVOLUTION.
fame, and was only induced after much persuasion to print a single volume of his sermons.1
The Rev. Samuel Checkley, Jr., minister of the Second or Old North Church, passed away in 1768, at the close of a pastorate of twenty-one years. He was a zealous preacher, rising at times to a certain sort of eloquence, and is said to have been gifted with uncommon felicity in the devotional exer- cises of public worship. He printed very little, and appears to have taken no part in public controversies.2 His successor, the Rev. John Lathrop, preached acceptably until the occupation of Boston by the British, when he left the town, and his church was destroyed. Returning to Boston the following year, his ministry was transferred to the New Brick Church, with which the society of the Old North was a little later united. From a strict Calvinist, Mr. Lathrop came to adopt the views of Mayhew and Chauncy, taking his church with him. He was an ardent Patriot, and mingled in the scenes of the Revolution with great zeal and untiring industry.8
The Rev. Ebenezer Pemberton had come to the New Brick Church in 1754,4 but his ministry was not fortunate. The North End was the centre and hot-bed of the Patriot movement. The residents and church-going people generally were stanch Whigs, with whom Mr. Pemberton had little sympathy. Governor Hutchinson was a member of his congregation, and the minister shared the unpopularity of his august parishioner. When, in 1771, Mr. Pemberton, almost alone among the Boston ministers, attempted to read the Governor's proclamation for the annual Thanksgiving, the Whigs, constituting the greater part of the congregation, indignantly walked out of meeting. From that time the attendance fell away. The minister's health perceptibly failed, and in 1775 the house was closed. Dr. Pember- ton - he had been made a Doctor of Divinity by the College of New Jersey in 1770 - retired to Andover during the siege and died in 1779, his connection with the society never having been formally dissolved.5
Though the Old South Church was the centre of many of the most ex- citing events of the Revolution, its ministers took a less conspicuous part in them than those of the neighboring churches. The Rev. Joseph Sewall," " father of the clergy," died in 1769, after a pastorate of fifty-six years. He
I Eliot, Historical Notice of the New North Church ; Sprague, Annals of the American Pul- pit, i. 417-421. [See Vol. 11. p. 243 .- ED ]
2 The Rev. Henry Ware, Jr., Historical Dis- course, p. 23. [See Vol. II. p. 240. - ED.]
8 " Dr. Lathrop's preaching was rather prac- tical than doctrinal ; rather sensible than ornate. His sermons were short, not ordinarily exceeding twenty-five minutes in delivery. There was little of the appearance of labor about them; and the thoughts which he expressed, though judicious and pertinent, were generally obvious to ordinary minds, and partook, like the character of his own mind, more of convictions than originality." The Rev. John Pierce, D.D., in Sprague's Aunals
of the American Pulpit, viii. 68-72. [See also Dr. Peabody's chapter in the present volume. - ED.] 4 [See Vol. II. p. 244 .- ED.]
5 " Ilis piety was of that fervent kind for which his father was remarkable. He had not his superior powers of mind, and in his old age grew unpopular in his delivery, though in for- mer times he drew crowded assemblies by his manner llis reading, however, was extensive, and his sermons correct in diction and style. He was a Calvinist according to the principles of our fathers." - Dr. John Eliot. See also Dr. Robbins's History of the Second Church, pp. IS9-193.
6 | See his portrait in Vol. Il. p. 241. - ED. }
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THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
was a minister of the old school, preaching the "faith of the fathers" in its strength and purity. Dr. Eliot speaks of him as more remarkable for piety than for learning; yet he was a good classical scholar and familiar with general literature. He possessed a large estate, which he used with great liberality and public spirit.1 Dr. Sewall had two colleagues during the later years of his ministry,2 and his pulpit after his death remained vacant for nearly two years, when John Hunt and John Bacon, young men of talent and promise, were settled together. Hunt was of a sensitive and delicate nature, of affectionate and winning manners, and a persuasive preacher. Bacon was of a disputatious and somewhat overbearing temper, and fell into difficulties with his congregation over the doctrines of atonement and im- putation. The ministry of both came to an end in 1775,-that of the former by his early death, the latter by dismissal.3 Soon after, the congregation was broken up, and the church was converted into a riding-school for the troops then occupying the town.
The New South Church passed, in 1773, to the pastoral care of the Rev. Joseph Howe.4 The storm was gathering rapidly when Mr. Howe began his ministry. "In the harbor," he wrote to an absent friend, "nothing is seen but armed ships; in the town, but armed men." He was not daunted by them. He performed the duties of his office with zeal and fidelity till the storm broke in 1775, when he returned to Connecticut and diced the same year. He was a preacher of remarkable promise, and his death was lamented as a genuine calamity.5
Of the Congregational clergy, Dr. Mather Byles stood alone against the Revolution. He tried, with undoubted sincerity, to avoid politics in his pulpit; but his opinions were too notorious, and his sharp tongue was too frec, to make his position long an agreeable one either to his people or to himself. He left his congregation in 1776, and in the following year was denounced in town-meeting, and tried by a special court for remaining in Boston during the siege and praying for the king. He was sentenced to be confined on board a guard-ship with his family, and sent to England, but the sentence was not enforced. The last twelve years of his life were spent in retirement; and the favor of the community was never restored to him. In the prime of his life he was blessed with a wonderful flow of spirits, with great skill and command of language, and had some claims to be regarded as a pulpit orator. 6
The Rev. Samuel Mather continued his ministry, without marked inci- dent, over an independent congregation in North Bennett Street, during the
P. 33.
1 Wisner, History of the Old South Church, portrait, and some characterization of him, is given in Vol. II. 227, 228. A small oval engrav- ing of him exists, S. Harris, sc. Pelham's en- 2 [See Vol. II. p. 240. - ED.] 3 [ Ibid., p. 241 .- ED.] graving is inscribed : "Mather Byles, A. M. et 4 [Ibid., p. 243 .- ED.] V. D. M. Ecclesiæ apud Bostonum, Nov. An- 5 Allen, Biographical Dictionary; Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit. glorum, pastor. P. Pelham, ad vivum pinx. et fecit." There is some mention of his Revolu- 6 Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, tionary tribulations in Mr. Scudder's chapter in PP. 376, 382; Tudor, Life of Fames Otis. {His the present volume. - ED.]
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siege and until his death in 1785, when his congregation returned to the Second Church, from which he had taken their fathers forty-three years beforc. He was on the side of the Col- onies during the whole struggle, but Samuel Rather took no active part in the discussions attending it. He had an inherited taste for collecting and preserving books, part of which were destroyed at the burning of Charlestown, and the rest were widely scattered after his death.1 He contributed little to the literature of the time, except a youthful life of his father, and a work now rarely seen, designed to show that America was known to the ancients, beside occasional sermons and theological tracts.
The piety and talent of the Rev. Samuel Stillman gave dignity to the Baptist church at this time of its low cstate. He was called to the pastorate of the First Baptist Church in 1765, and came to be recognized as one of the most powerful preachers of the Revolution. The unattached crowd thronged his obscure little church at the North End upon the report of his homely and effective eloquence; and distinguished strangers, as well as sailors just home from their voyages, met every Sunday morning in its narrow aisles. His piety is described as of the type of Hervey, Watts, Doddridge, and Payson.2 Nothing stirred him to deeper fecling or more moving eloquence, - sometimes scathing, sometimes pathetic, - than the prevailing inattention to religion. Yet he and his church were as deeply interested as any in the state of the country, and no more potent voice was raised in its behalf than that of Mr. Stillman. He was an early patron of, and most liberal contributor to, Brown University, and was devoted to lit- erature and all good causes. The Second Baptist Church had regular services under the ministration of the Rev. John Davis and the Rev. Isaac Skillman, neither of whom left any special mark. Mr. Davis, during his brief ministry, won much respect by his ability and zcal. Backus speaks of him as "the pious and learned Mr. Davis," and the contemporary no- tices of his death eulogized him as a man "of fine parts, an excellent scholar, and a pretty speaker."
" Refined his language, and his reasoning true, He pleased only the discerning few.""
The Episcopal clergy of Boston, in common with their friends in the other colonies, espoused the cause of the Crown. They derived their eccle- siastical authority from the Church of England, and loyalty to the king was a part of their worship. Whatever their individual inclinations might have been, they felt bound in a double sense to resist a sentiment and policy
1 [See Vol. I., Introduction, p. xviii. For Dr. chapter in the present volume, where a portrait of Mckenzie's mention of him, see Vol. II. p. 229. Stillman is given. - ED.] -ED.]
2 The Rev. Dr. Jenks in Sprague's Annals of the American Pulpit. [See also Dr. H. M. King's
8 Backus, History of the Baptist Church in New England ; Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit.
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THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
which must end in open rebellion; and they resisted at the risk of prop- erty, reputation, and life itself. Most of them were sent into exile after fighting a losing battle, and the few who remained were subjected to great losses.
King's Chapel, the first Episcopal church in New England, was at this time in a flourishing state. The Rev. Henry Caner, who had been called to the rectorship in 1747, was highly educated and endowed with many popu- lar qualities. Early in his ministry, and largely through his efforts, the first chapel was built. The university of Oxford conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Divinity. While British ships were in the harbor and British troops in the town, many of their officers regularly worshipped at the chapel. Dr. Caner's ministrations were in every way acceptable to them. There is no trace of his printed discourses later than 1765 ; but the traditions of his preaching give him a high rank as a man of learning and fine intellectual endowments. He was a devoted Loyalist, and with the departure of the troops in'1776, when it was evident he could no longer be useful in this field, he went with them to Halifax, and soon after returned to England, where he died at a great age in 1792.1
The ministry of the learned and venerable rector of Christ Church, Dr. Timothy Cutler, was nearly ended. The grand figure and commanding presence, described by Dr. Stiles, was bowed by infirmity when the crisis began, and in 1765 he passed away at the age of eighty-two years. He was a sincere and consistent Episcopalian, but took no part in the controversy.2 His assistant, the Rev. James Greaton, continued the services a year or two, when he was succeeded by the Rev. Mather Byles, Jr. This litigious minister had just " dismissed himself," according to the church record, from the church and congregation in New London over which he had been some- time settled, and became a zealous convert to Episcopacy. He was called to the vacant rectorship of Christ Church, and discharged his duties there without marked distinction until the siege, when he again deserted his flock, and left the colony. He was a fierce Loyalist, and was afterward proscribed and banished.
Trinity Church was, at the time of the Episcopal controversy, under the partial care of the Rev. William Hooper.3 Sabine classes him among the Loyalists, but there is no evidence of his having taken any active share in the contest, even in its earliest stages. He died in 1767. He is described as a man of native nobility of spirit and vigor of mind, uniting with a fine eloquence great clearness of thought and earnestness of purpose.4 His assistant,5 the Rev. William Walter, succeeded to the rectorship until 1776, when he also resigned his charge, and accompanied General Howe to Yar-
1 Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, v. 61, 63; Greenwood, Ilistory of King's Chapel. [See also Dr. Brooks's chapter on "The Epis- eopal Church."-ED.]
2 [An account of the Rev. Timothy Cutler's ministry is given in the Ilistorical Magazine, sup- plement of 1866, p. 124 .- ED.]
8 [See Vol. II. p. 229 .- En.]
4 The Rev. Dr. Bartol, in Sprague's Annals of the American Pulpit, v. 123.
5 [See Dr. Brooks's chapter on "The Epis- copal Church," in the present volume, and Dr. Mckenzie's chapter in Vol. II. p. 346 .- ED.]
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mouth in the Province of Nova Scotia. He was a zealous supporter of the Church and the Crown, and vindicated his sincerity by the sacrifices he made for them. He returned to Boston in 1791, became rector of Christ Church, and remained in that relation till his death. His discourses are described as rational and judicious, "recommended by an elocution graceful and majestical." He was no knight-errant ; but, while adhering to his own con- victions with quiet persistency, he exercised a large charity toward all forms of faith and Christian worship.1 The Rev. Samuel Parker became assistant rector of Trinity at the death of Dr. Hooper. He came to the post at a crisis, and stood by it through many and great trials. He conducted the services during the siege with remarkable discretion, meeting as well as he could the conflicting claims of his church and of his country. He read the service without interruption, including the prayers for the king, until the Sunday following the Declaration of Independence, when he was publicly warned of the peril of repeating them. The vestry authorized the omission of the offending portions, and the services continued as before. Mr. Parker became rector soon after the war, and received from his congregation many marks of favor for the prudence, patience, and zeal with which, under dis- tressing circumstances, he had kept the holy fire burning on the altar of Trinity.2 He became the second bishop of the Eastern Diocese in 1803, but died a few months after his consecration.
The Rev. John Moorhead, born at Belfast and educated at one of the Scotch universities, came to Boston with a number of Scotch-Irish families in 1727-28, and established public worship, according to the rites of the Scottish Kirk, under the name of the Church of the Presbyterian Strangers. In 1744 the meeting-house in Long Lane, afterward Federal Street, was built for them,8 and Mr. Moorhead continued his services here until after the Revolution. He published nothing, and his papers were lost or destroyed at the evacuation ; but tradition represents him as a forcible preacher, administering the law and the gospel with zeal and fervency. He and his people were warm friends of liberty. During the same period the Rev. Andrew Croswell conducted the worship of an independent society, with some success, in the church of the French Protestants in School Street. He was a stalwart Calvinist, a deadly foc of Arminianism and " new lights" of every kind, always disputing with the ministers, and usually with those who came nearest to his own way of thinking. He published several occasional sermons, including a narrative of the found- ing and settling of his own new-gathered church. A little later Robert Sandeman, the Scotchman, after holding meetings at the Green Dragon Tavern and other places, expounding his new doctrines, had a house of worship built for him near the Mill Pond in 1765. He rejected belief in the necessity of spiritual conversion, representing faith as an operation of
1 Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, v. v. 296. His publications were limited to a few 226, 233. occasional discourses.
2 Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, VOL. 111 .- 17.
* [Sec a view of it in Vol. II. p. 513 .- ED.]
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THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
the intellect, and speculative belief as quite sufficient to insure final justi- fication. He was the founder of the sect of Sandemanians, which survived from the time of his coming to these shores until 1823, when the last light was extinguished.1
The Press, like the Pulpit, reflected all the varying phases of current opinion ; but its prevailing force was on the side of the freedom of the Colonies. It had conspicuous faults and great virtties ; it was personal and partisan to a degree only tolerable in times of conflict; but it was frank, honest, impulsive, and sincere. Of the ebb and flow of events from 1760 to 1775, and the corresponding revulsions of popular feeling, the newspapers give the only satisfactory record. Slow and meagre, for the most part, in presenting the general news of the world, they teemed with resolves, pro- tests, instructions, appeals, sermons, satires, and arguments of every kind, - some addressed to the reason and conscience, some to the strong pas- sions, and all of them written with remarkable force and energy.
Of the pre-Revolutionary journals,2 the News-Letter and the Weekly Advertiser remained on the side of the Crown. Richard Draper, who con- ducted the News-Letter, with its numerous combinations,3 from 1762 to 1774, was an uncompromising Loyalist. The crown officers and their friends had free access to his paper at all times, and defended their cause often with marked spirit and ability. During the occupation the News-Letter had no competitor. The few numbers preserved show that the military au- authorities of the town found it a most serviceable instrument, and that they and their friends used it without scruple and without decency. Upon the death of Richard Draper in 1774, the News-Letter was conducted by his widow, with the assistance already indicated, until the departure of the troops compelled its suspension.
The Weekly Advertiser, in its later years, had limited influence and com- paratively few readers, but was never wanting in zeal for the Government. During the last two or three years (1773-75) the authorities, seeing that the tide was now setting strongly against them, secured new and able writers for its columns. Thomas, who remembered the paper well, says that in 1774 it was the chief organ of the Government party. It was pat- ronized by the officers of the Crown, and attracted much notice from the Whigs. The Chronicle, 1768-70, published by Mein & Fleming, the lead- ing booksellers, was neutral at first, afterward independent; but from the beginning there was in it an undertone of depreciation of the leading Whigs,
I Drake, History of Boston, pp. 618, 619; Allen, Biographical Dictionary.
2 See the chapter on the " Press and Litera- ture of the Provincial Period," in Vol. II.
3 The title in 1762 was the Boston Weekly News-Letter and New England Chronicle. The year following, the title was changed to the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston News-Letter, and was decorated with the king's arms. In
1768-69 the News-Letter and the Post-Boy and Advertiser entered into a quasi partnership, -one half of each paper being official, and called the Massachusetts Gazette, " published by authority ;" the other half of each bearing its own separate title, and published independently. The Weekly Advertiser also took for a time the name and decorations of the Post-Boy. Thomas, History of Printing, ii. 25, 59-
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THE PRESS OF THE REVOLUTION.
which soon developed into open hostility. Its literary pretensions, exceed- ing those of any other journal in the colony, did not save it from becoming the vehicle of gross calumnies. The people resented its attacks upon their leaders as in- John mein sulting to themselves; and John Mein, the editor, was forced to seek in his own country a refuge from their indignation. He went to Scotland in 1770, and never returned.
Thomas and John Fleet, who succeeded to the estate of their father, the founder of the Evening Post, just before the storm arose, tried hard to follow his example and to publish a strictly independent journal. Whigs and Tories fought their wordy battles in its pages with great vigor, and the young publishers for a time kept their balance well. But neither party was long disposed to be tolerant of such neutrality. The issues of life and death were too serious to be trifled with in that way; and the proprietors, after unavailing protests against what they regarded as encroachments upon their rights, discontinued the publication in 1775, the last number mentioning, but not attempting to describe, the " unlucky transactions " of the preceding week, - meaning the battles of Lexington and Concord. One incident of many illustrates the difficulty of maintaining its neutral position among the heady currents of this excited community. The Lib- erty Song,1 written by John Dickinson, of Philadelphia, and first printed in the Pennsylvania Chronicle, July 4, 1768, afterward in the Boston Gazette, was reproduced by request in the Evening Post a month later, " for the
1 This song was much in vogue in North America for several years, and was written under circumstances related in the following leller. The time was immediately after the refusal of the Massachusetts Legislature to rescind the circular-letter addressed by the llouse of Rep- resentatives to the speakers of the several Colonies.
Dickinson to Otis. PHILADELPHIA, July 4, 1768.
DEAR SIR. - 1 enclose you a song for American free- dom. I have Inng since renounced poetry ; but as indiffer- ent songs are frequently very powerful on certain occasions, 1 venture to invoke the deserted Muses. I hope that my good intentions will procure pardon, with those I wish to please, for the badness of my numbers. My worthy friend, Dr. Arthur Lee, a gentleman of distinguished family. com- posed eight lines of it. Cardinal de Retz always enforced his political operations by songs. 1 wish our attempt may be useful. . .
Your most affectionate, most obedient, servant,
JOHN DICKINSON.
The song was to the tune " llearts of Oak," and began as follows : -
" Come, join band io hand brave Americans all, And rouse your bold hearts at fair Liberty's call : No tyrannous acts shall suppress your just claim, Or stain with dishonor America's name. In freedom we're born and in freedom we'll live. Our purses are ready ; Steady. friends, steady, -
Not as slaves, but as freemen, our money we'll give." Tudor. Life of Fames Otis, pp. 322, 501.
The travesties were promptly answered by Whig verse-writers, their last song closing, --
" lo freedom we're born, and like sona of the brave We'll never surrender, But swear to defend ber, And scorn to survive if unable 10 save."
[The song seems to have been first publicly sung in Boston, Aug. 14, 1768, on one of the an- niversaries of the Stamp Act disturbance ; the Massachusetts Gazelle of August 18 recording the assembling of a great number of "persons of credit at Liberty Hall, where the much admired American song was melodiously sung ; " where- upon "the gentlemen set out in their chariots and chaises for the Greyhound Tavern in Rox- bury, where an elegant entertainment was pro- vided. After dinner the new song was again sung, and forty-five toasts drunk. After conse- crating a tree to Liberty in Roxbury, they made an agreeable excursion round Jamaica Pond ; and it is allowed that this cavalcade surpassed all that has ever been seen in America." This famous Greyhound Tavern stood on the present Washington Street in Roxbury, opposite Vernon Street. It was torn down during the siege. (Drake, Town of Roxbury. p. 166.) A letter from Dickinson, in answer to a vote of thanks from Boston, is among the old papers (1768) in the Charity Building. - ED.]
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THE MEMORIAL HISTORY OF BOSTON.
benefit of the whole continent of America." Parodies upon parodies fol- lowed in subsequent numbers to the great indignation of one or the other of the parties.
The most noted contributors to these journals were Joseph Green (mer- chant, poet, and wit, though he took no part in the later political discussions),
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