USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > Bedford > An address delivered at Bedford, New Hampshire, on the one hundredth anniversary of the incorporation of the town > Part 2
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The King seems, very naturally, to have selected his own countrymen, the Scotch, as far as he could, to take possession of these vacant lands which were now desolate, over-run with wood and infested with noisome wild beasts. But the Scotch, needy as they were, very reluctantly complied with the wishes of their sovereign ; so forbidding was this Irish province, in all its aspects, that it was deplored as a calamity to be compelled to remove thither : and it was often sneer- ingly and reproachfully said of the unfortunate or the guilty,
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"Ireland will be your latter end." In 1626, it began to improve rapidly ; - an unusual religious excitement having prevailed throughout the province, attracted the attention of the Presbyterians of Scotland, and many ministers and their congregations hastened to Ireland, where, by their labors and unwearied efforts, they ultimately helped to lay the founda- tion of the Irish Presbyterian Church. One of the immediate results of this revival, was the establishing the Antrim Monthly Meeting, which afterwards came to be a very interesting and important religious association. The pro- vince of Ulster contrasts very favorably with any other portion of Ireland to this day. The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Ireland lately addressed a letter to the General Assembly of the same church in the United States; in which they say, "that, in Ulster, where their principles are more widely disseminated, the recent visitation of the famine and pestilence was much less severe, than in those provinces in which the Roman system still unhappily maintains its degrading and paralyzing ascendancy." Macau- lay says, " that whoever passes from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant county in Ireland, finds that he has passed from a lower to a higher grade of civilization; " and this is con- firmed by the statements of all observing travellers. In 1631, having heard of the success of their puritan friends, the Independents, or Separatists, who had settled at Ply- mouth eleven years before, and learning also that the Salem settlement, then three years old, was prosperous, the Pres- byterians of Ulster anxious to escape, if possible, from the injustice of the perfidious Charles the Second, whose reign had just commenced, began to make preparations to remove to America. Agents were appointed, who proceeded to London, to procure a passage to New England ; but for some reasons, unexplained, the project was defeated for a time. Soon after this, " they sent over an agent who pitched upon a tract of land near the mouth of the Merrimack river, whither
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they intended to transplant themselves." This fact is stated by Cotton Mather. The expedition, which was undertaken in pursuance of the report of this agent, failed, as we shall see ; but it is more than probable, that this was the cause of the settlement of our Londonderry, nearly a century after- wards : for we find the Ulster emigrants, who landed in Boston and Portland in 1718, immediately inquiring for lands on the Merrimack river, and there they did ultimately settle and remain.
But the attempt to reach New England, which was made in 1636, failed. The vessel, which sailed from Lock-Fergus, a port very near Belfast, in Ireland, on the 9th of September, was of one hundred and fifty tons burthen ; she received on board one hundred and forty emigrant passengers, - . her name was " The Eagle Wing." Four of her passen- gers were distinguished preachers, - Blair, Livingston, Hamilton, and McClelland. Among others on board, there were families of the name of Stuart, Agnew, Campbell, Summerville and Brown. She was bound to New England. She was following directly and immediately in the track of the " May-Flower." Her passengers were to have settled upon the Merrimack, - our Merrimack river. The " Eagle Wing" never reached her port of destination; but we will allow one of her passengers, the Rev. John Livingston, to give us the reasons for her failure. " We had," he says, " much toil in our preparation, many hindrances in our out- setting, and both sad and glad hearts in taking leave of our friends ; at last, we loosed from Lock-Fergus, but were detained sometime, by contrary winds, in Lock-Regan, in Scotland, and grounded the ship to look for some leaks in the keel : yet, thereafter, we set to sea, and, for some space, had fair winds, till we were between three and four hundred leagues from Ireland, and no nearer the banks of Newfound- land, than any place in Europe. But, if ever the Lord spoke by his winds, and other dispensations, it was made evident to
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us that it was not his will that we should go to New England, for we met with a mighty heavy rain from the north-west, which did break our rudder, which we got mended by the skill and courage of Captain Andrew Agnew, a godly passen- ger, and tore our foresail, five or six of our champlets, and a great beam under the gunner's room-door broke ; seas came in over the round-house, and broke a plank or two on the deck, and wet all that was between the decks; we sprang a leak, that gave us seven hundred, in the two pumps, in the half-hour glass. Yet we lay at hull a long time, to beat out the storm, till the master and company came, one morning, and told us that it was impossible to hold out any longer, and although we beat out that storm, we might be sure, in that . season of the year, to forgather with one or two more of that sort, before we could reach New England." The account goes on to state, " that amidst all the fears and dangers, the most part of the passengers were very cheerful and confident ; yea, some, in prayers, expressed such hopes, that rather than the Lord would suffer such a company, in such sort, to perish, he would put wings to our shoulders and carry us safe ashore." Several of the passengers were sickly ; an aged person and one child died ; one child was born on ship-board. It was baptized by Mr. Livingston, and called Seaborn. After a long and most anxious consultation, with a fervent prayer to Almighty God for wisdom to direct them, the passengers agreed to yield to the earnest solicitations of the master. The ship was put about, and re-entered the harbor of Lock- Fergus on the 3d of November, having been absent about eight weeks.
The "Eagle-Wing " left the shores of Ireland, as did the May-Flower those of Holland, with the same high purpose, of finding a new habitation, where there was "freedom to worship God." The " May-Flower " succeed- ed in reaching this continent ; though, it is said, through the treachery of her master, at a point, very distant from that,
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to which she was destined. The "Eagle-Wing" was compelled, by stress of weather, to return again to the land of religious intolerance.
The company of pious and devoted ministers, and their congregations, who left Ulster, in this vessel, with flattering hopes for the future, and who returned disheartened and cast down, had yet, in the Providence of God, a. great work entrusted to their agency. "This company of men," as Dr. Foote says, "were, subsequently, the efficient agents in the hands of God of embodying the Presbyterians of Ireland, of spreading their principles far and wide, and marshaling congregation after congregation, whose industry made Ulster blossom as the rose. It was better that God's wise Providence sent them back to Ireland, and shut them up to the work - and last, it was best of all, that they laid the foundation of that church, which may claim to be the mother of the Amer- ican Presbyterian Church, the worthy child of a worthy mother."
We must now leave, for a while, this little group of pas- sengers, who composed the freight which the " Eagle- Wing" was too feeble to bear across the broad Atlantic, during the Autumnal gales of 1636. We are obliged to leave them in bad company, and, under circumstances most inauspicious ; for we leave them to the tender mercies of the faithless Charles the First ; to the uncertain and dangerous discretion of the shrewd, ambitious and unforgiving Oliver Cromwell ; to the reckless and shameful profligacy of Charles the Second ; and to the knavery and stupidity of the bigoted James the Second. Meanwhile, we must hasten to the consideration of some passages in their subsequent history, immediately connected with their actual emigration to this country.
Pass on with me now, for the space of fifty-two years, from 1636 to 1688. James the Second - the great-grandson of Mary, Queen of Scots, whom Elizabeth may almost be said to have murdered from envy, and the son of Charles the
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First, who perished on the scaffold, because he kept faith with no party, - had abdicated the throne of England. He had previously sent his wife, Mary of Modena, and his infant and only son, to France. All his relatives had deserted him. Even his daughter Anne, and her husband, the Prince of Denmark, had fled from his palace in the night. He, himself, having seized the great seal of state, stole from his bed- chamber at early dawn, hastened to a boat, in readiness for him, threw the seal into the Thames and escaped down that river. . After some further difficulties and delays, he reached Paris in safety. His eldest daughter, the offspring of his first wife, and her husband, William of Orange, were now proclaimed jointly King and Queen of England.
James, being in France, was urged and entreated, by the Catholic Louis, to return to Ireland, from which he had lately heard reports favorable to his cause, and to make a struggle to re-gain his crown. He at last complied, though with great reluctance, and being provided with twelve thousand French troops, a train of artillery and a supply of money, he landed in Kinsale, Ireland, in March, 1689. Stopping, for a very short time, at Dublin, he hastened to the north of Ireland, to our Ulster, with his foreign allies, and sat down before Londonderry, then in a state of seige.
You will pardon me, I feel assured, for recalling to your recollection some of the incidents, connected with the " seige of Derry," when you reflect upon the important bearing, which it had upon the character and destinies of our Pres- byterian friends in the north of Ireland and their posterity, here and elsewhere.
I confine myself to Graham's account of it. On the third of December, 16SS, an alarm was spread throughout the island, that the Catholic Irish had determined to rise and murder indiscriminately the protestants, on the next sabbath. The messenger, who carried this news to Derry, reported that on his way, he had passed the Catholic troops, and that
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their advance guard was close upon the city. All was consternation and dismay. There were no military prepar- ations for defence. The citizens ran together, each eagerly and anxiously inquiring what could be done. Many advised to open the gates and give their invaders an honorable recep- tion .. A few, bolder, and with better judgment, insisted that the gates should be shut, and that the soldiers should be resisted to the death. Among these were the Rev. James Gordon, of Clondormet, and Horace Kennedy, one of the Sheriffs. At length, there assembled a group of the " Ap- prentices " to the manufacture of linen, a large business at that time in Derry. These spirited apprentice boys heard the discussion of the public authorities, and perceived the danger to which the city was exposed. The soldiers began to cross the river and approach the walls of the town. A few of the leaders of the apprentices immediately seized the keys and rushing to the gates, shut them in the face of the enemy.
The seige was now commenced. The entire space, in- closed within the walls, was only two thousand feet in its longest diameter, and six hundred in its smallest. And yet there were shut up in this city, twenty-seven thousand persons, who were doomed to endure, for eight long months, famine and pestilence, constant exposure to the fire from the enemies batteries, and all the concurrent horrors which the imagination căn conceive to exist under such circumstances. So feeble did the defences of the city appear, to De Rosen, the French officer, who came over with James, when he first saw it, that he exclaimed, with a disgusting , oath, that " his men should bring it to him stone by stone." The French General was mistaken - he knew little of the determined energy of the men, women, and apprentice boys, with whom he had to contend. Exasperated, at length, that no offer to capitulate was made, he resorted to the brutal expedient of collecting from Belfast, (distant a hundred miles from
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Derry,) and its neighborhood, over four thousand men, . women, and children, of the Protestant party, without regard to condition; robbed them of their food and clothing, and drove them like so many cattle, under the walls of Derry, to perish in view of their friends.
To prevent this inhuman and barbarous destruction of life, the authorities of Derry erected a gallows on the walls of the town ; sent to De Rosen for a priest to confess the prisoners, (some of them distinguished French officers, ) assuring the general, that they should be hung, one by one, until there were no more to execute, unless he permitted the multitude under the walls to depart. This retaliatory measure pro- duced the desired effect. The Belfast people were released, but not till hundreds had perished from starvation and exposure. In all the agony and despair of these unfortunate beings, while held by the infamous order of De Rosen, there were none of them but what urged their friends, within the walls, to hold on and hold out, and not to yield in sympathy to the sufferings of those on the outside. But I must not continue these horrible details. It suffices to say, that after having been reduced to the extremity of eating horse-flesh, of feeding upon dogs, cats, rats and mice, and when, at last, there remained but half a pint of meal to a man per day, when the soldiers began to glare upon the citizens, and upon each other, with the famished look of starving cannibals, the long hoped for relief came. The ships of King William hove in sight, with men and supplies. The seige was raised. The army departed; but not until the Catholic party had lost nine thousand of their soldiers and more than two hun- dred of their officers.
It would be difficult to find, in the whole history of modern warfare, an example of such endurance, of so much personal suffering, of such devotion to the cause in which they were engaged, as was exhibited by these resolute Presbyterians in the defence of their homes and their religion, at the seige of Derry.
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The vast importance to the cause of Protestantism and the English government, of the successful defence of this for- tress, will be appreciated, when it is understood that James anticipated its speedy reduction, and had made his arrange- ments to cross directly over to Scotland, join the infamous Claverhouse, make a rapid descent upon England, and drive his son-in-law, William, back to his native Nassau. The names of these apprentice boys, who so nobly shut the gates, and thus defeated the ultimate purposes of the beseiging party, as Graham says, " deserve to be preserved in letters of gold." Many, very many of their descendants, are now to be found in this country. They are known to be in Virginia, Ken- tucky, Indiana, here in New Hampshire, and doubtless, in many other states of the Union. The leaders, and more prominent of these young men, were William Crookshanks, Robert Sherrard, Daniel Sherrard, Alexander Irwin, James Stewart, Robert Morrison, Alexander Coningham, Wil- liam Cairns, Samuel Hunt and Samuel Harvey.
Never were a people more unfortunate after all their efforts, than were these brave Presbyterians! They had held the troops of James in check, while they defended successfully the last stronghold of King William in Ireland, and until Claverhouse had been attacked and destroyed in Scotland. They had freely mingled their blood with the waters of the Boyne. They had consecrated the " billowy Shannon," that " river of dark mementos," by the sacrifice upon its banks, of their dearest friends, before the gates of Limerick and Aithlone. They had, in short, expelled James and his allies from the land, and were looking with great confidence for something like tolerance in religious belief and religious wor- ship, from William of Nassau and his protestant wife. But they were doomed to the sorest disappointment, and ultimate- ly became so disgusted with the calculating and selfish policy of William, his unreasonable and unjust demands of rents and tythes, as well as with the exactions and persecu-
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tions of the Anglican church, which now came to be regarded by them, as little better than the Roman Catholic, that they determined, once and forever, to abandon their country, and seek refuge in the wilds of America.
The tide of emigration, now began to flow towards this country. "Ship load, after ship load," sailed from Ulster, with better success, than had attended the " Eagle-Wing." These vessels reached our shores in safety, and the de- scendants of the immigrant passengers, whom they bore hither, may be counted to-day, by the thousands and tens of thousands, on the broad fields of Pennsylvania, in Virginia, in the Carolinas; in every portion of the sunny South. Away across the mountains, in Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana, and everywhere, in the mighty West ; and here, among our own Granite-Hills ; and, indeed, in greater or less numbers, throughout the entire Union ; the same conscientious, deter- mined, unyielding, persevering men and women, as were their fathers and their mothers, who sacrificed every earthly comfort, in defence of that cause, the nearest and dearest to their hearts, the principles of the religion of Calvin and Knox.
The first Presbyterian minister, who came to America, was Francis Mackemie ; and the first Presbyterian church on this Continent, was gathered by his exertions, in Accomac Coun- ty, in Virginia. He assisted also, in organizing churches in Maryland, the precise time is not known : but it must have been just at the close of the seventeenth century. His name indicates his origin. He also was from Ulster, and Scotch- Irish. Mather says, there were " Presbyterian ministers, resi- ding in New England, before Mackemie's time." But, if there were such ministers, they very soon adopted the " Con- gregational form of disipline." We know of no earlier churches of the Presbyterian denomination in New England, than that in Londonderry, in this State, which commenced with the town itself, in 1719; and the Federal Street Church,
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in Boston, gathered in 1727, the members of both of which came from the same common stock, the Scotch-Irish, in Ulster. The congregational form of government, was adopted in the Federal Street Church, in 1786. It is the same church, over which Dr. Belknap, the historian of New Hampshire, was settled, in 1787, and subsequently, the late celebrated Dr. Channing, and is now under the pastoral care of Dr. Gannett.
Mackemie's churches were certainly organized more than twenty years before either of these. Mackemie was ordained, at Lagan, Ireland, as early as 1682. He went first to Barba- does, and thence to Virginia and Maryland. He, at one time, officiated as minister in the church, which he had assisted to organize at Snowhill, in Worcester County, Maryland. He was a man of extraordinary intellectual powers, and was uni- versally beloved by the people of his charge. Irving Spence, Esq., in his letters on the early history of Presbyterianism, says " that the memory of no gospel minister was ever held in higher honor by an American congregation, than that of Mackemie at Snow-Hill. Tradition has made a record of his many excellencies, and one generation has uttered his praises in the ears of its successor, and you may ever yet hear its echo." In the village of Rehoboth, Maryland, near the Vir- ginia line, there is, at this day, a Presbyterian church organized in the time of Mackemie. Dr. Foote, to whom I am indebted for this sketch of the father of Presbyterianism, in America, says, " you may find now in Accomac, Virginia, a congregation of Presbyterians, rising, Phoenix-like, from the ashes of those, who heard Mackemie preach and pray."
Mackemie revisited his native country, in 1704, and in- duced other Presbyterian ministers to come and settle in this country. Two of these ministers, were NcNish and Hampton.
Mackemie assisted . in forming the first Presbytery in America, at Philadelphia, probably in 1705; though the first
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leaf of the records of that Body is missing, and the precise time cannot now be known. The first Presbytery in New England was formed in Londonderry, N. H., April 16, 1745' by John Morehead, of Boston, James McGregore, of London- derry, and Robert Abercrombie, of Windham, with an elder from each of these churches. The first Synod in New England was formed at Seabrook, N. H., May 31, 1775 ; the first meeting of this Synod was held at Londonderry, N. H., September 4, 1775. It was composed of three Presbyteries, namely, the Presbytery of Salem, the Presbytery of London- derry, and the Presbytery of Palmer ; the Church of Bedford was represented there by Rev. Mr. Huston, and belonged to the Presbytery of Palmer.
In 1706, Mackemie and his friend and fellow-laborer, Hampton, commenced a journey from Virginia to Boston. On their way, they stopped in New York to pay their respects to Lord Cornbury, then the Governor of that Province ; they were treated courteously and, upon invitation, dined with his Excellency at the castle. Afterwards, they were invited to preach by some Presbyterians settled in New York, and they did preach ; Mackemie in the dwelling-house of William Jackson, in Pearl Street, and Hampton, on the same day, at Newton, Long Island. For this they were both arrested, by Thomas Cardale, sheriff, on a warrant, signed by Lord Corn- bury, charging them with having taken it upon them to preach in a private house, without having obtained a license for so doing, contrary to the known laws of England; and being, likewise, informed that they were gone into Long Island with intent there to spread their pernicious doctrines and principles, to the great disturbance of the Church by law established ; and directing the sheriff to bring the bodies of Mackemie and Hampton to Fort Anne. They were both arrested and imprisoned in the fort ; indicted by the grand jury, and, after suffering a long confinement, were brought to trial. The prosecuting attorney called four witnesses, who
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had heard Mackemie preach; but the defendant told him they need not be sworn. "I own," said Mackemie, "the matter of fact as to preaching, and more than these gentle- men could declare on oath ; for I have done nothing therein of which I am ashamed, or afraid; but will answer it not only before this bar, but before the tribunal of God's final judgment."
Attorney. You own then that you preached, and baptized a child at William Jackson's ?
Mackemie. I did.
Att'y. How many hearers had you ?
M. I have other work to do, Mr. Attorney, than to num- ber my auditory, when I am about to preach to them.
Att'y. Were there above five hearing you ?
M. Yes ; and five to that.
Att'y. Did you use the rites and ceremonies enjoined by, and prescribed in, the book of Common Prayer, by the Church of England ?
M. No; Inever did, nor ever will, till I am better satisfied in my conscience.
The trial proceeded, and, in spite of all the efforts of Cornbury and his officers, they were both acquitted by the petit jury, and set at liberty ; not, however, till they had been compelled to pay an exorbitant bill of costs !
Would any one believe, now, without evidence which cannot be impeached, that such a scene as this was exhibited in Protestant New York, under the reign of Queen Anne, not one hundred and fifty years ago? while in Catholic Maryland a man might live in peace, whether Jew, Moham- medan, or pagan, - whether Atheist, Deist, or Polytheist, - provided he neither molested his neighbor, nor endangered the public morals. The truth is, that "great moral cataclysm of the Reformation," as it was called, so far as all the Tudors and Stuarts were concerned, from Henry the Eighth to Anne, amounted substantially to this, and nothing more, -
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it was a transfer of spiritual power from Rome to London ; from the Vatican to St. James's ; from the Pope to the Monarch of England. Protestantism was a matter of con- venience, merely to the crown. Elizabeth is said to have married Protestantism, and to have taken its name; but, it is added, "most of the court Protestantism of her time was of a damaged character." It was assumed that the sovereign of Great Britain, whoever it might chance to be, man or woman, boy or girl, was, jure divino, the head of the church ; from whom eminated, and in whom centered all spiritual power, and all ecclesiastical authority; the head of the Church and of the State, was one and identical. The immediate government of the church was committed to the Bishops, - the lordly prelatical bishops, as they were called by the Puritans, - the higher order of the clergy. The Anglican Church, thus constituted, became, as it was fitly denominated, the "queen, mistress, or nothing," and withal was a tremendous political engine, with which to govern and control the nation. Henry the Eighth wielded this power with a frightful energy; "he burned as heretics, those who avowed the tenets of Luther; and hung as traitors, those who owned the power of the Pope." He required uncon- ditional submission to his authority, as self-constituted head of the Church. His successors, down to the period of which we are treating, at least, followed his example, so far as they had the ability, and circumstances would permit.
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