USA > New Hampshire > Grafton County > Hanover > Hanover, New Hampshire, a bicentennial book : essays in celebration of the town's 200th anniversary > Part 21
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Very early the Church of England had its representative in the area. The Reverend Ranna Cossit of Farmington, Connecticut, who had been ordained priest by the Bishop of London in 1772, was sent to the "Haverhill Parish" the following year as "itinerant
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The Churches of Hanover
missionary" by the London "Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts." He "fixed his residence in Claremont," but spent one-fourth of his time conducting Episcopal services up the valley as far as Haverhill, paying occasional visits to Hanover.
"Prevailing and apparent divisions and contentions" within the membership of Mr. Burroughs' church started in 1783. The diffi- culties concerning action of the ruling elders in censuring a mem- ber grew into bitter dissension which culminated in an appeal to the Grafton Presbytery. The case was decided against Mr. Bur- roughs and his faction. Thereupon he and fifty-six members with- drew from the Presbytery and from further use of the meeting- house. This group held services in barns and private homes until 1791, when they built what came to be known as the "North Meeting-house" on land of Jonathan Freeman just west and north of the Parade. Mr. Burroughs, however, continued to demand payment from the town for his services. Year after year town rec- ords show the appointment of committees to settle the controversy of "Mr. Burroughs vs the town" which eventually reached the Su- perior Court. The case was finally dismissed and settlement of "costs accrued" made to Mr. Burroughs with payment "for execu- tions of Mr. Burroughs vs Hanover and officers fees" listed in the entries of the selectmen's accounts for the year 1801-02.
After the secession of Mr. Burroughs and his group, the remain- ing members of the original church continued to use the "South Meeting-house" under the leadership of Elder Bezaleel Wood- ward, their temporary moderator. Preachers from the College and elsewhere supplied the pulpit on occasion. Among them were Professor John Smith and Eleazar Wheelock's son-in-law, Profes- sor Sylvanus Ripley, who was about to accept a call to the vacant pastorate in 1786 when he met his untimely end. Returning home in a blizzard after preaching at the Center, he was thrown from a sleigh and died of a broken neck.
Two years later Reverend Samuel Collins was ordained min- ister at the South Meeting-house and continued until his dismissal in 1796. Due to the division of the church and the reluctance of the inhabitants to pay taxes for the support of preaching, Mr. Collins' salary was always in arrears. He is reported to have suf- fered much from poverty, "apparently forsaken by God and Man." These tax difficulties caused the town to leave supervision of re- ligious matters to the individual churches after 1796. With their
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old building in a state of disrepair, church members themselves undertook the expense of building a new South Meeting-house a few rods north of the burying ground. The "large" house was finished in 1797 in a "neat and hansome manner" both inside and out, with a graceful one hundred foot spire topped by a cockerel. It was popularly believed (by the youngsters of the neighborhood, at least) that when that cockerel heard other cockerels crow, he crowed too.
The Universalists, who had gained a foothold during the dissen- sion, contributed towards this new building and, in return, were allowed to hold services there every fourth Sunday. In spite of this unusual arrangement in ownership, with its inevitable diffi- culties, the new South Meeting-house was used by the two groups for some thirty to forty years. The Baptists also had certain priv- ileges. The old South Meeting-house was burned by an incendiary in 1797, and a committee was charged with the disposal of this town property.
Attempts to bring the North and South groups together from time to time were hindered by a few aggrieved members who felt they "could not be privileged under Mr. Burroughs' administra- tion." This stumbling block, removed in 1809 when Mr. Bur- roughs was called to Dothan, Vermont, left the way clear for a union. On May 16, 1810, the two churches presented themselves before a council, meeting at their request at the home of Colonel Otis Freeman, and gave their "assent and consent" to the "Con- fession of faith" and "covenant" and became the "First Church of Christ or Congregational establishment in Hanover, New Hamp- shire," with sixty-eight members.
While discord prevailed at the center of the town, the college church was encountering its own difficulties. In the early days many settlers from the Dothan section of Hartford, Vermont, had united with the church in Hanover. After President Eleazar Wheelock's death, they gradually ceased to attend meetings on the east side of the river or to contribute to the pastor's salary, al- though they retained their membership. At first, services were held in homes in the Dothan neighborhood, and later in their meeting-house built in 1799. Reverend John Smith, professor of learned languages, served as minister, after the tragic death of Reverend Sylvanus Ripley, and preached both at Dothan and Hanover, being appointed on a somewhat unusual year-to-year
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basis. Previously he had assisted Professor Ripley, who had be- come minister of the college church upon the death of Eleazar Wheelock.
Bitter dissension broke out in 1804 when the College trustees appointed the Reverend Roswell Shurtleff to the long vacant chair of divinity and assigned to him "the business of preaching" to the students. Church members called a meeting to vote on ex- tending an invitation to Mr. Shurtleff to become their minister, expecting Professor Smith to withdraw. But domineering Presi- dent John Wheelock was anxious to retain Professor Smith, who was completely under his thumb, and name Mr. Shurtleff, likely to be less subservient, as assistant. In a surprise move the Dothan members, who had not attended services in Hanover for years, ap- peared at this meeting to back up President Wheelock and a few supporters from the town in voting against the settlement of Mr. Shurtleff. The ensuing quarrel, during which President Wheelock tried to force the trustees to withdraw Mr. Shurtleff from preach- ing, was the beginning of President Wheelock's "disaffection" to the trustees which grew into open enmity and resulted in the fa- mous Dartmouth College Case.
The Dothan faction, being in the majority in the 1804 dispute, had boldly kept the name "The Church of Christ at Dartmouth College" and remained Presbyterian. Twenty-two members on the east side of the Connecticut River became an independent church, Congregational in form, sanctioned by a special council on July 2, 1805. This group took the name "The Church in the Vicinity of Dartmouth College." On May 28, 1812, it was voted "that this church shall in future be designated by the name 'The Congregational Church at Dartmouth College.'" So it remained for nearly a century, until 1906, when it resumed its original name, "The Church of Christ at Dartmouth College," as the Dothan church was no longer in existence.
Both the church at the Center and the college church became attached (1805) to the Congregational Association, which had grown in strength in the Upper Connecticut Valley with the fad- ing of the Grafton Presbytery and its short-lived successor known as the Consociation.
The formal religious life of Hanover was further extended when at Mill Village (Etna) on October 10, 1791, "the Baptist brethren and sisters met, and after opening the meeting by prayer pro-
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ceeded to imbody as a church" with David Eaton, deacon, Abel Bridgman, moderator, and Thomas Nevins, clerk. The nucleus of this group consisted of former members of Mr. Burroughs' church, one of whom, Susanna Dowe, as early as 1785 had become convinced that immersion was the only proper mode of baptism. In that year the Reverend Thomas Baldwin of Canaan adminis- tered the rite to Miss Dowe in the Pressey Brook not far from Goose Pond.
The Baptists for some years "enjoyed preaching of the word from different persons." Some were ministers from nearby towns, others their own members. In the early years the church was as- sociated with the Woodstock, Barre, and Meredith Associations, in turn, and had members coming from Hanover, Lyme, Dor- chester, and Norwich. For a short period it was known as "the church of Hanover and Lyme." Having no building of its own, the group met in private homes, the schoolhouse, or barns with privileges on certain occasions in the new "South" Meeting-house at the Center.
The Baptists grew in strength under the guidance of Elder Isaac Bridgman and also prospered under Elder Jesse Coburn dur- ing whose ministry their meeting-house was built. In 1825 the "First Baptist Society" was formed in accordance with the State Legislative Act of 1819. Records of the Society give details of the building of the "neat and convenient brick edifice two miles south of the center near the mills" on land given by Ithamar Hall.
Forty-six subscribers pledged "2,000 feet of boards" and $873, specifying in most cases that part would be paid in labor and material. Mr. Coburn is credited with the plans for the building and with the design and actual construction of the pulpit. The 40' x 40' brick church with belfry was dedicated in 1827. During the latter part of the century extensive repairs and improvements were made, including the building of a vestry in 1898-99.
From the beginning the church granted privileges to those outside its membership, stating that the church "shall be free for ministers of other Christian denominations who sustain a good moral character, to occupy when unoccupied by the Baptists." Specifically to the Universalists the Society said, "We have agreed to give you the use of our Meeting-house the first Sabbath in July and the first Sabbath in November, if you should wish to use it those days; which with the one you have had will make three Sabbaths for the present year (1832)." The arrangement was later
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extended to "every second Sabbath of every second month during the year."
Just after the Baptists had established themselves at Mill Village, the Congregational Church at the Center laid plans for a new meeting-house. Following the custom of the times, the church at the Center in 1835 organized a Religious Society for the better conduct of its business and appointed three trustees. A major en- deavor five years later (1840) was the construction of a new build- ing to replace the now dilapidated "new" South Meeting-house. This building, 56' x 42' with a belfry and dome, was situated a few rods north of its predecessor on land given by John Smith II. The arrangement whereby the Universalists had previously held part ownership in the Congregational Church building was not renewed at the new location.
The ministry of the Reverend John M. Ellis, pastor during the building of the new church, was marked by considerable activity both by him and by his wife who led the Female Missionary So- ciety. Mr. Ellis' salary is recorded as "$400 a year in addition to the use of the parsonage, firewood, and hay for a horse and a cow."
The church was served by a number of ministers for varying lengths of time, the Reverend Charles A. Downs of Lebanon be- ing pastor for twenty-four years. During one period of forty-five years and for shorter intervals between the settled pastorates, serv- ices were carried on by stated supplies and in several instances with the assistance of students from the College.
While the people at the Center were raising their new church, the Methodists banded together "on the Plain" to form the "First Methodist Episcopal Society in Hanover, N. H." in September 1840. There had been scattered periods of Methodist activity pre- viously. In 1796 Lorenzo Dow of Coventry, Connecticut, preached while visiting relatives in Hanover, and from 1800 to 1809 ap- pointments were made to a "Hanover Circuit." The Reverend Elijah Hedding, who was assigned to this circuit in 1804, con- sidered it a "resting place," a comparatively easy circuit to travel, preaching on alternate Sundays in Canaan. He described his usual "routine of labour" as follows: "On one Sabbath I was accus- tomed to preach twice in the daytime in the center of the town of Hanover, in a Congregational Meeting-house where they had no settled minister. In the evening of the same day I would ride to
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the village where Dartmouth College is located and preach in a private house or schoolhouse." The minister "lived from house to house as Providence paved the way," finding in Hanover "no lack of open houses and kind hearts ready to receive and entertain him. His opportunities for study also were better there than ever before and he was diligent in the improvement of them."
Later preachers coming on occasion from the Canaan, Norwich, and Lebanon Circuits laid the groundwork for the formation of the Methodist Church in Hanover. A meeting-house was built in 1841 at the northeast corner of Lebanon and College Streets at a cost of approximately $2,000. This building was used by the Society until 1850-51, when the Methodists, badly in debt, leased it to the Episcopalians, who purchased it a year or so later. Han- over members then joined the Lebanon Methodists. A local chronicler at mid-century summed up the situation in Hanover in one sentence: "At present the Methodists have no visible organiza- tion in the town." And there has been none since that time.
For many years following the "missionary work" of Mr. Cossit of the London Society (1775), the only Episcopalian services were those conducted by itinerant clergymen. About 1831, however, the Reverend Benjamin Hale, professor of chemistry at the Dart- mouth Medical School, began holding services in his own parlor and also in the Medical Building for a small group which in- cluded a few students, Dr. Daniel Oliver and other residents. Pro- fessor Hale's conduct was obnoxious to the Congregationalist Col- lege fathers. The trustees, who had no power to remove Professor Hale legally, abolished his professorship in 1835 with no charge of misconduct, no hearing, no warning to discontinue his Episco- pal services. The "case of Prof. Hale" was debated beyond the State boundaries and brought forth letters and vituperative pam- phlets.
No further Episcopal services are recorded until 1850, when Dr. Fitch Oliver of Boston, who as a boy had attended meetings at Professor Hale's with his father, became interested in seeing an Episcopal Church established in Hanover. Knowing there was a group of active Episcopalians with "three influential ladies" among them, he presented his views to Bishop Carleton Chase of New Hampshire. With the Bishop's support, the use of the Meth- odist meeting-house and the services of the Reverend Edward Bourns, president and professor of languages at Norwich Uni-
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versity, were secured. Dr. Bourns was installed as priest in charge with a salary of $300, preaching on Sunday afternoons except for the first Sunday of each month when he came in the morning to administer Communion.
The old church, purchased from the Methodists whose Society had been dissolved, was renovated in 1861 at an expense of $1200- $1400, met largely by interested persons outside of Hanover. One of the contributors was the Earl of Dartmouth, who gave £100.
The name "St. Thomas" was officially approved in 1854 and the parish formally organized with vestry, wardens and clerk elected by the whole parish with authority to choose their minis- ter and manage their local affairs. Professor Thomas Crosby be- came Senior Warden and served as Lay Reader after Dr. Bourns left the area upon the removal of Norwich University to North- field, Vermont.
Professor Crosby enlisted students as helpers. Among them were two freshmen, Abiel Leonard and Ethelbert Talbot, and a sophomore, Isaac Nicholson, who "conducted services, Sunday School, acted as sexton-sweeping floors, ringing bells, clearing paths etc." When the Reverend James Haughton was made the first rector, these students pledged the $1200 for his salary and undertook to raise the money outside the parish. "And they raised it." The three students assisted in building the rectory in 1869, "literally taking off their coats and becoming diggers and trenchers, to lessen the cost of preparing the foundation." And all three became bishops.
By 1870 the need "for a stone structure, solid, churchly, beau- tiful," was expressed by Bishop William Woodruff Niles, Bishop Chase's successor, who began soliciting funds among friends out- side of New Hampshire. In the next few years more than sixty contributors gave approximately $30,000. Two substantial local gifts came from Dartmouth College's President Asa Dodge Smith and Treasurer Daniel Blaisdell, showing the change in attitude of college officials towards Episcopalianism from the days of Profes- sor Hale. The old Methodist meeting-house was sold to become, in turn, Kibling's Opera House, a commercial inn, and "South Hall," used as a college dormitory until it was razed in 1959.
The foundation for the new "Gothic" St. Thomas Episcopal Church was laid in 1874. The nave, seating three hundred wor- shipers, was built the next year, and the chancel completed the following year. The chancel, altar and reredos, stained glass win-
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dows and organ were memorial gifts contributed at various times by members and friends of the church.
The edifice of granite from a local quarry, designed by Fred- erick Clarke Withers of New York, was consecrated on September 19, 1876. Since 1892, when the vestry was given up, the Senior Warden has been appointed by the Rector and the Rector by the Bishop of New Hampshire.
About the middle of the nineteenth century (probably 1845) Roman Catholic Mass was said for the first time in Hanover by the Reverend John B. Daley of Rutland, missionary at large, in a house on the corner of Lebanon Street and Sanborn Road. Later Mass was said at the O'Leary home and also at the Precinct Hall. Pastors from Lancaster, Laconia and Lebanon visited Hanover and administered to Roman Catholic residents.
In 1887 the Reverend Louis M. LaPlante, pastor of the Sacred Heart Church in Lebanon, purchased land for the building of a church on South Street. Under the Reverend Cyril J. Paradis, "work began July 6 and the church including altar and vestment case was completed December 29, 1887," Mass being said for the first time in the new wooden church three days later on New Year's Day, 1888. The building was blessed and dedicated on July 8 of that year by the Right Reverend Denis M. Brady, D.D., first Bishop of Manchester. Confirmation for the first time was ad- ministered on this occasion. Roman Catholics were under the spiritual jurisdiction of the pastor of the church at Lebanon until the establishment of a parish in Hanover in 1907.
The Congregational church on the green underwent many physi- cal changes during the nineteenth century. In 1827 the upper fifty feet of the tall and beautifully proportioned spire was pulled down as it had become unsafe. The square tower, capped by a railing, remained until remodeling in 1838, when a new steeple was built and the square pews were replaced by "slips."
A vestry for prayer meetings and social activities was built in 1841 on land given by Mills Olcott adjoining the meeting-house. The large white church with the small vestry at its side came to be known as "the Cow and the Calf." "Improvements" in the church building were the installation in 1852 of an organ for music previously provided by the Handel Society Orchestra, and the addition of vestibule porches, the repair of foundations, a
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Congregational Church at Hanover Center, erected 1841
Baptist Church at Etna, erected 1827
District No. 1 Schoolhouse, built 1839 at 1 School Street; now owned by the Christian Science Society
Hanover Grade School on Allen Street; built 1877, enlarged 1896
The Churches of Hanover
furnace for wood, and carpets for the aisles in 1869. Even the stu- dents' seats were "cushioned and widened, being too narrow to sleep on with safety." More radical remodeling was done in 1877 when $4,000 was spent in "necessary and convenient changes in the interior" and in lengthening the building by eleven feet.
Extensive alterations took place in 1889 when Stanford H. White of New York was engaged as architect to beautify and modernize the church called by students "the college barn." The building was extended twelve feet at the north end to make room for the new organ given by Mr. Hiram Hitchcock, who also met the greater part of the cost of the renovations. Dartmouth College contributed $500. On its ninety-fourth birthday the building, greatly changed in proportion and decoration, was reopened with an address by Frederick Chase, Esquire, and remarks by Professor E. R. Ruggles, chairman of the building committee, and the Reverend Samuel Penniman Leeds, the pastor.
The business affairs of the church, the custody of "the house," and the church's relationship with the College were carried on by the Dartmouth Religious Society, organized in 1830. From that date a pastor was engaged independently by the Society, no longer being the Professor of Divinity supplied by the College. However, the College contributed a substantial sum towards the minister's salary, as he was recognized as the official preacher to the students, and the College trustees were given the "right to use the building without charge (doing it no damage) for commencement and other public exercises of the College." This arrangement con- tinued until 1908 when commencements and other public assem- blies of the College were transferred to the newly completed Web- ster Hall.
During the present century several new church buildings have been erected and additions and improvements made to existing ones.
St. Denis Roman Catholic Church, which had been under the care of Lebanon, became a separate parish in 1907 when the Reverend James E. McCooey was made resident pastor of the church on South Street. It was not until 1922 that land was bought for a larger place of worship at the corner of Lebanon Street and Sanborn Road. Mass was said for the first time on November 1, 1924, in the new gray stone edifice, 108' x 52', de- signed by the firm of Larson and Wells, and the blessing and
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dedication of the church took place on May 23, 1925. The present parish covers Hanover, Lyme, Lyme Center, Hanover Center and Etna.
The Baptist Church at Etna and the Congregational Church at the Center united in 1911 in an effort to overcome financial difficulties each was experiencing. A conference, held at the home of the Reverend F. L. Knapp in Lebanon, by committees of the two churches with representatives of their respective State or- ganizations, resolved that "the interest of the Kingdom of God will be best served by a federation for the joint support of a resident minister." It was understood that "whatever arrange- ment is made shall not jeopardize the integrity of either church or their denominational interests."
The two churches held joint meetings annually, and confer- ences between their pulpit committees considered such matters as those "relating to the salary of our minister." The first minister under the federation was the Reverend Edward C. Sargent, a Congregationalist, who was followed by the Reverend Charles L. Chamberlain, a Baptist, and, in turn, by the Reverend Addison P. Gifford, a Congregationalist, whose pastorate ended with the discontinuance of the federation in 1924.
Termination was due to the acceptance by the Baptist Church of the terms of the bequest of Mr. John L. Bridgman. A phrase in the will, "maintaining preaching of the Baptist denomination," was interpreted as placing emphasis upon "baptism by immer- sion," which could not be carried out under the federation. At a final meeting of the pulpit committees it was voted that "the Con- gregational church be thanked for their participation in the fed- eration now terminated" and "that the Baptist church wishes to cooperate with said Congregational Church in all ways consistent with the terms of said will and invites that church to participate in its services."
Since the "unfederation," each group has maintained its respec- tive church, finding its own minister and making changes in its building from time to time. A vestry was added to the First Church of Christ at the Center in 1918 in a community enterprise in which Congregationalist members, neighbors of other faiths, and "unchurched" friends worked together on the construction.
Fire totally destroyed the Congregational Church of Christ at Dartmouth College on May 13, 1931. The lot on which the
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