History of Rockingham and Strafford counties, New Hampshire : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 20

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis
Number of Pages: 1714

USA > New Hampshire > Strafford County > History of Rockingham and Strafford counties, New Hampshire : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 20
USA > New Hampshire > Rockingham County > History of Rockingham and Strafford counties, New Hampshire : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 20

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south end, was chosen moderator. After passing two to be raised at the next town tax." This present voted to Mr. Emerson was probably with the idea that he was only a temporary supply, but it was soon found he was to be the popular and successful minister of - the parish permanently. This order of the General Assembly did not bring peace. Selectmen were chosen now on one side and now on another ; petitions were sent to the General Assembly now on one side and now on another. Town officers were chosen at the new meeting-house and also at the old on 7th of June, 1714; and it was left for the Governor to say which should serve. We find at another meeting held the 27th July, 1714, the Indians took up so much time of the General Assembly that it could not further pro- votes disorders arose, and the justices dissolved the meeting ; but those who remained, with Pickering at their head, put a number of things to vote which were carried, such as that the old meeting-house shall continue town-meeting house forever, and when too much decayed with age to be repaired, that a new one shall be erected in its place ; that the glebe land (this was the serious cause of the trouble), for -. merly given by the town for the use of the ministry, shall wholly remain to the benefit of the minister, who shall officiate in said house ; that a committee shall wait upon Mr. Rogers to see if it be his pleasure to continue preaching at the old meeting-house during bis abode in the town ; if not, that the said committee i ceed in relation to the selectmen of Portsmouth, but shall provide an able minister for the said place of worship, and agree with him for his salary, which agreement, so made, shall be ratified and fulfilled by the town. for the present voted that out of nine persons set down in margin (of petition) there be five picked by his Excellency the Governor to do the public service of the said town as selectmen till the 25th of March next. The Governor picked or chose those elected at the new meeting-house; and then the Assembly " voted a concurrence with the order of the Governor and Council, and considering the regularity of the town-meeting at the new meeting-house the 7th of of June, confirm the town clerk and all other officers then chosen and the votes then passed about the new meeting-house, and ordered that the officers stand as such until the 25th of March next, and that be the day for annually electing town officers." This of course was but a temporary matter, and as the months went on the town found the necessity and possibility of sustaining two flourishing parishes; but the embit- tered feelings were not allayed by the votes of the General Assembly ; peace did not reign at the Bank or at the Mill Dam. At first the advantage seemed to rest with the new parish, which had the strength of votes, but in Jannary of the next year we find at a meeting of the Council a petition appears from the persistent Capt. Pickering, presenting it personally, and the Council orders the clerk to read a summons to ye town of Portsmouth, to show cause if any there be why orders may not be given in favor of the peti- tioners belonging to Portsmonth, mostly residents on the south side of the Mill Dam; and the Council, Jannary, 1715-16, "ordered that ye Rev. Mr. Na- thaniel Rogers and Mr. Emerson be ye two estab- lished ministers of the town of Portsmouth, and that . they be each paid one hundred pounds per annum out of the treasury of the town of Ports, aforesaid, according to the orders made by his Excellency Col. Dudley, the Council, and Assembly of this province in_May, 1714, and that the selectmen of the town of Portsmo. aforesaid, for the time being, give ont their warrants from year to year to the constables for collecting the same and all such as are inhabitants [ratable at law] of sª town in proportion, except those that are of the parish of Greenland : and further , yt the P'sonage house on ye north side of the Mill

The General Assembly, at its same session, goes on to say, "And further considering of the great increase of the inhabitants of the said town of Portsmouth, that there be two ministers, two meeting-houses main- tained in the said town, and that the two meeting- houses now in being are the houses and places directed and agreed upon, and to be finished and repaired at the expense of the whole town ; that Mr. Rogers and his maintenance be established as above provided ; that the minister of the other meeting-house at the Mill Dam shall be named and chosen by an assem- bly of all the freeholders in the said town, and have ! his salary and parsonage house provided and main- tained at the charge of said town. And whereas Mr. John Emerson has served in the congregation at the meeting-honse near the Mill Dam for some time past, there be made him at his departure a present of fifty ponnds with thanks for his services there, the said fifty pounds to be paid ont of the town treasury, and . Dam be built at ye public charge of the town except

PORTSMOUTH.

as before excepted. Also y' as ye N. meeting-house was built by a public tax, ye old one be repaired, and both maintained from time to time out of a joynt stock ; and that ye two petitions relating to this mat- ter ( viz. ], ye petition preferred by Capt. Pickering, and ye petition preferred by Mr. Jaffrey, he dismissed."

This vote of the Assembly makes each parish of equal importance so far as public matters were con- cerned; but they there arose another trouble out of the embittered feelings. In providing the minister's salaries, it seems the seleetmen as they were on one or the other side would rate some of the parishioners in the wrong parish and so make them pay a double parish tax, and wardens generally find that most per- sons are ready to pay at least but one. The redoubt- able Capt. Pickering, in the midst of the difficulty, added fuel to the flame by some ways that were at least strange. It seems that a paper was signed, by which for certain advantages some of the parishioners at the new, to bring peace, agreed to contribute cer- tain sums for one year for the support of the minister at the old meeting-house, but afterwards found the paper was drawn up without limitations as to time." Thereupon we find in 1716, May 17th, this vote: "For preventing of any future disturbance & difference that has or may arise in ye town of Portsmo. about ye minister's salary in ye town, voted, that the subscri- bers to & constant hearers of ye Rev. Mr. Rogers at ye new meeting-house be impowered and enabled by an act to support him there in the ministry by an The South Parish retained the old meeting-house and a majority of the old parish. Whatever legal rights a majority vote of parish or church may con- fer, no going away of a part can affect the earlier history which belongs equally to each. The associa- tions which cluster around a locality can never be voted to another place, and around the old South the early settlement. For a long time the history of the two parishes was the same, that of the church of Portsmouth, and when it flowed into two channels it was fortunately to witness a prosperity for each of which neither need be jealous. The first difficulty was in regard to the location of the church, the next was doctrinal. equal assessment on themselves, & that they be ex- eused paying anything towards ye support of any other minister in ye town until named & chosen by an assembly of all ye frecholders of ye town accord- ing to an act of Gen. Assembly of ye 11 May, 1714, that the hearers of Mr. Emerson have ye same power for raising his salary among themselves." At the Church clustered and always will the recollection of same session there came before the Assembly the fol- lowing petition : " The humble petition of severall of ye Inhabitants of ye town of Portsmo in behalf of themselves & others humbly sheweth ; That whereas upon the Removal of Rev. Mr. Rogers unto ye new meeting-house, we, being disposed for one year and no longer to support a minister at the old until mat- ters of ye town were amicably accommodate, did in- advertently sign unto a certain instrument without reading or considering the contents thereof, & being CHAPTER XIII PORTSMOUTH .- (Continued.) since informed that ye import of the sª instrument was without any limitation of time, whereby. we & our successors are greatly insnared to our unspeaka- ble hurt & prejudice, doe humbly pray that ye said instrument may be produced, whereby the false insin- uations of those that insnared us may be detected, & that we may be released therefrom."

Still for two year- longer the matter came con- stantly before the Council and General Assembly, and the whole province was affected by the quarrel, until at last the selectmen each year, with the help of the wardens, made out a list of each freeholder and

the parish to which he belonged, so that no longer was the same person compelled to pay both, and no longer could any one escape paying to either by claiming a house of worship now at the north and now at the south.

The result of the whole trouble was that the two parishes were declared to be the two parishes of the town, and went on with a prosperity which has hardly known a pause until the present day. The north was the new parish, and made up principally of the new settlers in this part of the town, while the trouble seems to have had little effect upon the old as a parish ; it called another pastor at once, paid him the same salary that the whole town paid to Mr. Rogers, and seems to have known no break in its his- tory or its influence or its strength, but there was no such thing as first or second parish or church spoken of. It was always the old meeting-house and the new, or the parish at the Mill Dam or the parish at the Bank. The vote of the majority of the church as a body of communicants, being the more import- ant legal body in that day, gave them the right to take with them the church records and the commu- nion service, perhaps a part of the old service which belonged to Mason and the first Episcopal Chapel, and to compel Mr. Rogers to go with them. But the north was never in any sense the first church of Portsmouth, for that, as we have seen abundantly confirmed, was Episcopal.

Re-establishment of Episcopacy-Rev. Arthur Brown-Dr. Bancroft- Dr. Burroughs- Rulers until the Revolution-Benning Wentworth- Sir John Wentworth-Principal Names in the Early Settlement- Henry Sherburn-John Pickering-Sumuel Wentworth-Sir William Pepperell-The Siege of Louisburg-Champernowne-Succeeding Ministers of the Old South Parish-Emerson-A Church at the Plains -Alsence of the Spirit of Persecution-Witchcraft-A New Church -Shurtleff-Clerical Anecdotes-Revival under Whitefield-Strong- Jonathan Edwards-Ministers of the North Parish-The L'niversal- ist Parish-Various Events-Visit of Washington-Conclusion.

Re-establishment of Episcopacy .- The persist- ency with which persons for generations cling to

HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM COUNTY, NEW HAMPSHIRE.

their theological inheritances, even at times without being able to give any reason for them, is well illus- trated in the re-establishment of Episcopacy in Ports- mouth. This element never entirely died out here, but was cherished in a few families or individuals, ready to manifest itself at any opportunity which promised to give it an organization and a home. It was stronger in the Piscataqua than any of the his- torians have yet acknowledged. It was clearly a part of the early settlers' plan to make this a Church of England settlement, but the ascendency of the Mas- sachusetts soon put all the interest here in the hands of the Puritans. The first minister, a strong defender of the Established Church, was banished simply for that reason, and for a long time Episcopaey seemed entirely destroyed. In the first quarter of the eigh- teenth century quite a serious trouble was brewing in regard to the boundary line between the provinces of the Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire. As early as 1730, Col. David Dunbar was chairman of a commission on the part of this province to meet a committee of the Bay on the adjusting of this line. ' He was a native of Ireland, and appointed Lieuten- ant-Governor of this province in 1731, and also sur- veyor-general of the woods. He had been a colonel in the British service, and being commander of the fort at Pemaquid, he assumed the government of all the inhabitants in that part of Maine; but exercising the military discipline with considerable rigor, he came into collision with the land proprietors, who applied for relief to Governor Belcher, and he issued a proclamation ordering the inhabitants to submit to the Massachusetts instead of Dunbar. The Governor and his lieutenant were in contention as long as Dun- bar remained in the country. Dunbar had command of the fort at New Castle, and in retaliation made everything as uncomfortable for Governor Belcher as he could. The latter came into power in 1730, as Governor of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, was ambitious, arbitrary, tyrannical, and unjust, par- tial to Massachusetts, and unfriendly to New IIamp- shire, and it is probable that reaction against his counsels and decisions hastened the ecclesiastieal as well as the political opposition to his rule.

While Dunbar had charge of the settlement of the boundary line, which threatened to bring the prov- inees into open war, one Capt. John Thomlinson, a merchant of London well known in New Hampshire, was agent for the matter of the boundary at the court of Great Britain; and in this Thomlinson, Dunbar found a zealous friend of the new church movement. Theodore Atkinson, one of the most prominent eiti- zens, and whose name constantly appears in all po- litical matters, was also foremost in aiding it. It was begun in 1732, and the church was finished in 1735. This church was a frame building, somewhat smaller than the present one, with a steeple like that of the old South, and two entrances, one on the west, the other on the south. On the north side the central

of the wall pews was raised above the rest, a heavy wooden canopy built over it bore the royal arms, and red plush curtains were festooned around it. Pre- vious to the Revolution this was called the Governor's pew, and in 1789 was occupied by Washington when on a visit to Portsmouth. The bell was taken from Louisburg at the time of its capture in 1745, and in that year presented by the officers of the New Hamp- shire regiment to this church. The most valuable relic and ornament of the church, the font, a beauti- fnl piece of porphyritie marble of a brownish-yellow color, was plundered from a church in Senegal, Africa, by Col. John Tupton Mason, and presented by his daughters to Queen's Chapel; but, however inter- esting for its history, it confers only disgrace upon its capturer, for, according to the general rules of all Christian warfare, the churches are exempt from spoliation.

Rev. Arthur Brown .- On the 18th of August, 1735, and chiefly through the earnest activity of his ardent admirer, Dunbar, an invitation to Rev. Arthur Brown was extended and accepted, and he became rector of Queen's Chapel, the salary being assured by the liberality of the English Society for Propa- gating the Gospel in Foreign Parts. His ministry was popular and successful, and lasted until 1773, when, on a visit to Cambridge, he died, at the age of seventy-four, and was interred in the Wentworth tomb of Queen's Chapel graveyard. All the tributes offered to his memory show that he must have been a man of real culture, of unpretentious goodness, of eminent worth. It was not owing to his popular gifts and assiduous labors only that his success was so marked. The times were propitious and helpful to second his own and the enthusiasm of a people gathered with all the interest attendant upon the establishment of a new church. Every official of the government was expected to belong to the Estab- lished Church of England; the officers of the army and navy were all really compelled to choose that faith. The Rev. Mr. Brown was as fortunate in his death as in his labors, for it occurred just as the troubles were gathering with England, and the break- ing out of the war promised for a time to crush every- thing which related to English customs and English worship. The parish, which had enjoyed great pros- perity for nearly thirty years, suffered a sudden and almost entire overthrow and extinction, and Episco- pacy was reduced to a state almost as low as at the close of the ministry of Gibson, more than a century before, and for almost twenty-five years after the death of Mr. Brown the church was almost entirely neglected. After the Revolution, two or three sue- cessive rectors were not very snecessful in their min- istrations, and in the winter of 1806 the church was destroyed by fire. At that time the South Parish was without a pastor, and the use of the church was offered to Queen's Chapel, now changed to St. John's, and for some time it was not unusual for the two

PORTSMOUTH.

societies to unite in public worship, the same clergy- man frequently officiating for both parishes, reading the Book of Common Prayer one part of the day, and following the simple congregational order of services for the other. The extremely feeble condi- tion of this sect in this part of New England at that period is shown by the fact that there was no Epis- copal visitation of the Portsmouth parish from 1791 to 1812. In this latter year we have the first record of the administration of the rite of confirmation.

Dr. Burroughs .- Mr. Charles Burroughs, then in deacon's orders, had been the minister of the parish for three years, but never had the opportunity of being confirmed. The records show that on the day preceding his ordination to the priesthood he received confirmation, together with one hundred and fifty of his congregation, and in order to be or- dained as deacon he had been obliged to journey to Philadelphia.

With the establishment of peace and liberty of conscience, and under the attractive ministrations of Dr. Burroughs, St. John's again took its place among the flourishing churches of Portsmouth. Dr. Burroughs was born in Boston on the 27th of De- cember, 1787, and there his early boyhood was passed. Ile enjoyed and improved the best opportunities of that day for a classical education, in which he made great attainments, and all through life enriched a mind of fair proportions with all the elegant liter- ature of ancient or modern times. He came to Portsmouth as a reader in 1809, and such was his reputation for entering into and rendering the beau- ties of the church service, and the entire satisfaction he gave as a writer, that many from other parishes, being occasional listeners, confessed to a willingness to remain permanently if Mr. Burroughs could be induced to take the care of the parish. Among all the distinguished men of Portsmouth in his long ministry, Dr. Burroughs was still eminent for his rare gifts of conversation, for his ample culture, for his elegant hospitality at his beautiful home, for his inborn and acquired grace of manner, for his unfailing liberality, for his daily walk in harmony with his altar professions. He was rector until the year 1857, a citizen of Portsmouth until the 5th of March, 1868, when he became a fellow-citizen with the saints .?

Rulers until the Revolution .- In 1717, after a good deal of rivalry and disturbance between the Governor, the Lieutenant-Governor, and the Assem- bly, the king removed Vaughan from office, and John Wentworth was appointed Lieutenant-Governor in his place.

John Wentworth. - John Wentworth was the grandson of William Wentworth, the first of the name in this country, whose son, Samuel Wentworth, of Portsmouth, has been already referred to. William was an elder of the church at Dover, and occasionally

preached there. John was born in Portsmouth in 1671. Under his rule the town had a period of peace and steady prosperity until 1730, when again a dis- turbance arose from the appointment of Belcher as Governor of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, who from some petty displeasure turned out of office the friends of Wentworth ; but the Lieutenant-Governor died in this same year and Dunbar was appointed in his place, and retained the place under constantly-in- creasing opposition until 1741, when the great dissat- isfaction against him as well as Governor Belcher resulted in the erection of New Hampshire into a separate province, with the appointment of Benning Wentworth as Governor in 1741.

Benning Wentworth .- Governor Wentworth was a son of the former Lieutenant-Governor John Went- worth, and was born in Portsmouth in 1696. Ile be- came a merchant of prominence and a person of much influence in the colony, and his appointment was received with great satisfaction by the people. He married for a sveond wife Martha Hilton, his housekeeper, upon which incident is founded Long- fellow's story of Lady Wentworth. The expedition against Louisburg was the principal and exciting event during his term of office; which ended in 1766, just as the Stamp Act was arousing the indignation of the American people.

Sir John Wentworth .- Sir John Wentworth, a nephew of Benning, was appointed as Governor in 1766, and also as surveyor of all the king's woods in North America. IIe was born in Portsmouth in 1736, and, while on a visit to England, became a favorite of the Marquis of Rockingham, through whose influence he received his important offices and entered upon them in 1768, landing at Charles- town, and crossing from that port by land to this town. But the times were growing troublesome for all the English officials ; the sense of oppression and the de- sire for liberty were rapidly spreading, and in 1774, be- cause of the aid the Governor rendered to Gen. Gage, the excitement of the people was so great that he was compelled to take refuge, first, in the fort at New Cas- tle, and then upon an English man-of-war in the har- bor. He remained in England until peace was de- elared, became Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia, and died in 1820. Ile was a friend to education, and gave forty-six thousand acres of land to Dartmouth Col- lege, and also a grant to each member of the first grad- uating class. After he left the country and the war of the Revolution secured the independence of the United States, this settlement, whose history we have sketched in its most important events, became, with New Hampshire, a part of the American Union, and entered upon that marvelous prosperity which has won for this country the admiration and envy of the world.

A Few of the Principal Names in the Early Settlement .- HENRY SHERBURNE. Among those who were very prominent in the civil and ecclesiastical

1 See page 95.

HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM COUNTY, NEW HAMPSHIRE.

affairs of this colony was Henry Sherburne, from the appointed first president of the separate government of New Hampshire, in 1680, Capt. Pickering was a representative for the town of Portsmouth, and he was also a member of the Assembly called by Cran- field and dissolved in great wrath because it would not raise the money he desired. beginning an active churchman and a warden of the first church of the Piscataqua settlement. His asso- ciate warden, Walford, appears some years later as the husband of the witch Goody Walford, and there may be some reason for the supposition that the charge of witchcraft had a connection with the ani- mosity existing between the Independents and church party. Sherburne appears in this settlement as early as June, 1632, when the Bay Colony came into rule here and it was evidently no longer possible to main- tain Episcopacy. Sherburne still took an interest in supporting public worship, as approved by the ma- jority, although by no means to his own mind. We find him appointed by the town to go in search of a minister, and also engaging to entertain the minister | & clerk of the Superior Court, & demanded the records when he came. All this was in the faith that the re-establishment of Episcopacy might occur at an early day, and in this faith it doubtless was that we find him in the first list of the subscribers to the sup- port of Moodey while officiating at the old South in 1658; but when his faith by force of circumstances grew less, and it was evidently the intention of the Bay to establish their ecclesiastical system here, with all its vigor, then Sherburne refused altogether to contribute towards the support of doctrines he did not accept, for in a list of subscribers to the mainte- nance of Moodey in 1671 we find annexed to the names of Henry Sherburne and Richard Sloper, his son-in- law, the note " will not subscribe." Nor is there any want of Christian liberality or Christian charity in that, rather is it to be commended. There are persons enough without any religious connections, and with- out attachments to any of the various doctrinal sys- tems, and those who deem all equally good or equally poor, can help support all; but it is not the best- placed charity or the most commendable spirit, for the sake of improving a neighborhood, or being re- garded as generous, or becoming popular, to con- tribute to the advancement of views one does not think helpful to a higher religions life.

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History of Rockingham and Strafford counties, New Hampshire : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 20

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis Number of Pages: 1714

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis
Number of Pages: 1714