History of Essex and Hudson counties, New Jersey, Vol. I, Part 129

Author: Shaw, William H
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: [United States :]
Number of Pages: 840

USA > New Jersey > Essex County > History of Essex and Hudson counties, New Jersey, Vol. I > Part 129
USA > New Jersey > Hudson County > History of Essex and Hudson counties, New Jersey, Vol. I > Part 129

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The burdensome labors of Mr. Kanouse impaired his strength, and he retired from his charge in April, 1837, after a ministry of little more than two years. Long and greatly beloved as " Father Kanouse," he died in Deckertown at the age of eighty. The presi- dont of the Merchants' Bank in this city is his grand- son.

Probably toward the close of the year 1837 the being then about thirty-five years of age. Ile was no ordinary man. He had been intensely engaged from 1830 to 1832 in revival labors in Elyria, Ohio, and its vicinity.

By nature he was ardent, hopeful, disposed to under-

1 The only record of this event Is an advertisement which appenred in the Daily Adrerfixer the day previous. The dedication sertion wan prob- ubly preached by the pastor.

. The time when this ceased to br formally required as a condition of membership is not known. It seems to have passed at an early period into the number of things taken for granted on the part of applicants.

8 A copy of this address, printed five years later in a small paper called The Visitor, is in the library of the New Jersey Historical Society. The building in which it was delivered has been transformed into a tone- ment house, on Academy Street, In the rear of a brick block on the cor- ner named.

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RELIGIOUS INTERESTS OF NEWARK.

estimate difficulties and expect great things as the fruit of his zeal. He had, however, delicate health, with greatly impaired eyesight from the effects of poison taken in his youth by mistake for medieme, but habituated himself to severe physical exercise. It is related of him that he requested of two of his parishioners the privilege of sawing their wood, say- ing that it helped him think out his sermons. He felt himself free in this church to disregard the color line, as drawn in society, by putting his colored ser- vant in his own pew. It was not the first time that this line had been conspicuously disregarded. The negro Governor of Liberia had attended worship here before, in the company of Dr. Ward's father-in-law, Mr. William Rankin. Some of the people, however, were not equally ready for this more leveling appli- cation of their principles, and it made " some talk."

Mr. Shipherd's mind seems to have preferred his wider work at the West, and he soon relinquished his charge here. His brief stay here is chiefly noticeable for the historical fame of the man as the founder of two Christian colleges.

Directly upon his removal the Rev. Charles Fitch assumed the charge, Sept. 1, 1838, for a period of two years and a half, eventful for the church. He was remarkably familiar with the Bible, and his writings show him to have been an humble-minded, sweet-tem- pered, fervently religious man.

The interior life of the church was marked, during Mr. Fitch's ministry, by the fervor that had been manifest from the beginning, and by a continual in- gathering. The special phenomenon of the period was a theological controversy, growing out of its re- vivalistic spirit, and resulting in an unhappy disrup- tion from sister churches.

The church was from the beginning what was called " new school." This new schoolism showed itself less in dogma than in a spirit of revivalistic ag- gressiveness and the stress laid upon men's responsi- bility for immediate obedience to the Gospel. Mr. Fitch especially insisted on the duty of Christians to aim at entire holiness, nothing less. This raised the question whether entire holiness were attainable in this life. Mr. Fitch answered this in the affirmative by a pamphlet published in November, 1839, in re- spoonse to an inquiry in the Presbytery, This was pronounced by the Presbytery, in January, 1×40, to be a dangerous error, contrary to the Scriptures and the standards. They admonished him to desist from preaching that doctrine, and the session to prevent it from being propagated in the congregation. In the following April, Mr. Fitch announced that he must adhere to his views, and would withdraw from the Presbytery to spare them the painfulness of proceed- ing against him. At the same time the session in- formed the Presbytery that the church sided with its pastor. Upon this the Presbytery called upon the church to make its choice between giving up Mr. Fitch and his views and giving up further fellowship

with the Presbytery. The committee appointed to present this alternative to the church reported to the Presbytery that the church adhered to its pastor. Whereupon the Presbytery, June 16, 1519, resolved that the Free Church of Newark have no further con- nection with Newark Presbytery.1

Mr Fitch's " Reasons for Withdrawing from the Newark Presbytery " are on record in a pamphlet published in April of that year. It is but a drop in a Hood of publications of that period upon that subject. Mr. Fitch and his church never affirmed themselves sinless or perfect. They athirmed at most that a complete sanctification in this life was the divine promise, and that the attainment of sinlessness must therefore be the Christian ideal, satisfied with nothing short of it is a believing endeavor toward it. But they thereby contradicted the statement of the cate- chism : "No mere man is able perfectly to keep the commandments of God,"-a statement which they felt was too often rested in as an excuse for not trying. It would seem that they should have been tolerated in setting their standard at the highest, so long as they did not boast prematurely of attaining it.

The evangelistie spirit of this church showed itself, meanwhile and subsequently, in effective Christian work. " Miss Hunter's Sunday-school," as it was called, was one of its earliest undertakings. There were some fifty young women, hat-binders, in the fac- tory of Mr. William Rankin. Many of them were brought into our Sunday-school by his daughter, Mrs. Ward. Among these was Miss Nancy Hunter, one of three sisters. She carried on a Sunday-school in Mercer Street, then an out-of-the-way place on the hill. Out of this school grew the High Street Presbyterian Church, which was organized in 1549. Another Sun- day-school was opened in Camp Street in the house of Amos Lum, and moved in 1551 to what is now the Chestnut Street depot, where it became a mission- school of the South Park Presbyterian Church. An- other work of this kind was led by Miss Harriet W. Wardell, who became a member of our church in 1835, than whom a more zealous spirit has never been among us. Her school was on the corner of Bank and Lock Streets, and finally developed into the Wickliffe Street Presbyterian Church, which became a mission branch of the Third Presbyterian Church in 17. These schools were union efforts in concert with members of other churches, but these members of our church were leading spirits and aided by others of our num- ber. In our home Sunday-school Miss Wardell was also most active in mission work, having gathered in at one time as many as seventy children, for some of whom her fellow-teachers joined her in meeting to make garments .? She was also the first head of the

1 No mention of this event occurs In the Dualy Advertiser of that werk. The art of newspaper reporting had not then been born.

This work is said to have given rise to the Ladies' Benevolent Society, the date of the organization of which is uncertain. A Sewing ('ircle existed from a very early time, as in many churchos, meeting frumu house

518

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.

Industrial School, started first in the Bethel building, at the foot of Canal Street. Considerably later than these movements was the Rankin Street Sunday- school, the last of the series in which this church has been active, and the only one which it exclusively controlled and supported.

Mr. Fitch'- pastorate was shortened by his feeling that he had done his work here and was called to repeat it elsewhere. It is related by one of our oldest members that, while on a visit to Branehville, in Sussex County, she remarked to the pastor there upon the need of a revival in that place, and wished that he could get Mr. Fitch to help him. The next Sunday, to her surprise she saw Mr. Fitch in the pul- pit, and the hoped-for revival followed his preaching. Mr. Fitch closed his work here in March, 1841.

Mr. Fitch was succeeded Sept. 20, 1841, by a man of like spirit, though less force, the Rev. William L. Parsons. He held strong anti-slavery views, and stood by the doctrine for which the church had been dis- fellowshiped by Presbytery. He was winsome to children, and his spirit was thoroughly gentle and self-sacrificing. Like minded with him was his wife, a woman greatly beloved, who used to gather the children into her Saturday afternoon meetings, and finally lost her life by the small pox, contracted in nursing the sick.

The spirit of the church at that time may be de- scribed in the words of a prominent citizen, who has long since been connected with another congregation : " They were as godly a set of people as 1 over knew, religion seemed to be their daily and chief concern, their supreme practical interest. And they were a warm-hearted people, too." In the Manual of 1843, as in the first Manual of 1836, is a list of twelve questions with Scripture references for self-examina- tion. Among them are such as these,-

" Do you pray in your family morning and evening? Do yon daily read the word of Gud ? Do yon maintain secret prayer ? Do you bridle your tongue? Me yon at peace with all men ? What are you doing for the salvation of men at home and abroad?"

The exhortation follows to read these once a week. Discipline was more earnestly insisted on. The Man- ual of 1843 records the fact that nine had been ex- communicated during the nine years of the history, and that eight were then under suspension. There was much visiting of the members by each other. If any were sick, the deacons went to see them. The good old way was this. The fraternal spirit makes the church the true body of t'hrist. The modern way of deputing the manifestation of the fraternal spirit to the minister destroys the strength of the church that falls into it, reduces the body to parti-

lo house, with social aseanblies in the evening. When the basement at the church was reconstructed, in ING, into a large social room, and chair substituted for paws, these seventies began to be held there, and The social supper to be marad there, which till the present hus formed so attractive n feature of the winter season. The organization of the Benev- olent society was many years previony to this change.

cles that require a pulpit-magnet to hold them to- gether.

The annual parish-meetings are still opened with prayer. A short discourse in addition to this is occa- sionally reported ; for example :-

"January 1st, 1841 .- Meeting for religious service at 10 o'clock. After a thrilling discourse on the subject of abolition, which noule every heart bleed for the oppressed, the meeting proceeded to busi- 11088.''

The name which has since then been oftenest in the list of trustees is mentioned at that meeting in its earliest connection with that office. The trustees were then required to be sworn in, by a curiously elaborate triple oath, binding them to observe the constitution and laws of the l'uion and of New Jer- sey, as well as to be true to their official duties.

The statistics of the year 1843 show the church at its high-water mark in respect to numbers, with a membership of five hundred and fifty-seven. After a long decline that mark was reached again in 1866 in a membership of five hundred and sixty-one.

Mr. Parsons retired from his charge Dec. 1, 1843, with mutual good-will, and moved to Boonton, dying, when between sixty and seventy years of age, in Le- roy, N. Y. The four who have succeeded him in the pastorate are at this day all alive. The history of the church henceforth shows a gradual modification of its original character.

The Rev. Almon Uuderwood, still living at Irving- ton, took charge April 1, 1844. The circumstances were not wholly favorable, financial difficulties began to be serious, and the pastor's salary was but seven hundred dollars. There was fear of losing the church unless obligations could be met. Harder times were seen than ever before or since. There was a run on the bank. Removals not always for good cause diminished resources. When the defeat of Mr. Clay in the Presidential election of 1844 was announced, occasioned by the withdrawing of the anti-slavery vote of New York from the Whig party, a prominent member, a bank president, and a strong Whig, said, in his disgust at the political result, "If this is what Inderwood's principles lead to, I shall quit," and quit he did. In the struggle for existence, there was not much benevolent giving, but a missionary society was formed in the Sunday-school, with monthly meet- ings and considerable success. This continues to this day. The financial pillar at that time was Mr. Thomas V. Johnson. The society managed to pay one hundred dollars for music, the principal instru- ment being the bass viol.

Mr. Underwood was as strongly anti-slavery as any of his people, some of whom did service as conductors of the "underground railroad" for fugitives from bondage. He believed thoroughly in revivals, as his subsequent long activity as an evangelist abundantly showed, but he believed in a thorough work of con- science under law. It is related that he went to New York one Saturday for an exchange of pulpits. The

519

RELIGIOES INTERESTS OF NEWARK.

New York pastor was prevented from coming to Now- ark on Saturday. Both pastors had seruphs against Sunday traveling. In consequence, the church here had no minister that Sunday. Fellowship by ex- change of pulpits in this city was only with the Bap- tist, Methodist and African churches. The way he- gan to be prepared for the approaching change to the Congregational form. Mr. Inderwood being a Con- gregationalist, was in the habit of referring matters to the church-meeting for decision oftener than some of the ruling members liked.

Mr. Underwood's ministry closed in the latter part of the year 1819. In August, 1850, the Rev. Charles Beecher began to supply the pulpit regularly.1 By his counsel the step was taken which opened the way to a return of prosperity. The church had been for ten years isolated, Presbyterian in name only, and cut off from fellowship with others of that name as come- outers, both in theological and political opinions. In this isolation a decline had been going on, and invig- oration was hoped for in ceasing to stand alone. It was resolved therefore to enter into fellowship with the body of Congregational churches which had re- cently begun to spring up in Brooklyn, New York and vicinity.

After long and full discussion, the church voted, in a meeting in which thirty families were present, to dissolve and reorganize. The property was deeded in trust to Mr. J. H. Woodhull, who derded it to the newly-formed society. On June 21th, the new society chose its first board of trustees,-Messrs. Thomas V. Johnson, Dr. Thomas Lafon, John P. Jube, John Tobin, J. 11. Woodhull, S. B. Tuttle, Israel Pierson. On July 2d a council of eleven churches gave the hand of fellow ship to the reorganized church, in which upwards of two hundred persons were enrolled. The Rev. Dr. I P. Thompson, of the Broadway Taher- nacle, New York, preached the sermon from 1 Timo- thy i. 11 .- " The glorious Gospel of the blessed God." On November 7th following, Mr. Beecher was installed pastor in Congregational form by a council of ten neighboring churches.

The ebb tide had now changed to flood, but the rise was not rapid. It was a period of high political feel- ing on the slavery question, and this church was, as it had been, on the unpopular side. Mr. Brecher was stigmatized as an Abolitionist, and was never asked to exchange with any minister in Newark. He preached a strong sermon against the Fugitive Slave Law in 151. which the church printed, but the boy who sokl it in the cars was obliged to desist for his safety.

The ten years covered by the pastorates of Mesers. Underwood and Beccher formed a transition period between the primitive condition and the new order of things, which became established under Dr. Brown.

The original character of the church was a fusion of the Methodist and Presbyterian type, in which the Methodistie ferver and aggressiveness were most con- spicuous, permitting the audible responses of enthusi- astie worshipers, and the participation of women as they chose in the general prayer-meetings. This type now gradually gave way to the other. Revivalistic methods and the employment of evangelists declined, the church lost its original special characteristic as a church designed for strangers, and approximated more to the general type of a church for families In connection with this gradual change of character. the special advantages of the free-seat plan disappeared ; it became, perhaps, more of a hindrance than a help. to numerical growth.

Mr. Beecher was fully equal as a preacher to any of his predecessors. Ile did much to improve the church music, in which art he was proficient, per- forming both on the piano and the violin. In his time the bass viol in the gallery gave place to the first organ .? No revival ingathering is recorded, but the membership of the church increased by about one hundred during his ministry, showing an active church life.3 His wife faithfully shared his labors and the high esteem in which he was held." If he failed in anything at all, it was in the fine art of disarming small prejudices by small conces- sions. After three years of faithful service, he retired in impaired health, was dismissed by Council in February, 1854. and became pastor at Georgetown, Mass.5

In January, 1855, the Rev. William B. Brown, then pastor of the Free Christian Church in Andover, Mass., was called to the pastorate, in which he was installed on June 27th of that year." The record of his ministry makes nearly half of the whole history of the church. It was then that the original plan of seats free from rent or assessment was given up, to the strong disappointment of a sincerely-attached min- ority. The earliest reference in the records to this change is in 1858.

The invigorated growth of this society after the change vindicated the wisdom of it. The membership, which in 1856 was three hundred and four, was in 1866 five hundred and sixty-one. The whole number of communicants at one time or another connected with the church during that period is about eleven hundred. The pastor's salary, which began at twelve hundred dollars, was successively increased to fifteen

1 Poring a part of the interval the pulpit was supplied by the Hov. . I. F. Haly, who about that tune became pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Montelair, He died nbant two year ago.

" The second organ, much superior, was put in at a cost of slane twelve hundred dollars, during the carly part of Dr. Brown's past mate

3 Early morning prayer-meetings, at five or mit o'clock, are said to have been attended by as many ne twenty The same are reported from Mr. Fitch's time, ten years Infort.

4 In testintony of this, hin miary was increased In 154 frem om thoy- sand dollars to one thousand two hundred dollar.

At the close of this year the Incl sure of the church by the present Iron funer was undertaken, Mr. S. R. Heath, then a neighbor, con- tributing one hundred dedları,

" Between February and Jane the hatte underwent a vienosse repair

520

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.

hundred dollars, then to two thousand dollars, then to two thousand five hundred dollars.

From 1856 to 1866 two hundred and forty-eight person- made confession of faith, of whom one hun- dred and eight came in in the great revival of 1857- 58, forty-seven of them receiving adult baptism. During the civil war fifty from this congregation joined the army of the nation, the pastor's son among them, of whom one-half returned. The work of the Christian Commission within this State devolved upon the pastor of this church, with one other. When peace came, there came with it, in the triumph of the anti- slavery cause, for which this church had stood from the first, a restoration of that fellowship with neighbor churches from which it had been for a quarter of a century cut off.1 The long and happy continuance of Christian reason on the truths of Revelation. In this the church is content to wait as before, till time and experience shall have dissipated preju- dice.

the good feeling, in which old prejudices, theologieal and social, were forgotten, received a conspicuous at- testation in the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity, which was bestowed upon the pastor in 1877 by the College of New Jersey.

The Congregational Association of New Jersey2 or- ganized 1869, the Newark Association of Ministers in 1871, the Newark Conference of Churches in 1877,- gracions bonds of fellowship, for lack of which the primitive churches "kept not their first estate." All bear the impress of Dr. Brown's forming hand.

Seeing a gradual decline of numbers, but especially weakened by the sore bereavement which befehl him and the church in the death of his wife, in March, 1878, Dr. Brown, in May of that year, relinquished his charge,3 and became secretary of the American Con- gregational Union.

Two years previous to that the interior of the house had been brought into nearly its present con- dition by the removal of the galleries and pulpit, the putting in of the stained-glass windows, and the deco- ration of the walls and ceiling, at an expense of up- ward- of three thousand dollars. The exterior was also changed by the removal of the square bell-tower. Changes had been made nine years before in the basement, making a large social room, with side apartments, in place of three rooms. In 1882, when a new organ was procured, at a cost of upwards of two thousand dollars, the last change was made by the transfer of the organ and choir to the front.

The present pastorate. Rev. James M. Whiton. Ph.D., was assumed in February, 1879, and recog- nized by an installing council in the month follow- ing, has already continued longer than any but two of those preceding, and about as long as one of these two. Sixty-five members have been added to the church since it began. It began with an emphatic recognition on the part both of the church and council of the freedom of the progressiveness of Christian thought in the interpretation of the Serip- tures. Coincidently with this, it began, so far as our immediate neighbors are concerned, with a repetition of the intolerance shown in 1840 in the refusal of Christian fellowship on the same ground as then, namely, the freedom here claimed for the exercise of

In the summer of 1881 the thirtieth anniversary of the Congregational organization was celebrated. The three pastors who have occupied the period con- ducted the services of the day, Mr. Beecher preach- ing upon "Christian Friendship" in the morning, from John xv. 15, and commemorative reminiscenees by him and Dr. Brown occupying the evening, to- gether with salutations from Grove Street and Bell- ville Avenue by Dr. W. II. Ward; who said that this pulpit had not done its full share in helping on the unsectarian times that are to come. Dr. Ray Palmer offered the closing prayer.

During the present year for the first time in its his- tory, the church has undertaken the "systematic giving" which is being adopted by more and more churches, and to which all churches will ultimately come when the fundamental law of Christian steward- ship is duly recognized, and the objects for which Christ instituted His church are duly appreciated. The result is already a large increase of gifts, notwith- standing the pressure of home burdens. The charities of the last two years have averaged fourteen hundred dollars, two-thirds of what they were in 1866, with a membership then more than twice as large as now. If the church can hold on that way it will find that " God loveth the cheerful giver."

The membership of the church on the 1st of Jan- uary, 1884, was two hundred and ten, including non- residents.

It is an honorable history here sketched, luminous with worthy and cherished names, among which more than we have mentioned come to mind from the multi- tude now parted from the church, a few still on earth, but most in heaven, such as Mrs. S. G. Gould, Mrs. S. B. Alling, Caroline Riker, Caroline Logan, Mrs. A. N. Dougherty, Mrs. Rachael leaton, Archibakl S. Shafer, Arnold Shaw, James A. Baldwin, Joseph L. Hewes, W. M. Simpson, David (. Berry, Charles Merchant, William Lyon, John Adams, E. M. Noyes, Henry Hopper, J. B. and J. H. Wilkinson, W. D. Russel.

1 It was in this time of the greatest prosperity, 1864, that the subject of a change of loxation and "a new church edifice" was first broached in a meeting of the moiety, -o subject which has been before the church for twenty year-, and an open question still.

? This succeeded to the New Jermy Conference, organized in 1860. A baly of the same mme was organized in Iel, and met regularly till 1×53.

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History of Essex and Hudson counties, New Jersey, Vol. I, Part 129

Author: Shaw, William H Publication date: 1884 Publisher: [United States :] Number of Pages: 840

Author: Shaw, William H
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: [United States :]
Number of Pages: 840