USA > New Jersey > Essex County > Orange > The Mountain Society : a history of the First Presbyterian Church, Orange, N. J. organized about the year 1719 with an account of the earliest settlements in Newark > Part 5
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There is a copy in England among the Board of Trade papers. On the title-page is this note in the hand of Mr. James Alexander, of the Council of New Jersey: "This ought to have been with papers transmitted in December and February last, but copies could not then be got at New York, the author having carried all to New Jersey for sale there." See Analytical Index to the Colo- nial Documents of N. J., p. 196.
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REPLIES.
many of the rioters, being ignorant men, and many of them strangers to the Province, and since they came to it living retired in and behind the moun- tains of Newark, upon any land they could find, without enquiring who the owner thereof was, have of late been animated and stirred up to believe, that those things which the laws of the Province have declared to be criminal and penal were law- ful; and that those crimes committed gave the criminals rights, privileges, and properties ; but though many have been ignorant enough to be so seduced, we cannot think that all can with truth plead that excuse." Doubtless among the excepted cases was " Parson Taylor," suspected by council- man Alexander (who wished he had sufficient evi- dence of it) to be the composer of all their papers.
In their publication of Sept. 14, 1747, we find the following spicy allusions to our ancient pastor :
" The Committee [of the opposition] who appear on the stage, are nine expert men, with an Assem- blyman in the number, and many hundreds, even thousands, say they, of club-men at their command. And who can withstand that interest ? Especially as the worthy Committee and clubmen have two supernumerary prompters behind the curtain- CLERGYMEN-who sanctify their actions ! One of them, it's said, is the before-named Mr. Taylor, a reverend Independent minister of the mountains behind Newark, secretary, scribe, and councillor to
75
PULPIT VIEWS.
the worthy Committee, in their several late per- formances in newspapers, petitions, proposals, and answer now before us; and a worthy partner with the Committee in the fifteen-mile-square purchase aforesaid, lately (as before is said,) for a five-shil- ling York bill and some rum, bought of some Indians who claimed no right; and yet (if we will take their words for it) this their purchase was honestly, duly and legally made: which Reverend Pastor, it's said, makes it as clear as the sun, in his sermons to the Committee and Rioters, that all that they have done is authorized by the Bible; for there, he assures them, he has found a charter-grant for their lands; and even cites book, chapter and verse for it; and no man can question that to be the best record on earth, and all authority of man that would derogate from that charter, is rightly to be resisted and opposed. The other clergyman, it's said, is the Rev. Mr. John Cross, late minister of Basking-Ridge, Secretary, scribe and counsellor to the worthy Mr. Roberts, who assumed to be com- mander-in-chief of the rioters in their late expedi- tion to Perth Amboy, on the 17th of July last ; and for which he and many others stand indicted of high treason."'
Such was the tone of the controversy. It is not unlikely, if the sermons alluded to could be repro- duced, we should find indignation as eloquent, if not sarcasm as abundant, on the other side.
76
OTHER THOUGHTS.
But Mr. Taylor's interest in the controversy was now ending. A subject of more solemn concern- ment claimed his thoughts. About three months after the above publication was issued, he was setting his house in order as one whose time of departure was at hand. We present to the reader a copy of his will, taken from the probate records at Trenton, as showing the manner in which the old Puritans closed up their earthly affairs.
"In the name of God, amen : this twenty-first day of December, Anno Domini one thousand seven hundred and forty-seven, I, DANIEL TAY- LOR, of Newark, in the county of Essex and prov- ince of New Jersey, clerk,* being aged and infirm of body, but of sound and perfect mind and mem- ory, thanks be given unto God therefor, calling unto mind the mortality of my body, and knowing it is appointed unto all men once to die, do make and ordain this my last will and testament. And principally, and first of all, I give and recommend my soul into the hands of God who gave it, hoping through the alone merits of Jesus Christ to have eternal life; and my body I recommend unto the earth, (being dead,) to be buried in a decent Chris- tian manner at the discretion of my executors, nothing doubting but at the general resurrection I shall receive the same again by the mighty power
* That is, cleric, or clergyman.
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MR. TAYLOR'S WILL.
of God. And as touching such worldly estate wherewith it hath pleased God to bless me in this life, I give, devise and dispose of the same in the following manner and form :
" Imprimis, I give, devise and bequeath unto my beloved wife Elizabeth, one equal third part of all and singular my household goods and chat- tels, if she please to accept it as her dowry from me.
" Item, I give my son, Daniel Taylor, besides what he hath already had from me since he came of age, (which is to the value of more than sixty pounds,) the sum of ten pounds, to be paid within one year after my decease, either in money or what may be equivalent thereto.
" Item, I give my daughter Jemima what hath been provided for her against the day of her mar- riage of household furniture, as also a cow, and the sum of five pounds to be paid her as is above said.
" Item, I give unto my other two daughters, viz., Mary and Elizabeth, the other part of my house- hold goods, and the sum of twenty pounds in money, to be paid to each of them by their breth- ren hereafter mentioned, when or as they shall come to full age, &c.
" Item, I give unto my other three children, viz., Davie, Joseph and Job, all and singular my estate, (not otherwise herein disposed of,) both real and personal, to be unto or for them (when they come
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THE WITNESSES.
of age) and their heirs and assigns forever. And my will is, that if any or either of my children do or shall decease before they come of age, or with- out issue, their portion or inheritance shall be dis- tributed or divided unto or among the survivors, viz .: if males, unto the males, and [if] females, unto the females ; and also that the negroes, if they desire it, shall be sold, or at the discretion of my executors put out on hire, for the good of my sons aforesaid, till they come of age, and that they, par- ticularly Joseph and Job, be put to learn some trade.
"Item, I do hereby constitute, ordain and appoint my beloved friends and brethren in covenant rela- tion, Joseph Peck and David Williams, executors of this my will to see it duly performed, and I do hereby utterly disallow, revoke and disannull all other and former wills, legacies, bequests, and executors, at any time before-named, willed or bequeathed, ratifying and allowing this to be my last will and testament. In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal, the day and year first above written.
DANIEL TAYLOR. [L. S.]"
The witnesses were " Abraham Soverhill, Eleazer Lamson, Sarah Lamson [her mark.]" Eighteen days afterward, the testator experienced the solemn
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HIS DEATH.
change " appointed unto all men." The will was proved January 23d.
On a plain horizontal slab of brown stone in the old graveyard may be read the following :
" Survivers, let's all imitate The vertues of our Pastor, And copy after him like as He did his Lord and Master. To us most awfull was the stroke By which he was removed Unto the full fruition of The God he served and loved."
And below it-
" Here lyes the pious remains Of the Revd Mr. Daniel Tayler, Who was minister of this parrish Years, Decd Jany 8th, A.D., 1747-8, In the 57th year of his age."
The omission of the numeral before years, has left it impossible to determine just when he came to the parish.
We have already spoken of his family. His first wife, buried at Smithtown, was probably the mother of his daughter Jemima, who bore her name, and who, as we may infer from the will, was considerably older than her sisters. Daniel and Mary were nearly of an age, and are supposed to have been children of his second wife. As the will implies that at least one of his daughters was
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DESCENDANTS.
a minor at the time of his decease, we suppose Elizabeth and her younger brothers to have been children of his third marriage. The grave of his second wife, if she was buried here, is without a headstone and its place unknown. Daniel,* the oldest son, who lived on a farm beyond the moun- tain, died Oct. 17, 1794, aged 74 years, and was buried near his father. Of the daughters, Mary became the wife of Deacon Amos Baldwin, and died Sept. 30, 1795, in her 75th year.
In common with many of his parishioners and ministerial contemporaries, Mr. Taylor was a slave- holder. His will indicates a humane regard for the wishes of his servants in the disposition to be made of them after his decease.
We should like to be able to pay a due tribute to some of those worthy men who were the helpers of Mr. Taylor's ministry ; but with a single excep- tion, the names of the church officers of that period are unknown. Their only record is on high. There is presumptive evidence that Samuel Pierson, the carpenter, was one of the first deacons. The evi- dence is found in the following lines upon his head- stone :
* Daniel and Anne Taylor had a son Oliver, who died Aug. 11, 1785, in his 31st year. Also a son Daniel, who lived to old age and had several children. Among them was the late Mrs. Char- lotte, wife of John M. Lindsley. The descendants of the old pastor are found among the Lindsleys, Baldwins, and Cranes. None of the Taylor name, now resident here, have been traced.
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CHURCH OFFICERS.
" Here lies interred under this mould A precious heap of dust, condoled By Church of Christ and children dear, Both which were th' objects of his care."
His decease occurred March 19, 1730, in his 67th year.
Joseph Peck, one of the "beloved friends and brethren in covenant relation " selected by Mr. Taylor to be the executors of his will, held subse- quently the double office of elder and deacon. He was forty-six years old at the time of Mr. Taylor's decease. It is not known that he was then an offi- cer. The same may be said of the " pious and godly Mr. Job Brown," who was in his full man- hood - thirty-eight years old. Deacon Samuel Freeman, whose name will occur in the following chapter, was six years younger. These and others soon to be mentioned, received the bread of life from the first pastor of the flock, and formed a part of the sorrowful procession that followed him to his rest.
CHAPTER IV.
REV. CALEB SMITH.
TF, when Samuel Harrison was writing the accounts of his fulling-mill and saw-mill, he could have foreknown what was yet to be the historic value of a single leaf of his account-book; that after a hundred years and more the church records of that day would all be lost, the names of its officers lost, and all knowledge of the age and origin of the old parsonage lost, till the said account-book should open its bronzed and tattered lips to reveal the in- teresting secrets ; possibly that knowledge would have secured for the volume a more careful hand- ling and a choicer place in his writing-desk. Be- yond a doubt, it would have put in exercise all his clerkly skill. The pen would have striven for a little more method and grace, and the dictionary would have corrected sundry slips of orthography.
This Samuel Harrison was the second of that name in Newark, and a grandson of Sergeant Rich- ard. He exercised the quadruple functions of mag- istrate, farmer, fuller and sawyer. He was, withal,
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THE PARSONAGE.
a loyal rent-payer, as appears from a petition ad- dressed to Governor Belcher in 1747, and signed by Nathaniel Wheeler, Jonathan Pierson, John Con- dict, Nathaniel Camp, Samuel Harrison, Samuel Baldwin, and others, asserting their loyalty, and vindicating themselves against an implied connec- tion with recent disturbances and riots.
From the entries in his day-book, we learn that in July, 1748-the summer following Mr. Taylor's death-he was sawing "oke plank " " gice," "slep- ers," and other material, and also receiving sundry sums of money, "on account of the parsonage." The money was received, in sums ranging from a few shillings to near twenty pounds, from David Ward, Jonathan Shores, David Williams, Thomas Wil- liams, David Baldwin, Nathaniel Crane, Noah Crane, Azariah Crane, Stephen Dod, John Dod, Eleazer Lamson, Gershom Williams, Ebenezer Farand, Peter Bosteda, William Crane, Jonathan Ward, Jonathan Sergeant, Samuel Cundict, Joseph Peck, Deacon Samuel Freeman, Bethuel Pierson, Thomas Lam- son, Samuel Wheeler, Robert Baldwin, and Joseph Jones ;- a list of twenty-five names, chiefly repre- senting (we may presume) heads of families.
It thus appears that the society took occasion from the loss of its pastor to provide a home for his suc- cessor. Instead, however, of placing it on the par- ish lands, a new lot of four acres was bought of Matthew Williams, lying "on the north side of the
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CALEB SMITH.
highway that leads to the mountain, near the house once the Rev. Daniel Taylor's, late of Newark, de- ceased." It lay opposite to the twenty acres previ- ously owned by the parish, and included the ground now occupied by Grace church. The deed was given September 14th, the price being "four pounds per acre, current money of New Jersey, at eight shil- lings per ounce."
The house was to be of stone, and while the saw- mill aforesaid was turning out plank, &c., the quarry was yielding more solid material for the walls. At the same time the committee-men were looking out for a minister. This search was not a long one.
There was a young man-a licentiate-who had just completed his theological studies with Rev. Jonathan Dickinson, of Elizabethtown. He was a son of William and Hannah Smith, of Brookhaven, L. I., where he was born December 29, 1723. Enter- ing Yale College in his sixteenth year, he displayed during his course of study a vigorous mind and com- mendable application. He became also, in his sec- ond year, one of the hopeful subjects of a work of grace in the College. After receiving a degree in 1743, he remained some time as a resident graduate. In 1746 he was applied to by Rev. Aaron Burr, of Newark, to aid him in conducting a large Latin school. Other engagements prevented him at the time from accepting the place ; but some time after, upon an invitation of Mr. Dickinson, he went to
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THE CHURCH PRESBYTERIAN.
Elizabethtown to instruct a number of young men in the languages. There, as we have said, he prose- cuted simultaneously his studies for the ministry, and having, by the advice of Mr. Dickinson and other ministers, presented himself to the Presbytery of New York for licensure, and creditably sustained his trials, he was licensed by the Presbytery in April, 1747.
In the course of the next year and a half, he re- ceived a number of invitations to a settlement. He referred these to the Presbytery, but the latter sub- mitting them to his own judgment, he decided in favor of the call received from this society. Ac- cordingly, on the 30th of November, 1748, about eleven months after the death of his predecessor, he was ordained and installed by the Presbytery.
We see in this ecclesiastical act a previous and important decision of the Church, of which we know not the particular reasons and history. The relig- ious elements in New Jersey-and in New Eng- land no less-were originally mixed. There Con- gregationalism, and here Presbyterianism, had grad- ually absorbed the others.
The Mountain Society maintained its Indepen- dent relations about thirty years. But the influ- ences that caused this were now yielding to others. The generation of its founders was passing away. New circumstances produced new views. Either before or in connection with the acquaintance made
5
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MR. SMITH'S MARRIAGE.
with Caleb Smith, the Church resolved to conform to the prevailing type of ecclesiastical order in the province. From that period to the present, it has adhered steadily to constitutional Presbyterianism -ever true, at the same time, to the common cause of RELIGIOUS LIBERTY, on whose battle-ground it stands.
Mr. Smith was about twenty-five years of age at the time of his settlement. He was not married. But as he stepped into the new house from time to time to observe the progress of the work, or to drop a suggestion relevant thereto, we fancy thoughts of other relations than those which bound him to his people were sometimes present with him. The fu- ture mistress of the manse, Miss Martha Dickinson, was yet at the parsonage in Elizabethtown. It is quite likely that during the winter the young pas- tor found occasion now and then for a short absence from his mountain charge. As spring came on, Mr. Harrison's day-book received sundry charges (at the rate uniformly of three shillings sixpence a day) for work done on the parsonage. May 3d was employed in "slaking lime." Another day was devoted "to topping up the chimney." The sum- mer saw the work completed. In September, 1749, the minister's youngest daughter became the young minister's wife, and was happily installed in the stone mansion, then one of the best houses, we sup- pose, this side of Newark.
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PARSONAGE MEMORIES.
That mansion was to have a long history. It was to be occupied about thirteen years by Mr. Smith ; then several years by others, as it might find tenants; then thirty years by another pastor ; then about fourteen years by another ; and finally used as a tenement house near forty years more be- fore its demolition.
What memories have since gathered around it ! There were life's sweetest pleasures. There were its tenderest sorrows. It beheld in turn the hy- meneal joy and the mourner's anguish. The serene happiness of the fireside, the calm intellect- ual life, the steady flame of devotion, all that is generous and grateful in the charities of the heart and the benefactions of the hand, had there a home. Many a kind token found a silent way to its kitchen, its wardrobes, its library. Warm greetings were exchanged within its doors. Vigor- ous thoughts were born in it. Well beaten oil went from it to the candlestick of the sanctuary. And there freedom found ever an advocate, if not always a shelter. In the days of the Revolution it was a mark for British vengeance. But He who guards and blesses the habitation of the just, preserved it from the torch of war and the accidents of time till more than a century of years had rolled over it.
There was one custom which had a long exist- ence in connection with the parsonage. Once a year there was a general turn-out of men and teams
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WOOD-DRAWING.
for placing at the minister's door a suitable quantity of fuel. While the forest yet waved over the par- sonage lands, the invading axe was directed thither. When these were stripped, the standing wood was purchased elsewhere. The minister having con- tracted for the wood, his people did the rest. On a day appointed axes and oxen were in motion. The strokes resounded in the forest. The roads were astir. The pile in the parsonage yard grew large as the day grew small. There was a lively commotion too within doors, where the 'better-half' of the parish provided the last and best part of the entertainment. A supper and a scene of right social cheer for old and young was the winding up of the wood frolic. Time and change have set aside this merry custom. The woodlands have vanished or been shorn of their strength, and the blaze of the old broad chimney has waned to the dull glow of the imprisoned anthracite.
There was another species of wood-drawing prac- tised upon the parsonage lands of the old society- in which the mountain society contended for an interest-that it was found no easy task to suppress. Vote followed yote in the town meetings against the trespassers, with little apparent effect. Was
the plunder stimulated by the cupidity and jealousy of contesting claimants ? As a sample of town legislation on the subject, we give the following :
March 10, 1746-7 .- It was " unanimously voted,
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A QUEER WIND.
that whoever shall cut any wood or timber on any of the land called the parsonage land, shall forfeit for every cart-load, ten shillings, and so in propor- tion for a larger or lesser quantity, for the use of the poor ; also to forfeit the wood and timber, to be fetched away by any person, for the use of the poor ; the person carting the wood or timber to be paid by the overseers of the poor. Joseph Peck, Josiah Lindsley, Emanuel Cocker, David Crane, Samuel Plum, and David Bruen, were chosen to take care of the parsonage lands and prosecute offenders."*
The circumstances of the parish, when Mr. Smith entered upon his labors here, promised anything but a quiet and successful ministry. Disorders were rife. Not a week had passed after his ordina- tion, when the following appeared in a New York paper, of date Dec. 5, 1748: "We are informed from New Jersey that one of the heads of the rioters having been committed to jail at Newark, a number of those people came to the jail on Monday night last and let him out ; and he afterwards made his boast that a strong north-west wind blew the door off the hinges, and he walked out of prison as Paul
* A depredation of another sort, upon the produce of the Newark orchards, is noticed in a letter of Gov. Belcher to Col. Low, April 12, 1748. The Governor had a fortnight before desired the Colonel to send him some cider, "rich and potent, without any spirits put into it." Out of the seven barrels sent, such a quantity was drawn by the wagoners and others that it took all but seven gallons of one to fill up the other six. Analyt. Index, p. 227.
I
90
A PASTOR'S FEELINGS.
and Silas did." We doubt if the mountain pastor shared the feelings of the liberated prisoner with respect to this north-west gale. He was evidently a man of different temper from his predecessor, while we are not to judge of the latter by the hear- say accounts repeated and amplified in proprietary documents. Mr. Smith was eminently a peace-lov- ing man, and one who appears to have devoted himself with great singleness of aim to the specific duties of his high vocation. Only with feelings of anxiety and grief could a man of his spirit have contemplated the disturbances which agitated his parish during the whole period of his connection with it, and which were at once a cause and a conse- quence of the low state of religion that prevailed. He knew of course the state of things when he came here, but we do not doubt that his whole personal and ministerial influence bore in the direc- tion of pacification and compromise. His voice, however, had not power to allay the storm.
In the July following the above incident, the jail was again opened by a mob. Two prisoners were in it, whose friends (so wrote Mr. Alexander, one of the Proprietary Council,) tried to obtain a commis- sion for a special court to try them " by their fellow- rioters and relatives." Failing in this, "on the 15th inst., in the dead hour of the night, a number of people in disguise came to and broke open the jail, and rescued the two prisoners. By their com-
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MORE RIOTS.
ing in disguise, (the writer added,) it seems they have got a little more fear and modesty than they used to have." The congratulation was premature.
A letter written October 14, 1749, by David Og- den, of Newark, to James Alexander, discovers to us the confusion which at that time involved the subject of land claims in this region. The letter states that the bearer, Daniel Pierson, a man well informed on the subject, "would testify that three- fifths hold lands under proprietary titles ; one-fifth have no pretensions to any title, and these were the chief destroyers of timber; and the other fifth hold under Indian titles ; but not more than one-third first settled their lands under an Indian title ; and the other two-thirds purchased the Indian title within a few years then past."
By this time, a strong sympathy with the people in their opposition to the proprietors began to show itself in the provincial assembly. Governor Belcher, in a letter to the Board of Trade, November 27, 1749, complained that the Assembly of New Jersey, during the whole session, was in dispute and con- tention with the Council; and that it would enter into no measures to suppress the riots. On the same day, David Ogden wrote again to Mr. Alex- ander at Perth Amboy, relative to a riot committed a fortnight before at Horseneck, when the house of Abraham Phillips was broken open, the owner turned out, and a stack of his oats burnt; suggest-
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ARRESTS AND INDICTMENTS.
ing that "proper affidavits of this riot would be proper to accompany our Assembly's representation home, of the pacific spirit of the rioters." In the following March, according to another letter of the Governor, the rioters were spreading their influence to such a degree that the legislature seemed to be stagnated by it .*
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