USA > Rhode Island > Washington County > Narragansett > A history of the Episcopal church in Narragansett, Rhode Island, including a history of other Episcopal churches in the state > Part 32
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In the year 1713, the minister, church wardens, and vestry, petitioned the Queen for the establishment of Bishops in America, setting forth the great benefits that would result to the church from such a measure. Mr. Nathaniel Kay, the collector of the Queen's revenues in Rhode Island, who afterwards liberally endowed the school connected with this church, was among the signers to this petition. In the year 1724, Mr. Honyman writes to the Society in England as follows :- " That there were properly belonging to his church in Newport, above fifty communicants who live in that place, exclusive of strangers, the church people grew now too numerous to be accommodated with seats in the old church, and many more offered to join themselves to the church communion." Mr. Honyman proposed to the church members the building a new church, and subscribed £30 himself for that purpose. The people heartily con- curred, and he soon after obtained subscriptions amounting to one thousand pounds of the currency of the country. But it was esti-
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mated the building would cost twice that amount ; however, a suffi- cient sum was raised, and in the year 1726 the church was completed, and Mı. Honyman held the service in it. The body of the building was seventy feet long, and forty-six feet wide. It had two tiers of windows, was full of pews, and had galleries all round to the east end. It was acknowledged by the people of that day to be the most beautiful timber structure in America. The old build- ing was given to the people of Warwick, who had no church of their own. We have every reason for believing that the new building was erected on the site of the old one, for the old one appears to have been disposed of by gift, to make room for the new, which would not otherwise have been done in a town rapidly increasing in population, and in want of more buildings. At the time of which we are writing, 1724 to 1726, there were Quakers and two sorts of Anabaptists in Newport, yet the members of the Church of England increased daily ; and although there was not to be found alive, at that time, four of the original promoters of church worship in this place, yet there was then above four times the number of all the first. Mr. Honyman had under his care at this time the towns of Newport, Freetown, Tiverton, and Little Compton.
The history of the church has been, thus far, principally derived from the publications of the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts, and from letters from the minister, wardens, and vestry to Queen Anne, to the Bishop of London, and to Sir Francis Nicholson, copies of which have been preserved in the first parish records of the church. The first book of the corporation records having been lost, is a circumstance much to be regretted. The second book commences with the date 1731.
A letter written in Newport, and published in the New England Journal, Boston, Sept. 3d, 1729, says, " Yesterday, arrived here Dean Berkley, of Londonderry, in a pretty large ship. He is a gentleman of middle stature, of an agreeable, pleasant, and erect aspect. He was ushered into the town with a great number of gen- tlemen, to whom he behaved himself after a very complaisant manner. 'Tis said he purposes to tarry here with his family about three months."
The connection of Dean Berkley with Trinity Church calls for a passing notice of his sojourn in Newport, where he arrived by a cir-
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cumstance purely accidental. He, with other gentleman, his asso- ciates, were bound to the island of Bermuda, with the intention of establishing there a college for the education of the Indian youth of this country-a plan, however, which wholly failed. The captain of the ship in which he sailed could not find the island of Bermuda, and having given up the search after it, steered northward until they discovered land unknown to them, and which they supposed to be inhabited only by savages. On making a signal, however, two men came on board from Block Island in the character of pilots, who, on inquiry, informed them the harbor and town of Newport were near. That in the town there was an Episcopal church, the minis- ter of which was Mr. James Honyman ; on which they proceeded for Newport, but an adverse wind caused them to run into the west passage, where the ship came to anchor. The Dean wrote a letter to Mr. Honyman, which the pilots took on shore at Conanicut Island, and called on a Mr. Gardner and Mr. Martin, two members of Mr. Honyman's church, informing them that a great dignitary of the Church of England, called Dean, was on board the ship, together with other gentlemen passengers. They handed them the letter from the Dean, which Gardner and Martin brought to Newport, in a small boat, with all possible dispatch. On their arrival, they found Mr. Honyman was at church, it being a holyday on which divine service was held there. They then sent the letter by a servant, who delivered it to Mr. Honyman in his pulpit. He opened it, and read it to the congregation, from the contents of which, it appeared the Dean might be expected to land in Newport every moment. The church was dismissed with the blessing, and Mr. Honyman, with the wardens, vestry, church and congregation, male and female, repaired immediately to the ferry wharf, where they arrived a little before the Dean, his family and friends.
The foregoing tradition we have given as we received it, but other traditions vary a little from that ; some of which say that the ship made no land until she arrived in the East or Sachuest river, from which she came round the north end of Rhode Island to Newport. Others say the first land she made was Narragansett, after she had got into the west passage. But we have found no other so much in detail, or so well connected or probable, as the one given. The Dean purchased a farm of about one hundred acres, in the town of
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Newport, adjoining one of about the same extent belonging to the Rev. James Honyman, on which Mr. Honeyman resided. The Dean built him a house on his farm for his residence, which he called White Hall, which name it still retains. The house is still stand- ing. It is situated in what is now the town of Middletown, about three miles from the State House in Newport, and little back from the road which runs eastward from the town, near a beautiful little water course which runs southward toward Sachuest Beach. This White Hall estate he gave to Yale College, in Connecticut, which still owns the fee. He built his house in a valley, not far from a hill commanding an extensive view of the ocean and country. He preferred the valley to the hill, as he said, for the following reasons -" that to enjoy the prospect from the hill, he must visit it only occasionally ; that if his constant residence should be on the hill, the view would be so common as to lose all its charms." During his residence at White Hall, he wrote his " Minute Philosopher," and his celebrated poem so oracular as to the future destinies of America. These were principally written at a place about half a mile south- wardly from his house. There he had his chair and writing appa- ratus placed in a natural alcove which he found in the most elevated parts of the Hanging Rocks, (so called) roofed and only open to the south, commanding at once a view of Sachuest Beach, the ocean and the circumjacent islands. This hermitage was to him a favorite and solitary retreat. He continued here about two years, perhaps a little longer. He was certainly here as late as September, 1731, as appears by a supplementary inscription on the tomb-stone of Nathaniel Kay, Esq., which is as follows, viz. :- " Joining to the south of this tomb, lies Lucia Berkley, daughter of Dean Berkley, Obit. the 5th of September, 1731."
His preaching was eloquent and forcible, and attracted large con- gregations to Trinity Church. When he was called to a sphere of greater usefulness in his native country, he was not forgetful of a residence which was endeared to him by many pleasing recollec- tions ; and which, moreover, possessed for him a melancholy interest, from the circumstance of containing the ashes of his infant daughters, that had died during his sojourn in Newport.
After his return to England he sent, as a donation to Trinity Church, in the year 1733, a magnificent organ, which, though much
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impaired-having been used for upwards of a century-and which, although destitute of the modern improvements, still possesses some pipes of unrivalled excellence. This organ is surmounted by a crown in the centre, supported by two mitres, one on each side.
In the parish records of Trinity Church is the following entry, viz., " 1729, September 1st, Henry Berkley, son of Dean Berkley, baptized by his father, and received into the church." And on the 11th June, 1731, the following : " Philip Berkley, Anthony Berkley, Agnes Berkley, negroes." Mr. Nathaniel Kay, who came from England to Rhode Island, as collector of the King's customs for the colony of Rhode Island, was the most liberal patron, as to the amount of his pecuniary aid, that the church ever had. His house stood on the site now occupied by the dwelling house of George Engs, Esq., on the hill near the head of Touro street. It was, when built, one of the most spacious and elegant private dwellings in the town. He was one of the early friends of the church, for we find his name as one of the vestry as early as the year 1720. At his death, he devised and bequeathed to the church as follows :- " I give and bequeath my dwelling house and coach house to my wife during her natural life ; after which I give and bequeath both, with my lots of land in Rhode Island, and £400 in currency of New England, to build a school-house, to the minister of the church of England, (Mr. Honyman) and the church wardens and vestry for the time being-that is to say, upon trust and confidence, and to the intent and purpose, benefit and use of a school to teach ten poor boys their grammar and the mathematics gratis ; and to appoint a master at all times, as occasion or vacancy may happen, who shall be Epis- copally ordained, and assist the minister, Episcopal, of the town of Newport, in some proper office, as they shall think most useful."
The property thus given was applied to the building a school- house, and establishing a school, agreeably to the aforesaid will, which was continued up to the war of the revolution. At the close of that war, the property-in common with all real estate in New- port-was of but little value to its owners, and its income not more than would keep it in repair. The school-house had been pulled down about that time. Under such circumstances, the school was of course discontinued. The whole property, at the time of which
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we are speaking, would not probably have sold for two thousand dollars, although worth much more before the war.
The affairs of the church in the United States were then at a very low ebb, without a head, and unpopular with the people ; and Trinity Church, in Newport, depressed, perhaps, as much or more than any other. She was for years without a minister, her property in a state of dilapidation, her income suspended, her society discouraged, and her whole countenance sickly and declining. Nor were these all. The leading men of the church were at one time highly incensed against each other, and parties raged in the church, which carried discord into every class of her communicants and congregation. Those divisions were sometimes partially laid aside, and at others, partially revived, until the introduction of the Rev. Theodore Dehon, who took charge of the parish as minister, in 1797. His gentlemanly deportment and conciliating manners, his pulpit eloquence, his mild disposition, and his sound policy, soon brought back the wandering sheep to the common fold. The church was again filled with a numerous congregation, earnestly engaged in social worship.
The property given by Mr. Kay was, from time to time, partly sold and partly leased, and in conclusion it was all sold ; so that, at the present time, all of it has passed out of the hands of the church to individuals, and the avails have nearly or quite disappeared. A new school-house was built in 1799, and the school was revived and continued with little interruption. At first it was taught by a master Episcopally ordained, and then by a layman, until the first public school was established by the town of Newport ; after which, poor boys could not be induced to attend the church school, and on that account it was discontinued. Since that time the school-house has been used as a lecture room, and also for the accommodation of the church Sunday school, which is very large.
The church may be considered in fault for not having been more faithful to her trust in the case of the Kay estate ; but when we con- sider the great length of time (over 106 years) since this bequest, and the fate which most estates in trust have suffered-when we con- sider the effect of the Revolutionary war upon every thing in New- port while it was a British garrison, and more especially for ten years after-when we look at the fate of the Franklin Fund in Boston, or to the present condition of the Bank of the United States
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in Philadelphia, or the worse condition of many other monied insti- tutions-we may cease, in a great measure, to condemn. When we consider that a congregation think more of their present wants than of the future-that they will not tax themselves heavily as long as they can avoid it-that they are apt to hope for more prosperous days, and to expect their successors to do as much, or more, than they are willing to do themselves-when we consider the failure of almost all human appointments, the insecurity of all earthly posses- sions, the frailty of man, and the decay, even while living, of his most ardent hopes and expectations-we ought not to be greatly sur. prised that the will of the dead is not always done. In the emphatic language of Holy writ, " Riches take to themselves wings and fly away."
Mr. Kay's remains lie in Trinity churchyard, on the left hand immediately as you enter the gate, covered by a stone, on which is the following inscription :- " This covers the dust of Nathaniel Kay, Esq., Collector of the King's customs in Newport, whose spirit returned to God on the 14th day of April, Anno Domini, 1734, after it had tabernacled here 59 years. He, after an exemplary life of Faith and Charity, did, by his last will, at his death, found and largely endow two charity schools in Newport and Bristol, within his collection."
The early records of Trinity Church have been many years lost. A few meetings only of the wardens and vestry were recorded in the parish record books. With these exceptions, we have to commence the regular series of its secular affairs from July 5th, 1731, at which time its second book of records commences.
The present church edifice was erected on the site where the old building stood, in 1725, and was completed in 1726. The building was soon found to be too small for the rapidly increasing congrega- tion, for in 1733, two doors-one on the north and one on the south side, near the east end-were shut up, and pews made in the cross aisle ; and two other pews were built, one on each side of the altar. In 1749, the christening pew was made into two pews, and sold. In 1752, the vestry-room and church-wardens pew were converted into private pews, and sold. In 1758, the cross aisle from the north to the south door, at the western end of the church, was shut up, and four body pews made for the use of some families who were stil
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unaccommodated. In 1762, the church edifice was greatly enlarg- ed by moving the easterly part about thirty feet, and adding as much in the middle. This was done at the expense of forty-six gentlemen, who took the pews thus added in full satisfaction for the expense of the said enlargement.
There are no meetings of the congregation recorded earlier than 1742, previous to which time the rector, wardens, and vestry, held their meetings of business as often as they found it necessary, and whenever a vacancy happened, a new member was admitted by them.
In the year 1733, Bishop Berkley presented the organ, (before mentioned) and in the same year, Jahleel Brenton, Esq., presented the clock now in the tower. In 1740, the bell presented by Queen Anne was cracked : it was taken down, and sent to London to be re- cast. This year the estate left by Nathaniel Kay, Esq., appears to have come into the possession of the church. In 1741, the first school-house was built, and Mr. Cornelius Bennett appointed school- master, to serve until one Episcopally ordained could be procured. The church wrote to the Society in London, requesting them to send a school-master Episcopally ordained, and requesting them to make some provision toward his support-which application appears to have been unsuccessful; and another, made in 1746, shared the same fate. In 1744, by a vote of the congregation, the number of vestrymen was limited to sixteen.
In 1747, the church sent to London, at their expense, a young man named Jeremiah Leaming, to take holy orders, that he might be qualified to teach the church school in accordance with the will of Mr. Kay. He returned in September, and " produced his orders as Deacon and Priest," and also a letter from Dr. Bearcroft, Secretary of the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts, signifying that the Society did approve of the said Mr. Leam- ing for a school-master, catechist, and assistant to the Rev. Mr. Honyman ; and the vestry being satisfied with the vouchers, he entered immediately upon the discharge of the duties of the said offices.
In 1750, the Rev. Mr. Honyman died, after having lived to an advanced age, and to see his church large and flourishing, and the parochial school under his care fully established. He was buried
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at the expense of the church, on the south of the passage from the gate to the church, where his tombstone now lies, and which is engraved as follows :-
" Here lies the dust of James Honyman, of venerable and ever worthy memory, for a faithful ministry of nearly fifty years in the Episcopal church of this town, which, by divine influence on his labors, has flourished and exceedingly increased. He was of a respectable family in Scotland, an excellent scholar, a sound divine, and accomplished gentleman. A strong asserter of the doctrines and discipline of the Church of England, yet with the arm of charity embraced all sincere followers of Christ. Happy in his relative station of life, the duties of which he sustained and dis- charged in a laudable and exemplary manner. Blessed with an excellent and very vigorous constitution, which he made subservient to the various duties of a numerous parish, until a paralytic disorder interrupted him in the pulpit-and in two years, without having impaired his understanding, cut short the thread of life on July 2d, 1750."
On the 11th of July, only nine days after the death of Mr. Honyman, Mr. Leaming received a temporary appointment as minister of the church, and on the same day it was voted to apply to the Venerable Society for a minister to supply the vacancy occa- sioned by the death of Mr. Honyman. The church was in a measure divided in opinion as to who should be recommended to the Society, or if any recommendation should accompany their applica- tion ; and as no decisive measures were taken, Mr. Leaming con- tinued to officiate. In July 1751, the church agreed to ask the Society to send them Mr. Beach as minister.
On the 27th of August, 1752, a committee was appointed to col- lect by subscription a sum sufficient to purchase a parsonage. Their success was such, that in December the house was purchased for the purpose aforesaid. The same year, the Venerable Society cut off twenty pounds from their former allowance to this church for the support of a minister, which induced the proprietors of the pews to agree to subject their pews to an annual tax, so long as the Society should judge the same to be necessary. The said agree- ment was signed by nearly all the pewholders.
1754. Mr. Thomas Pollen arrived this year, having been sent by A50
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the Venerable Society as missionary. The congregation accepted him as such, and wrote a letter to the Society thanking them for their " care in sending him." In 1760, Mr. Pollen notified the church of his intention of leaving them very soon, when they again wrote the Society, requesting them to send another missionary, and also an assistant and school-master. In November, Mr. Pollen left.
The church being then destitute of a minister, called the Rev. Marmaduke Browne, of Portsmouth. He accepted the call, and arrived here in December. The Venerable Society was then requested to accept Mr. Browne as their missionary here. Mr. Roger Veates had a temporary appointment as school-master.
In 1762, the Venerable Society not having written to this church, nor sent them the annual allowance as usual, the church appointed the Rev. Mr. Browne permanently as their minister, with a salary of one hundred pounds sterling per annum, " provided the Society do not continue their mission here." The school was committed to the care of Mr. John Knotchell, the organist, as a temporary measure.
In 1767, the Rev. Mr. Bisset arrived from England, having come over as assistant and school-master, and his passage was paid by the church. In 1768, the old tower was taken down, and a new one built, eighteen feet square and sixty feet high.
In 1769, the church petitioned the General Assembly for an act of incorporation, which was granted. In May of this year, Mr. Browne went to England on a visit. At what time he returned does not appear, but during his absence, Mr. Bisset supplied his place as minister. There appears to have been much contention between the . church and Mr. Bisset respecting his compensation.
1770. October 27th, a severe gale of wind, in which the spindle on the steeple was broken off below the upper ball.
The Easter-Monday after the death of Mr. Browne, the congrega- tion chose Mr. Bisset their minister, until the Venerable Society was heard from.
A committee was also appointed to write to the Society to solicit a continuance of the mission, and recommending Mr. Bisset to be appointed by them. The committee were also to recommend to the Society the appointment of the Rev. Williard Wheeler as assistant and school master.
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Up to this time, the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts had supplied this church with a missionary, and contributed a part of his support ; but after the decease of Mr. Browne, they de- clined doing so any longer. Finding they could no longer expect assistance from other quarters in supporting the church and school, but that they must rely upon their own resources, the congregation, on the 28th October, 1771, elected Mr. Bisset their minister, with a salary of £100 sterling, or £133 6s. 8d. lawful money, being the same sum that, with the assistance of the Society, they had paid Mr. Browne. In May, 1772, Mr. Wheeler was chosen assistant and school-master, which place he held till 1776. At this time, the congregation and vestry became greatly dissatisfied with his school, and probably discharged him, as no more is heard of him by the records.
From 1774 to 1784, there is but one meeting of the vestry on re- cord. The corporation met once a year, on Easter Monday, for the choice of officers, and to fix a price for their rents. In the year 1780, there was a meeting of the corporation, but no choice of officers was then made.
On Sunday, the 8th of December, 1776, the British fleet and army took possession of the Island of Rhode Island, which event gave a new character to every thing here of a local nature. Mr. Bisset continued with the church until the evacuation of the Island, which took place October 25th, 1779.
Many of the leading members of Trinity Church were of the royal party, who, when the town was evacuated by the king's · troops, went with them to New York-and among the number was the minister Mr. Bisset, who left his wife and child behind, in the most destitute circumstances. His furniture was seized by the State of Rhode Island, but afterward, upon the petition of his wife to the General Assembly, it was restored to her ; and she, with her child, was permitted to go to her husband in New York.
A few days after the British left Newport, some young men of the town, and among them two American officers, entered the church and despoiled it of the altar-piece, consisting of the king's arms, the lion and the unicorn. They were highly ornamental, and were placed against the great east window. After trampling them under foot, they were carried to the north battery, and set up for a target
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