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COMMEMORATION 
 
 OF THE 
 
 TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTIETH 
 ANNIVERSARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 INCORPORATION OF LANCASTER 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS 
 
 TUESDAY, JUNE 30, 1903 
 
 LANCASTER, igo4 
 
 J^--<: 
 
F74 
 
 CLINTON. MASS. : 
 PRESS OF WILLIAM T- COULTER 
 
 2.6 u 'u4 
 
ORDER OF THE DAY 
 
 SALUTE AT SUNRISE 
 
 9 O CLOCK A. M. 
 
 OPEN AIR CONCERT BY THE SALEM CADET BAND 
 
 10.30 A. M. 
 
 EXERCISES IN THE FIRST PARISH MEETING-HOUSE 
 
 12.30 p. M. 
 
 PROCESSION 
 
 I p. M. 
 
 BANQUET IN THE TENT 
 
 5 P- M. 
 OPEN AIR CONCERT BY THE SALEM CADET BAND 
 
 8 p. M. 
 FIREWORKS 
 
LIST OF OFF^ICERS 
 
 President of the Day. 
 
 Rev. GEORGE M. BARTOL. D. D. 
 
 Vice- Prci idea ts, 
 
 Nathaniel Thayer Andrew J. Bancroft Spencer R. Merrick, Esq. 
 
 George Frederick Chandler William A. Kilbourn Arthur L. Safford 
 
 Edward Houghton Hon. Henry S. Nourse William H. Blood 
 
 George W. Willard Eugene V. R. Thayer, Esq. Harold Parker, Esq. 
 
 George W. Howe Anthony L. Sawyer George F. Morse 
 
 Frederick Whitney Beniamin F. Wyman Joseph H. Whelan 
 
 John E. Farnsworth Oliver W. Carter 
 
 Secretary. Toast-Master. 
 
 Hon. Henry S. Nourse Hon. Herbert Parker 
 
 Treasurer. Chief Marshal. 
 
 Eugene V. R. Thayer, Esq. William A. Kilbourn 
 
 Assistant Marshals. 
 
 John. E. Farnsworth Henry H. Fuller, Esq. Edward T. Cunningham 
 
 General Committee. 
 
 Rev. George M. Bartol, D. D.. Chairman 
 
 Hon. Henry S. Nourse Arthur L. Safford Hon. Herbert Parker 
 
 Eugene V. R. Thayer. Esq. George W. Willard William A. Kilbourn 
 
 Harold Parker, Esq. F. Lincoln Chandler Rev. Darius B. Scott 
 
 Samuel Hatch Quincy Ezra Burton Rev. Chauncey G. Hubbell 
 
 Edward T. Cunningham Col. John E. Thayer Henry H. Fuller, Esq. 
 
 Committee on Invitations. 
 Mrs. George M. Bartol, Chairman 
 Mrs. John Ware Miss Anna H. Whitney Miss Abby F. Green Mrs. George K. Powers 
 Spencer R. Merrick, Esq. Benjamin F. Wyman Arthur L. Safford E. Willard Carr 
 
 Committee on Reception. 
 Eugene V. R. Thayer, Esq., Chairman 
 Mrs. Eugene V. R. Thayer Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin F. Wyman 
 
 Col. and Mrs. John E. Thayer Mr. and Mrs. George F. Morse 
 
 Hon. and Mrs. Herbert Parker Mr. and Mrs. Henry H. Fuller 
 
 Committee on Tent and Banquet. 
 CoL. John E. Thayer, Chairman Bayard Thayer Harold Parker, Esq. 
 
 Committee on Music. 
 
 Arthur L. Safford. Chairman 
 
 Benjamin F. Wyman Arthur C. Hawkins. Eben C. Mann Arthur G. Chickering 
 
 Committee on Decorations. 
 
 Miss Mary W. Bartol, Chairman F. Lincoln Chandler Edward O. Orpet 
 
 Committee on Special Entertaintnents. 
 
 George F. Morse, Chairman 
 
 Bayard Thayer Arthur C. Hawkins Andrew J. Kennedy William P. Safford 
 
AT the annual town-meetinj^ of the voters of Lancaster held i6 March, 1903, it 
 - was voted, " that a committee of ten be appointed by the chair with full power 
 to arrange for the celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the 
 town." The following committee was appointed : 
 
 The Rev. George M. Bartol, D. D. Edward T. Cunningham 
 
 The Hon. Henry S. Nourse Arthur L. Safford 
 
 Eugene V. R. Thayer, Esq. George W. Willard 
 
 Harold Parker, Esq. F. Lincoln Chandler 
 
 Samuel H, Quincy Ezra Burton 
 
 At a town-meeting held 6 April it was voted to add to the committee — 
 
 Col. John E. Thayer The Rev. Darius B. Scott 
 
 The Hon. Herbert Parker The Rev. Chauncey G. Hubbell 
 
 William A. Kilbourn Henry H. Fuller, Esq. 
 
 and an appropriation was made to defray the expenses of the celebration. The 
 work of the committee and of the officers appointed by them, with the cordial 
 cooperation of the people of the town generally, resulted in the commemoration of 
 which these pages are a record. 
 
'I'^HE account that follows has been gathered from the material 
 collected by the Hon. Henry S. Nourse, Secretary of the Town's 
 Committee. Whatever errors, of omission or commission, may be dis- 
 covered in it, are to be attributed to the lack of his supervision. This 
 has been prevented by his lamented decease a few months after the 
 observance described. In that observance there has been no one who 
 felt a deeper interest, or to whom its prosperity was more largely owing. 
 Before action could well be taken by the Town on the question of 
 the present publication, provision was made for it, with characteristic 
 public spirit, by Mr. John Eliot Thayer, to whom we have been indebted 
 also, during the Anniversary Year, for a photographic reproduction, in 
 admirable form, from the copy in the Boston Public Library, of the 
 second, or earliest extant edition, of the Mary Rowlandson Narrative; 
 this fac-simile reprint having been brought out under the care, and with 
 the exhaustive commentary and notes, of Mr. Nourse; such as no other 
 could have given to it than that thoroughly advised and loving historian 
 and annalist of his native Town. 
 
 The exact day for the celebration would have been the twenty- 
 eighth of May, but it was judged best, for various reasons, to defer it until 
 the thirtieth of June. That date dawned between many days of cloud 
 and rain with a sky exceptionally bright and clear. Guests began to 
 arrive early in the morning, and assembled upon the Town Common, 
 where an hour or more was passed in mutual greetings and congratula- 
 tions. At half-past ten the Governor of the Commonwealth, ex-Gov- 
 ernor Boutwell, Senators Hoar and Fairbanks, representatives of 
 Harvard, Bolton, Leominster, Sterling, Boylston and Clinton — towns 
 once included within our original limits, delegates from the Massa- 
 chusetts Historical, American Antiquarian, and Historic-Genealogical 
 Societies, with many aforetime dwellers within our pleasant borders on 
 the banks of the Nashaway, under the direction of the chief marshal of 
 the day, entered the meeting-house of the First Parish, in which the 
 exercises proceeded in the following order: — 
 ORGAN PRELUDE B. J. Lang 
 
WORD OF WELCOME. . . . Rev. George M. Bartol 
 
 It falls not less to the privilege than the duty of the chairman of the 
 committee of arrangements for this occasion, to say a word here— a 
 word he is sure those whom that committee represent would each and 
 every one gladly say for themselves were that possible, but which some 
 one of them must say for all the rest — a word of respectful salutation, of 
 cordial greeting and hearty welcome, to those who by their presence and 
 sympathy with us in this Memorial Celebration we are alike favored and 
 honored. We trust you all feel it an honor to come at any time into any 
 meeting place dedicated to the public uses of religion and instruction, 
 and that you recognize with us a special significance and propriety in 
 the acts of worshipful acknowledgment in which we are now about to 
 engage, of the divinity that shapes the ends of individual men and of com- 
 munities and nations of men — even that overruling Providence in which 
 the fathers who have come and gone before us so devoutly believed 
 and trusted. 
 
 INVOCATION Rev. Darius B. Scott 
 
 HYMN— "We Come Unto Our Fathers' God." . . Thomas H. Gill 
 
 Tune— Decius. 
 
 We come unto our Fathers' God; Their joy unto their Lord we bring; 
 
 Their Rock is our Salvation; Their song to us descendeth; 
 
 The Eternal Arms, their dear abode, The Spirit who in them did sing, 
 
 We make our habitation: To us his music lendeth; 
 We bring thee. Lord, the praise they brought. His song in them, in us, is one; 
 
 We seek thee as thy saints have sought We raise it high, we send it on, — 
 
 In every generation. The song that never endeth! 
 
 Ye saints to come, take up the strain — 
 
 The same sweet theme endeavor! 
 Unbroken be the golden chain! 
 
 Keep on the song forever! 
 Safe in the same dear dwelling place, 
 Rich with the same eternal grace. 
 
 Bless the same boundless giver! Amen. 
 
 SCRIPTURE LESSON— From Psalm cvii. 
 
 Rev. Chauncey G. Hubbell 
 
ODE Miss Charlotte Mellen Packard 
 
 Tune— Olivet. 
 
 We sing the years that pass Their's was the strain and stress 
 
 Like shadows o'er the grass Through thorny wilderness 
 
 At summer's prime: A path to win; 
 
 We sing of Hfe's deep flow, By many a stubborn foe 
 
 Of men that come and go, Nobly at last laid low, 
 
 Their deeds for weal or woe Their labors high we know 
 
 Held fast by time. Who enter in. 
 
 We reap the harvests sown Guard we our sacred trust 
 
 By faithful hands unknown. Peace after battle dust, 
 
 Reap fruit or flower. And learning free. 
 
 They feared not fortune's frown, — Secure in homes so fair 
 
 The nameless ones— whose crown We breathe as common air 
 
 Is to have handed down The good they might not share, 
 
 This golden hour. Whose sons are we. 
 
 Thou to whose boundless thought 
 The ages are as naught, 
 
 The soul is dear. 
 Teach us that wisdom true 
 In which our fathers grew, 
 The springs of faith renew, 
 
 Teach us thy fear. 
 
 ADDRESS Hon. Charles Warren Fairbanks 
 
 ''TJic Indebtedness of the West to New England:' 
 Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: 
 
 With pleasure I have come to participate with you in this 
 interesting historical occasion, and to bear testimony of our gratitude to 
 New England for what she has been, and is, to the West. I do not feel 
 as though I had come among strangers, or "enemies," to use a phrase 
 which has had much currency upon the hustings, for the ashes of many 
 of my ancestors rest in your soil. They were among the pioneers who 
 aided in raising the torch of liberty upon the Atlantic coast, and they 
 were among those who carried beyond the Appalachian mountains the 
 fundamental principles of human freedom which were inculcated here. 
 
 We meet, not as strangers, but as friends, filled with the love of lib- 
 erty, and with pride in a common ancestry. We are bound together by 
 a common heritage, a common kinship, a common aspiration and a com- 
 mon destiny. 
 
 We return to New England with filial affection. We look to her as 
 
to a venerable mother, wise, noble-minded and generous-hearted. She 
 may have seemed exacting and austere in her early days, but she has 
 mellowed and sweetened with age. If she has faults they lean to vir- 
 tue's side. We recognize and gladly acknowledge our everlasting indebt- 
 edness to her for the high ideals which the pioneers carried hence to 
 their humble homes in the West. They took with them the love of 
 religion, the love of learning, the love of home. These have been the 
 inspiration of the West. They have been the sure foundation of her 
 development from small beginnings to her present strength and power. 
 
 I rejoice with you in the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the 
 municipal birth of Lancaster. Two and one-half centuries are but a 
 brief period, compared with the lives of some of the European munici- 
 palities, but it is a long time when compared with most of our American 
 cities, with the national government, and with the eldest of our States. 
 It is vast, indeed, when contrasted with the development and growth of 
 the West. 
 
 This old town, about which cluster so many splendid memories, has 
 witnessed all that is most memorable and glorious in American history. 
 She began before our fathers had awakened to the mighty possibilities 
 of the Western continent; before there was any dream of Lexington and 
 Concord; before Philadelphia and 1776; before there was any thought 
 of Bunker Hill and before any seer foresaw Yorktown. To write the 
 history of the country since the charter of Lancaster is to write the most 
 inspiring and luminous story in all human experience. In her modest 
 way, through it all, she has borne well her part. It is not for me to 
 dwell upon the story of her career, although it is most engaging. Ora- 
 tors and poets and historians have long dwelt upon it, and it is all as 
 familiar as a thrice-told tale. 
 
 Where is the East and where is the West .-• Who is able to delimit 
 them upon the map of our country so that we may know where the one 
 ends and the other begins.-' Our modern development is such that we 
 lose sight of geographical divisions. We have blended together into one 
 vast homogeneous community, and it is impossible to mark a boundary 
 to the East or the West, the North or the South. The time was when 
 these general divisions had a significance they do not now possess. The 
 
10 
 
 North and the South were sharply divided by a curse; but with the price- 
 less blood of the heroic youth of the republic it was washed away forever. 
 In the elder days the West was not far from the Atlantic seaboard, but 
 our western frontier has pushed farther and farther until the West and 
 the Middle West have become the East within the lifetime of many who 
 are here. The old maps have become obsolete, and the old East and 
 the old West are but traditional divisions. 
 
 In the years that are passed, a time within the memory of many who 
 honor this historic occasion, there v/as a well-defined East and an equally 
 well-defined West. There was a line on one side of which were years, 
 wealth, culture and conservatism, and on the other youth, small capital, 
 some culture, a high order of intelligence, and bold enterprise. 
 
 The East and the West, now somewhat vague generalizations, are 
 not composed of people of different bloods, of divergent racial tenden- 
 cies, but they are of the same blood; of the same races. They have 
 kindred sympathies and like aspirations. Their sons laid down their 
 lives upon the battlefields of the South, to preserve for the present and 
 future ages our sacred institutions. They, together, yielded up the last 
 measure of their devotion, to vindicate the national honor in the war 
 with Spain — a war which humanity commanded, and which drove across 
 the sea the Spanish flag, which had, for so many centuries, contaminated 
 the air of the western hemisphere. 
 
 Though many years have intervened since the early pioneers of the 
 East took up their march westward, into the unbroken and hostile 
 wilderness, we have not been divided. We have been brought continu- 
 ally into closer communion. The bonds of attachment have grown 
 steadily stronger. "The mystic cords of memory," of which the immor- 
 tal Lincoln, of New England ancestry, spoke, have stretched from many 
 an humble hearthstone in the great Mississippi Valley and beyond, to 
 the old homes in far-off New England. 
 
 New England's sons, who have been an important part of the pro- 
 gress of the West, and who are to be found in every neighborhood, 
 stretching westward three thousand miles to where the Pacific breaks 
 upon the western shores of our continent, and beyond even that, wher- 
 ever American enterprise has established dominion, have an affection for 
 
II 
 
 Plymouth Rock and Fanueil Hall, and for Lancaster and for her sister 
 towns. 
 
 The West was fortunate in having back of it such an East — an East 
 filled with patriotic memories, with lessons of heroic devotion to home 
 and country, an East which has been, and which is today, the pride of 
 America. 
 
 The soil of New England reluctantly yielded a livelihood, and no 
 drone or spendthrift could make his way here, A forbidding soil and a 
 severe climate were not hospitable either to ignorance or indolence. 
 Out of the earnest contest with nature came a splendid civilization, 
 which, when transplanted to the broader and richer fields of the West, 
 resulted in a development and growth which challenge our admiration 
 and command unstinted commendation everywhere. 
 
 The sons and daughters of New England carried into the West their 
 love of liberty, their devotion to republican institutions, their frugality, 
 their indomitable pluck, which defied adversity. If you would know 
 how we have so splendidly won our way, I would point you to these in- 
 fluences in answer. 
 
 The West is indebted, as is the entire country, to New England for 
 many patriots and statesmen whose lives and example are part of the 
 imperishable glory of the republic. From our earliest days until now 
 the stories of their lives have been daily told about the fireside, and no 
 one can measure the impetus thereby given to higher and more patriotic 
 effort. What were American history without them.? With the most 
 illustrious stand many of the sons of Massachusetts. Among those upon 
 the roll of honor are Bradford, Endicott and Winthrop, Otis, the 
 Adamses, and Hancock, Webster, Andrew, Dawes, and Sumner, Devens, 
 Hoar, Long, Lodge, and Moody. Her contributions to the world of let- 
 ters have been no less conspicuous, and have brought her high and last- 
 ing renown. Prescott and Motley, Emerson, Longfellow, Lowell, Whit- 
 tier and Bryant have become familiar names wherever the English 
 tongue is spoken. 
 
 Among those whose patriotic fervor we are pleased to acknowledge, 
 is one who honors this interesting event. His name will long endure in 
 the pure patriotic literature of the republic. It has been my good for- 
 
12 
 
 tune to be associated with liim during a tragic and forever memorable 
 period of our national history. He differed with many of his associates 
 on important matters of governmental policy, but it was an honest differ- 
 ence, a difference that all respected and honored. His voice has always 
 rung out clear in support of exalted principles, which his conscience com- 
 manded. He has brought us many messages which have burned with 
 the patriotic fires of James Otis and Samuel Adams. We all gratefully 
 bring the homage of our love and esteem, and lay it at the feet of your 
 great Senator, George F. Hoar. 
 
 There can be no doubt that among the most distinctive contributions 
 to the West by the East, were the Ordinance of 1787, and the Ohio 
 Company. The vast influence of the Ordinance of 1787 upon the West, 
 and upon the nation itself, will justify a somewhat special inquiry into 
 the movement which led to its adoption, and to the formation of the 
 Ohio Society. 
 
 Congress, in 1776, made an appropriation of lands to the officers and 
 soldiers of the army. The distribution of lands to those who served 
 during the war was to be made according to their several grades. A 
 private soldier was to receive one hundred acres; a lieutenant-colonel, 
 four hundred and fifty, and so on. Later, Congress provided that a 
 brigadier-general should receive eight hundred and fifty and a major- 
 general one thousand one hundred acres. 
 
 After the army of Washington had accomplished its high and immor- 
 tal mission, two hundred and eighty-eight of its officers and soldiers 
 turned their eyes westward. In June, 1783, they petitioned Congress to 
 have the lands which had been voted to them, located in that "tract of 
 country, bounded north on Lake Erie, east on Pennsylvania, southeast 
 and south on the River Ohio, west on a line beginning at that part of the 
 Ohio which lies twenty-four miles west of the mouth of the River Scioto, 
 thence running north on a meridian line until it intersects the River 
 Miami, which falls into Lake Erie, thence down the middle of that river 
 to the lake." 
 
 The petitioners further expressed the opinion that this country is 
 "of sufficient extent, the land of such quality, and situation such as may 
 induce Congress to assign and mark it out as a tract or territory suitable 
 
13 
 
 to form a distinct government (or colony of the United States), in time 
 to be admitted one of the confederated States of America." 
 
 Of the signers, more than one-half were from the State of Massa- 
 chusetts. The remainder were from the States of New Jersey, Connecti- 
 cut, Maryland, New York and New Hampshire. 
 
 The petition was put into the hands of Gen. Rufus Putnam, of 
 Massachusetts. It set forth the advantages to the entire country of the 
 establishment of such a colony. 
 
 "I am, sir," said he, "among those who consider the cession of so 
 great a tract of territory to the United States in the western world as a 
 very happy circumstance, and of great consequence to the American 
 empire. Nor have I the least doubt that Congress will pay an early 
 attention to securing the allegiance of the natives, as well as provide for 
 the defense of that country in case of a war with Great Britain or Spain. 
 
 "One great means of securing the allegiance of the natives, I take 
 to be," said he, "the furnishing them such necessaries as they shall stand 
 in need of, and in exchange receiving their furs and skins. They are 
 become so accustomed to the use of firearms that I doubt if they could 
 gain a subsistence without them, at least they will be very sorry to be 
 reduced to the disagreeable necessity of using the bow and arrow as the 
 only means for killing their game, and so habituated are they to the 
 woolen blanket, etc., that an absolute necessity alone will prevent their 
 making use of them. This consideration alone is, I think, to prove the 
 necessity of establishing such factories as may furnish an ample supply 
 to these wretched creatures; for unless they arc furnished by the subjects 
 of the United States, they will undoubtedly seek elsewhere, and like all 
 other people, form their attachment where they have their commerce, 
 and then, in case of a war, will always be certain to aid our enemies. 
 Therefore, if there were no advantages in view but that of attaching 
 them to our interest, I think good policy will dictate the measure of car- 
 rying on a commerce with these people." 
 
 He suggested a general chain of garrisons for the protection of the 
 frontier from the Ohio to the lake. 
 
 "The petitioners, at least some of them," said he, in conclusion 
 "conceive that sound policy dictates the measure, and that Con<Tess 
 
u 
 
 ought to lose no time in establishing some such chain of posts as has been 
 hinted at, and in procuring the tract ol country petitioned for, of the 
 natives, for the moment this is done, and agreeable terms offered to the 
 settlers, many of the petitioners are determined, not only to become 
 adventurers, but actually to remove themselves to this country; and 
 there is not the least doubt but other valuable citizens will follow their 
 example, and the probability is that the country between Lake Erie and 
 the Ohio will be filled with inhabitants, and the faithful subjects of these 
 United States, so established on the waters of the Ohio and the lakes as 
 to banish forever the idea of our western territory falling under the 
 dominion of any European power, the frontier of the old States will be 
 effectually secured from savage alarms, and the new will have little to 
 fear from their insults." 
 
 General Putnam speaks in his petition of "the faithful subjects of 
 these United States," a term with which the citizens of the new republic 
 had become quite familiar while they were subjects of Great Britain; a 
 term, however, which has long since, happily, become obsolete. The 
 loyal citizen has succeeded the faithful subject. The one is the stay and 
 support of republican institutions; the other, of monarchy. 
 
 The petition of General Putnam discloses the fact that the petition- 
 ers, or at least some of them, were much opposed to a monopoly of 
 lands, and wished to guard against large patents being granted to indi- 
 viduals, as in their opinion such a mode would be very injurious to the 
 country, and would greatly retard its settlement, as it would throw too 
 much power into the hands of a few. 
 
 George Washington gave his cordial assent to the plan of coloniza- 
 tion, because "it would connect our governments with the frontier, 
 extend our settlements progressively, and plant a brave, a hardy and 
 respectable race of people as our advanced post, who would be always 
 ready and willing (in case of hostility) to combat the savages and check 
 their incursions. A settlement formed by such men would give security 
 to our frontiers; the very name of it would awe the Indians, and more 
 than probably prevent the murder of many innocent families, which fre- 
 quently in the usual mode of extending our settlements and encroach- 
 ments on the hunting grounds of the natives, fall the hapless victims to 
 
15 
 
 savage barbarity. * * * j ^ju venture to say it is the most rational 
 and practical scheme which can be adopted by a great proportion of the 
 officers and soldiers of our army, and promises them more happiness 
 than they can expect in any other way. The settlers being in the prime 
 of life, inured to hardship, and taught by experience to accommodate 
 themselves in every situation, going in a considerable body and under 
 the patronage of government, would enjoy in the first instance advan- 
 tages in procuring subsistence, and all the necessaries for a comfortable 
 beginning, superior to any common class of emigrants, and quite 
 unknown to those who have heretofore extended themselves beyond the 
 Appalachian mountains. They may expect, after a little perseverance, 
 competence and independence for themselves, a pleasant retreat in old 
 age, and the fairest prospects for their children." 
 
 A meeting of the officers and soldiers of the Revolutionary war was 
 held in 1786, in Boston, pursuant to a call by Gen. Rufus Putnam and 
 Benjamin Tupper, to organize the Ohio Society. At this meeting the 
 Ohio company of associates was organized. Its purpose was "to raise a 
 fund in Continental certificates for the sole purpose of buying Western 
 lands in the Western territory and making a settlement." 
 
 Dr. Manasseh Cutler, of Massachusetts, was employed, in 1787, "to 
 purchase of Congress land for the company in the great Western Terri- 
 tory of the Union," and the purchase of 1,500,000 acres was effected 
 under an act of Congress, which was passed in July of that year. 
 
 What an important year that was in American history ! Seventeen 
 hundred and eighty-seven will forever mark some of the most important 
 and notable incidents in our national history. In addition to the pur- 
 chase of land by the Ohio company, our national constitution was 
 framed, and the Ordinance for the government of the territory north- 
 west of the Ohio River was enacted in that year. The Ohio purchase 
 and the Ordinance of 1787 were interdependent incidents. It has been 
 said that "the purchase would not have been made without the Ordi- 
 nance; the Ordinance could not have been enacted except as an essential 
 condition of the purchase." 
 
 The Ordinance was next in importance only to the adoption of the 
 Federal constitution. It was an act in the fullest sense of constructive 
 
i6 
 
 statesmanship. It was among the foremost in its scope and wisdom in 
 all the history of free government. What higher praise than that given 
 it by Mr. Webster.'' "We are accustomed," said he, "to praise the law- 
 givers of antiquity; we help to perpetuate the fame of Solon and Lycur- 
 gus ; but I doubt whether one single law of any lawgiver, ancient or 
 modern, has produced effects of more distinct, marked and lasting char- 
 acter than the Ordinance of 1787." 
 
 "It approaches as near to absolute perfection," said Judge Timothy 
 Walker, "as anything to be found in the legislation of mankind." 
 
 It has been said that it laid the foundation of national greatness. 
 
 To whom are we indebted for this incomparable Ordinance.-' To 
 whom shall we pay the tribute of our grateful appreciation for this nota- 
 ble achievement in statecraft, so potent and far-reaching in its beneficent 
 influence, not only upon the great Northwest, but upon the entire 
 nation? We must look to New England for the author, and we must 
 also look to the pulpit for the one who laid us all under grateful contri- 
 bution. The one to whom we are largely indebted was a graduate of 
 Yale College; a man of high culture, "and a member of divers philo- 
 sophical societies. At that time he was pastor of a church in Massachu- 
 setts," Dr. Manasseh Cutler. 
 
 Dr. Cutler gives an interesting account of the difBculty of securing 
 from Congress the lands acquired by the Ohio company. "By this Ordi- 
 nance," he informs us, "we obtained the grant of near 5,000,000 of acres 
 of land, amounting to three millions and a half of dollars, one million 
 and a half of acres for the Ohio company, and the remainder for a 
 private speculation, in which many of the principal characters in America 
 are concerned. Without connecting this speculation, similar terms and 
 advantages could not have been obtained for the Ohio company." 
 
 It would appear from this that the art of "log rolling," which has 
 sometimes been practiced in the West, finds its precedent in the early 
 practices of our virtuous fathers of the East. 
 
 The Ordinance of 1787 prohibited slavery in the Northwest Territory. 
 An effort had been made before its adoption to restrict the existence of 
 slavery in that territory to the year 1800. Such an ordinance was 
 reported by Mr. Jefferson's committee in 1784, but the restrictive clause 
 was stricken out. 
 
17 
 
 The Ordinance forever secured the Territory of the Northwest, and, 
 through force of example, the territory beyond, from the crime of human 
 slavery. Its soil has never been contaminated by the foot of a bondman. 
 Its vast domain has been in the fullest sense the home and habitation of 
 the free. And when the question of abolishing slavery in the United 
 States arose, its sword was tendered to wipe from our institutions the 
 great overmastering crime, the one relic of barbarism, which unfortu- 
 nately gained a foothold in a land dedicated by God Almighty to the 
 exalted cause of human freedom. 
 
 Senator Hoar, speaking with historical accuracy and characteristic 
 grace, at Marietta, Ohio, in 1888, said: 
 
 "Here was the first human government where absolute civil and 
 religious liberty always prevailed. Here no witch was ever hanged. 
 Here no heretic was ever molested. Here no slave was ever born or 
 dwelt. When older states and nations, where the chains of human bond- 
 age have been broken, shall utter the proud boast: 'With great cost I 
 obtained this freedom,' each sister of the imperial group — Ohio, Indiana, 
 Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin — may lift up her queenly head with 
 the yet prouder answer: 'But I was free born!' " 
 
 Who can imagine the condition of the Northwest, or that of the 
 country itself, if slavery had been permitted to gain a foothold in the 
 Northwest Territory.'' If it had ever taken root in that large domain, 
 the probabilities are that the historian of the future would write a far 
 different story of our country than he will now be able to record. We 
 know all too well the tremendous cost of tearing from the throat of 
 liberty the merciless clutch of slavery. 
 
 The authors of the Ordinance kept in view the necessity of ample 
 provision for "schools and academies." It was, indeed, a fortunate and 
 wise foresight which made ample provision for the establishment oj 
 "moral and educational influences" in conjunction with provisions for 
 securing and safeguarding "human rights." They did not believe the 
 support of the public schools was paternalistic and inimical to the public 
 welfare. They well regarded the system as fundamentally sound and 
 promotive of the best interests of society and of the Government itself. 
 To this wholesome provision we are indebted for many schools and col- 
 
leges throughout the West, which are doing a mighty work in the 
 advancement of our common interests. 
 
 "This Ordinance did that which is not so common," said Mr. Web- 
 ster. "It set forth and declared it to be a high and binding duty of 
 government itself to support schools and advance the means of educa- 
 tion, on the plain reason that religion, morality and knowledge are 
 necessary to good government and to the happiness of mankind." 
 
 The Northwest Territory, when the Ordinance of 1787 was estab- 
 lished, was essentially a wilderness. It extended from the Alleghany 
 mountains to the Father of waters, north of the Ohio. From an early 
 day it had been regarded as of great promise. The climatic condition, soil 
 and mineral resources, lakes and rivers were such that those who 
 reflected saw there was a future of exceptional promise. Richard Cob- 
 len predicted in 1835 that there "one day will be the headquarters of 
 agriculture and manufacturing industry. Here one day will center the • 
 wealth, the power, the civilization of the entire world." 
 
 If this generous prophecy shall be fulfilled it will be due not only to 
 our natural advantages, but it will be owing, in no inconsiderable 
 degree, to the Ordinance of 1787, and to the fact that running through 
 the texture of our civilization is the strong thread of New England gold 
 — conservatism, wisdom and patriotism. 
 
 Out of the great Northv/estern Territory, five powerful and majestic 
 States have been carved — Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wiscon- 
 sin. Their combined population is about sixteen millions, or some five 
 times more than the population of the Union when the constitution was 
 adopted. They have but fairly entered upon a career which is destined 
 in a large measure to verify the prediction of the great English states- 
 man. 
 
 We have sometimes heard it said by the passionate and unreflecting 
 that there will be no more trouble between the North and the South; 
 that they are indissolubly cemented together, and that if any domestic 
 division shall occur, it will be between the East and the West; that the 
 line of cleavage, if it shall come, will run north and south. Such senti- 
 ment is not well founded. It is contrary to good reason, for there is no 
 natural antagonism of interest between the East and the West. Their 
 
19 
 
 interests are entirely mutual. They are concerned in a mighty commerce 
 which flows back and forth between them, and which binds them firmly 
 together. They are of the same blood. They have the same churches, 
 kindred ideals and Hke aspirations. Those who conceive that there may 
 be a conflict between them in the great future see with the disordered 
 vision of pessimists. 
 
 Fate has decreed, and her decrees are forever irreversible, that we 
 shall dwell in perpetual unison. Political demagogues, for selfish ends, 
 and senseless agitators, can not disturb the ties which bind us togeth,er 
 with more than a Titan's power. I am not unaware of the force of the 
 subtle appeal to local pride and local self-interest, and local prejudice, 
 but this would be lost in our larger pride and our larger interest in our 
 great national development. 
 
 Many of the constitutions of our Western States are largely modeled 
 upon those of the East. Many of our laws and municipalities have been 
 fashioned after yours. What is best in yours we have freely adopted. 
 We have appropriated that which has seemed best to promote the cause 
 of American freedom. 
 
 We have built mighty highways of commerce. Some of them 
 stretch across the Mississippi Valley, the Western plains, through the 
 Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast. We have erected great industries 
 and have joined with the States of the Atlantic seaboard in establishing 
 the industrial supremacy of our country. Much of the capital for these 
 gigantic and far-reaching undertakings came from the Eastern States. 
 You manifested in full measure your faith in your sons of the West, and 
 we trust that our development is a full justification of the confidence you 
 reposed in us. 
 
 New England was founded by those who were enamored of freedom 
 and who desired to secure liberty for themselves and their posterity. 
 They placed the schoolhouse and the church side by side. These were 
 the essential and permanent foundations of free institutions. They were 
 carried into the West by the pioneers, who made their tedious and ardu- 
 ous way across the Appalachian chain to found new States. The New 
 England church and schoolhouse were the companions of the log dwell- 
 ing upon the frontier, and they have continued down to this hour, like 
 
20 
 
 mighty beacon lights, "casting afar the beams of a higher civihzation." 
 
 We have many years studied the rich hterature of New England. 
 Your statesmen, publicists, historians, poets, novelists and scientists 
 have long been familiar to us. Many of our young men and women 
 have been instructed in your colleges and universities. We are indebted 
 to Harvard and Yale, and to Dartmouth, of which Mr. Webster spoke 
 with such pathetic interest, for their splendid influence upon the minds 
 of many of our youth. They have been potent agencies in the education 
 not only of the East but of the West. 
 
 We have great centers of industrial activity, populous cities, moun- 
 tains, rivers and lakes, forests and mines of inestimable wealth. We 
 take pride in them, but they are not the trophies we most prize. They 
 go to make up our material assets which have received attention the 
 world over, but they are not our chiefest claim to distinction. We value 
 most the virtue and intelligence and patriotism of our people. We seek 
 wealth and power, not as the end of human ambition, but only as a 
 means to the end. We seek them only that we may advance knowledge 
 and the gentler qualities which are the flower and fruitage of the human 
 race. We seek physical power because it may advance our moral and 
 intellectual well-being. We desire it only because we may use it to 
 advance wisdom and charity. We regard an exalted, symmetrical per- 
 sonality as the end, rather than the erection of factories, the develop- 
 ment of farms, or the construction of far-reaching highways. 
 
 In these higher things we seek to emulate New England. We have 
 drawn from you ideas of "clean-thinking and clean-living," the bedrock 
 of contentment in the home, the essential predicate of wholeseme social 
 conditions. We have received from you culture, scholarship, patriotism 
 and morality. With them no people can be either small or mean, and 
 without them none can become truly great and strong. 
 
 The gifted Curtis, an honored son of the East, speaking of the far- 
 reaching influence of New England, said: 
 
 "It is the subtle and penetrating influence of New England which 
 has been felt in every part of our national life, as the cool wind, blowing 
 from her pine-clad mountains, breathes a loftier inspiration, a health 
 more vigorous, a fresher impulse upon her own green valleys and happy 
 
21 
 
 fields. See how she has diffused her population. * * * xhe blood 
 of New England flows with energizing, progressive power in the veins of 
 every State; and the undaunted spirit of the Puritan, sic semper tyran- 
 nis, animates the continent from sea to sea." 
 
 While we have received much from you — Omnipotence alone can 
 measure it — we have not been content with that. We have used it as 
 capital for making still larger gains in the common interest. What you 
 have given us has but stimulated our efforts to still larger advancement. 
 We have used what we have received at your generous hands as a step- 
 ping stone to greater things. We have made headway in statesmanship, 
 in literature, in art, in science, in invention, in education, in agriculture, 
 in manufacture. You were our wise and sympathetic teacher. If we 
 have been apt pupils and have increased the sum of what you have given 
 us, it awakens in you only a sense of pride and satisfaction, for we are 
 joint sharers in the honor and glory that come to either. 
 
 We live to-day in retrospect. We gladly survey the past, with its 
 mighty achievements, its immeasurable contributions to human progress, 
 but we cannot live alone in retrospective contemplation. 
 
 At the close of this memorable day, we shall turn our faces to the 
 future. We shall plan and toil until the celebration of the three hun- 
 dreth anniversary of the birth of Lancaster. What shall those speak 
 who shall then assemble here.-' There is no vision so penetrating that it 
 can see far in advance of the present hour. There is no seer with wis- 
 dom profound enough to open to us the mystic volume of the next fifty 
 years. We are not filled with anxiety as to the half century which lies 
 immediately before us. Hope tells us to look up, not down. She tells 
 us that if we but carry into the future the work and the faith of the 
 fathers, we shall surely go forward, expanding in knowledge and power, 
 and that the roots of our institutions will strike deeper into the affections 
 of the people, and that through the united efforts of the East and the 
 West, the North and the South, blended into one sublime word, "Amer- 
 ica," our primacy will be established and everywhere acknowledged, and 
 that in the future, as in this hour, our chief glory will be that wisdom, 
 justice and mercy will preside over us and the destiny of the great 
 republic. 
 
22 
 
 Tlic Chairman — Our orator, to whom we have hstened with eager 
 attention, before he began suggested that he be formally presented to 
 you. He was assured that you knew him already, and why he was here 
 to-day — that if there were any towns in this commonwealth where such 
 an introduction might be needful, certainly Lancaster was not one of 
 them. Still, though this is as it were a family party, it is a large one, 
 and possibly there may be some here who do not quite understand his 
 relations with us, and with this occasion, or why we should have asked 
 him to speak to us to-day. If they will go into our ancient burial ground 
 they can readily find a score of headstones inscribed with the name of 
 Fairbank or Fairbanks, and close by a ruder one as rudely chiseled 
 with the name John Prescott, whose daughter Lydia was married to 
 Jonas Fairbanks, one of the victims of the Indian raid that for a while 
 laid the Town waste and desolate. At the side of the lowly and nearly 
 hidden memorial that has marked the grave of Prescott for more now 
 than two hundred years, stands today a more fitting one, lately erected by 
 one of his descendants — Mrs. Roger Wolcott — and bearing an epitaph 
 written by another of his descendants, the honored senior Senator of 
 Massachusetts in the national Congress. Recording the main facts in the 
 story of its subject, it tells us that "his faith and virtues have been inher- 
 ited by many descendants, who, in every generation have well served the 
 state, in war, in literature, at the bar, in the pulpit, in public life, and in 
 Christian homes." 
 
 For how many of these descendants what has been but is no longer, 
 the West, or even the Middle West, maybe indebted to the always East, 
 it would not be easy to say, but we can safely say that not the least dis- 
 tinguished is Senator Fairbanks of Indiana. 
 
 HYMN— "In Pleasant Lands." .... Rev. James Flint 
 
 Tune— Duke Street. 
 In pleasant lands have fallen the lines The toils they bore, our ease have wrought; 
 
 That bound our goodly heritage, They sowed in tears— in joy we reap; 
 
 And safe beneath our sheltering vines The birthright they so dearly bought 
 
 Our youth is blest, and soothed our age. We'll guard, till we with them shall sleep. 
 
 What thanks, O God, to thee are due, Thy kindness to our fathers shown, 
 
 That thou didst plant our fathers here; In weal and woe through all the past, 
 
 And watch and guard them as they grew Their grateful sons, O God, shall own, 
 
 A vineyard to the planter dear. While here their name and race shall last. 
 
23 
 
 GLORIA AND SANCTUS— 12th Mass of Mozart. 
 
 ORGAN POSTLUDE . , B. J. Lang 
 
 At the conclusion of the exercises in the meeting-house, the proces- 
 sion was re-formed and led by the marshal to a tent pitched, by her kind 
 consent, on a field belonging to Mrs. E. M. Green, where dinner was in 
 waiting. When all had been seated the chairman said: We are per- 
 mitted to look to the Reverend Father O'Keefe, pastor of the Catholic 
 parishes in Clinton and Lancaster, to say grace to this our breaking of 
 bread together. 
 
 Dinner ended, the chairman said : Ladies and gentlemen, we are 
 happy that we can present to you, as the ruler of our feast this after- 
 noon, the Hon. Herbert Parker, and him, for the time being, you are all 
 expected to obey — even his excellency, the Governor of the Common- 
 wealth himself. 
 
 Mr. Parker, in accepting the position of Toast-master, said in part: 
 Mr. President, through benevolent affection, we who have come to 
 know you render you ready obedience. Were it not for that, I should 
 not have assumed the duties which you most gracefully could perform. 
 
 Addressing the gathering, Mr. Parker continued: 
 
 Centuries have passed since that time when a company of brave 
 and God-fearing men and women passed through the forbidding gates of 
 a wilderness, daring all the perils of a merciless warfare to win for us 
 from savage and forest the lands where to-day are fruitful fields and 
 farms and happy homesteads. The gates through which they passed 
 are open today in hospitality and set wide with our welcome; nor are 
 the smiling hillsides more open to the sunshine than our hearts in greet- 
 ing to our guests. 
 
 Apart from the busy avenues of commerce, we present to you none 
 of the splendors of a great city. We have known only the simplicity of 
 New England rural life; but from participation in the achievements of 
 every energy of our nation, a host of sons and daughters of Lancaster 
 are here with us to prove that the vigor and virtue of our ancestors live 
 again in their descendants. 
 
24 
 
 You shall find here none of the tumult of the market-place, nor do 
 the lofty chambers of trade fret our peaceful sky. The church spire still 
 rises supreme above all else in our village. Our town takes modest rank 
 among the municipalities of the State; but men and women nurtured here 
 have been of those who have made the nation great and respected 
 throughout the world. Here sleep the brave who have died for our 
 country. Here are the sacred ashes of God's ministers, of statesmen and 
 of patriots. 
 
 Here we have tried to keep the faith of our fathers, to love liberty, 
 to dwell at peace with our neighbors, to lead such lives as shall permit 
 us to read the ominous predictions of the last judgment written on the 
 stones of our ancient burial place with no greater terror than that felt by 
 other sinful human beings. That we may know and reflect upon the 
 real significance of our festival, you shall hear eloquent voices giving 
 utterance to its inspiration in living words. 
 
 Fortunate and happy is that festival honored by the presence of 
 the chief magistrate of the Commonwealth, the imperishable monument 
 to the foresight, the virtue, and the sacrifice of our fathers, to whose 
 memory we pay grateful tribute today. Defender of the people's faith, 
 fearless and just administrator of the affairs of state, type of her best 
 citizenship, true exponent, eloquent advocate of the principles upon 
 which the republic is founded, honored because of the dignity of his 
 great office, loved because of his stainless character, his broad humanity, 
 and his infinite kindliness of heart — His Excellency, the Governor of 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 Turning to Dr. Bartol, the Governor said: 
 
 It is with pleasure that I acknowledge your right to enjoin obedi- 
 ence upon us all, and with pleasure I recognize the authority conferred 
 by you on the toast-master. My only regret is that, with his eloquent 
 voice, you might not have conveyed to him the further duty of represent- 
 ing the State which he serves in one of its most important offices. After 
 calling upon him on so many occasions for service, I am prepared to tes- 
 tify to his worth, for I acknowledge myself in affairs of state a constant 
 debtor to the Attorney General. 
 
25 
 
 The Governer continued as follows: 
 
 I find great pleasure in occupying this platform with my prede- 
 cessor in office, the man who, over fifty years ago, was Governor of the 
 old Bay State, the youngest man to be elected to that office, who since 
 his retirement from public life has given his time and strength to the 
 American people — Ex-Governor George S. Boutwell. 
 
 It is always a pleasure, whether in Worcester County or Suffolk, in 
 Massachusetts or elsewhere, to stand by the side of the senior Senator, 
 who is elected from Massachusetts, but takes his commission from all 
 humanity. 
 
 Nor can I fail to recognize the greatness of Lancaster when I look 
 into your composite faces, for I understand you are all here today; and 
 when I look to my right I find a sample of the men with whom you have 
 populated the great West. [Senator Fairbanks.] 
 
 I have been here only a short time, a few hours; but I think I have 
 been here long enough to see the foundations of Lancaster. 
 
 When I came last night, I was taken first to a home; and I recalled 
 the fact that in reading the history of the founding of Lancaster, it 
 was not told how many people came, but how many families. They 
 came not to seek for gold or precious minerals, not looking for wealth, 
 distinction, or luxur}'. They came solely to establish wholesome, typi- 
 cal homes, such as constitute the cornerstone of the great Common- 
 wealth which I represent to-day. 
 
 Last night they took me to the school reunion; and then I recalled 
 the fact that Massachusetts does not produce great crops of grain or an 
 abundance of minerals, but she produces men. I thought it particularly 
 significant when I went to the town hall, and found the graduates 
 assembled there. It signifies another cornerstone to the great Common- 
 wealth. The Governor of North Carolina paid Massachusetts a deserved 
 compliment when he said: "North Carolina is poor because she is illiter- 
 ate; Massachusetts is rich because she is educated." When John D. 
 Long was secretary of the navy, he named the battleship Massachusetts, 
 not that the State might get honor out of its accomplishments in war, 
 but because of the majesty of mind which it represents. Massachusetts 
 stands for education. 
 
26 
 
 I visited your town hall, and remembered how you have guarded 
 the liberties of the country in the town-meeting. That, I think, is the 
 third cornerstone. 
 
 This morning I had the pleasure of sitting in your stately church, 
 its interior immaculate in its decorations, and whose pastor has for fifty- 
 six years pointed the way to God. It was as if the people of Lancaster 
 had, without knowing it, shown me the four cornerstones of their 
 existence. 
 
 You are not rich in money or great buildings, or in the wealth of 
 the world; but you are great in what you have done for the Common- 
 wealth and for the country. You have been great in peace, in the devel- 
 opment of the character of citizens. You have been great in war, for 
 Lancaster's sons have been in the forefront of the battle-line. 
 
 It was not many years ago when your attics were full of old furni- 
 ture, handed down from bygone generations. But a few years ago these 
 heirlooms were taken down from their obscurity, and it was found that 
 grandfather's chair and grandmother's table were superior in their lines 
 to those made now. So to-day may you bring forth from the storehouse 
 of the past, not the old furniture, but the noble lives and traditions of the 
 fathers. 
 
 The toast-master then introduced Senator Hoar : 
 
 I present to you one who has enlightened every field of human 
 knowledge; instructed by the history of all ages, the wisest counsellor 
 of our own; exalted among men by right of intellectual gifts; crowned 
 by scholars for his learning, by the nation for long years of noble public 
 service, by a grateful people for devotion to their cause; Senator of the 
 United States; distinguished son of American scholars and patriots; de- 
 scended from that John Hoar of Concord, who, by the diplomacy of his 
 courage, redeemed from captivity among the savages the devout mother 
 of our church and town— the Hon. George F. Hoar. 
 
 Senator Hoar spoke as follows: 
 
 I have been ordered by my excellent doctor to do no intellectual 
 work just now after ten o'clock in the morning. The doctor married a 
 descendant of John Prescott. So I think you will agree with me that he 
 
27 
 
 has what is said to be the best title to obedience, that of having himself 
 been accustomed to obey. 
 
 A few years ago somebody expressed his wonder at the prodigious 
 intellectual labor of a worthy senator from the South. "Why," he said, 
 "he studies every public question before the country. His head runs 
 over with statistics like an ant-hill. He works hard all day in his com- 
 mittee-room and almost all night at home, and beside that he makes 
 longer speeches and more of them than any other half dozen senators put 
 together." "Oh," was the answer, "there's no trouble about that. He 
 rests his intellect while he's making his speeches." 
 
 I am afraid when you have heard what I have to say, you will 
 conclude that I have not disobeyed the good doctor's injunction. 
 
 But I am myself one of the tribe of John Prescott. I have always 
 taken great pride and pleasure in the ties which for many generations 
 have connected me, and those whose blood runs in my veins, with your 
 town. 
 
 When John Prescott founded Lancaster, it was not merely the 
 clearing of a farm or the redeeming of a few acres from the forest or the 
 savage. It was the beginning of a beautiful life, beautiful among her 
 sister towns of New England, as your queenly elm is beautiful among 
 the trees of the country. It was the life of a moral being, with history, 
 with affections, with loves, with memories, with hopes and fears, with 
 a distinct quality of its own, like that of men and women, the parents of 
 children, loving them and in their turn the object of their love and 
 gratitude. 
 
 Not many of the great mass of mankind impress you with a sense 
 of their individuality. But there are a few that, when you think of 
 them, it is not a vague human image. It is a distinct and separate 
 individuality. It is Napoleon, Webster, Emerson, that rises in the 
 imagination. Of the multitude of cities and towns whose names are pre- 
 served in history, there are very few that seem to be anything but an ag- 
 gregate or society of men, distinguished by name or locality only from all 
 the others belonging to the same region or country or century. As you go 
 from state to state, or from district to district, one name, one county, 
 one town, is pretty much like another. But when Athens or Edinburgh 
 
28 
 
 or Boston is named, you have a conception of a separate life, a life like 
 no other, with a quality of its own like a face of Van Dyke or a statue 
 of Phidias, or a striking human character. 
 
 The number of communities of this class is not large. But I think 
 that by the general consent of all intelligent students of her history, 
 Lancaster would be held to belong to it. As I have always delighted 
 to think and say, my beloved native town of Concord belongs to it. 
 These two towns have much in common. They are alike in their 
 scenery. Each is seated by its beautiful river. Each has enjoyed, and 
 still enjoys, the gracious influence of beloved and saintly clergymen. In 
 each the spirit of peace in the landscape has entered into the very soul 
 of the town, and in each the spirit of the people, in its turn, seems to 
 have entered into the landscape. 
 
 Lancaster has done her full duty to the commonwealth and the 
 country in peace. She has been the mother of towns and the mother of 
 men. There are men all over the country, from Maine to the Golden 
 Gate or far Alaska, who are in the high places of public service, who 
 proudly trace their lineage to her. But yet, if you read her annals as 
 they have been compiled by her faithful and learned historian, you will 
 agree with me that the history of Lancaster, peaceful as she may seem 
 toda}^ has after all been a military history. 
 
 She has borne a brave part in seven great wars : at Martinique, at 
 Havana, at Carthagena, at Louisbourg, at Crown Point, at Quebec, at 
 Ticonderoga, in the great days of the Revolution, in the War of 1812, in 
 the War for the Union — gentle and beautiful Lancaster has done her 
 full share, and made her precious contribution of her brave sons in every 
 generation. At the call of the country they have gone out from their 
 modest homes, from the side of mother or wife or children, to discharge 
 the duty of an American citizen soldier; some to lay down their lives on 
 distant battlefields; others, when you think of the eternity of fame, 
 hardly more fortunate, to return to the same companionship, happiest 
 when their work was done. 
 
 Some of the veterans of the Civil War are spared to take part with 
 you in today's celebration. But for them, the sacrifices and service and 
 labor and devotion of the others would have been in vain. But for 
 
29 
 
 them, there could have been nothing left for us which would have made 
 life worth living, or made any son or daughter of Massachusetts proud 
 to be an American or proud to be a child of the old Bay State. 
 
 "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," would be all that 
 would be left for us to say. Everything Massachusetts valued, every- 
 thing her sons had done, was to be blotted out of history, if that war 
 had gone wrong. Plymouth Rock and Salem, Faneuil Hall and the Old 
 South Church, Concord and Bunker Hill, James Otis and Sam Adams, 
 John Adams and John Quincy Adams, Rufus Putnam, Daniel Webster, 
 Charles Sumner and John Andrew, the soldiers of the Revolution, the 
 sailors of the great sea fights of 1812 — all these were wretched failures, 
 if in that war our sun had gone down to defeat. 
 
 It was the good fortune of Lancaster to give to the country many 
 soldiers in the War for the Union. Many of them would well deserve 
 separate mention if time would permit. It was the fortune of one of 
 them to take a decisive part in the great final decisive action of the war. 
 
 Col. Francis Washburn, a native of Lancaster, son of your honored 
 fellow-citizen, my old friend and client, John M. Washburn, brother of 
 the late accomplished minister to Switzerland, my beloved pupil and 
 friend, and of Edward Richmond Washburn, himself a gallant soldier and 
 martyr of the war, with two regiments of infantry and part of his own 
 force of cavalry — less than a thousand men in all — held back the advance 
 of Lee's forces with heroic and desperate bravery until General Lee, sup- 
 posing that a strong Union force was there in his way, was driven from 
 the road he meant to take, and made a detour by way of Appomattox 
 Court House, which prevented the escape of the rebel army. 
 
 The inspector-general of Lee's staff says: "To the sharpness of that 
 fight, the cutting off of Lee's army at Appomattox Court House was 
 probably owing. So fierce were the charges of Colonel Washburn and 
 his men, and so determined their fighting, that General Lee received 
 the impression that they must be supported by a large part of the army, 
 and that his retreat was cut off." 
 
 In the third charge, while Colonel Washburn was crossing sabres 
 with a rebel officer, whom he had nearly disarmed, he was shot in the 
 head by another. While he lay wounded on the field, which had been 
 
30 
 
 left by the forces of both sides, he received a sabre cut upon the skull 
 from a man engaged in plundering the wounded. Whether the other 
 wound would have been fatal or no, is not certain. But the latter 
 proved mortal. 
 
 I heard the story of Washburn's fight and death, a year or two ago, 
 from Major Brown of the regular army, who himself bore a gallant and 
 conspicuous part in the closing action of the war. He was present when 
 Washburn was dispatched to hold High Bridge against the rebel advance, 
 and came upon the field where Washburn lay mortally wounded. He 
 heard the whole story from the lips of the dying boy. I had hoped that 
 Major Brown's narrative would have been taken down and permanently 
 preserved. That was prevented by his sudden death. 
 
 The importance of the gallant action of Colonel Washburn, and 
 the gallant men under his command, is established not only by the evi- 
 dence af the Confederate officer whom I have just quoted, but by that 
 of General Grant also, who said in a personal letter to Colonel Wash- 
 burn's mother: "I have just seen for the first time the obituary notice of 
 your noble son who fell wounded at the 'High Bridge' so gallantly lead- 
 ing his men. I had hoped his wound would not prove mortal and that 
 he might be spared many years to view with pride the work which he 
 so bravely aided in consummating." 
 
 Undoubtedly the war would somewhere and in some way have 
 ended as it did. Rebellion would have had ill-luck, and the Union 
 would have been saved. Yet but for this Lancaster boy, Lee would 
 have made his escape on that day, and there would have been no Appo- 
 mattox. 
 
 If we consider the personal quality of this young officer, the char- 
 acter of the act itself, and the importance of the result, it ought in my 
 opinion to be reckoned not only the most heroical of the actions of the 
 War for the Union, so fruitful in heroic actions, but among the great and 
 heroical actions of all military history. The statue of your brave boy 
 ought to stand forever in your street by the house where his father and 
 mother dwelt, and where he drew in courage and patriotism with his 
 mother's milk and his native air. 
 
31 
 
 Pride of his country's banded chivalry, 
 
 His fame their hope, his name their battle-cry. 
 
 He lived as mothers wish their sons to live. 
 He died as fathers wish their sons to die. 
 
 Ah, if the tree John Prescott planted had borne no other fruit than 
 this heroic youth; if that young Hfe had yielded nothing but that single 
 deed, who shall say that all the cost of planting and watering and tend- 
 ing through these long centuries was not well bestowed.-' 
 
 Human history sometimes seems infinitely tame and dreary. One 
 generation passeth away and another generation cometh. Men by the 
 million and by the thousand million live and perish and are forgotten. 
 But it is by such deeds as that of this Lancaster youth that we are 
 assured that we too are cast in the divine mold, that we too are a little 
 lower than the angels, and that we too can take hold on Immortality. 
 
 The Hon. George S. Boutwell was next presented, as "one who 
 has given exalted service to the Commonwealth, the nation, and society; 
 a man who has been most active when any evil endangered the princi- 
 ples upon which the Commonwealth is founded; former governor; 
 United States senator; secretary of the treasury; today one of the most 
 distinguished citizens of the State — Ex-Governor Boutwell, of Groton." 
 
 Mr. Boutwell's speech was as follows : 
 
 If I respond to your invitation to speak, I shall limit myself to a 
 brief view of the character of our New England towns, with some refer- 
 ence to the part they have played in the affairs of the State and of the 
 Country. My information touching the Town of Lancaster is limited to 
 such facts as I have gathered from the neighborhood and life that I have 
 enjoyed since the first quarter of the last century. It has a place — a 
 high place — in the first class of New England towns, and I hope it is not 
 a matter of regret with its citizens that it was once a part of the County 
 of Middlesex. It is to-day justly entitled to whatever share of honor may 
 be due for the identity of its history with Concord, Lexington, and Bun- 
 ker Hill. We may assume that its citizen soldiers served under Prescott 
 at Bunker Hill; and it is a matter of public knowledge that it performed 
 its full duty during the war of the Revolution and the war for the preser- 
 
32 
 
 vation of the government in the severe struggle incident to the contest 
 of 1861-1865. 
 
 Speaking generally of New England towns, it may be said that 
 their history is illustrative of two important features of public policy. 
 New England towns recognized equality of citizenship from the first; 
 and as a consequence of equality of citizenship they have consistently 
 maintained a public policy which recognizes equality of opportunity in 
 all the industries of life, in all the privileges of society, in freedom of 
 religious opinion, the unrestricted exercise of forms of worship, and in 
 fine the largest liberty to all men in all things as far as liberty can be 
 enjoyed by any one man, whatever his wealth, social standing, learning 
 or experience in public affairs. 
 
 These principles of social and municipal life as developed in our 
 New England towns cannot wisely or justly be limited by any public 
 policy to which we can give assent under any circumstances, with refer- 
 ence to any people or to any part of the world. The municipal freedom 
 of the New England town in its principles recognizes in all mankind full 
 freedom of opinion, free exercise of the right of self-government, exemp- 
 tion from taxation except through consent, the right of trial by jury, and 
 the protection of the citizen through the enjoyment of the writ of habeas 
 corpus. These great rights are as secure in New England as in any part 
 of the world; but the duty must ever remain to so protect them and to 
 so recognize them at home, that our influence may be constantly exerted 
 in aid of the claim of people in all countries to the enjoyment of equal 
 rights. 
 
 The Hon. Charles W. Fairbanks was next introduced as "a friend 
 of New England in the West." "Now we have seen him," said the 
 toast-master, "we know why that coy Priscilla of the wilderness chose 
 his ancestor from the warrior brothers." 
 
 Senator Fairbanks said : 
 
 Mr. Toast-master, Ladies and Gentlemen: Your kind invitation 
 comes to me as a surprise, though by no means a disagreeable one. 
 Shakespeare somewhere says, "Nothing pleaseth like rare accidents." 
 This is, indeed, a gratifying accident, as it gives me an opportunity to 
 
33 
 
 thank the good people of Lancaster for their more than generous kind- 
 ness and courtesy. 
 
 I infer from the generous introduction of the Honorable Toast- 
 master that I am expected to say something of the noble women of Lan- 
 caster. Lancaster! How sweet and how splendid is the name, for it 
 awakens memories of heroic deeds of men and sacrifices of women in the 
 splendid cause of civilization. It sometimes seems to me that we do not 
 always respect the proper proportion between the deeds and sacrifices 
 of men and women, done and suffered in the arduous work of building 
 up republican institutions. Think of the good old mothers of Revolu- 
 tionary days, who suffered a thousand deaths in the homes of New Eng- 
 land, even though they did not face death upon the battle-field. We 
 should never forget our indebtedness to them, for having, by their 
 splendid womanhood, softened the sternness and sweetened the auster- 
 ity of our good old forefathers. 
 
 Think of the courage and suffering of the women of Lancaster dur- 
 ing the long and weary years when the Indians made war upon the brave 
 pioneers who gave to fate the keeping of their lives and fortunes. 
 
 A few days ago I had the honor to deliver an address at the cele- 
 bration of the one hundred and twenty-fifth anniversary of the Battle of 
 Monmouth. Not far from where I spoke stood a majestic shaft, com- 
 memorating the valor and sacrifices of those who gave to history that 
 important event. In bas relief was a tablet in honor of Molly Pitcher, 
 who did well her part upon that famous field of glory. There was no 
 service more entitled to recognition than hers, and what she did was but 
 expressive of what her country-women were doing and willing to do 
 wherever need be. 
 
 The annals of Lancaster are filled with many deeds of great bravery 
 by the women who lived here since the first white settlement more than 
 two centuries ago. By the way, I think we are all related. I feel, from 
 my experience today, that we are all cousins, and I am proud of my 
 relations. All honor to the women of New England who have left the 
 impress of their minds and hearts upon our splendid civilization. 
 
 May the venerable town of Lancaster go forward in the ways of 
 peace and progress. May her future be characterized, as it has been 
 
34 
 
 during the two hundred and fifty years which close today under such 
 happy auspices, by devotion to rehgion, temperance, virtue, knowledge 
 and patriotism. 
 
 I thank you all. 
 
 Mrs. Charles W. Fairbanks was presented as "prominent among 
 those who are keeping alive the fires of patriotism." All present rose to 
 greet Mrs. Fairbanks, who said : 
 
 Mr. Toast-master and Friends : This most courteous and kindly 
 introduction, this generous greeting which you have accorded me, merits 
 an eloquent response; but as I came here to listen, not to speak, to learn 
 and not to teach, I may not attempt this. But I do return to you all 
 my most hearty thanks for what I feel in great part a tribute to that 
 grand patriotic society, the Daughters of the American Revolution, of 
 which I have the honor to be the head. This noble society, dedicated 
 to the love of country, the preservation of its institutions, is endeavoring 
 to carry out the lessons inculcated in Lancaster two hundred and fifty 
 years ago, which are still taught here, devotion to liberty and love of 
 humanity. 
 
 The toast-master, in introducing the Hon. Henry S. Nourse, said 
 that "he, knowing the days of the past, is living in quick sympathy with 
 those of the present. He is the historian of the Town and of its people, 
 fairly charitable to the sons of the Town and hopeful that they may 
 amount to something for their fathers' sake. He is the Tacitus of the 
 Lancastrian province." 
 
 Mr. Nourse said : 
 
 Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen : I think you all ought to 
 be informed that our eloquent toast-master has, during the past week or 
 two, been collecting an extensive assortment of gilt-edged adjectives 
 with which to besprinkle the numerous speakers expected to grace this 
 occasion. Several of these orators not being present, he has poured his 
 surplus adulation upon poor me. Now those of you who have no acquaint- 
 ance with me will please use your kindest credulity and believe all that 
 you can of his description; but I warn you that my neighbors who have 
 
35 
 
 known me for years are probabl}^ remembering their Dickens, and whis- 
 pering in each other's ears what Betsey Prig said to Sairey Gamp when 
 she had heard the mythical Mrs. Harris praised too much: "I don't 
 beheve there's no sich person." 
 
 But I turn to the regular business for which I am called up. 
 
 We all know how healthful it is for the individual soul now and then 
 to get away from the ruck of politics, the dust of traffic, the "hello" of 
 the telephone girl, and to listen in some vernal solitude to the droning 
 of the aboriginal bumblebee and the whistling of the unsophisticated 
 bobolink. It is equally healthful for the community at stated intervals 
 to cease from prating about its petty municipal affairs and boasting of its 
 physical charms and its achievements, and to reflect upon its humble ori- 
 gin. It is well for a man occasionally to look at that photograph of himself 
 which was taken when he was in swaddling clothes. It may be slightly 
 humiliating, but it is instructive. So it is well for us to look back down 
 the rugged staircase of years, and contemplate the seven or eight gener- 
 ations that have painfully climbed that staircase to give us foothold upon 
 the lofty platform of modern civilization. It is good for us to remember, 
 often, that all we have and all that we have wrought, and all that we 
 hope to be, to have and to accomplish, have been possible through the 
 strenuous perseverance of a few brave pioneers, the toilsome struggles 
 of a yeomanry clad in homespun — our ancestors. We look back through 
 a vista of two hundred and fifty years. How brief is that space of time 
 in the world's annals, in the story of human civilization! In the story of 
 England two hundred and fifty years only take us back to the times of 
 the iconoclastic Cromwell. In French history they bring us only to the 
 gilded reign of Louis XIV. But we of Massachusetts, we of the Nashua 
 Valley, need not reckon time by transatlantic calendars. Here, two hun- 
 dred and fifty years carry us back to the days when the leaden bullets 
 from the iron muzzles of Puritan matchlocks beat back the flint-tipped 
 arrows of the Algonquin bowmen; when the steel-edged hatchets forged 
 by John Prescott and Thomas Sawyer upon Lancaster anvils clashed 
 against the withe-bound stone tomahawks of Mohawk warriors. Yes; in 
 Lancaster, though our local civilization nominally is two hundred and 
 
36 
 
 fifty years old only, it in fact dates back to the stone age, and that is 
 everywhere recognized as respectable antiquity. 
 
 We honor our ancestors to-day. Let those who have no grand- 
 fathers to boast of scoff at us as ancestor worshippers. We honor our 
 progenitors because they were worthy of honor. We honor them for 
 what they wrought with infinite toil and danger, but much more do we 
 honor them for what they were. They loved God and they loved their 
 fellowmen — that is, if their fellowmen were not baptists, quakers or 
 witches. They feared God, but they feared no man. They set their 
 principles high above comfortable living. More than this, they were 
 men and women of rare, various and varied individuality; and Senator 
 Hoar has told us that in the individuality of the citizen is the hope and 
 the safety of our republican institutions. We, I think, may boast that 
 we their descendants have inherited something of the individuality of 
 the Nashua pioneers. I know that many now depreciate the force of 
 heredity. I have heard certain sentimental reformers almost assert 
 that the saint and the sinner are alike the product of their environment, 
 /believe in heredity; and when I hear, as we all often do, that in some 
 part of the broad domain of our republic a Prescott or a Fairbank, a 
 Carter, Rugg, White, Willard, Houghton, Wilder or Whitcomb, has 
 been laureled with fresh honors by appreciative fellow-citizens, I know 
 that then and there a scion of the old Lancaster stock has won the meed 
 of ancestral virtues, the honest dues of his family traits. Believe in her- 
 edity? How can we of Massnchusetts help it with the record of our 
 beloved senior Senator in our memories.^ A little less than two hundred 
 and fifty years ago, there lived in Concord a man of talent with a sharp 
 tongue, named John Hoare. He was our Senator's ancestor. He some- 
 times was at variance with His Excellency the Governor, and with the 
 Honorable Council. He was often at odds with the ecclesiastical 
 oligarchy then dominant in Massachusetts. For John Hoare always did 
 his own thinking. He did not belong to the Brahmin class and he did 
 not rely for his opinions upon the Brahmin class of which Cotton Mather 
 became the exponent — that brilHant pedant who in his vanity appointed 
 himself the almoner of God's wrathful judgments for New England. 
 John Hoare was an almoner of mercy. I suppose he was the earliest 
 
37 
 
 color-blind Puritan on record. He was just as likely to choose for his 
 friendly offices Tom Dublet and Peter Tatatiquinea, copper-colored 
 Nashoba neighbors, as those who sat in dignified pews in the Concord 
 meeting-house. And the red-men knew and had implicit trust in him. 
 
 When, in 1676, the wolves were howling and desolation brooded 
 over the ashes of what had been the pleasant village of Lancaster, the 
 heart-broken minister, Joseph Rowlandson, wandered up and down the 
 Bay towns begging for help to ransom his dear wife Mary, the captive 
 slave of Weetamoo the pet wife of that aboriginal Mormon, Quanopin, 
 chief of the Narragansets. And some gave him the glad hand and some 
 the cold shoulder; some gave him a few shillings, and some gay-colored 
 cloth loved by the squaws. John Hoare, the color-blind altruist, gave 
 himself; he took the shillings, the bright cloths, a bottle or two of New 
 England rum and a few pounds of tobacco, went up into the fastnesses 
 of Wachuset, met the wily and cowardly Philip, the revengeful Saga- 
 more Sam, the blood-thirsty Monoco and the drunken Quanopin, 
 exchanged his money and goods for Mrs. Rowlandson, and brought her 
 safely back to her husband and friends. Of course we cannot wonder 
 that our beloved Senator, Lancaster's persistent friend, is color-blind. 
 Of course, when he hears the cry of the oppressed, his heart throbs 
 faster and his words burn; and it makes no difference whether the cry 
 for help comes from the white laborer of the North, the black bondman 
 of the South, the red Sioux of the West, or the yellow Filipino of the 
 orient. He must exercise his inherited traits. 
 
 Our fathers and their fathers' fathers believed in heredity. One 
 hundred years or less ago, every man in this valley, whatever coat he 
 wore, wore a nickname that fitted him tighter than his coat. At least he 
 did if he had any individuality protuberant enough to hang an epithet 
 upon. And the same was true of families. There was a string of epi- 
 thets characterizing all the old families of Lancaster. I much regret 
 that the list of these is covered by the dust of years; for there's a deal of 
 history in nicknames if we could trace their origin. I can recall for you 
 but four of the list now: the "Wilful Wilders," "'Rastling Carters," 
 "Laughing Joslins," and "WhistHng Whitcombs." As for the Wilful 
 Wilders, is there one of you who does not know that every man Wilder 
 
38 
 
 gets his own way every day and all day, at any cost ? Do you know 
 of a single one who does not? Well, perhaps there may be two or three, 
 and do you know what is the matter with them? TJiey married Wilder 
 girls. (The laughter you just heard probably came from the Joslins. The 
 Wilders of course did not smile.) As for the 'Rastling Carters, I can 
 only say that in my boyhood there were champion wrestlers in every 
 town, every village, every school even. There are none now, you say? 
 Well, perhaps not. I know that the strenuous youth of to-day prefer 
 the more dangerous and tricky miscellaneous scrimmage which they call 
 football. I know that the less strenuous stroll — in pairs — leisurely about 
 a cow-pasture Sunday afternoons and call it golf. But there are wres- 
 tlers yet. A few years ago when we found that certain thieves were 
 seriously diminishing the value of our fur seal herds in Alaskan waters, 
 and it became expedient to assert our rights in a court of arbitration, the 
 government looked about for men qualified to encounter the champion 
 legal wrestlers of all England, and found them. When in due time our 
 champions came home from the great wrestling bout at Paris crowned 
 with the laurels of victory, chief among them was one born and bred in 
 Lancaster, James Coolidge Carter. He was expected here to-day, would 
 have occupied this place which I now hold, and would have delighted 
 you with the graceful oratory for which he is famous, and for which my 
 rude effort is substituted. I have just received a letter from him, stating 
 that he is in the hands of a physician, and greatly regrets his inability to 
 revisit at this time his native town, to revive old and pleasant recollec- 
 tions and to again meet with the few surviving friends of his youth. 
 
 Throughout the length and breadth of the great republic and in 
 other lands, the descendants of John Prescott and his fellow pioneers 
 have built happy and prosperous homes. Many of them have won more 
 than local fame. Many have gained honors which will give them place 
 on the pages of poet and historian. But all of them — may we not well 
 believe? — have helped to raise the average of intelligence, and to push 
 forward the march of civilization, whatever their stations in life. We give 
 a hearty welcome to their representatives who are with us to-day, and we 
 hope that when they go forth from the shadows of our ancestral elms, 
 they may bear with them the belief that we too who have chosen to 
 
39 
 
 linger on the banks of the skimberous Nashua, and to stand guard over 
 the graves of John Prescott and his compeers, the founders of Lancaster, 
 are not degenerate children of noble ancestors. 
 
 The next speaker was the Hon. Charles Francis Adams, whose 
 remarks were as follows : 
 
 In view of the weather, the length to which these ceremonies have 
 already extended, and the portion of the programme still remaining to 
 be carried out, I do not propose to occupy even my alloted ten minutes 
 of your time. 
 
 I come here, and am called upon, as representative of the Massa- 
 chusetts Historical Society. Perhaps, as such, it might to some seem 
 incumbent upon me to improve the occasion by erudite deliverances on 
 the historical past of Lancaster, or philosophical reflections on Massa- 
 chusetts towns in general, and the development of that peculiar political 
 and social system which is correctly associated with them and with the 
 name of New England. I propose to do nothing of the sort. Even had 
 I come here with any such design, I should have found my speech 
 already in large part made for me, and it would merely remain to inflict 
 a trite repetition, in somewhat varied words, of what others had better 
 said. 
 
 Meanwhile, whatever I may have designed, a wholly new direction 
 has just been given to my thought. I refer to the statement relating to 
 Francis Washburn, which bore so prominent a part in the carefully pre- 
 pared, and extremely appropriate as well as timely, address of Senator 
 Hoar. 
 
 When he introduced that name and record. Senator Hoar could 
 hardly have thought of the memories which his so doing revived in me. 
 But as he spoke, I was carried back through forty years, to other times 
 and other scenes. For it so chanced that Frank Washburn and I began 
 army life together, both junior officers, subalterns, in the same regiment 
 — the first regiment of cavalry from Massachusetts — than which, I am 
 fain to say, no finer soldier material — no body of men more characteristic 
 of the best New England can furnish — were ever brought together. And 
 when I say this, I mean all it may be thought to imply. In other words. 
 
40 
 
 looking back now in the light of a larger and wider experience, I will 
 say that I do not believe that in the history of mankind a regiment 
 superior in intelHgence, spirit and physical excellence was ever organized 
 in any country or for any cause. It lacked only training; and that it 
 rapidly acquired in the school of active warfare. 
 
 In this regiment and on the soil of South CaroHna, during the 
 earlier half of the year 1862, I first met Frank Washburn. Differently 
 stationed, we had not previously come together. But now, chancing to 
 be assigned to similiar duty, we occupied one tent, fed at the same table, 
 were called upon in turn. Naturally, I came to know Washburn well, 
 and to estimate him at his worth. I endorse all that Senator Hoar has 
 said. He was a noticeable example of the best Massachusetts con- 
 tributed to the great war— best by birth, by tradition, by education— 
 physically and morally best. In my estimation, he ranked with Lowell, 
 with Savage, with Revere, with Shaw, with Dalton and Perkins and 
 Dwight. I knew them all. A noble band; it is enough for any man if 
 he be able to say that he also, in his prime, was deemed not unworthy 
 associate with them. 
 
 And now, speaking here in the town from which, though I knew it 
 not before, Frank Washburn came, let me pay my tribute to him. On the 
 17th of June — Bunker Hill Day, though eighty-seven years removed— I 
 saw him, on James's Island, as a conflict was drawing to its close, perform, 
 in obedience to a thoughtless order, which all there knew at the time 
 should never have been given, an act of calm, cool courage not easy to 
 surpass. Yielding, as he could not but yield, instant and unanswering 
 obedience, I saw him turn his horse and ride across an open field towards 
 a fringe of woods, there to ascertain whether any of the enemy were 
 under cover within. It so chanced that a whole regiment of Confederate 
 infantry was there, I see him now, as, putting spurs to his horse, he 
 galloped alone across the ridges left in the soil from its last year's crop 
 of cotton, drawing his revolver from its sheath. I can see him as — we 
 intently watching— he got to the fringe of trees and undergrowth, and, 
 after peering into it, suddenly discharge the weapon twice. Immedi- 
 ately afterwards, a man came out into the open, dressed in Confederate 
 gray and with a rifle in his hand. I remember well, also, the way in 
 
41 
 
 which the officer who had given the senseless command, on the instant 
 sobered and, reaHzing what he had done, loudly called Washburn to 
 return, and, followed by his entire surrounding, galloped to his assist- 
 ance. The lives of all of them hung on the merest thread, a fact realized 
 by most of us. Fortunately, in those days mature military experience 
 had come to neither side, and our opponents, a regiment of Sonth Carol- 
 ina militia, failed to take in the situation. Our audacity, paralyzing 
 them, saved us. They were more afraid of provoking attack than 
 anxious to assail, and so they permitted the opportunity to escape them. 
 Washburn had taken an armed prisoner from under the very muzzles of 
 their rifles, and they allowed him, and us, to withdraw uninjured. A 
 single volley would have brought every man of our party down. 
 Throughout that campaign Washburn and I served together; subse- 
 quently he got himself transferred to another regiment, and it was not 
 my fortune again to meet him: unless, perchance, I may have seen him, 
 as I have since surmised I did, borne in the hands of attendants, appar- 
 ently a dying man, to a hospital transport at Fortress Munroe. If so, I 
 failed at the moment to recognize him in that corpse-like apparition, 
 and so no farewell word was exchanged between us. 
 
 But, let me take advantage of this occasion to make one suggestion. 
 You have, I am aware, here in Lancaster, a soldiers' memorial, your 
 public library building. It is the gift of a family which I have known 
 through generations — a family which, closely associated with Lancaster, 
 has here left deep its mark. There is one thing more that family might 
 do, a thing most proper to be done. We are, perhaps, in these days 
 erecting too many statues; and some, not impossibly, for insufficient 
 cause. Nevertheless, I make bold to say that one here in Lancaster of 
 Frank Washburn would be typical, suggestive and worthy. Moreover, 
 while emblematic of all who then went forth from your town, it would 
 be individual — representative. It would afford an exception, at once 
 striking and agreeable, to those familiar though somewhat conventional 
 and distinctly uninteresting figures which, purposed to symbolize all, are 
 reminiscent of none. But that effigy, in enduring bronze, standing in 
 the plot before your library — forever fronting your main thoroughfare — 
 would serve as a memorial of a gallant townsman, as well as of a great 
 
42 
 
 generation, memorable events, and awful sacrifice. Frank Washburn 
 was a son of Lancaster, given by Lancaster to the nation; and the figure 
 and bearing of my old comrade would lend themselves well to the work. 
 Tall, and well moulded, I see him stand, booted and spurred as of yore, 
 with the loose, short blouse of our cavalry days hanging from his 
 shoulders over the belt carrying his revolver; his hand lightly supported 
 by the sheathed sabre loosely attached to his side, and reaching to the 
 ground; upon his head the cavalry kepi; in his right hand a guantlet. So 
 standing, clad and equipped as when stricken down, he would look out 
 over the familiar foreground, at once a memorial and an inspiration. 
 Such an effigy would remind each new generation of what Lancaster had 
 done in the past, and nerve it, should occasion arise, to do not less in 
 future. A recognition of great deeds bravely done, of sacrifice courage- 
 ously and uncomplainingly endured. In it his descendants would round 
 out and complete the memorial erected by a benefactor who is gone. 
 
 Remarks were also made by the Rev. Edward A. Horton, of Boston, 
 and Arthur P. Rugg, Esq., of Worcester, a native of Sterling, copies of 
 which have not reached us. The toast-master then said that Judge 
 Christopher C. Stone, of Clinton, by reason of the virility of his race, 
 had consented to make the address he was to have made on this occa- 
 sion at the three hundredth anniversary celebration, fifty years hence, 
 and that Mr. Warren H. Fairbank, of Harvard, had similarly postponed 
 his address. And, with a Godspeed, the gathering was brought to a 
 close. 
 
43 
 
 The annals of Lancaster may be found in variously more or less of 
 detail in the Rev. Timothy Harrington's Century Sermon, May 28, 1753; 
 the Rev. Peter Whitney's Worcester County, Worcester, 1793; the 
 sketch by Joseph Willard, Esq., in the Worcester Magazine, 1826, and 
 the address by the same in commemoration of the Two Hundredth Anni- 
 versary, 1853; and in the history written by the Rev. A. P. Marvin, 
 Lancaster, 1879. 
 
 Also, in the following, by the ?Ion. Henry S. Nourse: The Early 
 Records of Lancaster, 1643-1725. Lancaster, 1884. The Military Annals 
 of Lancaster, 1740-1865. Lancaster, 1889. Birth, Marriage and Death 
 Register from 1643 to 1850. Lancaster, 1890. Historical Sketch of 
 Lancaster in History of Worcester County. J. W. Lewis & Co., Phila- 
 delphia, 1889. The Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. 
 Mary Rowlandson. First printed in 1688 at Cambridge, Mass., and 
 London, England. Now reprinted in fac-simile. Whereunto are 
 annexed a Map of her Removes, Biographical and Historical Notes, and 
 the last sermon of her husband. Rev. Joseph Rowlandson. Lancaster, 
 Massachusetts, MDCCCCIH. 
 
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