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 SAYBROOK, CONN. 
 Saybrook • s ^uadrimillenial .
 
 ^..^.^Ma^.Lr^'^mf''-. 
 
 ^351 
 
 1885 
 
 2 ^Otli Anniversary 
 
 (IF VHV. 
 
 I Settlement of Saybrook.
 
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 •s///y/.///--'47
 
 S.l VnROOK'S OUADRIMILLRNIAr. 
 
 COMMEMORATION 
 
 OF THE 
 
 250111 Anniversary 
 
 Settlement of Sayl}rook, 
 
 NOVEMBER 27, 18S5. 
 
 HARTFORD : 
 PRESS OF C I. A R K \ SMITH 
 
 1886.
 
 V 
 
 
 To OUR p.raVe ancestors, 
 
 THE NOBLE MEN AND WOMEN 
 
 WHO I'.y THEIR INDOMITABLE ENERGY AND COURAGE 
 
 MADE A HOME IN THIS NEW WORLD, 
 
 DO WE THEIR DAUGHTERS IN LOVING MEMORY 
 
 DEDICATE THIS WORK.
 
 PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 *" I ""HE approacliing 250111 anniversary of the settlement of Sav- 
 brook, in the State of Connecticut, having attracti-d i)ulillc 
 attention, a special town meeting of the citizens of Old Saybrook 
 was called in reference thereto, and was held on the 9th day of 
 March, A. D. 1885. 
 
 At that meeting Samuel H. Lord, Esq., was chosen moderator, 
 and the following preamble and resolution were adopted : — 
 
 Whereas : The present year ni-irks an epoch in the history of Say- 
 brook, it being the 250th anniversary of iis first settlement, A. D. 
 lf)35, by English colonists ; therefore be it 
 
 Resolved : That a committee be a])pointed to lake into consider- 
 ation the subject of an appropriate celebration of the event, to 
 designate the time of such celebration, the probable expense of 
 the same, and report at a future meeting. 
 
 A committee of nineteen i)ersons, of whom four were ladies, and 
 all selected from the old families of the town, was then appointed. 
 At an adjourned town meeting, held on the 3oth of that month, 
 the sum of $200.00 was voted to be placed at the disposition of 
 the committee for the purposes of the celebration ; and it was 
 also voted to invite the towns which were a part of the original 
 town of Saybrook, viz. : Chester, Esse.x, Saybrook, Westbrook, 
 Lyme, Old Lyme, and East Lyme, to participate in the occasion, 
 and appropriate therefor the sum of ^100.00 each. 
 
 This committee organized, and held several meetings, but 
 fiuestions having arisen as to the legality of such town appropria- 
 tions, the project was finally abandoned by the committee.
 
 6 Prefatory Mote. 
 
 lUit the interest in the subject that had been awakened moved 
 the ladies numerously to assemble, and take such action in favor 
 of the commemoration of the event, as was then practicable. 
 
 As the result of that action, the celebration took place on 
 Friday, the 27th day of November, 1885, in the presence of a 
 large and appreciative audience, at the Congregational Church in 
 Old Saybrook, which had been handsomely decorated for the 
 occasion. 
 
 The exercises commenced at one o'clock p. m. and were 
 concluded at half-past four. 
 
 The Ladies' Committees were as follows, viz. : — 
 
 111 the priiuipal Executive Charge of Arrangements : 
 
 MISS HETTY B. H. WOOD, Chairman, 
 MRS. JOHN D. INGRAHAM, 
 MRS. AMOS S. CHESEBROUGH, 
 MISS AGNES A. ACTON, 
 MISS FRANCES C. SHEPARD, 
 MISS GRACE E. SPENCER. 
 
 On Music 
 
 MRS. WILLIAM E. CLARK, 
 MISS MARIA L. DICKINSON, 
 MRS. C. P. DAVIS. 
 
 On Decorations : 
 
 MRS. CHARLES W. MORSE, 
 MRS. DAVID W. CLARKE, 
 MRS. SAMUEL H. PRATT.
 
 SAYBROOK'S QUADRIMILLENIAL. 
 
 COMMEMORATIVE EXERCISES. 
 
 A FTER an organ voluntary, rendered by Mrs. C. 
 Davis, a chorus choir sang the following hymn : 
 
 "THE ROCK OF THE PILGRIMS." 
 
 A rock in tlie wilderness welcomed our sires 
 
 From homes far away o'er the dark rolling sea ; 
 
 On that holy altar they kindled the fires, 
 
 Jehovah, which glow in our bosoms for Thee. 
 
 Thy blessings descended in sunshine and shower, 
 Or rose from the soil that was sown by Thy hand. 
 
 The mountain and valley rejoiced in Thy power, 
 And heaven encircled and smiled on the land. 
 
 In church and cathedral we kneel in our prayer, 
 Their temple and chapel were valley and hill ; 
 
 But God is the same in aisle or the air, 
 
 And He is the rock that we lean upon still. 
 
 The Hon, John Allen, Chairnian of the meeting, then 
 spoke as follows : — 
 
 Friends aud Fclloiv- Citizens : 
 
 Under the auspices of a committee of ladies of the town of 
 Old Saybrook, — worthy descendants of the Pilgrim mothers, 
 — you have met to celebrate the 250th anniversary, occur- 
 ring this year and month, of the first settlement of Saybrook 
 by English colonists.
 
 8 Saybroo/cs Qiiadriniillciiial. 
 
 The history of that settlement, which will be outlined to 
 you to-day, is that of a free and brave people, our Puritan 
 ancestors, accepting the struggle and suffering incident to the 
 achievement of a more perfect degree of civil and religious 
 freedom. 
 
 Restricted by natural barriers to commerce from becom- 
 ing a populous city, Saybrook has not arisen to the business 
 importance its founders anticipated, but their descendants 
 have maintained here a well-ordered, prosperous conmiunity, 
 and have creditably participated in shaping the present 
 civilization of the nation, and in framing and judicially inter- 
 preting its laws. 
 
 Prayer was offered by the Rev. BERNARD Paine, Pastor 
 of the Congregational Church. 
 
 The Rev. SAMUEL Hart, D. D., Professor in Trinity 
 College, Hartford, a native of Saybrook, was then introduced 
 and made an address on 
 
 "THE HISTORY OF THE EARLY SETTLEMENT." 
 
 ]\Ir. Chairman, Citizens of our Ancient Town, Ladies and 
 Gentlemen : 
 
 One does not apologize for obeying the commands of a 
 mother. Our common mother, the venerable village of Say- 
 brook, has not passed through her quarter of a millenium 
 without some trials and some disturbances of her quiet; but 
 on the whole her two hundred and fifty years have been so 
 peaceful, the wrinkles have gathered so slowly on her brow, 
 and so little change has found its way into either her outward 
 circumstances or her inner life, that she did not know until 
 the anniversary was close upon her that she had almost 
 reached a birthday of which she might well be especially 
 proud, and to the observance of which she would certainly
 
 The History of the Early Settlement. 9 
 
 wish to invite all her sons and daughters. As I am si)cal<in<,^ 
 to none who do not love and respect her, perhaps you will 
 allow me to say that when-it was suggested to her that the 
 day was approaching, she seemed to be a little hard of hear- 
 ing; and then she did not, we thought, quite understand the 
 meaning of what we said; the mention of a number, and that 
 a pretty large one, gave her the idea that we were asking for 
 a subscription of some kind ; and like a few of her descendants, 
 she was not willing to reply until she had given the matter 
 careful attention. And, so long was she in thinking of it, 
 that unless a few of her energetic daughters had taken the 
 matter in hand, this two hundred and fiftieth birthday of 
 our common mother would have passed without due ob- 
 servance. May I not express to these daughters of Saybrook 
 the thanks of all us the rest ? 
 
 Now that we have come, with scanty time for preparation, 
 to celebrate this anniversary, it must not be, as I was saying, 
 with words of apology. We are doing as best w-e can a duty 
 which has been laid upon us by one whom we have no right 
 to disobey. But this at least may be said, that the history of 
 Saybrook ought to be written out by some patient and skilful 
 pen, read at some future day in your presence, and put in 
 permanent form for the benefit of those who are to come 
 after us. 
 
 I am to carry you back in thought, as best I may, to the 
 earliest times of that history, when out of a sort of mythical 
 haze we first see events shaping themselves into figures of 
 real life, and then, if I can, to lead the way to what others, 
 more competent and better qualified than myself, will bring 
 before you as the important facts in the annals of our town. 
 
 Save for the records of early combats with the natives and 
 for the traces which we find, for the most part beneath the 
 soil, of what they did in war and in peace, how they lived 
 and how they were buried in some hope of immortalit)- — 
 save for such fragmentary records, we know ne.xt to nothing 
 of those who occupied this plain, these meadows, and these
 
 10 Siiybroo/Ss Oiiadriniillcnial. 
 
 hills before the eyes of enterprising Europeans saw the 
 mouth of our fair and quiet river, and the hope of commerce 
 and of resulting wealth led them to set a high value on the 
 location of our town. And there is a very legendary air 
 about the story of the attempted Dutch occupation, when the 
 redoubtable settlers of the New Netherlands claimed for 
 themselves the fields at the mouth of the river and the river 
 itself. Doubtless, as in the case of the poetic legends in 
 which the history of early Rome is enshrined, it will be 
 possible for some gifted student to separate, in part at least, 
 the true from the false, and to tell us the real story of Hans 
 den Sluys. Ikit we arc not to-day Indians or Dutchmen ; 
 we are not dwellers in Pashbeshauke or in Kievets Hook ; 
 we will simply assume that it is true that our ancestors pur- 
 chased their lands from the aboriginal inhabitants and that 
 the States General had no jurisdiction within the limits which 
 w.ere covered by the deed or patent under which the English 
 settlers took possession. Homer did not begin the history of 
 the Trojan war by describing the egg from which Helen was 
 born* ; we begin the history of Saybrook when it began to 
 be Saybrook two hundred and fifty years ago. 
 
 It was a troubled time in England, when a great revolution 
 was coming to a head, and when, besides, the thoughts of a 
 large body of men were turning eagerly and hopefully to the 
 Virginia and the New England across the seas. Under the 
 auspices of the Plymouth Company, settlements had been 
 made in the IMassachusetts ; and that company had trans- 
 ferred to Robert, PLail of Warwick, its rights to a tract of 
 land a little further south; and under date of March 19th, 
 1 63 1-2, the l£arl of Warwick executed a deed or grant by 
 which he conveyed to certain persons, "their heirs and as- 
 signs and their associates forever," the said lands, forming the 
 valley of the lower Connecticut, and described as extending 
 from a river called Narragansett to the south sea. The 
 
 *Nec gemino bellum Trojamim orJilur ab ovo. — Horace, Ais Poelica, 147.
 
 The History of the Early Settlement. 1 1 
 
 grantees first mentioned in this Company are those whose 
 names our town has perpetuated — the Right Honorable 
 WiUiam, Viscount Say and Seale, and the Right Honorable 
 Robert, Lord Brooke — the latter being, I suppose, the eldest 
 son of the Earl of Warwick ; and among those who were 
 joined with them were the Right Honorable Lord Rich, also 
 of the family of the Earl of Warwick, Sir Richard Saltonstall, 
 John Pym, and John Hampden. There is no need to ask 
 what were their political or their religious views ; it could 
 probably be sajd of them all as we are told it was said of 
 those whose names stood foremost, that when they were 
 asked to pledge their fidelity to the King, one of them would 
 not Say the words, the other would not Brook them. The 
 document is called the old Patent of Connecticut, though on 
 its face it is no more than a deed. As to its meaning and its 
 value there may doubtless be questions ; certainly it was 
 treated as if it were in some sense the patent of a govern- 
 ment. On the 7th of July, 1635, John Winthrop, Esq., the 
 younger, son of the Governor of Massachusetts, was ap- 
 pointed by the company who then held the title (and among 
 them was then George Fenwick, Esquire) to be " governor 
 of the river Connecticut, and of the harbor and places 
 adjoining, for the space of one year after his arrival there " ; 
 and Mr. Winthrop agreed to undertake the settlement, to 
 build a fort within which should be houses for " men of 
 quality", and to "reserve unto the fort, for the maintenance 
 of it, one thousand or fifteen hundred acres, at least, of good 
 ground, as near adjoining thereunto as may be." Winthrop 
 arrived at Boston in October; and, seeing the need of haste, 
 he sent a vessel and twenty men to the mouth of the river, 
 where there had already been the beginning of a settlement, 
 and where they arrived just in time to frighten the Dutch 
 from landing. It was on the 24th of November, 1635, 
 almost two centuries and a half ago to a day, that the vessel 
 reached here from Boston, and formal possession was taken 
 jn the name of Lord Say and Scale, Lord Brooke, and the
 
 12 Say/n-oo/Ss Ouadri))iillcnial. 
 
 rest of the company who chiimed the lands. Mr. Winthrop 
 liimself arrived a little later. 
 
 With Mr. Winthrop (or perhaps earlier, for we arc told it 
 was on the 28lh of November), came Lion Gardiner, an 
 English engineer who had been in the service of the Prince 
 of Orange, and who was employed to bnild the spacious 
 fortifications which were proposed and to lay out a city. It 
 was expected that in the next spring there would " come 
 from England three hundred able men, whereof two hundred 
 should attend fortification, fifty to till the ground, and fifty to 
 build houses." Under the most favorable circumstances, 
 little could have been done that winter except to provide for 
 the safety and the most urgent needs of the colonists landed 
 on Saybrook Point at the end of November, with no P2uro- 
 peans nearer than those in the settlements at Hartford, New 
 York, and Massachusetts Bay. But this was an exceptionally 
 hard winter. The Connecticut River was frozen over by the 
 15th of November — nine days before the first settlers came 
 here — and the snow was so deep to the north of us that the 
 settlers of Hartford, who were coming by land from Cam- 
 bridge, were exposed to great suffering, while the storms 
 were so severe that a company who were attempting to reach 
 Hartford by water were wrecked and wandered ten days 
 before they met a human being. 
 
 On the 3d or 4th of December the settlers at the fort had 
 unexpected visitors. Seventy men, women, and children, in 
 imminent danger of starvation, came from the settlements 
 up the river, looking for the provisions which they were 
 expecting from Boston. The vessels for which they looked 
 did not come ; but the Rebecca, a vessel which had been 
 frozen in below the narrows in the river, succeeded in work- 
 ing her way out, and, taking them all on board, carried them 
 back to Boston, liefore she sailed, however, on the loth of 
 December, 1635, she ran aground upon the bar, this being 
 the first record of a phenomenon with which we have become 
 f imiiiar. It seems that those who returned to Massachusetts
 
 TJic History of the Harly Sctt/cnicnt. 13 
 
 gave a dismal account of the slate of things here ; for the 
 governor of that colony ordered a general fast to be observed 
 on account of the peril of the garrison at the mouth of the 
 Connecticut. 
 
 It was a relief, no doubt, when the winter had passed; but, 
 to quote Mr. Gardiner's own words, the " great expectation 
 at the river's mouth came only to two men, Mr. Fenwick 
 and his man, who came [from Boston] with Mr. Hugh Peters 
 and Mr. Oldham and Thomas Stanton." He was greatly 
 disappointed; and in 1639 he removed to the island which 
 bears his name — he called it the Isle of Wight — where he 
 made the first English settlement within the limits of the 
 present State of New York. His son David was born here 
 on the 29th of April, 1636, being the first white child born 
 in what is now Connecticut. 
 
 The earliest instance of the use of the name Saybrook 
 which I have found is in the date of a letter written by Lion 
 Gardiner to the younger Winthrop bearing date " Say- 
 broock, 6 Nov. 1636"; in another letter dated the 23d day 
 of the following January, the name is spelled Seabrooke. As 
 the present names of Hartfoid, Wethersfield, and Windsor 
 were 'not given till 1637, Saybrook is the oldest town- name 
 in the State. 
 
 Of the two other colonies which were early established 
 within the present limits of Connecticut, one was almost 
 contemporaneous with that at Saybrook, and the other was 
 somewhat later. There was the beginning of a settlement at 
 Wethersfield in 1634, a settlement at Windsor in 1635, and 
 later in that year the founders of Hartford brought their 
 weary journey through the wilderness to an end. Tins colony 
 — for it was really one, the three grape-vines united in one 
 shield — antedated that at New Haven by some four }'ears. It 
 is doing no injustice to those who made these settlements to 
 say that they were influenced by different and mingled 
 motives. Political convictions, religious enthusiasm, and the 
 hope of commercial success, all doubtless liad much to do
 
 14 Saybroo/Ss Qiiadri))iillcniaL 
 
 with the settlements at Saybrook, at Hartford, and at New 
 Haven. Yet, if one may make tlie distinction, it would seem 
 tliat the political feeling was strongest in the colony to the 
 north of us, that the religious motive was most prominent in 
 that to the west, while here at the mouth of tlie river there 
 were the strongest hopes of success in trade and commerce. 
 The early appearance of the three settlements must also have 
 been very different ; in fact, each has in its topography to- 
 day the character stamped upon it by those who laid out tiie 
 lands of which they took possession. Hartford was laid out 
 along the line of a broad street, which served as the backbone 
 of a future city, and where another principal street crossed 
 it was the place of the meeting-house for both religious and 
 political purposes. New Haven was laid out as a great square 
 divided into nine squares, the centremost being reserved for 
 the public buildings. Saybrook was first of all to have a fort, 
 or fortified place, including residences and other necessary 
 buildings; and then evidently there was to be a large plot of 
 land laid out after the manner of a city but so as to be 
 dependent upon the fort at the river's mouth. The first fort 
 stood further back from the water than that the remains of 
 which were razed to the ground about fifteen years ago; and, 
 a stockade being built across the narrow neck — then nar- 
 rower than now — which divides the coves near the windmill 
 lot, the whole of the point was easily defended from attacks 
 by land. 
 
 In the spring of 1636, as has been already said, Mr. Fen- 
 wick visited Saybrook, being the only one of the grantees or 
 patentees who ever crossed the ocean. In the following 
 summer or autumn he returned to England.* 
 
 In 1636, before the garrison, now amounting to about 
 twenty men, had been many months at the fort, the Pequot 
 
 *IIe i}iobal)]y eslahlislied a system of tolls, or protective tariff, on goods 
 carried by llie fort up the river. Among the first ships to sail past were those 
 which carried the i^oods of Mr. rynchon, the foiiiidor of Springfield.
 
 The liisfory of I lie Early Setllenieut. i 5 
 
 war broke out. The attack on tlie natives was not without 
 provocation ; but it was unadvisedly and hastily undertaken, 
 against the strong advice of Lieut. Gardiner, and it certainly 
 seems to have been cruelly carried on at the last. The 
 settlers at Saybrook were in great danger, and some were 
 killed after they had been tortured by the savages. The war 
 was ended in 1637. 
 
 Meantime we hear of the arrival of other colonists, two of 
 whom — Robert Chapman and John Clarke — are represented 
 here to-da)^, while another — Capt. John Mason — made himself 
 a name famous in the early history of the Commonwealth. 
 After an absence of about three years, Mr. Fenwick returned 
 in July, 1639. bringing with him his wife, Alice Apsley, 
 formerly the wife of Sir John Botcler, from whom she had 
 by courtesy the title of Lady. With them, or about the 
 same time, came their chaplain, INLister Thomas Higginson, 
 who was afterwards pastor at Guilford and at Salem, Mass. 
 No church, however, was organized as yet in Saybrook ; 
 Lady Fenwick was admitted a member of the church in 
 Hartford, and her daughter Elizabeth, born not long after 
 her arrival here, was thereupon baptized. 
 
 Mr. Fenwick, as the only one of the patentees in the 
 colony, acted, it would seem, as ex officio Governor. In the 
 midst of many discouragements, he cared for the interests of 
 the little settlement and of the other patentees ; and he also 
 united with the representatives of the other colonies in 
 what are now the States of Massachusetts and Connecticut, 
 in forming the confederation of the United Colonies of New 
 England. 
 
 The independence of our colony lasted about ten years. 
 In December, 1644, an agreement was made between Mr. 
 Fenwick and the General Court at Hartford, by which the 
 former ceded to the other government the fort at Saybrook,* 
 
 *\Vliatever tlie value of Uiis cession or grant m il\r \\\\\<\ its intcnlioii ami 
 effect were ratified by the charter of if)6o.
 
 1 6 Saj'droo/cs Ouadi'iiuillcnial. 
 
 and in the following spring he was elected a magistrate of 
 the Connecticut colony. His wife died, probably in 1646, 
 soon after the birth of her daughter Dorothy ; and then, dis- 
 appointed and discouraged, and thinking that, if the purposes 
 of the colony were to be carried out, there was need of some 
 further efforts in England, he sailed back across the ocean. 
 There he became a colonel in the Parliamentary army, and 
 was elected a member of Cromwell's Parliament, though 
 excluded from his seat because he was not satisfactory to 
 the Protector. He died in 1657. 
 
 The death of Lady Fenwick is the romantic event in the 
 history of our town. For long years there was something 
 touching in the sight of the massive tombstone standing 
 alone in the field on the spot where the first settlers had 
 lived, as there was something pathetic in the story of which 
 it reminded the passer-by ; and the reverent care with 
 which, when her dust was threatened with disturbance by 
 ruthless hands, it was laid near the graves of seven genera- 
 tions of those who came after her, bears witness that she will 
 not be soon forgotten. 
 
 " And ever lliis wave-washed shore 
 
 Shall be linked with her tomb and fame, 
 And blend wilh the wind and the billowy roar. 
 The music of her name."* 
 
 In 1647 the first fort, within the enclosure of which Lady 
 Fenwick was buried, was destroyed by fire; and in the fol- 
 lowing year the new fort was built close to the river's brink. 
 Many of us remember the earthwork, far older than anything 
 else of the same kind in the northern part of the United 
 States, which formed so picturesque a feature of the scenery 
 until it had to give way to structures which may be more 
 useful but certainly are less attractive. 
 
 It was this second fort, the surrender of which was de- 
 
 ♦Frorn a poem by Miss F. M. Caulkins.
 
 The Histoj-y of (he Early Seftlevicid. i 7 
 
 nianded by Major Andross on the 8th of July, 1675, when 
 Captain Robert Chapman and Captain Bull of Hartford so 
 ingeniously defended the rights oi the colony ; for Major 
 Andross did not venture to fire upon the royal standard, and 
 either did not dare to read his commission or could not make 
 it heard. 
 
 But before this time Saybrook had sent out a colony to 
 settle in the eastern part of the State, where two beautiful 
 rivers, uniting to form the Thames, offer a site for a city than 
 which it is not easy to imagine one more attractive. The 
 outgoing colony was led by the Rev. James Fitch, who had 
 succeeded the Rev. Thomas Peters in the pastorate of the 
 church at Saybrook. With him he took a larger part of his 
 people, attracted, we are told, by the report of the fair tract 
 of nine miles square which the f^\ithful Uncas had granted 
 them in remembrance of the kindness of a Saybrook man 
 who had relieved his people when hard pressed by siege and 
 hunger. Thus many names which occur in the early records 
 of Saybrook are lost from its history and appear in the annals 
 of Norwich, its oldest and fairest daughter. 
 
 After a few years Mr. Fitch was succeeded here by the 
 Rev. Thomas Buckingham, whose pastorate extended into 
 the eighteenth century and covered the important period 
 marked by the foundation of the Collegiate School and the 
 meeting of the assembly which drew up the Saybrook Plat- 
 form. 
 
 It is not easy for us to draw a picture of Saybrook at the 
 close of the century, after sixty-five years of its history had 
 passed. The town had spread beyond the limits of the 
 stockade which had protected the first settlement from 
 attacks by land. A road doubtless led along the coast — it 
 was the old post-road to New Haven; and houses were built 
 on this road, not only on this side of Oyster River, but also 
 beyond it. As early as 1660 there were settlers in Pochaug, 
 afterwards called West Saybrook and Westbrook. Another 
 road must have led to the north, branching off on the right
 
 1 8 Sayl'roo/cs Ouadriniillcnial. 
 
 to tlie fcrrying-place and on the left, skirting the great 
 swamp and passing through the northern part of the town 
 to Iladdam and thence to Hartford. The burying-ground 
 had been early laid out at the foot of the present cemetery ; 
 I am inclined to doubt whether it was ever an Indian burial- 
 place. In front of it ran the road from the fort, past the 
 house and lot which were afterwards given by Mr. Nathaniel 
 Lynde for the use of the college ; and another road, also still 
 in use, completed the circuit of the Point. On the cross- 
 road, not far from the site of the present school-house, 
 stood the meeting-house, finished in 1680 or 1681, the 
 second edifice erected for the worship of God. Two other 
 streets ran across this from north to south, dividing the land 
 into six city-like plots. The houses were not inhabited by 
 the "persons of quality " who had been expected from Eng- 
 land or by their descendants; but a census taken at that time 
 would have contained many names which are represented in 
 this village and in other parts of the old town to-day; a few 
 of them we can find on the roll of civil dignitaries. The 
 town had had its own governor for a few years; but it 
 had furnished no governor for the colony of Connecticut 
 after it became merged in its jurisdiction. To the House of 
 " Assistants," the upper house of the General Assembl}', 
 elected by general vote, it had sent only George Fenwlck 
 (1644-1649) and Robert Chapman (1681-1685); the repre- 
 sentatives elected for the town had borne the names of 
 Chapman, Bushnell, Pratt, Parker, Lay, Dudley, Post, Lynde, 
 Clark, and Whittlesey. When in 1704 the General Assem- 
 bly, for the sake of confirming the title to the real estate 
 within the town, granted a formal charter of incorporation, 
 the document contained the names of Buckingham, Chap- 
 man, Pratt, Clark, Parker, Lay, and Sandford. We have the 
 names of but three Town Clerks before 1700 — Messrs. Tully, 
 Willard, and Pratt. To the north of the settlement lay the 
 common fields — that most interesting " survival " of an 
 ancient custom in regard to the tenure of land, for the lay-
 
 The History of t lie Early ScU lenient. 19 
 
 out and division of which provision was made by the town 
 within fifteen years after its first settlement. There must have 
 been aheady a settlement in Pettipaug at what we call 
 Centre Brook, and probably one at Pattaconk or Chester. 
 But nearly a quarter of a century was to pass before a second 
 ecclesiastical society should be organized, and nearly a century 
 and a half before the ancient town should be cut into pieces. 
 The country across the river had been for a short time called 
 East Saybrook, but its connection with the civil or eccles- 
 iastical administration of the town can have been hardly 
 more than nominal. 
 
 It docs not fall to my lot to dwell upon the important 
 events in the later history of the town. One best qualified 
 to do so will speak of the early annals of the Collegiate 
 School, in regard to which we affirm most emphatically that in 
 Saybrook and in Saybrook alone was its legal home and the 
 place where its degrees were conferred until it was removed 
 to New Haven, where under an honored name it has been 
 for many years, and will be, we trust, for many more, the 
 home of sound learning under the always recognized guid- 
 ance of Christian principle. I may note, however, that of the 
 fifty-five who received their first degree here, ^en were young 
 men of Saybrook, bearing the names of Whittlesey, Chapman, 
 Lynde, Taylor, Tousey, Blague, Buckingham, Clarke, Lord, 
 and Willard. The history and significance of the important 
 Synod of 1708 will be described by one who can tell us of 
 the influence of the Saybrook Platform in moulding the 
 ecclesiastical constitution of the Standing Order — the Estab- 
 lished Church — of this Commonwealth, and how its influence 
 has extended beyond our own borders. 
 
 The later history of the ecclesiastical organization within the 
 town will not, I trust, be passed by ; when under the guid- 
 ance of Mr. Buckingham, and after him, of JNIr. Mather and 
 Mr. Hart and Mr. Hotchkiss — the pastorates of these three 
 men extending over a hundred and thirty-four years — the 
 people of Saybrook were instructed in the faith and fear of
 
 20 Sayl>roo/cs Qiiadrimillciiial. 
 
 God. Nor ought we to forget the growth of settlements in 
 parts of the town remote from the site of the ancient fort, 
 and the progress of all in trade and commerce, in agriculture 
 and fisheries, and their advance in education and religion. 
 And, turning from the pleasant thoughts of quiet rural life 
 and of successful labors on land and sea, we ought not to 
 forget what Saybrook men have done for the defence of their 
 country in the times of her need ; we may be proud to 
 remember that a Saybrook captain was with Washington at 
 Valley Forge, and that he kept his soldiers shod by selling 
 his land here at home, even if we are ashamed at having to 
 confess that he received on earth no reward for his self- 
 denial. 
 
 But it is for me to do no more than point out the way in 
 which we may study the history of our ancient town, to 
 preface what others will say at length, and to point out a 
 part of what we may expect when our history shall be fully 
 and carefully written. 
 
 "Saybrook," said "A Gentleman of the Province," writing 
 the history of Connecticut in 1781, "is greatly fallen from its 
 ancient grandeur; but is, notwithstanding, resorted to with 
 great veneration, as the parent town of the whole colony." 
 If we lost our grandeur in the first hundred and fifty years, 
 I am afraid that a part at least of the veneration has been 
 lost in the century which has passed since Dr. Peters wrote. 
 But we at least, who have known Saybrook best, have never 
 failed to hold her in reverence, to recognize how much we 
 owe to her, and to pray in the devout words of the great 
 king, who looked back from the splendor of the newly estab- 
 lished kingdom and the newly finished temple to see in the 
 earlier history of Israel the pattern on which he would have 
 its later history framed : "The Lord our God be with us, 
 as He was with our fathers."
 
 Ya/c College at Savl)roo/c. 21 
 
 The Chairman then introduced the Rev. NoAH PoRTEK, 
 D. D., LL. D., President of Yale College, New Haven, who 
 spoke of the history of 
 
 "YALE COLLEGE AT SAYBROOK." 
 
 The story of Yale College is one that is not very agreeable 
 to the minds of the natives of Saybrook and their descend- 
 ants, and for that reason I shall be excused if I make the 
 recital of it brief. The story, as I shall give it, I have gathered 
 rather than gleaned from the complete history of the fiist 
 half century or forty-five years of the life of Yale College, by 
 my associate, Professor Dexter, who is here on hand to cor- 
 rect me if I shall make any mistakes. I say I have gathered 
 rather than gleaned what I shall tell you, for he has told the 
 story so fully that there is nothing left to glean after him. I 
 hope I shall make no mistakes. What I shall present is 
 simply a little bouquet culled from the abundant sheaf which 
 you will find in what he has wiitten of the first half century 
 of the life of Yale College. 
 
 The founding of Yale College was not an afterthought to 
 the original colonists, since it may be traced. back with a 
 certain degree of confidence to the leaders of the New Haven 
 colony, among whom John Davenport was conspicuous; and 
 probably we may, without any mistake, aver that the founda- 
 tion of the Hopkins Grammar School in New Haven, which 
 is nearly if not quite the first endowed school of the sort in 
 New England, was designed to be preparatory to the founda- 
 tion of another institution of a higher character. It is true 
 in fact that a little before the beginning of the last century 
 there was a movement in Connecticut toward the establish- 
 ment of a college, in which were conspicuous five clergj- 
 men whose parishes were all on the coast from New Haven 
 to Stratford. These clergymen counselled freely with certain 
 Massachusetts gentlemen, probably for the purpose of as- 
 certaining what was the best method to secure a trustworthy
 
 2 2 Saybrook's Quacirimillenial. 
 
 act of incorporation or or<^anization. Very soon after, as we 
 know, there was a meeting of seven clergymen, as it is 
 supposed, in Branford, each of whom, as the tradition goes 
 and we trust the tradition in this case, made a gift of books, 
 saying: "With these books I lay the foundation of a college 
 in this colony." By their deed of gift these persons invested 
 something in the enterprise, and thereby qualified themselves 
 to appear as petitioners for the assurance of certain corpor- 
 ate rights. In response to their petition a charter was 
 obtained, sometimes called the old charter of Yale College, 
 and on the iith of November, 1701, seven of the trustees 
 who were constituted by this act a corporate body, met at 
 Say brook, and, as I was informed by my mentor, Professor 
 Dexter, on the cars this morning, the organization of Yale 
 College took place at Saybrook one hundred and eighty-four 
 }cars ago, the 22d of this month. It appears, therefore, that 
 you came very near celebrating the founding of Yale College 
 by the celebration which you are now enacting in the ancient 
 town of Saybrook. The fact cannot be questioned that 
 Yale College was founded under its charter in Saybrook one 
 hundred and eighty- four years ago. You can make as little 
 or as much of this as you choose. Saybrook is not only the 
 place in which Yale College has spent sixteen years of its ex- 
 istence, but it is the place where it began its corporate life. 
 
 Now, why was Sajbrook selected ? That is a question 
 which comes home to the heart of every descendant. Why 
 was Sayb/ook selected as the pUice for the organization of this 
 institution and for the beginning of its operations ? Of course 
 I am trying to tell an honest story. I cannot say with truth 
 that it was because Saybrook was a fortified city at the 
 mouth of the Connecticut. I think it was in part accidental, 
 and can be, perhaps, more or less satisfactorily explained. In 
 the first place, you may say that it may be supposed that 
 possibly the pastor of the church in Saybrook may have had 
 some influence in locating the college here. Perhaps it was 
 because the place was thought very ea.sy of access, by the
 
 }\i/c Co//i'o'c at Say brook. 23 
 
 river from the north and by the shore from the east and the 
 west. Perhaps it was owing to the fact that the future rect(^r 
 had probably been fixed on, who hvetl \'ery near to this 
 place, since the trustees would hardly have dared to appoint 
 the place of meeting at Killingworth or Kenilworth, now 
 Clinton, if they had fixed their e}'es upon Dr. Pierson as the 
 first rector. It may be, also, that some who were active behind 
 the scenes thought that it would not do to designate New 
 Haven as the place, lest they might awaken the somewhat 
 sensitive feelings of the people at Wethersfield or Hartford. 
 As between the claims of all these rivals, it is not surprising 
 that Saybrook was selected and the college was located, for 
 the time at least, under the shadow of your fort, and possibly 
 as its permanent abiding-place. At all events wc know that, 
 having a rector in their minds who resided in a neighboring 
 parish, the trustees encamped in Saybrook waiting for future 
 developments — and liere the institution began. It deserves 
 to be remembered in honor of Mr. Nathaniel Lynde, that he 
 gave a lot for the use of the institution as long as it should 
 remain in Saybrook; and the lot was used till the institution 
 left tlie town, and then it very properly reverted to its 
 donor. 
 
 The first commencement was held here in 1702. Though 
 the college as yet had no pupils or actual stutlents, they held 
 session for conferring degrees, and they gave degrees to five 
 persons who were previously graduates of Harvard College. 
 Keep in mind, if you please, that the institution commenced 
 its operations by giving degrees, and this function seems to 
 have been recognized as of considerable importance. Tlie 
 institution was operated somewhat after the fashion of the 
 universities of the old country, as examining bodies, bodies 
 qualified to confer degrees. Whatever the fact might signify, 
 the fact is unquestioned that degrees were given to these 
 five persons in 1702. In 1703 the first graduate who was 
 instructed here received the honors of the institution, and at 
 the same time ]\Ir. Daniel Hooker, a son of Rev. Samuel
 
 ^4 Saybrook's Oiiadrimillcnial. 
 
 Hooker at Farmington, was appointed tutor; with him the 
 work of instruction began. I have had the satisfaction of 
 discovering that the first tutor of Yale in Saybrook, and 
 \'alc's first graduate student were from my native town. The 
 name of the student was John Hart, and he came here at the 
 beginning of what we call the junior year and graduated in 
 1703, so that the first instructor and the first graduate came 
 from Farmington. This Rev. John Hart was afterwards 
 settled in East Guilford, and filled an honorable pastorate 
 there, dying among his people. 
 
 I have spoken of the significance of Rector Pierson's resi- 
 dence in Killingworth in determining Saybrook as th.e first 
 site of the institution. Let me observe, however, that at the 
 meeting respecting the location, the first vote which they 
 passed on the subject was this : " That the college should 
 be no further east than Saybrook, nor further west than 
 New Haven." From which it appears that from the begin- 
 ning the trustees did not comnlit themselves to Saybrook as 
 the final resting-place of the college. 
 
 Rector Pierson must have been a man of great force of 
 character and of an ardent temper. He was inaugurated 
 as rector here, but he never resided in Saybrook ; although 
 a house- lot was provided for his occupation, the house 
 was never built. He gave instruction only to the members 
 of the senior class in his own parish, the rest of the in- 
 struction being given by tutors in Saybrook. His people, 
 as you may imagine, were all the while in a state of dis- 
 comfort, being disturbed by the claims of the college and of 
 the Saybrook community, lest they should lose him sooner 
 or later. For that reason alone the interests of the institution 
 must have suffered till his death, in 1707. He was an ardent 
 student, who had mastered the physics of his day, such as 
 they were, and the system of philosophy which he imparted, 
 as we find it in a manuscript volume now in existence, 
 marks somewhat definitely the transition period from the 
 old-fashioned plnsics of Descartes to the physics of lioyle
 
 Yale College at Say brook. 25 
 
 and of Newton. For very many reasons he was a man 
 who deserves to be lionored in the memory of all the loyal 
 sons of Yale. 
 
 Probably the course of study which was followed in the 
 institution would compare very favorably with the course of 
 instruction which is adopted at present in the secondary in- 
 stitutions of this country. The students recited in Virgil and 
 Cicero and the Greek Testament, very superficially doubtless. 
 They were also drilled in scholastic logic, and were un- 
 doubtedly held diligently to their work. We ought not to 
 estimate the value of the education which they received by 
 the text-books which they studied, but by the mental effort 
 which they bestowed upon them. It is not the breadth of 
 the field, but the thoroughness with which it is covered, 
 that is important. We have no reason to suppose that the 
 early students of Yale were either idle or superficial. 
 
 As we pass on to 17 10, Elihu Yale appears on the scene, 
 a native of New Haven, subsequently president of the since 
 famous East India Company, who retired to Wrexham in 
 Wales, where he died very rich. 
 
 Not long after, in the year 17 14, very considerable contri- 
 butions of books were received at one time and deposited in 
 Saybrook — seven hundred volumes contributed by eminent 
 writers, philosophers, and others in England, collected by the 
 zeal and assiduity of Mr. Jeremiah Dummer, agent of the 
 colony in England. 
 
 In 1 7 16 the last commencement was held at Saybrook, 
 and it happened in this way. Undoubtedly the older men 
 of the board of trustees had been considering the question, 
 .whether it were not wise to remove the institution westward. 
 As a first step they went so far as to vote, five to two, that 
 if the institution were to be removed at all it should go 
 to New Haven. It was also determined that before the 
 question should be decided whether the institution was to 
 be removed or not, it would be convenient to know which 
 of the three places named would raise the largest sum of
 
 26 SaybrooJSs Qitadrimillefual. 
 
 money. The people in Saybrook raised ;^r,400, the people 
 of New Haven ;^2,ooo, while the wealthy city of Hartford 
 raised nothing to speak of; either relying upon some other 
 instrumentality as the means of securing the college, or 
 giving the whole matter up in despair. An adjourned meet- 
 ing of the trustees was held in New Haven, October 17, to 
 decide this question, and, to their credit, they discussed the 
 question for a week although they were seven in number. 
 Arguments were urged on both sides. The reasons urged for 
 removing to New Haven were, that taking into account the 
 population to the west in what were then called the govern- 
 ments of New Jersey and New York, New Haven was more 
 central and would attract more students; and again that New 
 Haven would give the most money and would zealously 
 support the college. No other reasons than these were given 
 and no other reasons appear on the page of history. After 
 the deliberation of seven days it was decided finally, five to 
 two, that the college should go to New Haven, the two dis- 
 sentients being residents of Hartford and Wethersfield. Then 
 ensued a two years' succession of movements and counter- 
 movements in order to secure it elsewhere ; but the trustees 
 held fast to their original decision. The question was decided 
 in fact by holding a Commencement at New Haven, and by 
 the general acquiescence of the public mind, and above all by 
 a small appropriation of money from the State. This was fol- 
 lowed by the procedure of the trustees to erect a building, 
 which it was rightly reasoned would tend to fix the institution 
 in its place. So it came to New Haven and there it has 
 remained. 
 
 Let me say, however, that after this decision was reached, 
 for two or three years a large number of its students were 
 instructed in other parts of the State — in Wethersfield, in 
 Hartford, and in Saybrook ; even after the institution had 
 been fixed in New Haven by the vote of the trustees, more 
 than half the students were instructed elsewhere and carfie to 
 New Haven only to receive their degrees. So stiff were our
 
 The Saybrook Platfonn. 27 
 
 fathers for local rights, so tenacious were they of every ex- 
 pedient by which they could promote their individual or 
 their local interests. 
 
 This is the history of Yale College in Saybrook. It may 
 be said, to the honor of Saybrook, that the institution had 
 acquired some fixed habits of life under the fostering care of 
 its early nurse, and also that it will ever be remembered that 
 it was the seed-plot for what has now become a great 
 tree, in the shadow of whose branches the nations rejoice. 
 Whatever there may have been in the way of uncomfortable 
 associations in connection with this history, I have endeavored 
 to dispel by reciting the plain story of its removal. As our 
 fathers would have said, there were manifest indications of 
 Divine Providence that it was better for the institution that 
 its site should be changed. On the other hand, never should 
 the college forget, never should its friends cease to remem- 
 ber, that this pleasant village was the seed-place and the 
 nursery-house in which this noble tree struck its first roots 
 and began its glorious growth. 
 
 The Rev. Lewellyn Pratt, D. D., Professor in the 
 Hartford Theological Seminary, a native of the old town of 
 Saybrook, then made an address on 
 
 "THE SAYBROOK PLATFORM." 
 
 My task to-day is to give the story of the Saybrook Plat- 
 form. I shall not attempt to enter into an extended discussion 
 of its merits as a Congregational document — this is not the 
 time or place for that. I shall aim simply to make clear 
 what the Saybrook Platform was. 
 
 Saybrook seems to have been in early times a kind of 
 ecclesiastical centre for Connecticut; probably because it 
 was more easy of access than other places, possibly because 
 of the rivalry between Hartford and New Haven, and then 
 later because it was the seat of the college. 
 
 In 1668 the Legislature passed an act authorizing four
 
 28 SaybrooJcs Ouadrimillenial. 
 
 distinguished ministers — the Revs. James Fitch of Norwich, 
 Gcrshom Bulkley of VVethersfield, Jared EHot of Guilford, 
 and Samuel Wakeman of Fairfield — one from each county of 
 the Colony, to meet at Saybrook, and devise some general 
 plan of church government and discipline under which the 
 churches of Connecticut might be united. 
 
 Again, in 1703, in response to a circular issued by the 
 trustees of the College, the churches and their ministers were 
 convened, and gave their consent to the Westminister and 
 Savoy Confessions and drew up certain rules of ecclesiastical 
 union in discipline. It seems probable that this body met 
 at Saybrook, the seat of the College. So the council that 
 framed the Saybrook Platform was, perhaps, the third con- 
 vocation at Saybrook for devising an ecclesiastical code for 
 Connecticut. 
 
 That council met in this place one hundred and seventy- 
 seven years ago; that is, in 1708, on the 9th, or in our 
 reckoning, on the 20th day of September. It was composed 
 of sixteen members, twelve ministers and four lay delegates. 
 They came together at the time of the Commencement of 
 the Collegiate School, since known as Yale College ; eight or 
 nine of the members being at the time trustees of the 
 College. 
 
 The members of the Council were: — 
 
 From Hartford County: Rev. Timothy Woodbridge, 
 pastor of the first church, Hartford; Rev. Noadiah Russell, 
 pastor of the first church, Middletown ; Rev. Stephen Mix, 
 pastor of the church in Wethersfield, and messenger, John 
 Haynes of Hartford. 
 
 From Fairfield County: Rev. Charles Chauncey, pastor 
 of the Stratfield church, now the first church, Bridgeport; 
 Rev. John Davenport, pastor of the church in Stamford, and 
 messenger. Deacon Samuel Hart of Stamford. 
 
 From New London County': Rev. James Noyes, pastor 
 of the first church, Stonington ; Rev, Thomas Buckingham, 
 pastor of the first church, Saybrook; Rev. Moses Noyes,
 
 The Say brook Platforni. 29 
 
 pastor of the first church, Lyme; Rev. John Woodward, 
 pastor of the first church, Norwich, and messengers, Robert 
 Chapman of Saybrook, and Deacon Wilham Parker, 
 
 From New Haven County: Rev. Samuel Andrew, pastor 
 of the church in Milford ; Rev. James Pierpont, pastor of tlie 
 first church. New Haven ; Rev. Samuel Russell, pastor of 
 the church in Branford. 
 
 It would be interesting to dwell upon the characteristics of 
 some of these men, who met here for the purpose of defining 
 the government of the Colony religiously. The moderators 
 were: (i) James Noyes of Stonington, a venerated father, 
 then in his 69th year, an alumnus of Harvard College, and 
 son of one of the distinguished men of Massachusetts ; and 
 (2) Thomas Buckingham of Saybrook, first pastor of the 
 revived church after the removal of the major part to Nor- 
 wich with the former pastor, Mr. Fitch. Of minister Buck- 
 ingham we shall hear from a worthy descendant to-day. 
 
 Samuel Andrew, the member from Milford, was then 
 acting rector or president of the college. 
 
 There was also Timothy Woodbridge of Hartford, one of 
 the original " trustees or undertakers," appointed by the 
 Legislature "to found, erect and govern the college," one 
 who strove most vigorously against the removal of the 
 college to New Haven, the same Mr. Woodbridge whom 
 President Clap sarcastically describes as presiding over 
 "something like>a Commencement" at Wethersfield in 17 18. 
 
 There was James Pierpont of New Haven, to whom the 
 original draft of the Platform is attributed, whose pubhc 
 spirit and eminent gifts had made him conspicuous in the 
 Colony. It was out of his consultations with his two ne.xt 
 neighbors in the ministry — Andrew of Milford and Russell 
 of Branford — that the movement came which resullcti in the 
 founding of the college. His daughter was the wife of the 
 great theologian Jonathan Edwards, and among his descend- 
 ants are to be found the younger President Kdwards, Presi- 
 dent D wight, President Woolsey.
 
 30 Saybroo/cs Quadrimillenial. 
 
 The Charles Chauncey of Stratfield was grandson of 
 President Chauncey of Harvard College. John Davenport of 
 Stamford was grandson of the John Davenport, first pastor in 
 New Haven; and among the lay delegates were John Haynes 
 of Hartford, who was son of the second pastor in Hart- 
 ford and grandson of the first Governor of Hartford Colony, 
 himself prominent in civil life as judge and "assistant" in the 
 Connecticut Colony ; and another layman, Robert Chapman 
 of Saybrook, who for many years represented this town in 
 the Legislature and whose descendants are with us to-day. 
 
 These men were "picked men," worthy as any then living 
 in the Colony, to represent the churches and the State in 
 council. 
 
 We are to imagine these men, most of them, as coming 
 long journeys, with solemn purpose intent, not as we have 
 come, by easy transport on the Shore Line or Connecticut 
 Valley railroads, not even in carriages — for it was not till 
 after the middle of that century that wheeled vehicles were 
 used — but on horseback through the wilderness, some of 
 them requiring two days at least for the journey. They 
 probably met in the house of Mr. Buckingham, or, possibly, 
 in the house given to the college by Nathaniel Lynde, the 
 deed of which (although the offer of the house was made 
 six years before) was executed on the very day the council 
 met, September 9th, 1708. 
 
 There were at that time forty-one Congregational churches 
 — counting the one at Rye — in the four counties of Connec- 
 ticut Colony. There were no other churches in the Colony 
 but these, except one Baptist church in Groton, and one 
 Episcopal church in Stratford, both formed the year before. 
 The first Presbyterian church in the State was formed in 
 1723, and the first Methodist church not till 1789. 
 
 Tiiese men then were the representatives practically of all 
 the churches of the Colony. It was natural that it should be 
 arranged that they should meet at the time of the College 
 Commencement, for thq trustees of the College were all
 
 The Saybrook Plat form. 31 
 
 ministers, and were the only body of ministers of the scat- 
 tered churches that were brought together statedly by public 
 duties. These men had been regularly chosen by county 
 conventions of the churches held in June of that year ; so 
 that, as Dr. G. L. Walker puts it in the "History of the First 
 Church of Hartford," " there seems no valid reason for the 
 suggestion, which has been made, that the body convened at 
 Saybrook in September, 1708, was not a perfectly fair and 
 fully representative body of the forty-one churches of Con- 
 necticut." 
 
 This Council of sixteen members was convened by an order 
 from the General Court or Legislature of the Colony. Such 
 an order was in accordance with the ideas then prevalent 
 and with all the precedents of New England. 
 
 That order, adopted at the May session of the Legislature 
 in 1708, read : "This Assembly, from their own observation 
 and the complaint of many others, being made sensible of 
 the defects of discipline in the churches of this government, 
 arising from the want of more explicit asserting of the rules 
 given for that end in the Holy Scriptures, from which would 
 arise a permanent establishment among ourselves, a good 
 and regular issue in cases subject to ecclesiastical discipline, 
 glory to Christ our Head, and edification to his members, 
 hath seen fit to ordain and require, and it is by the authority 
 of the same ordained and required, that the ministers of the 
 several counties in this government shall meet together, at 
 their respective county towns, with such messengers as the 
 churches to which they belong shall see cause to sentl with 
 them, on the last Monday in June next, there to consider 
 and agree upon those methods and rules for the management 
 of ecclesiastical discipline, which by them shall be judged 
 agreeable and conformable to the word of God, and shall, at 
 the same meeting, appoint two or more of their number to 
 be their delegates, who shall ,all meet together at Saybrook 
 at the next commencement to be held there, where they 
 shall compare the results of the ministers of the several
 
 32 SaybrooJSs Quadriuiillcnial. 
 
 counties, and of and from them to draw a form of ecclesias- 
 tical discipline, which by two or more persons delegated by 
 them, shall be offered to this Court, at their session at New 
 Haven in October next, to be considered of and affirmed by 
 them ; and the expense of the above mentioned meetings 
 shall be defrayed out of the public treasury of this Colony." 
 
 The Legislature thus both convened the Synod or Council 
 and prescribed its duties. 
 
 No record has come down to us giving account of the 
 number of days spent in consultation or the details of the 
 discussions; we know the result from the report that was 
 made to the Legislature. That embraced a " Confession of 
 Faith," "Heads of Agreement," and "Articles for Adminis- 
 tration of Church Discipline." 
 
 In order to understand the result of this Council — the 
 Saybrook Platform — it should be borne in mind that this 
 Council was not called to settle doctrinal points; and that in 
 point of doctrine the Saybrook Council did nothing but re- 
 affirm previous standards. The churches of New England 
 were at one with each other and with the Reformed churches 
 of Europe on matters of doctrine. It is necessary to bear 
 this in mind because the Saybrook Platform is referred to as 
 though it enunciated some frightful statements of doctrine 
 peculiar to itself. It did nothing of the kind. 
 
 The Articles of faith of the Protestant churches of Europe 
 were acceptable to and accepted by our forefathers in this 
 country. They did not object to the Thirty- nine Articles of 
 the Church of England, except to those of a political charac- 
 ter or to those bearing upon church government. It is a 
 fact of history that Archbishop Cranmer, who was the lead- 
 ing spirit in framing the Thirty-nine Articles in the reign of 
 Edward VI., had the grand idea of framing an evangelical, 
 catholic creed, in which all the Reformed churches could 
 agree, in opposition to the Church of Rome then holding the 
 Council of Trent, and that he invited the surviving continen- 
 tal reformers, Melancthon, Calvin, and Bullinger, to London
 
 The Saybrook Plaiforiu. 33 
 
 for that purpose. Calvin replied that he "was willing to cross 
 ten seas for such a work of Christian union." Political events 
 however prevented the conference, and Cranmer with Ridley 
 and Latimer, and a few who came from foreign lands, framed 
 the forty-two Articles, which were afterwards reduced to 
 thirty-nine, and published in English in 1571. 
 
 The Westminster Confession of Faith, which afterwards 
 became the standard among Presbyterians and Congrega- 
 tionalists, was completed in 1646. 
 
 In 1648 this was adopted unanimously by the Council, in 
 which were representatives from the Connecticut and New 
 Haven Colonies, that met at Cambridge, Mass., as "very 
 holy, orthodox, and judicious in all matters of faith, and we 
 do therefore freely and fully consent thereunto for substance 
 thereof, only in those things which have respect unto church 
 government and discipline we refer ourselves to the platform 
 agreed upon by the present assembly." 
 
 This Westminster Confession was afterwards modified in 
 matters pertaining to church government at the Council of 
 elders and messengers of the Congregational churches in 
 England held at the Savoy Palace in London in 1658. 
 
 The General Council of elders and messengers of the 
 churches in New England held in Boston, in which were 
 representatives from Connecticut, in 1680, approved of and 
 consented to this amended form of the Westminster Con- 
 fession. 
 
 The Confession of Faith, then, that was approved at Say- 
 brook, was that which was affirmed at Cambridge in 1648 
 and at Boston in 1680, being the Westminster as modified 
 at the Savoy. The compilers at Saybrook did not alter this 
 Savoy Confession at all, but simply subjoined to each section 
 proof-texts from the Scriptures. That the Saybrook Council 
 regarded the three Confessions — that of the Church of Eng- 
 land, the Westminster, and the Savoy — as meaning essen- 
 tially the same thing, so far as doctrines are concerjied, and 
 as being in agreement with the Word of God, appears from
 
 34 Saybi'ooISs Qnadrimillenial. 
 
 this statement which they made in the eighth head of the 
 articles of agreement, which says: " As to what appertains 
 to soundness of judgment in matters of faith, we esteem it 
 sufficient that a church acknowledge the Scriptures to be the 
 Word of God, the perfect and only rule of faith and practise, 
 and we own either the doctrinal part of those commonly 
 called the Articles of the Church of England, or the Confes- 
 sion or Catechisms, shorter or larger, compiled by the 
 Assembly at Westminster, or the Confession agreed on at 
 the Savoy, to be agreeable to said rule." 
 
 That is, their doctrinal basis was in harmony with that of 
 the Reformed churches of England and the Continent. In 
 this part of their deliverance, then, we find no condemning 
 feature of the Saybrook Platform. 
 
 The second part of the result reported to the Legislature 
 consisted of the " Heads of Agreement " and " Articles for 
 the Administration of Discipline ; " the latter — the Fifteen 
 Articles^ — constitute what was peculiar to the Saybrook Plat- 
 form, all bearing upon church government. The Puritans in 
 the old country and in this were not at first as fully settled 
 and agreed upon church government and discipline as upon 
 doctrines ; and in this fact there is nothing surprising. Doc- 
 trines are more clearly and fully revealed in Scriptures than 
 matters pertaining to government, and the latter were sub- 
 jects of rriuch controversy when New England was settled. 
 
 There were differences of opinion among the Puritans of 
 England and of New England upon matters of church 
 government. Some were Presbyterians and some Inde- 
 pendents in England ; in New England they tried to take 
 the middle ground between Presbyterianism and Indepen- 
 dency. This is what was sought in the Cambridge Platform 
 and in the councils held from time to time during that 
 century ; and it was to remedy what defects had been found 
 in the working of the systems that had been previously 
 wrought out that the Saybrook Council was called. The 
 " Heads of Agreement," so called, were the same that had
 
 The Say brook P/al/ori)i. 35 
 
 been agreed upon in 1691 by the Presbyterian and Congre- 
 gational ministers in England. These have, for the most 
 part, to do with the power of particular churches in the 
 management of discipline among themselves. They refer 
 also to the relations of such churches to each other and to 
 their communion, and were decidedly Congregational. 
 
 Thus far then we have not come to the specific and pecu- 
 liar work of the Saybrook Platform. The Confession of Faith, 
 as we have seen, was meant to be in accordance with the 
 Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England, and was that 
 which had been adopted at Westminster and modified at 
 the Savoy. The Heads of Agreement was those agreed 
 upon by the Presbyterians and Congregationalists in Eng- 
 land in 1 69 1 for the sake of unity and peace. 
 
 We say that there was nothing distinctive in the positions 
 taken upon these points. We may, perhaps, make this ex- 
 ception, that the language used in the report of the Saybrook 
 Council, with reference to the " Confession " and " Heads of 
 Agreement," was more mandatory and authoritative than was 
 called for from representatives of the Congregational churches. 
 The Confession had been the doctrinal belief of the churches, 
 and there was no need for them to recommend that it be 
 declared by the Legislature tJiat this be the doctrinal basis, 
 or to agree that the Heads of Agreement "be observed" by 
 the churches of the Colony. 
 
 We come now to the Saybrook Platform proper — the fif- 
 teen Articles for the Administration of Discipline. Now we 
 reach what, in the minds of some, have been regarded almost 
 as the equivalent of the so-called Blue-Laws of Connecticut. 
 This was the Saybrook Synod's own peculiar work. 
 
 These articles of discipline were compiled at Saybrook 
 from the four models prepared in the county conventions. 
 President Stiles of Yale College observes: "I have been 
 told that the model from New Haven county, said to have 
 been draughted principally by the Rev. Mr. James Pierpont,
 
 36 Saybroo/cs Quadriniillcnial. 
 
 was that which, with some amendments, passed the Synod." 
 These provided for one or more consociations of churches 
 in each county, which should be the reguhir, known, and re- 
 sponsible tribunals with appellate and final jurisdiction ; to 
 which particular churches might refer cases too difficult to be 
 well adjudged and issued by them — cases concerning which 
 there should "be need of a council for the determination of 
 them" ; and to which aggrieved individuals in the churches 
 might apply for redress. "One principal thing," says Presi- 
 dent Clap, " wherein these articles differed from what had 
 been before generally received and practised in the New 
 England churches was this : that whereas the Cambridge 
 Platform had said in general terms, that councils should 
 consist of neighboring churches, and some question had 
 arisen who should be esteemed neighboring churches, and 
 what number should be called in particular cases; these 
 articles reduced it to a greater certainty, that councils should 
 consist of neighboring churches of the county, they forming 
 themselves into one or more consociations for the purpose." 
 The object was to prevent picked councils, ex parte councils, 
 and councils upon councils, which might give contradictory 
 results, and plunge the churches into endless troubles. 
 
 The articles provided also for associations in each county, 
 consisting of the teaching elders or ministers of that county, 
 who should meet at least twice in the year, consult together 
 with regard to the duties of their office and the common 
 interest of the churches, have the power of examining and 
 recommending the candidates for the ministry, take notice of 
 any of their number accused of scandal or heresy, and if they 
 find occasion should direct the calling of the council or conso- 
 ciation to proceed against such offending ministers. The as- 
 sociations also were to be consulted by "bereaved churches" 
 — those without a pastor — and were to recommend such 
 persons as might be fit to be called and settled in the work of 
 the gospel ministry ; and the associations were to see that 
 churches did seasonably call and settle a minister, or to report
 
 TIic Saybrook Platform, ^il 
 
 them to the General Assembly of the Colony. There had 
 been occasional meetings of ministers before this, but, as 
 Trumbull says, being "countenanced by no ecclesiastical con- 
 stitution, attended only by such ministers in one place and 
 another as were willing to associate, they had no regular 
 existence. The churches might advise with them or neglect 
 to do so, as the)' chose. There was no regular way of intro- 
 ducing "candidates" into the ministry. The Platform was 
 designed to bring these things into more order and system. 
 
 The articles also recommended a General Association, to 
 be composed of one or more delegates from each of tlie 
 county associations, which should meet once a year. In 
 recommending this last, the Platform said nothing about the 
 duties of this body, and no change was ever made in the 
 Platform defining the work of the General Association, It 
 was not deemed necessary; for in the general meetini^s, 
 which the ministers of New P^ngland had long held at the 
 time of the general elections at Boston and Hartford, they 
 had been accustomed to go into consultations on the interests 
 of the churches, and of the cause of literature ; and to give 
 advice when necessary; sometimes to devise measures for the 
 relief of the poor, and for civilizing and Christianizing the 
 Indians. It was not a legislative body, but being general 
 the recommendation gave abundant scope for that range of 
 consultation and discussion which has taken place in that 
 body, particularly for attending to those various objects of 
 benevolence and missionary enterprise that are of conunon 
 concern, and for opening correspondence with other minis- 
 terial and ecclesiastical bodies. 
 
 This then was the Saybrook Platform — a scheme for the 
 regular and orderly working of the churches. , The three 
 prominent objects had in view in adopting the Heads of 
 Agreement and the fifteen Articles of Discipline were as 
 stated by Dr. Bacon : 
 
 " I. The promotion of ortler aiul harmony among the 
 ministers and churches.
 
 38 SiU'h'oo/cs Ouadriniillonal. 
 
 2. The regular introduction of candidates into the min- 
 istry. 
 
 3. The estabhshnicnt of a fixed and defined board of 
 appeal — the county consociation — a council by which such 
 difficulties as the particular churches themselves could not 
 settle, might be adjusted." 
 
 Thus the work of the Sajbrook Synod was completed by 
 a unanimous vote, and the three documents were, one month 
 afterwards, presented to the legislature in its October session 
 at New Haven for approval and establishment. The legisla- 
 tive act making this the established religion of the Colony, is 
 as follows : 
 
 " The Reverend ministers, delegates from the elders and 
 messengers of this government, met at Saybrook, September 
 9th, 1708, having presented to this Assembly a Confession 
 of Faith, Heads of Agreement, and regulations in the admin- 
 istration of church discipline, as unanimously agreed and 
 consented to by the elders and churches in this government : 
 this Assembly doth declare their great approbation of such 
 an happy agreement and do crdain that all the churches 
 within this government that are, or shall be, thus united in 
 doctrine, worship, and discipline, be, and for the future shall 
 be established by law ; provided that nothing herein shall be 
 intended or construed to hinder or prevent any society or 
 church, that is or shall be allowed by the laws of this 
 government, who soberly differ or dissent from the united 
 churches hereby established, from exercising worship and 
 discipline in their own way, according to their consciences." 
 
 So by legislative enactment, the churches unjted under the 
 Saybrook Platform became "the establishment," or, as it was 
 known, "the Standing Order" of Connecticut, and all others 
 ivere dissenters. This so continued for seventy-six years, or 
 till 1784, when the legal establishment of the Saybrook 
 Platform was abrogated, leaving all persons free to worship 
 with whatever church they preferred. All, however, were 
 still taxed for some church, the church of their choice. In
 
 The Say brook Plat form. 3q 
 
 the year 1818, when the new constitution of the State was 
 formed, this last restriction was removed, and all the 
 churches were left entirely to voluntary support. 
 
 The Platform was made the law of the State before it had 
 been accepted by the bodies whose delegates prepared it. 
 The next year, 1709, however, it was approved by the 
 county conventions, and the Hartford North and South As- 
 sociations and Consociations, the New Haven Association 
 and Consociation, the Fairfield Association and Consociation, 
 and the New London Association and Consociation were 
 formed. Afterwards the New Haven was divided into the 
 East and the West, and as new counties were formed other 
 divisions were made. 
 
 The first General Association was held at Hartford on the 
 1 8th of May, 1709. The legislature in session at that time, 
 May, 1709, ordered, that the General Association revise and 
 prepare for the press the three parts of the Platform, "and 
 being revised, that the same shall be forthwith printed." A 
 t printing-press, given by Governor Saltonstall to the Colony 
 and set up at New London, the governor's residence, was 
 used, and in the next year — 17 10 — the Saybrook Platform, 
 the first book ever printed in Connecticut, was issued by 
 Thomas Short. 
 
 Under the Act by which the Saybrook Platform was made 
 the established religion of the Colony, all persons who 
 soberly dissented from the worship and ministry by law es- 
 tablished (/. e., the Congregational), were permitted to enjoy 
 the same liberty of conscience with the Dissenters in England, 
 under the act of William and Mary in 1689—/. e. they were 
 exempt from punishment for not conforming to the est.ib- 
 lished religion, but not exempt from taxation for its support. 
 By appearing before the county court, and there in legal terms 
 declaring their "sober dissent" they could obtain permission 
 to have public worship in their own way, but were still 
 obliged to pay for the support of the Congregational churches 
 in the places of their residence. There was a further rela.xa-
 
 40 SaybrooJcs Quadrimillenial. 
 
 tion as it regards Episcopalians in 1727, and as it regards 
 Quakers and Baptists in 1729. They were then exempted 
 from taxation for the established churches, provided they 
 attended on the worship of God in a tolerated society of their 
 own denomination. 
 
 The process of "signing ofif," as it was called, by which 
 one might remove from a church of the "standing order" to 
 another, was required in order to free one's self of the burden 
 of taxation. The story is told of an influential citizen of one 
 of the towns in the eastern part of the State, who had become 
 wearied of being taxed for the established church, and who 
 went to the proper official to sign the requisite paper by 
 which he should be released. On the clerk objecting to draw 
 up the paper because of his importance to the church, and 
 finally refusing, the man himself took pen and paper, saying, 
 "Well, then, I will draw it up myself." Whereupon he 
 produced a certificate somewhat like this : " This is to 
 certify that I, , hereby renounce the Christian re- 
 ligion that I may join the Episcopal church." 
 
 Not all who left the "established order " were required to 
 make such a renouncement of their faith. But Congregation- 
 aliats and Presbyterians were not understood as having the 
 privilege of exemption. If for any reason any of them 
 wished to secede and worship by themselves, they were still 
 obliged to pay their taxes for the support of the church from 
 which they seceded. Great was the hostility against the 
 " Separates," who, according to our present views of re- 
 ligious liberty, should have been freely allowed to secede and 
 form distinct churches. The plain operation of the discrimi- 
 nation against Separates or " Strict Congregationalists," as 
 they sometimes called themselves, was to drive them into 
 other denominations. If they seceded from the established 
 church and formed another Congregational church, they 
 were doubly taxed — i. e. for the new church and the old one 
 too — by law for the old one and necessarily for the support 
 of the new, whereas if they formed a church of another de-
 
 The Saybrook Plixtform. 4* 
 
 nomination, they were released from taxation for the one 
 whieli they had left. This diseiiniination in the time of the 
 Great Awakenins^ in the middle »)f the last eentnr)- resnlted 
 in the formation of many Baptist churches. 
 
 It was a matter of doubt what was the intent of tiie 
 proviso at the close of the act of the le<jislature. The fair 
 construction would seem to be that if one of the Congrega- 
 tional churches should refuse to place itself under the Platform, 
 it might maintain sepa'rate worship and be tolerated as the 
 churches of other denominations were, but it was not so con- 
 strued. Congregationalists were required by law to accept 
 the "standing order," and many churches and individuals 
 suffered great hardships for conscience sake. An illustration 
 of this was in the case of two brothers, T^benezer and John 
 Cleveland, students in Yale College in 1744. The corpora- 
 tion of the college adopted the Platform, and the trustees and 
 officers were required, upon their introduction into office, to 
 give their assent to it and to the Westminster Confession 
 and Catechism. The two students referred to were charged 
 with attending "unlawful or separate meetings" during their 
 vacation at home. On their return to college, they were 
 suspended till they should confess publicly " that they had 
 violated the laws of the Colony, of the college, and of God." 
 I'^ailing to do this, they were formally expelled and comman- 
 ded "to depart from the college limits, no more to return; 
 likewise the scholars were forbidden receiving them to their 
 rooms or conversing with them, lest they be infected there- 
 by." Many other instances of persecution because of Sep- 
 aratism could be cited. 
 
 All the Congregational churches existing at the time the 
 Council met were sooner or later consociated, and as late as 
 1 84 1, when there were two hundred and forty-si.x churciies, 
 all but fifteen were consociated. Gradually, however, since 
 the civil authority was wholly withdrawn, the consociations 
 have been changed to local conferences without judicial au- 
 thority, and the churches have been left to select their own 
 councils in all cases of difficulty.
 
 42 Sayl>}'Oo/cs Oiiadrimilleniat. 
 
 Tlie one great outstanding objection to this scheme of 
 government among Congregationalists has been the making 
 consociations a judicial and authoritative tribunal ; that has 
 always been regarded uncongregational. This objection has 
 always held against the Platform itself. 
 
 V>\\\. much of the odium that attached itself to the Plat- 
 form was due to the legislative action which made this the 
 State religion, and enforced it with such rigor and unjust 
 discrimination. It would have arisen against any union of 
 Church and State. Our fathers came hither to get away from 
 State religions, and they could not help being restive under 
 the inconsistency of State interference and dictation in 
 matters religious, even when they constituted the State and 
 administered its laws. They could not be satisfied even 
 though the " Separates " often, by their extreme and ultra 
 views, their special revelations, and irregular and questionable 
 practises, gave them some ground for complacency in enfor- 
 cing the laws. It was a State religion. It was imposed upon 
 them; and they were of too sturdy and independent a stock 
 to submit to dictation of that kind. 
 
 The suspicion, too, that the Platform tilted towards Prcs- 
 byterianism led many to set themselves in opposition. John 
 Wise, when the " Proposals " appeared in Massachusetts 
 advocating the adoption of a similar system there, wrote : 
 "They seem a conjunction of almost all the church govern- 
 ments in the world, and the least part is Congregational. 
 Indeed, at the first Cast of the Eye the Scheme seems to be 
 the Spectre or Ghost of Presbyterianism * * yet if I don't 
 mistake in intention there is something considerable of Prelacy 
 in it, only the distinct Courts of Bishops, with the Steeples of 
 the Churches, Tythes, Surplice and other Ornaments, do not 
 show themselves so visible, as to be discerned at the first 
 look ; yet with a Microscope you may easily discern them 
 really to be there in Evibyro, ct in Rernvi natnra, for this is 
 a known maxim, ^Qiiod neccssario SnbintcIIegiiiir non Deest,' 
 — what is necessarily understood, or lies hid in the Intention
 
 The Sayhrth)l- /V,i/ r,>)ii/. 
 
 43 
 
 of a Design, is really there by just IiUerprelalion. • • 
 There is also something in it which Smells very strong of 
 the Infallible Chair." And again he says: "Though it be 
 but a Calf now, yet in time it may grow (being of a thirsty 
 nature) to become a sturdy Ox, that will know no Whoa, and 
 it may be past the Churches' skill then to subdue it. For if I 
 am not much mistaken, That great and Terrible Beast with 
 seven Heads and ten Horns, described in Revelation 13, was 
 nothing a (cw Ages ago but just such another Calf as this is. 
 . Therefore to conclude and infer, Obsta Principiis ! It 
 is wisdom to nip such Growths in the Bud, and keep down 
 by early slaughter such a breed of cattle. Nam oimie malum 
 iiascens facile opprimitiir ! " 
 
 And when Dr. Emmons put forth his famous axiom : 
 " Association leads to Consociation ; Consociation leads to 
 Presbytcrianism ; Presbyterianism leads to l4)iscopacy ; 
 P!piscopacy leads to Roman Catholicism; and Roman Cath- 
 olicism is an ultimate fact" — then it was at last known by all 
 how perilous the whole scheme had been ! 
 
 The system worked well on the whole, and Saybrook has 
 no reason to be ashamed that her name is attached to the 
 historic document that has held so conspicuous a place 
 among the confessions of the Christian church. It bore a 
 large part in shaping Congregationalism. As Massachu- 
 setts guarded the one principle, the independence of the local 
 church: Connecticut defended its coordinate, the fellowship 
 and cooperation of the churches. 
 
 Gradually the system was relaxed, and what was judicial 
 and authoritative about it disappeared. It would have been 
 well if, in our swing toward independency, we had preserved, 
 by common consent, more of what was really wholesome in 
 the Saybrook system, and while guarding independence had 
 preserved some more regularity in calling councils, introdu- 
 cing into the ministry (and introducing out of it), and some 
 sisterly or at least cousinly watch and care between churches 
 of the same faith and order.
 
 44 Saybrook's QuadriiiiillcniaL 
 
 Rev. Dr. Porter of Farmington said at one time: " I have 
 been a member of Hartford Consociation more than fifty 
 years, and its doings, so far as I have observed, have been 
 sakitary only. And I know not how the same happy effect 
 could have been secured in any other way. Nor does it 
 seem to me contrary to the principles of Congregationalism, 
 for a church having in itself the power of self-government to 
 constitute the Consociation a standing council for ultimate 
 decision in those extreme cases which require it." 
 
 The ecclesiastical constitution adopted at Saybrook gave 
 to Congregationalism recognized and formal associations of 
 ministers for fellowship, mutual advice, and help in work, 
 bodies for the examining and certifying candidates for the 
 ministry, and for the discussion of questions of order and 
 doctrine. This arrangement of clerical associations, now 
 universally accepted, including all Congregational min- 
 isters who recognize each other's regular standing in the 
 ministry, and giving unity and completeness to our eccles- 
 iastical system, without infringing upon the self-government 
 of the churches, seems not to have been sustained elsewhere 
 until the usefulness of association had been proved by ex- 
 perience in Connecticut. 
 
 The plan of consociation of churches in defined districts 
 has found less favor beyond the limits of this State, but this 
 example of confederation has had its influence. The stated 
 annual meeting of local conferences is consociation in another 
 form ; consociation stripped of its judicial and authoritative 
 power. The churches of Connecticut, by their strict confed- 
 eration, have guarded, maintained, and commended to Con- 
 gregationalists everywhere, as I have said, the important and 
 distinctive principle of our polity, the fellowship of the 
 churches — the coordinate and complement of independency. 
 
 It may be noted also, to the credit of the stable and secure 
 condition insured under our ecclesiastical system, that while 
 other true Christian churches have grown vigorously here 
 and enjoyed the benefits, none of the religious organiza-
 
 The Say brook Platform. 45 
 
 tions commonly regarded as anti-evangelical or anti-orthodox 
 has ever flourished among the native population of our State. 
 " Whatever fault," said Dr. Bacon in his historical address 
 delivered in 1859, from which I have drawn liberally and 
 often literally, " we may find in our ecclesiastical system, 
 whatever errors may have been made from time to time in 
 the working of it, whatever reasons we may have to intjuire 
 whether the system needs revision and reconstruction, • • 
 our own Connecticut to-day, with all its imperfections, is the 
 convincing testimony to the value of these two principles — 
 the association of pastors for professional fellowshi[) and 
 mutual cooperation, and the friendly confederation of the 
 churches — which were first inaugurated and made effective 
 by our fathers " here at Saybrook " one hundred and fifty 
 years ago." 
 
 A quartette then sang Mrs. Ikmans's hymn, "The Land- 
 ing of the Pilgrim Fathers," the musical arrangement being 
 by Mr. William J. Wouu of Saybrook. 
 
 Tlic breaking waves dashed high 
 On a stern and rock-bound cuasl, 
 
 And tlie woods against a stormy sky 
 Tlicir.giaiit branches tossed ; 
 
 And the heavy night hung dark 
 
 The Iiills and waters o'er, 
 Wiien a band of exiles moored llicir bark 
 
 On the wikl New KngUind shore. 
 
 Not as the concjucror comes, 
 They, the true-hearted, came ; 
 
 Not with llie roll of stirring drums. 
 And llie trumpet lliat sings of fame ; 
 
 Not as the flying conic, 
 
 In silence and in fear ; 
 They shook the tlejjths of the desert gloom 
 
 With their hymns of lofty cheer.
 
 46 Saybrook's Quadriniillcnial. 
 
 Amidst llic storm llicy sang, 
 
 And the stars licard, and the sea, 
 
 And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang 
 To tlic anliicm of tlic free. 
 
 Tl)c ocean cagic soared 
 
 I'rom his nest by tlic white wave's foam, 
 And tlic rocking pines of the forest roared — 
 
 This was their welcome home. 
 
 What sought they thus afar ? 
 
 Bright jewels of the mine? 
 The wealtli of seas, tiie spoils of war? 
 
 They sought a faith's pure shrine ! 
 
 Ay, call it holy ground. 
 
 The soil where first they trod. 
 They have left unstained what there Ihcy found — 
 
 Freedom to worship God. 
 
 The Rev. John Edward Busiinkll, Tastor of the Con- 
 gregational Church in Fairfield, Conn., also a native of 
 Say brook, then spoke on 
 
 "SAYHROOK IN THE REVOLUTION." 
 
 Tlie distingtiished part borne by Connecticut in the Revo- 
 lution needs no praise to-day. Her honors are safe, woven 
 into the life of the nation's history. Enough to say that it 
 was hers to give a Governor, Trumbull, to Washington's 
 right hand — his "Brother Jonathan" — in counsel; that she 
 advanced her niillions for the "sinew" of that war, and sent 
 with this sinew a soul to quicken it, in the persons of 32,000 
 out of her total 40,000 fighting men — sent out of her own 
 borders, leaving her own precious homes defenceless, that 
 they might go to the continental army. She was the first 
 of the colonies to instruct delegates to the continental Con- 
 gress to strike iox liberty. Her sleepless devotion had ready 
 at hand for the battle of Bunker Mill, 3,000 men, and of those
 
 Say brook in tlic Revolution. 4^ 
 
 whom Washington commanded at the beginning of the con- 
 flicts about New York, viore tJian onc-lialf were from her 
 valiant yeomanry. While then Connecticut was a small star 
 among those that shone upon the old flag that led the Revo- 
 lutionary forces, she was lighted up — as it seems to her always 
 modest children — with a lustre that was shadowed by none. 
 
 My theme is Saybrook's portion of her lion-share. 
 
 But that we wish to-day to honor the details of history, it 
 would be safe and sufficient to say that she bore her share 
 along with her sister towns in the patient, devoted service of 
 that generation. In looking for eminent distinctions in her 
 pages we do not find them. Never did I so earnestly crave 
 a battle-field for the old town, with an honored list of killed 
 or captured, and thrilling adventures by land and sea, 
 and then to be able to take from their sacred resting-place 
 the old war-scarred banners and wave them here, and say 
 to the blooming generation of the present hour: "These 
 are the standards that your fathers held when they drove 
 the British invader from their gates." And to think that if 
 they had only been quick enough, they might have started 
 the battle of Lexington among the reeds and bullrushes of 
 our own fair streams ! 
 
 We can wish all this, but it could not be. The war was 
 not here. The plan of it was New York — north and south — 
 cutting off New England from the rest of the continent (jn 
 the one side and preventing such a division on the other. 
 I'^xcept for excursions for booty or malice, there was no mo- 
 tive to bring the enemy to our towns. But while such was 
 the plan and sphere of the war, there remained always the 
 possibility of a change, and the consequent danger felt for 
 Saybrook, so favorably situated for strategic purposes. The 
 liritish boats hovered about Long Island and menaced coast 
 and river. For their own reasons tiiey did not attempt to 
 possess the river. Perhaps they preferred to have us keep 
 the bar. There is abundant reason to believe that the people 
 of Saybrook were thoroughly alive to the spirit of the Rev-
 
 4§ Saybroo/cs QitadriiuillcniaL 
 
 olution; the constant view of British patrols passing up the 
 Sound was a daily reminder, if they needed any. 
 
 In the record of the colony we fnid that among the com- 
 panies which went to the relief of Boston during the Lex- 
 ington alarms, April, 1775, was one of fifty-nine men from 
 Say brook. In July of the same year the Point was further 
 aroused by the entrance of a Ikitish sloop chasing a Colony 
 schooner and examining her, while the militia, drawn by the 
 excitement to the shore, made a {nwi exchanges of shot with 
 them — the first of those grim courtesies of the war. 
 
 In the following year, (1776), Gov. Trumbull issued a pro- 
 clamation requesting all persons who were exempt from active 
 military service to organize companies to keep up the war 
 spirit at home. Saybrook was one of the towns to respond 
 heartily. 
 
 In August, 1776, a ship was built at Saybrook and passed 
 over the bar; the largest with which this old Neptunian rib had 
 ever had the honor of trying conclusions. In the same season, 
 Saybrook with three other towns raised the seventh regiment 
 for the continental army. In the May previous so zealous 
 were they that an appeal was made to the Legislature, and 
 granted, for building a fort on the site of the old one, to con- 
 tain six carriage-guns for the defense of the town and river 
 interests. To encourage them the more in this patriotic 
 action, twenty men were sent to their assistance out of the 
 regular army. Needless to say, this defensive enterprise took 
 time, labor, and expense. It was watched with anxious in- 
 terest by all the colony. With the work of ship-building and 
 fort-raising, in addition to the sending of men away to the 
 frontier lines of service, the eventful year of 1776 was filled 
 for them with sacrifice and the true spirit of the Revolution. 
 The State records are a sufficient witness to the fidelity of 
 her citizens. She has her share of names in the roll of 
 private soldiers who laid down their lives in battle, and of 
 those who were discharged with honorable wounds. A just 
 proportion of them, too, bore the title of Adjutant, Quarter-
 
 Saydrook in tJic Revolution. 49 
 
 master, Ensign, Lieutenant, Captain, and if tliey failed to at- 
 tain to a Generalship it was because the old xvolf-hnntcr from 
 Pcmfret could not spare them from their trusty flint-locks for 
 the idle business of wearing the gilt. We may add incidentally 
 to our previous mention, that the building of the ship at Say- 
 brook seems to have been made a matter of universal concern, 
 l^eginning with January, 1776, the records are replete with 
 solicitude about that boat. Capt. X. is appointed to build it. 
 At another date, Capt. Y. is sent to supervise and hasten 
 him. Then follows frequent mention of acts about rigging 
 and duck for tJiat boat at Sayhrook, not to speak of n^.oneys 
 sent to lubricate the machinery of progress still more. I am 
 not sure but that it was the cackling of the whole roost- 
 full over that one ^^^ which frightened the British fleet 
 from our river. The trouble did not end till the " Oliver 
 Cromwell" was safely over the bar, and certain of the build- 
 ers were brought to trial for alleged abuse of the building 
 money. Whether she, on the high seas, kept up the notoriety 
 begun on the stays I cannot report, but as Azariah Whittle- 
 sey, of Saybrook, was her master, it is safe to say that she 
 never ran from the enemy's fire. 
 
 In the same month that this naval thunderer went out of 
 the river, wafted on full sail by the acclamations of soldiers 
 at the fort and the jubilees of her citizens along the sh.ore, 
 another of the town's sea-princes, Capt. Seth Warner, received 
 commission and money to raise a crew of iio seamen for 
 duty on the northern lakes. For the few months following^ 
 the life of the town is varied by excitements attending watch 
 on British patrol-boats, the going and coming of companies, 
 and the perfecting of the fort. 
 
 Letters of 1776 are in the possession of our townsman, Mr. 
 Tully, written by valiant soldiers of the place, far off in the 
 Massachusetts camps, filled with the exciting news from the 
 very front line of war. Her sons were not to be drawn into 
 the war reluctantly; they were in an even line with the fore- 
 most on land and sea.
 
 50 Saybroo/cs QiiadriiuillciiiaL 
 
 The year 1777 opened, as we may imagine, with increaseu 
 fever in the veins of Revolution. In April, the town receives 
 peculiar renown through the scientific genius of one of her 
 sons, David Bushnell, who was born in the Westbrook parish. 
 This man appears before Governor and Council to exhibit a 
 torpedo arrangement for naval warfare. The acute minds of 
 Brother Jonathan and Gen. Putnam were not slow to see the 
 merits of his idea, and they furnished him with the requisite 
 provision, that he might put it to an immediate trial. Making 
 his headquarters at our ferry, he then went to work to construct 
 the famous "American Turtle," by which one Yankee expected 
 to sink the whole British navy. The inventor began with A in 
 the alphabet of the science. His first labor was to prove that 
 gunpowder would explode under water. Then he built the 
 boat. It outwardly resembled two tortoise shells in contact, 
 seven and one-half feet long, with just room for the captain, 
 who was also the crew in this case, and with air enough to 
 last thirty minutes. Most of the ballast was attached to the 
 keel and could be lowered to the bottom for anchorage. The 
 boat was so arranged with a paddle system that it could be 
 moved in either direction, the paddles being operated by the 
 feet. He had a barometer in the boat by which he could 
 estimate his distance from the surface, and also a compass by 
 which to direct his course. He was especially troubled about 
 the use of light. A flame would consume the air in a short 
 time. A kind of wood was found that was suitable for his 
 purpose except when it was injured by frost, and he wrote to 
 Dr. Franklin to inquire about the use of phosphorus, which 
 he was finally able to substitute. 
 
 Gen. Putnam himself was down to see the first experiment, 
 which was unsuccessful, in not grappling the magazine to the 
 enemy's ship. Other attempts were made, but, alas for 
 human hopes ! the British tar still rode the main. The good 
 frigate Cerberus came very near destruction off New London. 
 The torpedo, however, was so stupid as to grapple an inoffen- 
 sive Colony schooner near her, and demolished it instead.
 
 Sayhrook in tJic Rcvolntioii. 5 1 
 
 After this blunder " the Turtle" was excused ^nd allowed to 
 put its head within its shell, but not until it had succeeded 
 in alarming the enemy and making them extremely cautious 
 about their naval demonstrations. The inventor then used the 
 same principle in the employment of kegs of powder, which 
 were to explode by a system of machinery, on contact with the 
 hostile ships. A fleet of them was set afloat on the Delaware 
 river and commissioned to drift down the stream and destroy 
 the enemy. But this time it was the ice, (was ever an inven- 
 tor so beset as ours ?) and the kegs, having just as much feel- 
 ing against the ice as against the British fleet, went bravely 
 to work and cleared the -river of it, leaving the English — 
 excepting one unfortunate vessel which went up with the ice — 
 wondering what manner of country it could be where water, 
 and ice, and sometimes schooners, floated up-hill. They were 
 forthwith thrown into a panic, for they ranged the shores 
 along, and fired mercilessly at the floating kegs till they were 
 glad to hide their heads. To-day every American school- 
 lad knows where the " Battle of the Kegs " was contested, 
 when the valley of the Delaware was shadowed throughout 
 by the grim visage of war. As showing the shamefacedness 
 of the English over this event, it may be mentioned that 
 they offered a reward for Bushnell, living or dead. But he 
 escaped to serve his country to the end of the war. This 
 submarine science thus begun, though not as apparently suc- 
 cessful as it seemed to deserve, was the beginning of great 
 things. It established forever the principle of submarine ex- 
 plosives and set a whole school of successors (notably Robert 
 Fulton) at work on the same idea; and to-day our government 
 with its thousands of miles of open sea-coast, and without a 
 single ship for the defense of it, worthy of the flag it carries, is 
 rendered almost impregnable against the costliest iron-clad 
 fleets of modern Europe, by that deadly little scourge which 
 works out of sight and brings death and destruction out of 
 the depths of the sea. If then, as seems to be just, the greatest 
 war-defense of our nation, the American torpedo, is the
 
 52 Saybroo/ys Quadriuiilloiial. 
 
 youngest child of the genius which had the " American 
 Turtle" for its first-born, then to Yale College which schooled 
 that genius, and to Saybrook which cradled them both, 
 belongs the glory, which eclipses every other in Revolution- 
 ary annals, for the science which was then rudely shapen, at 
 present promises to change every principle of naval equip- 
 ment and warfare for all nations. During the rest of the war, 
 as they began, the people of this town went on, doing their 
 share of the work; sending out men ; on guard at home. 
 
 Owing to the location of the town, there was frequent 
 contact with that subtle kind of foe which works without 
 sword, by stealth and in the darkness — the enemy within the 
 gates. The British on the Sound were glad of the Tory 
 aid which brought them contraband supplies from up the 
 river. We are proud to learn that in their passage down the 
 river, they found a sleepless watch at the Point. And this 
 brings us to the only sanguinary battle of the Revolution 
 fought on Saybrook soil. A mass of contraband articles had 
 been taken from the Tories, and a young man — William 
 Tully — was set to watch it, in the house formerly owned by 
 Capt. John Whittlesey, still standing at the Point. 
 
 On a certain night eight Tories came to the house and 
 demanded entrance. Tully begged to be excused from 
 opening the door. They broke in without further parley and 
 rushed forward. Tully's flint was faithful to the trip of the 
 hammer and struck fire. The musket ball passed through 
 the first man, and to Tully's surprise he still advanced, but 
 the man directly back of him dropped dead. Tully then 
 surrounded the other six men and would have incontinent- 
 ally put them all to the bayonet (and did wound one of 
 them), had they not contrived to escape by the windows. 
 The first man whom Tully shot finally discovered that the 
 ball had passed through him, and dropped dead with one 
 hand on the window and the other grasping a chest of tea.. 
 The retreating forces left a quarter of their number dead on 
 the field — or floor — and a quarter of the remaining were
 
 Say brook in the Rcvolulion. 53 
 
 carried away wounded in their arms. It is, perhaps, note- 
 worthy that the continental army did not lose a man. 
 
 About the same time a Mr. Charles Williams of the Point 
 also constituted himself a continental army, and hearing one 
 night the rubbing of boat-keels on the beach, ran out and 
 cried to the passing winds: "Turn out, guards ! Turn out ! " 
 and the enemy fled, pursued by imaginary legions of the 
 adversary. This man's name takes us gracefully over to 
 Groton. His son, Daniel Williams, he allowed to go as 
 substitute for another man at Fort Griswold, receiving in pay- 
 ment a hogshead of cider, the legal tender for debts in those 
 days. Young Daniel reached the fort on the day before the 
 massacre, and was killed while passing powder to the soldiers 
 in the fort. He was the youngest member of the garrison. 
 Of Saybrook men killed at Fort Griswold, there were in all 
 five ; several others were wounded. Among those taken 
 prisoners was a Saybrook man. Lieutenant Jabez Stowe, 
 who seems to have been a valiant soldier. The government 
 afterward remunerated him for the losses and hardships en- 
 dured by him in the service, and it was even proposed to 
 give him a medal of honor. 
 
 It is, I may add, a tradition in my own family circle that 
 there was also a brother of this Lieut. Stowe present at the 
 attack on Fort Griswold, who escaped death by concealment 
 among the bodies of the slain, and after the slaughter walked 
 to this town, to his own home, bringing the first intelligence 
 of the disaster. 
 
 Such are the fragments of history which make up the story 
 of our town in the fevered days of the Revolution. 
 
 If that part were not a conspicuous one it was certainly a 
 faithful : heroic, in that they did all that God or man could 
 ask of them. 
 
 To know what the town was then, we must divest our 
 fancies of those colorings which make it now to us the fairest 
 corner of the globe. They fought for homes, humbler far 
 than those which adorn its streets to-day, but they were
 
 54 Saj'droo//s QuadyiniillcniaL 
 
 liomes as precious to tliem. Perhaps a dozen of the dwell- 
 ings then standing arc standing yet — those changed, and all 
 else Jioiv changed ! Suppose the homes that make the 
 town for us all gone ; remove both church edifices now 
 standing ; put the predecessor of this one, where we now 
 are met, across the street on the public green ; gather by- 
 fancy into that plain meeting-house for weekly devotion all 
 the people of the town, and at the head of that Christian fold 
 put that venerable and illustrious man, Rev, William Hart, 
 for fifty-two years the honored and honoring pastor, who 
 through his long and useful ministry was known as one of 
 the very foremost thinkers, scholars and debaters of his 
 day ; from our streets remove those stately trees which are 
 now our pride ; take the paint from most of the dwellings, 
 and on the remaining substitute the plain, not costly, red of 
 that day ; destroy the fences and abridge the walks to narrow 
 unkept paths; think of the men as walking about in homely 
 garments, spun by the hands of their good wives and 
 ruddy daughters, and earning their living by their own hard 
 industrious tilling of the soil where God had ordered it; 
 ascribe unto them the princely spirit of the sons and daugh- 
 ters of God, who scorned the fear of man, with whom 
 liberty was synonymous with life, and who were willing to do 
 and die for the sweet sake of that liberty; and we have Say- 
 brook in the Revolution. 
 
 After an organ solo by Mr. Frank Inman ClarK of 
 Saybrook — Mendelssohn's "War March of the Priests" — the 
 Rev. Salmon McCall of East Haddam, for many years 
 Pastor of the Congregational Church in Saybrook, spoke on 
 
 "THE DIVISIONS OF THE OLD COLONY." 
 
 Last Sabbath morning I felt very much at home in this 
 place, but I come to-day as one born out of due time, since
 
 The Divisions of the Old Colony. 55 
 
 it was only last Saturday evening that I received the invita- 
 tion to speak on this theme. To think of asking me, a man 
 of peace, who have been striving all my life to prevent and 
 heal divisions, to speak on such a subject as this, so difficult, 
 so painful, and so delicate — "The Divisions of the Old Col- 
 ony " ! However, the call has come, and here I am. 
 
 First, wc must give a few moments to the consideration 
 of that Norwich business, in 1660, a very painful affair in its 
 time. It was not supposed that so wise a man and so great 
 a king as Solomon in his time, could successfully divide a 
 living infant, and both parts should live afterwards, but that 
 was about the experiment which this Norwich business tried, 
 and, wonderful to tell, both parts lived and are living and 
 flourishing to-day. The early settlers had scarcely begun to 
 feel themselves at home here before they were called upon to 
 part with a majority of their number, and, among them, many 
 of those of the greatest weight of character, to go far hence 
 into the wilderness, and take up new lands, leaving the min- 
 ority to struggle and wrestle, as best they might, to sustain 
 their existence here. I think they worried along with many 
 sighs and tears for about five years, until there came to them 
 a very famous pastor in the person of the ancestor of Dr. 
 Buckingham, after whose coming this church flourished ex- 
 ceedingly well. 
 
 Who were these men, who went over to Norwich ? John 
 Mason, for one, a tremendous fighter of Indians; James h^itch, 
 for another, the early pastor of this church, and, in his time, 
 one of the wisest and strongest men in the colony. They 
 went over to Norwich very well pleased with the situation of 
 things over there and very well pleased with one another, for 
 it turned out in the lapse of time that Mr. Fitch, having 
 become a widower, asked Priscilla Mason, daughter of John, 
 if she would finish the rest of life's journey with him. We 
 do not know very much about her, but probably she may be 
 classed with that other Priscilla whom Miles Standish did not 
 marry and John Alden did. Mr. Fitch was the father of four-
 
 56 Say brook's QiiadriniillcniaL 
 
 teen children — I suppose about the average number for those 
 clays — and Norwich was found quite too narrow to contain the 
 energies of these settlers, so they overflowed into the borders 
 of what is now the town of Lebanon, in which town Rev. Mr. 
 Buckingham and myself had the honor to be born, and where 
 Mr. Fitch was buried. I remember among the sights of my 
 boyhood, the figures of some of these majestic men and 
 women, the descendants of John Mason and James Fitch. 
 I am reminded of what was said to Gideon respecting his 
 brethren : " Each one resembling the children of a king." 
 Let me recall to the recollection of some who are here to-day, 
 as one of the descendants of those early settlers, Jeremiah 
 Mason, who was regarded as one of the most magnificent 
 men this commonwealth, this country, has ever produced ; in 
 his profession having few if any superiors. 
 
 They are doing very well over there, and all the better 
 surely for having been reinforced in these later days by the 
 bright example and the patriotic labors of one whose ancestors 
 for five generations made this place their home, and who, 
 though not born here, was in his infancy here baptized. They 
 will not hesitate to allow that in the shining roll of their 
 worthies there is no more honorable, no more inspiring name, 
 no name deserving to be held in more lasting remembrance in 
 the commonwealth and in the nation, than that of William 
 A. Buckingham. 
 
 Well, we are glad for them that they found so favorable a 
 place and that they have done so well. We extend to them 
 greetings and congratulations, and may God bless them from 
 this time forth and forever ! 
 
 This town of Saybrook spread its wings in those days 
 across the river, and so we must have a word in regard to our 
 fellow citizens in the town of Lyme. You know they have 
 been very much given to the rearing and supporting of law- 
 yers. It has been a lawyers' town, and we over here have 
 sometimes feared they might get too much into a legal way 
 of thinking and of living. Nevertheless we are much pleased
 
 The Divisions of the Old Colo?iy. 57 
 
 with the eminence to which many of their sons have come. 
 We have seen their citizens selected by the people of the 
 State of Connecticut and placed in the Governor's chair. 
 We have seen them seated upon the bench of the Supreme 
 Court of the State of Connecticut, and one of them Chief 
 Justice of the State, and now his son Chief Justice of the 
 United States, a position in the judgment of some the high- 
 est to which any citizen of this Republic can aspire. I had 
 hoped to see here to-day the venerable face of one of those 
 lawyers, one of those judges. Lieutenant Governor, judge, and 
 foreign minister all in one, a graduate of Yale College in 
 1817; but, as he is not here to speak for himself, I should lilce 
 to tell a little story about him, and I shall tell it with a special 
 interest because our venerable President Porter is here, a man 
 who to me has seemed to know about everything that is 
 worth knowing in this world, but I think he had the misfor- 
 tune in his college days of not being one of the " Brothers in 
 Unity," and so of course he could not know anything about 
 the rich treats we enjo)-cd in those grand old days, when at 
 our annual reunions, one year His Excellency Governor 
 l^issell presided, at another His Honor Lieutenant Governor 
 McCurdy did the same. And I tell this little story to show 
 that the college has in these later years been in some measure 
 indebted to these old towns. 
 
 Mr. McCurdy was president of the Brothers in Unity in 
 his senior year, and like other presidents he had patronage 
 to dispense. Among the appointments in his gift was that 
 of reader for the freshman class. Of course he knew no one 
 in that class; for what senior ever did know a freshman ? But 
 he cast his eye over the benches where the freshmen sat and 
 he saw among them one little black-eyed boy, and he thouglit 
 there was something in him, so he ventured to appoint him 
 to the office; "and thus," said he, "I set his feet upon the 
 lowest step of the ladder, which he has ascended steadily till 
 the present day, when he occupies a position of as much 
 honor, influence, and fame, as any man in this Republic."
 
 5 8 Saybroolcs QuadrimilleniaL 
 
 The name of the little black-cycd boy is Theodore Dwight 
 Woolsey. 
 
 So much for the divisions of the old Colony times. 
 
 I"or one hundred and seventy years the town remained one 
 and the population increased to 8,000, who dwelt here har- 
 moniously. In 1835 or 1836, the people in the north part 
 of this town wished for a corporate existence. Then, as 
 Chester had done so well in setting up housekeeping for her- 
 self, those in the wxst part thought they would like to be in- 
 dulged in the same privileges, and the process thus begun 
 went on so that in about twenty years five towns were carved 
 out of this one — Chester, Westbrook, Old Saybrook, Essex, 
 and Saybrook, On some accounts we have regretted these 
 manifold divisions, and yet we bear the most cordial good- 
 will to every section and rejoice in the prosperity of each 
 and all in their several pursuits. And let me suggest to those 
 who in form have separated from us, that there may yet be 
 blessings to come upon them from the old home and hearth- 
 stone. And to illustrate my meaning let me relate a little in- 
 cident which occurred here not so very many years ago. 
 
 It so happened in those days that some of the citizens liv- 
 ing north of here became seriously disturbed in their neigh- 
 borly and family relations, in consequence of having been 
 out upon the errand of a hunting party. After the hunting 
 was ended they must have something to eat and drink, and 
 the result was that they became a little pugnacious. Two 
 men came to blows, and after the wine was out and the wit 
 was not fully in, they thought they must have redress, and so 
 one of them proposed to prosecute the other. They said, "We 
 must have a worthy man to judge us." They saw an old 
 man down here whom they were willing to trust, a man who 
 stood high in church and state, and they said, " We will go 
 down and see him." Lawyers were engaged on both sides; 
 the worthy magistrate held his court; all things were said 
 except the final sentence. The justice said, " I am satisfied 
 what verdict to give. The result of the whole thing I am
 
 Minister BuckiugluDu ami /lis Family. 59 
 
 afraid will be a family feud for generations. I advise you two 
 gentlemen to come together and shake hands and say it is all 
 right ; and now, as an inducement with you so to do, I will give 
 you the fees of my office for holding this court." The effect 
 was very great, and they began to be thoughtful. Presently 
 one witness said, " I will ciiarge you nothing," and another 
 said " I will charge you nothing," and the lawyers said " We 
 will charge you nothing,'* and then their hearts were softened 
 and they bowed down and confessed that they had done each 
 other wrong, and asked forgiveness. They went home happy 
 and afterwards lived in peace. Blessed are the peacemakers. 
 Scarcely anything needs to be said about church affairs. 
 In the early times there was this one old church. Now there 
 are six Congregational churches, four Baptist churches, two 
 Methodist churches, two Episcopal churches, two Catholic 
 churches, within the borders of the original town on this side 
 of the river. One Methodist church has ceased to be. In 
 all there have been eighteen churches, all sound in the faith, 
 confessing the substance of the doctrine set forth in connec- 
 tion with the Saybrook Platform. 
 
 The Rev. SAMUEL G. Buckingham, D. D., LL. D., of 
 Springfield, Mass., a descendant of a former pastor of Say- 
 brook, read a paper on 
 
 "MINISTER BUCKINGHAM AND HIS FAMILY." 
 
 Rev. Thomas Buckingham, the second pastor of this 
 church, was the son of Thomas Buckingham, one of the com- 
 pany which settled New Haven in 1638. This able and 
 opulent company, led by such men as P2aton and Hopkins, 
 rich London merchants, and Mr. Davenport, who had been a 
 famous minister in London and was followed by many of 
 his congregation, reached Boston the previous summer, where 
 they passed the winter, and the next spring they sailed
 
 6o Sayb7'ooJcs Qiiadrimillciiial. 
 
 around to Oulnnipiack, the Indian name of their future 
 home. 
 
 This old Puritan settler and ancestor of all of the name in 
 this country is registered among the original planters of New 
 Haven, and in the first division of lands received his allot- 
 ment near the corner of College and Crown Streets, some- 
 where near the large spreading oak under which Mr. Daven- 
 port preached his first sermon on the " Dangers of the 
 Wilderness," and not far from the spot where Dr. Lyman 
 Beecher was afterwards born. 
 
 It was decided to make another settlement at Milford, and 
 as the company had brought over two ministers, Mr. Daven- 
 port and Mr. Prudden, the latter became the pastor of the 
 new flock. The church was organized at New Haven and 
 the mode of organization was this : Seven men were 
 selected for their known Christian character, who covenanted 
 with God and with each other, to walk together in all the 
 ways and ordinances of the gospel. To these the rest were 
 joined. Among those " seven pillars," as they were called, 
 is still found on the old records the name of Thomas Buck- 
 ingham, and among those soon added is Hannah, his wife. 
 Opposite his name, in the handwriting of the second minister, 
 is the entry, " dy at Boston, 1657." Upon the death of Mr. 
 Prudden, he was sent to the Bay to procure another minister ; 
 and it appears from the probate records at New Haven, that 
 he made his will just before he left and that he never returned. 
 The pastor of this church was the youngest of his six chil- 
 dren, two of whom were born in P^ngland. This one bore his 
 father's name, and was born at Milford, November 8th, 1646. 
 Minister Buckingham, as he was called, began his ministry 
 here in 1665, though he was not ordained until 1670. Where 
 he was educated is not known, but he probably studied the- 
 ology with Rev, John Whiting of Hartford, where he married 
 his wife, Hester Hormer. His parish was large, embracing the 
 present towns of Old Saybrook, Saybrook, Chester, Essex, 
 Westbrook, and a considerable part of Lyi)ie across the river.
 
 ]\/i7u'slcr Bucki7igJui))i and liis Fanii/y. 6\ 
 
 At the same meeting when the town agreed upon the terms 
 of settlement with Mr. l^uckingham, the " IMack llill quar- 
 ter," which represented Lyme, was aUowed to form a separate 
 parish, having sufficient land for thirty families.* The new 
 minister was but eighteen years of age, and succeeded that 
 able man, Mr. James Fitch, who had removed to Norwich,! 
 taking with him, as we have been told, a number of his most 
 valuable parishioners, and greatly weakening this church ; 
 yet the young pastor maintained and built up the church, 
 and sustained himself here for forty-four years, growing into 
 the respect and love of his people, and becoming influential 
 throughout the colonies. 
 
 One of the most important works of your pastor's minis- 
 try was the part he took in the founding of Yale College. 
 The New Haven Colony had purposed from the first to have 
 a college. Some fifty years before. New Haven had made 
 a donation of ^300 for such a purpose, and Milford proposed 
 to give ^100 more. Gov. Hopkins's gift to found a gram- 
 mar school, the one which now bears his name at New 
 Haven, was at one time surrendered into the hands of the 
 general court, for the purpose of making it a college; and 
 the legislature promised an annual appropriation for some 
 such institution. Init the college at Cambridge needed all the 
 funds that could be collected for such a pur[)ose. Frequent 
 contributions were made to it from both the Connecticut and 
 New Haven Colonies, and money was also paid to it out of 
 the public treasury. And for all these years the inhabitants 
 
 *Tlie connection between Saybiuok and Lyme must always have been 
 close, not only on account of their near neij;hborhood and early connection in 
 the same parish, but as also appears on the records from their frequent inter- 
 marriages. This was true of our own family, for while our father was of Say- 
 brook, our mother was from Lyme. 
 
 f Mr. Fitch lived and died there at the ripe age of eighty, or rather in 
 that vicinity, for he spent the very last of his life and died in my native town of 
 Lebanon. I have often read that long and elegant obituary in Latin upon his 
 gravestone ; it could hardly have been better written, if he, scholar as he was, 
 had composed it himself.
 
 62 Saybroo/cs Quadriiuillcnial. 
 
 of the State educated their sons there. But the original plan 
 was never rcHnquished, until in 1700, tliosc ten ministers, of 
 whom your pastor was one, who had been nominated and 
 agreed upon as trustees, came together at Branford, and with 
 their few books, and by that simple declaration from each, 
 " I give these books to the founding of a college in this Col- 
 ony," they laid the corner stone of that university which has 
 so long been the seat of sound learning and of true piety, 
 and promises to remain such as long as the love of learning 
 and Christian faith shall last. True, those few books were a 
 small endowment for such an institution, but they implied a 
 love of letters. which would afterwards furnish the needed 
 facilities for all kinds of education and forms of culture. The 
 pecuniary value of such gifts was trifling, but it was the pledge 
 of all the liberality which has been, or shall be embodied in 
 the rich endowment of its future. And the minister who had 
 so much to do with the founding of this college, and the 
 community who were so anxious to have it located among 
 them, and subscribed almost as much as New Haven for this 
 purpose (Saybrook's subscription being ^500 sterling, while 
 New Haven's with its greater population and means was only 
 iJ"70o), may always claim honorable and grateful mention from 
 every historian of the university. 
 
 But the college, if founded, had no endowment. It had 
 not even a location. Mr. Lyndc of this town was pleased 
 generously to give a house and land for the use of the college 
 so long as it should continue here. The trustees, after some 
 debate, made choice of this as the most convenient location 
 for their collegiate school, and chose Mr. Picrson of Killing- 
 worth as its rector. But he, not being able to remove here, 
 was allowed to retain some of the students there, while others 
 were sent here to study under tutors, and be under the super- 
 vision of Mr. Buckingham. This state of things continued 
 for a dozen years, and the commencements were held here; 
 and it was not until 1718 that the college was fully located at 
 New Haven, and the first commencement held there. The
 
 hfiiu'stcr Jjuckiiighani and his Family. 6 
 
 J 
 
 liistory of that removal, and the temporary opposition made 
 to it here, I need not rehearse. It is enough to know that 
 your minister remained until his death, a faithful and trusted 
 member of its corporation, and when he died, his son Stephen, 
 the minister of Norwalk, succeeded to the same trust, while 
 you have always been educating your sons at that college. 
 
 Mr. Buckingham's position among the churches of Connec- 
 ticut was highly honorable to him. He was chosen one of 
 the two moderators of the Synod held here in 1708, and 
 which framed the " Saybrook Platform," as it is called. Of 
 the nature of that ecclesiastical sy.stem of faith and church 
 organization, I need not speak, after the careful and candid 
 consideration of the subject by Professor Pratt, to which we 
 have just listened. If I was to make any additional sugges- 
 tion, it would be : — that while it proved a mistake to con- 
 nect the churches so closely with the civil government, and 
 create a "standing order" by law, which all must be taxed 
 to support, except as they formally joined some other denom- 
 ination, and while it was too great a departure from pure 
 Congregationalism towards Presbyterianism: — there is this to 
 be said about its adoption : the times were bad : and there 
 were many difficulties in the churches, and unsatisfactory 
 modes of settling them : and there had been a falling away 
 from the original faith and exemplary living of the first set- 
 tlers. The magistrates and the ministers were on the most 
 friendly terms, the former being accustomed to consult the 
 latter on matters of legislation, and the latter thinking that 
 more rigid laws, and a stronger ecclesiastical system enforced 
 by the State, would remedy the evils under which they were 
 suffering, were ready to ask f(jr such aid, which, like all 
 church- and-state unions, sooner or later harm the ciuirch 
 more than they hcl[) it. There was also a large Presbyterian 
 element in the Connecticut churches, and much intercourse 
 and a close sympathy with New York and New Jersey, where 
 Presbyterian churches were numerous which favored such 
 action. And if that Synod made concessions to Presb)'ter-
 
 64 SaybrooJc s Qiiadriiniltenial. 
 
 ianism, which none of the other chinclies of New England 
 have seen fit to nialce, it certainly does honor to their cath- 
 olicity of spirit and Christian liberality, if not to their wisdom. 
 
 Mr. Biickingliam's connection with the Indians of this 
 region was also an interesting one. Uncas, chief of the 
 Mohigans in the eastern part of the State, had always been 
 a good friend to the settlers. He and his sons sold and gave 
 away many tracts of land to persons in this town and else- 
 where.* Mr. Buckingham and Thomas Clark purchased such 
 a tract of Joshua Uncas, one of his sons, lying in the north 
 part of Lebanon, where our family afterwards settled, though 
 not upon that land, or having any connection with it, but 
 where several of the name did settle. Attawanhood, another 
 of the sons of Uncas, was chief of the Indians in this vicinity, 
 and of the same disposition. He seems to have come quite 
 under the influence of our civilization and Christianity, for 
 he makes Minister Buckingham one of the executors of his 
 will and the guardian of his children. He directed that his 
 sons should live near Saybrook, and be taught luiglish by 
 their mother, and, at the end of four years, be placed in an 
 English school, and he also requested for himself, that he 
 might be " buried at Saybrook, in a cofifin, after the manner 
 of the English"; all this is another pleasant tribute to the 
 memory of your good minister. 
 
 As to his family, it may be said that he had nine children, 
 seven of whom lived to grow up and marry and settle here, 
 leaving behind them families of children. 
 
 Thomas was a prominent man in town affairs, being appoin- 
 ted to many important offices of trust, and was also a prom- 
 inent member of the church, and a large land-holder. 
 
 Daniel was for many years justice of the peace, and held 
 
 *It is often charged upon our ancestors, that they robbed the Indians of 
 their lands, or paid for them with a few coats or hatcliets ; but these lands had 
 no value. As late as 1776, the land which Massachusetts claimed as a part of 
 her southern boundary, and was finally surrendered to Connecticut, was sold at 
 auction, and only brought a little more than a farthing an acre. 
 
 I
 
 Minister BuchingJiai}! and /lis Fiunily. 65 
 
 other important offices in the town, and was also a prominent 
 member of the cluirch, lie was also a lar^e land-hoUler. 
 
 Stephen was pastor of the church at Norwalk thirty years. 
 
 Heaekiah also appears frequently as appointed to offices 
 of trust. 
 
 The three sisters were also married and settled here, leav- 
 ing behind them children, some of whose descendants, under 
 other names than the family name, are well known to you 
 and respected. 
 
 Our branch of the family, descending through Daniel, 
 Daniel Jr., Samuel, Samuel Jr., made this their home for 
 four generations, and their dust has mingled freely with the 
 ashes of your friends. My father left here at the beginning 
 of this century, and indeed his eldest child was born here. 
 ]5ut wherever his children have been located, they have 
 thought kindly of the home of their ancestry, and been most 
 grateful to that good minister, who taught them a5 he had 
 been taught himself, " To fear God and keep His command- 
 ments" and " To love others as we love ourselves," as the 
 first preparation for the duties of this life, and the only 
 preparation for the life immortal. 
 
 The following almost obliterated inscriptions are still found 
 on stones in the old burying ground at Saybrook Point: — 
 
 " Here lies the body of the 
 
 Rev Mr Thomas Buckingham 
 
 Pastor of the Church of 
 
 Christ in Saybrook, dec'd 
 
 April ye ist 1709 in ye 
 
 63 year of his age " 
 
 " Mrs Hester Buckingham 
 
 Wife to ye Rev Mr Thomas 
 
 liuckinghani, Pastor of ye 
 
 Church of Christ in .Saybrook 
 
 Dec'd June 3, 1702, in 
 
 yp 5O year of her age."
 
 66 SaybrooJcs Qitadrimilteiiial. 
 
 A poem written for the occasion by Mr. GEORGE W. BUN- 
 CAY of New York, was then read by Mr. MORTIMER 
 Chapman of Saybrook, a descendant of one of the first 
 settlers of the town, 
 
 SAY-BROOK. 
 
 Wliat did the gray forefalhers know, 
 Two centuries and a half ago ? 
 Ihey planted colonies that grow, 
 
 In greatness, symmetry, and beauty. 
 The axe, the anvil, and the loom, 
 The towering spire, the rounded dome, 
 The happy kingdom of the home, 
 
 Reveal the force of love and duty. 
 
 Fair Lady Fenwick, pure and just, 
 Whose fame smells sweetly from the dust. 
 On whose sweet spirit no distrust 
 
 Could cast a shadow of disfavor, 
 Still lives in sacred memory. 
 Waves voice her honor from the sea, 
 Which drowns discord in harmony ; 
 
 Its praise is salt that holds its savor. 
 
 We jubilantly hail to-day 
 
 The name and history of Say, 
 
 Who ruled his realm with quiet sway 
 
 And raised it to a prosperous portal ; 
 With glad complaisance we can look 
 At the memorials of Brook, 
 Seen in the street and shady nook ; 
 
 Say-Brook, twin-name, that's made immortal. 
 
 In potchards, flints, and arrow-heads. 
 And Indian mounds, where narrow beds 
 Hold bones of the untutored " Reds," 
 
 We scan the earliest history 
 Of this good, fair, and fertile land. 
 Settled and tilled by a brave band, 
 Guided and guarded by the Hand 
 
 Of Him who solves life's mystery.
 
 Say-Brook. 6 7 
 
 Wlicre the wiKl Indian's wigwam stood, 
 And beasts found shelter in the wood, 
 Progress has paved the iron road, 
 
 That links the States which grow to nations. 
 Ox-carts give way, the steam-car flics 
 On winged wheels, where cities rise, 
 With steeples pointing to the skies ; 
 
 Here freedom's greeted with ovations. 
 
 In early days wise men had sown 
 
 The seeds of learning, which have grown 
 
 To schools and colleges that own 
 
 A lofty and a glorious name. 
 One stainless flag to-day we hail, 
 It never taught a lad to fail ; 
 Our happy land is proud of Yale, 
 
 And Saybrook claims in part her fame. 
 
 After a few words from the Chairman, the audiencp united 
 in singing "America," and the benediction was pronounced 
 by the Rev. Jesse Brusii, Rector of Grace Church.
 
 N O 1 E 
 
 T^HROUGII the kindness of C. J. Iloadly, Esq., Libnirian 
 ■*■ of the State of Connecticut, the first speaker was enabled to 
 show to the audience two letters written to Governor Winthrop by 
 the officers in charge of Saybrook fort soon after 1700. To one 
 of the letters were appended two circular bits of paper showing 
 the calibre of the " great guns " for which balls were needed, one 
 being a little less and the other a little more than three inches 
 in diameter. 
 
 Professor V. B. Dexter of Yale College brought from the college 
 library President Sliles's " Itinerary," containing two diagrams of 
 Saybrook Point, marking the location of buildings, etc., as he 
 found them in 1793. With Professor Dexter's courteous per- 
 mission, one of these plans has been reproduced in fac-simile 
 and is prefixed to this volume. 
 
 Among the others who were i)resent was ]\Ir. David Lion Gar- 
 diner of New Haven, a descendant of Lion Gardiner, the engineer 
 who built the first fort and laid out the town, and of David 
 Gardiner, the first white child born in what is now Connecticut. 
 
 His Excellency the Governor of the State and many other in- 
 vited guests expressed to the Committee tlteir regrets that they 
 were not able to attend. 'J'he Rev. F. N. Zabriskie, D, I)., of 
 Princeton, N. J., formerly pastor in Saybrook, wrote as follows : 
 
 I am in receipt of your note of November 201I1, inviting me and my family, 
 in behalf of the Committee, to attend the commemoration of the two hundred 
 and fiftieth anniversary of the settlement of Saybrook. I thank you heartily 
 for the courtesy and kind remembrance. 
 
 I need not assure you that it would afford me very great satisfaction to be 
 present on so interesting an occasion. Old Saybrook holds a very warm
 
 Note. 69 
 
 place in my heart, and the rccoUeclion of my residence tlierc is among tlie 
 golden spots in my memory. As the shadows jjegin to len(;lhcn on my path- 
 way, it is a source of no little gratitude and yratification to me to feci that I 
 may have borne a humble part in promoting the best interests of tlie dear oM 
 town and in maintaining the faith which the founders brought with them to the 
 new world, and for which they forfeited so much. 
 
 I regret, however, that the state of my health and other circumstances put 
 it out of my power to participate in the celebration of the 27th. Be assured 
 that I shall be none the less present in spirit, and with my earnest and affection- 
 ate wishes for the temporal and spiritual prosperity of the good old town and of 
 every one of its inhabitants. 
 
 My family, who have most delightful associations with Saybrook, and one 
 of whom (my only son) has the honor to be a native, all join me in these con- 
 gratulations and greetings. 
 
 Yours faithfully, 
 
 K. N. Zaiikiskik. 
 
 The Rev. Theodore L. Ciiyler, I). D., of P.rouklyn, N. Y., 
 wrote : 
 
 I thank you for your kind invitation. Nothing would give me iiHirc |)leas- 
 ure than to join in the "Jubilee" of charming old Saybrook, in which I have 
 spent so many happy hours, and whose kind ]ieople I regard so warmly. lUit 
 I am held /rtj/ and ii:^hl at home on Friday and Saturday by important church 
 engagements, which I cannot possibly leave. 
 
 I should like to swing my hat in a good hearty cheer for the "fast- 
 anchored" old town, whose "Platform" was built of the soundest timber, whose 
 lighthouse has never grown dim, and whose sons and daughters rise up to bless 
 her memory forevermore. It is not easy to say "No" to so cordial an invitation 
 from three of the Saybrook sisterhood, but necessity compels me to do it. 
 
 With heartiest good wishes for a right royal celebration, I remain. 
 Cordially and gratefully yours, 
 
 TlIEO. I,. Cl'YI.ER. 
 
 Tlie Hon. T. C. Acton of New York sent tliis tcleyram : 
 
 lion. John Allen, Presiding Officer, Saybrook : — 
 
 My Saybrook sisters : My spirit is with you to-day and rcjuiccs in the 
 success attending your hajipy inspiration. What man proposes and fails to 
 accomplish, woman, I am proud to say, disposes and happily succeeds in this 
 instance. I regret the weakness of my brothers and applaud the strength of my 
 sisters. Don't be too much elated, but dwell together same as usual, in frater- 
 nal love, and I'll go back to Mother. 
 
 Alice Boteler Fenwick, through spiritual medium, 
 
 T110.MAS C. Acton.
 
 
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