History of Fairfield County, Connecticut

It is to be much regretted, therefore, that by the l)urning of tlie diurch and i)arsonage in the conflagra- tion of the town in 1779, the ancient records of the parish previous to that time were destroyed.? And it is hardly less to be regretted that there is also in the records of this town a singular omission, extend- ing from the year 1722, when the Rev. Mr. I'igot began to preach in .Stratford and Fairfield, to the year 1728, wlien Mr. Caner had taken full charge of this parish, and inchuling the whole jjcriod of its organi- zation and incipient stages. This singular circum- stance is especially unfortunate on account of the iin|)ortance of the period in question. It was evidently a time of much excitement and change in the public affairs of this town. And the omission of all the acts and projects of that period from the copy of records, wbirb iont;iiiw an account of uunual meetings and * The taugilile cviilclii-c>ti of tliu loculity of Uio chiircll were n fow tonibftuni-ii, wliich liiivo Jtoon recently removed hikI nre iiwniting rottet- tilig in »inn' jiliicn when, they may remain iiluIiHturljeil. Tliey arc at prc«ent in potwewiion of Mr. Frc^leric Stnrgei*. One of lliem was erected to " Alintimni A.lumd. a Wiiftliy fonntlor and lllieral lM.>nefactur of Trinity Churcli," wlio wait prubal'ly burled, according to the tlnioi, near the church. f President Stiica' Diar)', and MS. Letter of Prof. Kiugsloy to the au- tliiir. X The name of " Henry Ctmor" was enrolleil In tlio " registry-book" of Mr. Pipjl, Ujion the Ii.Hl of conimnni.-nnt« at StmtfonI, " Sept 2, 1T2*J," anil tliat of " Henry Caner, Jr.," by Mr. Jolintwin, " Mnn.ii 28, 172.".." It may be well to oli*erve here that ■Ahlle the ori^'inal orthography of Mr. Cuner'n name wiut tliat whieh In In-re eniploye.1, the received pn.numia- tion of it wan donbtlem* In.li.-ated more precitK'ly by I>r. Trnnil.nll, wlio WHfto it Onninr, and by the early churclimen of Fairfleid, who Hometimea wrote It (baarr. • ^ With the exception <.f tlio«e which ux loclu.loi iu the registr^'-book of Sir. PIgiit and Mr, Johnaju. votes of the town during all the re.^t of the time from 1661 to 1728, in the same book which has the original record of annual meetings and votes from 172!t to 1800, leaves us almo.it entirely to the testimony of one of the parties interested in certain important changes. It appears, then, from the reports of Mr. Johnson to the society, that in the year 1724 the prospects of Episcopacy in this town were very favorable in some respects. Speaking of the sufferings of ".sundry peo- ple of both sexes" wlu) had been persecuted and imprisoned on account of their attachment to the Episcopal system, and expressing his fear that if not soon relieved people would be quite discouraged, ho at the same time cx]>ressed his belief that " the whole town would embrace the church if they had a good minister at Fairfield," and added, " I have a Viist assembly every time I visit them." Within a few months afterwards he had " in Stratford and the neigh- ! boring towns more than a hundred communicants;" of ' whom about forty had been admitted to communion by him. And in 1727, just before Mr. Caner took charge of this parish, Mr. Johnson informed the so- ciety that there were about forty families of Episco- palians in Fairfield. These were, according to his account, " mostly of the poorer sort ;" as Mr. Caner also testified in his first report of the state of his mis- sion. It is evident, however, from various circum- stances noted in the records of this town, and upon tombstones in its old burial-places, that the parish at that time embraced some persons who had been, for many years previous, men of much consequence and influence in the town, and the mo.st of them, if not all, Congregationalists. The same fact is manife.'<t from the success which attended an ai)]dication made t)ie Colonial government at that time by the wardens and vestrymen of Trinity Church, Fairfield, for an alteration of the laws concerning the support of re- ligion. A petition was ])rescnted to the Assembly, signed by " Moses AV'ard and Samuel Lyon, church wardens, and Dongal Mackenzie, John Lockwood, Nathan Ailams, lienjaniin Sturges, and otliers, in the name ami behalf of all the rest of their brethren," dated May 1.5, 1727, stating that ten of them had been lately imprisoned for taxes, contrary to the Hon. Governor's advice, ami notwithstanding solemn prom- ises before given to sit down and be concluded in the aflair; jiraying that the sums of money so taken from them miglit be restored; and declaring that if their grievances might be redre.«sed, they should "aim at nothing but to live peaceably and as becometh Chris- tians among their di.-wenting brethren." And, in re- sponse to this petition, an act was ]>a;*sed, providing that the taxes cidlected from ICpiscopalian'* for the support of religion might, under certain circum- stances, be paid to the Episcopal missionaries instead of the Congregational ministers. This movement of the early cliurcbmen of Fairfield, about a hundred years after the settlement of this colony, wius the first ; cflectual step ever taken towards the establishment of FAIRFIELD. 353 rcliiiidus lilu-rty in ("onnecticut ; ;ii) (il)ji.-ct wliirh it requiivil about aiintlier century to aeconiiilisli. And tiiat those zealous ehurehnieii, so wortliy of Ikui- oralile renR'nihranee, were persons of jioml eluiraeter, ajiainst wlioui tlieir adversaries could find no oc- casion, may l>c safely inferred from the previous existence of a custom disclosed by the early reriirds of this town: the practice of expellini;- from its limits, bv a public vote, those who from time to time lie- came obnoxious on any account to the majority of the community; which may be supjiosed to have been thus kept very ]iure and select, from the hij.dicst to tlie most humble citizen. In view of these and other similar indications that tlie ]ieriod of the organization of this parish was oiu' of muidi excitement and change in the social aspect as well as the iniblic acts of this town, it is to be re- gretted on all hands that the record of its acts during that most interesting period of five or six years is wanting in the co|iy wJiich was made from an "old l>o(dx," and preserved evidently safe and sound,* hav- ing never lost a leaf of what was transcribed. Some clue, liowevcr, to the posture of jiublic affairs in this town at that interesting crisis may be obtained from a record of colonial acts, which is [ireserved among old manuscrii)ts in the ofKce of the Secretary of State at Hartford. It is in thc^e words: '-May 14. 17l''i. On advice of the infirmities of Kev. Mr. Webb, and the present circumstances of that society of which he is pastor, we" — the General Association of Congre- gational ministers convened at Hartford — " could not but think that their case called for a sjieedy visitation, and tliat nothing less would attain the end designed and so earnestly to be desired for that jieoplc, than an act of this Hon. General Asscnddy, rciiuiring that one or more of the ministry from the several counties or associati(nis of this colony be sent to convene at Fairfield for the consideration of their states and the application (d'pro]ier expedients for their united con- tinuance in the faith and establislu^d order of the church of Christ in the colony." Whereupon a reso- lution was "passed by the Hon. Assembly, that Fairfield should call some other orthodox minister to help Mr. Webb, that their sorrowful and sinking cir- cumstances might be relieved."! This interesting record also serves to illustrate a remark made not long afterwards by Mr. Caner, in » Tlie reliuirk of Dr. Tiuralmll (c. xix ) that " tlic first rui'Dnls rif Fiiir- field were burnt," ..;cm'I1i«. liy long repetition, to liuvo t'stalilisheil iiu im- pression very witlely that the archives of tliis aneient town are nt>t worthy of eNanii[iatioii. IJiit even the writer of a rererit " History of the In- dians of t'onneetieot" (I>e Foi-est) niistit have fonml here some inlei-esl- ing particulars of iiureha-ses of huni from the natives if he had not trusted tuo far tile stiange report that "the r(!eortls of FairtieM have huell (le- stroyeil." Page 1(17. "The first meeting of the I'lime .\niieiit (Congregational) So<iety of rairfleUl," ilistinet from " tow n-meetiiig." was held, arc ordiug to its own record, on " the Sltli of December, IT'JT," tin the old manuscript ln-ri^ cited the last (dause of this residiition has been partially enised. But without that clause the res ilutioii of tho Assembly is a very tame response U) tlie memorial of tho Association. one of his reports to the society, that Fairfield was "the idiief seat of opposition" to Kpisropai-y, a ri'mnrk in which he also had reference to the fact that tln^ seat of the County Court and its prison weri' in this town. Some idea of the state and materials of the mission at Fairfitdtl, when ]\Ir. Caner took charge of it after his oiilination, may fie gathered from a comparison of the small number of the communicants whom he fiiund here as ii lay re:idcr under ])r. .lohnsmi in 17'i'i, namelv ftrclrc, with the number of families belonging to the parish in 1727, namely, ,/''<W//. It is manifest from such a comparison that few of the early members of this parish were originally ehuridiincn. Most of them were doubtless converts fr<im the Congregational Society. This ajijiears, indeed, from a remark of Mr. I'igot, in one of his reports, that "the people of Fair- field, Riiiton, iind Newtown, were very licsirous of a minister, many of them having conformeil to the CInirch of Fnglaud." And the changes of this kiml, , by which :i very promising parish had been gathered j here before 1727, in part by Mr. Caner himself as lay- reader, seem to have increa.sed very raiiidly after his aiiiiointment to the mission of Fairfielil.