William W. Wheildon

“ Our Town is now Threescore and Eight years old: and certainly ’tis Time for us, with all possible affection to set up our Ebenezer, saying, Having obtained Help from God, the Town is continued, until almost the Age of Man is passed over it. The Town hath indeed Three Elder Sisters in this Colony; but it hath wonderfully outgrown them all; and her Mother, old Boston, in England also; Yea, within a Few Years, after the first settlement it grew to be, the Metropolis of the whole English America. ”

“ This discourse is very severe upon all “Houses where God is not served,” and defines them as gaming-houses, drinking-houses, houses where troops and harlots assemble. “If the Worshipful Justices, and the Constables, and the Tythingmen, would Invigorate their zeal, to Rout the Villanous Haunts of those Houses, the whole Town would be vastly the Safer for it.”
All that can be said of these curious discourses is that they are a strange medley of declamation, fanaticism, and exhortation, not lacking in thought perhaps, or devoid of sense, but rather insinuating than direct and sensible. ”

“ The early government of the Puritans in Boston was a sort of extemporary government, or, as it has been described, “temporary usurpation,”—a government of opinions and prejudices, and in small sense a government of law. It had some of the features of a family government, without system or order. If the inhabitant offended, or did any thing which was not thought proper by the Church, the assistants, or anybody else, fine or punishment was pretty sure to follow. To be sure there was the Massachusetts Colony Charter somewhere ”

“ At all events, with our best endeavors against being drawn into or multiplying errors, we lay no claim to invulnerability in the matter of accuracy, or immaculacy in the way of opinions; and we very sincerely add, if errors or mistakes have been made and are found, we shall be glad to be apprised of them. There are errors in our history which it is scarcely worth the while to attempt to correct, although they are not to be countenanced and should not be repeated. ”

“ Charlestown, the mother of Boston, is much more populous than Cambridge, and exceeds it much in respect of trade, being situated between two rivers, Mystic River and Charles River, and parted from Boston only by the latter, over which there is a ferry so well tended that a bridge would not be much more convenient, except in winter, when the ice will neither bear nor suffer a boat to move through it. ”

“ On the 1st of June, 1774, by order of Parliament and the King, Boston Harbor was closed and possessed by ships of the British navy. Nothing could enter or leave the port: wood as fuel could not be brought from the islands, or merchandise or lumber removed from wharf to wharf by water; nothing whatever could be water borne within a circle of sixty miles, either to arrive or depart. At the same time British troops held the town; and the government, such as it was, was removed to Salem, where the General Court reassembled on the 7th of June. ”

“ Each of these was connected with the mainland by a narrow neck of its own, and now all three, with the addition of Roxbury, West Roxbury, Brighton, and Noddle’s Island (East Boston) , are included in the present metropolis, while Muddy Brook (Brookline) and Winnisimmet (Chelsea) , which were originally attached to Boston, are not included within her present limits. The growth and expansion of the town, we judge, are unparalleled, in some respects, by any other city in the world, with a character of her own and a position in the history of the country of which she may well be proud. ”

“ Thy God hath helped thee!” “Old Boston, by name, was but Saint Botolphs Town. Whereas Thou, O Boston, shall have but one Protector in Heaven, and that is Our Lord Jesus Christ.”
The preacher’s third division is that the help Boston has already had should lead her people to Hope. “Hope in him for more help hereafter.” “The motto upon all our Ebenezer’s is Hope in God! Hope in God!” In the course of this part of his lecture, the preacher says,—
“The Town is at this day full of Widows and Orphans, and a multitude of them are very helpless creatures. ”

“ The preacher proceeds,—
[Pg 101] “A formidable French squadron hath not shot one Bomb into the midst of Thee;” our Streets have not run Blood and Gore; devouring-flames have not raged. “Boston, ’Tis a marvellous Thing, a Plague has not laid desolate!” “Boston, Thou hast been lifted up to Heaven; there is not a Town upon Earth, which, on some accounts, has more to answer for.” ”

“ It has been said that Americans are disposed to revel in big dinners; and, in fact, undertake to accomplish every thing with a big dinner, or at least celebrate the accomplishment of it in that way. One writer has said, if we welcome a guest it is done with a dinner; if we inaugurate a stock company or start a charity, it is pretty sure to have its relations with the market and the stomach. This may be partly so. A good dinner, social and liberal, is the reconciler, the inspiration, the motive power of good works generally ”

“ Banish the unfruitful works of Darkness, from your Houses, and then the Sun of Righteousness will shine upon them. Don’t countenance Drunkenness, Revelling and Mispending of precious Time in your Houses. Let none have the snares of Death Laid for them in your Houses.”
The preacher goes on in two or three further divisions with his declamation against evil and sins, and his conjurations for better things, in faith, hopes and works, intimating all the evils that exist in Boston, and warning the people of the danger of them. ”

“ News of the success of the expedition was received in Boston, on the 2d of July, 1745, and there were great rejoicings and illuminations in the town in consequence; and on the 8th, Gov. Shirley issued his proclamation for a general thanksgiving, it having pleased God, as he elaborately expressed it, “by a wonderful series of successes to bring this great affair to a happy issue in the reduction of the city and fortress of Louisbourg.” There was added, “All servile labor is forbidden on said day,” and the bar against recreations is omitted; but all persons are called upon to preserve order. ”

“ VISIT TO BOSTON.
The Narragansett Indians were one of the largest, if not the very largest, tribe in New England, at the time of the arrival of the Puritans; and they were especially friendly to the settlers. They lived along the coast, from Stonington to Point Judith, on Narragansett Bay. “They consisted,” says Hutchinson, “of several lesser principalities, but all united under one general ruler, called the Chief Sachem, to whom all others owed some kind of fealty or subjection.” ”

“ Although it has been impertinently said, that “the most curious [Pg vi] thing to be found is a woman not curious,” we submit that curiosity is a quality not to be disparaged by wit or sarcasm, but is rather the germ and quality of progress in art and science and history. ”

“ At all events, however successful the hunting parties were, so much of their supply of provisions was bartered with the Indians for furs that a scarcity of food was soon experienced, and then they had to buy corn of them. Matters soon became serious: for whatever might have been the primary object of the Puritans in coming to this country, eating was not beyond a secondary consideration, to say the least of it; and a market of supplies for the material man became an important consideration then, and has been so ever since. ”

“ Notwithstanding the strange judgments, fines, and punishments, made under the civil law or without law in the colony of Massachusetts, there seems to have been another sort of government, or perhaps one of the same kind, in relation to spiritual or religious things, the administration of which shows such a spirit and system of persecution, and such a degree of fanaticism, as can hardly be paralleled in history. ”

“ The name of Plymouth, of course, the Pilgrims brought with them, as the Puritans did the name of Salem and of Boston. But just how the name of Massachusetts originated is not so well known. It was no doubt of Indian origin; and if derived from the “greatest king of the Indians,” Massasoit, or, as Hutchinson says, Massasoiet, [3] it is well that it has been so preserved and perpetuated. Among the earliest English names, besides these mentioned, were the names applied to the islands, as Noddle’s Island, which possibly was given to it by Maverick, and Bird Island, in 1630 ”

“ The Mill Pond was formed by the building of a causeway across the head of the cove, as the street now runs, where there was, it would seem, a sort of Indian causeway, or pathway, at some prior time. It is represented by writers on the subject to have been built from Leverett Street to the Charlestown [Pg 22] Ferry; but as this would include the creek, built some ten or twelve years before, this seems to be impossible; for if the creek was connected with the pond, without a gate to shut it off, there could be no mill-power. ”

“ It is a curious fact that the first newspaper established in Boston should have got into the hands of the tories, and in the last year of its existence, in the trying times of the revolutionary war, should have been conducted by a woman. ”

“ Another inhabitant of the town was fin’d Ten Shillings for kissing his own wife in his Garden, and obstinately refusing to pay the Money, endur’d Twenty Lashes at the Gun, who, in Revenge for his Punishment, swore he would never kiss her again either in Publick or Private.”
John Dunton, in his famous work, “Dunton’s Life and Errors,” speaks of the government, when he was in Boston, in 1686. He says, “Let it be enough to say, The laws in force here, against immorality and prophaneness, are very severe. Witchcraft is punish’d with death, as ’tis well known ”

“ At the present time, it would be an easy matter to roast an ox every day, and big dinners are regarded as of small account on the score of rarity. Some philosopher has said, “Eating dinner is a task which, above all others, [Pg 141] requires the conscience pure, the mind easy, a reason undisturbed, the senses critical, and the body and spirit perfectly at rest.” ”

“ Another curious description of Boston is given in Wood’s “New England’s Prospect:”—
“Boston is two miles North-east from Roxberry. His situation is very pleasant, being a Peninsula hemm’d in on the south side with the Bay of Roxberry, and on the north side with Charles River, the marshes on the back side being not half a quarter of a mile over; so that a little fencing will secure their cattle from the woolves. It being a Necke and bare of wood, they are not troubled with those great annoyances, wolves, rattlesnakes and musquetoes.... ”

“ As early as the 5th of July, 1631, an order was passed by the Court of Assistants, “that £30 be levied on the several plantations for clearing a creek, and opening a passage to the new town,”—the town at this time being the settlement around the South Cove; so that the “clearing of a creek” was “a work of industry” on a small scale for such an enterprise. It was made across the narrow neck of land between the two great coves, and while it united the waters of Charles River with the harbor, divided the peninsula into two islands or sections. ”

“ Three persons known as Quakers, on their way from Salem to Rhode Island, to provide a place for themselves and families, were arrested by the constable at Dedham, and sent to Boston, where Gov. Endicott set them at liberty, but fined them twelve shillings, as it would seem for the stupidity of the constable. The constable, no doubt, arrested them for fear of being fined for neglect of duty. ”

“ Hutchinson concludes what he has to say of the remarkable persecution of the Quakers and its severity, with the remark, “May the time never come again, when the government shall think that by killing men for their religion they do God good service.” However other denominations of Christians were persecuted by the Puritans, only Quakers and witches were hung. ”

“ In the matter of currency, it was ordered, in 1634, “that musket balls of a full boar shall pass currently for farthings apiece, provided that no man be compelled to take above 12 pence at a time in them.”
It would seem that some of these decisions, or the general character of the government, had caused some remark, as it was “ordered that Henry Lyn shall be whipt and banished the Plantation before the 6th day of October next, for writing into England falsely and maliciously against the government and execution of Justice here.” “Execution of justice” is good, we should say. ”

“ Such was the nature, character, and contents of the first paper ever published in America; and we doubt if the first paper printed in England, more than a hundred years before, exceeded this in manner and matter. The judgment of the present day would be that it was a very good paper for the time, both in its news and editorial matter, and we fail to see any ground of offence either against law or religion. Many of the early papers published in this country, after the failure of this attempt, are not half as good as this first copy of “Publick Occurrences.” ”

“ Endicott, whom he came to displace, with a rich venison paté, such fare was not afterwards found to be very plenty; and the strawberries, which those he left on board the ships found on Cape Ann, were not always to be had, nor a very substantial food for the settlers. Of course, the party had a supply of provisions,—a market of their own which they brought with them; and, as nobody could become a freeman or have a vote in public affairs unless he was a member of the church, it is to be inferred that nobody would be allowed any thing to eat only on the same condition ”