The History of Barnstable County, Massachusetts Chapter X

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CHAPTER X.
THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.
By JOHN H. DILLINGHAM.
[Copyright, 1890.]
General View of the Rise and Course of their Principles in Barnstable County.-The
Society in Sandwich.-Newell Hoxie.-The Society in Yarmouth.-David K. Akin.
-The Society in Falmouth.-The Dillingham Family.

MINISTERS of the Society of Friends first made their appearance
in this county in the year 1657, ten years after the rise of the
society in England, chiefly under the ministry of George Fox.
These were Christopher Holder and John Copeland, who, having
landed at Rhode Island, proceeded soon to Martha's Vineyard. Their
religious offerings being unacceptable to the governor of the island
and to Mayhew, the priest, an Indian was ordered to convey them
across the sound. They stepped upon the (now called) Falmouth
shore on the 20th of Sixth* month, 1657, and proceeded to the town of
Sandwich. There they found a number unsettled in their church re-
lations, doubtful of the propriety of stated preaching, and believing in
the duty of Christians without human ordination to exercise their own
gifts in the ministry. Thus the seed of what was nicknamed Quaker-ism
found a soil to some extent prepared. The spiritual doctrines
preached by Christopher Holder and John Copeland were hailed with
feelings of satisfaction by those who had found little food in stated
preaching or in forms of worship. Not less than eighteen families in
Sandwich were on record the next year as professing with Friends.†
     This was not the first arrival of Copeland and Holder on New
England shores, but they were of the first cargo of Friends who suc-
ceededin getting a foothold on New England soil, to propagate their
views of gospel truth. They had first arrived from London in Boston

* Now Eighth month, called August.
† "They have many meetings and many adherents; almost the whole town of
Sandwich is adhering towards them. . . The Sandwich men may not go to the Bay
[Boston colony], lest they be taken up for Quakers."--Letter of James Cudworth, a Puri-
tan,in 1658.

158 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

bay one year before, together with six fellow laborers in the same
cause. These arrived only two days after the sailing away of Mary
Fisher and Anne Austin, who had been the first of that society to come
to New England; and who, after five weeks' imprisonment, had been
sent to Barbadoes on the vessel in which they came. Now, these
eight other Friends appearing in place of the two just banished,
brought no small consternation to the minds of the authorities,
who had them imprisoned for eleven weeks, and subjected to many
hardships in jail. before they were shipped back to London.
     The aged Nicholas Upshal, who had been touched by the suffer-
ings of Mary Fisher and Anne Austin as prisoners, and had given
them provisions, now raised his voice in protest against the treatment
of Quakers and the laws enacted against them. Banished from his
home in consequence, he proceeded southward in hope of finding
shelter at Sandwich. But the governor of Plymouth had issued a war-
rant forbidding any of the people of Sandwich to entertain him The
inhabitants of Sandwich, which even then began to appear as the
cradle of religious liberty for Massachusetts, were mercifully disposed
to ignore the governor's order summoning him to Plymouth. But
such was the pressure brought to bear on them by the governor,
that when spring-time came, they advised Nicholas Upshal to
seek refuge in Rhode Island. Succeeding in reaching the free
soil of Newport, doubtless there as during his sojourn in Sand-
wich, he served to prepare many minds for the reception of the
doctrines which he had learned in Boston through the per-
secuted Friends. The story of the old man's wrongs being a theme
of general conversation at Newport, an Indian chief was heard to ex-claim,
"What a God have the English, who deal so with one another
about their God! "
     It was while this topic was fresh that Robert Fowler's vessel, the
Woodhouse, arrived at Newport landing six of the eleven Friends whom
he had brought from England,-the other five of his passengers having
disembarked at New Amsterdam (New York). Of the six who pro-
ceeded to Newport. Christopher Holder and john Copeland remained
there nearly a fortnight. No doubt the exiled Nicholas Upsha1. who
had passed the preceding winter in Sandwich, had much conference
in Newport with these welcome brethren: and much that he could say
to them about the fields being ready for a harvest in Sandwich, may
have been instrumental in turning the course of Copeland and Holder
toward the Cape, by way of the Vineyard. But Copeland, in a letter to
his parents, names only the next station immediately in view: "Now
I and Christopher Holder are going to Martha's Vineyard in obedi-
ence to the will of our God, whose will is our joy."
     It is requisite here that we should take a glance at the more dis-

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 159
tinguishing doctrines inculcated by the Friends,* in order to under-
stand a little of their public. though invisible influence on the life of
the western half of the county, especially in Sandwich, Falmouth and
Yarmouth, where societies of them were early gathered and still re-main.
This influence has been due, not to their numbers, but to their
character. And their character, so far as it is the outcome of their
doctrines, is traceable to so much of the Spirit of Christ, not as they
have professed as a foundation doctrine. but as they have admitted
into their hearts to live by and obey.
     As the immediate beginning of modern Protestantism sprang up
in the revelation livingly opened to Luther while performing a Rom-
ish penance, that "The just shall live by faith," so a similar be-
ginning of that more distinct testimony for the spiritual nature of the
Christian dispensation. as the second wave of the reformation, by some

* The first written declaration of faith, representing some of the leading doctrines
of Friends, is believed to be the following, issued by Christopher Holder, John Cope-land
and Richard Doudney, soon after the first visit of the two former in Sandwich.
It is dated: "From the House of Correction, the 1st of the Eighth month, 1657, in
Boston. "
" We do believe in the only true and living God, the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who hath made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all things in them con-
tained, and doth uphold all things that he hath created by the word of his power.
Who at sundry times and in divers manners, spake in time past to our fathers by the
prophets, but in these last days hath spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath made
heir of all things, by whom he made the world. The which Son is that Jesus Christ
that was born of the Virgin; who suffered for our offences, and is risen again for our
justification, and is ascended into the highest heavens, and sitteth at the right hand of
God the Father. Even in him do we believe; who is the only begotten Son of the
Father, full of grace and truth. And in him do we trust alone for salvation; by whose
blood we are washed from sin; through whom we have access to the Father with bold-ness,
being justified by faith in believing in his name. Who hath sent forth the Holy
Ghost, to wit, the Spirit of Truth, that proceedeth from the Father and the Son, by
which we are sealed and adopted sons and heirs of the kingdom of heaven. From the
which Spirit the Scriptures of truth were given forth, as, saith the Apostle Peter, ' Holy
men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.' The which were written
for our admonition, on whom the ends of the world are come; and are profitable for the
man of God, to reprove, and to exhort, and to admonish, as the Spirit of God bringeth
them unto him, and openeth them in him, and giveth him the understanding of them.
"So that before all men we do declare that we do believe in God the Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit; according as they are declared of in the Scriptures; and the
Scriptures we own to be a true declaration of the Father, Son and Spirit; in
which is declared what was in the beginning, what was present, and was to
come. * * * [The only doctrinal matter which follows is contained in
an exhortation to turn to the Spirit] that showeth you the secret of your hearts, and
the deeds that are not good. Therefore while you have light, believe in the light, that
you may be the children of the light; for, as you love it and obey it, it will lead you to
repentance, bring you to know Him in whom is remission of sins, in whom God is well
pleased: who will give you an entrance into the kingdom of God, an inheritance
amongst them that are sanctified."

160	HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

denominated as Quakerism,* dates from the moment that George Fox,
after sore struggles and wanderings in search for the living truth,
heard the words as by a declaration from heaven, " There is one, even
Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition,"
     From that time, Jesus Christ, not only as "once offered to bear the
sins of many," but as the inspeaking Word of God and Mediator be-
tween man and the Father; the" true Light that lighteth every man
that cometh into the world "; the Leader, by the witness of his Spirit,
into all the Truth; and the practical" head over all things to his
church," even head over every individual exercise of true public and
private worship,--has been the foundation of the system of doctrines
and testimony, which seemed to the early Friends clearly to proceed
from Christ by the witness of his spirit to their hearts,
     They reverently owned the Holy Scriptures to be written words
of God, but were careful to observe them just as reverently in their
own confinement of the title" Word of God" to Christ himself, Sat-
isfied that the Scriptures were written by inspiration of God, they
dared to open or interpret their spiritual meaning under no other
qualification than a measure of that in which they were written,
Knowing that a prophecy of Scripture is of no private interpretation;
but, as it came not by will of man, no marc can it be so interpreted;
and" as holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy
Spirit," so in the light of the same Spirit must the sayings, as all the
other" things of the Spirit of God," be spiritually discerned; and,
when rightly called for, so declared to others.
     Now, since" a measure and manifestation of the Spirit of God is
given to every man to profit withal," and" the grace of God which
bringeth salvation, hath appeared to all men, teaching them," if they
will heed it, the essentials of life and salvation, God hath neither left
himself without a 'witness for Truth to every man's heart. nor man
anywhere with availing excuse. Since" sin is the transgression of
the law," and" all have sinned," all must have had the law, or evi-
dence of the divine will,--some in the Scriptures. and all mankind by
the Spirit, witnessing in their hearts against sin. "For where no law
is, there is no transgression." But by the inward witness of the Holy
Spirit. sin is disclosed to each man as sin; whereby Christ fulfills his
promise. if he should go away. to come again and "comvince the world
of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment." And if under this con-
viction for sin there is a faithful repentance toward God, a saving faith
toward our Lord Jesus Christ is imparted by the same Spirit (even to
such sincere penitents as may not have been informed of his outward

* A nickname, as in most cases happens, more persistent than the adopted name,
and started by George Fox's bidding a magistrate to " Tremble at the word of the
Lord,".

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 161

history, yet they experience the spiritual mystery) to give us to feel
our transgression forgiven and iniquity pardoned, not for works of
righteousness that we may have done. but according to the Father's
mercy in Christ Jesus, who laid down his life, "the just for the un-just,"
a " Propitiation for the sins of the whole world," that we "be-
ing reconciled by his death," may be "saved by his life."
     Consistently with this adherence to Christ as the Word of God
" speaking to our condition," as we reverently wait on Him to know
his voice, no ministration but that of his spirit is needed, whether vo-
cally through the minister or "in the silence of all flesh," for the per-
formance of worship acceptable to God,-a worship which stands not
in words, or forms or emblems, but must be "in spirit and in truth."
Here no words of man are a part of worship, except under a fresh re-
quirement of the" Head over all things to his church"; whose charge
through the apostle Paul was, " If any man speak. let him speak as the
oracles of God; if any man minister let him do it as of the ability which
God giveth." Ministry, whether it be exhortation, teaching, praise or
prayer, under such immediate putting forth of Christ's Spirit, requires
no previous intellectual study or preparation; but may be exercised
according to the anointing and gift whether by learned or unlearned,
male or female. For" There is neither male or female: for ye are all
one in Christ Jesus." And the dispensation has been introduced when
the Spirit was to be "poured out on all flesh," and" your sons and
your daughters.-servants and handmaids-shall prophesy." (Acts ii:
17. 18). And Paul who forbade women to speak or teach in the church,
in the human sense of the word. was careful to tell how women should
appear when they should speak in the divine sense,-when they should
publicly pray or prophesy.
     The Friends took note of the command of Christ: "Freely ye have
received, freely give," in its application to the ministry of the gospel.
Especially as, during the seasons of public worship, ministers in com-
mon with the flock were to " wait for a fresh anointing for every fresh
service," no sermons had to be prepared outside of the meetings in any
such way as to prevent ministers earning their own living, after the
example of the apostle Paul. Pastoral care, the watching over one
another for good, was the common duty of all the brethren. So. con-
scientiously unable to "preach for hire, or divine for money," and
concerned to avoid even the appearance of doing so, they brought
down upon themselves, chiefly by this one testimony against a "hire-
ling ministry," the most alarmed vituperation of the salaried clergy;
at whose instance the bulk of their persecutions thus most naturally
came.
     Regarding the ceremonials of the Old Testament law as types, fig-
ures and object lessons of the spiritual life of the religion of Christ

162 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.
who was to come; and that he, when he said on the cross, " It is fin-
ished," became" the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believeth "; and that every outward ordinance of the former dis-
pensation was obsolete because fulfilled in Christ himself, the living
. Substance, to whom all types and shadows that went before 
pointed;
-they believed it to be his will that the spirit and not the forms of
those ceremonials,-the heavenly things themselves and not the im-
ages of those things,-should be maintained and cherished by living
experience. The Jewish rite of water baptism and the passover sup-
per, as outward observances, ended like all the others, with the Old
Dispensation,-the baptism of John as a prophet under that dispensa-
tion belonging there, while he with his master distinctly declared that
Christ's own baptism, under the incoming dispensation of "One Lord,
one faith, one baptism," should be the baptism of the" Holy Spirit and
of fire." Also that no obligation for the continuance of the last pass-over
supper, as an outward form, is found in any more definite com-
mand than this,--in the fuller sentence as quoted by Paul:-" This do
ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me ";-a condescension
to a formed habit, with the command resting on the spiritual side,-the
remembrance of him. The Friends taught, that inward submis-
sion to Christ's spirit as the bread of life and the wine to be drank
"anew with his disciples in his kingdom," is the table of communion
at which he would "sup with us and we with Him."
     When the details of one's outward conduct or speech are referred
to his secret sense of the pure will of Christ in his heart. the consist-
ent attempt to carry out the light of truth into practice,  must separ-
ate the servant of Christ from many ways and modes of those whose
chief guidance is the prevailing fashion and practice of the times. So
looking at pure and simple truth as a guide, the Friends could. not ad-
dress to one individual the plural pronoun" you,"-especially when
they saw that the use of it had its root in vanity, to flatter a person as
amounting to more than one; but they kept to the original thou and
thee in addressing an individual. This gave offense to magistrates,
confirming the Friends in their conviction that it "pricked proud
flesh."  Regarding also the appellations Master (or Mr.), Mistress (or
Mrs.), Sir, Honorable, His Grace, Excellency, or Holiness, etc., as
springing from the root of pride in man, tending to feed the same. and
usually not founded in real truth. their spirit shrank from these and
all merely complimentary expressions and flattering titles. as incon-
sistent with the Spirit of Christ. Yet in the exercise of genuine
courtesy, William Penn testifies that George Fox was" civil beyond
all forms of breeding." They could find no spiritual warrant in mak-
ing obsequious distinctions between fellow-beings in what they termed
"hat-honor," and would retain their hats on their heads before king 

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 163

and peasant alike. It also seemed to them beneath a Christian to bor-
row his names for days and months from heathen worship, as, to call
the fourth day of the week Woden's day or Wednesday, or recogniz-
ing Juno's right to be worshipped in what is now the sixth month, or
Augustus to be adored in the eighth. The Puritans felt the same
scruple about calling the first day of the week Sunday. Accordingly
Friends have observed the numerical names of days and months, as
Third-day, Fifth month, etc. Christ's command to " Swear not at all,"
seems to them imperative against swearing at all, whether in courts
of justice or elsewhere, with any manner of oath. And their sense of
his spirit as the Prince of Peace and the exponent of divine love, for-
bids in their minds any participation in war or retaliation, or capital
punishment. Plainness of dress, as of address, must follow from their
principles; and while they prescribed no form of garb as a rule, yet,
by ceasing to follow the changing fashions, they found themselves ere
long left behind in a garb peculiar to themselves; which, on finding it
served as a hedge against the spirit and maxims of the world, and
served as a visible testimony of their principles before the public,
Friends have even yet to some extent retained, in proportion to their
strenuousness for the original principles.
     Such was the attempt of the" Friends of Truth," as they fre-
quently styled themselves, to get back out of the corruptions of the
church at large to first principles in Christ: or to represent what
William Penn, one of its noble converts, claimed to be "primitive
Christianity revived" ;--not a revelation of a new gospel, but" a new
revelation of the old gospel." Theirs was certainly not a superficial
doctrine, and as it insisted on a corresponding practice, it could not
be expected to be popular; or to escape that general misunderstand-
ing which exposed its adherents to persecutions. And as little general
openness for the understanding of it is found now, in the present day
of sensations, when entertainment is as much mistaken for worship, as
stated observances were formerly.
     Barnstable county appears foremost in early Massachusetts history
as a representative,-imperfectly so, it is true, but most creditably for
the times,-of the spirit of religious toleration. In what other county
could such a church thus early and numerously have gained so firm
a foothold? And what was the state of the community so preparatory
for the Friends' doctrine, that, within a year from the signal being
sounded by Holder and Copeland, a larger number of families in
"Sandwich gathered to the revived standard, than can be found pro-
fessing with Friends there now?
     The" ten men of Saugus" who began the settlement at Sandwich
in 1637, do not appear to have been imbued, as were their Puritan
neighbors whom they left behind, or the Puritanized successors of the

164 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY

Pilgrims whom they passed by at Plymouth, with determined zeal for a
theocracy,-or establishing on the Cape a church-state. Had they felt
most thoroughly at home in the intolerant sectarian atmosphere of
the Salem community, why did they separate themselves unto a dis-
tinct locality? Religious, indeed, they evidently were,-but less tied
down to' dogma, and of a freer spirit; adventurous enough to seek
new homes again; and a little more liberal than the stayers behind
to take new scenes, new comers and new doctrines on their merits.
     Dissensions were fermenting in the Sandwich church for several
years before the Friends appeared. Fines and penalties were imposed
on many who neglected or set at nought the stated worship. Some
professed to" know no visible worship," A growing movement in
favor of religious liberty and toleration, though strongly opposed by
the government, could not be set back. And for three years before
the arrival of Holder and Copeland, the stated pastorate of the church
in Sandwich had been discontinued. The pastor, William Leverich,
himself also said to be tinctured with toleration, found it expedient,
in consequence of the existing unsettlement. to leave the flock at
Sandwich in 1654 for Long Island. Yarmouth also was without a
pastor. And in 1659 we find the court still censuring the neglect of
some in Yarmouth to support the ministry. The people in both towns
are said to have become" indifferent to the ministry and to exercise
their own gifts." The doctrine of Friends had but to step in upon
this prepared ground and say that vocal ministry, and regulation
preaching at that, was not essential for worship in spirit and in truth;
and all ministry spurious except that proceeding from the immediate
anointing of the Head of the church, whose messages could be de-
clared, as by the fishermen-disciples of old, without the learning of
the schools except the school of Christ ;-the Friends had but to sound
this word, to discover they had told their eager hearers nothing, but
had only clearly formulated what they had already vaguely believed.
So the thoughts of many hearts being revealed, neighbor was dis-
closed to neighbor in mutual recognition, resulting in open fellowship
in a new church profession.
     The more distinguishing principle of the society having once
found entrance in Sandwich on the question of worship and ministry,
it legitimately followed through all their other lines of faith and prac-
tice.  Just as in this latter day from the same society the same prin-
ciples and consequently testimonies begin to go out at the same door,
-namely, the practice of worship and ministry,-at which they came
in. It is also but natural that the easy acquiescence in traditional
principles or in no principles, which is the weakness of merely birth-right
membership, should be but as a rope of sand to bind members
to the original profession; in comparison with that strong, individual

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 165

convincement of truth by which new members, experiencing the
original cost, join the faith. In addition to this, and to prevailing
worldliness, the emigration of younger members from the meetings
of Sandwich, Yarmouth, and Falmouth, to seek livings in cities or in
the West, has largely contributed to the present reduced numbers of
the society in these parts.
     But emigration is not a sufficient explanation, else the neighboring
churches should be found similarly diminished. "Thou hast left thy
first love," is the verdict which explains the thinning out of Friends'
ranks, even in cities of Massachusetts to which country-Friends' chil-
dren go. The movement of late years in Friends' meetings to borrow
modes and principles of other denominations ill a hope of holding the
interest of the younger members, has served to direct the young peo-
ple to the churches and systems from which these alleged improve-
ments came. So that Friends' meetings thus popularized in our cities
not chargeable with emigration, have not been found holding their
own.
     It cannot be denied that even on the Cape there was plenty of per-
secution to give impetus to the progress of the revival. It raised up
sympathy for the victims, zeal in the members, and inquiry concern-
ing their principles among many. Details of the convictions, fines,
and penalties imposed for countenancing Quakers, attending their
meetings, or advocating their doctrines,. belong to our more local
treatment of town histories. But the Sandwich authorities were not
altogether willing executors of the harsh orders of the Plymouth gov-
ernment; and the neighborhood which had the best opportunity of
understanding the Quakers, became the least inclined to harm them.
So we read of Holder and Copeland, who frequently visited the flock
here, that the Sandwich constable refusing to whip them, a Barnstable
magistrate gave them each thirty-three lashes, "with a new torment-
ing whip, with three cords and knots at the ends."
     Though we seem to give to the Plymouth government the credit
of much of the distress encountered by the Friends at the hands of
Sandwich officers; yet let us make haste to clear the Pilgrim fathers
from the charge of a persecuting spirit. A distinction must be
made between the Pilgrims, who sailed in the Mayflower in 1620 and
carne to Plymouth, and the Puritans who sailed in 1629 and founded
Boston. The Puritans were imbued with the principle of a state
church; the Pilgrims were Separatists, and they knew in England
what it was to be persecuted by Puritans. The Puritans of Massa-
chusetts bay had remained in the church of England as long as pos-
sible, and they continued here to believe in a union of church and
state. In coming here to live by themselves, they did not mean to
have such union weakened. "The order of the churches and the

166 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

commonwealth," wrote Cotton, "is now so settled in New England
that it brings to mind the new heaven and new' earth wherein dwells
righteousness."
     The Pilgrims came to these shores not primarily, like the Puri-
tans, to secure a state of their own as a church of their own, but to
enjoy religious liberty.  Nevertheless they too, as Bancroft says, "de-
sired no increase but from the friends of their communion, Yet their
residence in Holland had made them acquainted with various forms
of Christianity; a wide experience had emancipated them from big-
otry, and they were never betrayed into the excesses of religious per-
secution," Thus the Pilgrims at Plymouth before they were super-
seded by the Puritans from Massachusetts bay, were prepared to be
of the more charitable spirit which afterward appeared in those Sep-
aratists from the Lynn colony who sought new homes in Sandwich,
But when Friends first appeared and were maltreated in Boston in
1656, and other Friends found a foothold in Sandwich in 1657, almost
the last of the Pilgrim fathers was dead, "Plymouth had ceased to
be an independent colony, and was part of the New England confed-
eration*."  There was enough of the apparent Pilgrim spirit left in
Plymouth to make her milder towards dissenters than the Puritan
church-state at Boston could bear for her to be; and there were enough
of the descendants of the Pilgrims about Boston to get roughly
handled by the Puritans" for assisting the Quakers and boldly oppos-
ing persecution," But the great battle for religious liberty in :Massa-
chusetts, of which Friends took the brunt, was fought by the Separa-
tists of the southward shores, against the Puritans at the north, The
blood of the four Friends executed on Boston common, sealed the vic-
tory for religious liberty in America,
     How far the" Right arm of Massachusetts," as Cape Cod has been
styled, has reaped in its own character a worthy reward for magna-
nimity in shouldering the cause of religious liberty in her infancy,
cannot be fully measured till the secret workings of all principles are
revealed, That the so-called Quaker virtues and the characteristic
Cape virtues so largely coincide, we cannot presume to say is chiefly
traceable to the influence passing into the county through the Friends
themselves.  No real Friend would so claim.  "Names are nothing,"
said George Fox, "Christ is all." The same well-spring of life to
which he pointed men only to "leave them there," has watered the
land through many a human channel of spiritual influence, under
whatever name, But a standard for pure truth, when exalted. is just as
effective a signal, whether held in few hands or in many, It is in2vitable

*" And now the Plymouth saddle is on the Bay horse," says Ex-Judge Cudworth
in 1658, alluding to the way in which the authorities at Plymouth were imitating the
methods of Massachusetts bay towards the Friends.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 167

that the principles held forth by Friends should have increased a dis-
position to look at the true inwardness of all questions and subjects;
to strip off all shams and be satisfied with simple truth only; to de-
spise show and look for genuine substance, and to render" Quaker
measure" to others; to value straightforward common sense rather
than brilliancy, conscience before convenience, honesty above policy,
character above creed. the spirit above the letter, motives above move-
ments, the life above the living:-to respect the divine spark in every
human being, regardless of color or sex; and the equality of all. as be-
fore the law of God, so before the law of the land. Simplicity of man-
ners, genuineness of profession, the courage of one's convictions, plain
living because of "high thinking," inward retirement of mind to feel
the truth of one's self, a yes that is yes and a no that is no-and so
surer than most oaths,-these are virtues of which the professed
"Friends of Truth" by no means held the monopoly, and in which
individuals among them as in every other flock have signally failed;
yet the banner which they as a people have displayed because of the
truth, is one which the life and character of our county could ill afford
to spare.
     The preceding view of the establishment of the Society of Friends
in the county has been necessarily, to that extent, a history of the
Sandwich Society. Afterward a branch of Sandwich monthly meet-
ing became established in West Falmouth, and called Falmouth
Preparative Meeting of Friends; and another branch at South Yar-
mouth, called Yarmouth Preparative. Meeting. Each preparative
meeting, including one held also in Sandwich. sends representatives
to each session of the monthly meeting; which is held six times a
year in Sandwich, four times at Falmouth, and twice at Yarmouth.
Formerly, for a period, some sessions of Sandwich monthly meeting
were held also at Rochester, on the other side of the bay. A sketch
of the history of each of the Cape meetings of Friends will now be
given, beginning with Sandwich.*
     THE SOCIETY IN SANDWICH.-It has already been pointed out how
the Sandwich community was prepared for, and how responsively, in
the year 1657, many rallied to the preaching of the Word by the newly
arrived Friends Christopher Holder and John Copeland; so that in the
very next year, 1658, no less than eighteen families in Sandwich appear
as acknowledged adherents of the new Society.
     They met for worship at the houses of William Allen, William
Newland, Ralph Allen, and, as tradition hands it down, in Christo-

*The writer having had but few hours' opportunity to consult the original records,
has availed himself of a considerable part of the notes and extracts from them made by
the late Newell Hoxie, representing careful labor on his part continued from time to
time for years, He has also gleaned freely from Freeman's History of Cape Cod, and
other works.

168 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

pher's Hollow,-a spot believed to have been so named from the
preaching of Christopher Holder in at least one meeting which assem-
bled in that woodland retreat. This hollow or glen may now be ap-
proached by the road which passes the alms-house into the woods.
Not having visited the spot himself, the writer here presents the
description of a visitor, as given in the Falmouth Local, 12th mo.,
1887:
"About a mile southeasterly of the village of Sandwich is a deep
sequestered glen or hollow in the wood. There is no spot in the
county of Barnstable more secluded or lonely. It is even now as
primeval in appearance as it was on the day the Pilgrims first set foot
on Plymouth rock. This quiet glen is surrounded by a ridge of hills,
covered in part by trees, and it is some 125 feet deep. At the bottom
are to be seen a few straggling red-cedar trees. In the spring and
summer a small stream of water runs into this glen, which keeps up
a perpetual murmur. For over two centuries this lonely spot has been
called  'Christopher's Hollow,' in memory of Christopher Holder. . . .
In 1657, immediately after the severe penal acts of the provincial leg-
Islature were passed, this small and sincere band of Christian worship-
pers met at 'William Allen's house on Spring Hill, but [afterward] ad-
journed to this sequestered glen to offer up in the 'darkling woods'
their devout supplications to Him who is no respecter of persons.
Your correspondent visited this hollow a few days ago, and noticed,
particularly on its westerly side, a row of flat stones,* which are be-
lieved to be the seats on which this meagre congregation sat, and list-
ened to the heartfelt teachings of Christopher Holder."
     William Allen's house, the first or one of the first meeting places
of Friends, stood on the spot where Roland Fish's house now stands,
the first house by the road leading southward from the present
Friends' meeting house in Spring Hill. Near the southwest corner
of the house is the first burying ground of the Society, now enclosed
by an iron railing. On the early records we find a direction "that
servants shall be buried on the side next the swamp." This is the
half-acre given by the town in 1694. William Newland's house, an-
other of the first meeting places, "was opposite the old town burying
ground, on the road from the village toward Stephen R. Wing's. [Of
other Friends prominent in that day, William Gifford is said to have
lived near the house of late years known as Russell Fish's; Edward
Perry near Joseph Ewer's swamp, or opposite his house; and Edward
Dillingham, (one of the original "ten men of Saugus" to whom Sand-
wich lands were granted), to have lived on the hillside east of the up-per
pond, which is southeast from Stephen R. Wing's. The cellar is

* These stones are really half-buried boulders: quite a number haw' been carried
away.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 169

said to be still there, and a pear tree set out by Edward Dillingham.
The late Newell Hoxie, being able to designate the situation of sev-
enteen of the Friends' houses of 1658, once remarked to the writer,
that when by failing health he was laid aside from attending his
meetings for public worship, he would often carry himself in fancy
more than two hundred years back, and trace in his mind's view the
goings of each of those seventeen families from their respective
homes, as they took their several paths to William Allen's house, to
meet for divine worship after the manner of Friends.]
     In 1657 (to quote from Freeman) complaint was make to the gen-
eral court against divers persons in Sandwich" for meeting on Lord's
days at the house of William Allen and inveighing against ministers
and magistrates, to the dishonor of God and the contempt of govern-
ment."  Jane, the wife of William Saunders, and Sarah, the daughter
of William Kerby, complained of "for disturbance of public worship
and for abusing the minister," were, on being summoned to court,
sentenced to be publicly whipped. William Allen, William Kerby,
and the wife of John Newland were also involved in these difficulties.
John Newland was warned by the court to suffer no Friends' meeting
to be kept in any house in which he had an interest. It was also
ordered that "Nicholas Upsall, the instigator" of all this mischief,
"be carried out of the government by Tristum Hull, who brought
him." William Newland, a prominent citizen, was, "for encouraging
Thomas Burges" to let Christopher Holder, a Quaker, occupy his
house, sentenced to find sureties for his own good behavior. Ralph
Allen, "for entertaining such men and for unworthy speeches," was
also arrested and laid under bonds. Henry Saunders was arrested and
committed. Edward Dillingham and Ralph Jones were also arrested;
Jones was fined and Dillingham was admonished. Burges expressed
his sorrow for what he had done, and was released. This year, on ac-
count of increasing sympathy with the Quakers throughout the com-
munity, a marshal was provided by the general court in Plymouth to
do service in Sandwich, Barnstable, and Yarmouth.
     In 1658 Robert Harper, Ralph Allen, sr., John Allen, Thomas
Greenfield, Edward Perry, Richard Kerby, jr., William Allen, Thomas
Ewer, William Gifford, George Allen, Matthew Allen, Daniel Wing,
John Jenkins, and George Webb, "none of them," says Freeman,
"professed Quakers' at the time, though several of them afterward
became such," being summoned to court to give a reason for not tak-
ing the oath of fidelity to the government, professed that they held it
unlawful to take the oath, and all were fined. Friends' view of the
unlawfulness of all swearing, or oaths, is founded on Christ's com-
mand, "Swear not at all:" which is amplified in the epistle of James,
"But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven,

170 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

neither by the earth, neither by any other oath; but let your yea be
yea, and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation." Their
firm adherence to this command was much misunderstood by officers
of the government, and even by the clergy; and was the pretext for
a long list of fines and dreary penalties. Some of these Friends, allud-
ing to their sufferings for not swearing, remarked, that oath-taking
was "contrary to the law of Christ," "whose law," they add, "is so
strongly written in our hearts, and the keeping of it so delightsome
to us; and the gloriousness of its life daily appearing, makes us to
endure the cross patiently, and suffer the spoiling of our goods with 
joy."*
     The earliest meetings of Friends in Sandwich, even in 1607, in-
cluded six of the brothers and sisters of Ralph Allen. They had re-
sided upwards of twenty years in Sandwich and were much respected
by their neighbors. But their joining the new sect was "peculiarly
annoying" to the government, and they were among the first to be
tested by the oath of fidelity. William Newland and Ralph Allen, on
refusing to relinquish the keeping of meetings in their houses, "were
committed to the custody of the marshal, and kept close prisoners for
five months. When half the period had expired, they were offered
their liberty on condition of engaging not to receive or listen to a
Quaker; but the request was met by an immediate and decided nega-
tive." † 
     Under the law now prohibiting the frequenting of Friends' meet-
ings, William Allen was fined forty shillings for permitting a meeting
at his house. Cudworth says of another session of the court, that" the
court was pleased to determine fines on Sandwich men for meetings,
sometimes on First-days of the week, sometimes on other days, as they
say: They meet ordinarily twice in a week, besides the Lord's day,--
150 pounds, whereof William Newland is 24 pounds for himself and his
wife at Ten Shi11ings a Meeting, William Allen 46 pounds," etc.
William Allen's other fines and distraints amount apparently to 113
pounds. " They left him but one cow," says Bishop, "which they
pretend is out of Pity; but what their pity is, more than a Robbers on
the Highway, that takes away all a man hath, and then gives him a
penny, I leave to be judg'd. Also they took from William Allen one
Brass Kettle,-which the Governor put upon him for his Hat." He
also went to Boston prison. When the marshal took the goodwife's
kettle he said with a sneer,  "Now, Priscilla, how wilt thou cook for
thy family and friends? Thee has no kettle." Her answer was,
"George, that God who hears the ravens when they cry will provide
for them. I trust in that God, and I verily believe the time will come
* Norton's Ensign, P' 42.
†Bowden, vol. I, p. 147.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 171

when thy necessity will be greater than mine." This marshal, George
Barlow, would boast, "That he would think what Goods were most
serviceable to the Quakers, and then he would take them away, when
he went to distrain for the fines.'" "But now," says Bishop after-ward,
"being grown exceedingly poor, he presumes to say, 'He
thought the Quakers would not let him want.' And truly, it is said,
they relieve his Children, notwithstanding all the Villany that he hath
shown unto those people." (New England Judg'd, p. 389). This
drunken marshal and tool of Plymouth's blind policy is said to have
lived to fulfil abundantly Priscilla Allen's prophecy.
The following scale of penalties which the Plymouth government
required Sandwich magistrates to exact, is given by N. H. Chamber.
lain in his interesting article on Sandwich and Yarmouth in the New
England Magazine, 11th mo., 1889:-" Entertaining a Quaker, even for
a quarter of an hour, cost £5, or the year's pay of a laboring man. If
anyone saw a Quaker and did not go six miles, if necessary, and in-
form a constable, he was to be punished at discretion of the court; for
allowing preaching in one's house, 40 s., the preacher 40 s., and each
auditor 40 s., though no Quaker spoke a word, The Quakers were
fined for every Sunday they did not go to the Pilgrim meeting, and
for every Sunday they went to their own. In three years there were
taken from them cattle, horses, and sheep to the value of £700, besides
other punishments."
     Other names and cases, equally as interesting as William Allen's,
cannot here be detailed with the same fulness; but similar recitals,
with more or less suffering, may be understood with each name on the
following list of distraints made about this period from Friends in
and near Sandwich:-- The list is preserved by Besse, as follows:-

              	£ sh.
Robert Harper 	44 0
John Jenkins 	19 10
Daniel Wing 	12 0
Joseph Allen 	5 12
Henry Howland 	1 10
Peter Gaunt 	43 14 ½
Edward Perry 	89 18
Ralph Allen, sen 	68 0
Michael Turner 	13 10
George Allen 	25 15
Thomas Greenfield 4 0
John Newland 	2 6
William Gifford 	57 19
Richard Kirby 	57 12
Matthew Allen 	48 16
William Newland 	36 0
William Allen 	86 17
Ralph Allen, jr 	18 0
Thomas Ewer 	25 8
Total   		£660 7 ½ sh.

     On the other hand we cannot say that unwise provocations were
not sometimes given by individuals reckoned as Quakers. Some ex-
pressions made to magistrates and others, whether the speakers had
been goaded into them or not, we would not now approve as proceed.
ing from the principles or spirit which they themselves professed.
And some extravagances of conduct, in exceptional instances, would
in this and should for that day, be attributed to derangement of mind,
from which members of no denomination are found exempt.
     The noted letter of James Cudworth, a Puritan and a judge (who

172 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

lost his place by entertaining some Friends at his house), written in
1658, says of the Friends" They have many :Meetings, and many'
Adherents; almost the whole Town of Sand which is adhering towards
them. . Sandwich men may not go to the Bay [or Boston col-
ony] lest they be taken up for Quakers. William Newland was
there about his Occasions some Ten Days since. and they put him
in Prison 24 hours, and sent for divers to witness against him; but
they had not Proof enough to make him a Quaker, which if they had
he should have been Whipped."
     In 1659 an order was given by the general court to arrest Quakers
repairing to Sandwich" from other places by sea. coming in at Man-
nomett,"- now Monument. Also George Barlow, marshal. was or-,
dered to take with him a man or two and make search in the houses
of William Newland and Ralph Allen of Sandwich and Nicholas Davis
of Barnstable for Friends' books or writings.
     In 1661 William Newland" for entertaining a strange Quaker
called Wenlocke Christopherson" was fined five pounds, and said
Christopherson was sent to prison and afterward sentenced "to lay
neck and heels." He was then whipped and sent away.*  Afterward
in Boston he was sentenced to death. but was released.  William
Allen was again summoned to the court at Plymouth and charged with
-entertaining Christopher Holder, a Quaker: and Wm. Newland and
Peter Gaunt were similarly charged; and Lodowick Hoxy was fined
20 shillings for not assisting marshal Barlow. The following were
fined ten shillings each 'for being at Quaker meetings': Robert Har-
per and wife, John Newland and wife. Jane Swift. Matthew, William,
Joseph, and Benjamin Allen, William Gifford, William Newland and
wife, the wife of Henry Dillingham, Peter Gaunt. John Jenkins,
Richard Kerby, sr., Richard Kerby. jr., Obadiah and Dority Butler."
     This year, 1661, marks the deliverance of Friends in the colonies
from further danger to their lives by hanging in consequence of their
profession. William Robinson, Marmaduke Stevenson, Mary Dyer
and William Leddra having thus been executed in Boston, Charles II.
was induced to send a mandamus to New England, commanding Gov-
ernor Endicott to send to England all Quakers who were under con-
damnation or imprisonment. . This put a stop to executions, but not
to persecutions. The Act of Toleration under William and Mary was
not passed till 1689.
     In 1674 "Priest John Smith" and others are said to have caused
Friends to be recorded as non-townsmen,-probably because they
could not take the oath of fidelity. It was because it was an oath, and
not because it meant fidelity. that Friends felt forbidden to swear it.
As faithful observers of the law of the land. where that does not con-

*Freeman I, p. 241.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 173

travene the divine law, they have proved themselves exemplary citi-
zens.  In 1675 they were invited by the treasurer of the town to sub-
stitute  something for an oath. The firmness of this Society in refusing
to take oaths in any form, has since been respected by legislative bod-
ies both in America and in England, which have authorized a form
of affirmation to be taken by Friends and others instead of an oath.
By substituting passive for active resistance to oppressive laws, they
have on other subjects also converted oppression into concession: as
in the requirement to bear arms or otherwise to deny their testimony
for the Prince of Peace, also in the matter of taxes for the support of
a paid ministry. In 1686 Edward Randolph, who had some sixteen
times been sent over from England in consequence of complaints
made by Friends and others, wrote as follows to Governor Hinckley:
"Perhaps it will be as reasonable to move that your colony be rated
to pay our minister of the church of England who now preaches in
Boston and you hear him not, as to make the Quakers pay in your
colony." Thus the stand made by Friends on the Cape was steadily
opening the way for liberty to all. In the words of Brooks Adams on
the" Emancipation of :Massachusetts," referring to the Friends by
whose suffering he says "the battle in New England has been won":
--"At the end of 21 years the policy of cruelty had become thorough-
ly discredited, and a general toleration could no longer be postponed;
but the great liberal triumph was won only by heroic courage and
by the endurance of excruciating torments."
     We may leave our fragmentary specimens of the period of intoler-
ance, with the acknowledgment that their townsmen in general ap-
pear to have taken no pleasure in the hardships inflicted on Friends.
They elected Friends to responsible offices even while the sect seemed
outlawed by the Plymouth court; whose marshal, Barlow, had none of
their sympathy in his unsavory doings. Freeman characterizes the
Friends as regarded at heart by their Sandwich neighbors, as "ever
among our best and most esteemed citizens, benevolent and kind, pure
in morals, and most deservedly honored."
     Sandwich has the distinction of being the first town on the conti-
nent of America to establish a regular monthly meeting of the Society
of Friends. That meeting, set up in the year 1658, has continued its
monthly sittings in unbroken succession, so far as we know, ever since.
They are still (though changes of the time have been tried for brief
periods) held at the same hour of the same day of the week on which
they were appointed to be held by the first minute of the first existing
record book of the meeting. The said minute is 'as follows: "At a
mans meeting kept at 'William Allens house ye 25 day of ye 4th mo'th
in ye year 1672. At w'h meetting it is concluded and ordered y't for
ye future a mans meetting be kept ye first six day of ye week in every

174 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

mo. and for friends to come together about ye eleventh hour." A
marginal note written beside this minute says: "This was ye first
mans meeting that was kept by ffriends in sandwich that is re-
corded."
     Accordingly we may understand that no records of the monthly
meetings between the years 1658 and 1672 were kept; or if the min-
utes were made, they were not kept in book form. It was in the 7th
month of this year that" It was ordered y't Will'm Newland buy a
book for friends use and truths service." Edward Perry appears to be
the clerk, and his hand-writing in these minutes very creditable.
It may be that Edward Perry was earliest in the annals of Sand-
wich authorship. His published religious writings bear date between
the years 1676 and 1690, and titles like the following :-" A Warning
to New England"; "To the Court of Plimouth, this is the Word of
the Lord"; "A Testimony concerning the Light"; "Concerning True
Repentance," etc. He died in 1694. We are not aware that more
than one copy of any of his writings remain in print.
     The second entry for 4th mo. contains an appointment of John
Stubs and Robert Harper to know and report the reasons why Peter
Gaunt "absents from friends' meettings." His answer reported next
month was: "That he doth not know any true publick vissible wor-
ship in ye world." This was the same answer which he had given
sixteen years before to the Plymouth court, before any of the Quaker
name had arrived in Sandwich. For we read that Peter Gaunt being
called upon by the court to answer for not frequenting the public
worship of God, affirmed that he "knew no public visible worship";
and Ralph Allen, whose seven children were among the first to join
Friends, took similar ground. The answer of another who had been
likewise waited upon by a committee the same month, " forasmuch as
be was once convinced of the truth," was "That his ground and
reason was knowne unto himselfe and he was not willing yt it should
goe any further at present." Next month his answer was "much as it
was before: or as a man Gon from truth," And we find this same de-
linquent patiently dealt with even for two years; for his answer in
1674 was, " That he could not come amongst us till the power did make
him or work it in him."  In 1673 the answer of William Allen's brother
was, "That he was not so convinced as they might think he was." But
in process of time some of these and similar cases were restored to
attendance of meetings. Even Peter Gaunt was fined more than once
for attending them.
     The following curious minute has been handed down as issued by
Sandwich monthly meeting in one of its occasional sittings at Fal-
mouth: "20th of the 9th mo., 1688. It is concluded that the Friends
.appointed in every particular meeting shall give notice publicly in the
 
[photo of Friends Meeting –house and Newell Hoxie residence]

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 175

meeting that cross-pockets before men's coats, side-slopes, broad hems
on cravats, and over-full skirted coats are not allowed by Friends."
     In 1688 a clergyman by the name of Pierpont, of Roxbury, who on
invitation preached at times in Sandwich, records in his diary :-" I
had inclined to go to Sandwich, first, because I saw there was an op-
portunity to do service for Christ in that place; second, the generality
of the people, except Quakers, were desirous of my coming amongst
them; third, the young men of the place were in danger of being
drawn away by the Quakers, if a minister were not speedily settled
among them,"-During the preceding pastorate mention is found of
one man, ,. a member of the church, proselyted to the Quakers by one
John Stubbs," In 1696 the town assigned a salary of £80 to Roland
Cotton as pastor of the church, "provided he shall remit yearly the
proportion of all those neighbors generally called Quakers," And yet,
by a monthly meeting's minute of 3d mo" 1712, it is recorded that John
Wing and Daniel Allen" gave account that they had found out the
proportion between Priest Rate and Town and County, and the Priest
part, which Friends cannot pay, is near one half, lacking one half of
one third of the whole,"
     Of a history of the Friends' meeting houses in Sandwich, we have
materials for a concise account. In the 7th month, 1672, the monthly
meeting is recorded as "held at our meeting house." In 1674,4th mo.,
the meeting house is spoken of as enlarged; and five years after, a
record is made of finishing the meeting house, In 1694, according to
the town's record," The town did give to those of their neighbors called
Quakers half an acre of ground for a burial place* on the hill above
the Canoe swamp between the ways," In 1703-4, First mo" a quarterly
meeting's committee was instructed to pitch upon a place to set the
new meeting house; and in the 3d mo, it was concluded to get a new
meeting house, In 1704, 1st mo" Robert Harper was appointed to
build a new meeting house for £111, "except the glass, plastering,
and ground-pinning," One was to get the shells for lime, another
wood, another stone, and "Lodowick Hoxie to Diet the carpenters for
his share," In 1709 it was proposed to build" a small meeting house" ;
and the next year £6, 12ts, were subscribed to build a stable. In 1723,
£28, 5s, were subscribed" to enlarge the small meeting house, under-pin
the large meeting house, and build a shed," The work was done
by Joseph Show, In 1740 it was concluded to hold a preparative
meeting in Sandwich; and in 1745 the preparative meeting purchase
"the remainder of the gore of land, about one and one-fourth acres,
near the meeting house for a cemetery which is near the old one," In
1757 it is ordered to "add 16 feet front, width and height the same,
to the great meeting-house," Apparently after this date women

*Now enclosed by an iron railing, near the southwest corner of Roland Fish's house.

176 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

Friends begin to hold a preparative meeting like the men Friends.
In 1793, 11th mo., measures were taken to build a porch to the meet-ing
house.
     The third meeting house, 48 by 36 feet in size. now in use, was
built in 1810 on the site of the first, costing two thousand dollars.
Sandwich Friends at first gave $723 toward it, Falmouth $24, Yar-
mouth $120. The old meeting house was sold for one hundred dol-
lars.  In 1822 the remaining amount of the cost, principal and inter-
est, was paid over to the quarterly meeting's treasurer.
     In 1715 Benjamin Holme, an English minister traveling in religious
service, records in his journal that he "went to the yearly meeting
at Sandwich, where one Samuel Osbourne, a schoolmaster. made some
opposition." This resulted in a pretty extensive setting forth of
Friends' views on the Scriptures and on perseverance in grace.
     In 1770 a voluntary payment was made by the Friends' meeting to
relieve" the charge the town had been at on account of a poor woman
belonging to said Meeting." It has been the rule with the Society to
maintain their own destitute members without recourse to the town's
provision for the poor. Also when ministers, with the approval of
their proper meeting, are traveling in religious service, to provide for
their expenses from place to place, if their circumstances require it.
As far back as 1677 we find by a monthly meeting's minute that horses
were to be provided for "Travelling Friends" at the meeting's ex-
pense.
     In the conducting of these monthly meetings which appear so promi-
nently in the regulation of church affairs among Friends, the only
officer known is the one who sits as clerk of the meeting. ender the
profession that "Christ is head over all things to his church," and ac-
cordingly the mind of Christ is devoutly to be referred to and waited
for in deciding church affairs, Friends have presumed to name no
other presidency than his over their monthly or other meetings for
discipline: but they simply appoint a clerk to record the sense of the
meeting when that is ascertained. This" sense of the meeting," it is
trusted, is the product of the judgment of truth, or .witness of Christ's
spirit, which individual members, when apprehending they have a
sense thereof on any question, announce as his or her view of the
case. And the clerk, without taking a vote or any reference to ma-
jorities, is to gather and record what appears the prevailing judgment
of truth as expressed by the members. The Head of the church is
majority enough, though he find expression through but one voice.
This conduct of Christian church government throws great spiritual
responsibility on them that sit in judgment, to whom Christ is prom-
ised to be "a spirit of judgment"; and will largely be admitted to be
consistent with the true theory for a pure church. But for a church,

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 177

though not pure yet prevailingly sincere, this principle has been found,
while helping to make it more pure, to work at least as harmoniously,
peaceably and satisfactorily as the more human modes of moderator-
ship elsewhere resorted to in deliberative bodies.
     The clerks of Sandwich monthly meeting who appear to have
resided in Sandwich. have been. so far as can be gathered from the
records: Edward Perry. serving 1672-94; another not named, 1694-
1709; Edward Perry, jr., 1709-12: then three unnamed clerks, serving
respectively 1712-19, 1719-20, 1720-22; Humphrey Wady, 1722-42;
Daniel Wing, 1743-45: Seth Hiller. --; Samuel Wing and Daniel
Wing, 1755; Timothy Davis, 1755-65; Nicholas Davis, 1765; Ebenezer
Allen, to 2d mo., 1786; Jeremiah Austin, 1787-90; Obadiah Davis,
1790-95; Stephen Wing, 1795-6; John Wing, 1801-10. The other
clerks* were, at the time of their service, residents of Falmouth, ex-
cept Richard Delino (1765 and 1786-7) of Rochester, and David K.
Akin of Yarmouth, (1849-61).
     Doubtless there were not a few ministers in the Sandwich meeting
from the first. But the list of those recorded does not begin till the
year 1789, when we find Anna Allen and Samuel Bowman acknowl-
edged: Benjamin Percival, 1808; Anna D. Wing, 1838; David Dudley,
who moved hither from Maine in 1838; Newell Hoxie, 1846; Mercy
K. Wing. 18;)1 : Presbury Wing, 1852; Elizabeth C. Wing, 1862; Han-
nah S. Wing. 1883.
     "The principle was from the first recognized by George Fox and
his brethren, that the true call and qualification of ministers can be
received only from the great Head of the church Himself, and that
the church has only to judge of the reality of the call, and to watch
over, encourage, and advise those who are entrusted with such gift.
Even the recognition of ministers. as such, in the Society was of an in-
direct and informal character for many years after its establishment.
Those who spoke frequently and acceptably were asked to occupy a
raised seat. facing the body; but then, as now, this was adopted as a
matter of convenience, not of ecclesiastical distinction or superiority.
Before long it was found needful to give certificates of membership
to those who removed from one meeting to another; and about the
same time a necessity was felt for giving similar credentials to those
who left their homes to travel in the service of the gospel. But more
than one hundred years had elapsed before formal recognition was
adopted. But from mention in various journals we find the number
was large."
     We found in 1658, almost in the first year of this religious Society

* The Sandwich women who have been monthly meeting clerks in recent times,
were: Mary R. Wing, 1850-51 ; Elizabeth C. Wing. 1851-2 and 1856-69; Rebecca D.
Ewer, 1876-83 and 1885-87; Lucy S. Hoxie, 1863-85 and 1887 to present time.
12.

178 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

in Sandwich, eighteen families professing to be its adherents. In
1769 a committee of the town report that there are sixty families of
Friends or QL1:1.kerswhose rates are not available for the support of
the ministry. Now, in 1890, most of the younger natives of the Sand-
wich membership are dispersed throughout the country to gain a
livelihood, or have joined other associations: leaving fragments of
about eleven families remaining, the present membership numbering
40 individuals. But the purity of a principle cannot fairly be tested
by the number of its human adherents. The world will love its own:
and a Society supposed to represent spirituality or self-denial, cannot
easily be popular. Nor on the other hand, in the guise of an imitator,
could it be respected. By divine grace to be staunch to its special
message, the Society was what it \vas. The same grace, uncompro-
misingly adhered to, alone is able to keep it from falling, and give
vigor yet to shake itself from the dust of the earth.
     NEWELL HOXIE, the youngest child of Joseph and Deborah (Wing)
Hoxie, was born in East Sandwich in 1803. In 1842 he married Re-
becca Chipman, of Sandwich. Both will be remembered by many as
successful teachers of schools in Dennis, Barnstable, and Sandwich.
Both were marked by mental endowments. literary interest, and deep
thoughtfulness of no common order. With the exception of eighteen
years passed in West Falmouth, he was a resident of Sandwich all his
life. The impress which his life has made upon the character of the
western portion of the county in these two neighborhoods of his resi-
dence, has been chiefly as a leading member of the Society of Friends.
In intimate knowledge of its history he stood confessedly foremost,
and in the maintenance of its original principles he was devoutly
concerned. Perhaps no member of that Society in Sandwich monthly
meeting (which includes Falmouth and Yarmouth) has for a longer
period been prominent in its counsels, or more uniformly deferred to
in the conservative shaping of its course. His influence was also
largely respected in the counsels of New Englard Yearly Meeting at
large. A minister in that Society for thirty-eight years, he often
visited during this time the Friends' meetings of New England, and
twice those of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. He died in 1884,
aged 80 years. With him has departed an invaluable fund of infor-
mation, which cannot now be replaced, relating not only to the history
of his religious Society, but to that of his native county and its
families.
     THE SOCIETY IN YARMOUTH.-The community of Friends at Bass
River has so long given character to the neat and peaceful village of
South Yarmouth, that it is still familiarly known as "Quaker village."
But it was over the river, in South Dennis, where their first meeting
house stood.

 
[Portrait of Newell Hoxie?]


THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 179

So free from molestation were the first Friends' families in this
neighborhood. that no ripple in the current of history appears to have
been produced by their presence here, sufficient to leave a trace of the
time of their first settlement. John Wing, from Sandwich, in 1659,
was building a house in the Yarmouth jurisdiction; a John Dillingham,
from Sandwich, early became a landholder in Dennis and Brewster,
residing near Bound Brook. It was in his house and Henry Jones'
that the first Friends' meetings of which we have record were held,
as appears by the following minute,-which seems to relate to bi-
monthly meetings for discipline or society business, rather than their
probably much more frequent meetings for divine worship. If their
Sandwich neighbors early began holding at least three meetings a
week,-two on week-days besides First-day,-the kind of convince-
ment which produced Friends in that day must in Yarmouth also have
brought them together for worship as often as once a week:-
     "At our Mens Meeting at William Allens first day of the 2 mo. 1681.
-At this meeting it was ordered concerning the setting of the meet-
ings  at Yarmouth. Whereas it was ordered to be kept upon the first
day of the week in every other mo. It is now ordered at the 6th day
of the week in every other month and the meeting to be kept at Henry
Jones his house. The next to be kept at John Dillingham's and so
continue to be kept at those two houses, and the first meeting to be at
John Dillingham's which will be the 2d Sixth-day of the week in the
next 3d month."
     In 1683 a "monthly meeting" at Yarmouth is spoken of in the
Sandwich minutes. This may have been one of the occasional sittings
of Sandwich monthly meeting there, such as were sometimes held
also at Falmouth, before the present division of sessions between the
three towns became settled.
     In 1697 the town ordered "that the Quakers be rated for the sup-
port of the ministry, but that the tax be made so much larger that
Mr. Cotton may have his full salary," -probably without drawing on
the Friends for their rate. And in 1717 an appropriation was made
to build a meeting house for the town,-- "the Quakers to be exempted
from the charge." Also it was "voted that such of our inhabitants
as are professed Quakers be freed from paying the minister's rate."
In 1703 a committee is sent to urge Yarmouth and Falmouth
Friends to attend the monthly meetings more faithfully.
In 1709, 1st mo., Yarmouth Friends requested liberty of Sandwich
monthly meeting to hold a preparative meeting. In 11th mo. a
"Man's meeting" at John Wing's is mentioned; and 1st mo., 1710,
one at John Dillingham's. As the same request to hold a preparative
meeting was made one hundred years later, it would seem that the
first was unsuccessful. It is the opinion of an aged Friend, judging.

180 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

from memory, that the preparative meeting at Yarmouth was estab-
lished about the time when the present meeting house was built, in
1809. Another, of venerable age, Ezra Kelley of New Bedford, who
attended meeting in the old house, believes it was not established till
some years after.
     In 1710 it was proposed that Sandwich monthly meeting hold a
monthly meeting at Yarmouth and one at Falmouth; which was al-lowed
for Falmouth, but naught appears as regards Yarmouth.
     The meeting house in Dennis was probably built about the year
1714, as the date is estimated by so careful an authority as Newell
Hoxie. Mention of the house, however, does not appear in the month-
Ly meeting minutes, until 1720.
     In 1717 John 'Wing was appointed to inform Yarmouth Friends
that if they did not attend monthly meeting better, they would be
turned over to the quarterly meeting. They promised to do better.
For the past fifty years, at least, no such complaint, considering their
numbers, could be made of Yarmouth members; some of whom have
been among the most steadfast in keeping up the attendance of the
monthly meetings. And they have made the attendance at Yarmouth,
whenever the monthly meeting is held there, so very attractive by
their hospitality as to need no committee to enforce attendance from
Sandwich and Falmouth. Yet no longer do the wild deer of the Wa-
quoit woods, the forest of the Mashpee Indians, the sober villages of
Cotuit, Centrevi11e, Marston's Mills, Hyannis, and South Sea, view the
quaint procession of Quaker carriages wending their way of thirty
miles through the sands of summer or the snows of winter, between
Falmouth and Bass river, to attend the monthly meetings. No longer
does Cotuit behold them halting at Hinckley's or Heman Crocker's, as
a half-way house, for a dinner and a "nooning"; or returning the day
after the meeting in the same deliberate style, satisfied with the social
priv11eges of Quakerism, and stronger for the next month's battle of
life. The railroad has undone all this, and robbed these monthly
meeting excursions of time for that social commingling of neighbor-
hood with neighborhood, which, in the days when they carried their
boys and girls to monthly meetings, helped to hold the rising genera-
tion to the Society.
     The old meeting house in Dennis had stood for about fifty years,
when in 1765 Yarmouth Friends request liberty to repair it, or rebuild.
Permission was granted, and John Kelley and Hattil Kelley were ap-
pointed to attend to it. Timber was bought to repair it, and Falmouth
and Sandwich contribute money for the cost. It was found that to
repair the house where it stood would make a difficulty. Committees
come and go, until in 1768 some one, probably the contractor, fails,
the monthly meeting gives him the lumber, and that ends the project.

 
[Sketch of Friends Meeting House and The Late Residence of David K Akin  South 
Yarmouth]

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.  181

nineteen years after, however, the meeting house was repaired. A
writer is quoted by Freeman, who says of this building, that there was
in 1795 in Dennis "a small Friends', or Quaker, meeting house, situ-
ated on the east side of Follen's pond: at this five families belonging
to the town attended, with others from Yarmouth and Harwich."
     In 1807 liberty was given to move the Dennis meeting house over
to the west side of the river, near Seth Kelley's, in South Yarmouth.
In 1808, 6th mo., David Kelley gave half an acre for a lot of ground
for the new meeting house, which it had been decided to build. In
12th mo. it had cost $864. Yarmouth paid one half. Sandwich and
Falmouth gave $161, and the quarterly meeting $271. Accordingly
Friends' meetings began in the new house early in 1809; and next
year the old Dennis meeting house" was sold to Lot Sears, torn down,
put on a raft, floated down the river to a place about a mile below
where the Friend's village then was. and was built up into a dwelling-
house" which may yet be standing. The money received from the
sale of the old house was laid out in painting and shutters for the new
house. The old Friends' burial lot at Dennis is now surrounded by
woods and overgrown with shrubbery. There was formerly a post-
and-rail fence surrounding it, which having gone to decay, Ezra Kel-
ley has had a neat board fence put up, and the graves of four of his
ancestors marked by simple white stones.
     In 2d mo., 1810, Yarmouth Friends request a mid-week meeting:
and the next year they ask to hold a preparative meeting, and to have
two sittings of the monthly meeting each year in their house. They
continue thus to be held.
     In 1815 Yarmouth Friends, by consent of the monthly meeting,
commenced holding two meetings for worship on First-day of the
week. At length the two meetings a day were confined to the sum-
mer season. But for the past fifteen years, nearly, there has been but
one Friends' meeting on the First-day of the week, besides the regular
mid-week meeting on Fifth-day.
     Prior to 1819 we are at a loss to know who of the members of the
Yarmouth meeting were ministers; except one Joshua Weekson, who
in 1731 is mentioned as a "public Friend." "Our meetings in the old
house," says Ezra Kelley," and for some years in the new, were usually
silent, except when visited by ministering Friends from away, We
did occasionally hear a few words from Abby Crowell (formerly Kel-
ley) but had no approved ministry before Russell Davis," About 1819
Russell Davis moved from New Bedford to South Yarmouth, having
a remarkable gift in the ministry of discerning and addressing the
states of individuals and meetings, With but little human learning,
and regarded as inferior in manner and appearance, he was often ena-
bled, both in public and in private, to reveal to individuals their.

182 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.


thoughts and spiritual conditions, to their own astonishment. He
became known as a true seer; and such was the general confidence in
his declarations as being from the true source of authorized ministry,
that the attendance of the South Yarmouth meeting grew in his day
to its greatest number. He died in 1847, aged seventy-five years.
The subsequent acknowledged ministers have been: Jacob H. Vining,
whose residence here was contemporary with the oil-carpet manufac-
tory which he conducted; Ruth H. Baker, acknowledged in 1843; and
Elizabeth Stetson, 1889.
     The religious concern represented by the meeting house near
Georgetown, a short distance northward from the Friends' meeting
house, is attributed to Friends, though having no official connection
with the Society. In 1868 her Christian interest in the welfare of fami-
lies of fishermen and others led Rose Kelley, the beloved daughter
(now deceased) of David Kelley, with Rebeeca Wood (now Howes) to
read the Bible to them in their homes, and at times to gather as many
children as would assemble for instruction in the contents of the
Scriptures. The attendance soon outgrew the capacity of any of the
Georgetown houses, and encouraged David Kelley, in 1873, to build
a plain, commodious building for the good of all who would assemble
there rather than in one of the denominational houses for worship.
One and another non-clerical laborer has been raised up to work in
this mission, and a decided change for good has been wrought in
many lives, and in the neighborhood. At the close of Friends' meet-
ings, visiting ministers often repair to this house. as if in continuation
of their service. The beloved elder still lives to acknowledge, in view
of remarkable results which have followed the reward of peace with
which the erection of his building has been blessed.
     There would be no easy stopping place were we to begin giving
credit to the estimable lives of men and women among the South Yar-
mouth worthies. The memory of these just, though blessed in the
scale of virtue, has only its invisible record. As to public note, the
name which stands in the writer's memory as most conspicuous in the
affairs of Yarmouth Friends forty years ago is that of Zeno Kelley.
His most widely known successor in public prominence and esteem
was the late David K. Akin, a sketch of whose life has been furnished
by other hands as follows:
     DAVID K. AKIN.-This valued citizen was born 1st mo. O. 1799, and
departed this life 8th mo., 23. 1887, at his homestead in South Yar-
mouth.  Of his ancestry it is only known that a widowed lady named
Akins came from Scotland to Dartmouth early in the last century, and
from her two sons the name descended. Other branches of the name
exist at Dartmouth and New Bedford, but Abiel, son of Thomas, was
the first known in Yarmouth. Abiel Akin was born at Dartmouth and
 

[Portrait of David K Akin?]

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 183

came to South Yarmouth, where he married Catherine Kelley, 6th
mo., 12, 1794. She was the sister of Zeno and Seth Kelley, the latter
being the father of the present David Kelley. The children of the
marriage were: Rebecca, Thomas, David K., Joseph, Seth K., Phoebe,
and Catherine. The mother died, and Abiel for his second wife mar-
ried Mary Wing of Sandwich.
     David K. Akin. the third child, was married 6th mo. 28, 1824, to
Rachel W. Peckham of Westport, Mass., who died 6th mo., 17, 1848.,
leaving her surviving, a husband and two children,-Hannah P., who
married David Kelley and died 2d mo., 21, 1872, without issue; and
Peleg P. Akin. This son is the only surviving male representative of
this branch of the Akin family, also of his mother's family. He was
born 6th mo., 30, 1832, and married Mary A. Leonard, who died with-
out issue. He married 1st mo., 7, 1866, Rebecca B. Howes, and their
only child, Mary L. Akin, resides with them.
     David K. Akin learned clock-making and commenced for himself
in this trade at South Yarmouth in his early married life. When the
manufacture of salt became a leading industry he erected works
which, although in decay, are now owned by his only son. He was
an early merchant of South Yarmouth and with his brother, Thomas,
conducted a store many years under the firm name of David K. Akin
& Co. For years he was secretary of the first Marine Insurance Com-
pany of the town, and a director of the Barnstable County Fire Insur-
ance Company, in which he succeeded Amos Otis in the presidency.
He was director in the affairs of the Yarmouth National Bank, being
elected to his fiftieth term the year he died, and was its president from
1871 to 1879. He was also one of the prime movers in the organiza-
tion of the Bass River Savings Bank, of which he was a trustee. Other
responsible positions he satisfactorily filled in his active life; but
those civil relations which would absorb too much of his time, he de-
clined.  His generous nature induced him to serve a term as overseer
of the poor, and he once served as a county commissioner with his re-
publican contemporaries, Seth Crowell and John Doane.
     He adhered to the faith of the Friends, and was a leading member
and an elder, aiding greatly in its material and spiritual mainten-
ance.  He was a valued counsellor of the Representative Meeting of
the Friends of New England, and for twelve years (1849-61) served as
the clerk of the Sandwich monthly meeting. For his second wife he
married, 10th mo., 5,1849, Betsey Crowell, who died 1st mo., 18, 1881.
To his social relations he was strongly attached. To his purity of life
in all its phases his associates attest. He was liberal in his views,
sympathetic and kind, and among the first in every good enterprise.
He possessed physical strength, energy of character, and great moral
courage; all of which, united with his generous nature and conscien-

184 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.


tious consideration for the rights of others. rounds into a column purer
and more lasting than marble.
     THE SOCIETY IN FALMOUTH.-In our general survey, we have
seen that Sandwich was the first town in America where a society of
that people was established. and that this took place in 1657, only ten
years after the rise of the Society in England.
     Turning our eyes now three years later southward to the Succo-
nesset shore, we are struck with the view that Quakerism appears an
occasion of the first settlement of Falmouth*; and that, too, in the per-
son of no less a character than Isaac Robinson himself, the son of that
distinguished pastor of the Pilgrim fathers, John Robinson, whom on
embarking in the Mayflower they left in charge of the church at Ley-
den.  The Pastor Robinson having died in 1625, Isaac, his son, came
over in 1631. In 1639 he removed from Scituate to Barnstable. For
twenty years he was a highly respected citizen there, being deemed
"an excellent and sensible man"; and was some time in the service
of the government. In the year 1639, as we are informed in Cogs-
well's historical sketch in the Barnstable County Atlas, "the General
Court of Plymouth by special order permitted Robinson and three
others to frequent the Quaker meetings 'to endeavor to seduce them
from the error of their ways,' But the reverse effect followed. Rob-
inson became a sympathizer with the Quakers, and June 6, ]600, a
year less one day, he was pronounced a manifest opposer of the laws."
In the statement of another we read: "Instead of convincing the
Quakers he became self-convicted, embraced many of their doctrines,
and consequently rendered himself so obnoxious that he was dis-
missed from civil employment and exposed to much censure and some
indignity,"
     This was enough to make Isaac Robinson, now ostracised as a
Quaker, feel no longer at home in Barnstable, and incline to seek a
new residence. Thirteen other men with their families, and proba-
bly having religious toleration as their bond of sympathy. accompany
him in boats on Vineyard sound, and sail westward, till they find at
Succonesset satisfactory land and a fresh pond. which determine them
to settle there. The first house built in the town was Isaac Robin-

*The opinion of Charles W. Jenkins, in his lectures on the history of Falmouth, is
confirmatory of this view. He says: "One of the first and leading settlers was Isaac
Robinson; and what were the lessons he had learned from his Puritan father': They
were the following: 'Follow no man any farther than he follows the Lord Jesus Christ.'
I am confident God has yet much truth to break forth from His holy word; and fol-
low the truth ,whenever and by whomsoever taught.' These lessons of the pious,
catholic, and learned Robinson were not lost on the son: and when persecution in the
New World lifted its arm, he was the first who dared openly to avert the blow. For
this he sacrificed the favors of the government, and it was this that led him and his as-
sociates, who probably sympathizt'd with him, to commence a new settlement at this
place."

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 185

son's.  He lived in continued good esteem to the venerable age of
ninety-three: but appears, after keeping" an ordinary at Saconesset
for the entertainment of strangers" to have moved before the year
1673 to 1Iartha's Vineyard (where it had been his intention to sail
when he left Barnstable), and to be residing there in 1701. He was
proprietors' clerk at Tisbury in 1673, and 1678-84 was selectman.
     It is not known how soon actual members of the Society followed
their forerunner, Isaac Robinson, into Succonesset, or Falmouth. But
the prominence and undenied influence possessed in his new colony
by their former champion, doubtless early turned the eyes of some
Friends to Succonesset as a safe abiding place for themselves also. In
his lectures on early Falmouth history, Charles W, Jenkins thinks it
probable that the" first founders of the Society of Friends in this
town arrived about six years after the first settlers, and that William.
Gifford and Robert Harper were of this number, and that their meet-
ing at West Falmouth was established about 1685. Probably Isaac
Robinson, jr., a son of the first settler, joined this meeting,-he set-
tled at West Falmouth,-and Isaac Robinson is one of the first names
to be found on the records of that Society."
     This Robert Harper, who afterward, in 1685, took up lands in the
eastern part of the township, had been a prominent sufferer in Sand-
wich  from the first rise of the Society there. In 1659 he was sentenced
in Boston to fifteen stripes, also suffered imprisonment there; and his
fines in Sandwich (for not swearing, etc.) are recorded* as amounting
to £44; namely, "all the cattle he had, his house and land"; leaving
him and his family "one cow. which was so poor that she was ready
to dye." Robert Harper was one of the four Friends, who, when Wil-
liam Leddra, the last of the four Friends thus executed, was hanged
on Boston common, and his body was cut down, as says the chroni-
cler,† "attended the fall of it: and heaving catch'd it in their Arms
laid it on the Ground, until your Murtherer had stripped it of the
cloaths: who, when he had so done, confesst he was a comely Man."
     Freeman says that in 1668 William Gifford, Thomas Lewis and
John Jenkins became inhabitants of Succonesset. William Gifford's
fines in Sandwich, in 1658 and '59, had been fifteen head of Cattle,
"half a Horse" and "half a Swine"-all amounting to £57,19s. "For
no other cause," as says George Bishop, "but for Meeting with the
People of the Lord; and for that in Conscience to the Command of
Christ, he could not Swear."
     In the oldest existing book of minutes of Friends' monthly meeting
held at Sandwich, the earliest entry being for 25th of 4th mo, 1672, we
find Robert Harper (then of Succonesset) among the first to be em-

*New Eng. Judged, p. 185.
†Id., p. 331..

186 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.


ployed on committees for services requiring tact and good judgment.
Two months later, William Gifford is one of two named to speak to
Thomas Johnson, also of Succonesset, "to know how it is with him in
respect of his outward condition." And the care of the meeting month
after month for the guardianship and relief of Thorn. s Johnson's fam-ily,
makes interesting reading. Before leaving Sandwich to take up
land in Succonesset he had had his house and land seized by the
marshal for fines.
     The following has been preserved as the record of a monthly meet-
ing held at Falmouth the 2d day of 11th mo.. 1673: "Friends having
met together in the fear of the Lord, found all things well and in or-
der, and so departed in love, giving God the glory, who is blessed for-
ever."
     In 1678 lands were laid out at Oyster pond: also at Hog island and
Great Sipperwisset "where the early settlers were William Gifford,
Senior; William Gifford, Jr.; John Weeks, and William Weeks." This
is the first recorded beginning of the settlement at \Vest Falmouth,
and Quaker names head the list,- William Gifford, sr., having become
an inhabitant of Succonesset ten years before. He was evidently a
prominent character, and employed in useful services in town as well
as in Society affairs.
     In 1681, 2d month, the monthly meeting at Sandwich ordered that
a meeting (probably a session of the monthly meeting) be held "at
Joseph Hull's at Suckonessett, the last 6th day in 3d mo. next." Like
Robert Harper, Joseph Hull afterward took up lands in the eastern
part of the township. This Joseph Hull is traced, in notes left by
Newell Hoxie, as a son of Joseph Hull who came from Weymouth to
Barnstable in 1639, and in 1641 went to Yarmouth to preach without
approbation of his brethren, and was excommunicated. Afterward
he made satisfaction and was restored. "His son Joseph moved to
Falmouth and bought of Zach. Perkins the estate which Zach. bought
of William Weeks, sen., for £105 in 1078. His uncle, Tristum Hull.
who moved to Newport, was father to John, captain of the first packet
to England, and from him came Commodore Hull."   Tristum Hull
was blamed by the Plymouth authorities for bringing the persecuted
Nicholas Upshal to Sandwich, and was ordered to  "carry him out of
the government." It appears that Newport became the home of
both.
     In 1682 a meeting,-probably another transferred sitting of the
monthly meeting,-was ordered to be held at William Gifford's at Sip-
perwisset (West Falmouth) the 20th of the month and 6th day of the
week. In 1683 Robert Harper informed that Friends at Succonesset
desired that Friends might have meetings among them. And in the
8th month a meeting was appointed to be held at Succonesset the

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 187

16th of this month, 3d day of the week. Of such occasional monthly
meetings held at Falmouth, and sometimes at Yarmouth, there is no
record of the business.
     In 1685, by a minute of the monthly meeting, "Friends of Sucko-
nessett were encouraged to meet together." This may be regarded
as the date of the official establishment of the Friends' meeting in West
Falmouth; though no doubt, according to their principles, they had
been regularly holding meetings for worship from the time when but
"two or three" began to reside here. Before moving from Sandwich
to Falmouth, Cudworth says of them: "They meet ordinarily twice in
a week besides the Lord's day." Since worship in spirit and in truth
cannot, in the Friends' view, be treated as if dependent on the serv-
ices of a minister, or hearing of words, their meetings for that pur-
pose must have been the earliest regularly held in the township.
Though the town voted land in 1687 for the support of any who might
be found fit to "teach the good word of God" in Falmouth, it was not
until 1701 that Samuel Shiverick was settled upon as the town min-
ister.
     The relations between these first two churches which grew up side
by side in Falmouth-the Congregationalist and the Friends'-seem to
have been amicable or mutually tolerant, from the first. The leading
pioneer or first settler of the town, Isaac Robinson, seems to have been
a representative of both societies in his own person.* The thirteen
families who joined him in the Falmouth colony were no doubt in
sympathy with his spirit. Though all were Congregationalists, so as.
early to identify that church with the town government, they started
the town on its general course of giving fair play to the Quaker refu-
gees from the rigors of the Plymouth rule. There are traditions that
Friends were made to suffer even here by orders from Plymouth,-for
instance that Daniel Butler "was tied to a cart and whipped
through the town." But leaving tradition for history, the records of
the town contain an application from the "persecuted Quaker Daniel
Butler" to the town, to be released from liabilities to the minister OD
account of his being a Friend. The request was granted, thus show-
ing, as Jenkins observes, "that if Butler was persecuted it was not
the result of town action,"   "There are many instances recorded,"
says the same author, "where individuals made it to appear that they
had conscientious scruples on this subject [of paid ministry] and their
tax was promptly remitted. It is to be hoped that our worthy

*" Our habit of toleration began with Isaac Robinson in 1660, who with his father,..
the Leyden minister was taught' to follow truth whenever and by whomsoever taught.'
Intercourse with the Quakers had undoubtedly much to do with the liberal and tolerant
ways of the community. This liberality and humane disposition is seen in the just
treatment of Indians, with whom Falmouth was always on the kindest terms."-John
L. Swift (Falmouth Hi-centennial Oration)..

188 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

neighbors of this sect, when thinking of the cruel persecutions of the
Quakers, will not forget these acts of liberality on the part of the good
people of this town."
     In 1688 lands in Falmouth were laid out to Thomas Bowerman. In
1705 a Thomas Bowman (whether the same Friend or not, it is not
clear) appears on the monthly meeting record as being in prison for
priest's rate, and Friends send him a bed and bedding. As Friends
could not contribute to a paid ministry in the form of taxes or other-
wise, neither could they vote with their fellow-townsmen for the sup-
porting of a stated minister. In 1731, the following voters, being
members of the Society of Friends, dissented from a call to Samuel
Palmer to serve as the town's minister with a stated support: Stephen
Harper, Benjamin Swift, Richard Landers, Samuel Bowerman, Thomas
Bowerman, jr., Amos Landers. Justus Gifford. John Landers, Thomas
Bowerman, William Gifford, sr., William Gifford, Seth Gifford, and
William Gifford, younger. But the record states that "in November
the town voted £170 for 11r. Palmer's settlement and salary-to clear
the Quakers."
     In 1703 Falmouth Friends are so remiss in attending the monthly
meeting that it appoints a committee to look after them :-likewise
Yarmouth.
     In 1709 the monthly meeting held at Sandwich conferred the powers
of a meeting for discipline, or preparative meeting, upon that held in
Falmouth; and the next year a monthly meeting for Falmouth was
proposed. Sometimes when no business appeared in the Falmouth
preparative meeting to report up to the monthly meeting. it is stated
that "Friends sent their love."
     The need of a regular meeting house. for a better accommodation
of public worship than private houses could afford. soon began to find
expression. In 1717 Richard Landers was appointed by the monthly
meeting to dig graves for Friends in Falmouth: and at the next
monthly meeting those who had promised to pay money for fencing
the burying ground were requested to bring it to him. This grave
yard, though now grown up with trees, may still be found in the
woods eastward of the houses at present occupied by Judah Bowman.
or Maria F. Hamblin. Traces of the stone wall which in 1730 John Lan-
ders and Stephen Bowman were appointed to build about the burial
ground are still to be discerned: but all marks of the graves are
obliterated, except such rude natural stones as might be found by
digging. Here were the remains of \Vest Falmouth Friends gen-
eraly buried, until the second grave-yard surrounding the present
meeting house facing the new road below, was laid out.
     The main road to Falmouth village lay between the first burying
ground and the first Friends' meeting house; and that road may still

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 189

be traced in places in the woods for a mile or two. The ground over
which the first Friends' meeting house stood is marked at its central
spot by a stone post, chiseled with the figures "1720," and erected by
the late Daniel Swift and others. The building, which was begun in
the year 1720, was thirty feet square on the ground, and one story
high, having a "hopper roof,"-that is, coming to a point like a pyra-
mid.  On meeting days in cold weather an attempt was made to
warm the room, or at least some of the worshippers' feet, by a large
pot of charcoal standing on the ground or floor in the middle of the
room. For the escape of the fumes, an opening was made in the
roof. Meetings were regularly held here for fifty years. Of all the
Friends traveling in the ministry who preached in this house, Samuel
Fothergill, from England, seems remembered as the most eminent.
     The building of this meeting house was authorized by the follow-
ing minutes of Sandwich monthly meeting: "At our monthly meet-
ing, at our meeting house in Sandwich the 2d of the 7th month, 1720,
were the several weekly meetings belonging to the same, called on:
For Sandwich John Wing and Edward Perry present, for Falmouth
Richard Landers and Stephen Harper present, for Yarmouth none
appears. At this meeting it is agreed and concluded that there be a
meeting house built at Falmouth, and Friends subscribed towards the
building of it as follows:

			£ sh.
Ebenezer Wing 	1 0
Gidian Hoxie 	1 0
Stephen Bowerman 	2 0
Benjamin Allen 	0 10
Nicolas Davis 	0 10
Isaac Robinson* 	3 0
Edward Perry 	1 0
Richard Landers 	6 0
John Robinson 	1 0
Obediah Butler 	1 10
Thomas Bowerman 	3 0
Peter Robinson 	1 0
Gershom Gifford 	1 0
Stephen Harper 	5 0
William Gifford 	2 0
John Strobridge 	0 10
Joseph Landers 	3 0
Benjamin Swift 	3 0
Joshah Wing 	0 10
Benjamin Bowerman 2 0
John Wing 		2 0
Joseph Hollway 	0 10
Justes Gifford 	2 0
Daniel Allen 	1 0
Total       	£44


     The first ten names on this subscription list appear to be those of
residents in Sandwich; and the remaining fourteen, beginning with
Richard Landers, residents .of Falmouth. Accordingly Falmouth
Friends subscribed thirty-six pounds toward the building of their
own meeting house, and Sandwich Friends eight pounds. Consider-
ing the much larger value of money in those days than its purchasing
power now, and the hard work to obtain it by farming, the subscrip-
tion was a generous one. Sandwich monthly meeting had a few years
before liberally responded to a call to help build meeting houses in
Salem and in Boston.
     It does not appear how long a time was taken in bringing the build-

*If this Isaac Robinson was the son of the original settler, he was then at least
seventy-eight years of age: if the grandson, he was fifty-one.

190 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.


ing to completion. We read that at the monthly meeting held at Fal-
month, 6th mo., 1722, Ebenezer Wing was appointed to gather the
money contributed by Sandwich Friends toward building a meeting
house in Falmouth, and bring whatever he received to the next
monthly meeting; and at the next monthly meeting held at Sand-
wich in 7th mo., he turned in £9, 1s., 6d., which he had collected.
And the first meeting recorded as held in Falmouth meeting house was
2d day, the 6th month, 1725.
     Whether Benjamin Swift, whose name appears among the sub-
scribers, was then a member, or his wife, who was a member, was sub-
scribed for in his name, is not clear. But Daniel Swift, a beloved and
venerable Friend who died in 1879, desired the writer to preserve for
future memory, along with some of the information above given: that
Benjamin Swift, being formerly a staunch Congregationalist, persisted
in regularly attending his own meeting in Falmouth village, even
when on extraordinary occasions his wife was anxious to have him go
to meeting with her. At length one First-day morning, having in-
formed him that two ministers from abroad were to be at Friends'
meeting, she went her usual way. But while sitting in the meeting.
she was surprised to see her husband hitching his horse at a fence,
coming up toward the house, and taking his seat among the rest. He
never attended the meeting at town afterward, but went regularly with
his wife, and in due time joined the Friends. Benjamin Swift served
as the monthly meeting's clerk, the first from Falmouth, in the years
1745-47. His grave was the first in the new, or present burial ground,
and is to be seen beside his good wife's at the northwest corner of the
original portion.
     In 1731 a stable, sixteen feet square, was ordered to be built, to
accommodate the horses of Friends coming to meetings. How long
that building stood has not been learned. But one of apparently
larger size gave place to the present commodious sheds, which were
completed in 1861. . Stephen Dillingham offered to give the meeting
one hundred dollars toward the proposed sheds, or if the meeting
would raise $175 by subscriptions, he would build the sheds. The
latter offer was accepted. And Stephen Dillingham, in rendering to
the Preparative meeting a report of his care, concluded by saying in
substance: "I have done the best I could for the meeting's benefit.
The sheds are finished, and offered to Friends: and I hope they will
be of use to many, long after I am laid away." He died in 1872. Many
marks and memories remain in West Falmouth, as reminders of his
enterprise, public spirit, and sagacity in business. He was for 40
years postmaster. X one but Friends (Gilbert R. Boyce, and now
James E. Gifford) have succeeded him in the West Falmouth post-
office.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 191

In 1742 the monthly meeting complains of  "a cowardly spirit
about training"; that is, some members not having courage to main-
tain their testimony against war, by refusing to train.
In 1755 the women Friends of Falmouth requested a preparative
meeting. The holding of a women's meeting for religious business
separate from that of men Friends, and co-ordinate with it, has contin-
ued (developing in many women valuable traits of judgment), till
within two or three years; when preparative meetings have been
driven by the smallness of numbers attending, to avail themselves of
the yearly meeting's permission to hold joint sessions.
The original "hopper-roof" meeting house on the hill-side knoll,
which as a shelter for Friends in their often silent worship had stood
for fifty years. was now in the year 1771 believed to have had its day.


 
FRIENDS' MEETING HOUSE, WEST FALMOUTH, BUILT 1842.

A new edifice, larger and more convenient, began to be built, facing
the new public road below; and by the year 1775 the house appears
to have been completed. An addition to it was made in the year
1794. This second meeting house stood for nearly seventy years, or
until 1841, when it was decided to replace it by a new edifice.
The present, or third meeting house, under a contract made with
Moses Swift, was built on the site of the second. The builder receiv-
ing the material of the former house to dispose of as his own, Zena
Kelly of South Yarmouth, persuaded that Moses Swift had an unfa-
vorable bargain on his hands, endeavored to relieve him by buying
the frame of the second meeting house; which he transported on a.

192 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.


vessel to South Yarmouth, where it lay under temporary cover on a
wharf by Bass river for about a year, when it was utilized by being
erected as the frame-work of David Kelley's present barn. There the
heavy oak beams are still to be seen, staunch and sound. attesting the
solid growth of the West Falmouth oaks of 1771. In 1842 the build-
ing committee acknowledge the receipt of S202,-contributed for the
new meeting house, and in the Seventh month of that year report that
it is finished. Still well preserved, it bids fair to be longer-lived than
either of its predecessors: but whether longer-lived than the meeting
itself, will depend on the life of the people in the principles for which
it was built.
     Sandwich quarterly meeting began to hold its mid-summer session
at Falmouth in 1779, where it continued to be held annually till 1792.
when it was transferred to Nantucket and held there up to 1850.
Thence it was returned to Falmouth, where it is still held every
Seventh month by representatives and visitors from the Friends
included in Barnstable, Bristol and Plymouth counties;-an occurrence
still of interest, and formerly regarded in the neighborhood as an an-
nual event of remarkable account.
     Here as elsewhere Friends found it difficult, while their children
were mingling indiscriminately with others in the public or district
school, to train them according to the principles and testimonies which
Friends had received to hold. At length, in 1831, the Friends in West
Falmouth built by subscription a school house on the east side of the
road opposite the northern portion of the burial-ground. The first
school therein was held in the winter of 1831-2, the building not yet
being plastered. Asa Wing, of Sandwich, is said to have been em-
ployed as the first teacher, and his name is held in honored memory
by pupils who still survive him. It was regarded as a fine school,
and it gave general satisfaction in the neighborhood. The prosperity
of the schools held in that building at length waned with the decreas-
ing interest of Friends in its original purpose; and especially while
for several years the teachers employed also in the district school of
the neighborhood were usually members of the society. At length
the Friends' school house was removed by Edward G. Dillingham*,
and made the body of the Lindley M. Wing house, where it now stands.
     The real history of the Friends' meeting in Falmouth, adequately
portrayed, would be biographica1.-chiefly in the bringing to light of
those obscure and hidden lives that appear but little in the records,

*Edward G. Dillingham removed from "West Falmouth to Acushnet in 1855. His
gift in the ministry being acknowledged by the society, he is still often seen and wel-
comed in his native place ministering the word-likewise in Sandwich and Yarmouth.
As his frequent companion, the late Josiah Holmes, jr., of New Bedford, has long had
familiar place in these meetings, and at funerals of members.

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 193

and less in the chief seats. The influence of some of these in their
silent spheres, has been of the deepest and most far-reaching. As re-
gards the prominent and well-remembered names, we forbear to be-gin
the mention of them, knowing there is not room to do equal jus-
tice to all.
     If, however, we may allude to the use made of members in public
life,- James T. Dillingham was chosen 1ll 1857 to serve as representa-
tive in the Massachusetts legislature, being the first of the three mem-
bers of the Friends' Society in Falmouth who (since Isaac Robinson-
probably the junior-and a Friend, who was deputy in 1691) have been
elected to the general court. He served a few months, when he
moved to Wisconsin, pursued a successful business career, and died in
1889. James E. Gifford served in the legislature in the years 1880 and
1881. By his efforts an act was passed in 1880 having the effect of
giving to widows of intestate husbands leaving no children, real es-
tate that may be left, up to $5,000 in value;-an act highly commended
by enlightened judges as in the direction of needed reform toward
justice for women. Thus the Friends' principle of co-ordinating
rather than subordinating woman in her church relations, having
shown its tendency in public legislation, was learned in West Fal-
mouth to some purpose. 11eltiah Gifford (the younger) served in the
legislature as representative in 1884, but died in the same year, much
lamented in appreciation of his extended public usefulness in the
town and especially in the services of the Society. He and James E.
Gifford (the latter, for several years past, moderator of the town meet-
ings) appear thus far the last of a series of selectmen in Falmouth who
professed with Friends. Until recently it was the policy of managers
in the town's affairs to have usually one Friend among the selectmen.
In that office we recognize also the names of Thomas Bowerman,
Richard Landers, Stephen Bowerman, Paul Swift, Prince Gifford, Wil-
liam Gifford, Daniel Swift, Barnabas Bowerman (who served twelve
years), and Prince G. Moore (who served fourteen years), long respected
not only as a veteran in the town's government, but as an example of
uprightness and good judgment.
     The list of preachers recorded as ministers in the Friends' meeting
in Falmouth could not be traced back by the present writer farther
than the year 1815,-though doubtless unrecorded ministers, or
speakers in the meeting, have exercised their gifts from an early
period. The names found, with dates of acknowledgment by the
meeting, are as follows: Browning Swift, 1816; Susan Swift, 1818;
Joshua Swift, 1827; William Gifford, 1827; John R. Davis, 1804 (he
came from New Bedford monthly meeting); Huldah Gifford, 1829;
Newell Hoxie (originally of Sandwich) 1846; Elizabeth Gifford,1849;

13.

194 HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.


Mary Hoag, 1851; Elizabeth G. Dillingham, 1851; Lois B. Gifford. 1867;
Charity G. Dillingham (now Chace), 1867; Daniel Swift, 1870.
     The clerks of Sandwich monthly meeting who were residents of
Falmouth, are named as follows: Benjamin Swift, serving in the years
1745-47: Daniel Bowman, 1796-98 and 1810-11: Prince Gifford, 1798-
1801; William Gifford, 1811-14 and 1817-23; Prince Gifford, jr., 1814-
17; Daniel Swift. 1823-31: Stephen Dillingham, 1831-35; Newell
Hoxie, 1835-49; Arnold Gifford, 1861-72: Meltiah Gifford. 1872-84;
 James E. Gifford, 1884 to the present time.
     The only clerks of the women's monthly meeting. from Falmouth,
since 1849, have been: Hepza Swift. 1849-'50 and 1852-1854; and
Huldah Gifford, 1869-1876.
     In the autumn of 1888, while on a visit from "Worcester to his na-
tive place, Daniel Wheeler Swift, one of the sons of the late Daniel
Swift of beloved memory, took very practical interest in improving
the condition of the burial ground about the meeting house. By a
subscription of three hundred dollars he set about starting a fund of
one thousand dollars, the annual income of which is to be applied to
keeping the grave yard in a neat condition. Considerably more than
the one thousand dollars asked for was contributed by residents of the
neighborhood-some of them not members of the meeting-and by
several residing in different parts of the country. who have remem-
bered with affection the scenes of their youth and the graves of their
departed, The excess contributed has been applied to the leve1ing
and renovating of the entire surface of the ground. removing most
of the rough boulders used as head-stones, and distinguishing the
graves by neater marks. The present year will probably complete
this part of the work.
JOHN H. DILLINGHAM.- The publishers feel justified in giving
place in this history of the West Falmouth Society, to some account
of one of its sons, whose annual sojourn and interest in his native
homestead and meeting still identifies him with the neighbor-
hood.
     John Hoag Dillingham, the son of Abram Dillingham* of  West
Falmouth and Lydia Beede Dillingham (daughter of John Hoag of

     *Descent in the Dillingham name, which comes from Old Englsh words dealing
and ham/ (for hamlet or viI/age) and was applied to a market-town in Cambridge county,
Eng., is thus traced: Edward Dillingham, an original settler of Sandwich, had children
Henry, John (who moved to Yarmouth, or Harwich), and Oseah (who married Stephen
Wing, son of John who moved to Yarmouth). Henry had a son Edward one of whose
eight children Edward, jr., had six. One of these, Ignatius, who married Deborah Gif-
ford, had eight children, the youngest of whom, Joseph, married Esther Rogers of
Marsfield, whose children were Stephen, Reuben, Deborah, Mary, Elizabeth, Abram.
and Edward G.   Abram, the father of John. died 7th mo., 7,1879. It is believed all
the above were members of the Society of Friends. and apparently Ignatius' father Ed-
ward moved from Sandwich to Falmouth.

 
[Portrait of John H Dillingham]

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. 195

Centre Sandwich, N. H.) was born 6th mo., 1st, 1839. Of his three
brothers, all younger, two died in childhood, and Moses B. next
younger, died at home, aged 22, while a student of Exeter Academy,
where he had nearly fitted for college. Life on a small farm, varied
by three months' attendance of the district school in winter and three
in summer, brought John to the age of 12, when he commenced daily
walks to Lawrence Academy in the village, four miles from home,
continuing at this school in the spring and fall terms till the age of
19, when by the encouragement and training of his teacher, the Prin-
cipal, George E. Clarke, he entered Harvard College in Cambridge,
from which he graduated in 1862. He had taught school one winter,
when at the age of 16, at Shumet Pond, and the next two winters in West
Falmouth, and the next at South Pocasset,-the two latter winters
having leave of absence from college for the purpose. In the autumn
after graduating he accepted an offer to teach in the boarding-school
for boys conducted by Charles A. Miles at Brattleboro, Vt., and con-
tinued there 2 ½ years. In the summer of 1865 he accepted the posi-
tion of tutor in Latin and Greek. also of Librarian, in Haverford Col-
lege, Pennsylvania. The superintendent retiring near the middle of
the year, the new tutor was induced to accept the care of the students
in the household-all boarding in the college. This charge continued
for ten years. His department of instruction was early changed to a
professorship in "Moral and Political Science." In 1871 he was mar-
ried to Mary Pim, of Caln, in Chester county valley. In 1875 he left
the college-building with his family for another house on the premi-
ses, continuing only in duties of instruction. until, in 1878 he accepted
the place of Principal in the Friends' School for Boys in Philadelphia,
a name under which he still serves as senior teacher in the same in-
stitution.  In 1886, the school having been removed to its new build-
ing at 140 N. 16th street, and also the Friends' library to a new build-
ing on the same ground, the service of Librarian and Custodian of
Friends' records was added to his school duties. His interest in the
truths of the gospel as committed to the Society of Friends is in part
represented by service as overseer since 1874, as clerk of the monthly
meeting 1882-86, as elder from 1883 till 11th mo., 1889, when he was
acknowledged as a minister. His children are four daughters, Anne
Pim, Lydia Beede, Mary Edge, and Edith Comfort Dillingham. His
interest in his native town, the place of his family's residence in the
summer with his surviving mother, continues not only unabated but
heightened.