History of the American board of commissioners for foreign missions

Front matter

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HISTORY

OF THE

Preface

For the materials of this History, the author is^ndebted, most especially, to the kindness of the Prudential Committee of the Board, who have granted him free access to their numerous and valuable unpublished documents. Besides these, the principal sources of information have been, the thirty Annual Reports of the Board ; thirty-five volumes of the Panoplist and Missionary Herald; Du Halde's China ; Barrow's Travels in China; Medhurst's China; Abeel's Residence in China; GutzlafT's Voyages and History of China; Crawford's Indian Archipelago; Raffles' History of Java ; Malcom's Travels ; Georgii Alphabetum Tibetanum ; Osborn's Doctrinal Errors of the Apostolic and Early Fathers ; Heeren's Researches ; Tod's Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan ; Maurice's Ancient India ; Ward's View of the Hindoos; Malcom's Central India; Duff's History of the Mahrattas ; Memoirs of William Carey ; of Buchanan ; of Swartz ; Read's Christian Brahmun ; Ramsey's Missionary Journal ; Memoirs of Mrs. Judson ; of Gordon Hall ; of Harriet Newell ; Knox's, Percival's and Cordiner's Accounts of Ceylon ; Upham's Sacred and Historical Books of Ceylon ; Malcom's History of Persia ; Smith and D wight's Researches in Armenia; Memoirs of Levi Parsons; of Pliny Fisk; Anderson's Peloponnesus and Greek Islands ; Voyage of Tyerrnan and Bennett ; Ellis' Polynesian Researches ; Stewart's Sandwich Islands ; Dibble's History of the Sandwich Islands ; Williams' Missionary Enterprises in the South Seas ; Loskeil's History of the Moravian Missions among the American Indians ; Memoirs of David Brainerd ; of Catherine Brown ; Parker's Exploring Tour beyond the Rocky Mountains ; Smith and Choules' History of Missions ; Brown's History of Missions ; Humphrey's History of the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts; Life of Eliot, (Wilson's and Sparks'); Life of Wheelock ; Stone's Life of Brant; Holmes' American Annals ; Massachusetts and Hazard's Historical Collections ; Drake's Book of the Indians; Morse's Report on Indian Affairs; Mather's Magnalia ; Morton's New England Memorial; Memoirs of Samuel J. Mills; the Christian Observer, Missionary Register, and other periodicals and newspapers published within the 2

10 PREFACE.

last thirty years. Some facts have also been learned from the recollection of individuals, and from private journals, and letters of missionaries.

To bring the transactions of the Board and of so many missions, so distant and distinct from each other, into one connected history, is no easy task : nor is it easy to decide what arrangement of the matter would be most favorable to its accomplishment On the whole, it has been thought best to adopt the form of annals. By giving the events of each year in one chapter, the gradual increase of the resources, operations and influence of the Board are better exhibited, and the chronological order of events is more readily seen and remembered. In the history of each year after 1812, the account of the annual meeting and domestic operations of the Board is placed first ; then that of the Bombay or Mahratta mission ; then that of the mission to Ceylon ; and afterwards of the other missions, always in the same order. By this arrangement, the account of any mission for any year is easily found ; and those who choose, may read the history of each mission continuously, from beginning to end.

Names, dates and numbers have been given with as much particularity as seemed consistent with the design of making a readable work. Whatever of these is found wanting in the body of the history, will, it is hoped, be supplied by the tables in the Appendix ; where, also, some important documents will be found, which could not be conveniently introduced into the body of the work.

It is obvious that a work of this size cannot narrate all the interesting events that have occurred in the operations of the Board and its missions. The most that can be done, is to give such a selection as shall best show the general character and results of each mission, and of the whole system. This part of the work has been attended with considerable difficulties, some of which are, from their nature, insurmountable. It is not always possible to know what have been the results of any particular measure ; or what, of the events that occur in the vicinity of a mission, are produced by its influence. Many of the transactions, too, are of such recent date, that their most important influence is yet to be exerted, and can be known only in future years. — For similar reasons, due prominence may not always have been given to the labors of each missionary.

The account of missions previous to the formation of the American Board, embracing a period of 190 years, could be only a brief summary of the principal enterprises and their more important results. It has cost an unexpected amount of labor. The subject needs and deserves such attention as it has not yet received.

Several of the maps are struck from cerographic plates, prepared by Mr. Morse, the inventor of cerography. Those of the several islands of the Sandwich group are copied from a map of the Sandwich Islands, drawn, engraved and printed at Lahainaluna, by natives who have been educated under the care of the American Mission. Several others have been prepared expressly for this work, from manuscript and printed maps furnished by missionaries, and never before published in this country.

It may be proper to state, that neither the Board, nor any of its officers, are responsible for the character or contents of this work. At the request of the author, the Prudential Committee have granted important facilities for preparing it. For the use made of them, the author alone is responsible. If they have been so used as to promote the great and good object for which the Board exists, he will not have labored in vain.

Chapter I

Introduction. Protestant Missions previous to the formation of the

American Board.

First settlement of New England. Eliot. Mayhew. Influence of New England example in Europe. Societies formed. Praying Indians in New England. Parkes, Morton, Sergeant, Edwards. The Moravians. Brainerd, Samson Occum, Wheelock ; Kirkland. Societies formed about the beginning of the Nineteenth Century. Reflections.

The first settlement of New England was a missionary enterprise. The " Pilgrims " had escaped from persecution by retiring to Holland. They left Holland and came to this continent, for the sake of preserving their rights as Englishmen by settling under English jurisdiction ; of preserving their descendants from the contagion of false doctrines and corrupt examples; and above all, of extending the Redeemer's Kingdom in lands where Christ had not been named. Such is their own account of their own motives. The royal charter of the Plymouth Company mentions the depopulation of the country by pestilence and war, and its freedom from the claims of any Christian power ; and then goes on to say : " In contemplation and serious consideration whereof, we have thought it fit, according to our kingly duty, so much as in us lieth, to second and follow God's sacred will, renderingreverend thanks to his Divine Majesty for his gracious favor in laying open and revealing the same unto us before any other Christian prince or state ; by which means, without offence, and as we trust to his glory, we may with boldness go on to the settling of so hopeful a work, which tendeth to the reducing and conversion of such savages as remain wandering in desolation and distress, to civil society and Christian religion." And in this, the charter professes to favor the " worthy disposition " of the petitioners to whom it was granted. It was natural, therefore, for John Robinson, the pastor of that part of the church which remained at Leyden, to exclaim, in his letter to the governor of the colony, " that you had converted some, before you killed any."

But efforts for the conversion of the natives were not delayed. As early as December, 1621, Elder Robert Cushman informed his friends in England that many of the Indians, especially of their youth, were found to be of a very tractable disposition, both to religion and humannity ; that if the colonists had means, they would bring up hundreds of their children, both to labor and learning; and that young men in England, who desired " to further the gospel among those poor heathen," would do well to come over an dspend their estates, their time and their labors in that good work. It was indeed impossible, during a few of the first years of their contest with hardships and privations, to make such public and systematic efforts for the conversion of the Indians as were desirable ; but individuals, both ministers and laymen, appear to have seized such opportunities as they could command, to make known and recommend the gospel to their heathen neighbors ; and in this way, much was done towards diffusing a knowledge of Christianity, and producing an impression in its favor. A few of the natives even gave satisfactory evidence, living and dying, of real conversion to God. In 1636, the government of the Plymouth colony enacted laws to provide for the preaching of the gospel among the Indians, and with the concurrence of the principal chiefs, for constituting courts to punish mis-

Introduction

Landing of the Pilgrims.

demeanors ; measures which would not have been adopted, had not the influence of Christianity been already very considerable.

The Massachusetts colony was established with similar designs. Its charter declares that " to win and incite the natives of that country to the knowledge and obedience of the only true God and Saviour of mankind and the Christian faith, in our royal intention and the adventurers' free profession is the principal end of the plantation." The seal of the colony had as its device, the figure of an Indian, with a label at his mouth, on which was inscribed the " Macedonian cry," " Come over and help us." And here also, as at Plymouth from the beginning of the settlement, occasional labors diffused some knowledge of Christianity, and were followed by some instances of conversion.

When the colonies had been successfully commenced, multitudes joined them for the sake of enjoying religious liberty : so that this was the leading object with a large majority, probably, of those who came over during the first twenty or thirty years, and is so spoken of in some of the public documents of that period ; though the missionary designs of the colonies were never disavowed, and seldom forgotten. The appeals to sympathy made by various sects, professing to be deprived of some part of the religious liberty for which our fathers braved the ocean and the wilderness ; the important influence which the settlement of New England has exerted on the cause of religious and of civil liberty throughout the world ; the intense concentration of feeling concerning liberty produced by the struggle for independence ; the fact that worldly-minded statesmen and orators love to write and speak of the spirit of liberty more than of the spirit of Christ ; all these and many other causes have led later writers to represent the desire of religious liberty as the principal motive which led to the first settlement of New England, and to forget that which, at the first, was really predominant in the minds of the Pilgrims. But justice to the memory of those Pilgrims, and to the cause of missions, requires that the truth should be restored to its place.

These Pilgrims were the pioneers of the Protestant world, in their attempts to convert the heathen of foreign lands. The Swedes, indeed, in

FIRST MISSIONS. ELIOT.

the preceding century, made some efforts for the conversion of the remaining- heathen within their own borders. The French HuguenotSj too, under the patronage of the celebrated Admiral Coligny, attempted a colony in Brazil ; and at the request of Villagagnon, the leader of the colony, pastors were sent from Genoa in 1556. But Villagagnon returned to the church of Rome, and put three of the Genevan teachers to death ; controversies among themselves drove their best men back to Europe ; and finally, the Portuguese massacred the remainder, and thus became undisputed masters of Brazil. "Whether this ought to be considered as a missionary colony, or only as an intended refuge for persecuted Huguenots, it is not easy to determine.

But concerning the Plymouth and Massachusetts colonies, there can be no doubt. They were missionary colonies. They were self-supporting missions, of the only kind that can succeed. And they were composed of men who possessed the qualities indispensable for such an undertaking. They went on their own responsibility, and at their own expense ; determined by the help of God, in whom they trusted, to make themselves a home, to live and die and leave their posterity, in the land of the heathen whose salvation they sought.

In 1646, the legislature of Massachusetts passed an act for the propagation of the gospel among the Indians ; and in the same year the celebrated John Eliot began his labors at Nonantum, now a part of Newton. He had commenced the study of the native language in 1641. He had now become able to converse and preach in it ; and had conversed with the natives from various places in the vicinity, and knew how they were affected towards the gospel. He now established regular preaching among them on the Sabbath ; the neighboring ministers agreeing to supply his pulpit in his absence. On the 2Sth of October, he and three others went to Nonantum, where an assembly of Indians met him by invitation. After prayer, he addressed them in a sermon an hour and a quarter long, in which he Stated the leading doctrines of Christianity, and applied them to the condition of bis hearers. He then asked them whether they understood his discourse, and they replied that they understood all. A fortnight afterwards, he met a still larger assembly at the same place. After spending a short time in instructing the children, he addressed them for about one hour on the nature of God, the plan of salvation through Christ, the necessity of faith, and the awful consequences of neglecting the gospel. The whole assembly appeared serious and attentive ; and after the sermon, an aged Indian rose up, and with tears inquired whether it was not too late for such an old man as he, who was now near death, to repent and seek after God. In conclusion, the Indians said they thanked God for the visit, and for the wonderful things they had heard. At his third visit, the assembly was less numerous ; for the powoivs, the priests, or more properly, conjurers, had forbidden the people to attend. But those present were serious, and seemed much affected by the discourse. A few days afterwards, several Indians came and requested to be admitted into English families and taught the Christian religion ; and at the next meeting, all present offered their children for instruction. A settlement of " praying Indians " was soon formed at Nonantum ; but in 1651 it was removed to Natick, where a church was organized in 1661, and the community flourished for a considerable time. The labors of Eliot were not confined to this settlement. He travelled extensively among the Indians, from Cape Cod to Worcester County. He visited Martha's Vineyard ; and once preached the gospel to the famous King Philip of Pokanoket, who rejected it with disdain. He translated the Bible and other Christian books into the lano-uage of the Indians. Of his

INTRODUCTION.

Bible, 1500 copies were published in 1663, and 2000 in 1685. They were printed at Cambridge, and were the only Bibles printed in America till a much later period. Eliot died in 1690, aged 85. He was ready to depart, and " Welcome joy " was one of his last expressions. He has ever since been called " the apostle of the Indians."

But Eliot was not the first who preached to the Indians of New England. Thomas Mayhew began his labors at Martha's Vineyard in 1643. After laboring successfully for three years, he sailed for England, to solicit aid. The ship was lost in the voyage. His father, Thomas Mayhew, who was the proprietor and governor of the island, though about 70 years of age, then engaged in the work, and continued his labors till 1681, when he died at the age of 93. His grandson succeeded ; and for five generations, till the death of Zechariah Mayhew in 1803, aged 87, that family supplied pastors to the Indians of Martha's Vineyard. Nantucket was included in the scene of their labors.

A iew of the Indian Meeting-house at Marshpee.

In Plymouth colony, an Indian congregation was early gathered at Marshpee, of which the Rev. Richard Bourn was pastor. And among those who labored in this work during Eliot's life, the names of Treat, Tupper and Cotton in Plymouth ; Gookin, Thatcher and Rawson in Massachusetts ; and Fitch and Pierson in Connecticut, ar ementioned with distinguished honor. As the result of these efforts, there were in 1675, fourteen settlements of " praying Indians," and 24 regular congregations. In six of these, churches had been organized. One was at Natick, one at Grafton, one at Marshpee, two on Martha's Vineyard, and one on Nantucket. The population of the 14 towns was 3600 ; and there were 24 Indian preachers.

These Indians were instructed, not only in religion, but also in the arts of civilized life. The men became farmers. They ploughed and sowed and gathered in their harvests. The women learned to spin and weave, to sew and knit, and to perform the various duties of housewifery. Magistrates were appointed to administer justice, and to sustain good morals. The children were gathered into schools, and many of the teachers were educated Indians. They showed, as American Indians have always showed, an uncommon degree both of readiness and ability to throw off their barbarous habits and become civilized men.

< Animating accounts of these labors and conversions were written from time to time, and published in England. They excited intense interest. Liberal contributions were made for defraying the expense of these labors

MISSIONARY SOCIETIES FORMED.

of love. With the sanction of Parliament, collections were taken up in the churches. In 1649, " The Society for Propagating the Gospel in New England" was incorporated. With the funds raised for that purpose, lands were purchased, yielding an income of more than £500 a year, which appears to have been faithfully expended in printing Eliot's translation of the Bible, paying the salaries of Eliot, Mayhew, Bourn and other missionaries, and of several white and Indian school-masters, and in meeting divers other expenses incurred in the prosecution of the work. On the restoration of Charles the Second, the corporation was esteemed dead in law ; and Col. Bedingfield, a Roman Catholic, who had sold the Society an estate worth £322 a year, repossessed himself of the land, and refused to repay the money he had received for it ; but in 1861 a new charter was granted, and the estate was restored to the Society. The celebrated Robert Boyle was among the most zealous and influential of those who procured the new charter, and was made " governor" of the Society, which office he held for thirty years. In this second charter, it was called " The Society for Propagating the Gospel among the heathen nations of New England and the parts adjacent in America." Richard Baxter was its earnest and efficient friend. Nor was this all. Cotton Mather was informed by a letter from Dr. Luesden, that the example of New England had awakened the Dutch to attempt the conversion of the heathen in Ceylon, and their other East India possessions, and that multitudes there had been converted to Christianity.^ And in 1698, some zealous members of the Church of England, moved, Bishop Burnet says, by the example of the Dissenters, whose evangelical labors they admired, formed the " Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge," which is so well known for its labors in various parts of the world, and especially for the support it afforded to Swartz and his missionary brethren in Southern India.

In 1701, the English " Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts" was instituted. Most writers confound this with the " Society for Propagating the Gospel in New England," already mentioned ; but they are distinct societies, and for many years each carried on its own system of operations in New England. This was an era of missionary enterprise. In 1705, the Danes commenced a mission in Southern India, and another in Greenland in 1708. The " Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge" was formed at Edinburgh in 1709. In 1725, Berkeley the philosopher, then Dean of Deny, and afterwards Bishop of Cloyne, published his " Schemes for Converting the Savage Americans to Christianity," by a College which he proposed to establish at Bermuda, and to which he was ready to devote his life and fortune. Having obtained some private subscriptions, and a promise from the government of a grant of land and £20,000 in money, he came to Rhode Island in 1728 ; but the promise of the government was never fulfilled, and having made some generous donations to Yale College and to several clergymen, he returned to Europe in 1731. In 1732, the first Moravian mission was undertaken. It was to the slaves in the West Indies. The Moravian mission to Greenland was commenced the next year. So extensively had the flame of missionary zeal already pervaded the Protestant world. — But let us return to New England.

*The Dutch obtained possession of a part of Formosa in 163-1. Soon after, Robert Junius and others labored there for the conversion of the natives with great success. The exact date of his labors is doubtful. Mather, in 1697, said it was 50 years ago. If so, he probably left Holland befoie the report of Eliot's labors reached that country. Still, Mather's account of Lucsden's letter favors the belief, that this mission also was the result of the example of New England. In a few years, the Dutch were expelled from Formosa, and Christianity was extinguished there.

INTRODUCTION.

Philip of Pokanoket had resolved to exterminate the E nropeans from New England and for this purpose, endeavored to combine the whole force of all the Indian tribes in a simultaneous attack upon them. The war began in 1675. A warrior and statesman so sagacious as Philip could not overlook the Christian Indians. He must have done all in his power, both by persuasions and by threats, to procure their assistance; and it would have been strange if none had been found, of all the unrenewed in the Christian towns, to regard his enterprise with favor ; and it was inevitable that they should be suspected. Yet there is reason to believe that very few, if any of them, entered into Philip's designs. Eliot loudly asserted their innocence, and thereby brought upon himself no little odium. They suffered from both parties. Some were put to death by Philip, for betraying his designs ; some fell in battle against his followers ; some were executed by the authority of the Massachusetts colony, as his accomplices ; some were the victims of a partisan warfare, carried on against all Indians indiscriminately, Finally, the legislature, probably with the double view of protecting them and guarding against them, ordered them all to be gathered into five towns, which they must not leave without a white protector ; and afterwards, 500 of them were removed to Deer Island, and other islands in Boston Bay. When they were released from this confinement, they found many of their towns in ruins, their fields laid Avaste, and their hopeful beginnings in civilization blasted. They renewed their attempts, but never fully recovered from the discouragement and despondency which the events of this war had brought upon them.

Still, the progress of the gospel among the Indians, though interrupted and retarded, went on. In 1685, the praying Indians in Plymouth colony were estimated at 1439. In 1696, there were 30 Indian churches in Massachusetts, some of which had Indian pastors. In 1698, the whole number of Indians in Massachusetts is said to have been 4168, and the number of " converted" Indians 3000. Probably, in this last estimate, all catechumens were reckoned as converts. A great part of those who obstinately adhered to their ancient paganism, had either perished in Philip's Avar, or left the country at its close, and became amalgamated with distant tribes. Others of them were destroyed by the vices, from which nothing but conversion to Christianity can save barbarians who dwell among civilized men.

In Connecticut and Rhode Island, missionary efforts were less successful. The Narragansetts were generally and decidedly opposed to the introduction of Christianity ; though they permitted Roger Williams, as a personal favor, to preach among them occasionally, when he could find leisure from his numerous controversies and secular cares. When the Massachusetts colony attempted by negociation to prevent them from joining Philip, they demanded, as one article of the treaty, that no attempts should be made for their conversion. To this, of course, the Puritans could not agree. When Mayhew requested the privilege of preaching among them, one of their sachems told him to preach to his own countrymen, and make them honest in the first place. Yet something was done. Mr. Fitch and Mr. Pierson labored industriously for the conversion of the heathen about them. The Society for propagating the Gospel in New England made donations " for the encouragement of well-deserving Indians" among the

*It does not appear that this war was provoked by any injustice or injury received from the colonists. Phiiip himself never advanced such a pretence. It was, on his part, purely a matter of "state necessity," — to prevent the growth of a community, which would soon become too strong for his people to cope with. It was the same in principle, as the wars undertaken in Europe "[to preserve the balance of power. 1 '

THE ST0CKBR1DGE INDIANS.

Pequots and other tribes, and the Governor of the New Haven colony was one of the agents for distributing them. Mr. James, of Easthampton, fitted himself for the work of instructing the Indians on Long Island, and was engaged in that employment in 1660, at the expense of the same society. And, finally, before the commencement of Philip's war, there were in the vicinity of Norwich, Ct., 40 converted Indians under the care of Mr. Fitch, pastor of the church in Norwich; but Uncas, the great sachem of that region, would not suffer any of his people to be gathered into Christian towns. Subsequent labors were more successful.

In 1733, the Rev. Mr. Parks, sustained by the same society, began to preach to the Indians in Westerly and Charlestown, R. I. From the beginning, his labors seem to hare been moderately successful. But in February, 1743, a number of Christian Indians from Stonington, Ct., came to visit their countrymen ; and from that time the awakening seemed to be almost universal. They abandoned their dances and drunken revels, and crowded the places of worship. Within a little more than a year, more than 60 were received into the church. The whole community appears to have become nominally Christians. A few years later, the number of truly pious persons among the Narragansetts, was thought to be at least 70; of the Pequots, about 20; of the Neanticks, 6 or 7 ; of the Mohegans, 20 or 30 ; of the Montauk tribe, on the eastern end of Long Island, where the Rev. Mr. Horton had labored for several years, 1-5 or 16; besides a considerable number of the Stonington tribe.

Mr. Horton, who has just been mentioned, was sustained by the Society in Scotland for promoting Christian Knowledge. In 1730, that society had appointed a committee at Boston, through whom some missions had been commenced with little success. This committee continues, to the present time, to expend a part of the annual income of that society ; and the mission of the American Board among the Stockbridge Indians is now in part sustained by its appropriations. — In 1741, the Society appointed a similar committee at New York, and by them Mr. Horton was stationed on Long Island. In the course of two or three years, he baptized 35 adults and 44 children. The mission was abandoned in 1753, but the church continued for many years afterwards.

In 1734, Mr. John Sergeant resigned his office as tutor in Yale College, to commence a mission among "the Stockbridge Indians ; or rather, among the wandering Mohegans, whom his labors ultimately collected at Stockbridge into a tribe which still bears that name. His hearers were few at first, but soon increased ; and in a few months he baptized more than 50 of them. They began to collect and build their town in ■ May, 1736. That year, they planted three times as much corn as they had ever done before. A house of worship and a school-house were erected for their accommodation at the expense of the province. In about three years he was able to preach in the Mohegan language, into which he afterwards translated nearly the whole New Testament, considerable parts of the Old, and some other religious works. Placing his chief hopes of success in the education of youth, he formed the plan of a Manual Labor Seminary, in, which the pupils should contribute to their own support, the boys by agricultural labor, and the girls by housewifery. Subscriptions were solicited for that purpose in England, but they amounted only to an insufficient sum. Mr. Hollis, however, the founder of the Hollis professorship at Harvard College, provided for the education of twelve boys. Afterwards, he doubled the number, and finally, as some say, raised it to thirty-six. Land was procured, a school-house was built, and some of the boys were collected ; when Mr. Sergeant was removed by death, at the age of 39, in