Part 9

“May 1647. Whereas God hath committed the care and power into the hands of parents for the disposing of their children in marriage, so that it is against rule to seek to draw away the affection of young maidens under pretence of purpose of marriage, before their parents have given way and allowance in that respect; and whereas it is a common practice in divers places for young men irregularly and disorderly to watch all advantages for their evil purposes to insinuate into the affections of young maidens, by coming to them in places and seasons unknown to their parents for such ends, whereby much evil hath grown amongst us to the dishonor of God and damage of parties; for prevention whereof for time to come:

It is further ordered that whatsoever person from henceforth shall endeavour, directly or indirectly, to draw away the affection of any maid in this jurisdiction, under pretence of marriage, before he hath obtained liberty and allowance from her parents or governors, or in the absence of such, of the nearest magistrate, he shall forfeit for the first offence five pounds, for the second towards the party ten pounds, and be bound to forbear any further attempt and proceedings in that unlawful design without or against the allowance aforesaid; and for the third offence upon information or complaint by such parents or governors to any Magistrate, giving bond to prosecute the party, he shall be committed to prison; and upon hearing and conviction by the next court, shall be adjudged to continue in prison until the court of assistants shall see fit to release him.”

In 1641, before this statute was enacted, a case occurred which Mr. Pynehon records, in which he sentenced parties for the misconduct forbidden by this statute. This must have been under his general authority to examine misdemeanors and inflict corporal punishment.

“January 11, 1640, it is ordered that John Hobell shall be well whipt by the constable for two misdemeanors, first for proceeding to get promises of marriage from Abigail Burt, after that both he and she had been prohibited by her father several times (and also for offering and attempting to doe the act of fornication with her as they both confesse, though as far as we can discerne by any proof of justice the act was not done).

Also Abigail Burt is found guilty in both the said faults, and is also to be well whipt by the constable for the said faults.”

COMMON RAILERS AND BRAWLERS were punishable by the old provincial laws as they are by our present laws, but in a different way. A curious case is recorded by Mr. Holyoke as having come before the courts at the time John Pynehon, Samuel Chapin and Eliziar Holyoke were the Magistrates.

“March 13, 1655—Obadiah Miller complaynes against Joane, his wife, for abusing him with reproachfull tearmes or names as calling him foole, toad, vermine and threateninge him; as also for yt yesterday shee fell upon him endeavoring to beat him, at which tyme shee scratched his face and hands. The case being examined it was found that Joane, the wife of Obadiah Miller was guilty of very evil behavior towards her said husband; it being proved by the testimony of John Lamb and Tho. Miller.

John Lamb testifyed he heard her say shee would knock him on the head, and yt shee did often call him foole and other reproachful tearmes.

Thomas Miller testifyed yt wn his brother Obediah, his wife lived with him she did comonly call him foole and vermine; and he doth not remember he ever heard her call him husband, and that shee said shee did not love him but hated him; yea shee here said shee did not love him and shee should not love him.

For which, her vile misbehaviour towards her husband, she was adjudged to be taken forth to ye whipping post, there to receive soe many stripes on ye naked body as ye commissioners should see cause to inflict on her; whereuppon shee was brought forth, but by her humileation and earnest protestations for better carriage towards her said husband, the punishment was remitted and this sentence passed yt for the least miscarriage to her husband after this tyme, shee should be brought forth agayne to receive a good whipping on the naked body well laid on.”

HUSBAND OR WIFE STRIKING.

Colony Laws, Chap. 66.

October 1650. “It is ordered by the Court and authority thereof, that no man shall strike his wife, nor any woman her husband, on penalty of such fine not exceeding ten pounds for one offence, or such corporall punishment as the County Court shall determine.”

The Colony laws regarding the OBSERVANCE OF THE SABBATH were quite numerous and strictly enforced by various penalties.

At a court before the Commissioners John Pynehon, Eliziar Holyoke and Samuel Chapin. May 8th, 1654.

“Daniel, a Scotchman servant to Thomas Merick being found to profhane the Sabbath in idle walkinge about, and not cominge to ye ordinances of ye Lord, yea though he had warninge to ye contrary; and being also complayned of by his said master for his grevious idleness in neglecting his busyness for severall dayes, yea synce he was called before authority for the like misbehaviour formerly at wh tyme he promised amendment; but he grew worse and worse and therefore was adjudged to be whipped on ye bare back wth five lashes well laid on, and execution was done accordingly.”

Another case in which four young men were charged with violation of the Sabbath was attended with this peculiarity—that two of the culprits were sons of Holyoke, one of the two Magistrates before whom the trial was had.

This trial was in 1664, and was thus recorded in the handwriting of Holyoke.

“Thomas Noble, Constable, presenting Thomas Thomson and John Horton for that last Sabb., was fortnight, June ye 7, they made a fray in ye street in ye evening about ½ an hour after sunsett. Samuel & Elizar Holyoke being accessory in ye said fray.

The Commissioners uppon examination of ye case doe fynd that the said foure persons did profane the Lord’s day, and therefor doe determine that they all shall be admonished thereof & that Thomas Thomson, John Horton, and Samuel Holyoke shall pay a fyne of five shillings apeece to the County, or be whipped by the Constable on ye naked body with three stripes apeece; whereuppon they were all admonished & the 3 former desiring to pay ye fynes, then otherwise were ordered to pay them to ye County Treasurer.”

Samuel Holyoke upon whom this sentence was passed by his own father, was then a boy of seventeen years. Twelve years afterwards in 1676, he was the Capt. Holyoke who so greatly distinguished himself in the celebrated Falls fight with the Indians.

ASSAULTING OF WOMEN.

PROVINCE LAWS CH. 105-1711.

SEC. 2. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that whosoever shall be convicted of assaulting or offering any insolence or violence to any woman or mankind in the fields, streets or lanes in any town, or of despoiling them, damnifying or defacing of their attire or ornaments, or attempting the same, shall be punished by being publickly whipped, not exceeding two stripes, or by being committed to the house of correction to receive the discipline of the house and continue there by the space of thirty days.

The discipline of the house by a law passed in 1699, included among other things, “moderate whipping not exceeding ten stripes at once, which shall be inflicted at their first coming in and from time to time, in case they be stubborn, disorderly or idle.”

(At a Court holden at Northampton, June 19, 1672, John Edwards, of Northampton, who came to that place from Virginia, was tried for some misdemeanor in lascivious carriage towards divers women of Northampton, and the case being searched into. It is found and proved yt the sd Edwards hath been notoriously lascivious and hath carried himself very debauchedly towards diverse women of N (as by test on file appears) and yt he hathe traded? this way:)

“The Courte doth adjudge him to be whipt on ye naked body with 20 stripes well laid on.”

A different case with a different penalty is this. At a County Corte holden at Northampton, March 31, 1674.

“Martin Smith, resident at Pacomtuck, being bound over to this Corte by N. Comiss: for offering abuse to Jedidiak Strong’s wife (in ye street near her father Woodwards house) laying hold on her to kiss her as shee thinks, and she testifying her offence to be soe affronted whereby shee sayth also shee was somewhat affrighted; he appearing in Corte and owning his fact and condemning himself and seeming sorrowful that he should be left to such folly, was fyned only 20s. to be pd to ye Treasurer and 2s. and 6d. as ye Recorder’s fees.”

SITTING IN THE STOCKS was a mode of punishment for certain offences to which persons of either sex were sometimes subjected. Occasionally it was ordered as an alternative sentence in a case where the culprit failed to pay the fine imposed.

Webster’s Unabridged describes the stocks as a machine consisting of a frame of timber, with holes in which the feet, or the feet and hands of the criminals were confined by way of punishment. The picture gives a much better idea of this punishment than can be gained from the definition. The offender sits on a bench with a high back, his feet projecting through two holes in an upright plank in front secured so that they cannot be withdrawn or moved. In this situation he can neither lie down or stand up, but must remain fixed until released. The stocks were usually located in some public place where the culprit could be seen by all passers by—and not seldom he was subjected to the taunts and ridicule of the crowd that were sure to gather on such an occasion.

PROFANE CURSING AND SWEARING was one of the offences subjecting the transgressor to the punishment of the stocks.

COLONY LAWS, CHAP. 94.

AN ACT AGAINST SWEARING AND CURSING.

“SEC. 1. It is ordered by this Court and authority thereof, that if any person within this jurisdiction shall swear rashly or vainly by the holy name of God, or other oath, he shall forfeit to the common treasury for every such offence ten shillings; and it shall be in the power of any Magistrate by warrant to the constable, to call such person before him, and upon sufficient proof to sentence such offender, and to give order to levy the fine; and if such person be not able or shall refuse to pay the said fine, he shall be committed to the stocks, there to continue not exceeding three hours nor less than one hour.

SEC. 2. And if any person shall swear more oaths than one at a time before he remove out of the room or company where he so swears, he shall then pay 20 shillings. The like penalty shall be inflicted for profane and wicked cursing of any person or creature, and for the multiplying the same as is appointed for profane swearing, and in case any person so offending by multiplying oaths or cursing, shall not pay his or their fines forthwith, they shall be whipt or committed to prison till they shall pay the same at the discretion of the Court or Magistrate that shall have cognyance thereof.”

The wife of Henry Gregory, one of the early settlers here, transgressed this law, and her case came before Mr. William Pynehon as a Magistrate. His record of it is as follows under date of February 15, 1640:

“Goody Gregory being accused by oath of John Woodcoke & Richard Williams for swearing before God I could break thy head: She did acknowledge it was her great sin & fault & saith she hath bin much humbled for it.

She is fined 12d (12 pence) to the poore to be paid to Henry Smyth within a month; or if she doe not she is to sit 3 hours in the stocks.”

COMMON SCOLD.

By the English common law in force here in the early times a common scold was liable to a peculiar form of punishment. Blackstone (4 Black. Com. 168) says:

“A common scold—communis rixatrix—(for our law confines it to the feminine gender) is a public nuisance to her neighborhood for which offence she may be indicted, and if convicted shall be sentenced to be placed in a certain engine of correction called the trebucket, castigatory or cucking stool, which in the Saxon language is said to signify the scolding stool, though now it is frequently corrupted into ducking stool, because the residue of the judgment is that when she is placed therein she shall be plunged in the water for her punishment.”

Oct. 24, 1673—“John Petty complaines agt Goodwife Hunter for offering to mischiefe his wife & giving her ill language; calling her as ye testimonys speake:

Railing, scolding & other exorbitancys of ye Young appearing as by ye Testimonys of Mary Brookes & Mercy Johns on file & also ye neighbors, declaring her continual trade upon every occasion to be exorbitant in her Toung as particularly Sam Marshfull & John Bagg so declared. I sentenced her to be gaged or else set on a ducking stool & dipped in water as law provides. Shee to choose wh of ym shee pleases within this half houre; or else I do determine & order either as I see cause. Shee not choosing either, I order her to be gagged & so to stand half an hour in ye open street wh was done accordingly; & for her reproaching Goodie Petty shoe did openly cleare her of all shee spake agt her & asked forgiveness wch G. Petty accepting of shee was released as to yt.”

The Puritan Fathers are often blamed on account of their witchcraft persecutions. Long after Massachusetts had confessed her wrong-doing, England and Germany put people to death for witchcraft. Twenty-five years after persecution had ceased in New England, Chief Justice Matthew Hale, of England, sent a mother and her little daughter to the scaffold for the same offence; and one hundred and one years afterwards Germany did likewise. The age in which these men lived is responsible for these things, and not the men themselves. They were founders of schools, and were not intolerant. I do not believe in the cry of the “good old times” simply. There are more good men and women now than ever before. I think it almost unfortunate to explain away witchcraft and some other peculiar things of those times, as then some people would have nothing to talk about and sneer at and criticise the Pilgrim Fathers. Some persons like to continue this. Dr. Blake of Boston, says that a good Baptist brother had often met him and chaffingly asked, “How is Roger Williams to-day?” when Mr. Blake, tiring of the question, answered, “Oh, he is warm and dry by this time.” The Pilgrims had especially three noble qualities: Earnestness, definiteness of belief and stalwartness of spiritual life.

GENERAL WILLIAM EMERSON STRONG.

With the death of General William E. Strong of Chicago, in April of the present year, there passed away another of the distinguished volunteer soldiers of the United States who won distinction during the War of the Rebellion, and at the close of that great conflict returned to civil life to become the flower of American manhood, and a perfect representative of American citizenship. Brave, loyal and patriotic, when the call came for his services in support of the Union he was prompt to respond, and was a faithful and gallant soldier until the struggle was ended and victory achieved. When that time came it found him equally ready to return to peaceful pursuits in which in later years his high character and ability made him both successful and distinguished.

William Emerson Strong was born in Granville, in Washington County, New York, August 10, 1840. The family to which he belonged was one of the oldest and most noted of the Puritan families of New England. Elder John Strong, the founder of the family in America, was a native of Taunton, England—where his ancestors had been honorably mentioned in public records as long ago as 1545. He sailed from Plymouth in the ship “Mary and John,” March 20th, 1630, in company with one hundred and forty other persons. They landed at Nantasket, (twelve miles s. e. of Boston) at the end of a voyage of more than seventy days, and John Strong settled at Northampton, Massachusetts. Here several generations of his descendants lived, and from thence representatives of the family drifted into other States, to become conspicuous in all the walks of life.

One of these descendants, but three or four generations removed from the pilgrim John Strong was Caleb Strong, one of the framers of the Federal Constitution, Governor of Massachusetts from 1800 to 1807, and again from 1812 to 1816, and also one of the first United States Senators from the “Old Bay State.”

Other representatives of the family who have achieved extraordinary distinction have been Gen. George C. Strong, who was mortally wounded while leading the Federal troops in the assault on Fort Wagner, July 18th, 1863, Rear Admiral James Hooker Strong of the United States Navy, Theron R. Strong, at one time a Judge of the Supreme Court of New York State, William Strong one of the most noted of American jurists, and Simeon Strong, who sat on the Supreme Court Bench of Massachusetts from 1800 to 1805.

General William E. Strong was descended on the father’s side from the Emerson family of New England, one of his near kinsmen being Ralph Waldo Emerson, the poet-philosopher, whose name is revered by all those who appreciate the purest and best in intellectual culture.

Gen. Strong’s father, John Emerson Strong, was a wealthy manufacturer and merchant of Granville, New York, up to 1849, when he met with business reverses which changed the character of his business and led him to seek a new location. In the spring of 1853 he removed from New York to Wisconsin, and settled with his family at Jefferson Prairie, in Rock County, where he purchased a farm and turned his attention to bringing it under cultivation. His son William was at this time thirteen years of age. Prior to the removal of the family from New York he had enjoyed all the educational advantages afforded by the excellent schools of the town in which he had lived and had made good progress in his studies. From the time he was thirteen until he was seventeen years of age however, he was busily employed at work on his father’s farm and only attended school during the winter months of each year with the exception of one year, when he had the privilege of spending six months in the preparatory department of Beloit College.

In the fall of 1856 when he was in his seventeenth year, he entered the law office of Strong & Fuller, at Racine, Wisconsin, and under their preceptorship began the study of law. He was at that time an active, manly young fellow, and he entered upon the work of fitting himself for a professional career with all the ardor, enthusiasm and determination which characterized him in later years. Whatever he undertook to do, he endeavored to do better than it had been done before. In everything he strove to excel, and in this he observed the spirit of the old motto “Tentanda est Via,” placed upon the Strong escutcheon three hundred years ago.

After a time he temporarily dropped his law studies and went to Phillips Academy at Andover, Massachusetts, where he prepared for college and was admitted to the sophomore class of Harvard. Before completing his college course however, he determined to enter upon the practice of law, and in accordance with the course he had mapped out for himself, he made application for admission to the bar of Wisconsin. He was examined at Racine, in open court, by a committee appointed for the purpose in accordance with the usages of that period, and the examination being passed successfully he was duly authorized to begin practicing his profession in the courts of the First Judicial Circuit of Wisconsin. This was in 1861, and it will be observed that notwithstanding the fact that he had had to contend with disadvantages of various kinds, before he was twenty-one years of age he had fitted himself to enter the profession in which so large a number of those bearing the same name and belonging to the same stock had achieved unusual distinction.

The day he received the certificate which entitled him to begin the practice of law, was that which brought the news of the fall of Fort Sumpter. This suddenly changed all his plans, and ultimately the whole course of his life. At once he resolved to tender his services to the government, and on the same day that President Lincoln issued his first call for volunteers, he was regularly enlisted in the government service. He proceeded to raise a company, known as the Belle City Rifles, which was assigned to the Second Regiment of Wisconsin Infantry. When the company was organized, William E. Strong was commissioned Captain and went into the field in command of it, the regiment becoming part of a brigade commanded by Colonel (afterward General) W. T. Sherman. He retained the command of the company between four and five months, participating in the battle of Blackburn’s Fort and Bull Run. He was also in command of his company when the next advance of the army into Virginia was made by way of Chain Ridge. It was during his first campaign that Captain Strong met with one of his most thrilling experiences, and demonstrated that his fighting qualities were such as could be depended upon under all circumstances. At one time while extending his picket line, he ventured too far out and found himself inside the lines of the enemy. Before he could retire from this embarrassing and dangerous position he was surrounded by a band of five confederates, three of whom were mounted and two of whom were on foot, and was taken prisoner. The confederates demanded his pistols, and with great courtesy and suavity he responded “certainly gentlemen,” at the same time drawing the weapons from their holsters. His “suaviter in modo” threw his enemies off their guard, but he had no intention of being captured without a struggle, and no sooner were the pistols in his hands than they were brought to bear on the confederates and two of them fell at his first fire. The suddenness and vigor of the attack caused the remaining captors to beat a retreat, and Captain Strong reached the Federal lines in safety. In this encounter he was shot through the cheek, but although the wound was painful he did not regard it as serious and did not allow it to interfere with his regular discharge of his military duties.