GIFT OF 
 
 1 HQMAS RUTHERFORD BACON 
 MEMORIAL LIBRARY 
 

 
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 SKETCH 
 
 Rev. David Bacon 
 
 Rev. LEONARD BACON, D. D. 
 
 Reprint from the Congregational Quarterly, 1S76. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 CONGREGATIONAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY. 
 
 1876. 
 
f 
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 ALFRED MUDGE & SON, 
 34 School Street, Boston. 
 
DAVID BACON. 
 
 In the North Cemetery at Hartford, Conn , a simple head- 
 stone bears this inscription : — 
 
 &o % mernorg of 
 The Rev. DAVID BACON, 
 
 A HUMBLE MISSIONARY OF THE CROSS, 
 
 who, having passed through 
 
 many scenes of suffering 
 
 in his efforts to extend 
 
 The Redeemer's Kingdom, 
 
 entered into his rest 
 
 August 27th, A. D. 1817, 
 
 in the 46th Year of his Age. 
 
 Few and far advanced in life are those who can have any 
 personal memory of a man who rested from his labors almost 
 sixty years ago. The name inscribed on that marble is not 
 found in Sprague's " Annals of the American Pulpit," nor was 
 it ever the theme of biography in a religious magazine ; yet 
 in various places, and especially in one town and church of 
 northern Ohio, a tradition of the name, and of what the man 
 was who bore it, lives, and is beginning to be invested with 
 mythical associations. I have hoped that, in my old age, I 
 might find time to write out my recollections of him, with what 
 I have learned about him from authentic sources, so that my 
 children, and theirs after them, may share in the benefit of his 
 example, as well as in God's answer to his prayers. But my 
 
 267979 
 
old age has, thus far, brought me so little leisure that perhaps 
 that work of filial piety and of paternal forethought would 
 never have been begun, and certainly nothing of it would have 
 been given to the public, had not the editor of the Congrega- 
 tional Quarterly invited me to make this beginning. 
 
 The records of the First Church in Woodstock, Conn., show, 
 in the fair handwriting of Abiel Leonard, then pastor of that 
 church, that on the 9th of August, 1764, "Joseph Bacon of 
 Stoughton, Mass., and Abigail Holmes, of Woodstock," were 
 married. Stoughton was originally a part of Dedham ; and 
 Michael Bacon, of whom Joseph is known to have been a de- 
 scendant, was among the planters of that town, his name appear- 
 ing on the records there as early as 1640. By what ordering of 
 the Divine Providence it was that Joseph Bacon, of Stoughton, 
 found a wife sixty miles away, at Woodstock, I do not know ; 
 for, though there had been Bacons in Woodstock ever since 
 the first settlers came from what was once Roxbury, but is 
 now Boston Highlands, our Joseph was not of their kindred. 
 Not to encumber these pages with particulars of family his- 
 tory, uninteresting to the public and unnecessary to the 
 completeness of my story, I may say that the earliest years of 
 Joseph and Abigail's married life were passed in Stoughton or 
 Dedham ; that their second child, the eldest son, born there, 
 was named Leonard, in affectionate remembrance of the 
 Woodstock pastor ; and that after a few years they dwelt for 
 a while at Woodstock, where their third son (the fifth of their 
 children) was born in 1771, and was baptized on the 15 th of 
 September by the name of David. 
 
 When I was a little child living at home, I heard, of course, 
 many incidents of my father's early life ; but having neglected 
 to correct and confirm my imperfect memory of them while 
 there were survivors to whom I could appeal, I dare not now 
 attempt to tell the story of how he was brought up, and of 
 the various influences and experiences under which his char- 
 acter was formed. His mother died when he had not yet 
 completed his eighth year ; but the reverent and most loving 
 remembrance of her among her children assures me that from 
 her they inherited much that was better than riches, and that, 
 
though she left them early, her faithful care and love had 
 wrought effectually for their spiritual welfare. Of her six 
 children who lived to maturity, every one, I believe, made 
 profession of a personal faith and hope in Christ ; and of those 
 whom I knew, others besides the subject of this memoir were 
 eminently characterized by the old Puritan godliness. 
 
 Joseph Bacon, the father of those children, and of other sons 
 and daughters, the offspring of a later marriage, was of the 
 same type. He seems to have been ingenious and enter- 
 prising, but never in any high degree successful. I remember 
 the story (told by his eldest son) that at one time, when the 
 War of Independence had made the importation of foreign 
 goods impracticable, he invented and undertook a method of 
 printing (in imitation of calico) the home-made linen of which 
 every farmer's house had its store. His process was like that 
 by which I have seen paper-hangings printed without 
 machinery. With his own hands he cut the figures on blocks 
 of wood, and printed the white linen with such colors as he 
 could obtain from native dye-stuffs like the yellow blossoms of 
 the golden-rod. After several emigrations to places in Massa- 
 chusetts, — Amherst, Sterling, and Holden, — he removed 
 with all the family save Leonard and David to the northern 
 part of Vermont, where he died at Cambridge in January, 
 1803. " Blessed be God," wrote one of his sons to another, on 
 receiving the intelligence of that event, " we have reason to 
 believe that our dear father has been convoyed by angels from 
 this vale of tears to the mansions of glory. I join with you in 
 praying that we may imitate him in his simple and unaffected 
 piety towards God and in his benevolence to man, by which 
 he was distinguished from most, if not all, among whom he 
 lived, and by which he shone as a light in the world." 
 
 David Bacon had all his father's mechanical ingenuity and 
 dexterity. I have no means of knowing how early he left his 
 home, or from whom he received the instruction which pre- 
 pared him for teaching a school. His first serious enterprise 
 for himself seems to have been a short-lived partnership with 
 his stepmother's son by her former husband, in the manu- 
 facture and sale of spinning-wheels at Troy, N. Y., when 
 Troy had just begun to be. I remember having heard him 
 
speak of being under the ministry of Dr. Jonas Coe, the first 
 pastor of the Presbyterian Church in that place. About that 
 time (probably after the failure of hi9 business enterprise) he 
 found employment for a season as a teacher somewhere in 
 Washington County, N. Y. For all that portion of his 
 life there is no sort of record, therefore I cannot tell when 
 or where it was that he began to be conscious of peace with 
 God through Jesus Christ ; but well do I remember that, in 
 one of his long and earnest talks with me about my own salva- 
 tion, while I was a boy of less than thirteen years, he told me 
 something of his early religious experience, — how sweetly, 
 after long anxiety and fear, the sense of God's love came to 
 him with the submission of himself to God's will, and how, in 
 the silence and solitude of night, he could not refrain from 
 repeating the psalm, — 
 
 " Sweet is the work, my God, my King," 
 
 singing it in a murmur (though he was never musical) to the 
 old tune of Bridgewater. Mere poetry had for him, I think, 
 no great fascination ; but devotional poetry, that of our best 
 psalms and hymns, was often an inspiration to him. The 
 psalm, 
 
 " Early, my God, without delay," 
 
 sung in public worship, would sometimes fill his eyes with 
 tears. That grand lyric, 
 
 " Father, how wide thy glories shine," 
 
 was a delight to him. Nor can I ever read 
 
 " The deluge, at the Almighty's call," 
 
 without seeming to catch an echo of his voice reading it in the 
 family, full two thirds of ja. century ago. 
 
 In my childhood I received from him an impression con- 
 cerning the " Life of David Brainerd," as if it were not very far 
 below the level of the canonical Scriptures. His reading of 
 that book must have been connected in some way with his 
 own experience of conversion. Probably its influence on his 
 theory of Christian experience was not, in every respect, the 
 best that could be ; but from the beginning of his own new 
 life his soul was fired by the example of Brainerd's self-conse- 
 
cration and self-sacrifice. He felt that to labor, like Brainerd, 
 in the service of the gospel among the most benighted of his 
 fellow-men, was the highest vocation to which he could aspire. 
 He determined that, if it were possible, he would be a mis- 
 sionary to the Indians. But how could he realize such an 
 aspiration ? He was already too old to think of college and of 
 entering the ministry through that gate ; nor was there, as 
 yet, any missionary institution to send him forth into the 
 wilderness. 
 
 From his sojourn in the State of New York he returned to 
 Connecticut, and in 1799, perhaps earlier, he was at Mansfield, 
 where his eldest brother had established himself as a physician. 
 He taught a school, I believe, and was at the same time learn- 
 ing, under the instruction of Rev. John Sherman, who was 
 then the young and zealous pastor there, and under whose 
 ministry (though he afterwards lapsed from the communion of 
 the Connecticut churches) that parish, so long taught and 
 guarded by Dr. Richard Salter, had its share in the religious 
 awakening which marks the transition from the eighteenth 
 century to the nineteenth. The records of the Mansfield 
 church show that David Bacon was one of its members, and 
 that he was received by dismission from some other church not 
 named. 
 
 At that time the " Associated Pastors " of Connecticut were 
 just completing their organization as a missionary society. 
 Their earliest efforts for evangelization beyond the limits of 
 the State were made in some of the local or district " associ- 
 ations," one of the pastors going on horseback with his saddle- 
 bags to perform a few weeks of itinerant labor in " the new 
 settlements " of Vermont, his pulpit, meanwhile, being supplied 
 by his associated brethren. After two or three years of such 
 effort, the work was undertaken on a somewhat larger scale 
 by the " General Association," representing all the u Associ- 
 ated Pastors " in the State. Emigration from Connecticut was 
 beginning to spread over the great West, which is now known 
 as Central and Northern New York, and each " new settle- 
 ment" in the wilderness needed for a while, till it should have 
 its own church and pastor, the frequent visits of a missionary. 
 The desultory labors of such pastors as could be spared, each 
 
8 
 
 for a brief " mission," were inadequate to a work which was 
 becoming so wide and so distant. Competent ministers, with 
 no pastoral charge at home, must be sent forth to itinerate in 
 the new settlements, and must be sustained by the liberality 
 of good people in old Connecticut. In 1798 the General Asso- 
 ciation constituted itself " The Missionary Society of Connec- 
 ticut," and in that character was incorporated by the legislature 
 four years later. The old relations between the churches and 
 the State had not been entirely dissolved, and therefore, to 
 provide a revenue for the Missionary Society, the governor 
 was authorized to issue a " brief," year by year, calling for a 
 contribution on the first Sabbath in May from each Congrega- 
 tional parish in the State. 1 
 
 It would have been strange if the Associated Pastors of 
 Connecticut, when they constituted their Missionary Society, 
 had made no reference to the Indians. The work begun in 
 the seventeenth century by Eliot, Pierson, and the Mayhews 
 had been continued by the Brainerds (David and John), by Jon- 
 athan Edwards for a time, and by John Sergeant and others ; 
 but from the beginning it had been sustained largely by con- 
 tributions from England and Scotland. One consequence of 
 the Revolution by which these English colonies had become an 
 independent nation was that the Indian tribes, within the limits 
 conceded to the United States, being no longer related in any 
 way to the British Empire, the work of spreading the gospel 
 among them was not only to be performed as before by Amer- 
 ican missionaries, but was also to be sustained thenceforth by 
 American contributions. The Missionary Society of Connec- 
 ticut, therefore, proposed to care for the heathen tribes of the 
 wilderness as well as for those adventurers into the wilder- 
 ness who were in danger of becoming heathen. It was in 
 June, 1798, that the Constitution of the Society was adopted at 
 Hebron, with the express announcement, " The object of the 
 
 1 The "brief " or proclamation from the governor enabled the minister to call 
 for a contribution without asking leave from the church or the society. It car- 
 ried no coercion with it. Where the minister had no sympathy with the cause or 
 was afraid of possible opposition among his people, the brief would pass without 
 notice. As the usage is now not only obsolete but almost forgotten, the writer 
 may add that it did not cease till after the commencement of his pastorate. The 
 last proclamation of that sort was issued by Gov. Wolcott in 1826. 
 
Society is to christianize the heathen in North America, and 
 to support and promote Christian knowledge in the new set- 
 tlements within the United States." Whether, at that time, 
 the subject of this memoir had already been in communication 
 with any of the pastors who formed the Society and denned 
 its object, I do not know ; but I find him very soon afterward 
 preparing himself for a mission to the Indians. 
 
 As the founding of the Missionary Society at London, in 
 1793, had been followed by the establishment of an " Evangel- 
 ical Magazine," which, being conducted in the interest of 
 evangelical Calvinism, became a medium of communication 
 between the Missionary Society and its supporters, so the 
 " Connecticut Evangelical Magazine " came into being, not as 
 an official organ, but rather as an auxiliary institution, co-oper- 
 ating with the Missionary Society of Connecticut, though not 
 in any way controlled by it. l Its first issue, bearing date 
 July, 1800, contained an official announcement from the 
 Trustees of the Missionary Society of Connecticut " relative 
 to a mission among the Indians." They had determined at a 
 late meeting " that a discreet man, animated by the love of 
 God and souls, of a good common education, who can be 
 obtained for a moderate compensation, be sought for to travel 
 among the Indian tribes south and west of Lake Erie, to 
 explore their situation, and learn their feelings with respect to 
 Christianity, and, so far as he has opportunity, to teach them 
 its doctrines and duties." They had also determined "that 
 said missionary, with the advice of the Rev. Mr. Sergeant of 
 New Stockbridge, obtain from among his Indians a pious 
 guide and interpreter to accompany him in his travels." So 
 far had the plan been matured that " a system of instructions " 
 for the missionary, and a "message" or "talk" five columns 
 in length, introducing the missionary " to the Indian tribes 
 bordering on Lake Erie," and explaining the views and hopes 
 
 1 The Trustees of the Missionary Society were " six civilians and six clergy- 
 men." Five of the six clergymen were also among the fifteen editors of the 
 Magazine. The word " civilian," I think, was not used as exactly synonymous 
 with " layman," but rather as implying civil office, or some eminence in civil as 
 distinguished from ecclesiastical affairs. Through a long series of years, the six 
 civilians in the Board of Trustees were always designated as " Honorable," being 
 members of the Council or " Upper House." 
 2 
 
IO 
 
 of the good people who were sending him on so benevolent 
 an errand, were published in connection with the official 
 announcement. The name of the "discreet man, animated by 
 the love of God and souls, and of a good common education," 
 who would require only " a moderate compensation," was not 
 given at that time to the public ; but evidently the Trustees 
 were already in communication with him. 
 
 While these good men, the Trustees and others, had been 
 deliberating about an Indian Mission, and contriving to make 
 it inexpensive to the contributors, the future missionary had 
 been preparing himself for the work. Probably his study of 
 theology was not very extensive, but it was according to the 
 fashion of those times when there were no theological semi- 
 naries. His principal teacher was the Rev. Levi Hart, of 
 Preston ; but he seems to have studied also with Rev. Samuel 
 Nott, of Franklin, and with Rev. Zebulon Ely, of Lebanon. 1 
 The late Dr. Ezra Stiles Ely, of Philadelphia, writing to me in 
 1849, sa id incidentally, " I have a fresh remembrance of your 
 father, in his black deer-skin breeches, when he studied theol- 
 ogy with my father in my chamber." 
 
 Lebanon had a special attraction for the missionary student 
 of theology. The first number of the " Evangelical Magazine," 
 which has been mentioned as announcing the plan of a mis- 
 sion to the Indians, contained also " A Letter from a Young 
 Woman to her Pastor, giving some Account of the Exercises of 
 her Mind," and subscribed, " Your inexperienced Eliza." A 
 manuscript copy of that letter, worn and yellow, in I know not 
 whose handwriting, is in my possession. It is identical with 
 the printed copy, save in the name subscribed, which is " Your 
 inexperienced Alice." The "pastor" was pastor of the 
 church in Lebanon, and the letter, dated March 1, 1800, was 
 written by Alice Parks, a young parishioner of his, who, on the 
 twenty-seventh of the following month, was received, with 
 others, to the communion of that church. "Alice," as I heard 
 
 1 Dr. Hart's study, like that of Dr. Backus in Somers, was one of the Divinity- 
 Schools which Connecticut had in those days. Dr. Nott's son, Samuel Nott, Jr., 
 was one of the first company of missionaries sent to India some twelve years later 
 by the American Board of Commissioners. Mr. Ely was pastor in Lebanon from 
 the time when the humble edifice which, when Jonathan Trumbull was a mer- 
 chant, had been his place of business, was the " war office " for Connecticut. 
 Messrs. Hart and Ely were among the editors of the " Evangelical Magazine." 
 
' II 
 
 Mr. Ely call her twenty years afterward, was a favorite with 
 him ; and so long as she lived, she retained among the treas- 
 ured relics of her girlhood some of her pastor's letters to her 
 written about that time, and now valued by her children's chil- 
 dren not only as testimonies of his esteem for her, but also as 
 evidence that the diligent pastor was availing himself of her 
 religious influence among her youthful friends. To him, the 
 letter, written at his request to describe the mental conflicts 
 through which she had passed, and which had ended in a con- 
 sciousness of peace with God through Christ, seemed an 
 exceptionally valuable record of Christian experience. Copies 
 of it appear to have been made for some of his friends ; and 
 either the original or the copy now in my possession came into 
 the hands of Mr. Bacon. He had never seen the writer, but he 
 could say to her, " I have in some measure become acquainted 
 with you by means of our worthy and honored friend, the Rev. 
 Mr. Ely," and with that reference he introduced himself to her 
 in a simply fraternal letter of counsel to a beginner in the 
 Christian life. The correspondence led to personal acquaint- 
 ance, and the acquaintance had become mutual affection and 
 engagement before that " Letter from a Young Woman to her 
 Pastor " had been sent to the printer by some officious friend. 1 
 The second issue of the Magazine, only two or three weeks 
 after the first, 2 gave no additional information about the 
 
 1 Alice Parks, who became the wife of the Rev. David Bacon, was a daughter of 
 Elijah Parks and his wife, Anna Beaumont. She was born at Bethlehem, Conn., 
 February, 1783. At the death of her father, when she was only seven years of 
 age, she was taken by her grandfather, William Beaumont, to his home in 
 Lebanon, and by him and his wife, Sarah Everett, she was brought up as their 
 child. The little girl became the darling of the aged pair, whose own children 
 (of whom four sons were soldiers of the Revolution) had gone forth from 
 beneath their roof, one son only remaining in Lebanon, and building his house 
 near theirs, that he might help them in their declining years. " Alice " seems to 
 have been a favorite, not only with the good pastor, but with all who knew her. 
 Dr. Ezra Stiles Ely, in the letter above quoted, records his " lively recollection " 
 {forty-nine years later) of the day when, as he said, " Your mother, Alice, stood 
 beside me, and we together professed faith in Christ, in the old, large frame 
 meeting-house in Lebanon." The Beaumont farm was three miles distant from 
 the meeting-house ; but every Sabbath morning the old couple mounted their 
 horses and rode to church, the granddaughter riding on a pillion behind the 
 grandfather. 
 
 2 " The present number was delayed to give opportunity for the return of sub- 
 scription bills, but in future a fresh number will be ready for delivery the first 
 Monday in every month." — Connecticut Evangelical Magazine i, 40. 
 
12 
 
 Indian Mission. The third number, issued on the first Mon- 
 day in September, made another announcement: — 
 
 " On Friday, the 8th of August, Mr. David Bacon left Hartford with a 
 view of visiting the Indian tribes bordering on Lake Erie, according to a 
 resolve of the Trustees of the Missionary Society of Connecticut, noticed 
 in our magazine for July. Previous to his departure he was examined by 
 the Committee of Missions, who, highly approving of him as qualified for 
 such a mission, unanimously appointed him to that service, and by 
 prayer commended him to the Divine blessing. It is expected that he 
 will obtain a guide and interpreter at New Stockbridge, or somewhere in 
 that neighborhood, and then proceed on to the southwest part of Lake 
 Erie, and visit the Indian tribes in that quarter. It is presumed he will 
 have the prayers of all good people for a blessing on his labors." 
 
 A letter dated Aug. 7, from the missionary to his brother 
 at Mansfield, gives some additional details : — 
 
 " I fell in company with two gentlemen, who brought me comfortably to 
 Hartford by about five o'clock, free from expenses. I travelled but about 
 two miles afoot. 
 
 " I passed my examination yesterday. 1 The result of the Committee, in 
 their own words, was as follows : ' The Committee, having examined 
 him with respect to his knowledge of the doctrines of Christianity and 
 his experimental acquaintance with the truth, were fully satisfied with his 
 answers, and highly approved of him as qualified for a missionary to the 
 Indians. Whereupon, Voted that the said, &c. ' be appointed a missionary 
 to the Indians in the vicinity of Sandusky Bay, or to some of the tribes 
 
 1 That was a second examination. From the records of the Committee it ap- 
 pears that Mr. Bacon's formal introduction to them was on the 27th of June, at 
 which time they "examined him as to his doctrinal and experimental acquaintance 
 with the truth, and were fully satisfied with his answers." Learning that he was 
 embarrassed in his worldly circumstances, they kindly undertook to mediate be- 
 tween him and his creditors, but assumed no responsibility for his debts. Those 
 debts could not have been very large, as it was evidently expected that he would 
 be able to pay them out of the salary of " one hundred and ten cents a day." In 
 explanation of the letter above, I copy the following from a rough draught pre- 
 served in the archives of the Society : — 
 
 " Hartford, July 23, 1800. 
 
 " Sir, — There was yesterday a meeting of the Trustees of the Missionary Society 
 of Connecticut ; at which meeting much was said respecting the proposed mission 
 to the Indians ; in consequence of which the Committee of Missions are to meet 
 on the 6th of August at 10 o'clock, at Mr. Strong's ; at which time and place the 
 Committee earnestly wish you to attend. Tho' you are not absolutely appointed 
 by the Board to go as a missionary, yet if without inconvenience to yourself you 
 can come prepared to go immediately on to the westward, you are advised to do'it. 
 
 " Yours with esteem, A. Flint, Secretary. 
 "Mr. David Bacon." 
 
13 
 
 south and west of Lake Erie, for a term not exceeding six months, to be 
 computed from the time of his leaving Hartford.' My wages are one 
 hundred and ten cents per day. They have left it to my discretion to 
 choose and agree with an interpreter, only I must not overgo a certain 
 sum, which is nearly double what I expect to give. They have paid me 
 one hundred dollars in money, and one hundred in negotiable orders on 
 the Secretary. . . . The writings are all completed, and I expect to 
 set out to-morrow. I have received a small Bible, which cost 12s. gd. 
 [$2.12^], with some other small articles, as a present from the Society. 
 Mr. Flint is very kind, and Mr. Strong and his family are all attention, to 
 try to find out and help me to everything that I shall be likely to want. 
 
 " By the desire of Dr. Trumbull and Mr. Strong, a few Christian 
 friends met here and spent the last evening in fervent prayer for my pres- 
 ervation and success. A few hymns were sung, which were adapted to 
 the occasion. As soon as the friends were collected, Mr. Strong under- 
 took to represent to them the importance of the work I had undertaken, 
 and the trials and dangers to which I should be exposed ; but before he 
 got through his voice faltered, and then in broken accents he requested 
 that they might all heartily join in commending their dear brother to the 
 blessing and protection of Almighty God. Dr. Trumbull made the first 
 prayer. . . . They were all in tears, and expressed the tenderest affec- 
 tion and concern for me, and the most ardent desires for the salvation of 
 the heathen. But I was as insensible as steel, — could neither feel for 
 myself nor for others, . . . but hope I shall erelong reap the happy fruits 
 of their prayers, and praise God for the health of his countenance." 
 
 A postscript, written the next morning, says : — 
 
 " Mr. Strong had determined to send his son with the carriage to help 
 me on seven miles, but just as I got this letter sealed he came running up- 
 stairs and told me that Providence had sent Mr. Morgan with an empty 
 carriage to take me on to Canaan, forty miles on my road. He is the 
 minister of that place. I expect to set out with him in a few minutes." 
 
 It will be observed that the outfit of the missionary for this 
 expedition was of the simplest kind. Afoot and alone he was 
 to make his way towards the wilderness, with no luggage more 
 than he could carry on his person, thankfully accepting any 
 offer of a seat for a few miles in some passing vehicle. Such 
 was the equipment with which the good people of Connecti- 
 cut, seventy-five years ago, sent forth their first missionary to 
 the heathen. 
 
 The earliest intelligence from him was published in the 
 Magazine for November. It was a letter dated " Buffalo 
 Creek, Sept. 4, 1800." What was then known only as Buffalo 
 
14 
 
 Creek is now the site of the great city of Buffalo. A letter 
 written from that point at that date is in some respects more 
 interesting to us at this day than it could be then to the 
 readers of the " Evangelical Magazine." The missionary 
 says : — 
 
 " I have not been unwell since I left Hartford but two or three days' 
 and even then I was able to walk several miles in a day. I was much 
 fatigued at first, but can now travel twenty-five miles in a day with ease. 
 I found opportunities to ride, in the whole about one hundred and fifty 
 miles. Both the friends and enemies of religion have conducted towards 
 me as though they were commissioned to help me. 
 
 "When I arrived at Canandarqua [Canandaigua] I visited Capt. 
 Chapin, Superintendent of Indian Affairs, and requested of him a speech 
 of introduction to the Seneca chiefs at Buffalo Creek, in order that I 
 might get a speech from them to the Western tribes. He treated me in a 
 very friendly manner, approved of the proposal, furnished me with a string 
 of wampum, a lengthy and suitable letter to the chiefs, and another to his 
 brother, a worthy merchant in this place. I arrived here last Monday 
 [Sept. l], found Capt. Chapin's brother, the principal sachem, and 
 Capt. Johnson, the interpreter. The business was soon introduced. The 
 old sachem approved the proposal, appeared very friendly, and said that 
 he would notify the chiefs to meet me the next day at ten o'clock. Six of 
 them met at the time appointed, and Capt. Johnson with them. The 
 business was soon explained to them. They heard with attention, made a 
 few pertinent observations, and told me they expected to grant my 
 request, but that it was customary with them to defer the matter until the 
 second day, that they might have an opportunity to consult among them- 
 selves. They then shook hands with me, very affectionately wished me 
 the blessing of the Great Spirit, and retired to their council-house. The 
 next day, when they met as they had proposed, their great orator, in the 
 midst of a large concourse of Indians, delivered a speech to me, and 
 another for me to write down to their Western brethren. They also gave 
 me a very curious string of wampum to go with their speech. 1 
 
 1 If I may confide in my recollection of a stage-coach conversation, many years 
 ago, with a stranger (the Rev. J. N, Granger, I believe, afterwards pastor of the 
 First Church in Providence), that " great orator " was Red-Jacket, celebrated in 
 Halleck's poem : — 
 
 " Thou wert monarch born ; tradition's pages 
 Tell not the planting of thy parent tree." 
 
 One point in the speech was to the effect that the Senecas would gladly 
 receive a missionary if they should discover that their white neighbors were made 
 better by his preaching. 
 
 My informant told me that among papers left by his father, who had held some 
 official relation to those Indians, he had found an account of the interview 
 between them and my father. 
 
15 
 
 - I am now four hundred miles from Hartford, in sight of Lake Erie, 
 just at the outlet, and within twenty-four miles of the Falls of Niagara. 
 Capt. Johnson, who is well acquainted with the Indians, says there is no 
 probability of my finding an interpreter until I get to Detroit, if I should 
 go all the way round by land. I am now waiting for a passage to Detroit. 
 They tell me that the nearest way that I can go by land is not short of four 
 hundred miles, and by water it is but two hundred and fifty. There are 
 several sail of vessels in this harbor, on board of one of which I am 
 expecting to embark as soon as the wind is favorable. 
 
 " I have had nothing to trouble me since I left home but a hard and 
 ungrateful heart. ... I do not recollect that I have had the least 
 desire to turn back, but have felt as though I was going home." 
 
 The next communication from the missionary to his employ- 
 ers was written from " Harson's Island in the River St. Clair, 
 Sept. 29, 1800." He had sailed from " Buffalo Creek" on the 
 fourth day after the date of the preceding letter, and by a 
 speedy voyage had arrived at Detroit on the nth of Septem- 
 ber, thirty-four days after leaving Hartford. He had been 
 hospitably welcomed to the house of Major Hunt, commanding 
 officer at the fort at Detroit ; and Gen. Uriah Tracy, of Litch- 
 field, who was there as Indian Commissioner for the United 
 States, had been equally kind to him. From Mr. Schieffelin, 
 an Indian agent, from Judge Askin, who had been formerly a 
 trader at Michilimakinac (now known as Mackinaw), and from 
 " Mr. Benjamin Huntington, a merchant who was formerly 
 from Norwich," he had received information and advice, with 
 some encouraging offers of aid, which had convinced him that 
 it was " expedient to relinquish the idea of going to the south 
 of Detroit, as was expected, and to sail to the river St. Clair, if 
 not to Mackinac." But if he was to be governed by the letter 
 of his commission, he must go " to the south and west of Lake 
 Erie, and had no liberty to go to the north." What ought he 
 to do ? The letter proceeds : — 
 
 " I applied to Gen. Tracy for advice. He honored my judgment with 
 respect to the business, and said that he thought it was a pity that there 
 had not been added another clause to my directions, which would have left 
 the matter a little more to my discretion ; but said, as circumstances were, 
 he knew not what advice to give. However, being confident that the 
 spread of the gospel was the great object which the Trustees had in view, 
 J was sure that it could not be their intention to prohibit my going to the 
 place which the providence of God should so clearly point out. I there- 
 
i6 
 
 fore concluded that the only way to deserve or secure their approbation 
 was to act discretionary till I received further orders. 1 And the General 
 told me that if I wished to visit Mackinac, I should be welcome to a pas- 
 sage with him, going and coming. I accordingly went on board with him 
 Saturday the 13th. . . . I had not yet determined how far to go. I felt 
 unwilling to stop here on the river St. Clair, on account of the Indians 
 being so much scattered, and I doubted the propriety of venturing so far 
 as Mackinac, without orders from the committee. But as I could not hear 
 from them, I had no way to do but to commit my ways to the Lord, and to 
 rely on his promise for direction. But on the third day after we sailed, as 
 we lay wind-bound in Lake St. Clair, and at a time when I was pleading 
 with God in secret to resolve my doubts and to send me where infinite 
 wisdom saw best, the young man who had been recommended to me for 
 an interpreter came on board, and soon convinced me that it was my duty 
 to stop here." 
 
 That young man, named Bernardus Harson, was the son of 
 a worthy Dutchman, who, before the Revolutionary War, had 
 removed with his family from Albany to Niagara, where, at 
 the beginning of the war, the British, instead of permitting 
 him to return as he desired, stripped him of his property and 
 then sent him far westward to what still bears the name of 
 Harson's Island. The old man's trade as a gunsmith introduced 
 him to much intercourse with Indians, and their language 
 became almost as familiar to his children as his own vernacular, 
 the Dutch. His house was evidently a good place for learning 
 the Chippeway (or, as we now call it, the Ojibway) language ; 
 and with the young man Bernardus Harson for interpreter, it 
 was likely to be a good place for intercourse with the neigh- 
 boring Indians. Detained by adverse winds, the vessel did not 
 arrive at Harson's Island (only forty miles from Detroit) till 
 the fourth day of her voyage. Mr. Bacon, at the date of the 
 letter, had been twelve days in the Harson family, having con- 
 tracted to pay two dollars weekly for his board and lodging, 
 and ten dollars monthly to the interpreter and teacher, who 
 was to be half the time at his service. He was full of thank- 
 fulness and hope. After the foregoing details, he said : — 
 
 " When I left home, like Abraham, I knew not whither I went ; but I 
 expected I should have to lie upon the ground in the open air for several 
 
 1 A note appended by the trustee who received the letter says, " Mr. Bacon's 
 good judgment directed him right. He found in the place of which he speaks 
 the Indians for whom he was designed." 
 
i7 
 
 nights while on my journey, and then to take up my abode in a dreary 
 wilderness, at a great distance from civilized people, with nothing better 
 than an Indian hut for a house and a blanket for a bed, and where I 
 should suffer for food that was comfortable, and have no one that I could 
 converse with but an Indian interpreter. But instead of this, the Lord 
 has richly provided for me on the way, has not suffered me to lie out one 
 night, and has brought me into a pleasant place, among civilized people, 
 and where I have a prospect of success, and has provided me a comforta- 
 ble house, a convenient study, and as good a bed and as good board as I 
 should have had if I had remained in Connecticut. But I am still 
 ungrateful. I know of no place in the State of New York so healthy as 
 this. I believe the water and the air are as pure here as in any part of 
 New England. And I have never been before where venison and wild 
 geese and ducks were so plenty, or where there was such a rich variety of 
 fresh-water fish." 
 
 Nanga, the principal chief among the few Chippeways scat- 
 tered along the river St. Clair, had his quarters at the same 
 house, but was then absent. He was well reported of by- 
 young Harson, and by others, as " one of the worthiest and 
 most influential characters in the nation." After a visit the 
 year before (1799) to Congress at Philadelphia, he had ex- 
 pressed a desire to have a minister and schoolmaster come 
 among his people. He had talked of applying to Congress for 
 aid, and was proposing to gather his tribe into a village, that 
 they might be more accessible to preacher and teacher. It 
 was represented that his mind had been turned in this direc- 
 tion by conversation with benevolent persons whom he had 
 met in his tour to Philadelphia ; and that a book which had 
 been put into his hands by a minister in New York, and 
 which gave an account of " the Northern Missionary Society," 1 
 had confirmed him in his views and hopes. That book, it was 
 said, had been carefully preserved by him, and several times 
 he had heard it interpreted and explained by Harson, though 
 not without expressing his apprehension " that some of the 
 Indians were so stupid that it would be impossible to beat 
 religion into them." 
 
 Letters from Michigan in those days were under a necessity 
 of waiting for some opportunity of conveyance. The letter 
 dated at Harson's Island, Sept. 29, was kept open till Oct. 8 f 
 and was then completed at Detroit. Gen. Tracy had returned 
 
 1 See Gillett's History of the Presbyterian Church, i, 397, 436. 
 3 
 
i8 
 
 from Mackinaw, and on his arrival at Harson's Island Mr. 
 Bacon had re-embarked with him for Detroit, in order to 
 attend a grand council of Indians who were to meet him at 
 that place. In his official character Gen. Tracy had held a 
 talk with a meeting of chiefs at Mackinaw, and he had taken the 
 opportunity to confer with the chiefs of an Ottawa village at 
 Arbre-Croche 1 about a mission to their people. They appeared 
 to be well pleased with the proposal, " and they observed that 
 they had great need of ministers to restrain their young men 
 and make them like the young men who " wear hats!' But, 
 after the manner of the Indians, " they must defer the decision 
 of the business until they could call a council," and then they 
 would send their answer. 
 
 At Detroit, Mr. Bacon had a brief interview with two Pres- 
 byterian ministers from Pennsylvania, members of the Ohio 
 Presbytery, 2 who had been sent to "obtain information 
 respecting the Indians with a view of sending missionaries." 
 Their inquiries had not been very successful, the Indian agent 
 who could have given them information being absent with 
 Gen. Tracy. But the Connecticut missionary communicated 
 as much of what he had learned as could be imparted in so 
 brief an interview, and they departed, depending on him for 
 additional information, " as there would be frequent opportu- 
 nities to write." They were expecting that their presbytery 
 would be able erelong to institute an effective mission, though 
 their funds were as yet too small for any considerable under- 
 taking. As a beginning of the work they took with them a 
 young Shawnee, for the purpose of giving him an education. 
 Mr. Bacon's view was that it would be wiser to begin with 
 some nation more numerous than the Shawnees. He wrote, 
 for the information of his employers, — 
 
 " The Chippeways are supposed to have twenty thousand fighting men, 
 and there are seven other nations, beside the Ottawas, that understand 
 
 1 Arbre-Croche was represented to Mr. Bacon as twenty-five miles distant from 
 Mackinaw, but the map shows that the distance is not less than forty miles. 
 Writing the name as he heard it, without knowing its orthography or its origin, 
 he wrote * Arber-Croash," which by a mistake of the compositor was printed 
 "Arber-Croa.sk." — Connecticut Evangelical Magazine, i, 234, 236. 
 
 2 See Gillett, i, 324, 471 ; also, for a notice of a later visit of the same sort, at 
 the appointment of the same zealous and enterprising presbytery, ii, 134. 
 
19 
 
 their language. There are above a thousand Chippeways near Sagana 
 [now Saginaw], on the south of Lake Huron, but they are not in a 
 compact village. While I was at Mr. Harson's a large company of them 
 called to see me. They appeared to be very dirty, but were exceeding 
 friendly. I arc. informed that the Moravians have been very successful 
 among the Delawares, on the river Detrench [in Canada, the river now 
 known as the Thames], forty miles east of where I have been living. The 
 Indians at Harson's Island appeared very friendly, and very desirous to 
 have me continue with them ; but they told me that Nanga was absent, 
 and that they could give me no decisive answer till he returned. I did not 
 see Nanga till I came back to this place. He tells me that he is very 
 glad that I have come among them. He says that the Moravians have 
 been the means of making the Delawares sober, industrious, and happy, 
 like the white people, and that he hopes that my endeavors will have the 
 same effect on his Indians." 
 
 At the great council of Indians, Oct. 7, Gen. Tracy, after 
 his political conference with the chiefs, introduced the mission- 
 ary to them as the representative and agent of a Society that 
 desired to do good. He told them that good would come 
 from their having such men to instruct them and their chil- 
 dren ; he requested them to treat the missionary hospitably 
 and kindly, and told them that if that first teacher should find 
 a favorable reception, they might expect others to be sent on 
 the same benevolent errand. " He hoped they would not be 
 so unwise as to defeat the good intentions of their white 
 brothers, which respected their own happiness ; and the whole 
 council gave their hearty approbation to all that he said." 
 The Indian agent, Mr. Schieffelin, testified that the General 
 had given great satisfaction to the assembled chiefs. 
 
 Such a letter, printed in the Magazine for December, could 
 not but be read with deep interest in the study of many a 
 pastor, and by the winter fireside of many a Christian home in 
 Connecticut. In its closing sentences there was a tone of 
 exultation : — 
 
 " I have everything to support and animate me. I think the most san- 
 guine have never dreamed of such an encouraging prospect. Surely the 
 fields are white already to harvest ! May the Lord of the harvest send 
 forth his laborers. If I am prospered, I expect to return home some time 
 in the month of March. I hope that I shall be appointed again, and that 
 the Directors will send back two or three with me. There are a number 
 of sober, likely young Indians, who wish me to take them under my care 
 and give them a good English education ; and I have given them encour- 
 
20 
 
 agement of keeping a school one half of the time through the winter. I 
 expect that a good schoolmaster would have constant employ, and be very 
 useful." 
 
 It soon turned out that the young Indians who desired " a 
 good English education" were not so ready to begin as the mis- 
 sionary had hoped they would be. The letter just described 
 had not gone far towards its destination when the wild men 
 determined to spend the winter months in hunting ; and the 
 proposed school must needs be preceded by a long vacation. 
 Nothing could be done towards teaching them till spring. 
 The Magazine for January announced that Mr. Bacon had 
 returned, arriving at Hartford about the middle of December. 
 Although his return at that time (after four instead of six 
 months' absence) was unexpected, it was by no means disap- 
 proved. It had " not arisen from any circumstance unfavora- 
 ble to the great object of his mission, but quite the reverse." 
 The information which he had acquired — his commission 
 being " to go among the Indian tribes with a view of exploring 
 their situation, and the propriety of sending the gospel among 
 them " — would " greatly aid the Trustees in systematizing the 
 future plan of proceeding " ; and it was " a kind of information 
 which could not be obtained in any other way." The Trustees 
 had been called to meet on the 30th of December, and it was 
 expected that then Mr. Bacon would " be directed to return 
 with enlarged powers of acting." 
 
 From the records it appears that the Committee of Missions 
 met Dec. 15 ; that "Mr. David Bacon, missionary to the In- 
 dians, appeared before the committee, and gave an account 
 of his proceedings on the business of his mission to the pres- 
 ent time " ; and that thereupon it was voted, " That the chair- 
 man of the Board of Trustees be requested to call a meeting 
 of the Board, in this city, on the thirtieth day of instant De- 
 cember, at 2 o'clock, p. m." 
 
 That conference with the committee was sufficient to assure 
 the missionary that he would be empowered by the Trustees, 
 at their expected meeting, to pursue the work for which he had 
 been making the preliminary exploration. On the 24th of 
 December he was married at Lebanon to Alice Parks, then 
 not quite eighteen years of age. On Tuesday, the 30th, he 
 
21 
 
 received his new and enlarged appointment from the Board of 
 Trustees at Hartford, and on the next day (the last day of the 
 eighteenth century) he was ordained in the same city to the 
 work of an evangelist. 
 
 In those days " the Trustees of the Missionary Society of 
 Connecticut" considered themselves competent to ordain their 
 own missionaries without consulting any church or calling any 
 council. The record of that meeting (Dec. 30, 1800) shows 
 that "the question concerning the expediency of ordaining 
 Mr. Bacon to the work of the gospel ministry, previous to his 
 going out again as a missionary, was taken up and largely dis- 
 cussed " ; that thereupon it was " voted to proceed to the 
 examination of Mr. Bacon, with a view to his ordination " ; 
 that " the Board then proceeded to examine him," and " gain- 
 ing full satisfaction " on all the points on which an ordaining 
 council examines a candidate, "voted unanimously to ordain 
 him accordingly, and that the solemnity of his ordination be 
 attended at the North Presbyterian Meeting-house in this city, 
 to-morrow, at eleven o'clock, A. m." On the next day's record 
 it was entered that " the ordination of Mr. Bacon was per- 
 formed according to the votes of yesterday." 1 
 
 With the least possible delay, Mr. Bacon and his wife began 
 their journey, setting out from his brother's house in Mansfield 
 on the nth of February, 1801. They were accompanied from 
 Bethlehem by one of Mrs. Bacon's brothers, Beaumont Parks, 
 
 1 [From the American Mercury?^ 
 
 " Hartford, Thursday, Jan. i, 1801. 
 
 " Yesterday the Rev. DAvm Bacon was ordained in this city to the work of 
 the gospel ministry, with a particular reference to his laboring as an Evangelist 
 among the Indian tribes of North America. The Rev. Abel Flint made the 
 introductory prayer ; the Rev. Benjamin Trumbull, D. D., preached the sermon 
 from Mark xvi, 15 ; the Rev. Levi Hart, d. d., made the consecrating prayer ; the 
 Rev. Nathan Williams, D. D., gave the charge ; the Rev. Cyprian Strong gave the 
 right hand of fellowship ; and the Rev. Nathan Strong made the concluding 
 prayer." 
 
 This, I believe, was the first instance in Connecticut of an ordination to the 
 specific work of a missionary to the heathen. David Brainerd was ordained at 
 Newark, New Jersey, by a Presbytery in 1744. John Sergeant, the elder, was 
 ordained by Congregational ministers, at Deerfield, Mass., in 1735. The younger 
 John Sergeant was ordained to the same work in 1788, — in Massachusetts, as I 
 suppose. 
 
22 
 
 a lad in his fifteenth year, who was expected to become ser- 
 viceable as a teacher after learning the Chippeway language. 
 Mr. Parks, afterwards a lawyer at Middlebury, Vermont, a 
 professor in the University of Indiana, and in his old age a 
 beloved and honored teacher at Springfield, Illinois, gave me 
 at my request, not long before his death, some recollections of 
 that journey. His narrative is so vivid in its simplicity, and 
 so suggestive of old times, that I cannot refrain from tran- 
 scribing some portions of it : — 
 
 " I can hardly tell how it happened that I went with your father. I 
 know that Alice and he wished it, as I could be company for her when he 
 was away among the Indians, and might be useful in various ways. The 
 Missionary Society also wished me to go. My uncle was very unwilling ; 
 he expected me to remain till I should be twenty-one, and I was now able 
 to help a great deal. But by the influence of Dr. Backus x and others, he 
 consented. I was unprepared for the journey, — had no clothes fit for 
 travelling. Here again Dr. Backus came to the rescue ; he and others 
 gave me a good outfit, so that I could pass very well among strangers. 
 Mr. Bacon and Alice came for me — remained one night at uncle's. We 
 started next day. It was hard parting from the family. . . . Still I 
 was glad to go. There was something romantic in leaving home, perhaps 
 never to return, to go to the great West and live among the Indians, learn 
 their language, and lead them to God. On our way we called on the 
 Doctor, bade him farewell and received his blessing. A great and good 
 man ! 
 
 "The weather was very cold, but we did not suffer; we had a good 
 sleigh and two good horses. Although we did not leave Bethlehem till 
 near noon, we were at Canaan before dark, — stopped at a noisy country 
 tavern. We were a large company all together in the bar-room ; some 
 were drinking, some telling stories, and some swearing. This was new 
 and rather painful to Alice and me. We had never stayed at such a place 
 before. What we here saw was common in nearly all the public houses 
 where we stopped. At that time everything was done by sleighing. The 
 roads were full. Sometimes we would meet thirty or forty sleighs loaded 
 with wheat going to Albany and Troy to market. This made travelling to 
 the West rather unpleasant. We, however, got along very well — had fine 
 sleighing till we got as far as Geneva, where the snow left us. We 
 dragged along on bare ground and in mud to East Bloomrield. Here we 
 remained till the spring, when the roads were settled. Nearly all the 
 first settlers [in Bloomfield] were from Connecticut ; many from Bethle- 
 hem, old acquaintances of our family. They were intelligent, strong- 
 minded farmers, most of them Christians. Mr. Williston and Mr. Bush- 
 
 'Dr. Azel Backus, afterwards President of Hamilton College, was pastor of the 
 church in Bethlehem at that time. 
 
23 
 
 nell [missionaries from Connecticut] had been there, and God had 
 displayed the glory of His grace in those ends of the earth. We were 
 treated with great respect and kindness. Alice and I were a kind of 
 wonder to them. That we, so young, should be willing to forsake home 
 and friends and good old Connecticut, and go among the wild sons of the 
 forest, they thought strange indeed. Your father preached every Sabbath, 
 as they had no preacher. 
 
 " About the first of April we started for Buffalo, having sold the sleigh 
 and things we could not carry. We had two good horses and one man's 
 saddle, and a Mackinaw blanket for the other horse. Mr. Bacon and 
 Alice would ride on two or three miles, while I trotted along on foot as 
 fast as I could. After a while he would tie his horse to a tree, and go on 
 with Alice. When I overtook them, I rode on ahead a mile or so, and 
 then tied and went on again. Thus we did till we reached Detroit, about 
 two hundred and fifty miles by land. There was no wagon road, only 
 a path through the woods, sometimes rather obscure, the trees marked to 
 show the way. We crossed the river at Rochester, where there was only 
 a house for the ferryman, / think. At Batavia there was a log tavern. 
 From that to Buffalo there was only one log-house, not chinked, that is, 
 the chinks [between the logs] not filled. We remained there over the Sab- 
 bath. The next day we reached Buffalo. As the lake was not open we 
 had to remain a number of weeks. . . . The town was full of Indians, 
 many of them drunk. There was a large village of them on Buffalo Creek. 
 Red Jacket was the chief. Here Alice and I, for the first time, saw what 
 we then called wild Indians. We were at first afraid, but in a short time 
 ceased to fear. They were a miserably degraded specimen of human 
 nature. I thought then there was little hope of doing them good by teach- 
 ing or preaching. 
 
 " We waited for a vessel to take us to Detroit till we were tired. Then 
 we concluded to go by land and ' ride and tie.' We crossed at Black 
 Rock, and went down on the Canada side to the Falls of Niagara. There 
 was at the Falls a good tavern, where we took breakfast ; but there was no 
 other house, and I think there was none on the American side. Upper 
 Canada was then almost an unbroken wilderness, — no public roads. 
 We came to London on the river Thames. There wc remained a num- 
 ber of weeks, very kindly treated." 
 
 What Mr. Parks, writing his recollections in 1864, called 
 " London on the Thames," Mr. Bacon, in a letter to his brother, 
 June 26, 1 801, called by another name. After describing 
 more briefly their journey to that point, his narrative proceeds 
 thus : — 
 
 " Though we met with some hindrances by means of bad roads [in the 
 journey through Canada], we arrived at the Pinery on the River Detrench 
 in ten days, one hundred and sixty miles from Buffalo, and within one hun- 
 
24 
 
 dred and forty miles of Detroit. There we were told that the way through 
 the fifty-mile wilderness was extremely miry and difficult, and that by wait- 
 ing three or four days, we might have an opportunity to go down the river 
 on a raft ; we therefore waited. But we were detained much longer than 
 we expected ; the raft did not start till the tenth day after we arrived there, 
 at noon. We slept on it two nights, but as we built us a little hut, kept a 
 good fire, and had hay for a bed and blankets for covering, and plenty of 
 coarse provisions, we were pretty comfortable. The third day, at about 
 noon, ourselves and horses were safely landed this side of the wilderness. 
 That evening we came to Fairfield, or Moravian Town, where we were 
 treated in the kindest manner by the Moravian ministers and their wives, 
 who appeared glad to see us. It being very rainy, we tarried there the 
 next day till near night, and spent the time very agreeably." 
 
 Among the incidents of that rainy day was one which Mr. 
 Bacon communicated to the trustees in his letter to them, 1 and 
 which was, in his view, so interesting that he told the same 
 story in almost the same words to his brother. The incident 
 ought not to be omitted from this narrative : — 
 
 " Having occasion to speak of Brainerd, as they were giving the charac- 
 ter of some of their missionaries, they observed that they had two Christian 
 squaws in their society who were baptized by him, and that one of them 
 had showed them a Bible a few days before, which she said she received 
 as a present from him. Recollecting that these Moravian Indians were 
 Delawares, and that it was near this nation that Brainerd visited, I thought 
 the story was probably true, and was highly pleased to hear that some of 
 his Indians were still in the land of the living, and in the very neighbor- 
 hood where I was. It was very rainy, but I immediately sent for the one 
 who lived nearest to come and see me. She came according to my request ; 
 she appeared very decent, sensible, and clever ; she spoke pretty good 
 English, seemed considerably advanced in years, but could not tell her 
 age, as is commonly the case with Indians. I think she told me that it 
 was on the Forks of the Delaware that she became acquainted with him. 
 She observed that she was very small when she was baptized by him, and 
 putting her hand out about three feet and a half from the floor, said she was 
 not more than so high when she saw him last. She left that place about 
 that time, and knows of no other who was acquainted with him but the one 
 that is with her. 2 
 
 The day after leaving Moravian Town, Mr. Bacon sold one 
 of his two horses, fearing he might not have so favorable an 
 opportunity at the end of his journey ; and the remainder of the 
 
 1 Conn. Evang. Mag., II, 159. 
 
 2 Brainerd's residence at the Forks of the Delaware ended fifty-five years before the 
 date of this incident, — Memoirs in Edwards's Works(Divighfs edition), X, 193. 
 
25 
 
 way to Detroit, about fifty miles, he and his young brother- 
 in-law went on foot. At that season the paths that served for 
 roads were extremely bad, the soil often miry, the streams 
 swollen ; but in two days and a half of difficult progress they 
 arrived at Detroit, Saturday evening, May 9, three or four 
 weeks earlier than would have been possible had they waited 
 for a vessel from Buffalo. 
 
 Happy and thankful were they all to find themselves at the 
 end of a journey so wearisome and perilous. Nothing had dis- 
 appointed them save the too early melting of the snow when 
 they had hardly measured half the distance. Not one of them 
 had been detained a day by any illness. The young wife's 
 " strength and courage held out through the whole way as good 
 as at the first." Five Sabbaths the missionary had preached 
 at Bloomfield, once at Buffalo, and twice in Canada, doing really 
 missionary work wherever he was hindered in his journey. 
 
 Their arrival before the opening of navigation was a surprise 
 to the few friends who were impatiently expecting them, and 
 who received them with great kindness. None of Mr. Bacon's 
 letters had reached Detroit ; but at his former visit he had 
 arranged to open a school at his return from Connecticut, and 
 " the proprietors " were waiting for him. A few days were 
 spent in getting ready to keep house with scanty apparatus, 
 and on the 25 th of May the school was begun. A special 
 school being desired by some of the inhabitants for their 
 daughters, Mrs. Bacon, four weeks later, undertook that work. 
 The missionary family had become, for the time, self-support- 
 ing. Indeed, it seems to have been expected that the mis- 
 sionary would go that warfare very much " at his own charges." 
 
 In 1800 and 1801 the Society paid for the Indian Mission a 
 sum total of $400. This included the entire expense of the lone 
 pedestrian journey, beginning in August, 1800, and the outfit 
 of the mission in Jan. 1801 ; and from that time till September, 
 1803 (a year and eight months), there was not another cent of 
 payment for its support from the Society. 1 
 
 Those schools were not the only employment of the mission- 
 ary. With some assistance from the government interpreter 
 at Detroit, he was struggling with the difficulties of the Ojib- 
 
 1 Conn. Ev. Mag., I, 479 i tt 9 399 i HI, 330. 
 4 
 
26 
 
 way language, which had not then contributed its marvels to 
 the science of Comparative Philology ; and he thought himself 
 able to report in that first letter, " We are making pretty good 
 progress." He had also begun a home missionary work, of 
 which we get some glimpses in his letter: — 
 
 " The first Sabbath I did not preach, as I was very much fatigued and 
 not prepared. Before the next Sabbath I made preparation, and in the 
 forenoon I gave them an introductory discourse, showing the need and 
 advantages of Divine revelation and of a regular ministry of the Word. 
 The assembly, which was more numerous than I expected, appeared to be 
 all attention. We make use of the court-house, which is very convenient 
 for the purpose. As the congregation is more numerous in the forenoon 
 (on account of their being in the habit of visiting and riding out for pleas- 
 ure in the latter part of the day), if I have a sermon of my own, I deliver 
 it in the forenoon. 1 I am so cold and lifeless through the week that it 
 seems as if I should be no way useful to this people. But when the Sab- 
 bath comes, I am generally so unexpectedly assisted, and the people 
 appear so uncommonly attentive, that I cannot but hope there is mercy in 
 store for them, and that it will be poured out upon them in answer to the 
 prayers of thousands who are pleading for my success. I use notes, but 
 the best of my sermons often come to me while I am preaching. Four or 
 five of my hearers are men of liberal education, but I have not heard 
 that they have made any unfavorable remarks. Indeed, I am treated with 
 much more respect by all classes of people than I had any right to expect. 
 . . . Though I have been enabled, as I believe, to declare to this 
 people the counsel of God without reserve, yet the number of my hearers 
 increases." 
 
 Yet he expected to encounter difficulties in that ministry. 
 He was not surprised to find that the people all demanded 
 baptism for their children, thinking, indeed, " that this was the 
 principal thing for which they wanted a minister." His refu- 
 sal to baptize the children of parents making no profession of 
 religious experience had already been talked about ; and he 
 had preached on the subject from Rom. iv, n, showing, 
 among other things, * the sin and folly of misapplying the 
 seals of the covenant." The subject was one on which discus- 
 sion, renewed from the time of Edwards and the " New 
 Lights," had hardly ceased in the New England churches ; 
 but he had no doubt of his duty. In his sermon on that sub- 
 ject, " I had," said he, " uncommon assistance ; and they have 
 since been very silent." Silent they might be without being 
 1 Sometimes, it seems, he would read a printed sermon. 
 
27 
 
 satisfied. Mr. Parks's recollections describe more distinctly 
 the difficulties of the position : — 
 
 " Detroit, at the time we were there, was the largest and most important 
 city west of Albany. ... It was the great emporium of the fur trade. 
 The Indian traders, as they were called, were men of great wealth and 
 highly cultivated minds. Many of them were educated in England and 
 Scotland, and generally spent the winter there. They returned in the 
 spring with new goods, all purchased in Europe, and most of them brought 
 in vessels through the lakes. The inhabitants were English, Scotch, Irish, 
 and French, all of whom hated the Yankees most cordially. I am sure 
 there was not an American in the place except the officers and soldiers of 
 the garrison, which was composed of a regiment of infantry and one com- 
 pany of artillery. The city was enclosed by cedar pickets about twelve 
 feet high and six inches in diameter, and so close together that one could 
 not see through. At each side were strong gates, which were closed at 
 night and a sentinel placed at each. No Indians were permitted to come 
 in after sundown, or to remain over night. 
 
 " Your father had a fine school at first. The children of nearly all the 
 principal men attended. The school was popular and well-taught, for your 
 father was a good and faithful teacher ; but he was a Yankee, and after a 
 while a strong influence was brought against him. The people, as I said, 
 hated the Yankees. The Roman Catholic priests, four or five in number, 
 had great influence even over those who were not Roman Catholics. 
 They were classical men, he was not. All this was against us. One 
 thing was very much in our favor : the officers of the army and their 
 families treated us all with great kindness and respect. Your father had 
 a letter from the Secretary of War, requesting those at Detroit and Mack- 
 inaw to show him kindness, and give him all the aid they could in the 
 good work. This they uniformly did." 
 
 In the Magazine for November there was given a portion of 
 another letter from the missionary, dated Aug. 25, 1801. He 
 was still preaching at Detroit, but had discontinued his after- 
 noon service there, and had undertaken to preach every Sab- 
 bath afternoon at another place, to which he had been invited 
 by the people, about six miles distant. He had found his 
 audiences generally " more attentive to the Word preached than 
 is common at the East." He had received a visit from Nanga 
 and several other chiefs, who had talked favorably, and had 
 promised that, at their next visit, they would have a formal 
 council and hear his " speeches," i. e. the communications of 
 which he was the bearer from the Missionary Society and 
 others. But he added, — 
 
28 
 
 "Since this interview with the chiefs, Mr. Denkey, one of the Moravian 
 ministers, has been to see me, informing me that his brethren had sent on 
 another missionary to supply his place among the Delawares, requesting 
 him to begin his mission with the Chippewas, as had been proposed. He 
 observed that it was his desire, and the desire of his brethren, that he 
 should begin with the Chippewas that lived nearest to their village in Fair- 
 field, but as this would require him to take those at the River St. Clair, he 
 would not doit without my consent. . . . All things considered, I did not 
 hesitate to give my consent, and assured him that I would use my influ- 
 ence with the Indians in his behalf. 
 
 " We make but slow progress in the Indian language ; I find it hard 
 work to commit their words to memory, and when I have learned them I 
 find it extremely difficult to construct a sentence according to the idioms 
 of their language. It seems to be full of irregularities ; but if life and health 
 are spared, I expect we shall be able to surmount every difficulty. The 
 chiefs frequently call to see us, and appear extremely pleased to hear us 
 talk their language, and do what they can to help us." 
 
 A letter to his brother at Mansfield, Conn., bears date Oct. 
 22, 1801. His wife had been ill, but was nearly well again, 
 though not well enough to resume her school. The prospect 
 of his usefulness in Detroit had begun to be less hopeful. A 
 certain class who had been at first among his hearers, " our 
 greatest worldlings and men of pleasure," he called them, men 
 who had " manifested uncommon uneasiness when the truths of 
 the gospel had been most clearly exhibited," and who had been 
 no better pleased with the printed discourses which he selected 
 for reading than with those which were his own, had at last 
 entirely forsaken public worship, though they treated him per- 
 sonally with undiminished courtesy ; nor was the discourage- 
 ment lessened when he saw more clearly that they disliked the 
 message rather than the messenger. Having alluded to his own 
 want of classical learning, he added, — 
 
 " But a circumstance has lately occurred which has made it evident that 
 they will not receive the same truths from the hands of the learned. About 
 the 25th of September we received a visit from Mr. Badger, who was lately 
 sent as a missionary to New Connecticut, and a Mr. Hughes from Penn- 
 sylvania. Mr. Hughes is one of the ministers I saw here on missionary 
 business last fall. Hoping that the Lord had sent them for good to this 
 people, I exerted myself to give general information that Mr. Hughes was 
 to preach on the Sabbath ; but to our great grief and disappointment, he 
 had as few, if not fewer hearers than usual, though he is one of whom the 
 world is not worthy, and was educated at Princeton College. Mr. Badger 
 
29 
 
 preached an evening lecture, and had more hearers. But though he 
 preached an excellent and solemn discourse, a contemptuous sneer was 
 visible on the countenances of several gentlemen, some of whom had the 
 impudence to express their feelings by winking and grinning. 
 
 " The Sabbath before these men arrived here, finding so little prospect 
 of usefulness and so much difficulty in learning the language here merely 
 by means of an interpreter, I almost came to a determination that I would 
 go among the Indians as soon as next spring, if Providence would permit ; 
 and we were rejoiced to find that Mr. Badger was disposed to go with us, 
 and that there was a prospect of his being sent out, either by the Boston 
 or the Connecticut Society, in the spring. I have now written to the 
 trustees that if they will give me orders, I will try to set out for Arbercrosh 
 (four hundred miles northwest of this, and twenty-four miles southwest 
 from Michilimakinac) as soon as the first of May." 
 
 Another letter, dated Feb. 10, 1802 (but postmarked "Cin- 
 cinnati, 19 March, 1802"), intimates a possible change of his 
 plan. He had learned that there was a " very encouraging 
 prospect on the Miami [now written Maumee], seventy miles 
 south " from Detroit ; " and I have concluded," he said, " to go 
 there the ensuing season if the trustees and the Indians are 
 willing." The place had been " very populous before it was 
 destroyed by Gen. Wayne," and it was still attractive to the 
 Indians, thirty families having lately removed thither from near 
 Detroit, for better hunting ground and better planting ground. 
 The letter illustrates, indirectly, his idea of what a mission 
 among Indians ought to be : — 
 
 " It is the opinion of Nanga and the interpreter, who are well acquainted 
 with the Indians and the country, that a thousand might soon be col- 
 lected there, if we would go among them and afford them what assistance 
 we could by making them ploughs, helping them to plough their ground, 
 etc. . . . It is said that the situation is beautiful and healthy, con- 
 taining a mill-seat environed by excellent land, interspersed with large 
 openings covered with grass that is sufficient to support any number of 
 cattle that could be wished. It seems that the greatest objection to it is 
 that it is too tempting for missionaries. The difficulties and expense of 
 beginning and supporting a mission there would be much less than at 
 Arbercrosh. . . . Immediately on the opening of the spring, if per- 
 mitted, I mean to visit them and take Beaumont and a hired man with me 
 to make a beginning for me, and assist the Indians about ploughing their 
 land. They have horses, and they have plough-irons which they received 
 from Congress. But I must return and tarry till the last of May to fulfil 
 my engagements here. Then, if the Lord will, I purpose to move imme- 
 diately on with my family. I hope Mr. Badger will be there soon after. 
 
3° 
 
 But perhaps the trustees will think it best to send us to Arbercrosh ; if 
 they do, I trust I shall go cheerfully, though the place is much more 
 remote and friendless." 
 
 Mr. Badger, whose visit at Detroit in September, 1801, has 
 been mentioned, returned to Connecticut in the winter, and 
 was present at a meeting of the trustees, Jan. 6 and 7, 1802. 
 In that meeting the Indian Mission seems to have been partic- 
 ularly considered. " Several letters from Rev. David Bacon 
 were read, and verbal communications were made by Rev. 
 Joseph Badger respecting the Indians round Lake Erie, etc." 
 What Mr. Bacon was intending to do, " if the trustees and 
 the Indians should be willing," was voted to be expedient. A 
 memorandum drawn by Gov. Treadwell was adopted and put 
 upon record, intimating the will of the Board. 
 
 That he "proceed on the opening of the spring to Arbercrosh or some 
 other settlement of the Chippewa tribe, which on inquiry he shall find 
 best adapted to the object of his mission ; that he perfect himself in the 
 language amongst them by intercourse and conversation as soon as may 
 be ; that when he shall have acquired a sufficient knowledge of the lan- 
 guage, or before, if an interpreter can be found in the vicinity to assist him 
 at a moderate expense, he deliver to the assembled chiefs and others the 
 Talk composed by this Board for that purpose, and receive their answer ; 
 that he acquaint himself with their circumstances, manners, and customs, 
 and with the best means of bringing them to give up their wandering 
 habits of life and to attend to a regular course of education and religious 
 instruction, with the obstacles in the way, and the best means of avoiding 
 or surmounting them ; that as he has power and opportunity, he impart to 
 them, in conversation and in public discourses, the first principles of reli- 
 gious truths ; that he continue among them on this visit as long as the 
 public service shall require and the circumstances of himself and family 
 permit ; and that he report to the Board his proceedings and prospects as 
 opportunity presents." 
 
 Such was the plan which the honorable and reverend 
 Board proposed for a vigorous prosecution of the work. It 
 was just what the missionary was himself proposing. But 
 what ideas the trustees had concerning the necessary cost of 
 the campaign they were planning may be inferred from their 
 next vote, which munificently appropriated to the Indian Mis- 
 sion " an aggregate sum not exceeding $250," but at the 
 same time repealed an appropriation of $150 which had been 
 made in the September preceding. 
 
31 
 
 How early, in those days of infrequent and uncertain com- 
 munication between Hartford and Detroit, the instructions 
 drawn by Gov. Treadwell, and adopted by the Board on the 7th 
 of January, reached the missionary, does not appear. It only 
 appears that he went forward in a courageous attempt to obey 
 the instructions which accorded so well with his own judg- 
 ment expressed in his February letter to his brother. The 
 trustees were willing, and without loss of time he went to find 
 out whether the Indians were also willing. As early as the 
 1 2th of May the Board seems to have learned that the "aggre- 
 gate sum not exceeding $250" was hardly adequate to "the 
 object of the Indian Mission " \ for on that day Mr. Bacon was 
 " authorized to employ as interpreter the man mentioned in 
 his letter of Jan. 1, provided he can procure him upon the 
 terms proposed." On the 25th of May, the Board had gained, 
 it seems, a still broader view, and "voted that the sum of $410 
 be appropriated to the object of the Indian Mission for the cur- 
 rent year, including the sum of $250 appropriated to said 
 object by a vote of this Board in January last." But those 
 judicious men had yet to learn how much the work would 
 inevitably cost, even on " a plan of the strictest economy." 
 Only a few days after that more generous appropriation, there 
 came a draft from the missionary for an amount larger by $100 
 than what remained unpaid of the appropriation. Not only 
 was the account overdrawn, but there was an informality in the 
 draft itself, and no letter of advice had been received. The 
 Committee of Accounts could only suffer the draft to be 
 protested, and a special meeting of the Board was held^on the 
 14th of July, to meet the emergency. Should the missionary, 
 at so great a distance, be disgraced without a hearing ? It was 
 agreed that the committee had done right in suffering the 
 draft to be protested ; but on the other hand, a suit at law 
 against the missionary " would be of unhappy tendency," and 
 a communication from him was daily expected. So the Com- 
 mittee of Accounts, with two members more, were authorized 
 to accept the draft in whole or in part, if the expected expla- 
 nation should seem to be sufficient, and meanwhile to inter- 
 cede with the holders for reasonable forbearance. It was pro- 
 vided, nevertheless, that if the draft should be accepted in 
 
32 
 
 whole, $100 of the amount should be considered as paid "in 
 advance towards another year's salary." The record of the 
 next meeting (Sept. i) shows that " a lengthy letter was com- 
 municated to the Board " from the missionary, and that there- 
 upon it was " voted that the bill of exchange drawn by Mr. 
 Bacon, be paid, $100 of the same to be considered as advanced 
 towards another year's salary." It would seem to have been 
 inflexibly determined that the Indian Mission in the depth of 
 the wilderness, a thousand miles away, whatever the cost to 
 the missionary, should not cost the Society more than $250 a 
 year. 
 
 A large part of that " lengthy letter " (seventeen printed 
 pages) was published in the Magazine for October. The 
 letter, dated " Michilimakinak, July 2, 1802," gave a detailed 
 account of what had been done in strict obedience to the in- 
 structions of the Board. An abridgment of it would be diffi- 
 cult, and would much impair the vivacity of the story. Some 
 passages from the recollections written down by Mr. Parks, 
 years afterwards, may be illustrated from the more extended 
 sixty-two report of the missionary. Before proceeding to Ar- 
 brecroche, it had been necessary to investigate the possibility 
 of establishing the mission " at the Miami " ; and the experi- 
 ment which the missionary had made in that quarter was the 
 subject of his report to the Trustees. In the words of Mr. 
 Parks, — 
 
 " Your father and I went to the Maumee to make trial of the natives and 
 see what could be done for them. We made preparations for our perilous 
 journey, and purchased a canoe or dug-out large enough to carry us and our 
 baggage. . . . We packed our ' plunder,' as it is called by the natives, 
 and prepared for an early start in the morning. The first day [April 29] 
 we reached Brownstown, — twenty miles. This was the last settlement 
 between Detroit and Fort Wayne, except a few cabins at the mouth of the 
 River Raisin, where Monroe now is. Sometimes the lake was very rough, 
 but the man whom we hired to go with us, a large, courageous Pennsyl- 
 vanian, was a good waterman, and managed the canoe with great skill. 
 We arrived safely at Maumee Bay in three or four days. Here was an 
 old Indian village on a beautiful, elevated place, covered with blue grass. 
 The Indians had just returned from Detroit, where they had been selling 
 their furs and peltry. They received in payment whiskey, bread, flour, 
 and meat, and were preparing for a grand drunken powwow. I think there 
 were about 1,500 Indians on the river, or near it, when we were there. Our 
 
33 
 
 man could talk the language so as to be understood about common mat- 
 ters, but not so as to act as interpreter ; but fortunately, or providentially, 
 we found a white man who had been with the Indians many years, and 
 spoke their language as well as an Indian. 1 He acted as interpreter for 
 your father as long as we remained on the Maumee. He boarded with us, 
 and I believe was paid for his services. 2 
 
 " When we started on our expedition we laid in a good store of pork, 
 bread, flour, and salt. We got very good maple sugar from the Indians. 
 Our tea and coffee were made of wintergreen. . . . Fried pork, bread 
 baked before the fire, wintergreen tea sweetened with maple sugar, — oh, 
 how good ! And then the sleeping — how delightful ! — on the cool earth, 
 under a blanket. . . . Sometimes I was afraid of the Indians when 
 large numbers were drunk, but I soon got over this, and became so familiar 
 with their ways that I ceased to fear. 
 
 " Your father had many talks with them, and met them in council when 
 large numbers, five hundred or a thousand, were present. They listened 
 to all he said, and answered with great deliberation. They did not wish 
 to make any change in their religion, but thought the good old way was 
 the best. Having done all he could, and having no hope of doing any good 
 to the Indians there, your father concluded to leave them and seek a more 
 favorable location." 
 
 The missionary's more extended narrative shows that when 
 he arrived at the mouth of the river (near the place where the 
 thriving city of Toledo now gives employment and homes to 
 more than 30,000 people) most of the chiefs were drunk at the 
 trader's, above. After waiting there two days, and finding that 
 their absence might be indefinitely prolonged, he, with his com- 
 panions, went up the river eighteen miles to Fort Miami (now 
 Maumee City), that he might there deposit the provisions and 
 the farming tools which he had brought. The next day he 
 returned, having learned that the chiefs had gone down. On 
 Saturday, May 8, he found the head chief (whose name being 
 interpreted was Little Otter), and one other at the main village, 
 all the rest being drunk in the neighboring villages, and with 
 those two he held a conference of several hours, explaining to 
 them the nature and design of his mission. They were 
 courteously attentive, and when he had finished his statement 
 Little Otter made reply (so the missionary wrote), — 
 
 1 He had been taken captive " when he was ten years of age, and adopted into 
 the head family of the nation, and was considered a chief." 
 
 2 " An excellent interpreter," says the missionary, " who served me faithfully 
 for a much less sum than what either of the others would have asked." 
 
 5 
 
34 
 
 " That the Great Spirit had been listening, and that they and their young 
 men had been listening to all that I had said ; that he believed it was true ; 
 that the air appeared clear and no clouds in the way, and that he would 
 assemble his chiefs and hear me again as soon as possible, but that till 
 then he could give me no further answer." 
 
 Through the next day, the Lord's Day, they " enjoyed peace 
 and quietness" in that heathen village; but the night which 
 followed was noisy, for a poor child was dying in one of 
 the wigwams, and conjurers were at work to save its life by 
 making an uproar with drums and rattles. Such work, as the 
 morning drew near, required whiskey, and from drinking some 
 of the conjurers got to fighting. " But at the request of the 
 sober Indians, who chose not to interfere," the missionary party 
 separated the fighters, and after a while succeeded in putting 
 an end to the quarrel which otherwise would have been a mur- 
 der. No progress could be made on Monday, for most of the 
 chiefs being still drunk, Little Otter could not convene his 
 parliament, but he informed the missionary that they would be 
 sober the next day, in preparation for a dance that was to fol- 
 low in the night. On Tuesday it was found that nothing could 
 be done before the dance ; and Little Otter advised that the 
 business be deferred three days, intimating that the chiefs 
 might be expected to be wise by that time, and ready to attend 
 to a communication from the missionary. One incident of that 
 day, Tuesday, May n, may be given in Mr. Bacon's own 
 words : — 
 
 " As there were sick people who needed my charity, and as others were 
 constantly begging from me, I had disposed of all my provisions, and 
 found it necessary to go up to the fort for more. When I arrived at my 
 interpreter's, which was one mile above, I found there the head chief of 
 Rushdaboo, who was very troublesome when in liquor. I perceived that 
 he was intoxicated, and soon discovered by his gestures and the tone of 
 his voice while talking with another Indian, that he had something against 
 me. Within a few minutes he accosted me in an angry manner, — told me 
 that he had heard bad news, that he had been informed that the white 
 people were a-going to collect all the Indians together, and then fall upon 
 them and kill them, and that he believed that I had come upon that busi- 
 ness. But I soon convinced him by means of my interpreter, that I had 
 neither inclination nor ability to destroy them ; and that I had come among 
 them to be one of their people, and to do them all the good that was in my 
 power. He then gave me his hand, and told me he would be my friend, 
 
35 
 
 but begged that I would lend him a dollar to get some whiskey. I put 
 him off by telling him that I had been so long from home that I had spent 
 the most of my money, and that if I had to remain there much longer, I 
 did not know but I should have to call on him for assistance. But before 
 we parted, he kissed me more times than I could have wished, and hugged 
 me till he obliged me to return the compliment." 
 
 An adverse wind hindered their going up the river more 
 than five miles that afternoon, and they encamped for the 
 night about a quarter of a mile above the Indians' dancing 
 ground. The interpreter (who, it will be remembered, was an 
 Indian by adoption) advised Mr. Bacon to go with him to the 
 dance ; but he, knowing that some of the Indians would be 
 intoxicated, that such would be apt to be jealous of him at that 
 time, " and that nothing would be too absurd for their imagi- 
 nations to conceive or too cruel for their hands to execute," 
 judged it "not prudent to be among them that night." One 
 night, however, was not all ; for that was "their annual conju- 
 ration dance, which they celebrated every year on their return 
 from hunting." The next morning a son of the head chief 
 was sent with an express invitation to the missionary, and he 
 went. From his full description of the conjuration dance and 
 the conjurers, one passage may be transcribed : — 
 
 " The dancers appeared to be about one hundred and fifty in number, 
 very fairly dressed. Their parade was on a beautiful eminence on the 
 bank of the river. The turf was taken off from their dancing ground, 
 which was about twenty feet in width and forty in length. In the middle 
 stood a red post with a white feather in the top, round which the conjurers 
 took their stand, who seemed to be musicians to the rest who were dan- 
 cing round them. On each side they had bark roofs erected, under which 
 they smoked their pipes and refreshed themselves when fatigued. The 
 most of them had begun to be intoxicated, and some were very noisy and 
 quarrelsome ; but when they attempted to fight, the rest would hold them 
 till they got pacified, or till they got them drunk enough to sleep. The 
 Indians who did not belong to the dance were seated round at some dis- 
 tance from the rest, and were merely spectators. I took my stand at the 
 end of a bark hut, within four or five rods of them, where I had a fair 
 prospect. While I was standing there, I recollect to have seen one of the 
 conjurers walking about for some time, and looking at me ; but I paid no 
 attention to him till I saw him advancing very fast towards me, with a 
 countenance that bespoke bad intentions. He was just enough in liquor 
 to feel insolent and courageous. The nearer he advanced, his countenance 
 assumed a more threatening aspect. By the time he came within a rod of 
 
36 
 
 me, while approaching with greater speed, he railed out at me, flourishing 
 his fist, and charged me with despising them and coming there to make 
 game of them. I must acknowledge, with shame, that I was daunted at 
 the first shock, being off my guard ; but on looking to God for grace and 
 strength, and recollecting that this enemy could not raise his hand without 
 His agency, I was immediately strengthened. As soon as the words were 
 interpreted to me, I replied that he was mistaken, and that what he said 
 was not true ; that I had a great regard for the Indians, and had come out 
 in a friendly manner to visit them, in order to do them good ; that I had 
 been invited there by one of his own people, but had not come with the 
 least intention of making sport of them. This, however, did not satisfy 
 him, for he immediately added that he supposed I thought he was poor 
 and did not know much ; but he said that he had property at home, and 
 that he thought himself as good as a white man. I replied that I had a 
 good opinion of the abilities of the Indians, and that he had no reason to 
 think that I was disposed to undervalue them, as I had come out to live 
 with them and be one of their people if they were willing to receive me. 
 But he said that he did not want to have me stay there ; and after some 
 remarks about the French and the unsatisfactoriness of their religion to 
 Indians who had tried it, he added that the Great Spirit had made him 
 an Indian, made him red, and made him every way just as he was, and 
 placed him there on that ground, and he said that he meant to remain just 
 as he was, and that he did not mean to hear to me. ... I told him 
 that I was waiting to have a council with the chiefs, and if they were not 
 generally disposed to have me stay, I should go away immediately. And 
 I observed that if I did stay, he or any other one would be at liberty to do 
 just as they pleased about embracing my religion. . . . To cut the 
 ousiness short, as he was disposed to be tedious, I offered him my hand 
 and told him I must leave him, as I was in a hurry to go up the river ; 
 that if I remained there and he wished to have any more talk with me, he 
 must come to see me ; and I added that, notwithstanding all he had said, 
 if I came there to live, I meant to treat him well and to have him for one 
 of my best friends. At first, he seemed unwilling to receive my hand ; 
 but on hearing that I meant to be a friend to him, he shook my hand and 
 said, if that was the case, he would be a friend to me ; and as a token of 
 this, invited me to come and eat meat and bear's grease with him." * 
 
 1 Something more than ordinary courage was necessary in the presence of so 
 many drunken and half-drunken Indians, any one of whom might suddenly shoot 
 or tomahawk the missionary at the slightest provocation, or at none. The two 
 instances mentioned by him, in which he was enabled to baffle the malice of sav- 
 ages ready to murder him, remind me of another incident. It was while my par- 
 ents were living in Detroit, and when I was an infant of less than four months. 
 Two Indians came as if for a friendly visit, one of them a tall and stalwart young 
 man, the other shorter and older. As they entered, my father met them, gave his 
 hand to the old man, and was just extending it to the other, when my mother, 
 quick to discern the danger, exclaimed, " See ! he has a knife ! " At the word, my 
 father saw that while the Indian's right hand was ready for the salute, a gleaming 
 
37 
 
 It was now Wednesday, the 12th of May. Mr. Bacon, with 
 his companions, continued his voyage to the fort, and there, 
 recognizing the probability that those Indians would not per- 
 mit him to remain among them, he reloaded his canoe with 
 what remained of his goods, so that he might be ready for an 
 immediate return to Detroit. 
 
 At last, on Friday, the 14th, the Indians being sufficiently 
 sober for business, the great council was held at the mouth of 
 the river. The missionary, obeying as closely as possible the 
 instructions which he had received from the trustees, made a 
 short introduction, and then " delivered to the assembled chiefs 
 and others, the talk composed by the Board for that purpose," 
 giving them such translation and exposition of it as was pos- 
 sible. The " talk " had been " composed " and published two 
 years before, 1 and seems to have been regarded by the trustees 
 as the very first thing in the enterprise of converting the sav- 
 ages ; but with all deference to the memory of Gov. Treadwell, 
 who "composed" it and subscribed it as chairman of the 
 trustees, I will venture to say that, though very good, it was an 
 instance in which there was " too much of a good thing." It 
 began in this fashion : — 
 
 TO THE INDIAN TRIBES BORDERING ON LAKE ERIE. 
 
 " Friends and Brothers, — The person whose name is underwritten 
 announces himself to you as the chairman of a council of twelve persons, 
 who are here known by the name of the Trustees of the Missionary Society 
 of Connecticut j you will please to listen while, in the name of the trustees, 
 he explains to you their origin, their views, and the objects of this address." 
 
 Having made this announcement, the talk proceeded to 
 explain the constitution and functions of the General Associa- 
 tion of Connecticut, and (what is not easy for the average 
 
 knife in his left hand was partly concealed under his blanket. An Indian, coming 
 to assassinate, waits for a moment when his intended victim is looking away from 
 him, and then strikes. My father's keen eye was fixed upon the murderer, and 
 watched him, eye to eye. The Indian found himself strangely disconcerted. In 
 vain did the old man talk to my father in angry and chiding tones, — that keen 
 black eye was watching the would-be assassin. The time seemed long. My 
 mother took her baby from the birch-bark cradle, and was going out to call for 
 help, but when she reached the door she dared not leave her husband. At last 
 the old man became weary of chiding ; the young man had given up his purpose for 
 the time, and they retired. 
 1 Conn. Ev. Mag., I, 16-18. 
 
38 
 
 Connecticut Christian to understand) the identity between the 
 General Association and the Missionary Society, which is 
 nevertheless not the same thing, but another ; also what mis- 
 sionaries are, whence is derived the name of the Missionary 
 Society. Then came an explanation of what is meant by 
 religion, — an explanation including a summary of theoretical 
 and practical theology, and ending with a description of the 
 Bible as the authentic source of religious knowledge. It 
 seemed necessary, also, to explain that the Legislature of Con- 
 necticut had " granted liberty to the trustees to ask the con- 
 tributions of the good people," and that thus the means had 
 been provided for sending a missionary. The bearer of the 
 talk was commended to the Indians as " a good man and a 
 good Christian." Then, with a few words expressing the kind 
 feelings of those who had sent him on that errand, and asking 
 for him that he might be received and treated as a friend, — 
 words which, had they been all, might have been sufficient for 
 their purpose, — the talk of the trustees was brought to an end. 
 It will have been seen that the missionary, bound by positive 
 instructions, could not evade the duty of delivering to those 
 chiefs and others the written message which had been put into 
 his hands. He felt the difficulty of the task. First, he must 
 make the document intelligible to his interpreter, a wild man of 
 the woods, whose education in English had been broken off in 
 his childhood ; and then he must trust that man to make it intel- 
 ligible through the probably inadequate medium of the Ojibway 
 language. He had gone over it with the interpreter beforehand, 
 carefully endeavoring to make him understand it ; but when he 
 came to the public reading of it in that assembly, he felt that 
 the interpreter was still in need of help. " I took care," so he 
 reported, " to read him but a few lines at a time, and then to 
 express the ideas in language better adapted to his capacity, 
 and more agreeable to their modes of speaking." He added 
 frankly, though modestly, "I think the address was much too 
 long, i. e. it contained too many ideas on that subject, to them 
 so uninteresting, to be delivered to Indians at once, but this 
 made it longer." To help his explanation of the address, he 
 drew on the ground, before beginning to read, a map of Lake 
 Erie, of the State of New York, of Connecticut, and (more 
 
39 
 
 vaguely) of regions beyond, even as far as the city of Wash- 
 ington. He showed them how Connecticut was divided into 
 towns, each with its great house for worship, and its minister ; 
 and thus giving them some notion of what Connecticut was, he 
 tried to make them understand that the trustees whose talk he 
 was about to read were persons of great eminence and authority. 
 The map excited their curiosity, and they were somewhat atten- 
 tive to the statement of matters of fact. It was also observed 
 that when they heard such parts of the address as accorded 
 with their notions, when they were told that God made all 
 things, and that we must not murder, steal, cheat, or lie, they 
 responded, though not very fervently, with their " Huoh ! " as an 
 English audience responds " Hear ! Hear ! " But to other parts 
 of the address they were less attentive, giving almost no 
 response. " This shows," said Mr. Bacon in his report, " the 
 difficulty of teaching a disorganized people." 
 
 Having gone through the task of interpreting the official 
 talk, he told the chiefs that if their patience was not exhausted 
 he desired them to hear what he had to say for himself. They 
 readily consented, and as he began to speak, they seemed more 
 attentive. His discourse, as reported by himself to the trustees, 
 was by no means a brief one. He began by explaining how it 
 had come to pass that no missionary had been sent to them 
 till then. Having heard of certain objections to their receiving 
 him, he stated those objections one by one, and answered them. 
 Had it been said among them that the white men's religion was 
 not designed for Indians ? His answer was, God has revealed 
 it for the world, and has commanded that it be preached to 
 every creature. Was it objected that this religion is not good 
 for red men ? He answered by showing what effect it would 
 have on their children, on their young men, on their entire 
 community, and how it would fit them for Heaven and bring 
 them thither ; and how other Indian nations had tried it and 
 found it good. Had it been objected that by receiving him 
 they would " expose themselves to the fate of the poor Mora- 
 vians [on the Muskingum], who were destroyed by our people 
 in consequence of their embracing our religion *■ ? His answer 
 was, that our bad men would be restrained by our laws, for the 
 Indians were at peace with us and under the protection of 
 
40 
 
 Congress. But the most serious objection of all was that if 
 they were to receive instruction they must live together in 
 permanent settlements, which was impossible on account of 
 their fighting and killing one another when intoxicated. This 
 great objection he answered more at length by explaining to 
 them what his method would be, and how he hoped to do them 
 good. He acknowledged that the objection was valid while 
 they made such use of spirituous liquor, and his plan was that 
 they should begin a new village in which none should be 
 allowed to get drunk, and from which every one should be 
 expelled who would not comply with that regulation. His 
 report tells how he argued with them : — 
 
 " I showed them the advantages of adopting the plan, — that they 
 would live in peace, as they never quarrelled when they were sober ; that 
 with my assistance they would be able to give their children an education, 
 for want of which they were going on blindfold in their business with 
 white people, who frequently imposed upon them, but who would not be 
 able to cheat them if they once had eyes of their own to see for them- 
 selves, as would be the case if their young chiefs and others should get an 
 education and learn to speak English ; and that then they might have 
 books printed in their own language for them to read ; that I would show 
 them and assist them what I could, about making carts and ploughs, and 
 about ploughing their ground ; so that they might improve [employ] their 
 horses, which were then almost useless to them, and raise a plenty of corn 
 and wheat, potatoes, squashes and tobacco, horses and cattle, sheep, hogs, 
 and poultry ; that I would show them and assist them what I could about 
 building a mill, building houses, and making furniture for their houses ; 
 that I would make them wheels, and show them about making looms ; and 
 that my wife would learn their young women to make their own cloth ; 
 that our good people would send them on schoolmasters enough to school 
 all their children for nothing ; that I would try to have them send on a 
 blacksmith who was a good man, and would mend their guns and do all 
 their work for them in the best manner, and at a much more reasonable 
 price than what they had to give for it then, besides saving them the trou- 
 ble of going a great distance for it. I told them that, as their land was 
 excellent, if they would adopt this plan and their young men would assist 
 their women and children, they might enjoy all these privileges within a few 
 years, without working hard, and that then they would have a comfortable 
 home for their old people and for those who were sick, where they could 
 remain through the winter whilst the others were gone to their hunting 
 grounds ; and what was infinitely more than all the rest, they might then 
 enjoy the religion of God's Word, which, if they would rightfully attend to 
 it, would make them unspeakably happy forever." 
 
4i 
 
 He showed them what the prospect would be if they should 
 reject his proposal. Game was growing scarce, and would 
 soon be too scarce for them to live by hunting. Unable to 
 obtain their living from the soil, they would become in a few 
 years very poor and hungry. They would sell their excellent 
 land for little or nothing, and would be under the necessity of 
 leaving that pleasant river and delightful country, and of seek- 
 ing a home in some distant and unknown wilderness. He 
 urged them, therefore, not only to prevent liquor from being 
 brought into the proposed village, but to desist entirely from 
 drinking it. He would have them more afraid of those who 
 brought whiskey among them than of those who came with 
 fire-guns. He told them how the tribes that once lived east- 
 ward to the Atlantic had almost perished, " principally by 
 means of this destroying liquor." This universal drunkenness 
 was displeasing to God, and had provoked Him to give them 
 up to die as by their own hands. If the Indians there continued 
 to go on as others had done, they must expect to be swept 
 from the earth in like manner. They might think they could 
 not keep from drinking, but if they would strive against it, and 
 pray to the Great Spirit to help them, He would enable them 
 to keep from it. The peroration of his discourse was in words 
 like these 1 : — 
 
 " I might have lived much happier at home among my dear friends and 
 acquaintance, where we had everything that was comfortable around us ; 
 but knowing how much you need my assistance, and having a great love 
 for you, and being commanded by God, I have forsaken all, and have 
 come a great distance to spend my days with you, in order to make you 
 happy in this world and in the world to come. I have come by the desire 
 of God's ministers and good people, who have always been your best and 
 only true friends, both in time of war and in time of peace, and have 
 always been praying to God for you, that you may enjoy the great privi- 
 leges which they have now been at so much pains and expense to help you 
 to. I have not come merely of my own accord or by the desire of 
 those good people ; but God has sent me and commands you to listen to 
 me. Since it is thus, if you do not receive me and attend to the good 
 things which I am sent to teach you, you will make me very sorrowful ; 
 you will exceedingly grieve the hearts of God's ministers and people, and 
 what is infinitely worse, you will dreadfully offend God who has sent me, 
 and will make Him very angry with you. 
 
 1 Conn. Ev. Mag, III, 153, 154 The language in the quotation is changed 
 simply from the oblique form to the direct. 
 6 
 
42 
 
 " To conclude my speech, you are not to blame for not having this good 
 religion sent to you before ; but if you reject it now it is sent, if you reject 
 the goodness of God in sending it to you, and all our kind offers to you 
 which have cost us so much trouble and expense, you will certainly be 
 inexcusable. I hope, therefore, you will give me a favorable answer." 
 
 He was thus urgent in his appeal to them because he sus- 
 pected that the majority were determined not to receive him. 
 The patience with which they heard him was partly due to the 
 fact that he had " furnished them, in the first place, with as 
 much tobacco as they could smoke." The council was pro- 
 longed into the night. The next day, about noon, they 
 assembled on the grass, and sent for the missionary that he 
 might receive their answer. Little Otter, as the principal 
 chief, announced the result of their long deliberation in a speech, 
 which, as written down by Mr. Bacon, is by no means the least 
 noteworthy among the recorded specimens of aboriginal 
 eloquence. The answer was courteously and ingeniously 
 evasive. Game was indeed becoming scarce, but there would 
 be enough of it if only the " great black-gowns and chiefs " 
 would keep the white people from settling so near the Indians. 
 Whiskey was very mischievous, but it would do them no harm 
 if the white people would leave off making it and bringing it to 
 them. What the missionary had been saying was all very good, 
 but they of that tribe would not wish to steal these good words 
 or keep them to themselves, and therefore they advised the 
 missionary to confer with other Indians, of whom there were a 
 great many. The only promise they would make was that if 
 all the tribes would agree to have black-gowns, they would 
 agree to have one too. 
 
 All this was only u a more polite way of answering than to 
 say No." Most men would have regarded that indirect refusal 
 as conclusive. " But," said Mr. Bacon, " I was not disposed to 
 take even No for an answer, till I had a further trial." He 
 immediately begged another hearing, and went on with a fresh 
 argument on all the points which their answer had proposed. 
 Without repeating what he had said before, he refuted their 
 evasions in a way level at every point to their capacity, and 
 then he ended with this appeal : — 
 
 " Fathers, you see that I am very unwilling to leave you. I have come 
 a great way to visit you, and I find there is a prospect of my doing you so 
 
43 
 
 much good if I remain here that I do not know how to think of going 
 away. You see that it is just with me as it is with your children. If you 
 tell them that you can't have them with you, and that they must go off and 
 look for another home, they will tell you that they love you so much that thev 
 can't leave you. And if you insist on their going away, they will hang 
 round you and tell you they can't, and they will plead with you to let them 
 live with you, and will tell you how much good they will do you if you will 
 let them stay. Now, Fathers, if you will not turn away your children who 
 love you and are willing to do anything for you, and who plead with you in 
 this manner to keep them, I think I may conclude that you will not turn 
 me away." 
 
 All this the Indians heard with increased attention, and then 
 they held a secret consultation. After some time the mis- 
 sionary was summoned to receive the answer which they had 
 agreed upon. Little Otter again exhibited his oratorical skill. 
 The reply was courteous but decisive. It was to this effect : 
 You think the Indians are like wild horses, and that we are 
 tame enough to be caught and to be used in catching others. 
 But we are all wild, and if you were to try ever so long, you 
 could never get us to live together. You can go home to the 
 great fathers who sent you, or write to them and let them know 
 how it is. Tell them that you have tried all you could to have us 
 live together and could not get us to do it, and that this is the 
 way with their red brothers. Your religion is very good, but 
 only for white people ; it will not do for Indians. When the 
 Great Spirit made white people He put them on another island, 
 and gave them farms and tools to work with, and He made 
 horses and horned cattle, and sheep and hogs for them, that 
 they might get their living in that way, and He taught them 
 to read and gave them their religion in a book. But when He 
 made Indians, He made them wild and put them on this island 
 in the woods, and gave them the wild game that they may live 
 by hunting. We formerly had a religion very much like yours ( 
 but we found that it would not do for us, and we have discovered 
 a much better way. If you had only proposed to school our 
 children, you might have got here and there one to attend ; but 
 we are afraid of your religion, and therefore we cannot listen to 
 you. You said that you had come a great way to see us. We 
 go a great way sometimes to see folks and get news, but if we 
 do not make out anything, we do not mind it or think anything 
 of it. This is all that your red brothers have to say to you. 
 
44 
 
 So the negotiation with those Indians was ended. Sadly 
 the missionary thanked them for their civility, and expressing 
 at once regret for their delusion and hearty wishes for their 
 welfare, he took leave of them. It was Saturday, the 15th of 
 May, and night was approaching, but as he had made every- 
 thing ready, and J^he wind was favorable, he and his companions 
 made haste to embark in their canoe, and by dint of hard row- 
 ing, with little rest, they reached home safely on Tuesday, hav- 
 ing been absent almost three weeks, exposed to wind and 
 weather, and lying on the ground almost every night. 
 
 Mr. Bacon's narrative of his attempt at the Maumee River is 
 the longest and most elaborate writing of his that has been 
 preserved. Inasmuch as it exhibits the man better than I can 
 describe him, I have given the story in full, and much of it in 
 his own words. The traits of character which the reader will 
 hardly fail to discern are the traits which live in my remem- 
 brance of him from my early childhood till my sixteenth year. 
 
 The next thing in Mr. Bacon's plan, and in directions given 
 by the trustees, was to visit the Indians at Arbrecroche. Only 
 fourteen days elapsed before he was embarked with his family for 
 Mackinaw. Seven days of pleasant sailing brought them to the 
 beautiful island, whence his voluminous letter was despatched, 
 bearing date three weeks after his arrival there. He had been 
 cultivating an acquaintance with the Indians, whom he found 
 far more numerous there than at Detroit, and apparently " more 
 sprightly, cleanly, industrious, and agreeable than those." He 
 had not yet been able to talk much with them for want of an 
 interpreter, the public interpreter being a Frenchman who 
 could speak only a little English, and their dialects, whether 
 Ottawas or Chippewas, differing perceptibly from the dialects 
 spoken by the same nations at Detroit. He was hoping to 
 obtain the help of a young man whom he had lately seen, who 
 could speak both English and Indian well, and who had partly 
 agreed to serve " for his board and schooling." Without such 
 an interpreter, his progress in acquiring the Indian language 
 would be slow and difficult. Having learned that the Indians 
 at Arbrecroche were having a drunken bout, and were in 
 respect to drinking and fighting no better than those at the 
 Maumee, he had not attempted to visit them without an inter- 
 
45 
 
 preter. He deemed it doubtful whether the chiefs there would 
 permit him to reside among them. Two difficulties were to be 
 overcome, which had not before been mentioned : first, the 
 remaining influence of Roman Catholic priests, who had for- 
 merly been there ; and then, the superstitious fear which those 
 Indians had in common with others, as if ministers were 
 another sort of conjurers with power to bring distempers and 
 sickness upon them. " But," said the missionary, " if I cannot 
 prevail on the chiefs to receive me, I mean to insist on their 
 letting me have a number of their sons to educate here on the 
 island while I am learning their language " ; and lest the 
 trustees should be alarmed at the prospect of expense, he 
 added, " I shall require them to find [for their sons] food 
 and clothes." The conclusion of the letter is : — 
 
 " My present determination is to remain about here till, in one way or 
 another, I get the language, and, if I can get a good interpreter at a mod- 
 erate expense, be preaching through the summer to all the Indians who 
 will hear me. As they are always absent through the winter. I must try in 
 that part of the time to be doing something to help support myself, either 
 by a school (which must be small) or by some kind of labor." 
 
 Mackinaw was, at that time, one of the remotest outposts 
 of the fur trade. It was garrisoned by a company or two of 
 United States soldiers, and under that protection the traders 
 and the Indians could meet for the exchange of commodities. 
 The place could hardly be called a settlement ; it was little 
 more than a military and trading station. Mr. Bacon was able 
 to obtain what was considered a comfortable house, as houses 
 then were at that place, where the best houses, if my impres- 
 sions are correct, were built of hewn logs and consisted of 
 perhaps two rooms and a garret. But living was costly even 
 in the humblest style ; and the mission, it will be remembered, 
 was to be sustained without expense to the Society beyond 
 $250 for the year. 
 
 All the discouragements anticipated in that first letter were 
 realized. The missionary was there in obedience to orders, but 
 the Indians at Arbrecroche were not less determined than those 
 at the Maumee that no missionary should be admitted to live 
 in their villages. His letters preserved in the archives of the 
 Society, and the few private letters from him and from his 
 
4 6 
 
 wife that have happened to come into my possession, show 
 what difficulties he encountered, and how he kept on hoping. 
 Through the summer his work was obstructed by the impossi- 
 bility of obtaining an interpreter, though the chiefs, so far as 
 he was able to communicate with them, showed no unfriendli- 
 ness. He was making what progress he could in the circum- 
 stances towards the acquisition of the language which he was 
 
 to use in his work. From a Dr. M , who was well versed in 
 
 that language, and whose wife was also familiar with it, he had 
 received some indefinite promises of help in the difficult study. 
 He hoped that by means of a school for the children of the 
 few white families on the island he might earn in the winter 
 $150 towards the expenses of the mission. But as time went 
 on, those expectations were disappointed. The friendly doctor 
 and Mrs. M were so busy with the gayeties and dissipa- 
 tions of the winter that they had little time to help the mis- 
 sionary and his wife in the conflict with Ojibway etymology 
 and syntax, though it appears that in the latter part of the 
 winter Mrs. Bacon had begun to spend much of her time with 
 
 Mrs. M for the purpose of talking with her in the 
 
 Indian language, — an expedient which till then had been 
 impracticable, because it had been impossible to hire a woman, 
 at any price, to do the work of the family. " This," said her 
 husband, " seems the only way of doing anything to purpose 
 Mrs. Bacon will acquire the language by talking there much 
 faster than I should, and what she gets, I shall get of course." 
 But this hope soon failed. Mrs. M was prostrated by ill- 
 ness, and did not recover till the Indian trade, returning with 
 the spring, required all her attention. The school, too, by 
 which the missionary had hoped to support himself in part 
 while acquiring the language, did not entirely meet his expec- 
 tation ; it was continued four months, and then was closed for 
 the season, because many of the children were kept at home 
 for want of clothes, and because many of the parents found 
 themselves too poor to pay what they had promised. 
 
 A letter from my mother to one of her young friends in 
 Lebanon happens to be in my possession. It bears date 
 " Michilimackinac, Feb. n, 1803," and beneath the date is a 
 memorandum, — " Just two years ago I left Lebanon." A few 
 
47 
 
 sentences from it may help to fill out the picture of life in 
 Mackinaw seventy-three years ago. 
 
 "My dear Jerusha, — * . . . Though nature has twice performed 
 her annual round since I bade farewell to the dear companions of my 
 youth, it seems not long since I was a happy resident in your thrice happy 
 village. I cannot, nor would I wish to forget the pleasure which I there 
 enjoyed ; but, though you will scarcely believe it, I am far from being 
 wretched where I am. It is true that I am deprived of many privileges, 
 but there are many things which still afford delight. I am favored with 
 the most excellent books, which I often read with pleasure. I have the 
 satisfaction of believing that God fills Heaven and earth, and does not 
 confine the manifestations of himself to persons in particular places, but 
 condescends to reveal his glory to all who humbly and ardently desire it. 
 . . . God has given me a dear son, and has hitherto smiled upon him 
 in a remarkable manner. ... I am anxious about his life, his health, 
 and trust that I am anxious also about his immortal part. I am pleased 
 to see his daily improvement, and am often diverted with his little, playful 
 airs. Oh, that I had that grace which is sufficient to enable me to train him 
 up for God ! . . . 
 
 * It has been impossible for us to get much assistance in the Indian 
 language this winter, as the gentleman who promised us assistance has 
 been constantly taken up with amusements, as is customary for all in high 
 life here [high life being a little circle, ' about twenty-five on the island ']. 
 Card-clubs statedly, two evenings in a week for ladies and gentlemen, balls, 
 dinners, tea-parties, etc., occupy nearly all their time, the Sabbath not 
 excepted. When I first came here, there were not so many people as at 
 present. A large number of troops have since been sent on, among whom 
 are several officers and their families. These are, generally, destitute of 
 religion. What a place must this be ! Could you be transported hither 
 and hear the awful language which I daily hear, methinks you would be 
 filled with horror, and imagine that this is the place where infernals 
 rave." 
 
 So the first winter in Mackinaw wore away. On the 12th 
 of May, 1803, the missionary received from Hartford the first 
 communication addressed to him at that distant outpost. The 
 letter itself, written by the secretary of the trustees, and dated 
 Feb. 10, has not been preserved ; but it was more than a mere 
 copy of record. From the record, it appears that a special 
 
 1 This friend, Miss Bayley, afterwards Mrs. Little, gave a son, the late Rev. 
 Charles Little, to the foreign missionary work. Mr. Little was, for some years, in 
 the Madura Mission of the A. B. C. F. M. He, after his mother's death, gave me 
 two old letters which she had kept as memorials of her early friendship with 
 Alice Parks. 
 
4 8 
 
 meeting of the Board was held on the 8th of February, the 
 particular occasion being a communication lately received from 
 Rev. David Bacon, missionary to the Indians. A generous 
 soul in Vermont, Mr. Solomon Goodell, 1 had made a gift of 
 more than $100 to the specific work of Indian missions The 
 communication from Mr. Bacon, together with the evidence 
 which that contribution gave of interest in missions to the 
 heathen, seems to have produced a deep impression. It was 
 voted that $500 should be "appropriated to the object of the 
 Indian mission for the current year." Of that appropriation 
 $400 was to be remitted to the missionary, and the remainder 
 was to be subject to his order for the payment of certain debts 
 which he had been struggling to pay ever since he entered on 
 the mission. An explanatory vote was added that the appro- 
 priation should be " in full for Mr. Bacon's services for the year, 
 and for the payment of an interpreter to be hired by him," the 
 trustees having been distinctly informed that the wages of an 
 interpreter would probably be not less than $ 1 50. At the same 
 time it was ordered that the secretary procure, at the expense 
 of the Society, three complete sets of the Connecticut Evan- 
 gelical Magazine (then in its third volume), and transmit the 
 same to Mr. Bacon 2 ; and also " that the secretary procure the 
 last letter from Mr. Bacon to be copied at the expense of the 
 Society, and transmit a copy of it to Mr. Goodell," with an 
 assurance that his donation should be expended according to 
 his request, and with the information that $500 had been 
 appropriated to the Indian Mission for the current year. 
 
 These extraordinary indications of interest in the work called 
 forth from the missionary a joyful response : " I am perfectly 
 satisfied, and most cordially approve of every measure which 
 our worthy trustees have adopted with respect to this mission. 
 The sum they have appropriated for the support of this 
 mission for the current year, though not more than will be 
 
 1 See " Memoirs of William Goodell, D. D.," pp. n, 12. 
 
 2 Nine months later Mr. Bacon said in a letter to the secretary, " We have not 
 yet received the magazines. We should be willing to go fifty miles to have an 
 opportunity to read them. For more than two years past we have been as much 
 secluded from the circle of religious intelligence as if we had been under ground. 
 We are extremely anxious to hear something respecting missions and poor mis- 
 sionaries in different parts of the world." 
 
49 
 
 necessary, is greater than I dared to hope for, considering that 
 the most of the supporters of the mission are unacquainted 
 with the expenses of living in this country." Evidently it was 
 his expectation, as well as that of the trustees, that a mission 
 to the Indians in that distant wilderness would be able to do 
 much for its own support. The $500 in full for a year's ser- 
 vice, with $150 deducted for an interpreter, could not have 
 been considered, either by the missionary or by the Board, as 
 anything more than a generous " grant, in aid " of his self- 
 sacrificing zeal. 
 
 " The spirited exertions of the venerable Board of Trustees, and the 
 liberal donations which are made by the children of God who are ardently 
 praying for the success of the mission, loudly call for thanksgivings to the 
 Great Inspirer of every good design, and afford the highest encourage- 
 ment to hope that the Lord is about to do great things for these poor, 
 wretched, and long-neglected heathen. . . . The directors and support- 
 ers of the mission seem to have done their part, thus far, very faithfully ; 
 and as they have sowed bountifully, they will doubtless reap bountifully. 
 May that liberal soul in Vermont be rewarded with a plentiful harvest of 
 grace here and of glory hereafter ! I pray that I may not be left to coun- 
 teract these noble exertions by slothfulness as a laborer, or to waste by 
 unfaithfulness as a steward the sacred treasure that has been deposited for 
 such a benevolent and god-like purpose. . . . If the Lord were not sov- 
 ereign in the choice of instruments to be employed, as well as in the ends to 
 be answered, I could have no hopes of success unless baptized anew with 
 the fire of that love which is stronger than death. . . . But why is it 
 that I am so unprepared, when such great preparations are made in other 
 respects ? Is it not because that for all these things God will be inquired 
 of; and the friends of the mission, depending too much on temporal means 
 and too little on his power and grace, have offered more money for my 
 support than prayers for my sanctification and success ? " 
 
 After describing the failure of the help which the mission- 
 ary and his wife had hoped for in their efforts to acquire the 
 Indian language, the letter proceeds : — 
 
 " I have therefore tried to get a sober young Indian into the family, who 
 was much pleased with the idea of coming, as he is very desirous of 
 acquiring an education. But a trader, to whom he is indebted, would not 
 consent to it unless I would pay $50 for him. I was therefore obliged to 
 relinquish this plan also. The young fellow appeared extremely sorry, and 
 says that as soon as he has paid the debt, he will come and live with me 
 till he is qualified for mercantile business. I expect him in about a month. 
 He proposes to work for me a part of the time, and I am to pay him for 
 what he does. He is a young chief, of a very worthy and respectable 
 7 
 
5° 
 
 family, and is possessed of superior abilities. The worthy old chief 
 mentioned in my journal last fall x (an uncle of this young chief), lately 
 made me a present of a bark containing more than forty weight of the 
 finest maple-sugar I ever saw. After making a hole in the top, he cut it 
 open in the side to show me that it was all of the same quality, and 
 assured me that it was a ' mokok ' of ' sisebauquet ' that he had made on 
 purpose for me. I was pleased with the present, especially as it was an 
 expression of friendship which no other person on the island received 
 from him, though it is common for the commanding officer to receive such 
 presents from the Indians, especially from the chiefs. I suppose it was 
 owing to my having treated him with more kindness and respect, always 
 bringing him to my table, whereas if others fed him it would be in the 
 manner that we feed our dogs. We made him presents in return, to more 
 than the amount of what he would have sold it for. 
 
 " Mr. , who had offered me a hundred acres of land, and made me 
 
 many fair proposals, if I would go and live by the side of him, when I went 
 to draw writings refused to fulfil any of his promises, and would not suffer 
 me to come on to his land unless I would consent to give him my improve- 
 ments when I might leave them. I have therefore been making provision 
 on this island for my family. I have begun to build a log-house, a mile and 
 a half from the village. We have cleared a little piece of land, and are 
 now fencing and planting our garden. The land is the best on the island, 
 and full as good as it is at Arbrecroche, and the wood is chiefly taken off, 
 just there, by the citizens, so that the place is very suitable for an Indian 
 village. . . . 
 
 " I hope to see my interpreter here within a month. As soon as he 
 comes, I calculate to go directly to Arbrecroche, and spend most of the 
 time there through the summer. My family will remain on the island. 
 
 " The Indians are very unwilling to part with their children ; but if it is 
 possible, we mean to take a little boy and girl to live with us till they are 
 of age, in order that they may hurry us forward in the language, and be 
 of service to us in other respects. I expect that most of the chiefs of 
 Arbrecroche will soon be here ; but for want of an interpreter that speaks 
 English, I shall not be able to say much to them." 
 
 About five weeks later (June 25) the missionary had another 
 opportunity of sending a letter. The young chief, Sigenog, 
 had been with him since the last of May, and was confirming 
 the favorable opinion already given concerning him. His 
 behavior in the family and out of it had been better than could 
 reasonably be expected of one " brought up in a heathenism 
 greatly corrupted by intercourse with what are called civilized 
 people." The time when Sigenog was one of our family is a 
 
 1 That " journal," like many other letters in the correspondence, is not now 
 found in the archives of the Society. 
 
5i 
 
 little beyond the reach of my recollection ; but his name was 
 a household name with us in my childhood, and I remember 
 vividly the copy-book filled with his neat penmanship and long 
 retained as a sort of keepsake. I may be permitted to tran- 
 scribe here some part of what was written about him at the 
 end of the first month : — 
 
 " He eats and drinks at our table, is very fond of our way of living, 
 tries to conform to us in everything, conducts with as much decency and 
 propriety as a white person, and is very modest, cheerful, and sociable. 
 . . . He has such an aversion to intoxication that he will not asso- 
 ciate with Indians who give way to it. He has not slept out of the house 
 more than one or two nights since he has been with us, and then he was 
 with his near relations. He goes to the fort (a mile and a half from where 
 we now live) two or three times a week, but seldom stays more than three 
 or four hours, and often returns much sooner, with the complaint, ' Enish- 
 enabage kenassquiebe mozhuk, mozhuk, mozhuk.' (Indians drunk always, 
 always, always.) He is very fond of his book, finds great difficulty in pro- 
 nouncing / and r, but has got so far as to read tolerably in two syllables. 
 For his amusement, I have lately put him to writing, in which I doubt not 
 he will make great proficiency. ... As he has not been used to con- 
 stant labor of any kind, I am afraid that he will get tired of it if I require 
 him to do much at present. I believe he has done about enough to pay for 
 his board ; and I think it likely that after he has got a little more into the 
 habit of working, he will do enough to pay for his clothes. We are all of 
 us extremely pleased with him, pay him the utmost attention, and find that 
 we make much more rapid progress in the language than we ever have 
 made before. 
 
 " The chiefs have not met at this place this spring, and I believe never 
 will, as they are not likely to receive any presents from the Americans. 
 If my interpreter [so long negotiated with, and so often expected in 
 vain] comes, I expect to go to Arbrecroche soon after he arrives. If he 
 does not come, I do not see but that I must remain here this season, and 
 improve my time in learning the language and in making preparation to 
 lighten the expenses of the mission, by clearing and cultivating a piece of 
 ground. . . . We live at present in a very small log-house, which I 
 was obliged to build this spring. I am preparing a more convenient one, 
 which will not be finished before another year. We expect to spend the 
 winter in the village. I shall not raise much of anything this year. The 
 flies and worms have destroyed the most of my garden vegetables, and 
 what is worse, the most that are on the island." 
 
 The second summer at Mackinaw was wearing away, and 
 the prospect of success did not brighten. The attempt to ob- 
 tain an interpreter was continually renewed and continually 
 baffled. Probably it was a grave mistake to suppose that any 
 interpreter, w ever serviceable to fur-traders or to military 
 
52 
 
 officers in such intercourse as they held with the Indians, 
 would be of much use to the mission beyond the aid he might 
 render in learning the language. Mr. Bacon's experience with 
 interpreters was teaching him that lesson ; and he was learn- 
 ing, at the same time, that no negotiation with chiefs, like that 
 which he had with Little Otter and others at the Miami, was 
 likely to open the door for him. He saw that success was to 
 be achieved only by establishing his abode in some convenient 
 proximity to the Indians, and beginning a new village for such 
 of them as might be induced to learn a better way of living ; 
 and he was gradually bringing his plans into accordance with 
 that view. In a letter written on the 27th of September, he 
 expressed a feeling like that of the Psalmist, crying out, " Woe 
 is me that I sojourn in Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of 
 Kedar!" His latest communication from the secretary had 
 told him, incidentally, that in New England there were still 
 <( revivals of religion in many places" ; and he could not but 
 think with sadness how far away he and those dearest to him 
 were from " sanctuary and sacramental opportunities, and the 
 fervent prayers and animating discourse of those whose hearts 
 are warmed with love to God and to the souls of men " ; he, 
 with his wife and her brother, and the little one just learning 
 to lisp an infant's prayer, the only worshipping household within 
 hundreds of miles. " How dark and gloomy ! . . . And 
 what adds to the gloom, there is little prospect that it will ever 
 be otherwise. There seems less hope with respect to the white 
 people than for the poor Indians who are so greatly corrupted 
 by intercourse with them." His soul was vexed with profane- 
 ness, drunkenness, licentiousness, absolute godlessness, all 
 around. Yet he and his family were not altogether friendless 
 there, nor without refined society. One of the officers in the 
 fort was " Capt. Dunham, who with his wife and brother and 
 one other person seem," said the missionary, " to be the only 
 people here who are willing to hear anything on religion." 1 
 
 1 Capt. (afterwards Col ) Josiah Dunham was a graduate of Dartmouth Col- 
 lege, 1789. After leaving the army, he resided at Windsor, Vermont, became 
 distinguished on the Federalist side in the politics of that State, and was emi- 
 nently useful there (and in his later years at Louisville, Kentucky) as the head of 
 a school for young ladies. His wife was Susan Hedge ; and it was in testimony 
 of grateful affection towards her and her husband that my eldest sister, born at 
 Mackinaw, was named Susan Dunham. 
 
53 
 
 The want of access to the Indians was still more discoura- 
 ging. Without a competent interpreter, there would be no hope 
 of gaining anything from a visit to Arbrecroche. The inter- 
 preter with whom he had corresponded through a friend, and 
 whom he had so often hoped to obtain, had again disappointed 
 him. Finding another man who could speak both Indian and 
 English, he had attempted to obtain his help in the expedition ; 
 but that man's father and mother — the one a Jew and the 
 other a Papist — were unwilling that he should fulfil his en- 
 gagement, and he had reasons of his own for his reluctance. 
 The Indians, he said, had been for a long time carrying home 
 kegs of rum ; not half-a-dozen in the whole village would be 
 found sober, and the drunken ones would be very troublesome. 
 Sigenog had already made a similar representation ; and when 
 he saw Mr. Bacon ready to embark, and urging the interpreter 
 to go, he renewed his remonstrance. " Father, if you think it 
 is best to go, I will go with you, but I think you had better not 
 go. I am an Indian, and I think I know Indians better than 
 you do. They have got a great deal of rum, and they will, 
 almost all of them, be very drunk. I am sure they will not lis- 
 ten to you nor mind what you say to them. I know they will 
 talk very foolish to you ; and I should not like to be there, for 
 I should not know how to bear it." The question, to go or not 
 to go, must be reconsidered, and this was the result. 
 
 " Finding on inquiry that the Indians had probably more than one 
 hundred nine-gallon kegs of liquor at Arbrecroche, knowing that nothing 
 could be done with them when they were intoxicated, remembering how 
 long I was detained with drunken Indians at the Maumee, where they had 
 not a tenth part of the liquor ; thinking that if I dragged a Jew or a Roman 
 Catholic there against his will, he would not be likely to favor the pure 
 gospel of Christ, and finding Sigenog so much opposed to my going, I 
 reluctantly gave up the idea and returned home. . . . Another thought 
 which had weight with me was, that going among them at such a time 
 might create prejudices in their minds, which would be likely to prevent 
 my usefulness among them afterwards. I was also aware that my life was 
 in danger ; but considering how much had been expended and how little 
 had been effected, and as I had waited so long for an opportunity, and was 
 afraid that the friends and supporters of the mission would be discouraged, 
 I believe I should have gone if Solomon [the interpreter] had been willing 
 to go with me." 
 
 No opportunity of friendly intercourse with those Indians 
 
54 
 
 had been neglected. An invitation sent through the head chief 
 to the five other principal chiefs had been ineffectual, though 
 the head chief had promised to bring them down for a confer- 
 ence. Two of the six were understood to be distinctly opposed 
 to the missionary's coming among them. " It is strange/' said 
 Mr. Bacon, " if they are not all opposed to me, as I have none 
 to speak a word in my favor, and as I am dependent on the 
 French for interpreters, most of whom are undoubtedly doing 
 all in their power to prejudice the Indians against me." The 
 old chief, Pemenechaugun, Sigenog's uncle, had continued his 
 friendly visits, and the young chief himself was at once a stead- 
 fast friend and a hopeful pupil. 
 
 " Sigenog is much respected by several of the principal chiefs and all 
 the best Indians, but the others are opposed to him, because he is trying 
 to be something more than an Indian, and is going to be a Kiche 
 Makomon (great knife), as they call the Americans. But he says they are 
 fools ; that they would rather be always drunk than to learn anything ; and 
 that he does not regard them. It is not in the power of Frenchmen or 
 Indians to persuade him away, though many of them have exerted them- 
 selves to the utmost. He has never gone to see his friends till very lately, 
 and seems much more fond of our company than of the Indians'. They 
 are always inviting him to drink, but he appears not to be fond of it, and 
 tries to avoid them as much as he can. He seldom goes out, and I have 
 never known him to come home intoxicated but twice (which could be said 
 of hardly any gentleman in the place), and then he had been with some 
 chiefs who were old acquaintance and would take no denial. . . . He 
 is twenty-five years of age. He showed himself very brave in their war 
 with us (which he says was caused by the British, who were constantly 
 persuading and urging them, and giving them presents), and he is accounted 
 one of the best hunters in the country. . . . On hearing my speeches 
 interpreted to him, he appeared highly gratified, and said he could sit all 
 night to hear such talk, and greatly lamented that Indians at Arbrecroche 
 were such fools. He seems fully bent on getting an education, is very 
 fond of writing, and improves as well in reading as could be expected 
 considering his age, that he has to begin where a child does, that he 
 understands not what he reads, and has no others with him to excite his 
 ambition. ... I spoke to him some time ago, to know if he would be 
 willing to go to Connecticut to get an education. The idea was very 
 pleasing to him, and his desire to go appears to be continually increasing. 
 I have told him that I would write to the trustees to know whether they 
 would be willing to take him, and he is impatient to know. He thinks he 
 could get another sober young Indian to go with him, if they would wish to 
 have two. Their education would cost but a trifle there to what it would 
 here ; and if Sigenog were there he would soon learn the English Ian- 
 
55 
 
 guage. He understands a good many words, but he will not be likely to 
 learn the language here, as we always speak Indian to him. . . . Sig- 
 enog is a great help to us in acquiring the language." 
 
 The next opportunity for sending a letter was not till Nov. 
 4. In the letter of that date, Mr. Bacon communicated the 
 formal answer which he had received from the chiefs at Arbre- 
 croche. Early in October, Pondegakauwan (the head chief by 
 birth), with two other Chippewa dignitaries, came to the mis- 
 sionary, and presenting to him a string of wampum, delivered 
 the following speech : — 
 
 " My father, I have spoken to your children, to get them to listen to you, 
 but they tell me that they think they are too foolish to learn. 
 
 " My father, we think the Great Spirit did not put us on the ground to 
 learn such things as the white people learn. If he had thought it proper, 
 he would have taught us such things when he put us here. My father, we 
 cannot live together so as to attend to these things like the white people. 
 The Great Spirit has given them cattle and everything about them that 
 they want to live upon. If they are hungry they have only to go into their 
 yard and kill a creature. But he gave us no such things. He put us upon 
 the ground to run in the woods to get our living. When we are hungry, 
 we have to go away and hunt to get something to eat. If we set out in 
 the morning, we may have to run all day to find something, and we some- 
 times have to go without. My father, we hope you will be disposed to 
 give our people such things as they need. And we hope they will do bet- 
 ter in future. If it was not for rum, they would like what you have to say 
 to them very well. But rum is our master." 
 
 There being no interpreter at hand, this official speech, so 
 freighted with Indian philosophy, and so diplomatically non- 
 committal on the main question, was delivered to Sigenog to 
 be retained in his memory till a translation into English could 
 be made. Afterwards the head chief, in a less formal way, but 
 in the presence of his two associates, said something more 
 which Sigenog might report to the missionary : — 
 
 " If our father were to come and stay with us, so that we and our chil- 
 dren could run in and out and talk with him when we pleased, perhaps we 
 might learn something. Our children would get used to him, and it may 
 be that they would listen to him. But I do not know that it would be 
 best. Our father is a great man, and knows a great deal j and if we 
 were to get to know so much, perhaps the Great Spirit would not let us 
 live." 
 
 Although that official communication, with its unofficial 
 
56 
 
 supplement, was on the whole as favorable as Mr. Bacon, with 
 his previous knowledge of the case, had expected, he judged 
 that the question whether to make the long-contemplated 
 attempt at Arbrecroche ought not to be decided without 
 further advice from his patrons in Connecticut. He therefore 
 proceeded to lay before the trustees, distinctly, the consider- 
 ations which occurred to him as having weight either for or 
 against the prosecution of the work at that point. The dis- 
 couraging considerations were very grave, i. Those Indians 
 were so near to Mackinaw and to the British fort on the island 
 of St. Joseph, that they were constantly and abundantly sup- 
 plied with the means of intoxication, and the Act of Congress 
 prohibiting the licensed traders from supplying them was of no 
 effect. They were able to purchase as largely as they might 
 desire, bringing to those markets every spring their furs and 
 maple sugar, and in the autumn their corn and birch-bark 
 canoes, and whatever else had been the result of their women's 
 summer industry. At the same time they were receiving 
 from the British large annuities in goods, which of course 
 could be bartered away for whiskey. Consequently, the most 
 of them were half the time intoxicated, and there was no time 
 when all were sober. 2. Another obstacle was the influence 
 of the French Canadians, who were only one degree more 
 civilized than they, and with whom their relations were every 
 way intimate. Everything that those "bigoted, persecuting 
 Papists " could do to defeat the mission was to be expected. 
 3. " British influence " would be adverse to an American mis- 
 sion in that region. Already it was understood among the 
 Indians that the redcoat officers at St. Joseph's were dis- 
 pleased with Sigenog on account of his living with an Amer- 
 ican missionary. While the British were expending some 
 thousands of pounds yearly for the sake of influence with the 
 Indians, hostility, either open or covert, must be expected from 
 that quarter. 4. Opposition from traders as. such, whether 
 French, British, or American, was to be expected as soon as 
 the mission should seem to have any possibility of success. 
 It being the highest object with them to obtain the greatest 
 quantity of furs at the lowest possible rate, " they would not 
 be willing to have the attention of the Indians diverted from 
 
57 
 
 the chase for the sake of saving their souls, while a paltry skin 
 was to be had " ; and every trader was aware that if they became 
 more temperate and more knowing, they would be much harder 
 to deal with. 5. There was discouragement in the fact that 
 those Indians had little acquaintance with the Americans, and 
 had received no favors from the Government. " Many of them 
 had seen Montreal, but none of them had visited Congress or 
 the States." It had been deemed important to conciliate other 
 tribes, by taking notice of their chiefs and by presents, but 
 those Indians in the far Northwest had been in some sort dis- 
 regarded. They were avoiding intimacy with the Americans 
 for fear of losing the more substantial friendship of the British, 
 and they were frequently telling Sigenog " that he would 
 receive no more presents from that quarter since he had 
 become an American." 6. Those Indians at Arbrecroche 
 were under some special influence from French priests at 
 Montreal. Some of them had been baptized by French 
 priests, and had learned to cross themselves, to count their 
 beads, and to repeat certain formulas. Between Arbrecroche 
 and a village of Romanist Indians near Montreal, there 
 were relations which might be a very serious hinderance to a 
 Protestant mission. 7. But on the other hand, it was a com- 
 mon belief among the same Indians that they had already 
 made trial of the white men's religion and had found no good 
 in it. "This," said Mr. Bacon, " is an objection that is in the 
 mouth of every one in this country, and it is thought to be so 
 conclusive that to make any further attempts is the height of 
 folly. Pemenechaugun gave me this as a reason for his con- 
 cluding that I should not be successful ; and I believe it is so 
 considered by the Indians in general." 
 
 Discouraging as these views were, the missionary found rea- 
 son to believe that it was not wise to withdraw from that par- 
 ticular field without a most thorough trial of its possibilities. 
 Nowhere north of the Ohio could success be reasonably hoped 
 for after an acknowledged failure at Arbrecroche. That neigh- 
 borhood, therefore, notwithstanding the hinderances, might be 
 the place for a beginning ; but whether there or elsewhere, he 
 would have no more negotiating with chiefs for permission to 
 preach the gospel : — 
 
58 
 
 " If I am left to act for myself, I do not propose to ask their permission, 
 or pay them any other compliment than to inform them of my business and 
 that I should be glad to enjoy their friendship and protection. I esteem 
 the friendship of the principal chiefs to be of great importance, and would 
 spare no pains or reasonable expense to procure it by lawful means ; and I 
 have always made a point of inviting them to my table, and of treating 
 them with more attention and respect than they receive from any other 
 person. But there seems to me to be an impropriety in asking permission 
 of them, or of the rulers of any nation, to preach that gospel which Christ 
 has commanded to be preached to every creature. ... I know of no 
 instance in Scripture in which a faithful minister of God, when he had 
 received a message from the Lord of Hosts, went to any of the ruling 
 powers of the world to know if he might publish it. The apostles and old 
 prophets acted prudently, and it is safest, to follow their example. By our 
 doing so, the pride of haughty rulers would be mortified and we should be 
 exposed to persecution ; but it would be no matter, since God would be 
 glorified, his gospel spread, and souls saved. I pray that I may have 
 Christian fortitude to act up to these principles. . . . But should I be 
 found destitute of such courage and fortitude, I know I should be utterly 
 unfit to be a missionary to the heathen or a minister of Christ." 
 
 In a subsequent part of the same letter, the missionary, hav- 
 ing had occasion to mention that he had begun to clear a piece 
 of ground a mile and a half west of the fort and village, and to 
 begin the building of a log-house therefor his own residence, 
 brought out incidentally but clearly the plan on which he was 
 proposing to conduct his mission : — 
 
 " If I can get the Indians to listen to me, I think it will be necessary to 
 proceed upon the Moravian plan, that is, to begin a new village and draw 
 them into it as fast as they can be brought to submit to good regulations. 
 It would probably be in vain, and worse than in vain, to attempt to intro- 
 duce any new regulation in the old village at Arbrecroche. And if a new 
 village is to be built, I know of no better place than where I have begun. 
 Lines drawn south and west from my house to the lake will include about 
 a mile square of the best land on the island, and about all the wood except 
 what is reserved for the use of the garrison. As this land is the property 
 of the United States, we need not ask the Indians for it ; and if there 
 should be a prospect of success, it is likely that Congress would grant it to 
 the Society for their use, if they were to petition for it." 
 
 The same long letter gave some further information, which 
 might naturally make the trustees anxious for the future. 
 That modest log-house (twenty feet by thirty) for which Mr. 
 Bacon had procured the logs at some expense, could not, for 
 want of help, be put up in time to be occupied by the family 
 
$9 
 
 when obliged to leave the house in which they had lived 
 through the winter. A mere hut, about ten feet by fifteen, 
 built of poles and roofed with bark, had been their only shelter 
 from the last of May to the beginning of September, when they 
 returned to winter in the village, having had the offer of a 
 comfortable tenement, rent free, till the next May. But how, 
 in the mean time, was the log-house to be put up and made 
 - habitable ? That would cost more than he could foresee the 
 means of paying " at present." But it must be done, or else 
 they must move into the hut again ; "for," said he, "stables 
 rent higher here in summer than houses in Hartford." People 
 in Connecticut might think that such a house as he proposed 
 could be built without any expense worth mentioning, but in 
 Mackinaw the prices of window-glass, of nails, and of boards x 
 were such as Connecticut would be astonished at ; and no 
 house, however humble, could be comfortable without some of 
 these things. 
 
 The trustees might reasonably ask themselves whether the 
 cost of a mission to the Indians, on that frontier, was not 
 likely to exceed their appropriations for its support. 
 
 That young chief, too, of whom the missionary had such 
 hopes, — should the Board run the risk of some expenditure for 
 his education ? " Sigenog," said the missionary, " continues to 
 do well." 
 
 " If he remains with us, I do not think it is likely he will ever be intoxi- 
 cated again. ... He appears so perfectly honest that I do not hesi- 
 tate to trust him with anything ; and he is so very agreeable that he is 
 exceedingly dear to us. He is very desirous of going to Connecticut to 
 obtain an education, and wishes to take a young Indian with him, who, he 
 says, is willing to go. ... I have frequently told him that he must 
 not depend on going ; but he will be extremely disappointed if the trus- 
 tees do not receive him, as he is fond of believing that they will. I sin- 
 cerely wish they may. I cannot but hope that he is designed for great 
 usefulness. It is thought very strange by every one that he should quit 
 his own people while in the midst of them, and that he should break off his 
 former habits and become so completely civilized in so short a time in 
 spite of the solicitations of his friends and the evil insinuations of perfidi- 
 ous Frenchmen. Ha is thought to be very eloquent in his own language, 
 and if he were t© become a sincere and zealous Christian, with but a mod- 
 
 1 "Boards, forty dollars a thousand; nails, half a dollar a pound; glass, a 
 quarter of a dollar a pane." 
 
6o 
 
 erate education he would perhaps be worth half-a-dozen English mission- 
 aries among the Indians. I beg, sir, that you will let me know what the 
 trustees mean to do about him." * 
 
 One point in that letter of Nov. 4 was faintly premonitory 
 of what proved to be the burthen of the next letter. The 
 remittances in support of the mission were made by the Com- 
 mittee of Missions, in orders on the treasury, payable to the 
 missionary, and negotiable with his indorsement. But the 
 committee seem not to have known how necessary it was that 
 those remittances should be made early in the season. " The 
 summer," said Mr. Bacon, "is the time to purchase goods here ; 
 and for ready money I can procure them much cheaper. . . . 
 This year my orders came much too late. I have sent them 
 
 1 A letter from Mrs. Bacon to her friend Miss Bayley, was written the next day, 
 and gives some glimpses of the missionary family. 
 
 " To visit good old Lebanon once more, to see and converse with those dear 
 friends of mine who still remain there, would afford me inconceivable pleasure. 
 No other earthly joy could equal it. . . . But it is not often that I allow myself 
 the pleasure of visiting you even in imagination. When I bade farewell to Leb- 
 anon, it was without the least expectation of returning. 
 
 " I bade a long, a long farewell 
 To all I left behind ; 
 To flowery meads and shady groves, 
 And friends profusely kind. 
 
 11 Behind I left an aged pair, 
 Guides of my youthful days. 
 Ah, how it tore my aching heart 
 To give the last embrace ! 
 
 ; Where am I now ? Beyond the lakes, 
 
 Beyond the Huron bay, 
 Far from my friends, far from the land 
 Of Christian harmony. 
 
 ; Upon an isle in Huron's lake 
 Is pitch'd my humble tent, 
 Perhaps no more to be removed, 
 Till life, short life, is spent. 
 
 But if my God hath thus ordained 
 
 And I return no more, 
 No more behold those absent ones, 
 
 Whose loss I still deplore, — 
 
6i 
 
 all to Detroit [to be cashed], but I have not yet received more 
 than one half of the money. The consequence is that I have 
 been obliged to purchase goods on credit at a higher price, 
 and then to borrow money to pay my bills." Eighteen days 
 later (Nov. 22) he had opportunity for another letter : — 
 
 " I have just received a statement of accounts from my agent at Detroit 
 (which I have not been able to obtain sooner), and find that my bills so 
 far exceed my expectations that I shall not be able to spare the money 
 [for the payment of old debts in Connecticut] till the following year. It 
 is painful to me to write thus, and I can hardly believe that it is so, 
 though I know it to be a fact. What makes it more strange is that I have 
 endeavored to get nothing that we could do without, and have taken the 
 utmost care to purchase at the lowest rate possible. Lest it should be 
 thought that we have been extravagant, I will mention as an instance of our 
 economy, that our common diet for morning and evening, last winter, was 
 bread and tea ; that but twenty weight of butter was used in the family 
 from November till May ; and that, in order to lay up butter for this win- 
 ter, we have made use of bread and sour skimmed milk sweetened with 
 Indian sugar through the summer. When I mention this, I mean to 
 except Mrs. Bacon, as I would not suffer her to conform to us in this 
 respect. Her health would not have permitted it. I do not recollect that 
 I have purchased a fowl since we have been here, except in case of sick- 
 ness, and six pounds of poor beef (for which I paid a dollar) and about as 
 much pork, at a quarter of a dollar a pound, is all the fresh meat I remem- 
 ber to have bought since last winter. 
 
 " But so it is, my money is gone, and I am so much in debt that I shall 
 need all my pay for the ensuing year, and must practise the strictest econ- 
 
 " Then let His sacred will be done 
 Whose wisdom is divine ; 
 His seat be ever on the throne, 
 And at His footstool mine." 
 
 After these stanzas of what I remember to have heard my mother call (in 
 describing the difference between John Newton's hymns and Cowper's) " home- 
 made poetry," the letter proceeds : — 
 
 " Mr. Bacon has proposed to the Missionary Society to take Sigenog, our young 
 chief, and another Indian boy, for the purpose of educating them. It was proposed 
 that Beaumont should accompany them as their guide and interpreter. Mr. Bacon 
 told me that I might go with them, if my desire to see my friends would lead me 
 to encounter the difficulties and dangers which would attend such a journey. I 
 was at first pleased, but have since thoroughly considered the matter, and think it 
 would be an undertaking too great for me. Besides, the expense would be greater 
 than we could afford. ... I can jabber Indian a little now, and hope, if Sig- 
 enog remains with us, that we shall all learn to speak it very fast. My little L. is 
 more attached to our Indian than he is to me. He now understands a little of his 
 language, and will probably be master of it before me." 
 
62 
 
 omy in order to be clear of debt at the end of the year. And unless the 
 trustees will lend me $100 to enable me to build the house I have begun, 
 I am afraid we shall have to spend another summer in the little hut made 
 of poles and covered with bark, and which is without a window and not 
 worth putting one into, and is too small to be convenient for one person. 
 And in that case we should have to return to the village in the fall, draw 
 in whatever we raise and all our wood, nearly two miles, besides having a 
 great deal of trouble in making one of their dirty, shattered houses com- 
 fortable for winter, and in putting it in order when we leave it in the 
 spring. . . . The loan of $100 for a year or two would enable me to 
 avoid all these disadvantages. . . . Such seasonable assistance 
 would put me in a way of helping myself much sooner than I otherwise 
 could. And it will not do for the Society to be always burthened with 
 the enormous expense which must unavoidably attend this mission at 
 present. . . . 
 
 " The advanced prices of several important articles, and the expense of 
 procuring things there [at Detroit], of getting them on board of vessels, and 
 of freight to this place, have swelled my bills to a size that has far exceeded 
 my expectations." 
 
 On this last letter is a memorandum by the secretary, 
 "Received Jan. 3, 1804." It had been six weeks on the way, 
 which appears to have been the ordinary time for the trans- 
 mission of a letter from Mackinaw to Hartford. Its arrival 
 was opportune ; for the records show that on the next day a 
 meeting of the trustees was held at the house of Dr. Strong, 
 by adjournment from the annual meeting in September. As 
 the letters from Mackinaw were read, the eyes of the venerable 
 Board were opened, at last, to the fact, palpable and stubborn, 
 that a mission to the Indians, so far from its base of supplies, 
 could not be maintained on the narrow scale of their appropri- 
 ations. They saw that their missionary was forming a larger 
 plan than they had dreamed of, — a plan that would send young 
 chiefs to Connecticut for such an education as might make 
 them efficient instruments of good among their wild brethren, 
 and that required ground for a village of such Indians as could 
 be induced to adopt a new mode of living ; and that he was 
 becoming more burthened with debt while struggling on in 
 sanguine hope of better days in which the mission should be 
 self-supporting. The record shows what the effect was. 
 
 " Sundry letters from the Rev. David Bacon having been communicated 
 to the Board, 
 
63 
 
 "Voted, That the said Mr. Bacon be directed to leave that part of the 
 country where he now is, without unnecessary delay, and repair to New 
 Connecticut, there to itinerate as a missionary and to improve himself in 
 the Indian language ; and that the Rev. Joseph Badger, in concert with 
 Mr. Bacon,, endeavor, as soon as possible, to gain information respecting 
 the state of the Indian tribes in the vicinity of New Connecticut and San- 
 dusky Bay, and the expediency of. sending a missionary to them or any of 
 them ; and that they communicate such information to this Board. 
 
 "Voted, That the sum of $150 be .granted to the Rev. David Bacon, to 
 defray the expenses of his removal from Michilimackinac to New Con- 
 necticut ; and that the Committee of Accounts take measures to transmit 
 the same to him." 
 
 Of course, Mackinaw was at that season of the year, and till 
 the opening of navigation in the month of May, inaccessible to 
 any communication from Hartford. The missionary might 
 almost as well have been at the North Pole. No direction, 
 no advice, no remittance for his relief could reach him 
 while the lakes were frozen. Put entirely upon his own 
 resources, he could only do as he had been doing. He had 
 his Indian pupil, whose language he was learning ; he had 
 occasional intercourse with neighboring Indians, chiefs and 
 others, whose confidence he was trying to win. No writing 
 remains nor any living memory to tell how that winter passed 
 away. His letters to the Society the next spring are not now 
 in its archives. The first information from him that I can find 
 after Nov. 22, 1803, is in a letter to his brother at Hartford, 
 which was dated "June 1, 1804." 
 
 " The fourth vessel has just arrived, and though one or two of them 
 came from Fort Erie, we have not received one word from Connecticut. 
 It seems as though all our friends were dead. I fear that you have for- 
 gotten your promise to write often. But we wish to believe that you and 
 Mr. Flint (secretary) and many more have letters on the way. It is not 
 so much matter about my writing to you, as you have frequent opportuni- 
 ties of perusing my letters to the Society. 
 
 11 1 wrote to Mr. Flint the 16th of May ; you will have learned from that 
 that a letter from Mr. Badger has informed me that I am appointed to go to 
 New Connecticut. As my mind was fully bent on prosecuting the objects 
 of this mission, and as I had strong hopes that God would glorify Himself 
 by granting success to it, notwithstanding present appearances, I was not 
 thinking or wishing for a removal. But the information I have mentioned 
 gave a turn to my thoughts, and the more I contemplated the increasing 
 discouragements attending this mission and the brighter prospects which 
 
6 4 
 
 were presented from another quarter, the more occasion I saw for joy and 
 thankfulness. It gave me new feelings with respect to almost every French- 
 man and every Indian I met with. I had considered my life to be as much 
 as possible at their disposal, and that their alike savage tempers needed 
 no more than a divine permission to put an end to it. . . . Though I 
 still wish to give no occasion of offence, I am less anxious to please. I 
 also feel very much relieved as to worldly incumbrances. My attempts 
 in farming, which seemed necessary here, have proved too burthensome 
 and ensnaring for one that should be wholly devoted to the gospel minis- 
 try. ... I think there is a prospect of my being able to dispose of my 
 improvements, farming utensils, horse and two cows, household furniture, 
 etc., for as much or more than they cost me. . . . 
 
 " If I am ordered away, we shall not be able to leave this place before 
 the last of July." 
 
 In such suspense was Mr. Bacon waiting for some communi- 
 cation from the trustees of the Missionary Society. Informa- 
 tion that the mission was to be discontinued, and that he was 
 to be transferred to the Western Reserve, had found its way to 
 that region, and thence to him, in a letter from his friend, Mr. 
 Badger. He could only wait for orders. At last the orders 
 came in the following letter from Capt. Dunham, who happened 
 to be just then in Detroit : — 
 
 " Detroit, June 20, 1804. 
 
 " Dear Sir, — Excuse the hasty and short letter I must give you. 
 Col. Kingsbury has arrived and has just inquired after you. He says, 
 Mr. Strong of Hartford, who saw him just as he was leaving that place, 
 requested him to tell you that he had not, at that moment, time to write 
 you, but wished you to repair with your family somewhere into New Connec- 
 ticut, and then to report yourself to the Society and give them an account 
 of your pecuniary affairs, — to let them know how much you have already 
 received, and how much you wanted, — that your drafts would be always 
 honored, etc. etc. This was on or about the 1st of June that he left 
 Hartford. And he says that Mr. Strong wished you to consider his ver- 
 bal communication to you, through Col. Kingsbury, as official, and a suffi- 
 cient warrant for your quitting your present station. I mention this by 
 his particular request. 
 
 " The vessel is now ready to sail. I hope to be at Macana before your 
 departure from that place. Pray, sir, make my compliments acceptable to 
 Mrs. Bacon, and believe me to be with much respect and sincerity, your 
 obedient friend and very humble servant, 
 
 "J. Dunham." 
 
 The foregoing letter must have reached Mr. Bacon at Mack- 
 inaw, not long after the 1st of July. Being now at last author- 
 
65 
 
 ized to relinquish the mission there, and officially assured that 
 his drafts on the trustees would be honored, he proceeded to 
 close up his affairs, by selling what he had that could be sold, 
 and by drawing for the balance necessary to the payment of 
 the debts contracted in his work. The farm which he had 
 partly cleared, and by which he had hoped to make his mission 
 self-supporting, was left in the care of his brother-in-law, and 
 soon passed into the possession of a man who had advanced 
 means for the purchase of cows and other live stock from Detroit, 
 and to whom (if my impressions are correct) it became ulti- 
 mately a mine of wealth. About the ist of August — cer- 
 tainly not much later — he sailed for Detroit with his wife and 
 two children, the youngest an infant, born on the 4th of the 
 preceding month. From that point, there was a regular 
 though slow conveyance of letters by the post-office depart- 
 ment ; and he wrote to Dr. Strong for the information of the 
 trustees, — a letter which is not now found in the archives of the 
 Society, but which seems to have given a statement of his pro- 
 ceedings, and of the drafts which he had made according to 
 the authorization sent to him through Gol. Kingsbury. 
 
 At Detroit that migrating family was detained by sickness 
 and other causes nearly two months ; but they did not wait 
 long for a solution of the question how to find their way from 
 that point to their destination. When they were able to pro- 
 ceed, they embarked in a canoe, with what remained to them of 
 their worldly goods and with provisions for "their voyage, — the 
 father, the delicate mother, and the two little children. With 
 I know not what help for rowing or steering, they went down 
 the straits, out into Lake Erie, creeping along the silent shore, 
 resting at night, making progress by day, till having performed 
 a voyage of nearly two hundred miles, they arrived at Cleve- 
 land, which was then a mere hamlet on the lake shore. In a 
 letter written thirty-five years afterward, my mother said to me : 
 
 " We had completed a long and perilous journey through an uninhabita- 
 ble country, had all been sick on the way, and had expended our very last 
 mite before we reached Cleveland. . . . We did not reach the place 
 of our destination till near the middle of October." 
 
 Mr. Bacon had received no communication from the trus- 
 tees later than the unwritten message which had reached him 
 9 
 
66 
 
 at Mackinaw. In obedience to that message he was now in his 
 new field. Two missionaries from old Connecticut were itin- 
 erating there among the scattered settlements, and by them 
 his coming to their help had been anxiously expected. Mr. 
 Badger, the true apostle of the Western Reserve, knew him, 
 and loved him as a brother. The Rev. Thomas Robbins, who 
 had been sent out the year before, knew him only by report 
 and by his letters published in the magazine, but was equally 
 prepared to bid him welcome. As early as April, while he was 
 still ice-bound at Mackinaw, a letter from Mr. Robbins to the 
 Secretary said : — 
 
 "We have heard indirectly that Mr. Bacon is recalled from the Indian 
 mission and appointed to come here. If that be true, I am very glad, and 
 am well pleased with the appointment. We much need a fellow-laborer." 
 
 Another letter from him to Dr. Strong, Oct. 21, says : — 
 
 " We have long been in great doubt and anxiety concerning Mr. Bacon, 
 but this is now removed by his late safe arrival in the county. 1 I suppose 
 he is now in Hudson. I have not seen him, but have seen Capt. Tanner, 
 of Canfield, who has lately been at Hudson and spent some time with Mr. 
 Bacon. Capt. Tanner is much pleased with the man, and this appears to 
 be the case generally with those who have seen him. His wife and two 
 children are with him." 
 
 The letter from Detroit, in answer to that unwritten but 
 " official " message from Dr. Strong, could hardly have reached 
 Hartford before the annual meeting of the trustees, Sept. 6 ; 
 but at that meeting, the Board, acting on such information as 
 they had, or acting in the want of information, put upon their 
 record a peremptory vote, which was to be their first greeting 
 to their missionary on his arrival in the new settlements : — 
 
 " Voted, That the Committee of Correspondence write to the Rev. Da- 
 vid Bacon, directing him to exhibit an account of his claims on the Society 
 without delay, comprising a particular statement of his expenses while at 
 Michilimackinac, in order to an equitable settlement ; and that any further 
 payment on his draughts be suspended until such settlement is made, or 
 until the further order of this Board : That Mr. Bacon be at liberty to 
 return home, and that in the event of his choosing to return, Mr. S. P., 2 of 
 
 1 What had been New Connecticut (or the Western Reserve) was now the 
 County of Trumbull, in the State of Ohio. 
 
 2 For a reason which will appear in the sequel, these letters are substituted for 
 the name on the record. 
 
6 7 
 
 Warren, in the County of Trumbull, State of Ohio, be requested, on Mr. 
 Bacon's application, to advance him, on account of the Board, a sum suffi- 
 cient, in Mr. P.'s judgment, to defray the expenses of his return, and that 
 the said committee write to Mr. P. accordingly." 
 
 This order, if immediately sent, would arrive at Warren, in 
 the due course of the mail, not later than the last week in Sep- 
 tember. Mr. Robbins, writing from Warren, Oct. 21, said, 
 after mentioning Mr. Bacon's arrival in the county, and that 
 Capt. Tanner had seen him at Hudson, — 
 
 " Major P. of this town has shown me a letter from Mr. Brace, contain- 
 ing a vote of the trustees relative to Mr. Bacon, which appears to manifest 
 some dissatisfaction. I cannot know all the circumstances, but I presume 
 a statement of facts by way of explanation would give them satisfaction. 
 Mr. Bacon says he has received no official communication from the trus- 
 tees in a long time, and all the information he received that they wished 
 him to return from his Indian mission and come to this county was a 
 verbal errand by a certain colonel (I suppose Col. Kingsbury — Capt. Tan- 
 ner had forgot his name) from Mr. Strong. Upon that information he left 
 Michilimackinac, and came to this county, but [he] was still waiting for 
 positive instruction. This, I conclude,, he will have from Mr. Badger. If 
 their dissatisfaction was on account of delay, I trust this will appear suffi- 
 cient ; if there are other reasons, I do not know them, and have nothing 
 to say. I earnestly wish, if consistent, that Mr. Bacon may be continued 
 a missionary in this county. On many accounts, certainly, he is the right 
 man. ... I shall advise him not to go to Connecticut, for I think the 
 vote of the trustees does not require it. . . . And I think I shall not err 
 in advising him to perform the duties of a missionary here till he shall 
 receive further directions." 
 
 At last, I know not precisely at what date or where, Mr. 
 Bacon received the communication which informed him that 
 his drafts were protested ; that he was " at liberty to return 
 home " (as if he had somewhere on earth a home to which he 
 might return) ; and that for the expenses of his return he must 
 make application to Mr. S. P., of Warren, who was to judge 
 how much it would be safe to put into his hands. The short 
 time that he had been in Hudson had been long enough for 
 him to win the confidence and friendship of good people there, 
 and he left his little family to be protected and sustained by 
 them. Setting out from Hudson about the first of November, 
 he went to Warren, but he did not refer to Mr. S P. the ques- 
 tion how much it would be necessary to expend in a winter 
 
68 
 
 journey to Connecticut. He conferred with his apostolic 
 friend Badger in the neighboring town of Smithfield ; and 
 on Thursday, Nov. 8, afoot and alone, he continued his jour- 
 ney. From the place then known as Presque Isle, where the 
 city of Erie now is, he wrote, on the 15 th, a report of his 
 progress : — 
 
 " My Dearest, — I wrote to you from Warren and from Smithfield, by- 
 Mr. Badger. I expect you will have seen him before this reaches you, and 
 will have learned how happily we spent a day and a half in each other's 
 company. I left him on Thursday about noon. Meeting with Dr. Reeve, 
 an old acquaintance and a Christian friend, I was detained so that I got 
 on only about six or seven miles that afternoon. I tarried over night with 
 pious Pennsylvanians, who appeared very happy in my company, and would 
 receive nothing for entertaining me. I took breakfast with them, as it was 
 five miles to the next house, which made me late in starting. I had not 
 gone far before it began to rain. I had a very blind path all day, and once 
 got some distance out of my way. The rain continued to increase, and 
 when I had travelled twelve miles it came down like a thunder-shower. I 
 then put up with a Capt. Ewins [Ewing ?], who with his wife appeared to 
 be pious and very agreeable. They made me welcome. I took breakfast 
 with them, and set out with an expectation of spending the Sabbath with 
 the minister of Meadville, who lives off the road, five miles west of the 
 town ; but I could find no one to direct me to him when I came near the 
 place where I should have turned off. I therefore kept on to the town. I 
 reached the tavern by the ferry, where I lodged, about 8 o'clock in the 
 evening. A great quantity of rain had fallen the day and night before, and 
 considerable that day; the roads that were travelled had become intolerable ; 
 but I travelled sixteen miles, which was as bad as to have travelled twenty- 
 five in a good road. Sabbath morning I crossed French Creek, and put 
 up at a better tavern in the town. As Mr. Stockton x had gone to preach 
 to his other congregation, I offered my services there ; but as it snowed 
 very hard, and their place of worship not very comfortable, the time for 
 giving notice short, and the roads very bad, it was thought not best to make 
 the attempt. 
 
 " It continued to snow all day on Monday, but after procuring some lit- 
 tle necessaries, I started, — took dinner with a pious Mr. Davis, four miles 
 on my way, where I was again made welcome. While they were prepar- 
 ing dinner, a young licentiate from the Ohio Presbytery came there in 
 order to preach in that neighborhood. He had come but a small distance 
 that day ; but he complained much of the tediousness of the weather, 
 though he had a good horse, was wrapped in a cloak, and had socks over 
 his boots. However, when he found what a journey I had undertaken and 
 my manner of performing it, he talked no more about his hardships. After 
 
 1 Rev. Joseph Stockton. See Sprague Annals, IV, 243. 
 
6 9 
 
 dinner I travelled till about eight o'clock, but got no more than seven or 
 eight miles farther, as the snow and mud had become so deep as to make 
 it very slow travelling. Tarried at a tavern where they would receive no 
 recompense. I travelled as late the next day, but got on not more than 
 twelve miles, the road growing still worse. The next day, which was yes- 
 terday, it snowed the most of the day. I lost my road several times, and 
 went three or four miles out of my way ; but I got ten miles ahead, and 
 reached here about dark, very tired in consequence of travelling through 
 mud and snow half-leg deep, and very lame in one of my ankles, having 
 strained the cords by jumping across many sloughs, brooks, and other wet 
 places. I supped the night before on mush and milk, and breakfasted and 
 dined that day on cold johnny-cake and milk. In consequence of this, I 
 had become debilitated. I rested but poorly last night. My stomach be- 
 ing very much out of order, and my ankle still lame, and finding myself in 
 good quarters and the weather continuing to be very stormy, I have spent 
 the day here. I am at the house of a Mr. Reed whom we saw at Buffalo, 
 and who came with Mr. Olmstead to our house in Detroit. He treats me 
 very politely. I am now four miles from the lake. Perhaps the account I 
 have given you of my journey has increased your sorrow and your anxiety ; 
 but I wish you to believe that my mind was so agreeably occupied most of 
 the time that I thought little about the way. The greatest trial of a tem- 
 poral nature that I have hitherto experienced is that I have been going, 
 and must continue to go, farther and farther from the dear partner of my 
 joys and sorrows, and our lovely little children ; and that it is uncertain 
 whether I shall ever see you or them in this world again. But faith tells 
 me that it is not desirable that it should be as I would have it ; that it is 
 enough for me to know that the Lord reigns and hath promised that all 
 things shall work together for good to them that love Him ; and that 
 He hath said l Leave thy fatherless children and let thy widows trust in 
 me.' 
 
 " At the Lake, Monday, 19. Finding myself in better health, and partly 
 recovered of my lameness, I came from Mr. Reed's on Friday last. Learn- 
 ing that the ' Lark ' was expected to sail for Buffalo on Saturday evening, 
 and the prospect being fair, I concluded to wait and take a passage in her, 
 as they commonly run it in twelve hours. I knew that my route by land 
 must be very tedious and attended with some dangers, and concluded that 
 to start in the evening, in a good vessel, well manned, with a good land 
 breeze, would be attended with little if any more risk. But on Saturday, 
 near night, it was found that the vessel, having been aground, had broke 
 one of her rudder irons, and that it would be impossible to sail before 
 Monday evening. Just at night the Rev. Mr. Patterson, who lives twelve 
 miles down the lake, being in town on his way to a congregation eight 
 miles back of this place, providentially heard of me and came to see me. 
 He urged me to go with him. I consented, and he soon procured me a 
 horse, and we proceeded on. I was extremely happy in his company, and 
 he seemed pleased with me. I found the people very agreeable where we 
 spent the Sabbath. I preached in the forenoon, and he in the afternoon. 
 
7° 
 
 I found much assistance in the service. He received four dollars for 
 preaching and would make me take two of them. I wish you could see 
 him ; you would be charmed with him. He is about twenty-five, blessed 
 with a strong mind, a liberal education, an easy address, and with all the 
 graces of the Christian spirit. He is the son of the pious and Rev. Mr. 
 Patterson, 1 who went on a mission to the Shawnees, accompanied by 
 Mr. Matthews and G. Blue-jacket, about the time that we sailed for Mack- 
 inac. He told me that he had often heard his father say that he had a 
 great desire to see you and talk with you. I asked him why, and he said 
 it was because he had seen a letter of yours that had been published in 
 the Magazine. Mr. Patterson has offered to procure me a horse to go to 
 Connecticut, clear of expense, but as the snow is two feet deep back from 
 the lake, and is going off very fast, the streams will be exceedingly high 
 and the roads excessively bad between here and Buffalo, so that it is not 
 likely that I should arrive there under a week if I were to go through by 
 land. As it is now near night, and we have the fairest prospect for wind 
 and weather that we can wish, I expect to go on board and sail this 
 evening." 
 
 A passage of twelve or fourteen hours brought the traveller 
 safely and pleasantly to Buffalo, and thence he wrote to his 
 wife another letter, which might relieve her anxiety but which 
 she did not receive. Yet her chief anxiety for him was not 
 about the storms on Lake Erie, nor about the hardships of his 
 journey through the wilderness, but rather about what he might 
 suffer from angry creditors. In those days an unfortunate 
 debtor might be imprisoned at the discretion of anybody to 
 whom he was indebted ; and of all creditors, the holder of a 
 protested draft was most likely to use his power vindictively. 
 This must be considered in order to appreciate the distress 
 which compelled that long, lone wintry journey, and the anx- 
 iety of the heroic wife, left with her two little children to the 
 pitying hospitality of friends who had hardly ceased to be 
 strangers. Long afterward she said, "When he left me at 
 Hudson among strangers, with my two little ones unprovided 
 for, I never expected to see him again. He was just recov- 
 ering from a very serious attack of intermittent fever, and 
 was pale and emaciated." A letter from her, dated " Hud- 
 son, Dec. 24, 1804," shows with what spirit she endured the 
 trial, and with what fidelity of love she sought to comfort 
 him : — 
 
 1 Sprague, III, 523, 524. The father was Joseph; the son, probably, Robert. 
 
7i 
 
 " When I contemplate the many changes through which I have passed 
 during the last six years of my life, I am astonished, and cannot forbear 
 exclaiming with wonder, 'Is it I ? ' — Is it I that have escaped so many 
 dangers, that have experienced so much mercy ? and is it I that am so 
 insensible and ungrateful ? This, my dear, is the anniversary of that 
 happy day which joined our hands. Happy, did I say ? Was that a happy 
 day which was only a prelude to so much sorrow, anxiety, and distress ? 
 Can I commemorate that event with joy, which has been the apparent 
 cause of so much adversity ? Yes, to my dying day, I will. . . . You 
 are well acquainted with my many peculiar trials, yet I can assure you that 
 they have ever been lessened by your sympathy and love. . . . Though 
 my trials have been great, they have never exceeded my expectations 
 (except the late unaccountable affair). You never proposed to place me 
 in easy, honorable, or affluent circumstances ; but on the other hand, you 
 represented to me the greatness of the undertaking and the necessity of 
 counting the cost. You painted to my imagination the cruelty and fero- 
 ciousness of the savages among whom we were to reside. . . . But 
 God has preserved both you and me. We have not fallen a prey to savage 
 cruelty, but to — . I can say with safety that I have never experienced any- 
 thing since I became yours which so much overpowered me with grief as our 
 late trial. It was a thing wholly unexpected, and therefore I was altogether 
 unprepared for it. I have reason to be ashamed that I bore it with so 
 little fortitude and resignation. Grief, like a torrent, seemed to bear down 
 all before it, and had it not been in a measure assuaged, it would before 
 this time have swept me into the grave. . . . But, blessed be God, I 
 am yet in the land of the living, and have cause to sing of mercy in the 
 midst of judgment, and to rejoice in the loving-kindness of the Lord. I 
 have not, in this four years past, enjoyed so much serenity of mind, for 
 such a length of time, as I have since your departure. My sorrow and 
 anxiety have been strangely hushed, and I am left to wonder at my com- 
 posure. You left me weak and infirm : I am now in vigorous health. I 
 was unprovided with a comfortable home, — supposed myself friendless, 
 forsaken, and forlorn. But my accommodations are far better than I 
 could reasonably have expected in a country like this, and I find myself 
 in the midst of the most agreeable friends. I am now at the house of 
 good Mr. Norton, and have been almost ever since you left me. It is im- 
 possible for me to tell you how kindly I am treated both by him and his 
 amiable companion. ... If I was her [Mrs. Norton's] sister her ten- 
 derness could not exceed that which she expresses towards me. If my 
 children were her own she could not treat them with more mildness. Now 
 I am speaking of the children, I suppose you would wish to hear something 
 more about them. . . . 
 
 " It appears to me that I never saw so much to be thankful for as I 
 have of late. Though your absence is a great calamity, and I consider it 
 to be one of the greatest trials that I have been ever called to endure, yet 
 I have been enabled to bear it with a greater degree of fortitude than I 
 expected. I think it has already been of service to me. I know not what 
 
72 
 
 will be the issue of the late event which has occasioned us so much distress, 
 yet I am sure that it is at the disposal of that All-Perfect Being who can- 
 not err. ... I hope that you are before this time at Hartford, and 
 know the worst of your circumstances. Pray make me acquainted with 
 your situation and prospects as soon as possible. If you are to be im- 
 prisoned, fear not to inform me of it ; for if that should be the case, I am 
 determined, if my life and health are spared, to share with you in the horror. 
 I trust I shall be prepared for the event. I can assure you that I have 
 thought much of the matter, and think that I feel in a measure reconciled 
 to it. I would rather be in a dungeon with the dear partner of my woes, 
 than in a prince's palace with any other person on earth. . . . 
 
 " Mr. Badger has been here since you saw him. What a dear, good 
 man he is ! What a blessing to the world ! He says that he will prob- 
 ably be here again in the course of the winter, and proposes taking me to 
 Austinburg with him." 1 
 
 The date of Mr. Bacon's arrival at Hartford does not appear? 
 but it was near the end of December. A letter written on the 
 29th describes his journey from Buffalo to Connecticut, and 
 tells what friends and relatives he had seen on the way or since 
 his arrival. " It would take me a week," said he, " to tell with 
 what kindness, attention, and respect I have been treated by 
 all Christian people on my way and since I have been here, 
 and what tenderness and respect they have manifested for you." 
 At Bloomfield, among the friends they found there in 1801, 
 he had kept a New England Thanksgiving. Through all the 
 wilderness from Buffalo to Whitestown (two hundred miles), he 
 found it hard, because of mud and snow, to advance at the 
 rate of fifteen miles a day ; but thence eastward into Litchfield 
 County, he " had a good, hard snow path," and found himself 
 " able to travel thirty miles a day " without intolerable fatigue. 
 The settlers of Hudson were from Litchfield County, and he 
 had seen some of their friends. " Mr. Owen Brown," said he, 
 " brought me from Torrington to this place in his sleigh. Tell 
 Esq. Hudson that Mr. Brown and his friends calculate to move 
 
 1 On the margin is written, " I am not able to pay the postage on this letter, I 
 hope you can." The postage was twenty-five cents. 
 
 2 Mr. Owen Brown (I remember him well) was the father of John Brown, 
 famous for his exploits in Kansas and at Harper's Ferry, and for his death at 
 Charlestown, Va. The old farm-house in Torringford, whence Mr. Owen Brown 
 conveyed my father to Hartford, is now celebrated as " John Brown's birthplace." 
 Among my earliest school memories is my being in school with John Brown and 
 his brother, at Hudson, hard by where the college buildings now stand. 
 
73 
 
 The same letter gave an account of an interview which the 
 writer, on his arrival at Hartford, had with Dr. Strong. But 
 before transcribing that portion of the letter, it seems fit to 
 say that Dr. Strong had already learned some things since the 
 meeting of the trustees in September, when the vote was 
 taken which exposed their missionary to arrest and imprison- 
 ment. Mr. Robbins had written deferentially (as we have 
 seen) concerning the impression made on him by the letter 
 and the vote which " Major P." had shown to him. He had not 
 only intimated that good people generally, in those new settle- 
 ments, were receiving Mr. Bacon with much favor, but had 
 said, as an argument for his being " continued a missionary " 
 there, " Hudson will probably be glad to settle Mr. Bacon for 
 half of the time, immediately." The more free-spoken Mr. 
 Badger had written, Nov. 21, in a different style, having withal 
 some grievances of his own to write about. 
 
 " Rev. and Dear Sir, — Yours of the 8th of October came by Mr. E. 
 Root last evening. Mr. Bacon left the county, on foot, last Thursday, on 
 his way to Connecticut. He feels himself extremely wounded and in- 
 jured by the official communications sent to him and Mr. P. That sent 
 to Mr. P has surprised everybody of feeling. If I am to be dismissed 
 for any unwarrantable step in my mission, I beg that I may have oppor- 
 tunity to make the most full and fair statement to the society before I 
 am committed to the tender mercies of infidels in New Connecticut. In 
 regard to Mr. Bacon, I have no doubt but his necessary expenses far 
 exceeded the calculations of the Board. The knowledge and experience I 
 have had of expenses in this part and about Detroit lead me to believe 
 his expenses have not been extravagant. I was obliged to pay a man four 
 dollars for paddling me across the mouth of Detroit River to Maiden and 
 back again, — about four hours' work. This kind of marauding has been 
 practised on Mr. Bacon continually. He will be able to state the whole 
 matter. I hope the Board will hear him patiently. 
 
 u I must now say a word for myself. Next March, if I should continue 
 until that time, gives me four years' experience in missionary labors and 
 support. I have tried to be prudent. I am positive there is not a gentle- 
 man in the Board of Trust that would be willing to do and suffer what I 
 have done, and to have his family suffer as mine has done, for double the 
 sum I have received. . . . Am I to go on with the warfare at my 
 own charges ? If the apostle to the Gentiles be consulted, he says not. 
 . . . You can send young men [unmarried] ; they can live on the pay ; 
 it is enough. But must I starve because I 'lead about a sister,' or, rather, 
 leave her in a very poor cabin without the comforts of life ? ... On 
 settling accounts with myself, I find my suggestions about sending minis- 
 10 
 
74 
 
 ters with families here, to be missionaries, will not do, unless they can go 
 a warfare at their own charges." l 
 
 [Apropos of a proposed mission to Indians at Sandusky Bay.] " The 
 only way to do anything permanent among those Indians is to obtain a 
 plot of ground to farm it on, either of them or of the Government, who have 
 lands lying near them. ... I have not a doubt but that if Mr. Bacon 
 had been directed to establish a farm at Mackinaw, at his first going there, 
 it would, in four years' time, more than have supported the mission there. 
 . . . The people and traders about those garrisons and Indian trading 
 places, plunder, by an exorbitant demand for every trifle, whoever goes 
 among them to live on money. 
 
 " The good people here have a high esteem of Mr. Bacon, — are anxious 
 for his return. At Hudson they have provided for his support half the 
 time." 
 
 " Received Nov. 27 " is indorsed on that letter in Dr. Strong's 
 handwriting. Hartford had then some comfortable things for 
 its honored pastors, as it has now ; and from Thanksgiving Day 
 to Christmas that good man, sitting by his warm fireside, might 
 have thought, sometimes, of the late missionary to the Indians, 
 performing his journey of six hundred miles afoot, — tramping 
 on through mud and snow, encountering the rigors and storms 
 of the season, learning what that meaneth : " Pray ye that your 
 flight be not in winter," — that he might respond to a summons 
 
 1 It is worth remembering, as an illustration of those times, that while Mr. 
 Badger was making such complaints, the contributors to the Missionary Society 
 were giving, year by year, more than the trustees, in their wisdom, thought fit to 
 expend. Not only were the profits of the Evangelical Magazine given by the 
 editors to constitute a fund of which only the income could be expended in sup- 
 port of missions, but as early as 1801 the trustees "voted that all donations 
 which have been or may hereafter be made to the Society, exclusively of the an- 
 nual contributions in the several parishes in the State, be appropriated to the estab- 
 lishment of a permanent fund, when not otherwise especially appropriated by the 
 donors ; and that the interest of the permanent fund be added to the principal 
 until otherwise ordered by the Board.' 1 Besides all this, the accounts published 
 annually show that not even all " the annual contributions in the several parishes " 
 were expended in support of the work. Thus, in the year 1802, the parish contri- 
 butions were $2,986.16; and the disbursements for all expenses (including the 
 loss by three counterfeit dollars) were $2,221.72^. In 1803 the parish contribu- 
 tions were $3,069.96 and the disbursements $1,908.25^. In 1804, the year of Mr. 
 Badger's complaint, the contributions from the parishes were $2,740.86, and the 
 disbursements $2,334.13^. Some portion of the surplus in those successive years 
 is what was saved by keeping Mr. Badger's family as near to starvation as they 
 could live. 
 
 No missionary society in these days salts down its contributions to make per- 
 manent funds. 
 
75 
 
 from the honorable and reverend trustees, and give them an 
 account of his mission. Dr. Strong had befriended the mis- 
 sion and the missionary ; and " the official communication " 
 to Mr. P., which " surprised everybody of feeling," was not 
 from his pen. He was, therefore, not unprepared to give the 
 returning missionary a friendly reception. Of all the pleasant 
 news from kindred and friends in the letter of Dec. 29, nothing 
 could so effectually relieve the anxious wife and mother as the 
 brief description of that interview : — 
 
 " Dr. Strong received me in a very friendly manner. He says I have 
 wholly misunderstood them ; that he does not believe there was a member 
 in the Board that had the least suspicion that I was dishonest, or that it 
 would be unsafe to leave it to me to name the sum for my [travelling] ex- 
 penses ; but that, as they were taking a vote to have Mr. P. furnish me, it 
 occurred to them that they were unable to determine how much would 
 be wanted, and therefore said 'such a sum as he should judge necessary,' 
 without meaning thereby to intimate anything to my disadvantage. He 
 blamed me for not insisting on having money enough of Mr. P. to furnish 
 me with a horse, or to defray my expenses in the stage from Pittsburg. 
 He says it is true that they were alarmed on finding that I had drawn on 
 them to so great an amount, and could not think that they could be justified 
 in paying the drafts without inquiring into the matter, as it appeared to 
 them that I had not managed the business with prudence. However, he 
 seems to be of opinion that they will answer the drafts." 
 
 The meeting of the trustees, by customary adjournment from 
 their annual meeting in September, was at the house of Dr. 
 Strong, Jan. 9, 1805, at ten o'clock, a. m. From the record we 
 learn that " the Rev. David Bacon appeared before the Board, 
 and gave a general statement of his late mission to the Indians, 
 and of the expenses attending the same." Evidently the "gen_ 
 eral statement " was drawn out into particulars and occupied 
 the day, for nothing more appears on the record, save the ad- 
 journment " to to-morrow morning, nine o'clock." The next 
 day's record opens thus : — 
 
 "Thursday, Jan. 10. 
 
 " Met according to adjournment. 
 
 " Voted, That the payment, by the Committee of Accounts, of two orders 
 drawn on them by the Rev. David Bacon, at Detroit, the one for $110 
 and the other for $50, be and the same is hereby sanctioned by the Board 
 as having been proper under existing circumstances. 
 
 " Voted, That the sum of $700 be granted to the Rev. David Bacon, 
 which, with the sum of about $250 laid out by him in stock and farming 
 
7 6 
 
 tools at Michilimackinac, heretofore advanced for his support, is in full for 
 his services as missionary to the Indians, which sum of $700 shall be paid 
 to his future order or orders on the Society." 
 
 These votes might have been accepted as a sufficient vindi- 
 cation of the missionary. But the business was not yet concluded. 
 Mr. Bacon had been recalled, and virtually dismissed from the 
 service, in terms which had been understood by him and by 
 others as implying censure. Should he be honorably rein- 
 stated ? He was the bearer of a letter addressed to the trus- 
 tees by David Hudson, Esq., the founder of the town which 
 bears his name. Mr. Hudson, in behalf of the people there, 
 certified for Mr. Bacon that having become acquainted with 
 him, and " having enjoyed the ministration of the Word since 
 his coming among [them] from his lips," they had " an ardent 
 desire to live under his preaching." In the newness of their 
 settlement, they were " hardly able to do anything to support 
 the ministry," yet " with much unanimity " they had subscribed 
 an amount nearly equal to half the pay of a missionary, 1 and 
 expected to subscribe more, for the purpose of employing him 
 in that settlement half the time, " provided he could any way be 
 employed and supported the other half." As Mr. Badger had 
 an ample field in the northeastern part of the county, and Mr. 
 Robbins in the southeastern, so they desired " that the labors 
 of Mr. Bacon might be continued in the western part." " I 
 hope," said Mr. Hudson, " that your Honorable Board will so 
 far co-operate with us as to continue Mr. Bacon for the one 
 half of the time in your service, as we are unable for the 
 present to support him wholly." 
 
 In view of that appeal, and of the letter from Messrs. Badger 
 and Robbins expressive of earnest desire for Mr. Bacon's return 
 to New Connecticut, the trustees could not well hesitate. The 
 proposed arrangement was consented to by the Board, and the 
 way was open for the missionary to go back with a cheerful 
 heart to his family and to his ministry in the woods. 
 
 Mr. Bacon had said to his wife, in his letter of Dec. 
 29, " I mean to set out for home as soon after the meeting of 
 the Board as possible." Cheerfully anticipating the result of 
 
 1 The Society paid its missionaries #6 a week. Hudson people had subscribed 
 $136. 
 
77 
 
 the meeting, he had " pretty much determined not to go back 
 on foot." He was " impatient to set out," and having men- 
 tioned his sleepless hours at night, he added, "If I could 
 know that my dear wife and the dear little ones are alive and 
 well, perhaps I should fall to sleep much sooner." He left 
 Hartford, Jan. 17, and arrived at Hudson, March 5, having 
 performed some missionary service on the way. 
 
 He immediately began his quasi pastoral work in Hudson, 
 occupying with his family a little hut of which I have a dim 
 remembrance, and which I think had been built for some other 
 use. His letters to the Society describe his missionary cir- 
 cuits, of which I give some specimens to show how such work 
 was done in those days. In his first excursion, of one week 
 only, he visited Warren, preaching there on the Sabbath, and 
 at Nelson, Mantua, and Aurora on other days. The second 
 was occasioned by a call from Austinburg, where his assistance 
 was desired in the adjustment of a church difficulty. Leaving 
 home on Friday, he preached in Cleveland on the Sabbath, 
 and from Austinburg (to fulfil an engagement which Mr. 
 Badger had made but was unable to meet) he went, accompa- 
 nied by several members of the Austinburg church, to Green- 
 field, Pa., that he might assist Mr. Patterson in a sacramental 
 four-days' meeting of the Pennsylvania or Scotch-Irish sort. 
 There he preached Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. Turn- 
 ing homeward, he preached at Conneaut on Friday, and 
 again on the Sabbath, having meanwhile preached on Satur- 
 day, at a place ten miles eastward, in Pennsylvania. For that 
 Sabbath service at Conneaut, he was " poorly able, having been 
 almost sick with a cold and violent cough for more than a 
 week " ; yet he proceeded to Austinburg the next day, and 
 then, on Tuesday, he and Mr. Robbins attended a church 
 meeting which had been called " to attend to the complaints of 
 four discontented members." On Thursday he preached at 
 Morgan. On Saturday, according to a previous arrangement, 
 Mr. Patterson, accompanied by several of his church members, 
 came to assist him and the Austinburg church in a sacramental 
 celebration, like that in which he had been assisted two weeks 
 before. In the services which followed, and which were at- 
 tended by " a large number of communicants " and " a very 
 
78 
 
 numerous congregation," Mr. Bacon preached once on the 
 Sabbath, again on Monday ; and his report was, " It appeared 
 to me that there was more of the power of religion in that 
 church than in any other that I had ever been acquainted 
 with." Going homeward, he kept Sabbath at Cleveland, and 
 preached, as before, at the line between that town and Euclid, 
 to a congregation convened from both places. The next day he 
 arrived at Hudson. 
 
 Thus dividing the time between his parochial charge and 
 his missionary circuits, he became thoroughly acquainted with 
 the wants and with the possibilities and prospects of those new 
 settlements. Less than a year's experience convinced him 
 that more could be done for the establishment of Christian 
 institutions, and for the moral and religious welfare of the 
 Reserve as a whole, by one conspicuous example of a well- 
 organized and well-Christianized township, with all the best 
 arrangements and appliances of New England civilization, 
 than by many years of desultory effort in itinerant preaching. 
 The idea was not wholly new. Four years earlier Mr. Badger's 
 journal contains a record of his attending a consultation at 
 Rootstown "on the subject of forming a settlement in some 
 place so compact as to have schools and meetings." 
 
 There must have been in many minds a longing, more or less 
 distinct, after the old Puritan way of colonizing. Doubtless the 
 matter had been talked of between Mr. Badger and his two 
 fellow-missionaries. Mr. Bacon was a man more likely than 
 the others to seize upon such an idea, to brood upon it in his 
 thoughts, to shape it into a definite scheme, to picture to him- 
 self in strong colors the good that might be done by making 
 that Utopia a reality. While residing at Hudson, he had the 
 opportunity of observing what effect had already been produced 
 upon the character of that town by a few of its earliest settlers 
 from Litchfield County, and especially by the strong-minded 
 and great-hearted old Puritan whose name it perpetuates. He 
 would naturally form in his thoughts the idea of what Hudson 
 might have been in 1805, if in 1800 the ground had been 
 occupied by a religious colony strong enough and compact 
 enough to maintain schools and public worship, with a stated 
 ministry of the Word, as Hartford, Wethersfield, and Windsor 
 
79 
 
 did in 1636. Being near what was then the western limit of 
 the progress of settlement in that region, he looked about him 
 for a vacant township in which such an attempt might be 
 made. Ten miles south from the centre of Hudson was the 
 centre of such a township, "No. 2 in the tenth Range." His 
 prophetic mind saw the exquisite capabilities of that five-miles 
 square, its fertile soil, its salubrious air, its beautifully undu- 
 lating surface, its pure and abundant water, its streams singing 
 in the grand old woods, and rich with power for the service of 
 man. He saw that the proprietorship of it was chiefly in the 
 hands of men who, as his trusting and hopeful nature led him 
 to believe, would enter into his views, and would even be will- 
 ing to sacrifice something of their possible gains (if need 
 should be) for so great a scheme of public usefulness as that 
 with which his mind was laboring. 
 
 Having determined to make the attempt, he relinquished 
 his prior engagements for the new enterprise. Leaving 
 Hudson with his family, Nov. 7, he passed two weeks at 
 Canfield, preaching and performing other missionary work, 
 his last in the service of the Society, and at the same time fin- 
 ishing such preparation as he could make for the journey which 
 he contemplated. From that place, he set out, Nov. 21, for 
 Connecticut, with his wife and two children, in a wagon which 
 was returning by way of Pittsburg and across the Alleghanies, 
 and which his ingenuity and dexterity as a mechanic had made 
 in some sort comfortable. Thus ends the story of his mission- 
 ary life. It has been narrated somewhat in detail, because of 
 its relation to the general history of American missions, home 
 and foreign. What remains of the labor and the sorrow through 
 which he entered into rest may perhaps be told more briefly. 
 
 Through the ensuing winter he was busy in making arrange- 
 ments for his new enterprise. The trustees, at their January 
 meeting, soon after his arrival at Hartford, renewed his appoint- 
 ment, but he did not continue in their service. He succeeded 
 in making a contract with the proprietors of the selected town- 
 ship, and in forming such arrangements for the purchase and 
 sale of the lands as seemed to him safe and sufficient. He went 
 through various parts of Connecticut to make his plan known, 
 and to procure the migration of the right sort of settlers. In 
 
8o 
 
 the summer of 1806 he returned to the Reserve, and again 
 established his temporary home at Hudson till he should 
 remove to the place where he expected to live and die. 
 
 A survey of the township, with the laying out of the ground 
 plan for its settlement, was commenced in November, 1806. 
 With what forethought that was done the inhabitants of the 
 town to-day, and all who are acquainted with it, are witnesses. 
 The laying out of a town before its settlement is a matter of no 
 slight importance to the successive generations of those who 
 are afterwards to dwell there. A township measured off into 
 quarter-sections, divided among a few landholders, broken into 
 scattered settlements, and with no roads but such as lead to a 
 convenient market for its produce, can hardly grow into a town. 
 Its population of isolated families, having no acknowledged cen- 
 tre, does not readily become a community with a vital organ- 
 ization and with united interests and sympathies. The unity 
 of a town as a body politic depends very much on the fixing of 
 a centre to which every neighborhood and every homestead 
 shall be obviously related. In no rural town that I have ever 
 seen is that necessity so well provided for as in Tallmadge.* 
 No observing stranger can pass through the town and not see 
 that it was planned by a sagacious and foreseeing mind. Vil- 
 lages and cities have often been delineated on paper before the 
 first house was built, and sometimes the aspirations of the 
 projector have been realized ; but I know not where else the 
 same sort of forethought has been expended in marking out 
 beforehand the highways that were to bind together in ties of 
 mutual dependence and intercourse the scattered dwellings of 
 an agricultural township. Public spirit, local pride, friendly 
 intercourse, general culture and good taste, and a certain moral 
 and religious steadfastness, are among the characteristics by 
 which Tallmadge is almost proverbially distinguished through- 
 out the Western Reserve. Much of that character may be 
 referred to the forethought of the man whom its traditions 
 honor as its founder. The meeting-house at the geographical 
 centre, with the parsonage, the physicians' houses, the academy, 
 the country inn, and the mechanics' shops and dwellings around 
 
 * The town was so named by the early settlers from Col. Benjamin Tallmadge, 
 of Litchfield, Conn., the most distinguished among the original proprietors. 
 
8i 
 
 the neighborhood, school-houses at the corners made by the 
 intersection of the parallel roads with the diagonals, the 
 attraction drawing all households, on the Sabbath, towards the 
 central place of worship where all the highways meet, the gen- 
 tle pressure of the bond of neighborhood, binding every family 
 to every other, — all this was in the mind of the projector when 
 he drew the plan, and was often on his lips while he was toiling 
 to achieve the reality. 
 
 It was fit that he who had planned the settlement, and who 
 had identified with it all his hopes of usefulness for the re- 
 mainder of his life and all his hopes of a competence for his 
 family, should be the first settler in the township. He did not 
 wait for hardier adventurers to encounter the first hardships 
 and to break the loneliness of the woods. Selecting a tempo- 
 rary location near an old Indian trail, a few rods from the 
 southern boundary of the township, he built the first lone 
 cabin, and there he placed his family. I well remember the 
 pleasant day in July, 1807, when that family made its removal 
 from the centre of Hudson to a new log-house in a township 
 that had no name and no other human habitation. The father 
 and mother — poor in this world's goods, but rich in faith and 
 in the treasure of God's promises, rich in their well-tried mu- 
 tual affection, rich in their expectation of usefulness and of 
 the comfort and competence which they hoped to acheive by 
 their enterprise, rich in the parental joy with which they looked 
 upon the three little ones that were carried in their arms or 
 nestled among their scanty household goods in the slow-moving 
 wagon — were familiar with whatever there is in hardship and 
 peril, or in disappointment, to try the courage of the noblest 
 manhood or the immortal strength of a true woman's love. 
 The little ones were natives of the wilderness, — the youngest, 
 a delicate nursling of six months, the others born in a remoter 
 and more savage West. These five, with a hired man, were the 
 family. I remember the setting out, the halt before the door 
 of an aged friend to say farewell, the fording of the Cuyahoga, 
 the day's journey of somewhat less than thirteen miles along 
 a road that had been cut (not made) through the dense forest, 
 the little cleared spot where the journey ended, the new log- 
 house, with what seemed to me a stately hill behind it, and with 
 
82 
 
 a limpid rivulet winding near the door. That night, when the 
 first family worship was offered in that cabin, the prayer of 
 the two worshippers for themselves and their children, and for 
 the work which they had that day begun, was like the prayer 
 that went up of old from the deck of the Mayflower or from 
 beneath the wintry sky of Plymouth. 
 
 One month later a German family came within the limits of 
 the town ; but it was not till the next February that a second 
 family came, a New England family, whose mother-tongue 
 was English. Well do I remember the solitude of that first 
 winter, and how beautiful the change was when spring at last 
 began to hang its garlands on the trees. 
 
 The next thing in carrying out the plan to which Mr. Bacon 
 had devoted himself was to bring in, from whatever quarter, such 
 families as would enter into his views and would co-operate 
 with him for the early and permanent establishment of Christian 
 order. It was at the expense of many a slow and weary journey 
 to older settlements that he succeeded in bringing together 
 the families who, in the spring and summer of 1808, began to 
 call the new town their home. His repeated absences from 
 home are fresh in my memory, and so is the joy with which 
 we greeted the arrival of one family after another coming to 
 relieve our loneliness ; nor least among the memories of that 
 time is the remembrance of my mother's fear when left alone 
 with her three little children. She had not ceased to fear the 
 Indians, and sometimes a straggling savage, or a little company 
 of them, came by our door on the old Portage path, calling, 
 perhaps to try our hospitality, and with signs or broken Eng- 
 lish phrases asking for whiskey. She could not feel that to 
 " pull in the latch-string " was a sufficient exclusion of such 
 visitors ; and in my mind's eye I seem now to see her frail form 
 tugging at a heavy chest with which to barricade the door 
 before she dared to sleep. It was, indeed, a relief and joy to 
 feel at last that we had neighbors, and that our town was 
 beginning to be inhabited. At the end of the second year 
 from the commencement of the survey, there were, perhaps, 
 twelve families, and the town had received its name, " Tall- 
 madge." 
 
83 
 
 Slowly the settlement of the town proceeded from 1807 to 
 18 10, — too slowly for the hopes, far too slowly for the personal 
 interest and pecuniary responsibilities of the founder. During 
 those three years emigration from Connecticut to the Reserve 
 was almost at a stand. The crimes of the first Bonaparte, who 
 was then ravaging Europe, had their effect even in that West- 
 ern wilderness, bringing disappointment and unexpected pov- 
 erty into the homes of the pioneer settlers. The embargo and 
 other non-intercourse measures by which the administration 
 of President Jefferson, whether wisely or wickedly, annihilated 
 for a time the foreign commerce that was so rapidly enriching 
 our country, produced a universal stagnation of business. 
 Property could no longer be converted into money. Men in 
 Connecticut who might have emigrated could not sell their 
 farms, and were compelled to wait for better times. What 
 money came into the Reserve in the early days was brought 
 on the current of emigration ; and the little that came was 
 continually returning, in payment for lands as well as for those 
 articles of necessity which the wilderness could not yield. 
 There was little buying and selling but by barter. Inevitably, 
 under the pressure of such times, the founder of Tallmadge 
 became embarrassed in his relations to the proprietors in Con- 
 necticut. The strict fulfilment of his contract with them 
 became impossible for a twofold reason : first, because the 
 land which he had contracted to purchase could not be sold, 
 and, secondly, because there was no money wherewith to make 
 payment for what little had been sold. It will be seen at a 
 glance what anxieties, what fears, what depressing thoughts 
 were crowding upon him year by year. 
 
 In January, 1809, a year and a half from the date of his 
 removal into the township, he assisted in the gathering of " the 
 church of Christ in Tallmadge." On that day, and through 
 I know not how many following months, it was " the church in 
 his house." That earliest log cabin had been, from the first 
 Sabbath on which two or three families could come together, 
 the place of united worship, and under that roof (most fitly) the 
 solemnities connected with the gathering of a church and with 
 the first administration of Baptism and the Lord's Supper 
 
8 4 
 
 were performed. 1 In the report made to the Connecticut 
 Society by one of its missionaries, who had a leading part in 
 the services, there was a prophetic word which did not fail : 
 " This society promises soon to be the best on the Reserve." 
 That church holds fast its Congregational self-government 
 among the churches of " The Reserve," and is distinguished 
 by the efficiency of its salutary influence on the surrounding 
 community. 
 
 The year 1 8 10 brought some encouragement, for it was marked 
 by the arrival of the first settlers that came directly from New 
 England. Some new aspirations began to be awakened in the 
 leading minds of the little community, for it had been greatly 
 strengthened, especially by the coming of Elizur Wright, Esq., 
 from Canaan, Conn., who brought with him not only a large 
 family, but more capital and more wealth of culture and infor- 
 mation than any who had come before him. Just then the 
 story was told that one of the most honored pastors in Con- 
 necticut, the Rev. Asahel Hooker, of Goshen, had been dis- 
 missed from the church which he had guided for twenty years 
 with eminent success, his impaired health being unequal to the 
 severity of Litchfield County winters. Some of the Tallmadge 
 people, even in that day of small things, were bold enough to 
 think of obtaining Mr. Hooker for their pastor. A letter from 
 Mr. Bacon to Mr. Hooker, dated Aug. 01, 1810, shows what 
 they were then thinking about in Tallmadge. 
 
 "Rev. and Dear Sir, — After having been long afflicted in your afflictions 
 we rejoice to hear by Mr. Cowles that your health is so far recovered that 
 you are able to preach. I learn from him that it was your conclusion that 
 you would have to leave Goshen, as your health would not endure the 
 severity of the winters in that place or the labor of composing sermons. 
 On hearing this, I was led to hope that one of the designs of God in 
 afflicting you was to prepare the way for your removal to this place. 
 Though it would have seemed to be an act of cruelty to your people at 
 Goshen to have made such a proposal while you had it in your power to 
 serve them, and though such an event seemed very unlikely to take place, 
 yet I have been often led to think within these four years past, that should 
 
 1 The writer of this memoir — at that time not quite seven years old — is 
 probably the only survivor that can remember the transaction when the first 
 fathers and mothers of Tallmadge entered into covenant with each other and with 
 God that they would walk together as a church of Christ He remembers, also, 
 the baptism on that day of an infant, who is now his only surviving sister. 
 
85 
 
 it be so, I should rejoice in it as one of the happiest events to this church 
 and society that they could ever expect. 
 
 " I learn, also, that it is probable you may have an opportunity to settle 
 at New Haven. 1 That is doubtless a place where the senses and the 
 social feelings may be highly gratified, where the understanding may be 
 greatly improved and the heart made better, where children may be well 
 educated, and where a clergyman of your respectability may be genteelly 
 supported and be extensively useful. Notwithstanding, I should give it as 
 my opinion that it is best by far that you come here, — 
 
 "First, On account of your health. It is a fact that winters have been 
 much more severe at New Haven than at this place, though the latitude 
 is about the same. Sea breezes, I have been told, are unfavorable for peo- 
 ple of consumptive habits: it is rare that a person dies of consumption here. 
 Many weakly people and such as were inclining to a consumption have 
 emigrated from New England to this country, but though my acquaintance 
 has been extensive, I do not recollect one who has not been benefited if 
 not completely cured by the change of climate, except here and there one 
 who was worn out with age. But Dr. Wright, our beloved physician, 
 whose practice has been very extensive both in the eastern part of this 
 purchase 2 and in this quarter, will give you sufficient information on this 
 head. 
 
 " Secondly, As it respects your usefulness. Many may be found who 
 would be both useful and acceptable to that people, whose minds revolve 
 within the narrow bounds where all things are made ready to their hands, 
 whose breasts were never fired with a holy ambition to preach the gospel 
 where Christ had not been named or in such parts of His territories as 
 are overrun by the enemy, who like to occupy the strongholds built by 
 their ancestors in the face of danger, but never aspire to the honor of 
 breaking through the ranks of the enemy to build more. That society is 
 formed, this is in the forming state. Should there be a few years' delay 
 as to the settlement of a suitable minister there, it probably would not 
 materially affect that society, while such a delay would be likely to prove 
 fatal to this. If that flock has no shepherd over it, it has many about it : 
 here it is not so. When I consider the immense importance of the objects 
 contemplated in this plan of settlement, and when I consider that the 
 first minister and the people who first fill this township are to give it a 
 character, either good or bad, which will probably last for ages, I want the 
 wings of a dove and liberty to fly, till I have secured, as far as possible, its 
 highest interest. Your settlement here would add another very important 
 inducement to those which already operate powerfully for bringing in the 
 best of settlers. Should I see you settled here soon, I should rejoice in 
 the high assurance which it would afford me that the grand object would 
 
 1 The first church in New Haven had been made vacant by the removal of its 
 pastor, Moses Stuart, to Andover. 
 
 2 The Reserve had been purchased from the State of Connecticut by the Conn. 
 Land Company. 
 
86 
 
 soon be accomplished. I might be tempted to boast as he that putteth off 
 his armor, but I think I should not relax my exertions till I had filled the 
 township with proper characters, nor even then ; for if you were here, 
 Sir, I should feel almost as certain of accomplishing the other important 
 object which I have had in view, — that of raising funds and establishing in 
 this place a seminary for the education of needy candidates for the minis- 
 try. I believe I conversed largely with you on the subject before I left 
 Connecticut. Esq. Wright seems as much determined about it as I am 
 myself. I mention his name because you know the man. My settlers 
 generally will exert themselves to the utmost to set the thing on foot. 
 The way is now clear for us, as Burton Academy is not likely to succeed. 
 If our seminary were once established, with you at the head of it, I would 
 fear no want of funds. The General Association of Connecticut would 
 help us; no pious person of our denomination could withhold his mite. 
 Should you come and have an opportunity to officiate in both capacities, I 
 think you could not expect to be more useful in any part of the world. 
 Add to this the importance of your counsels and influence to the infant 
 churches in this country, who are as sheep without a shepherd ; add to this 
 the good to be done through the influence which this society shall have on 
 the inhabitants of other towns (situated around this as were the nations 
 around God's people of old) when they shall see the regularity, order, and 
 beauty which shall have been effected in this society in a great measure 
 through your instrumentality ; add to all this the great encouragement 
 which the success of the experiment would hold out to others to form other 
 new settlements on the same plan, — and then say if God does not call you 
 to 'come over into Macedonia and help us.' 
 
 "Fourthly, As it respects making a comfortable provision for your 
 family. I know something about the expense of supporting a family in 
 such places as New Haven, and I think you should not calculate on laying 
 up anything there. The property which would scarcely shelter you there, 
 if laid out here would soon rise into a good estate. It is my opinion that 
 if you come and lay out your property here, you will twice double it in a 
 few years. I shall sell centre lands low, according to what would be their 
 value without a college, and if the plan for that succeeds, the profits on 
 them [to purchasers] will doubtless be great. But I calculate to have 
 you do still better ; for if you come on immediately, or between this and 
 next January, and officiate not less than three years, and purchase lands of 
 me to the amount of $1,000 as they are selling at the time you purchase, 
 I will give you $500 for my part of the settlement. Esquire Wright told 
 me that if you would come, he would give you one hundred acres of land 
 that is now worth $300. Mr. Kilbourn told me that he would defray the 
 whole expense of moving you out. What others would do, I know not, as 
 I have not had time to call the church and society together. All I have 
 conversed with seemed very desirous that I should write by the first mail, 
 fearing you might be engaged if I delayed till next week. 
 
87 
 
 " I think I never saw a better township of land than this. When im- 
 proved it will be very pleasant. It seems likely to be as healthy as any 
 place in the world. It is remarkably supplied with excellent water, and 
 it abounds with mill-seats. It is so situated as to receiving travel, and as 
 to water carriage into the lakes and to New Orleans, that it will be a fav- 
 orable place for business. There are now in the township about thirty 
 families, a good physician, a merchant, mills, distillery, etc. We have 
 twenty-five persons who are professors of religion, but they have not all of 
 them joined the church as yet." 
 
 At the date of the foregoing letter, Mr. Bacon regarded him- 
 self as far more prosperous than he could have expected to be 
 had he foreseen the public calamities which had almost arrested 
 the stream of emigration from New England westward, and 
 which had greatly embarrassed him in his relations to the 
 proprietors of the township. Two months earlier he had writ- 
 ten to his brother at Hartford a hopeful letter though confess- 
 ing some anxiety. " Sanguine as I was," he said, " I should 
 not have dared to undertake had I foreseen the turn of times 
 which was coming on ; but when enlisted, I should have failed 
 had I been otherwise. That persevering sangninily which you 
 expected would (and which may yet) ruin me is what hath 
 saved me. So many, so great, and so various have been the 
 difficulties I have had to struggle with that had a succession 
 of your prudent, cautious calculators been brought forward, 
 in my circumstances, to fill my place, scores, if not hundreds 
 of them would have given up before this, and come out bank- 
 rupt, and would have found themselves and their families in- 
 volved in perpetual wretchedness for this world, — and all for 
 want of David's ruining foible which makes it so dangerous 
 for his friends to afford him any assistance. But if it is true 
 that men of an opposite turn of mind would have done noth- 
 ing, it is also true that I should not have succeeded so far, if 
 it had not been that many peculiar instances of Providence, 
 counteracting the natural tendency of things, have favored my 
 designs. ... If I am prospered, I hope to be in Connecticut 
 within three or four months, and to make sale of the rest of 
 this township before I return. As the plan of settlement 
 makes it an object for good people to move in, as there are 
 twenty-six families in the township, etc., and as I can carry 
 with me vouchers sufficient to satisfy candid minds that it is 
 
88 
 
 without exception the best township in the purchase and that 
 the remainder is as good as what has been sold, I think I can 
 find people enough who will be willing to purchase without 
 coming to view, and who will be able," etc. " I should hope that 
 the whole might be effected in six or eight months, hard as 
 times are at present. Should I be prospered so far, I should 
 hope to have little more to do with the world than to try, with 
 others, to reform it." 
 
 His intended journey to Connecticut was not performed till 
 the next year. Meanwhile his relations to a part of the church 
 and society in Tallmadge had become increasingly painful. 
 And that readers of this narrative may appreciate the cares 
 and sorrows that were crowding upon him and upon the loving 
 and delicate one who had already been his partner in so many 
 trials, it must be said that among the inhabitants whom his 
 invitations and persuasions had brought into the place, and 
 who had been his friends, — and among the members of the 
 church of which he was, by a provisional arrangement, the min- 
 ister, — some were in danger of losing both the land which 
 they had purchased of him and whatever partial payments they 
 had made to him, inasmuch as he had become, in those disas- 
 trous times, unable to fulfil his contract with the proprietors, 
 and so to obtain for them a valid title. It is not to be won- 
 dered at that some of them felt themselves wronged and were 
 ready to blame him. They did blame him, and there was pain- 
 ful alienation between him and them. That was the bitterest 
 ingredient in the cup which he and the partner of his sorrows 
 were, in those days, compelled to drink. Such was the com- 
 plication of troubles against which he struggled, hoping on 
 and hoping ever. He had friends in the place, kind friends, 
 true and faithful friends, who clung to him like brothers, and 
 whose affectionate confidence in him could not be shaken. To 
 their sympathy and kindness he left his wife and his five little 
 children, while he went to Connecticut in a last endeavor to 
 retrieve the fortunes of the enterprise in which he had embarked 
 all his hopes this side of heaven. 
 
 He set out from home on horseback, early in April. Most 
 of his letters to his wife, and of hers to him, during that separa- 
 tion of nearly a twelvemonth, have been preserved, and by their 
 
8 9 
 
 aid I am able not only to recollect many particulars of our home 
 life that year, but also to trace the story of his journey and of 
 its results. Generally his letters were full of his characteristic 
 hopefulness. His first Sabbath was passed near the eastern 
 border of the Reserve, with a minister who had been under- 
 stood to be in some sort an abettor of the Tallmadge malcon- 
 tents, but by whom he was, nevertheless, received fraternally. 
 Naturally he reported to his wife, for her comfort, any incident 
 tending to show her that though some of her neighbors would 
 not hear him, he was respected elsewhere, and by better judges. 
 Expressions of approval from that minister were, in the cir- 
 cumstances, worth reporting. 
 
 " He treated me with much respect and attention. At his urgent 
 request I preached in the forenoon on the Sabbath, and assisted him in 
 administering the sacrament. As the meeting was on the line between 
 H. and S., and the day pleasant, most of the inhabitants of both places were 
 present. Being requested, I went, accompanied by Mr. L., and preached 
 at S. in the evening. I felt much liberty in preaching, and I learned that 
 my discourses were much applauded and by none more than Mr. L." 
 
 Arriving at Hartford not much earlier than the first of June, 
 he entered at once on the business which had brought him to 
 Connecticut, negotiating with the proprietors for a postpone- 
 ment of their demands, and at the same time finding out, in 
 one place and another, the men whom he might persuade to 
 purchase farms in Tallmadge. Eager for intelligence from his 
 family, he returned to Hartford, and on the 4th of July he 
 received a letter from his wife, dated on the 29th of May, but 
 ending with a postscript a week later. Evidently she had strug- 
 gled to write cheerfully, but she had not succeeded. Her 
 letter began : — 
 
 «■ Hitherto hath the Lord helped me, and through His goodness we are 
 all alive, and most of us in good health. I am the only one that is com- 
 plaining, but perhaps not more unwell than when you left home. . . 
 I suffer greatly from a depression of spirits, which I cannot shake off. I 
 think I never was so unable to endure your absence as at present. . . . 
 How much do I need your sympathy ' in all the cares of life and love ' ! All 
 the sweets of life seem to be embittered to me, and everything I see 
 reminds me that you are not here. The care which devolves upon me in 
 your absence is considerable, and I sometimes feel it a burthen almost 
 too great to struggle with. But this is the dark side. I have infinite 
 
90 
 
 cause to sing of mercy in the midst of judgment, and to rejoice in the 
 loving kindness of the Lord. Our beloved children are all healthy, lively, 
 and happy. ... I have been comfortably supplied with the necessaries 
 of life since you left me. My neighbors are as kind as can be reasonably 
 expected. ... I am not without friends even here, and trust that you 
 have some also. God is able to raise up friends in the midst of enemies, 
 and to provide for us in every strait and difficulty. How often hath He 
 appeared for us in darkness and distress, and wrought out deliverance for 
 us ! We have been called to pass through the fire and through water ; our 
 path has been frequently hedged up so that we could see no way of escape, 
 and had nowhere to look for relief but immediately to God. He has 
 always appeared for us in our extremity. ... It becomes us to — 
 
 " Praise Him for all that is past, 
 And trust Him for all that 's to come." 
 
 " I have this day received a letter from directed to you, which is 
 
 written in a very imperious style. I am much mistaken if you do not find 
 him as unaccommodating as any person you ever dealt with. I hope, at 
 any rate, that you will get the business off your hands as speedily as possi- 
 ble. I am not anxious how, if it is only done. I long to have you free 
 from such embarrassments and such a load of cares. You have almost 
 worn yourself out in the arduous employment. I hope you will not find 
 it necessary to stay so long in Connecticut as you expected. ... I 
 dare not tell you half I suffer, nor could I if I would. I do not wish to 
 intimate that I suffer for food or raiment, but you know that I have many 
 sources of sorrow. Oh, that I might find consolation in that ever-living 
 Fountain from which all true comfort flows ! 
 
 " Mr F. has preached here two Sabbaths. It is expected that he will 
 administer the sacrament here next Sabbath. I think he is an excellent 
 man, though not a popular preacher. He has called upon me a number of 
 times, and I have enjoyed his conversation greatly. Mr. D. preached a 
 lecture here a few weeks ago ; he also made me a polite visit. Thus, you 
 see, I am not wholly neglected. Mr. F. tells me that I have many real 
 friends in this place and that your opposers manifest very friendly feelings 
 towards me. 
 
 " I am afraid you can never read this letter, for I have written the most 
 of it with the babe in my arms. . . . Forgive me for not writing 
 before. I have many excuses, but can't offer them now. Do not retaliate. 
 . . . I need an interest in your prayers. I hope you will not protract the 
 time of your absence to an unreasonable length. Oh, may we have another 
 happy meeting, another opportunity of rejoicing together in the land of 
 the living ! " 
 
 Tallmadge had no post-office in 1811, and it seems there 
 
9i 
 
 was no opportunity of sending the letter to any post-office that 
 week. So it came to pass that there was a postscript, dated 
 June 5 : — 
 
 " I have broken open my letter and torn it sadly to inform you that my 
 health is miserable. My spirits are so depressed that it seems to wear me 
 out. [A few words are illegible.] My heart is full of sorrow, and my eyes 
 are overflowing with tears. The real cause of my depression is unknown. 
 Dr. Wright is doing his best for me. My friends are all kind. Would to 
 God you were here ! But, oh ! now I have hit the sore ; it bleeds afresh. 
 Gracious Father, give me submission to Thy will ! If my life is spared, 
 I mean to write to you again soon. It is more than three weeks since I 
 began to write this letter, but I could not get it mailed." 
 
 It is not without reluctance nor without a tear that I unveil 
 these sacred confidences, but how else could I fairly tell the 
 story of the " much tribulation " through which the subject of 
 this memoir " entered into the kingdom of God " ? His reply to 
 the foregoing letter was dated " Litchfield, July 12," and from 
 the sheet inscribed with his close but most legible handwriting 
 five and sixty years ago, u he being dead, yet speaketh" : — 
 
 " When I read, I tenderly sympathized with you in all the trials of which 
 you complained, but that was not the first of it, for I had anticipated all 
 that you complain of as to ill health and depression of spirits. Great 
 is my sorrow . . . especially that I cannot be there to bear your 
 burthens and administer to your relief. But greater is my joy in that 
 you were all alive, and so many of you well, and in that you are favored, 
 as I trust, with the cheering light of God's countenance, the earnest of 
 your heavenly inheritance, that by which you are sealed unto the day of 
 redemption. All that God does is well because it ends well, — well for Him- 
 self, for His kingdom, for every individual who shall be an heir of it. How 
 precious to you has been the trial of your faith ! How much more precious 
 than that gold which perisheth ! Sweet affliction, sweet affliction, not in 
 itself but in its fruits, — especially the fruits of the latter harvest, when 
 they who went out weeping shall return rejoicing, bringing their sheaves 
 with them, and when the wheat shall be gathered into the heavenly garner. 
 Be strong, my dear, and be of good courage. Be strong in the grace that 
 is in Christ Jesus, for, through Christ strengthening you, you can do all 
 things. Be of good courage, for if you trust in Him He will cause all things 
 to work together for your good, and will not suffer you to want any good 
 thing. It would certainly ruin us to have our own way. We could not do 
 well, if at all, with less affliction, for, if we are in heaviness, there is a 
 1 need-be.' I trust, my dear, the time is coming when we shall both see 
 occasion to bless God for this long separation, painful as it now is." 
 
92 
 
 Such confidence in God's sovereignty, such walking in the 
 light of things not seen, was the faith in which he endured 
 affliction, and by which he overcame. But writing to one so 
 dear, who was depressed on his account, he could not refrain 
 from telling her some things which he would hardly have 
 reported to any friend less intimate. 
 
 " Since I have been in Connecticut I have preached at Canton, at Tor- 
 ringford, at Cornwall, at Warren, at New Preston, and at Litchfield. And 
 in every place I have been free from embarrassment and have enjoyed 
 great liberty in preaching. I find myself much animated in exhibiting 
 and applying the great truths of the everlasting gospel to hundreds of 
 souls at once, in seeing so many eyes fastened upon me, in observing such 
 a multitude eagerly or anxiously listening to my discourse, and hanging 
 upon my lips till the closing sentence is pronounced. From ministers and 
 other good judges where I have preached I have received encomiums 
 enough to ruin me if not restrained by grace. Said Father Hallock, after 
 meeting, 'Why, Brother Bacon, I had formerly heard of your preaching in 
 different places, and had always heard that you preached well; but I had 
 no idea that you would preach so.' He observed that such was the atten- 
 tion that the house was as still as in the dead of night, and seemed to 
 fancy that he saw, under my preaching, the commencement of another 
 revival. He compared me to a plowshare grown bright by use, and him- 
 self to one that had lain in the shade till it was covered with rust. This 
 was enough to make me very much ashamed, but he said a great deal 
 more. 
 
 " I think it probable that I had in this place, last Sabbath, not less than 
 fifty hearers who were men of liberal education, among whom are three or 
 four of the first characters in the United States, and they are used to very 
 extraordinary preaching; but as Mr. Beecher was absent, and I had 
 agreed to supply his place, I gave myself no trouble about these circum- 
 stances, for I calculated on getting so near the great Lawgiver and Judge 
 of all, and on having my mind so overawed by His presence as not to be 
 unduly affected by the presence of the judges and legislators of the earth, 
 and I hoped, through the assistance of the Holy Spirit, to get them so to 
 realize His presence, and that they had to do with Him, that they should 
 find no time nor inclination for criticising my performances. The event 
 was much as I had hoped. I soon perceived that I had their serious 
 attention, and I discoursed to them with as much freedom as I should to 
 my own children. Many have manifested their high approbation, but 
 none, perhaps, more fully or heartily than Col. Tallmadge and Judge 
 Reeve, the two great and good fathers of this great church, who are greatly 
 beloved by the people of God around them. The attention and respect I 
 received from them before I preached here was greater than I expected, 
 but it was easy to see that it was much greater afterwards." 
 
93 
 
 Under a later date, " Hartford, July 19," he made something 
 like an apology for the foregoing paragraphs : — 
 
 " You will wonder, perhaps, why I took up so much time in writing about 
 my public performances, and will think that it savors toomuch of vanity. 
 I don't know that I have any sufficient reason to assign for it ; but as so 
 little was thought of my services in Tallmadge, as you felt that to be an 
 affliction, and as I am not willing that you should be unhappy or think 
 meanly of me, it was natural for me to wish to do away the impression. . . . 
 But the most important reason is that you may have an opportunity to 
 unite with me in presenting a tribute of praise to Him who lifteth up those 
 who are cast down, for His rendering my services in the gospel ministry 
 so acceptable to so many, and thereby intimating that, if spared, I may be 
 useful in the important work, notwithstanding my want of education and 
 the many disadvantages under which, hitherto, I have had to labor." 
 
 At that time he was hopeful in regard to the business which 
 he had in hand. " On the whole," said he, after giving some 
 particulars, " the prospect is favorable, but how soon I shall 
 be able to complete the business I cannot tell." 
 
 It is hardly possible for those whose memory does not run 
 back more than thirty years to conceive how difficult was inter- 
 course between parted friends before the era of cheap postage. 
 Blessed be the memory of Rowland Hill ! Blessed be God 
 who raised up Rowland Hill, not only to confer new benefits 
 on commerce and international communication, but especially 
 to be the benefactor of the poor. In 181 1 there was a weekly 
 mail eastward from the Connecticut reserve, and the postage 
 on a letter was not three cents only, but twenty-five. It was 
 only the rich (as men were counted rich in those days) who 
 could indulge in the luxury of frequent letters even to the 
 dearest friends. Bearing this in mind, the reader will under- 
 stand why the correspondence from which I have given quota- 
 tions was not more voluminous. Every letter was a serious 
 affair for a poor man struggling to feed and clothe a helpless 
 family and to meet the demands of creditors. Thus it is easy 
 to understand why a second letter from the lonely wife to her 
 husband so far away, though begun on the 15th of July, was 
 not completed till the 26th. Referring to her first letter she 
 said : — 
 
 "You have probably received it some time ago. If you have, it has 
 probably given you some anxiety, though I hardly know what I wrote. I 
 
94 
 
 recollect that I broke open my letter and added something after I had 
 sealed it. Judging from what I remember of my feelings at that time, I think 
 I could not have written anything very pleasant. I think I was not far from 
 a state of distraction. I have since learned that my friends were quite 
 anxious about me. . . . My neighbors are all exceedingly kind, and I 
 think you could not have left me in a better place. O my dear friend, I 
 have infinite cause for thankfulness, but blush to acknowledge that I am 
 one of the most ungrateful of creatures. How can I be so unmindful of 
 the God of all my mercies, who has raised me up so many friends and put 
 it into their hearts to treat me with so much kindness ? . . . I think 
 my health and spirits are rather improving, though far from the best. 
 Capt. S.'s people [a family from Warren, Conn.] arrived here 
 the first of July. ... I have to acknowledge the good hand of Provi- 
 dence in sending to me so good a young man and woman as young Mr. S. 
 and his wife. They live with me, and I hope they will stay till you return. 
 Before they came I frequently thought to myself, What would I give for 
 some one to stay with me who would be willing to assist me when I am 
 unable to raise my head, and who would take some care off from my over- 
 loaded mind. Little did I think that God was providing for me exactly to 
 my wishes." 
 
 The answer was written Sept. 16, while thousands, as the 
 writer said, were "gazing at the eclipse." Let them gaze. 
 To him his reception of a letter from that log-house in Tall- 
 madge was " a more important event." 
 
 li Your last letter has relieved me, in a great measure, from an almost 
 insupportable burthen. What cause have I for thankfulness that the God 
 of all grace and consolation has so far answered my daily prayers for the 
 dear companion of my life, and also for our dear children. Since I left 
 home, thousands of husbands and wives and children have been torn from 
 their dear connections in life by the hand of death ; thousands of the liv- 
 ing who were then rational have become distracted ; thousands who were 
 then in health have been lying on beds of languishing ; millions have 
 been suffering the want of all things, and millions more have been experi- 
 encing the horrors of war. We have been spared, we have been blessed, 
 not because we were not equally ill-deserving, but because God delights 
 in showing mercy to sinners, through the mediation of His Son, as far as 
 is consistent with His infinitely wise and benevolent purposes ; and to His 
 name be the praise ! It is necessary for us to bear in mind what" we de- 
 serve, and the trials to which we are exposed in order to our being grateful 
 for the mercies we experience and submissive under the trials which must 
 befall us. But we need not be ' afraid with any amazement,' and shall not be 
 if we trust in Him who hath said, ' I will never leave thee nor forsake 
 thee,' — * my grace shall be sufficient for thee ' ; for great peace have they 
 that love God's law, and nothing shall offend them. They may there- 
 
95 
 
 fore say, ' Though I walk through the valley and shadow of death I will 
 fear no evil.' " 
 
 In regard to his business, he was still hopeful of success ; he 
 was making progress in his negotiations with men in various 
 places who were contemplating a removal westward, and were 
 attracted by the advantages which his township offered ; he 
 was expecting to obtain something by compromise, as better 
 and less costly than a lawsuit, from two men who had refused 
 to pay what he claimed as justly due to him for service which 
 he had rendered to them in the sale of lands ; he suggested 
 some possible arrangements for himself and his family in the 
 future. "The doctor" (his brother at Hartford) had desired 
 them to send their eldest child to him, that he (the doctor) 
 " might put him to school." After writing of such matters, he 
 added, in reference to the uncertainty of the day when he 
 should set his face homeward, — 
 
 M I hope you will strive to be patient, my dear, under your present trials. 
 Remember, that if it should be eight or nine weeks before I return, the 
 time will soon slip away ; and that, if we are of those who are called 
 according to God's purpose, the time is coming when we shall see cause 
 for thankfulness for this long and painful absence. The thought that I am 
 not gone to * Guinea ' 1 should be some comfort to you. And surely you 
 can imagine something much worse from which we are exempted. I hope 
 you will take good care of your health for my sake. Do not fail to get 
 wine if it can be procured, or anything else that can be procured that is 
 calculated to strengthen you. I would rather live on bread and water than 
 that you should want anything that is necessary to your comfort in your 
 debilitated state. 
 
 " I am looking for another letter from you, but if you shall not have 
 written before the reception of this, I fear it will be too late for you to 
 write again." 
 
 " Another letter " was already on its way by a private con- 
 veyance. It was dated Aug. 12. That morning it had been 
 reported to Mrs. Bacon that there was a letter for her in the 
 nearest post-office, five miles away. Leaving her baby in the 
 care of a neighbor, and borrowing a horse for the expedition, 
 she had gone the five miles, had obtained the precious commu- 
 nication, and had returned rejoicing. The letter [pp. 9 I- 93j 
 
 1 The allusion is to John Newton's Letters to His Wife, a book which they had 
 recently been reading. 
 
9 6 
 
 begun at Litchfield, on the 12th of July, and posted at 
 Hartford on the 19th, had arrived at its destination in three 
 weeks and three days. Such were the then existing facilities 
 for correspondence between places a few hundred miles apart. 
 A few sentences from the lonely wife's reply will show in what 
 spirit she was waiting. " Hope deferred maketh the heart 
 sick" ; but her heart was steadfast. 
 
 " I rejoice with you, . . . and hope you may realize your expecta- 
 tion so far as may be consistent with our best interests. But should you 
 finally be disappointed, and should I realize all my fears and dismal fore- 
 bodings, may we be submissive ! I trust I shall never give myself so much 
 trouble about the event as I have heretofore done. I know that all my 
 anxiety will not make one hair white or black. I most heartily wish that 
 you might be so far prospered as to be able to satisfy your creditors ; be- 
 yond this I have no concern. I have many times thought (of late) that it 
 was pleasant to be in the situation of the poor widow who was about to 
 bake her last cake, for it is then that we most sensibly see the hand that 
 feeds us. I love to be immediately dependent on a heavenly Father for 
 my daily bread ; He is the best provider ; He never wants for means to 
 supply His creatures, for the earth is His and the fulness thereof. I think 
 a thankful heart with a mouthful of bread is better than thousands of gold 
 and silver without thankfulness. . . . God grant that though we walk 
 in the vale of poverty below, we may lay up for ourselves treasures in 
 heaven, even durable riches and righteousness. 
 
 " I rejoice that you have found so much liberty in dispensing the great 
 truths of the gospel. ... I thought, and had hoped that you would 
 not preach in old Connecticut, because I knew you had no sermons with 
 you. But I hope it is for the best. I think, however, if I had been with 
 you, you would not have preached at Litchfield." 
 
 On the 6th of November the long-absent husband wrote 
 from Sharon, where he was working, that his sorrowful absence 
 might not be in vain, and hoping persistently. " I fear," said 
 he, "I shall hear no more from you till I see you, if that 
 happy event is ever to arrive." 
 
 " I find myself frequently sighing and saying to myself, * Oh, my dear 
 family, my dear wife, and my dear children ! ' . . . But I must not 
 murmur at the Providence of God which has caused this long and painful 
 absence, but pray that it may be sanctified to us, and that we may be un- 
 feignedly thankful that we have enjoyed so many mercies. . . . But 
 methinks I see your eyes impatiently running over these lines to find 
 whether I have set out on my journey home, or when I expect to start. 
 W^at would I not give that I could tell you. 
 
97 
 
 " It has afforded great relief to my mind to reflect that it is to make pro- 
 vision for you and the dear children that I am so long absent from you, — 
 as well as to be able to do justice to my creditors, and promote the spirit- 
 ual and everlasting good of the thousands who are to inhabit the town of 
 Tallmadge. ... I seem to have a fairer prospect of succeeding than 
 I ever had before. ... I have no money to send you at present, 
 but hope to bring you some soon ; and I must stop writing and go about 
 my business that I may bring it the sooner. I know not how you are to 
 be provided for, but I trust the God of all our mercies will never leave you 
 nor forsake you." 
 
 This seems to have been the last letter before his return. 
 But his homeward journey, which he then expected to begin 
 " within three or four weeks at the longest," was more distant 
 than he thought. He was then negotiating with a principal 
 proprietor of lands in Tallmadge for an arrangement which he 
 was sure would be advantageous to both parties, and the nego- 
 tiation seemed almost concluded. It was in this confidence 
 that he said, " I seem to have a fairer prospect of succeeding 
 than I have ever had before." But when that prospect had 
 deluded him a while, it vanished. My next information con- 
 cerning him is a letter (of which a copy has been preserved) 
 from his brother to that proprietor. The letter was dated 
 "Hartford, 8th January, 1812"; and I cannot tell the story 
 better than by transcribing a portion : — 
 
 * As your letter to my brother, of the 25th of November, has not been 
 answered, I beg leave to address you on his account, and must apologize 
 by informing you that his present state of mind is such that, though he 
 has made several attempts, he has not been able to write. Yours he 
 received early in December, while in Litchfield County, but as he has but 
 just now arrived at my house, I have known nothing before of his unhappy 
 condition. He feels that his last earthly friend on whom he could depend 
 for succor, and in whose constancy he had the utmost confidence, has now 
 forsaken him. His countenance, at first sight, impressed me with the idea 
 that he had been sick, and I instantly made the inquiry. He answered 
 
 that he was not well, and, handing me your letter, said, ' has broken 
 
 my heart.' He sleeps but little and with constant interruption, and dur- 
 ing the day seems like one from whom hope, the last consolation of the 
 wretched, has departed. I love my brother and feel most sensibly for his 
 unhappy case, and have not been without fear that he would sink under 
 his mental depression, at least so far as to injure his future usefulness. 
 ... He has now been for five years beating against the stream of adverse 
 incidents, in pursuit of a favorite object, in the accomplishment of which 
 he hoped to subserve the cause of religion, advance the interest of his 
 
 13 
 
9 8 
 
 friends, and obtain a pittance for his family. In this pursuit he has used 
 his credit to the amount of at least a thousand dollars. He is now six 
 hundred miles from home, and destitute of money. If aided by his 
 friends to return, to what will it introduce him but to scenes of more com- 
 plicated woe, — to behold a beloved wife of feeble health, and five helpless 
 children, who look to him for bread but look in vain; for he must immedi- 
 ately resign himself to a host of disappointed creditors, whose tender mer- 
 cies are cruelty, and who will probably seek revenge in attempts to vilify 
 his character and through him to wound the cause in which he is by pro- 
 fession engaged." 
 
 " I never doubted that my brother would exert himself to the utmost in 
 the service of his employers, and would advance their interest ; but [I] 
 was not without fears that he would eventually involve himself in difficulty. 
 I therefore, in the beginning, endeavored to dissuade him from the enter- 
 prise ; but it was too favorite an object with him to be given up. Of 
 course, I had nothing further to do but to wish him success and hope he 
 might succeed. This hope strengthened into expectation after I had the 
 pleasure of an interview with you, and heard you express your friendly 
 wishes for his success and your determination to lengthen out his term of 
 probation, as you had already done, till he should succeed." 
 
 The letter then refers to Mr. Bacon's " repeated disappoint- 
 ments during the last summer in procuring purchasers who 
 could make payment " either in cash or in secured obligations. 
 It mentions an interview in which, at Mr. Bacon's proposal, 
 that proprietor had consented to exchange all his lands on the 
 Reserve for Connecticut farms under certain conditions. It 
 tells how the enthusiastic canvasser for purchasers had found 
 the men who were willing to sell their farms and take those 
 wild lands in part payment ; and how, having obtained assur- 
 ance of the necessary aid from his brother and other friends, 
 he had written to that proprietor requesting him to consum- 
 mate the arrangement which had been agreed upon between 
 them. Then it tells what the reply was to that communica- 
 tion : — 
 
 " Your letter came, which (if I understand it) seems not to recognize 
 the last agreement, but proposes new conditions beyond his power to exe- 
 cute. To a mariner returning to his long-desired haven, shipwrecked in 
 sight of land, and clinging to his shattered bark, expecting that the next 
 rolling surge will sweep him from his feeble hold and engulf him in the 
 ocean, proposals for another voyage would administer but poor con- 
 solation. Pardon me, sir, if I have used too much freedom. I have 
 labored to make you acquainted with my brother's unhappy case. I can- 
 not, I will not believe, after what I have heard from your lips and seen on 
 
99 
 
 paper in your former correspondence with my brother, that his future peace 
 and prosperity is a matter of indifference to you. There must have been 
 some misunderstanding or want of recollection on one side or the other. 
 I have therefore, after much hesitation what advice to give, prevailed on 
 my brother to suspend his determination of giving up all and returning 
 home till I should hear from you. 
 
 " I am not asking alms for him. Could he so far succeed as to find the 
 means of discharging the just debts he has contracted in prosecuting the 
 business, though it left him without a cent for the time he has spent and 
 the fatigue he has endured, I would not have become his intercessor; but 
 I fully believe that this and more than this can be effected, and your inter- 
 est promoted by carrying the negotiation into effect, agreeable to your last 
 conversation with him ; that is, you will eventually realize a better bargain 
 than though the original contract had been carried into execution." 
 
 The correspondence with that proprietor was continued into 
 February, but resulted in nothing. So far as the projector's 
 interests were concerned, the undertaking in which he had 
 expended so much of his life was a failure. Instead of a home- 
 stead with comforts for his declining years, instead of shelter 
 and support for his wife and helpless children, nothing 
 remained to him but the burthen of debts which he had con- 
 tracted in good faith and with most reasonable hope of ability 
 to discharge them. 
 
 From the termination of that correspondence, the story of 
 his life is very short. With difficulty he obtained the means 
 of returning to his family, and of removing them from the scene 
 of so great a disappointment. All that he had realized from 
 those five years of arduous labor was poverty, the alienation of 
 some old friends, the depression that follows a fatal defeat, and 
 the dishonor that waits on one who cannot pay his debts. 
 Broken in health, broken in heart, yet sustained by an immov- 
 able confidence in God and by the hopes that reach into eter- 
 nity, he turned away from the field of hopes that had so sadly 
 perished, and bade his last farewell to Tallmadge and the 
 Western Reserve. Some time in the month of May, 1812, we 
 left the home that, to the children certainly, had been so 
 pleasant, and parting from friends who had kindly aided our 
 preparations and contributed to our comfort on the way, began 
 the slow journey towards " Old Connecticut." Our arrival at 
 Hartford, after resting at various places where there were friends 
 to greet us, was not till near the middle of July. In the autumn 
 
IOO 
 
 and through the ensuing winter, Mr. Bacon found a temporary 
 home in Litchfield, supporting his family by a school, as he had 
 done twelve years before in Detroit. Though he had relin- 
 quished the hope of anything for his family out of the wreck of 
 his Tallmadge undertaking, he labored on " to do justice to his 
 creditors " there, and " to promote the spiritual and everlasting 
 good of the thousands " who have been, or are now, or are yet 
 to be the inhabitants of the township on which so much of his 
 life had been expended. I think that his sojourn in Litchfield, 
 near the places where he had been so industriously canvassing, 
 and not far from some of the proprietors whose agent he had 
 been, was partly with reference to those ends. Some of the 
 best of the emigrants from Connecticut who afterwards settled 
 in Tallmadge went in consequence of his persuasions ; nor 
 was he altogether unsuccessful in his endeavor to obtain jus- 
 tice for his creditors. 
 
 Through the year 18 13-18 14, he performed a pastor's work 
 in a parish on the ridge between Cheshire and Waterbury, now 
 the town of Prospect. The next year he resided in the parish 
 of Westfield, in Middletown, preaching there and in the neigh- 
 boring parish, now the town of Middlefield. Finding that his 
 health was no longer equal to the stated work of the ministry, 
 he removed to Hartford early in 181 5, and entered into an 
 undertaking which, while it had the charm to him of usefulness 
 in the service of Christ, would give him work better suited to 
 his physical condition than the care of a parish could be. He 
 took part (without investment of capital or credit) in publishing 
 a Hartford edition of a work highly esteemed in those days 
 (and with good reason, for it was without a rival), — Scott's 
 Family Bible. His varied experience, first as a missionary and 
 then as a canvasser, West and East, for settlers in his township, 
 his wide acquaintance with good people, and his never-failing 
 zeal in religion, were special qualifications for such a service. 
 In that itinerant work he passed on horseback through large 
 portions of Connecticut and Western Massachusetts, renewing 
 his intercourse with old friends and forming new friendships, 
 preaching occasionally, as his health would permit, and lingering 
 especially where he found a revival of religion. In the early 
 years of my own ministry, I sometimes heard from ministers 
 
IOI 
 
 and others of a generation now gone how powerfully he had 
 preached on some occasions in their hearing. My own mem- 
 ory does not enable me to testify concerning his power in the 
 pulpit, for it so happened that I never heard him preach after 
 I was old enough to remember anything about a sermon ; but 
 what I have learned from such tradition leads me to think that 
 his power as a preacher was manifested not so much in the 
 ordinary course of ministration as when he had some favorite 
 theme or was excited by some inspiring occasion. 
 
 His bookselling enterprises (for besides his connection with 
 the publication of Scott's Family Bible, he published on his 
 own account an edition of DeFoe's Family Instructor) yielded 
 for the time a better support to his family than he had gained from 
 any former undertaking ; but meanwhile his infirmities, the 
 accumulated effect of his hardships and trials through so many 
 years, were increasing, and there were indications that his con- 
 stitution, originally hardy, might soon break down. 
 
 In the autumn of 1816 he took up another employment 
 requiring less of fatigue and exposure, and promising much 
 larger returns. But the night was near in which he could work 
 no more. He was a little while at New Haven, where he had 
 previously formed some friendships ; and then he was at New 
 York. There, about the first of December, he suffered what 
 seems to have been a dangerous attack of illness. A few days 
 later, thinking that he had recovered, he wrote, with character- 
 istic hopefulness, ' • Since that my health has been comfortable, 
 though I have been so feeble, by turns, as to be able to do lit- 
 tle or nothing. You may depend on it that my business will 
 eventually succeed to admiration, if it is faithfully pursued." 
 On the first of January, 18 17, he wrote that his return might 
 be expected in two or three weeks, and added, " I intend to rid 
 my hands of the business I have been engaged in, and to be in 
 a way to live with my dear family if the Lord will." 
 
 " If the Lord will ! " Such was the habitual attitude of his 
 mind. Confiding in the Supreme Will and Wisdom, he could 
 always say, " Father, not my will but Thine be done ! " His 
 hope was that he might soon return " to live with his dear 
 family " ; but the will of the Lord was that he should come home 
 to die. The springs of his life had been broken, and after his 
 
102 
 
 arrival at home he could do little more than wait for the end. 
 His disease was that to which physicians have given the 
 expressive name marasmus, from the Greek word which sig- 
 nifies to wither. As a plant withers when its root is dried, so 
 he withered, the strength failing, the flesh wasting away, though 
 the mind was unclouded and serene. 
 
 I remember three letters that came to him in those months 
 of slow decay, possibly at a somewhat earlier date. One was 
 from his kinsman, Dr. Abiel Holmes, of Cambridge, Mass., 
 inviting him, in behalf of some Board of Trust, to be as a pastor 
 to some remnant of an Indian tribe, perhaps the Marshpee 
 Indians. Of course he could give no thought to such a pro- 
 posal. Another letter was from some old friends of his in Tall- 
 madge who had been alienated from him and had judged him 
 harshly. Frankly, and in a Christian spirit, they acknowledged 
 that they had wronged him in their judgment and in their feel- 
 ings. It was a solace to him in his waiting for death that those 
 from whom his parting was so painful had remembered their 
 old affection towards him, and at last had judged him kindly and 
 truly. 
 
 The third of the three letters referred to was also from the 
 place for which he had done and suffered so much. The es- 
 sential features of the plan on which he undertook the settle- 
 ment of that township were beginning to be realized. But, as 
 has been indicated on a former page, the plan shaped and 
 rounded out in his mind included a hope that the Yale Col- 
 lege of that " New Connecticut " might become the crowning 
 institution of his model town. A pleasant swell, now covered 
 by a cemetery, close by the centre of the township, was the 
 spot which in his thoughts he had destined to that use. Not 
 very long before his death he received a letter written by the 
 pastor of the church in that town, and expressing the wishes 
 of some of the leading citizens. The time had come when it 
 seemed as if something might be done for the establishment 
 of a college on the Reserve, and he was invited to attempt that 
 arduous labor. l It was thought that his projecting and en- 
 
 1 The Western Reserve College, which he had hoped to see at Tallmadge, was 
 organized about ten years after his death, and was established at Hudson, the 
 place of his first residence on the Reserve, and among the people who first chose 
 him for their minister. 
 
103 
 
 thusiastic genius and his strenuous perseverance might be 
 again enlisted in the service of the Western Reserve and of 
 Tallmadge ; but the application came to a man whose force had 
 been exhausted, whose heart had been broken by disappoint- 
 ments, and whose frame, worn out by many hardships, was 
 already wasting away. 
 
 I have drawn out to an unexpected length the story of my 
 father's life. Why should I not complete it with the story of 
 his death ? " Whether we live we live to the Lord, or whether 
 we die we die to the Lord." If he glorified God in his life, it 
 was to be expected that he would glorify God in his death. 
 Let me say, then, that for some time before the end he was per- 
 fectly, and with entire serenity, aware of the approaching change. 
 I remember being present at a conversation when the certainty 
 that he must die was distinctly spoken of between him and his 
 brother, 1 the physician. " I know myself to be a sinner," said 
 he ; "I feel it, but I submit myself to God, and I hope to be 
 saved through Christ." In the evening of Aug. 24 (which was 
 the Lord's day) he was visited by friends with whom he had 
 some talk, more, perhaps, than his failing strength could bear. 
 The next day, as if aware that the time of his departure had 
 come, he called me to his bedside, and reminding me of his 
 many godly counsels, charged me to keep them when I should 
 be fatherless. What words of paternal solicitude he spoke to 
 the younger children I can only infer. On Tuesday, before 
 noon, there came a sort of shock, as of paralysis, premonitory 
 of death, and he thought himself dying, as those who were 
 around him also thought. My mother, standing over him with 
 her youngest, an infant, in her arms, said to him, " Look on your 
 babe, and bless him before you die." He looked up, and said 
 with distinct and audible utterance, " The blessing of the God 
 of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, rest upon thee ! " His 
 brother, who had often befriended him in his difficulties, and 
 who venerated his religious character though he himself had 
 not then made a religious profession, came in, and after 
 feeling his pulse and silently observing the indications of 
 
 *Dr. Leonard Bacon (often mentioned in this memoir) removed from Mans- 
 field to Hartford in 1802, became eminent there in the practice of medicine, was, 
 in the later years of his life, a communicant in the First Church, under the pas- 
 torate of Dr. Hawes, and died in 1839. 
 
104 
 
 death, sat down by his side. I cannot but think of the 
 contrast between the two brothers at that moment : the 
 older, a shrewd and careful man, prudent in his affairs and 
 prosperous in the world, health in his stalwart frame, and with 
 years of life before him ; the younger, an enthusiast by nature, 
 but wise to eternal life by grace, born to a career of disappoint- 
 ment in this life, but trained by the discipline of defeat to a 
 better inheritance hereafter, and dying at what might have 
 been the noon of life to him but for the hardships he had en- 
 dured in his self-sacrificing efforts to do good. Some tender 
 memories of childhood and of later years were doubtless in 
 both their minds, when the younger, turning his eyes towards 
 the elder with affectionate gaze, said to him, " I entreat you to 
 make sure that better part which shall never be taken from 
 you." Through the remainder of that day, and through the two 
 following days, he was failing, and his mind was often confused 
 and wandering ; but when the sunset of Thursday was ap- 
 proaching, he collected his thoughts, and with a deliberate 
 effort took leave of his wife, committing her to the care of a 
 divinely gracious Providence. After that farewell there was 
 only one articulate utterance from his lips. To some word 
 from her he loved best, he answered " All is well." Just before 
 dawn on Friday, Aug. 29, he breathed his last. "Now he 
 knows more than all of us," said the doctor ; while my mother, 
 bathing the dead face with her tears and warming it with 
 kisses, exclaimed, " Let my last end be like his ! " 
 
 His funeral was on Saturday, Aug. 30, from what is now 
 called the Centre Church, Rev. Abel Flint and Rev. Joseph 
 Steward conducting the service, and the next day Mr. Steward 
 preached an appropriate discourse from the text, 2 Cor. iv, 17, 
 — "Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for 
 us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." 
 
 Note. — On page 21, the ordination of Mr. Bacon is spoken of as probably the 
 first instance of an ordination to the specific work of a missionary to the heathen. 
 I have since learned, through Rev. F. D. Avery, of Columbia, Conn., of the fol- 
 lowing instances of earlier date: At Lebanon Crank, now Columbia, Conn., where 
 Dr. Wheelock was pastor, Charles Jeffrey Smith, of Long Island, in 1763. — 
 (Sprague's Annals, Vol. I, p. 402, note;. Samuel Kirkland, June 19, 1766. 
 {Spragne's Annals, I, 624.) — Titus Smith and Theophilus Chamberlain, April 24, 
 1765. — {Narrative of Moor's Indian Charity School. By Mr. Wheelock, printed 
 in Boston, in 1765, p. 8.) 
 
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