The Church Militant.
For many years after the settlement of New England the Puritans, even in
outwardly tranquil times, went armed to meeting; and to sanctify the Sunday
gun-loading they were expressly forbidden to fire off their charges at
any object on that day save an Indian or a wolf, their two "greatest
inconveniencies." Trumbull, in his "Mac Fingal," Avrites thus in jest of
this custom of Sunday arm-bearing:--
"So once, for fear of Indian beating,
Our grandsires bore their guns to meeting,--
Each man equipped on Sunday morn
With psalm-book, shot, and powder-horn,
And looked in form, as all must grant,
Like the ancient true church militant."
In 1640 it was ordered in Massachusetts that in every township the
attendants at church should carry a "competent number of peeces, fixed
and compleat with powder and shot and swords every Lords-day to the
meeting-house;" one armed man from each household was then thought
advisable and necessary for public safety. In 1642 six men with muskets and
powder and shot were thought sufficient for protection for each church. In
Connecticut similar mandates were issued, and as the orders were neglected
"by divers persones," a law was passed in 1643 that each offender should
forfeit twelve pence for each offence. In 1644 a fourth part of the
"trayned hand" was obliged to come armed each Sabbath, and the sentinels
were ordered to keep their matches constantly lighted for use in their
match-locks. They were also commanded to wear armor, which consisted of
"coats basted with cotton-wool, and thus made defensive against Indian
arrows." In 1650 so much dread and fear were felt of Sunday attacks from
the red men that the Sabbath-Day guard was doubled in number. In 1692, the
Connecticut Legislature ordered one fifth of the soldiers in each town to
come armed to each meeting, and that nowhere should be present as a guard
at time of public worship fewer than eight soldiers and a sergeant. In
Hadley the guard was allowed annually from the public treasury a pound of
lead and a pound of powder to each soldier.
No details that could add to safety on the Sabbath were forgotten or
overlooked by the New Haven church; bullets were made common currency at
the value of a farthing, in order that they might be plentiful and in every
one's possession; the colonists were enjoined to determine in advance what
to do with the women and children in case of attack, "that they do not hang
about them and hinder them;" the men were ordered to bring at least six
charges of powder and shot to meeting; the farmers were forbidden to "leave
more arms at home than men to use them;" the half-pikes were to be headed
and the whole ones mended, and the swords "and all piercing weapons
furbished up and dressed;" wood was to be placed in the watch-house; it was
ordered that the "door of the meeting-house next the soldiers' seat be kept
clear from women and children sitting there, that if there be occasion
for the soldiers to go suddenly forth, they may have free passage." The
soldiers sat on either side of the main door, a sentinel was stationed
in the meeting-house turret, and armed watchers paced the streets; three
cannon were mounted by the side of this "church militant," which must
strongly have resembled a garrison.
Military duty and military discipline and regard for the Sabbath, and for
the House of God as well, did not always make the well-equipped occupants
of these soldiers' seats in New Haven behave with the dignity and decorum
befitting such guardians of the peace and protectors in war. Serious
disorders and disturbances among the guard were reported at the General
Court on June 16, 1662. One belligerent son of Mars, as he sat in the
meeting-house, threw lumps of lime--perhaps from the plastered chinks in
the log wall--at a fellow-warrior, who in turn, very naturally, kicked his
tormentor with much agility and force. There must have ensued quite a free
fight all around in the meeting-house, for "Mrs. Goodyear's boy had his
head broke that day in meeting, on account of which a woman said she
doubted not the wrath of God was upon us." And well might she think so, for
divers other unseemly incidents which occurred in the meeting-house at the
same time were narrated in Court, examined into, and punished.
In spite of these events in the New Haven church (which were certainly
exceptional), the seemingly incongruous union of church and army was
suitable enough in a community that always began and ended the military
exercises on "training day" with solemn prayer and psalm-singing; and that
used the army and encouraged a true soldier-like spirit not chiefly as aids
in war, but to help to conquer and destroy the adversaries of truth, and to
"achieve greater matters by this little handful of men than the world is
aware of."
The Salem sentinels wore doubtless some of the good English armor owned by
the town,--corselets to cover the body; gorgets to guard the throat;
tasses to protect the thighs; all varnished black, and costing each suit
"twenty-four shillings a peece." The sentry also wore a bandileer, a large
"neat's leather" belt thrown over the right shoulder, and hanging down
under the left arm. This bandileer sustained twelve boxes of cartridges,
and a well-filled bullet-bag. Each man bore either a "bastard musket with
a snaphance," a "long fowling-piece with musket bore," a "full musket," a
"barrell with a match-cock," or perhaps (for they were purchased by the
town) a leather gun (though these leather guns may have been cannon).
Other weapons there were to choose from, mysterious in name, "sakers,
minions, ffaulcons, rabinets, murthers (or murderers, as they were
sometimes appropriately called) chambers, harque-busses, carbins,"--all
these and many other death-dealing machines did our forefathers bring and
import from their war-loving fatherland to assist them in establishing
God's Word, and exterminating the Indians, but not always, alas! to aid
them in converting those poor heathen.
The armed Salem watcher, besides his firearms and ammunition, had attached
to his wrist by a cord a gun-rest, or gun-fork, which he placed upon
the ground when he wished to fire his musket, and upon which that
constitutional kicker rested when touched off. He also carried a sword and
sometimes a pike, and thus heavily burdened with multitudinous arms and
cumbersome armor, could never have run after or from an Indian with much
agility or celerity; though he could stand at the church-door with his
leather gun,--an awe-inspiring figure,--and he could shoot with his
"harquebuss," or "carbin," as we well know.
These armed "sentinells" are always regarded as a most picturesque
accompaniment of Puritan religious worship, and the Salem and Plymouth
armed men were imposing, though clumsy. But the New Haven soldiers, with
their bulky garments wadded and stuffed out with thick layers of cotton
wool, must have been more safety-assuring and comforting than they were
romantic or heroic; but perhaps they too wore painted tin armor, "corselets
and gorgets and tasses."
In Concord, New Hampshire, the men, who all came armed to meeting, stacked
their muskets around a post in the middle of the church, while the honored
pastor, who was a good shot and owned the best gun in the settlement,
preached with his treasured weapon in the pulpit by his side, ready from
his post of vantage to blaze away at any red man whom he saw sneaking
without, or to lead, if necessary, his congregation to battle. The church
in York, Maine, until the year 1746, felt it necessary to retain the custom
of carrying arms to the meeting-house, so plentiful and so aggressive were
Maine Indians.
Not only in the time of Indian wars were armed men seen in the
meeting-house, but on June 17, 1775, the Provincial Congress recommended
that the men "within twenty miles of the sea-coast carry their arms and
ammunition with them to meeting on the Sabbath and other days when they
meet for public worship." And on many a Sabbath and Lecture Day, during the
years of war that followed, were proved the wisdom and foresight of that
suggestion.
The men in those old days of the seventeenth century, when in constant
dread of attacks by Indians, always rose when the services were ended and
left the house before the women and children, thus making sure the safe
exit of the latter. This custom prevailed from habit until a late date in
many churches in New England, all the men, after the benediction and the
exit of the parson, walking out in advance of the women. So also the custom
of the men always sitting at the "head" or door of the pew arose from the
early necessity of their always being ready to seize their arms and rush
unobstructed to fight. In some New England village churches to this day,
the man who would move down from his end of the pew and let a woman sit
at the door, even if it were a more desirable seat from which to see the
clergyman, would be thought a poor sort of a creature.