The Puritans and Christmas

On the first Christmas in the New World, 25 December 1620, the Mayflower passengers stranded in Plymouth, Massachusetts spent the day working on building their new settlement, building homes and finding food. There was no celebration.  The following year, in 1621, a group of laborers were seen playing "stoole-ball" (an early version of baseball), and Governor William Bradford punished them. He believed that his conscience could not let them play whilst others were working.  In his journal he wrote "One the day called Christmas Day, the Governor called [the settlers] out to work as usual. However, the most of the new company excused themselves and said it went against their consciences to work on that day.  So the Governor told them that if they made it [a] matter conscience, he would spare them till they were better informed". When he later found them playing stoole-ball he confiscated their ball, forbade reveling, and sent them home. 

We can't confuse the Separatists with the Massachusetts Bay Puritans, but remember that like the Presbyterians and other religions, all were Calvinists. All believed in a strict interpretation of their religion, which included turning away from "Papist" holidays.  None celebrated any religious holidays - no Easter, no Christmas, no Lent.  And believe it or not, no other holidays, religious or civic.  Why? 

1659 Massachusetts statute:   "For preventing disorders arising in several places within this jurisdiction, by reason of some still observing such festivals as were superstitiously kept in other countries to the great dishonor of God and offence of others; It is therefore ordained by this Court and the authority thereof, that whosoever shall be found observing any such day as Christmas and the like, either by forbearing labor, feasting, or any other way upon any such account as aforesaid, every such person so offending shall pay for each such offence, five shillings as a fine to the Country."  

In 1712 Reverend Cotton Mather gave a famous anti-Christmas sermon.  He argued against play, excessive drinking, and inappropriate behaviors, but allowed for the possibility of marking the day. 

A quote from Judge Samuel Sewell's (1652 - 1730) diary:  "Decr. 25, 1685.  Friday.  Carts come to town and shops open as is usual.  Some somehow observe the day; but are vexed I believe that the body of the people profane it, and blessed be God no authority yet to compel them to keep it."  The following year, on Christmas of 1686 the Royal Governor, an Anglican no doubt, Sir Edmund Andros, held a Christmas service in Boston with prayers and Christmas hymns. He was escorted by redcoats to assert his authority in the matter. 

In 1722, also from Judge Sewell's diary:  "Decr. 19. His Excellency took me aside to the South-east window of the Council Chamber to speak to me about adjourning the Gen. Court to Monday next because of Christmas.  I told his Excellency I would consider it."  

However, Judge Sewell had already made up his mind to not keep Christmas, but he remained very diplomatic, see his diary entry the next day:  "Decr. 20.  I invited Dr. Mather to Dine with me.  After Dinner I consulted with him about the adjournment of the Court. We agreed that 't would be expedient to take a vote of the Council and Representatives for it." 

Of course, in 1722, the Royal Governor of Massachusetts was Samuel Shute (1662 - 1742), and was of course a member of the Anglican church. Shute argued for keeping Christmas. He was a controversial figure in Puritan Boston due to his attendance at Anglican services, and his habit of hosting many parties at his mansion.  [Michael Batinski, Jonathan Belcher, Colonial Governor, 1996 University Press of Kentucky, p. 29] 

The matter was argued in the Council the following day, with both sides giving their opinions.  In the end, the governor proclaimed a Christmas holiday.   This only set up decades of controversy in New England.  Shute soon left the colony and returned to England in January 1723, where he was free to celebrate Christmas. He never married, and died in England on 15 April 1742.  [Henry Wilder Foote, John Carroll Perkins, Warren Winslow, 1882, Annals of Kings Chapel, Little, Brown Co., p. 267]  

Why did the Puritans dismiss Christmas?  Was it because it was based on a pagan holiday? Because it was no biblically based?  No, it was because it promoted play and waste at a time when people should be working.  Thus, they had no holidays except Sundays, and on days of fasting, and days of Thanksgiving.  The matter became controversial again at the time of the American Revolution, when the colonials in Boston saw Christmas as a royalist celebration.  The King, as the head of the Anglican church, represented everything the Patriots were fighting against. 

The Massachusetts senate gathered for work on Christmas Day in 1797.  In New England school was held on Christmas day until the 1850s.  But soon after, the Puritan sentiment against making merry began to wane.  In 1856 Christmas became a holiday in Massachusetts.  

For the truly curious:

The Not-Quite Puritans, by Henry W. Lawrence, 1928, Boston, Little, Brown Co. 

"Christmas in Early New England, 1620- 1820: Puritanism, Popular Culture, and the Printed Word", by Stephen W. Nissenbaum, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, 106: 1: 79 (January 1996) 

Are you curious about how the early Presbyterian Scots Irish settlers celebrated Christmas in Nutfield?  Click on this 2014 blog post to read all about it!  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2014/12/how-did-scots-irish-celebrate-christmas.html  

------------------

To cite/Link to this post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "The Puritans and Christmas", Nutfield Genealogy, posted December 22, 2020, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2020/12/the-puritans-and-christmas.html: accessed [access date]). 

Researching Ancestors Who Were Religious Leaders

Rev. Ingraham Ebenezer Bill
My 3rd great grandfather

I've found quite a few ministers in my family tree.  Are there clergy, rabbis, or any other religious leaders in your family?

When tracing the protestant ministers in my family, I came to the conclusion that in early colonial New England the ministers' children married mostly the children of other ministers.  This pattern was quite common in the 1600s and 1700s, but I can see it also in the 1800s.  Perhaps it was a social class distinction.  Ministers were well educated, but often very poor, so their children tended to marry teachers and other ministers instead of lawyers and other businessmen?  Perhaps it was due to the fact that they led a strict upbringing?  This is just my theory. What do you think?

Most religious leaders had some sort of formal education, but not all.  Take advantage of this education to find where they attended schools, colleges and universities.  Some of the Puritan ministers who came over with John Winthrop's fleet in the 1630s went to Cambridge and Oxford Universities in England, and that is a great place to look for personal family information.  Harvard was founded as a place to instruct these ministers in the New World.  You can contact the colleges, universities, and religious institutions in the areas where your family lived to find out if they attended, and what records might be available.  Even if the school is no longer in existence, the records were often moved to another school's archives or library.

Sometimes someone in your family tree will just "see the light" or have a calling to the ministry.  This is what happened to my ancestor Ingraham Ebenezer Bill, who was the son of Asahel Bill, a Connecticut farmer who relocated to Nova Scotia during the planter movement in the 1760s.  Ingraham Ebenezer Bill was the youngest of eleven children, born in 1805 in "Billtown", Nova Scotia.  During his youth he experienced a religious conversion to the Baptist faith.  He was uneducated beyond grade school, yet went on to be one of the founders of the Baptist school Acadia College in 1831, and was later granted an honorary Doctorate of Theology.

Once I found Rev. Bill's connection to Acadia College (now Acadia University), I contacted their archive and received a large envelope with copies and newsclippings of his activities, photographs, sermons, and travels through Canada, all the eastern USA, and England.  The college also had a copy of his personal journal, and a biography written by one of his sons!  You can be sure that I wrote a nice donation to the Acadia library in lieu of regular copy charges.  You can read about the Bill family at this link:  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/03/surname-satruday-bill-of-boston.html 

Finding a religious figure in your family tree can open up lots of information.  Just Google all the variations of your ancestor's name and see all the results.  Try "Rev. John * Smith"  or "Reverend *Smith" or "Rev. Smith DD", etc.   Each denomination and religion has it's own variations. Google can bring up sermons, weddings, funerals, newspaper articles, and obituaries this way.

Make a time line to see where your religious leader may have lived.  Some led one congregation for their entire life, and others moved from town to town, state to state, or even from country to country.  Timelines can be invaluable for genealogy research.

If your family was Roman Catholic, often there were siblings (great aunts and uncles) who entered religious service as nuns, priests, and or monks.  These family members didn't leave descendants (unless they were widows or widowers, and even rarer, divorced), and often changed their names, making them difficult to trace  (census records will use their religious name, not their birth name).  However, there are patterns in some families about which religious orders they preferred, which can help you to find the convent or monastery, and often the catholic schools other family members attended.  Once you find the religious order this relative entered, you can write to the order, or visit your own parish priest for help.  Once you find the religious order, you will find they kept very good records on their members, including birth place, parents names, burials, and more.

For the truly curious:

Is a Rabbi Hiding in Your Family Tree?  Lessons from Genetic Genealogy for Traditional Genealogists   https://www.academia.edu/18659950/Is_a_Rabbi_Hiding_in_Your_Family_Tree_Lessons_from_Genetic_Genealogy_for_Traditional_Genealogists 

Rabbinical Genealogy: Sources at the Center for Jewish History
https://www.cjh.org/pdfs/Rabbis.pdf 

Finding Family in Religous Service, by Juliana Smith
http://blogs.ancestry.com/circle/?p=3243 

Researching Irish Catholic Priests, Nuns and Religious Brothers, by Kyle J. Betit
https://www.irishrootsmedia.com/img/products/Sample%20issue%20108_1.pdf 

Colonial American Ministers Project at geni.com
https://www.geni.com/projects/Colonial-American-Ministers/13900 

The Colonial Clergy and the Colonial Churches of New England, by Frederick Lewis Weiss, reprinted by the Genealogical Publishing Company of Baltimore, Maryland, 1936  (there are similar books by Weiss for Maryland, Delaware, Georgia, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina).  Some of these are available online - check Google books.

Society of the Descendants of the Colonial Clergy
http://colonialclergyorg.blogspot.com/  

The Society of the Descendants of the Colonial Clergy has sponsored a book Pedigrees of the Descendants of the Colonial Clergy, by Robert Glenn Thurtle, 1976 available online at the Hathi Trust website:  https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/005802358

A handy list of the New England Puritan ministers and their approximate time of arrival from England (1630 - 1641):  http://sites.rootsweb.com/~genepool/preacher.htm 


----------------------------

Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Researching Ancestors Who Were Religious Leaders", Nutfield Genealogy, posted January 9, 2020, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2020/01/researching-ancestors-who-were.html: accessed [access date]).

A Bundling Song

I saw an excerpt of this "Bundling Song" in the book The Not-Quite Puritans, written in 1928 by Henry W. Lawrence.  On page 30 there is an image of some of this poem with the following "Twentieth-century discretion permits the reproduction of only a small part of The Bundling Song which in the eighteenth was so instrumental in breaking up the practice." Of course, I was instantly curious and wanted to know the rest of the poem!  I found this image from the American Antiquarian Society online.  

Bundling Song:
Or a reproof to those young Country Women, who follow that reproachful practice, and to their Mothers
for upholding them therein.

Since bundling very much abounds,
In many parts in country towns,
No doubt but some will spurn my song,
And say I'd better hold my tongue;
But none I'm sure will take offense;
Or deem my song impertinence,
But only those who guilty be,
And plainly here their pictures see,
Some maidens say, if through the nation,
Bundling should quite go out of fashion,
Courtship would lose its sweets; and they
Could have no fun till wedding day.
If shant be so, they rage and storm,
And country girls in clusters swarm,
And fly and buz, like angry bees,
And vow they'll bundle when they please.
Some mothers, too, will plead their cause,
And give their daughters great applause,
And 'tell them, 'tis no sin nor shame,
For we, your mothers, did the same;
We hope the custom ne'er will alter,
But wish its enemies a halter.
Dissatisfaction great appear'd,
In several places where they've heard
Their preacher's bold, aloud disclaim
That bundling is a burning shame;
This too was cause of direful rout
And talk'd and told of, all about,
That ministers should disprove
Sparks, courting in a a bed of love,
So justified the custom more,
Than e'er was heard or known before.
The pulpit then it seems must yield,
And female valor take the field,
In places where there custom long
Increasing strength has grown so strong;
When mothers herein bear a sway,
And daughters joyfully obey.
And young men highly pleased, too,
Good Lord! What can't the devil do.
Can this vile practice ne'er be broke?
Is there no way to give a stroke,
To wound it or strike it dead.
And girls with sparks not go to bed?
Twill strike them more than preacher's tongue,
To let the world know what they've done,
And let it be in common fame,
Held up to view a noted shame.
Young miss if this your practice be,
I'll teach you now yourself to see:
You plead you're honest, modest too,
But such a plea will never do;
For how can modesty consist,
With shameful practice such as this?
I'll give your answer to the life:
"You don't undress like man and wife"
That is your plea, I'll freely own
But whose your bondsmen when alone,
That further rules you will not break,
And marriage liberties partake?
Some really do, as I suppose,
Upon design keep on some clothes,
And yet in truth I'm not afraid
For to describe a bundling maid;
She'll sometimes say when she lies down,
She can't be cumber'd with a gown,
And that the weather is so warm,
To take it off can be no harm:
The girl it seems had been at strift,
For widest bosom to her shift,
She gownless, when the bed they're in,
The spark, nought feels but naked skin,
But she is modest, also chaste,
While only bare from neck to waist,
And he of boasted freedom sings,
Of all above her apron strings,
And where such freedoms great are shar'd
And further freedoms feebly bar'd,
I leave for others to relate,
How long she'll keep her virgin state,
Another pretty lass we'll scan,
That loves to bundle with a man,
For many different ways they take,
Though modest rules they all will break,
Some clothes I'll keep on, she will say,
For that has always been my way,
For would I be quite naked found,
With spark in bed, for thousand pound,
But petticoats I've always said,
Were never made to wear in bed,
I'll take them off, keep on my gown,
And then I dare defy the town.
To charge me with immodesty
While I so ever cautious be.
The spark was pleased with his maide,
Of apprehension quick he said,
Her witty scheme was keen he swore,
Lying in gown open before.
Another maid when in the dark,
Going to bed with her dear spark,,
She'll tell him that 'this rather shocking,
To bundle in bed with shoes and stockings.
Nor scrupling but she's quite discreet,
Lying with naked legs and fee.
With petticoat so thin and short,
That she is scarce the fetter for't;
But you will say that I'm unfair,
That some who bundle take more care,
For some we may with truth suppose,
Bundle in bed with all their clothes,
But bundler's clothes are no defence,
Only horses push the fence;
A certain fact I'll now relate,
That's true indeed without dete.
A bundling couple went to bed,
With all their clothes from foot to head,
That the defence might seem complete,
Each one was wrapped in a sheet.
But O! This bundling's such a witch,
The man of her did catch the itch,
And so provoked was the wretch,
That she of him a bastard catch'd.
Ye bundling misses, don't you blush.
You hang pour heads and bid me hush,
If you wont' tell me how you feel,
I'll ask your sparks thy best can tell.
But it is custom you will say,
And ustom always bears the sway,
If I won't take my sparks to bed,
A laughing stock I shall be made;
A vulgar custom 'tis I own,
Admir'd by many a slut and clown,
But 'tis a method of proceading,
As much abhor'd by those of breeding.
You're welcome to the lines I've penn'd,
For they were written by a friend,
Who'll think himself quite well rewarded,
If this vile practice is discarded.



“A New bundling song: or A reproof to those young country women, who follow that reproachful practice, and to their mothers for upholding them therein,” Isaiah Thomas Broadside Ballads Project, accessed August 21, 2019, https://www.americanantiquarian.org/thomasballads/items/show/170 

-------------------------------

Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "A Bundling Song", Nutfield Genealogy, posted September 3, 2019, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/09/a-bundling-song.html: accessed [access date]).

Wicked Apparell

The Puritans did not dress like this!

Whilst browsing in a favorite used book store, I found a book published in 1928 by Henry W. Lawrence titled The Not-Quite Puritans.  This quirky old book starts with a dedication quoting Viscount Bryce “It is Facts that are needed: Facts, Facts, Facts. When facts have been supplied, each of us can try to reason from them”.  This old book's first chapter "Wicked Apparell" [sic] states some facts about the Puritan Sumptuary Laws in Massachusetts, but neglects to provide footnotes or sources for these interesting tidbits.  Perhaps we can crowd source the origins of these quotes?

From pages 4- 5:

“As early as 1634, some ‘new and immodest fashions’ alarmed the authorities of Massachusetts into ordering ‘that no person, either man or woman, shall hereafter make or buy any apparel, either woolen, silk or linen, with any lace on it, silver, gold, silk or thread’.  A prohibition was likewise laid on ‘slashed clothes, other than one slash in each sleeve, and another in the back’; also on ‘all gold or silver girdles, hat-bands, belts, ruff, beaver hats.’ With due regard for the avoidance of waste, however the law allowed the present possessors ‘to wear out such apparel as they are now provided of, except the immoderate great sleeves, slashed apparel, immoderate great rails, long wings, &c.’

This early prohibition law evidently proved inadequate, especially with the women; whereupon moral suasion was tried.  Governor Winthrop writes that, in 1638, ‘The court, taking into consideration the great disorder general through the country in costliness of apparel, and following new fashions, sent for the elders of the churches, and conferred with them about it, and laid it upon them, as belonging to them, to redress it, by urging it upon the consciences of their people, which they promised to do.  But little was done about it, for divers of the elders’ wives, etc. where in some measure partners in the general disorder.’

… in the very next year, 1639, it was found necessary to pass a law against the improper clothing worn by frivolous males.  ‘Immoderate great breeches’ were forbidden; also broad shoulder bands, double ruffles, and capes.  It seems, too, that the dandies were adorning their shoes with silk roses, till this law plucked them off.”

What is the source for these quoted bits of information?  I used Google to search for some of them and this is what I found:

The first statute mentioned above from 1634 is from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, 3 September 1634.  It also forbade “new fashions, or long hair”, or anything of the like nature”.   I couldn’t find the exact law through Google.

The quote from Governor John Winthrop in 1638 about the sumptuary laws comes from Winthrop’s Journal “History of New England 1630 – 1649”, Volume 7, page 179 and is dated 25 September 1638.

The statue against “Immoderate great breeches” comes from the Massachusetts Colonial Records, Volume 1, page 126 with an admonition from the Massachusetts General Court in 1639, and it reads “Immoderate great breeches, knots of ribbon, broad shoulder-bands and rails, silk rases, double ruffs and cuffs… the excessive wearing of lace and other superfluities… [tended]… to little use or benefit, but to the nourishing of pride and exhausting of men’s estates, and also of evil example to others”

For the truly curious:

Sumptuary Laws, by Margaret Wood at the Law Library of Congress  https://blogs.loc.gov/law/2014/02/sumptuary-laws/

The Puritans: Sumptuary Laws for Those of Mean Condition, by City College New York:

  http://digital-archives.ccny.cuny.edu/exhibits/What_Not_to_Wear/WNTW_6_Puritans.pdf

----------------------

Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Wicked Apparell", Nutfield Genealogy, posted April 20, 2019, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/04/wicked-apparell.html: accessed [access date]).