MONG the worthy company of persons and dignities gathered in the new church on those August Sundays, His Excellency the Governor claims precedence, not only by official rank, but as its most generous benefactor and the inspirer of its erection. The summer of 1754 was largely spent by him at Falmouth, with a quorum of his Council and other high personages, in making a treaty with the Norridgewock Indians, erecting forts on the Kennebec, and perfecting his scheme of warfare against the French settlements on the Chaudière. In his train went the King's Lecturer, and with him the services of the Church. The pastor of the First Congregational Society of Falmouth wrote: 1. "June 26, 1754. The Governor got in this morning. "June 30 (Sunday). Parson Brockwell preached here, A. M., and carried on in the Church form. "July 14. Mr. Brockwell preached. He gave great offence as to his doctrine." 1 Rev. Thomas Smith's Journal, ary," p. 282; Batchelder's "The Church quoted in Bartlet's "Frontier Mission- in Maine," p. 45. But Lecturer and Governor were at home again, when their fellow-worshippers entered the Lord's house with joy and singing. William Shirley, born in England in 1693, and descended from the family ennobled under the title of Ferrers,1 had come to this country about 1734, and was practising law in Boston when, as before related, in 1741, the removal of Belcher and the death of John Jekyll left vacant the two offices of Governor and Collector of the Port, and Sir Henry Frankland receiving the more lucrative position from the Duke of Newcastle, the office of Governor fell to Shirley. For fifteen years, in difficult and glorious times, he filled the chair with distinction, and to him were largely due the measures which led to British supremacy in America. The French and Indian wars fill his administration with the sound of martial music, and give it light and color brighter than any other chapter in our history, culminating in that splendid achievement of the Provincial arms, the reduction of Louisburg. The financial troubles consequent on the collapse of the currency and his controversies with the Bank party did not affect the Governor's hold on the regard of the sturdy yeomanry which even his advocacy of the Royal prerogative and his stanch, perhaps aggressive, devotion to his Church did not destroy, while his literary accomplishments gave refinement and grace to his public career. 1 "Burke (Extinct Baronetcies) calls on whose monument show that she was him son of William, who died in 1701, probably of the Yorkshire family of that by Elizabeth, his wife, daughter of John name. By her he had (1) William, secGoodman, deriving his descent from retary to General Braddock, and killed the Shirleys of Wisterton;' but Drake with him in 1755; (2) John, a captain (N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., x. 47) in the army, died at Oswego; (3) Ralph, states that he was son of Thomas of died young; (4) Thomas; (5) Judith, Preston, Co. Sussex, and grandson of died young; (6) Elizabeth, married EliSir Thomas S. of Wiston, in the same akim Hutchinson; (7) Frances, married county. This seems his most probable William Bollan; (8) Harriet, married descent. Brydges's Collins's Peerage Robert Temple; (9) Maria, married John derives the family from Sewallus de Erving. Etingdon, who died about 1085. After several generations, we come to Sir Ralph Shirley, a noted warrior under King Henry V., who died in 1443. His second son Ralph, Esquire of the Body to King Henry VII., inherited Wiston. Ralph's great-grandson, Sir Thomas, was father of Sir Thomas Shirley, M. D., who suffered much for his loyalty, and had Wiston taken from him, and who was grandfather of our Governor. "The Governor married (1) Frances, daughter of Francis Barker, the arms VOL. II.-9 "Governor Shirley died March 22, 1771, aged seventy-seven. His only surviving son, Thomas, Governor of the Leeward Islands, Major-General, etc., was created a Baronet in 1786, and married Anne, daughter of Thomas Western, by Margaret, daughter and co-heir of Sir Richard Shirley, Bart., of Preston. Sir Thomas died in 1800, and his only son, Sir William Warden Shirley, died sine prole in 1815, when the baronetcy became extinct." — Heraldic Journal, ii. 116-118. Secretary Willard wrote in his praise to Dr. Benjamin Avery: 1 "Dec. 31, 1743. . . . I am very glad of the Correspondence entered into between Govern! Shirley and you, and believe it will every way promote the publick Good of the Province. I must do him the Justice to say I think him a good Govern! And althô his not being of the same Profession in Religion with the Body of this People may [be] attended with Inconvenience, yet I am not apprehensive that he will ever use his Power to oppress us on that or any other Account. I must say this (as to mildness and prudence of his Governm! and the visible Effects thereof among us), that althô we have had none but good Govern's for the six and twenty years that I have been concerned in the publick Business here, and we might have lived happily with any of them had it not been our own fault, yet in no part of that time has there been a greater Harmony and Agreem! between the several parts of the Legislature than since the beginning of his Administ, nor have any of our Govern's had more of the Affection of the People than he, if I can judge truly, althô the perplexed and entangled State of the publick Affairs has rendered his Administration as difficult as that of any of his Predecessors. However, I can't pretend that he is without Enemies among us: there is evermore a Party that are uneasy under all Administrations where they have no Share themselves; And whatever discontents there may be now, I believe that is at the Bottom of them. "You have justly observed that the different Apprehensions we have 'among us as to the true Interests of the Province brings a great difficulty upon our Friends in England what measures to take for our benefit. Upon this Occasion I cannot but give you my Opinion That none of your Correspondents here (that I am acquainted with) will give you more intelligent and disinterested Advices of these Matters than M: Thomas Hutchinson, who is justly had in great Esteem by the best men. "I take this Opportunity to recommend to your Acquaintance and Favour my Brother in Law, Mr. Joseph Brandon. . . . Thô he is not a Native of this Countrey, yet he is a true New England Man in his Heart, and (I think) a solid, judicious Man." A great bereavement early took from the Governor her to whom he owed his position. "Boston, Sept. 4, 1746. Last Lord's Day Evening died, after a few Days Illness, the Honourable Mrs. Shirley, Consort of His Excellency our Governour: The Funeral will be this Afternoon, and the Corps will move between three and four o'clock." 2 1 Mass. Archives, liii. 167. 2 The Boston Weekly Newsletter, Sept. 4, 1746. The great public events in which his administration was involved overshadowed the Governor even at the moment of his lady's death. This took place in September, 1746, when an attack from the French fleet under D'Anville was imminent; and the only mention of the forces which the Governor had gathered to resist the invasion (and on which the public prints were enjoined to silence) is in connection with their attendance at her stately funeral, in the same churchyard where Lady Andros had been interred. The death of his beautiful and accomplished lady had left the Province House desolate before the subscription for the new church was begun, and his interest in it may well have led him to regard it almost as a memorial for her, especially when, from his seat in the "Governor's pew," he read the tablet which blended her virtues and those of her daughter in one inscription.1 M. S. FRANCISCE SHIRLEY, Omnium Admirationi commendavit Familiarium vero etiam Amori Gratior veniens in pulchro Corpore virtus: 1 See heliotype of the Shirley monument, surmounted by her bust, in Vol. I. p. 12. The monument associates with Mrs. Shirley in enduring memory the name of her second daughter Frances and her husband William Bollan. Born in England, he had come to Boston with Mr. Shirley, had studied law under Mr. Auchmuty, succeeding Shirley as Advocate-General of the Admiralty Court in 1741. The death of his lovely young wife, in 1743, must have made him welcome the position of Agent of the Province in London in 1745. He had already been sent, in 1740, to secure the reim tionary," which gives a list of his political writings. The association of this rare lady with the present church, like that of Lady Andros with its predecessor, deserves note. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, in his poem, "King's Chapel," 2 voices the sentiment awakened by these ancient monuments: "Lightly we glance the fresh-cut marbles o'er; Those two of earlier date our eyes enthrall: bursement of the Cape Breton expedi- «Ay! those were goodly men that Reynolds drew, tion. As a friend of Shirley's party, he was finally displaced from the agency in 1762, but continued to be employed by the Council, and rendered great services. "Mr. Hancock declared in the House of Representatives that there was no man to whom the Colonies were more indebted, and whose friendship had been more sincere." He urged conciliatory measures up to the eve of the Revolution. See Eliot's "Biographical Dic And stately dames our Copley's canvas holds, To their old Church, their Royal Master, true, Proud of the claim their valiant sires had earned, That "gentle blood," not lightly to be spurned, Save by the churl ungenerous Nature moulds. 2 The Poem is printed at length on pp. 626, 627, post. |