The Boyhood of
Rev. Samuel Robert Calthrop
Compiled by His Daughter,
Edith Calthrop Bump
Syracuse, New York
April, 1939
[Following
is an edited version of a manuscript by Edith that was donated to May Memorial Unitarian
Universalist Society. The information was compiled by Edith from interviews
with her Dad, material he provided, and other information she found. Where
appropriate, helpful, and educational, Internet links have been added by Roger
Hiemstra, Church Archivist. The original material was data processed by Carolyn
(Lyn) Coyle.]
Chapter One –
Early Days
I
was born in Swineshead
Abbey,
The
house in which I was born was built of stones taken from the old Abbey of
Swineshead and on the same site. Shakespeare commemorated it in his play of “King John.”
The king died in the old abbey, with his defeated army camped around it.
There
was an old story told about the ruined abbey. When Cromwell was pursuing some
of the king’s followers, a Sir John came with a few friends to Swineshead to
escape to France by way of “The Wash.” Sir John had a fine horse of which he
was very fond and he took it into the ruined cellar of the abbey. He got all
the water and hay he could find and stowed it where the horse could find it.
Then Sir John threw the key into the abbey well. Months later he returned and
broke in the cellar door, to find the skeleton of the horse leaning against the
door listening for his master. (When my father cleaned the abbey well, the old
key was found at the bottom.)
It
was strange that when I went to
One
of the first things I remember was going to the
The
next scene that took place and left a deep impression on me was in the great
Swineshead Church. I was taken there in the pony carriage by my sisters one
Sunday morning. When we entered, my sister Elizabeth led the way and found a
man with a very red beard sitting in the corner of our pew near the door. When
she lifted me to my hassock (thick cushion used as a seat), she politely handed
him a prayer book. Soon mother and father and the rest of the family came in,
having driven to church behind us in the phaeton (four wheeled carriage). When
my father saw the red bearded man sitting in our pew, he seized him by the
collar and pitched him into the aisle. There was actual clapping in the church.
Father was church warden, and Mr. Foss, the red bearded man, had refused to pay
his tithes and so my father had sold one of his cows to pay them. Mr. Foss had
dared to sit in my father’s pew to insult him, but he insulted the wrong man.
The
nursery at Swineshead Abbey was the place where we children lived. It was a
most delightful room to us all, made so by our dearly beloved nurse, Mary
Sentence. We children did not know whom we loved better, our mother or our
nurse. The nursery had windows on the south side so it was very bright and
sunny. On the east was a large fireplace which had a fender (rails or barriers
placed in front of a fireplace) on which we could put our arms. Here Mary
Sentence cooked our dinner on a skillet – a sort of gridiron with hollow arms
into which the gravy ran. I remembered this skillet for a long time, for one
day I put my hand on one of the arms. Mary found out I had done so and asked me
if it hurt, I said it did not. She looked at it and said I had told a story,
which meant a lie. It had merely touched the skin, though the scar remained for
a couple of years. She never had to say that to me again.
Five
of us children slept in the attic with our nurse, Mary. In the morning, when it
was dark, Mary Sentence used to get up and take her tinder box, flint, and
steel to light a candle. Then she started the large fire and we children would
get up and dress before it. We were a very happy lot, especially when we
gathered around the fire and Mary told us stories. She was gifted that way.
Next
in our love was Thomas Grayson, groom and gardener. We admired his skill in
mowing the lawns. His scythe cut the grass with perfect smoothness, better than
a modern lawnmower. He was so kind to us. When our sister, who was our teacher,
punished us for not completing our lessons, little sister Emma was apt to have
to wear a fool’s cap. She would run out into the garden to have a good cry, but
Thomas would tell her, “Thomas doth not see what thou hast on thy head, my
dear.” Generally, the fool’s cap was our sole form of punishment.
A
Miss Dando was a frequent visitor in our young days and we were very fond of her.
She slept in a spare room next to the nursery. As she had to pass through our
room to get to her own, often she would stop and tell us stories. She had a
very fine diamond ring, an heirloom. She used to show it to us and we loved to
see it glisten. One morning she left it on a long pin on her pin cushion. When
she returned to her room after breakfast, the ring was gone. She at once called
Ellen the house maid, and told her what had happened. Ellen said she had not
seen it, but Ellen felt believed Miss Dando thought she must have taken it
because she was the only one to go to Miss Dando’s room. Ellen went at once to
my mother and told her what had happened.
“Mrs.
Calthrop,” she said, “I am the only one who goes into Miss Dando’s room and if
the ring cannot be found she will think I took it.” Poor Ellen was so overcome
that she burst into tears.
Our
mother called each one of us to her and questioned us very carefully as to
whether we had seen the ring or seen anyone go into Miss Dando’s room. None of
us knew anything about it.
“Fetch
Thomas,” said mother. “If anyone can solve this mystery he can.” Thomas came
and mama put the whole story before him. Thomas scratched his head and said,
“Madam, I will do my best to find out who took that ring. I cannot believe that
Ellen did.” He cast a shy glance at the tearful Ellen.
Thomas
went out doors and sat under the big linden tree that stood near the house. He
sat there for some time, thinking and puzzling out any possible way the ring
might disappear. Suddenly he heard a noise in the tree above him. He raised his
head and looked in the branches. There sat the pet jackdaw, a great favorite of
the family. As Thomas looked he noticed that the jackdaw was playing with
something in his mouth. The bird moved about and suddenly the sun shone on him
and Thomas saw something glisten in his mouth. Thomas’ heart nearly stopped
still. It must be the ring. Thomas did not call him but went into the kitchen
and cut some pieces of raw meat and placed them under the tree, just where the
bird could see them. The temptation was too great for soon the bird came down.
Thomas watched him as he gazed at the meat, then he opened his mouth and soon
began to eat. When the jackdaw was too busy to notice him, Thomas reached out
carefully and got the ring from where the jackdaw had let it drop. Great was
the rejoicing when Thomas brought the ring to my mother.
One
time Miss Dando came just after making a visit to London. While there she went
to the theatre one evening. During one of the interludes the manager of the
theatre came forward and said, “You are going to see a genuine feat of skill,
and I pledge you my honor there is no fake in it. The performer will set up an
ordinary set of poker, tongs, and shovel, standing them all in a row. I only
ask you to be very still.” The performer came out then and in a short time he
had these all standing in a row. There was great enthusiasm for the feat among
audience members. One evening there was a large company at dinner and Miss
Dando told the guests about the act she had seen at the theatre. The gentlemen
were very skeptical and when mama led the ladies into the drawing room after
dinner, she found Miss Dando in tears because the gentlemen did not believe
her. Mama thought a minute and then called Thomas. He had helped wait on the
table and had heard the discussion. “Thomas,” she said, “if anyone can do this
thing you can.” Thomas took poker, tongs, and shovel into the front kitchen and
told the other servants to keep out. He tried and tried to make them stand on
end. Finally, one stood and then another until at last he had the three
standing in a row. When the gentlemen came into the drawing room, mamma, in her
most stately manner, invited them to come with her into the kitchen. There to
their great amazement they saw for themselves the poker, tongs, and shovel
standing bravely up in a row. Thomas told them how he tried and tried the poker
first, until suddenly it stood still. The tongs and shovel were a little harder
but not much. Miss Dando beamed as now she was vindicated.
When
I was six my sister Elizabeth came home from Mrs. Whittingam’s school in
Birmingham. Sister Lizzie, as we called her, was a born teacher. She taught us
by her great enthusiasm to love and admire noble characters. When we studied
Greek history, we were thrilled when Leonidas and his brave three
hundred died for their country’s cause. We read the Epitaph:
“Go Stranger, and tell all
She
dictated to us from J.
Lempriere’s Classical Dictionary,
“Socrates was the most celebrated philosopher in antiquity,” and when we
heard of his heroic death, we mourned. When Marcus Curtius, armed cap a pied, and riding a war
horse, jumped down the gulf which opened suddenly in the Forum, which the
Oracle had declared would never be closed until Rome had thrown into it the
most precious thing she possessed. The people began throwing down their jewels
and gold, but Curtius
knew better, for gallant men who defended Rome were her most precious
possession. The gulf closed over him for he had fulfilled the will of the
Oracle.
Our
young hearts were thrilled by such heroism. My sister’s eyes beamed as she told
us those great stories. Her influence was an unforgotten throughout our lives.
One
great event of our day was when tea time approached. Then we children went into
the dining room to have a game of “Robbers” with papa. He would hide himself
behind one of the red curtains and in a terrible voice would call,
Fee, fi, fo, fum,
I smell the blood of an Englishman.
Be he alive or be he dead,
I’ll grind his bones to make my bread.
The
more terrible the voice, the more delighted and terrified we were. Little Emma
would cry out, “B. Y. Bob” and just what that meant we never knew. He would
then rush out and catch us. Those were very happy days for us children.
The
first great event of my life came on June 20th, 1837. I was just
eight years old. Queen
We
had large gardens with two lawns, one at the front of the house which was well
kept, and the other at the back and sides. My sisters had a very pretty flower
garden on the western lawn, not far from the sunken fence. When there was water
in it, the sunken fence was a fine place to play. There our eldest sisters,
Fanny and Ellen, used to play at inn keeping. Harriet, Jennet, Emma, and I
would play with our hoops as the coach. This was great fun and Fanny was
allowed to gather a few currants to feed the “horses.”
The
best fun of all was the cat-gallows (a jumping frame). Thomas made the ones we
used first, but I soon learned the trade. They were made of two sticks with a
fork at the top. These were placed in the ground and another small stick was
put in the forks. If the jumper could jump over the cross piece he was given a
higher one, but if the stick dropped off he had to try again. I made one for
each jumper and one for myself. Jennet and Emma had one, as they jumped exactly
the same height. Jennet ran with a very solemn and determined rush, but Emma
skipped along in a gay manner.
About
this time Carrie was given to me. She was a King Charles spaniel and was one of
the great loves of my life. She was a wonderful dog. When I took her with me,
no one thought of taking her away because she would not leave me. When I came
home from school in the summer time, my father, mother, and the whole family
would come out on the lawn to see how Carrie acted. She would begin to run
around the party, the second round being shorter, and press the whole family
into a smaller space. After four or five rounds we would be crowded together.
Then she would give a rush for me, jumping and kissing me with wild delight. It
made no difference how far away she was, she would always find me. Once I could
not find her. I called and whistled for her but she would not come. I searched
the whole garden until I came to the third lawn. There she was with her nose to
the ground. When I called she would not come and I was angry with her for the
first time in my life. As I came nearer to her I saw that her nose was close to
something. It was my purse which I had dropped. It had three shillings and six
pence in it. Imagine my delight to find her so true to me.
Soon
I was ready to go away to a school and my Uncle Sam, who had the fine old
Calthrops’ ancestral home at Gosburton, also took care of the farm that
belonged to St. Paul’s School in London. The school was in the hands of the
Mercer Company, guardian of the wealth of the great Dean Colet, who founded the
school in the reign of Henry the Eighth. Uncle Sam, being an admirable tenant,
put in a good word for me and I was accepted into St. Paul’s School.
Chapter Two –
St. Paul’s School
The
great day came, the first of October, when my father and I got up at four in
the morning, had our breakfast, and were driven in the phaeton by Thomas to
Sutterton. Here we waited until the big coach Perseverance came along and we
were on our way to London, one hundred and ten miles away. Boy-like, I got a
great thrill riding in the coach. We traveled through many hamlets where it
seemed as though every one was at their door to see us pass. When we stopped to
change horses, the shouts and calls to the driver and others caused much
comment among the people on the coach. It was a great event for a small boy of
nine, especially when we stopped at Biggleswade and had an excellent dinner.
Never
shall I forget the feeling as I looked down on the lights of
After
breakfast the next morning, father took me to the great cathedral and we stood
under the dome, which is immense. We went into the Whispering Gallery and
father whispered to me from the other side of that great dome and I heard every
word. It was a wonderful thing to this small boy. Then we went to the
Zoological Gardens and I saw the bears, monkeys, and elephants. The keeper of
the elephants put me on the neck of one of them and I rode around for a long
time. His neck was as broad as my pony’s back. It was another great thrill.
In
the afternoon we went to see the Rev. Charles Colby Robert’s, one of the
Masters, where I was going to board. He was a
I
said goodbye to my father, and soon was settled as a real school boy. That
night I was put in the attic in a large room with four other small boys. When
we were going to bed, the boy next to me said, “The beds are very narrow so
your bed might turn over if you did not lie in the middle.” Being very tired
from all my new experiences I soon fell asleep. Suddenly I was awakened and
found myself on the floor. The boy, who had kindly warned me, helped me lift up
my bed and put on the mattress and the bed clothes. I fell asleep again and
once more found myself on the floor. The kind boy helped me again and, as we
were lifting up the bed, I heard voices in the passageway saying, “He bears it
so well we won’t do it again.” So at last I understood.
I
soon found all the boys in my room were very nice and we had great times
playing together, especially when it rained and we played marbles.
The
long anticipated week before Christmas came and I went home with one of my
sisters who was in school near London. Oh! What a happy time it was. Although I
had enjoyed my school very much, the joy of being home was very great. My
recollections of that Christmas day and all the preparations are very vivid.
First it began with breakfast. Such a meal! On the sideboard was a great spiced
beef and on the table pork pies and sausages. Those pork pies were works of art
and we children were sometimes allowed to have a hand in the making of them. A
round tower of crust with a firm base was slowly built under skilled fingers.
Then pieces of pork, chopped large, were poured in and finally the whole
edifice crowned with a crust and put in the oven to bake, just as a loaf of
bread. As for those sausages, the making of them is a lost art.
After
breakfast came the Christmas presents, all spread out on the dining room table.
Every Christmas our good and saintly vicar (alas living near London for his
health) used to send every member of the family a present – a book, box of
fruit, and the finest raisins and prunes. So we christened his present, “Plums,
Prunes, and Tracts.”
Then
we went to church, the grand old village church that seated two thousand
people. It was a great sight, with the church filled with people. The monks of
Swineshead Abbey had built this grand old parish church, a splendid specimen of
the Early English architecture. To the font in this church I was taken as a
tiny baby. There my father and mother consecrated me to God in baptism. The
church was about a mile away. It was quite a procession that sallied forth from
our home, including father, mother, twelve children, and two or more visitors.
Some of them walked, but most went in the big phaeton and pony cart.
After
church we hurried home to Christmas dinner. Such a dinner! On the table was a
great joint of beef, which had been cooked on a spit before the fire; and there
were turkeys, chickens, and many other items. After all these things had been
well tasted, we were served the plum pudding which had taken days to prepare.
The brandy around it was solemnly lighted and became a veritable Christmas
family altar. The “ohs” and “ahs” from us children showed our appreciation.
After
dessert our dear mother danced a minuet
for us, the one day in the year she danced, for her piety was very strict. She
had learned this stately dance in the days of her youth. We children were very
much awed by its grandeur. Then we children, thirteen of us, stood in a row
from the oldest to the youngest, the baby being held in the arms of the nurse.
We stood in order of height, my two big brothers at the top and dwindling down
like a succession of Pan’s pipes. As the years went by, I slowly ascended
toward the top, until I stood third. This ceremony my father never forgot and
he would stand and rub his hands with delight.
Not
long after dinner we were informed that the bell-ringers had come. Our church had
a grand peal of bells and it was a great moment when they pealed out merrily
over the country side on Christmas morning. It was the custom of the ringers of
the church bells to come around every Christmas evening and ring their bells at
our house. We all went into the front kitchen and there we saw four solemn and
speechless men with eight bells on a long table spread with a soft cloth. After
a rustic obeisance to us they nodded to each other and the ringing began. It
was all very quaint and simple. It was odd to see how deftly those awkward
hands moved and how noiselessly they put the bells on the table. The harmonies
were so sweet and sure.
In
those days we had no organ in the church. The choir consisted of brass, string,
and wood instruments. My childish delight was the bassoon and the big bass
viol. With the bell ringers and the choir, a good deal of music took place in
our village. Christmas music was an event for the choir and when the organ took
its place, the men in the band felt very blue and some actually shed tears.
When the next Christmas came around and their occupation was taken away, the
pride of their rustic hearts was gone.
The
climax of Christmas Day came when we children were allowed to sit up and see
the Morice Dancers. (How old this dance was no one knows.) The name Morice –
Moorish – probably came from
What
a dance it was with Robin Hood and Maid Marian and, gradually, all the men of
the Green Wood. First, half a dozen masked figures with drawn swords appeared.
Our childish impressions deepened and deepened as they danced their mystic
dance. One would fall down, apparently slain, then five others placed their
swords’ points on the center of his breast and solemnly danced around his
prostrate form repeating some mystic words in a monotonous refrain. It sounded
like a vow they were repeating, an oath to avenge his death, or a sung dirge,
or a solemn song of incantation to revive his lifeless body.
We
had very happy times while I was home, and I was obliged to stay at home
several weeks because I had whooping cough. One day a remarkable letter came to
me with a coin in it. Papa, mamma, and the others felt the coin and debated
whether to keep the letter or not because the postage was a shilling and the
one receiving it had to pay the postage. It was finally opened and there was a
coin dedicated to me.
When
I got back to school all was changed for the worse. A small boy – a brother to
that wonderful creature, the captain of the school – had been put in our room.
He was the biggest bully I ever knew. I found that the other four were
perfectly cowed by him and he bullied them night and day. He immediately zeroed
in on me and one morning, while saying my prayers at the foot of my bed, he
took my hairbrush and spanked me as hard as he could. I stood it, not because I
was a Christian but because I was a coward.
At
last, having no more worlds to conquer in our room, he picked out a boy who was
about two years older than he. He was reading in the sitting room on the ground
floor. I liked this boy. He could draw such fine skeletons, trees, and houses
on his slate, and was such a fine fellow to go walking with. That big boy stood
the bullying in silence. But soon I saw two tears drop from his eyes; that was
too much for me. Something immense came up in my chest and I felt like a lion.
I began to spank the bully’s face as hard as I could; I spanked him again and
again. He was an arrant coward. He ran upstairs and wrote a letter to his
father and mother to take him home. He vanished and peace fell on our room once
more. It was like Heaven.
I
must now speak of my master, the Reverend Mr. Cooper. As I entered the last boy
in school, I had work to make up. Mr. Cooper was an admirable teacher and heard
me alone. Fortunately, my sister Lizzie had taught me to work steadily when
there was work to be done, so I progressed rapidly under Mr. Cooper’s
direction. At last I was allowed to join my class and I moved up several places
before the assessment of our status, which took place in the summer time just
before the holidays.
I
was in the Second Class and had several fine classmates, the strongest and
biggest of them being Jack Robinson. He was brave and kindly but no scholar. He
also had a brand new Roger and Company’s four bladed knife which we all
admired.
For
sometime Mr. Cooper did not allow anyone to pass by the older boys. Soon I
reached the seventh place in the class; mistakes then made by the three older
boys in front of me, including Jack Robinson, were so bad that Mr. Cooper
passed a question down to me. I answered it and went up to fourth place. After
school Jack Robinson came to me and said, “Oh, Calthrop, my father and mother
will never forgive me if I do not get passed on up to the next class. If I give
you my four bladed knife will you let me pass you by?” This was my first
temptation. I knew it was wrong so I refused.
When
the first three boys were moved to the Third Class, Mr. Cooper called me up to
him and said, “Calthrop, it is very unusual to move a boy up when he has been
in the class only three months, but there are two or three in the Third Class
who are of the same age as you. I think you ought to have a chance to become
captain of the school, which you could not be if I kept you here.” So I was
moved up to the Third Class. It was very kind and noble of him to do this.
Mr.
Bean was an entirely different kind of man. He was a bachelor and wore silk
stockings with silver buckles on his shoes and a black coat buttoned to the
collar. He came to school twisting his keys around his thumb. Before I could
get used to Sel Prof – which meant Seletae e Profanis Scriptoribus Historie – a
terrible accident happened to me. Someone above me threw a dart made of paper
that landed on old Bean’s desk. He called me up to him. “Calthrop, did you
throw that dart?” “No, sir.” “That is a lie,” he said. Immediately he spanked
be and put in the lowest form within the Third class. That winter had been a cold
one, so my mother had Mr. Pape make me a pair of trousers so thick that you
might call them a cast iron pair of breeches. Old Bean, thrash as he might,
could not make me feel anything. He did cause be despair, though, by placing me
at the bottom of a class of 24.
Fortunately
for me, the examinations were near. It would be strange for the bottom boy to
answer the hardest questions. The examiners were entirely independent of all the
masters and were selected from the highest class. The two at this time were
Lonsdale (who later became Bishop Lonsdale) and Dean Butler. I reached the
twelfth place by examination, so old Bean had to let me move up. Old Bean never
apologized to me, but plainly he felt he had wronged me because I became his
favorite pupil. One day he astonished the class by saying, “Boys, I am never
going to cane again.” For years he caned his fill, but after that he never did.
He still set great impositions; he gave my cousin, Arthur Bonner, the whole
Italian grammar – a book of three hundred pages – to write in full before he
could go home for the holidays. By the end of the school year I had reached
first in the Fourth class.
The
summer vacation came in July. My home coming was a happy one. Father bought me
a cricket bat, ball, and wickets. No one could have felt prouder than I when my
brothers bowled at me and found I had a good defense. We still continued our
practice in jumping, both with cat gallows and with standing jumps.
While
I was home I was eager to be allowed to climb the great hay and straw stacks.
We had a very large corn harvest that summer and I wanted to go up the stacks
and help. The harvesters were building by far the largest stack I had ever
seen. Two experts in building worked in concert, one on each side of the stack
making it swell equally on each side. The other men furnished them with the
best sheaves, while the experts filled up the center with ordinary sheaves.
One
morning I came out and saw that the heavy ladder was actually standing straight
up, without leaning inward at all. I shouted to the men that I did not dare
come up. They did not realize how they were pushing the ladder out with every
sheaf, and they did not think a small boy could be right and they wrong, so
they shouted, “It’s all right. Come up.” I did as I was bid and climbed to the
top of the ladder. Suddenly I felt the ladder was beginning to fall backwards.
Instantly I shifted my weight to the other side of the ladder and jumped for my
life. The very weight of the ladder helped me. I caught at a sheaf and held it.
The ladder fell to the ground with a terrible crash. The men heard it and
rushed to the edge of the stack to see what had happened. They found no boy at
the end of the ladder for I had caught the sheaf and was holding on for my life
depended on it. One of the men, Millhouse by name, threw himself on his face at
the edge of the stack while the other men held onto his feet. Being very strong
he lifted me up and the others caught me. To this day I thank God for my
escape. If I had waited a tenth of a second before I leaped I would have been
killed.
One
of our great summer pleasures was being driven to our uncle’s house in Moulton
Marsh. The carriage had to go through the shallow waters of “The Wash” – the
very ford (shallow water crossing) King John and his barons had to cross, where
he lost all his baggage and retired heartbroken and dying to Swineshead Abbey,
whose ruined stones were used to build the house where I was born.
Chapter Three
– Back at St. Paul’s
I
entered the Fifth Class in 1841. The Reverend Charles Colby was Master of both
the Fifth and Sixth Classes. It was a great relief to study under a fair minded
and conscientious teacher. I soon became familiar with Virgil’s Aeneid and the
history of my beloved Herodotus. In 1842 I received the prize for being head of
the Fifth Class, Heyne’s Virgil in four volumes. The following year, I received
Herodotus in two volumes. By this time I almost knew Herodotus by heart.
I
was just thirteen years old when I entered the Seventh Class. At this level,
students stayed in a class for two years. I soon became head of the class.
When
I was fourteen I had a very unpleasant experience. A boy named Earle came into
the class. He was dirty in appearance and for that reason the others did not
like him. I did not share this feeling and encouraged the other boys to think
better of him. One day he sent a message to me at the Top Form where I was
sitting reading. “Tell Calthrop I will fight him after school.” Words cannot
tell what terror came into my mind. He was eighteen and I was four years
younger. I said nothing, but those two hours were hours of perfect misery.
Soon
it was noised about that we were to fight. As boys of the Seventh Form seldom
fought, boys of the Eighth Form came into the room to take charge of the fight.
We were to fight in the hat room, the walls of which were made of iron and
painted a dull color.
When
all was ready my terror seemed to disappear. The terror in me was not being
scared of Earle, it was the infinite or rather the indefinite terror of the
unknown. At first I was vexed with the awkwardness of my arms. They did not
seem to obey my will, but when I warmed to the fight they began to find their
way to Earle’s face and to hit more and more vigorously. Soon he realized he
was being beaten and he turned deliberately to the iron wall and with
out-stretched thumb drove it into the wall and broke the joint. Then he turned
around and apologized for stopping, saying his thumb was broken. This was the
oddest end to a fight I ever heard of and though he deserved to be kicked I
could not do it.
I
was nearly fifteen and a half years old when I walked up the iron stairway that
lead to the great school room. I saw three or four boys pulling themselves up
by their hands. One boy pulled himself up and back seven times running. I
waited until they had gone and then I tried to lift myself up, but found I
could not do it even once. This startled me and I determined to become stronger.
Day after day I practiced on the bars until I was able to lift myself
twenty-two times. When I had spare time I also took an iron poker and work it
with my fingers from the bottom to the top, then down again and up again. This
made my wrists like iron. Then I would hold the poker out for five minutes at a
time in one hand and five minutes in the other. The older boys began to call me
“The Muscle Man.” There was a young man named Pritchard who was very strong
because he used to go out and row every day on the Thames. In the past he had
taken me by two hands and bent me to the floor in fun. One day he met me at the
top of the stairs going out of school. (He was eighteen and I was fifteen.) He
had not tried to put me down in some time. Close by me was a chap named Pitman.
“Calthrop,” he said, “let him see how he likes it.” The mighty Pritchard had to
kneel and a more astonished fellow you never saw for he was sure he could make
me kneel. So my constant work with the poker had paid off.
Later,
when I went home for my vacation, my two brothers were waiting for me in the
dining room. “Sam, my boy,” said Richard, “you have grown a bit. (I had grown
four inches in half a year.) I must put you down.” So he put his two hands in
double grasp, as he had always done. “Dick,” said Everard, “the boy will put
you down.” “Never!” said big brother Richard, but Richard had to kneel.
Perhaps
one of the things that pleased me most of all was that now I could go into the
fields and pitch the sheaves with the men. I could also go with the men in the
wagon to the stack-yard and help them build the stacks.
Chapter Four –
Games and Sports
The
last two years of my life at
During
my last years at school I took a great interest in sports, especially cricket.
We had many fine games with other schools. The game of Rugby still remains in
my mind. We had become so skilled that we challenged other schools to play with
us. We played them at Copenhagen Field. In one match I made the longest hit of
my youth and shall always remember that game. We also had some good games with
King’s
It
was at school that I began to play chess with my friend Brian. We studied
openings and by so doing we played ourselves into first class form without
knowing it. I became so interested that I used to go to some of the places
where some England’s best players used to congregate. It must have seemed
strange to see a boy of sixteen playing with some of the best in England.
While
I was at school my cousin, Gordon Calthrop, who had taken his degree and was a
scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge, and whose family lived in London, came
and played with me from time to time. It was he who told his friends about my
chess skills, for when I went to Trinity in 1845, a student came to my room and
told me there was to be an extra meeting of the Trinity Chess Club that night
at Vansittart’s rooms. Vansittart had been a senior classic but was now a
fellow of the college. Francis, a London barrister, also was to play that night
and Vansittart was no match for him. “Now, Calthrop,” he said, “we will elect
you to play tonight. You are our last hope.”
At
eight that evening I entered Vansittart’s rooms and found about thirty men
present. I soon found Francis, who was playing with a very slow player so I
played with someone else. Then the game of the evening began. The members
gathered around to see us play. It was not long before I found that Francis was
a first class player. He soon thought he had the best of the game, when I
sacrificed two castles and mated him. He jumped from his chair and said, “That
was the prettiest mate I ever saw.”
It
was now supper time and we went into the dining room. If I had been invited to
a banquet at
Cambridge
was renowned for its plate, some of it having come down from the university’s
early days. I had a splendid opportunity of meeting some very fine young men
there, many of whom made a name for themselves in the world.
After
I had been in
At
the first gun each eight-oar leaves the shore and gets ready in mid-stream with
the coxswain holding tight a long line. Each coxswain having a line the same
length. At the second gun the oarsmen stretch forward and at the third gun they
are off, the coxswain letting go his line. Pandemonium reigns. (I remember how
surprised we were to read in one of Kingsley’s works, that people were shocked
at the profanity of the cries, not knowing they were the names of the
colleges.) To a stranger it must have sounded queer. “Go, Trinity!” “Pull,
Christ!” “Look out Emanuel or Jesus will bump you!” Such were the calls you
would hear all down the Cam. I well remember the excitement one day when Second
Trinity was headed up the river, with a fellow student named Waddington at
stroke. He also stroked the Varsity eight and so wore on his head a light blue
cap. (Waddington
was afterwards the French Ambassador to England as he was half English and
half French.) Third Trinity was second, and being composed of
In
essence, my life at Cambridge was full of very interesting events but my last
year there changed the whole current of my life, ending in a great crisis.
Chapter Five –
The Crisis in My Life and My Little Church
During
the last year of my university life, when I was twenty-two, I went through a
searching religious experience. All my life it had been my ambition to be a
clergyman in the Church of England. I felt it my destiny. I had never known any
other church, had been baptized in it, brought up in it, and confirmed in it.
The good bishop who had confirmed me prayed, “Defend, O Lord, these servants
with thy heavenly grace and make them thine forever.” It was a noble prayer.
About
this time I had to attend the lectures of the Professor of Divinity and study
the creeds. The Athanasian
Creed was the stumbling block. It was not the work of Athanasius but was
written by an unknown monk four hundred years after his death. Nevertheless, it
was the creed of the Church of England. I felt reluctant to attend this
professor’s lectures. The climax came when he said this about Athanasian Creed:
“Gentlemen, this is the Church of England’s creed and it is my duty to tell you
that, if you do not believe this, you should not as gentlemen enter the
church’s ministry.” This was enough for me, and I gave up the thought of being
a minister in my mother church.
I
had been in college five years, but refused to graduate because no degree was given
by the university authorities unless the recipient signed the thirty-nine articles
of the Church of England. I left college without a degree; I could not
acknowledge that I believed what my reason would not accept.
I
then experienced a great darkness and depression and prayer was impossible. I
declared to my friends I would not bow to such a God. I would denounce Him
before the judgment throne itself, if necessary. Friends tried to influence me
by talking to me. One said, “But don’t you know that God could strike you
dead?” “Yes,” I replied, “anyone can gag me.”
It
was not sense of my own sin that lead me to this decision; it was a deep sense
of the exceeding sinfulness of a bad God. My revolt was much more a revolt of
the heart from heartless doctrines than a revolt of the head from erroneous
opinions. My whole soul rose in protest against this. At last I said, “If God
is good, I will worship, serve Him, love Him; but if He is bad I will
absolutely refuse to bow the knee.” Then a deep peace and joy fell upon me.
Saint Paul sent his
loving greetings to Priscilla and Aquila, his fellow workers in Christ
Jesus, and the church in his house. A church in a house! But a house is a very
poor one which is not in some sense a church, a place where the great
sanctities of truth and right and love are known, honored, and worshipped. My
little church was smaller yet. It contained only one person – me.
No
one around me could sympathize with me. They were actually afraid of me, or
rather the great Idea that was in me. The message was in my heart and had to be
uttered. One night I went to hear a Mr. Cosgrove, a converted soldier, who was
speaking in the Methodist chapel at Sandown,
The
awful disappointment of my parents and friends was very great. What should I
do? I made up my mind that I wanted to go to
I
first went to Deeping Fen in Lincolnshire to see my brother, Everard. He met me
at the train with our cousin, Arthur Bonner, who was studying at Oxford just
what I had been studying at Cambridge. We had hardly gotten into the dog cart
to be driven to my brother’s home when they began. “Sam dear,” Everard said,
“Arthur and I feel sure that we can persuade you not to give up all your
prospects in England to go to America.” “Supposing we wait until after dinner
before we talk about it,” I said, and they agreed. We started right after
dinner and talked until
Next
I went to my cousin William of Withern. He was a very able physician, later
saving brother Everard’s life when the other doctors had given him up. William
was very glad to see me and to my surprise he heard me as though I had been a
prophet. He poured out his soul to me, “Sam, I have heard damnation preached in
all the churches until I gave up going at all. It made me feel like an infidel.
Now I rejoice as you do and I thank you with all my heart.” It was a great
moment in my life and now my church had four members.
I
soon set sail in the ship “Southhampton” bound for America. She was one of
those wonderful sailing ships, the glory of the
One
day he said to me, “I greatly wish you would come down to our cabin and see my
wife. She is a daughter of a D.D. in the
Chapter Six –
The United States
Soon
after I reached the
Next
day I started for Southold. It was about a hundred miles from
The
church leaders in Southhold asked me to preach again the next Sunday and then
they asked me to stay. I said I would if they would pay for my board which was
three dollars a week. To this they agreed, but twenty years afterwards I
received a request to pay that bill which had never been paid. That was the
cheapest preaching I ever did.
After
I had preached in Southold three months I realized that I knew far too little
of the American character to preach to them. Now the great task of studying that
unique character was before me.
When
I came to
It
was during this visit to America, too, that I went to West Point and saw the
then Colonel Robert E. Lee, Lieutenant Alexander, Major Garnett, and others. I
had been told by a friend in England to be sure and go to West Point and see
the Academy and the wonderful view. I put up at a hotel that faced the north
and commanded a marvelous view of the river, Storm King, Crow’s Nest, and
Newburgh in the distance. The hotel was crowded with officers and their wives.
Captain Peck, later General Peck, was there and I asked him if anyone played
Chess. He replied, “Oh, yes, we have the best chess player in the United States
here, Professor
Agnel. In fact he has written a book on chess.” Then I said to him, and it
might have sounded cheeky but I did not mean it so, “Tell him I am here and
would like to play with him.” Although I was only twenty-one the chess magazine
had spoken of me.
He
called and we had a delightful time. He was pleased, isolated as he was in such
things, to find a foe worthy of him. We struck up quite a friendship. Later I
visited in his tent and played with him. I soon got acquainted with all the
officers and they began to call me affectionately “The Englishman,” for I was
the first university man they had met.
As
I looked out on that beautiful river, I commented that there was no eight-oar
on the water. “At Cambridge,” I said, “the water is a dirty ditch but any day
one can see as many as thirty eight-oars contending.” I suggested to Lieutenant
Alexander, who later became General Alexander and defended Washington, that we
go boating, which we did with a fisherman. That was the first pleasure-pull
ever taken at
It
was the first time that I had a glimpse of Colonel Robert E. Lee. He was a
splendid fellow, most gentlemanly and a soldier every inch. I was interested to
see the deep respect the officers and cadets had for him. It was strange that
this man commanding
Colonel
Lee said he would be greatly obliged to me if I would teach the officers how to
play cricket, so we went to the library. I remember distinctly the words used
by Lieutenant Alexander in asking for the cricket things. He said, “Can you
tell me, Sir, where the instruments and apparatus are for playing cricket?” The
librarian knew nothing about them and so our project came to naught.
One
of the interesting things to look back upon is the fact that in talking to
those men, they all told me there was no promotion in the
With
regard to Robert E. Lee it is interesting to note that in 1854, when I visited
Harvard for the first time at the request of the crew, I went to Fort Warren
and back with them and Fitzhugh Lee, Robert E. Lee’s son, was the stroke for
the crew.
Before
I went to Southhold, I called on Mr. Pell at his place of business. He was very
glad to see me again and invited me to go home with him. He was now living at
At
dinner that evening no less a person than General Scott, head of the
About
this time William
Thackery came to this country and was entertained by Mr. and Mrs. Pell, the
latter a very charming woman. He told us he was going to lecture on the “Four
Georges.” He gave Mrs. Pell a pen and ink drawing which he sketched while at
the table. It was a scene from “The Tattler.” His lecture on George the First
was very interesting and his fine voice was full of power and his wit was
delightful.
About
this time my brother-in-law, Thomas Webster, came from
When
I returned to Southold Mr. Pell wrote me a very fine letter saying he would be
delighted to have me come and teach his son Robert who was in Columbia, but was
not very strong and he feared he could not get through college: “The schools
are all provided with teachers for this year, but you will have an opportunity
to see for yourself how teachers with your training are needed.”
I
gave up my parish at Southold and came to
I
found a boarding place with an Irish family, a man and his wife, who had come
from
One
day when I was stopping for dinner at Mr. Pell’s, Mrs. Pell said to me, “I saw
Mr. Heckster today. He is a coal merchant, and his son is at Mr. Such’s school
in
Chapter Seven
– Boy Region
So
at last I found myself at
Some
of the boys were still at school. One young man, a Mr. Forbes, the son of the
well known Mr. Forbes, was preparing for the sophomore class at Harvard. Two
others were preparing to enter their father’s vast business in
The
house faced the
There
was a good playground behind the house and at the north was a large barn where
some of the boys kept chickens. The older boys rode for exercise and were able
to get fine horses in the town as there were many good stables.
When
I began at the school in early summer, I needed a new pair of trousers. My
purse was reduced to a two and a half dollar gold piece so purchasing something
was a dilemma. My trunk was full of the splendid prize books I had won at
school. I could certainly sell one or two of those; the Russian leather prizes,
Cramer’s
“Asia Minor,” for instance. So I began selling them. In addition, within a
week I had fifteen hundred dollars in my pocket as payment on each boy’s
entrance, as was the rule.
I
started with fifteen boys. The tuition for each was four hundred a year and
twenty dollars more a year for French and music. Here I was to learn the
character of Americans. For me this was absolutely essential.
Miss
Housely informed me that all the clothes were washed in the house. Kate, the
laundress, was admirable and was paid eight dollars a month; Mary the
chambermaid, six dollars, and the cook who was very good, got I know not what.
The
house was well arranged for a school. Two prettily furnished bedrooms were set
aside for mothers or fathers of the boys who wished to visit the school and see
the workings of it and what the boys were being taught.
The
bedrooms for the boys were neat and clean and each bed had a good horsehair
mattress. One room downstairs was the school room, and the drawing room was
very comfortable with an open wood fireplace. In the front of the house was a
nice veranda looking out on the water.
Each
day I said prayers before breakfast and supper and on Sunday had a short
service in the afternoon. When the service was over, I asked the boys to come
in, one at a time, and had each read a single verse from the bible, usually
from the Psalms or the New Testament. The boys had a reverence for the bible
and this helped me. Sometimes I felt dull in mind when I began to talk to a
boy, but soon beautiful words of the Eternal Father began to speak through me
to His child. This was my great harvest time.
The
school had been accustomed to the Episcopal Church, so every Sunday morning I
used to take all of my pupils there. It was a very pleasant walk through shaded
streets and the service was well conducted.
When
I had been about two years in
A
business man in New York had a boy in the school. He heard that I was coming to
New York to meet my sisters and wrote me to say that he and his family were
going south, but his suite of rooms at the Brevoort House
would be vacant. He invited me to bring my sisters there. Everything was paid
for already and he hoped everything would be done to make them comfortable. The
Brevoort House was one of the best hotels in
I
met them at the dock and took them to the hotel at once and they were surprised
by the elegance of their private rooms, the kindness of my good friends, and
the arrangements that had been made for our comfort. They, of course, were
weary from the voyage sea and the good rest made them feel like themselves. The
hotel owner came and hoped we would not hesitate to ask for anything we wanted,
as my friend had especially asked him to do everything in his power to make us
feel perfectly at home.
It
was bitterly cold and very wintry in
They
had been to Bridgeport about a year when Ellen opened her heart to me. “Before
I left England,” she said, “dear mother took me and we went over text after
text in the Bible, Old and New Testaments, showing how wrong you are in your
theology, so I came here eager to show you. I thought you would begin the first
day, but you said nothing at all. Then I heard your little talks and sermons to
the boys and you never mentioned such things at all. Your talks to friends made
a deep impression on me. After six months your ideas were in my heart and head
and I felt they were my own.” So my little church kept on growing.
Chapter Eight
– Physical Training
While
visiting Mr. Pell in
It
was not long after I began to teach that one of the most interesting boys came
to me after the summer vacation and told me his story. “Before I came to you, I
was at a school where a great revivalist, by invitation of the head master,
came to preach to the pupils for six weeks. The boys were intensely excited and
all were converted. When the revivalist had gone, a boy brought a vile book
that was full of indecent pictures. Then all the boys began self-abuse. When I
came to your school, the games you played with us took away from me all sexual
desire. During mid-summer holidays I went with my parents to a hotel just
outside the grounds of
I
put a bath in his room and filled it with cold water and said, “The moment you
feel any temptation, sit down in the cold water till the desire leaves you. Dry
yourself and get back in bed, but promise me solemnly to come to me if you
fail.” It was not long before he conquered.
It
was later that I heard Rainsford of St. John’s College,
When
I began to teach, I was surprised how little the boys knew about play. Almost
the only game they knew was marbles in a round ring and they only drizzled on
the ground; whereas, when I was a boy we plumped and always had to hit the
marble we aimed at before it hit the ground at all. I at once began to teach
them cricket and hockey. I also bought a fine, safe boat which was built after
the model I gave to the
We
played at hockey both winter and summer; in winter we played right through the
snow. At
Soon,
Thanksgiving Day began to be the special day when our own old boys came to play
hockey, but we kept improving so fast that the “old boys” were always beaten.
I
started teaching them cricket on our own ground, but they improved so fast that
I made a fine ground on the common about half a mile away. One Sunday afternoon
I gave them a little sermon on “Cricket Religion.” I said that the boy who
played well should always teach newcomers how to play so they, too, could soon
enjoy the game.
One
Monday afternoon we walked to the common where a good game was to be played. As
I passed along the road, I saw little Frank Van Buren had stopped behind so
that he could teach two boys who had just come to the school. Frank was small
in size but he was one of our best players and also knew cricket religion.
Some
years later I was traveling from Boston to Syracuse when a gentleman caught my
attention and said, “Don’t you remember me? I am Walter Cutting, one of your
boys. I have a factory in Pittsfield and I am going there with my wife and
daughter. I was in the Civil War and went into the Cavalry. When we used to sit
around the camp fire at night we talked about the schools we had attended and
the stories were pretty hard tales. When I told them about your school they
would not believe me. I know there never was a boarding school in the world of
twenty boys where the boys were so innocent as we. There were only two grave
offenses at school, smoking and drinking. The colored man who used to work at
the parties we had at home came to Bridgeport and set up a saloon there. You
allowed us to go there now and then to have oyster stew. One day we took some
claret with our oysters. You should have seen us going home; you never saw a
more hanged-dog lot of boys than we were. We found out that you knew and we
were glad of it. But somehow you always knew.”
Walter
Cutting was a born actor. He and four or five other boys made a little theatre
up in the attic at the school, and we had some wonderful acting in that attic.
They gave “Slasher and Crasher,” “Box and Cox” and many
other plays.
Some
years later – in 1915 – Mrs. Van Buren White came to see us. She was the only
female pupil we had, but her three brothers were in the school and her father,
Colonel Van Buren, begged me to take his daughter. She told my daughters that
it was the most ideal school she had ever seen or heard of. We studied hard,
played hard, and in every way did our work the best we knew how. A very happy
lot of boys and girls!
Chapter Nine –
Athletics
It
was in the spring of 1854, carrying a letter of introduction from my friend Dr.
Osgood to President Walker, that I stepped into the Harvard College yard close
to the park. There I saw several stalwart looking fellows playing with a ball
about the size of a small bowling ball, which they aimed at a couple of low
sticks surmounted by a long stick. They called it a wicket. It was the ancient
game of cricket and they were playing it as it was played in the reign of
Charles the First. The bat was a heavy oak thing and they trundled the ball
along the ground, the ball being so large it could not get under the sticks.
They
politely invited me to take the bat. Any cricketer could have stayed there all
day and not been bowled out. After I had played awhile I said, “You must play
the modern game cricket.” I had a ball and they made six stumps. Then we went
to Delta, the field where the Harvard Memorial Hall now stands. We played and
they took to cricket like a duck to water. One of the best players was
Alexander Agassiz, son of Professor
Agassiz, the great naturalist, who soon became a fine bowler. I think that
was the first game of cricket at Harvard.
After
my pleasant experience with cricket, I called on President Walker and presented
my letter of introduction. I found him a strong man, most cordial and
courteous. Learning I was a
“Because,”
I said, “all
“We
did not believe the accounts we read of these things,” said Dr. Walker, “but
they sent all the papers of the six-day examinations in classics and copies of
the answers of the students. Now we believe it, but we want to know how such
attainments are possible to a young man of twenty two.”
“First,”
I said, “the classical drills of the great public schools in England are
remarkably careful and thorough. At college the lectures are of the first
class, but the most wonderful agent for developing attainments of the first
class is the system of private tutoring. For instance, the junior Fellows of
Trinity and the young graduates who are trying for fellowships take private
pupils. Barry, the son of the architect of the Parliament buildings, had just
taken a very high degree and had won a fellowship. For three days each week I
was a half pupil. I read to him classical authors and on the fourth day I sat
down and wrote an examination, probably selected from one of the papers from
the classic tripos. I had
exactly three hours to write – the same time allotted for the final
examinations. Some of the passages were selected from the truly classical
authors. There were no limitations for we were expected to be familiar with the
Latin and Greek languages. Fresh from school I thought I could make pretty good
translations. This was fairly true, but here and there when Barry reviewed them
with me I found heavy pencil marks under what I had written. ‘Hello, Calthrop,
here’s a screamer,’ was his usual remark. To this thorough drill in accuracy I
am deeply indebted to Barry, and to this day consider it far the surest and
quickest way to get knowledge.”
“Your
valedictorian, Dr. Walker,” I said, “is a man who has been to every recitation,
has prepared his lessons with greatest care, and has never cut chapel. But is
this proof that he has mastered the Greek and Latin languages?”
All
this Dr. Walker took in the kindest manner from the lips of a young fellow of
twenty four, and then he said in his sonorous voice, “Would you like to be
introduced, Mr. Calthrop, to some of the young men?”
“Doctor,”
I said, “I bring a cricket ball in my trunk, a capacity to pull an oar with my
hands, an ability to play chess in my head, and, if that is not enough to introduce
me to the young men, I do not know what will.”
My
prophesy to Dr. Walker proved correct. Before I had been at Harvard a fortnight
every student knew me. We formed the chess club with some very promising
members. Among the prominent ones was my friend, Joseph Willard, who afterward
became the clerk of the Court of Boston and was a truly great scholar.
Several
of my friends rowed in the boats and they invited me to go to
During
our trip Fitzhugh Lee asked me what I thought of the crew and its’ stroke. “The
stroke, “I said, “is the good old, long slow
They
soon purchased, at my suggestion, the boat I had seen advertised for sale. It
was an outrigger in which the water men of St. John’s had beaten the water men
of the
About
this time the Linonian
Society of Yale invited me to give them a lecture on the “Athletics of
English Universities.” I began by describing the scene on the River Cam which I have
already given. I told them how grave doubts were expressed by some educators if
boating was introduced into the colleges of this country. I told them there
were hundreds of men at Cambridge whose studies would amount to very little and
be almost unbearable if it were not for the athletics. There is a moral
discipline in the boats that keeps hundreds of young men straight. The captain
sees to it that no man of his crew drinks more than one glass of sherry or one
tumbler of beer a day. He also sees that every man is in bed at
The
next day the Commodore of the Yale navy took me to see their boats. The first
boat I saw was a four-oar hung up. “That is the boat that poor Dunham was
drowned in,” the commodore said sadly. “I do not wonder,” I said, “for the boat
has no floor.” It was just like a wedge and would take skilled oarsmen to keep
it afloat. “Our races are with six oars now,” the commodore continued, “and you
will do us a great favor if you tell us what the true proportions of a six-oar
outrigger should be.”
“In
the first place, a six-oar should have a coxswain; if in a race the wind is on
the beam, no bow oar can steer straight. Your boat should be fifty feet long
with plenty of floor in it; if not you will bury it with every stroke.” On
these suggestions, the Yale crew proceeded to have an outrigger built.
In
my next lecture I told them that boating had no secure foothold in American
colleges, and it was most important that no scenes of rioting or improper
conduct of any sort take place among the Yale men who attend the races. They
all cordially agreed to these suggestions and made up their minds that they
should be strictly carried out.
The
next race between Harvard and Yale was held at Lake Quinsigamond,
Worcester, Massachusetts. I arrived there the afternoon of the races. The
commodore took me out to the lake and on the way there he said, “I did what I
could to have your model strictly carried out, but the fellows did not dare
have the boat made so long. So it is only forty-five and one half feet, but
here comes Page, the builder.”
At
that moment the Yale six-oar pulled by. “Page,” I said pointing to the boat,
“what do you think of that?” “Ho! Ho!” he exclaimed, “It’s a minute faster than
any boat in
At
this time the Harvard and Yale crews pulled two races on two consecutive days.
The Harvard crew was the best that Harvard had ever assembled. Their six-oar
was forty feet long without a coxswain, but was broad and held the crew
perfectly.
Yale
was nervous and expected to be beaten. At first they pulled unevenly and the
boat wobbled from side to side. They knew they were beaten from the start. The
course was three miles, one mile and a half to the turning point and back. The
crew knew they were losing and were very down hearted.
“Go
down tomorrow morning,” I told them, “and practice starting. Take six strokes
on the even keel and then stop. Then come to a rest; try six more times, and so
on. Don’t care in the least whether you are ahead at first, only be determined
to keep your boat even and true.” The next afternoon, as luck would have it, a
brisk wind blew on the beam and that was where the coxswain began to tell. The
bow oar of the Harvard crew tried in vain to keep his boat straight. Yale came
in well ahead. I heard afterward that the Harvard crew was so disgusted with
the result that they asked permission to take the Yale boat around the course
all by themselves, and they beat the Yale time by a minute.
The
morning after the races the Yale men told me, with great pride, that not a Yale
man misbehaved himself during the days of the races. It was a noble record, one
of which Yale had reason to be proud.
About
that time, I was asked to lecture before the American Institute of Instruction
at
We have met together to consider the best methods of
educating – that is, drawing out or developing the human nature common to all
of us. Brothers, teaching is a very high calling. The speaker, proudly
enrolling himself in the noble band, greets you from his heart this day, and
invites you to spend a thoughtful hour with him, to study in some small measure
the nature and method of human development.
Ours is an age of analysis. We begin to see that
before we can understand a substance, it is necessary to become acquainted with
all its component parts. Thus, with regard to human nature, we must understand
all of its grand divisions before we can comprehend the method of developing
the whole. There are five grand divisions in human nature – the physical,
intellectual, affective, moral, and devotional – or in other words, man has
body, mind, heart, conscience, and soul.
Concerning the great divisions I shall assert first
that they are all mutually dependent upon each other. If man is not developed
in all five he is not complete, and as my special subject maintains, the
physical well-being, health of body, is necessary for the complete development
of the human nature. In essence, the body has something to do with the mind,
heart, conscience, and soul of man.
Intellect, then, needs a fine body. For example, our
hero, George Washington, was endowed with a calm silent devotion, a conscience
pure and reverent, a heart manful and true, an intellect clear and keen, and a
physical frame of iron. Washington had to endure physical fatigue enough to
have killed three ordinary men. How well did his youth prepare him for a life
of toil? Hear
what his biographer Irving says; ‘He was a self-disciplinarian in physical
as well as mental matters, and practiced himself in all kinds of athletic
exercises, such as running, leaping, wrestling, pitching quoits, and tossing
bars. His frame even in infancy had been large and powerful, and he now excelled most of his playmates in
contests of agility and strength. As a proof of his muscular power, a place is
still pointed out at Fredericksburg, near the lower ferry, where, when a boy,
he flung a stone across the Rappahannock. In horsemanship too he already
excelled, and was ready to back, and able to manage the most fiery steed.
“How far does American education fulfill the wants
of human nature, and where does it disregard them? I find in America that the
body is almost entirely neglected. Thirty thousand clergymen, from as many
pulpits, are teaching about the conscience and the soul, a hundred thousand
teachers are busy throughout the land training the intellect, while one could
count on his fingers the number of those engaged in training the body. I spent
four or five days going through the schools of New York and I was proud to be a
teacher when I saw the order, the unbroken discipline, and the intelligence of
the pupils. I am ashamed to criticize such schools, but nowhere was there
anything done to improve the body.
What is the remedy for all this? In the crowded
cities gymnastic training, systematically pursued as a study is one way;
however, there is a better way where playgrounds can be obtained, one which I
pursue myself, by teaching all manner of manly sports and games. I have given
them four years trial in my school and every day convinces me of their
beneficial results. I cannot tell you how much physical weakness, how much
moral evil we have batted and bowled, and shinnied away from our door, but I do
know we have batted and bowled away indolence, and in doing so we have kept the
Devil away.
I also know that the boys’ enthusiasm in these games
never dies out and their enjoyment never flags, for these games supply the want
of the boys’ natures, and keep thoughts from straying to forbidden ground.
See how rigorously the Puritans tried to put down or
squeeze this heinous tendency out of human nature because it was connected with
the sporting world. Friends, I am finding fault with the Puritans in the midst
of their descendants. But what greater compliment could I pay these old Puritans
than that they left their descendants the precious legacy of free thought, and
so deeply imbedded is this in the bones of the race that they will gladly hear
a stranger criticize and even condemn a portion of the Puritan mind. This takes
place knowing full well that the fabric they built on the shores of this
continent is sufficient to bear witness to the real manhood that was in them.
What was the reason of their failure? Simply they tried to drive Nature out
with a pitchfork, and she, of course, perpetually comes back.
This then, is what cricket, boating, battledore,
baseball, etc. means, namely, it gives a joyous spontaneity to human beings. It
is something that statesmen, lawgivers, preachers, and educators would do well
to lay to heart. If an educator or college tutor wishes to influence his
pupils, or if a clergyman wishes to gain the souls of this part of his
congregation, let him join with them in some manly game; nothing but real vital
religion, real nobleness of character will be of use in the cricket field or
rowboat. This also will hold its own here as well as elsewhere.
See to it then, educators, that young human nature
has its due. See to it that conscience and the soul have their rightful
supremacy. See to it that intellect and sweet human affection walk hand in
hand. And, lastly, see to it, educators, that these young bodies have their
due. Learn for yourselves numerous manly sports and games and resolutely continue
to teach and practice them yourselves with your pupils. Love open air and
exercise yourselves first. This love will be contagious, and will communicate
itself to those around you.
After
my lecture a vote was taken and passed unanimously that 5,000 copies be printed
and put into the hands of all public school teachers.
Later
when I met Governor Buckingham at dinner in the St. Nicholas Hotel, he asked me
what I thought Yale needed. “A gymnasium,” I quickly replied. He sent a check
to Yale and a gymnasium was built at once.
Chapter Ten –
Great Personalities
About
this time my good friend, Alfred Pell, junior, was studying law at Harvard. He
roomed with a nephew of Ralph Waldo Emerson, who kindly gave Alfred Pell and me
a letter of introduction to his uncle. When I was next in Boston, Alfred and I
rode horseback to Concord a distance of about twenty miles. When we arrived we
found Mr. Emerson had gone out walking. Alfred Pell had to recite early the
next morning, so felt he must ride back at once. He was a good rider and forty
miles seemed nothing to him.
I
went to the inn, put up my horse, got a good bed for the night, and then walked
back to Emerson’s home. He was at his door folding up an umbrella. It had
stopped raining but he did not know it and was standing in the exact center of
a rainbow that embraced his house as well. It was very beautiful and as I stood
and looked it seemed like a wonderful omen for my visit.
I
presented my letter of introduction and he courteously invited me in. He said
that I was just in time for supper and his oldest daughter was a wonderful
maker of waffles. So we sat down to a genuine
After
supper, he took me into his study and gave me three hours of his best self. I
shall never forget the kindness he bestowed on a young man of twenty four. When
I told him I had come to the United States to preach, but found I knew nothing
of the American character, I felt I needed to teach young Americans before I
could possibly teach their elders. I told him I found teaching a romance. “All
sane men,” said Emerson, “reverence the teacher’s office.”
Then
I bared my hopes, ambitions, and fears to him and how the great drawback to me
was that I knew not a single soul in Bridgeport to whom I could talk and
exchange great ideas. “How large is Bridgeport?” asked Emerson. “About ten
thousand,” I said. “Ten thousand is a large number of people, and I have an
idea, no, a faith, that each of us is accompanied by, say twelve, friends. We
do not meet them all at once. If we did the rest of our life would be bereft.
We meet one or two at a time, on our way. I expect you will meet one or two in
Bridgeport.”
I
then told Emerson that I had been educated in St. Paul’s School,
Then
I told him how we enjoyed Clough’s books, naming some of them. He replied, “Our
friends in
“You
went to see Carlyle
in Scotland, did you not?” I asked. What did you think of him?”
“Carlyle
is one of those rare men who knows that all things obey common sense, from the
making of a nutmeg grater to the solar system. Of course he is peculiar. Many
young men send him their pamphlets all filled with Carlylian phrases and very
little else. One morning I came down early and I picked up a pamphlet that had
just come. It was a work of genius. It was much too full of Carlylianisms, but
that was to be expected. When Carlyle came down, I said, ‘Here is a young man
who has genius. He is young and if you would kindly write to him that an
imitator is always doomed to mediocrity, he will stop imitating you.’ Carlyle
answered roughly, ‘Well, he could do a good deal worse.’”
It
was interesting to me that Emerson differed with me about what a college should
be. He thought of a college as a beautiful place having a fine library. I told
him that I thought a university must have great teachers who could inspire
their scholars in the special subject they taught and give them a desire to
learn more. (In later years he came to my view and when he was overseer of
Harvard he came and asked me what its needs were.)
That
was my first meeting with that great man and he did nothing that evening but
give to me. Years later when I was old enough to preach, I went to
The
last time I saw Emerson was at a great convention of Unitarians at
It
was beautiful to see the quiet patience with which he bore his great
misfortune, this loss of memory of which he was so conscious. Carlyle was a
torch, but Emerson was an evening star of most wonderful and quiet beauty.
At
this time I had the pleasure of hearing Agassiz, the great naturalist, lecture
on geology. His presence and address were most winning. It was no wonder the
students loved him. His subject was his favorite, “corals.” He proved that
He
concluded his lecture thus: “You have heard traditions that the world itself is
only 6,000 years old, but to find out the age of the world, you must study
nature and not the traditions of men.”
Some
years later, through the kindness of my good and faithful friend, Professor
Childs, I was made a member of the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity. My first meeting
was a memorable one. Emerson gave one of his grand orations, full of noble
stimulus to scholars and students alike. James Russell
Lowell presided at the dinner. He was full of wit and genial humor as he
introduced each speaker. Edward
Everett gave an oration, one of his finest efforts. I sat near him and I
could not help noticing the breadth and depth of his chest; he seemed built to
last to ninety or a hundred years. But alas, the public men of
The
last time I attended a Phi Beta Kappa dinner my friend, James Thayer, Dean of
the Harvard Law School, presided and at his request, I gave the history of the
beginnings of Harvard boating. He declared that it was so far in the past that
not one of my hearers could know anything about it.
The
accuracy of some of my statements was questioned by a dear old pupil of mine,
but I had the pleasure of taking him later into the
I
sat that night by Phillips
Brooks, the other speaker of the evening. That wonderful manhood of his had
not lost an atom of its strength. Years of splendid performance seemed to lie
ahead of him but, alas, Boston, the United States, and all the English speaking
world were soon to lose a great leader.
The
last time I saw Harvard was at a great Congress of Liberal Religionists. I sat
on the platform close to the great and venerable Otto Pfleiderer of
Berlin. He gave a fine address which proved to be his swan song. I remember how
I took him into Memorial Hall and how interested he was to see the names of
those who had gone from the Halls of Harvard to give their lives for their
country.
Chapter Eleven
– The Ministry
[Note:
These last two chapters were written by Rev. Calthrop’s daughter, Edith
Calthrop Bump, based on her memories and a few materials her father had kept.]
It
was during the Christmas holidays in the year 1857, that father was married to
mother, Elizabeth Alison Primrose, daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Francis Primrose of
New Market, Toronto. He was introduced to her by her guardian, Mr. Thomas
Stewart, who was very proud of his ward. It was when father came to
After
a short honeymoon he brought his bride to the school at Bridgeport. The boys
were very much taken with her, as mother was pretty and attractive. A son was
born to them in November, 1958, and died in October, 1859. It was a great blow
to my parents. About this time, father broke his leg and so could not play with
the boys. He felt the time had come when he should give up teaching and follow
the calling he so much desired – that of becoming a minister.
He
gave up the school much to the sorrow of the parents of his boys as they felt
the school was an ideal place for their sons. He went to Boston and due to the
great kindness of his friend, James
Freeman Clark, who opened his church to him, the Indiana Place Chapel, He
began to preach there with great success. While there he met some wonderful
people, among who were Julia
Ward Howe and her splendid husband, Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe,
the great teacher of the blind.
In
1860 father was called to
When
the Civil War began to threaten, the South started canceling their large orders
for boots and shoes which had been placed with Marblehead manufacturers for
years. This threw hundreds of men out of work and they wandered aimlessly about
the streets with nothing to do. It was then that father announced that he would
give lessons in gymnastics every afternoon in the town hall. The first
afternoon the hall was crowded. He had asked the ladies to make him quantities
of bean bags. So he lined the men up in two rows on either side of the hall and
had them pass the bags over their heads to the ones behind them until the end
was reached. Then he had them turn back to back the opposite way. The man who
got the bag over the end first won for his side. This they all enjoyed, simple
as it was. Then he did a number of exercises with his arms, the men imitating
him. It was in this way that he kept them off the streets and out of mischief.
The town hall was crowded every afternoon. It was not long before the men came and
asked him to teach them scientific boxing and many were the bouts they had.
In
1861 the war broke out. These same young men wanted father to form a company,
drill them, and become their captain. He drilled them in Hardee’s tactics and showed
them how to carry a gun. Soon they urged him to go to
The
governor agreed with father, but he had his orders. When they began to order
troops by conscription, they put them in camps to be trained. It was too late for
father’s company as they had enlisted elsewhere.
At
this time father became very much interested in the anti-slavery movement. He
used to visit the colored regiments that were sometimes stationed near
Captain
Shaw invited father to dine with him one night just before he took his colored
troops to attack
As
I’ve said, father was intensely interested in the anti-slavery movement and
often preached on the subject. There were a goodly number of people in
Prior
to traveling to England father had been receiving newspapers from England
telling of the English people’s attitude in regard to the Civil War. Their sympathy
was mostly with the South, partly from selfish reasons and partly from
misapprehensions of the real cause of war. This aroused father very much and he
began to write letters to the English papers. He found that his letters were
not published in the London Times so
he wrote the following letter to the Daily
New.
To the Editor of the Daily New.
Sir,
Enclosed
for publication you will find a copy of the letter I addressed to the Times on Saturday, February 7th,
1863. As it has not appeared, I presume it will not be published. I leave it to
the public to decide whether a resident of ten years in
I am, S.R. Calthrop, Marblehead, Massachusetts, and
late of Trinity College, Cambridge
Following
are a few excerpts from letters written to the Times but published in the Daily
News.
Sir:
Has it occurred to you, in
relation to American affairs, to consult the opinions of Englishmen who have
resided in the United States long enough to be familiar with the complicated
political system of that country? I myself have lived in the United States
nearly ten years; during which time I have naturally become acquainted with the
feelings of all parties, and at risk of being styled a ‘nobody’ or a
“groundling,” I nevertheless summon up sufficient courage to declare, that to
the best of my knowledge and belief, the great American contest originated with
slavery, and slavery alone.
He
goes on to show how the correspondents of the London Times and other papers prejudice the English people by false
statements about the causes of the Civil War by stating that the real cause was
secession and that slavery was a secondary cause. One of his letters states the
following:
Many people in England are quite at the mercy of “Our
Own Correspondents,” as they have no other means of ascertaining the merits of
the case, and thus such correspondents should be held strictly accountable to
the public, with regard to the truth and fairness of their representations. I
therefore deliberately say, that when the Times’
correspondent at New York – to quote one instance out of many – writes for the
information of the British public such a statement as this: ‘that Massachusetts
hates with equal hatred, slavery and the slave alike’ – is guilty either of
deliberate falsification or unpardonable ignorance. I am now living in
In 1850 the Southerners declared they would break up
the Union if the Fugitive Slave Law was not passed. Daniel Webster was able to
get the law passed.
But the North should have let the South go. Let us
examine this assertion: Is every Englishman aware that fully three-fourths of
the soil of Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Texas was bought and
paid for by money from the North? Florida was bought from Spain; Louisiana,
Mississippi, and Arkansas were bought from Napoleon for $80,000,000; and Texas
cost the Union $150,000,000, of which the North paid at least three-fourths. It
would be a curious transaction to pay $150,000,000 for the privilege of keeping
Texas for fifteen years at a considerable expense and then allowing her to take
herself off, “resuming her sovereign rights.”
“The South only wanted to be let alone.” Yes, they
wanted to be let alone to take Missouri, Maryland, Kentucky, West Virginia, and
East Tennessee, and to confiscate the property of every Union man.
Lincoln proclaims freedom to those to whom the
constitution gives him power to proclaim it, and makes no proclamation where
that proclamation would be a dead letter. Under the constitution, the President
has no power to interfere with the “domestic institutions” of any state, unless
in his deliberate and solemn judgment the safety of the nation imperatively
demands it.
While
my father was in
In
the summer of 1863 father returned to
One day my mother had to go to a meeting of the
Ladies’ Aid at the church and she asked my father to take care of sister Bessie
who was a baby at that time. Bessie was very good and gave him no trouble, but
he suddenly remembered something he wanted to do, so he bundled her up and took
her to Mrs. Brown’s, asking her if she would look after the baby while he did
an errand. Mrs. Brown was glad to take care of Bessie for she was very good,
but time passed and no one came for her. Suppertime came and no one appeared.
Finally the Browns sat down to dine. While they were eating, in rushed father,
without coat, hat, or tie, perspiration running down his face. “Mrs. Brown,
have you seen anything of my baby? I cannot remember where I left her.” “That
was like him,” Mrs. Brown said, “but we loved him just the same.” Her sweet old
face beamed.
Another
tale I’ve often heard is about one day when Deacon Hathaway was standing near
the post office when father came riding up on his little horse, Katie. Father
got off the horse and asked the deacon if he would hold her for him while he
went into the post office. He got his mail and started to read it and kept on
reading as he walked out of the post office. When he got home mother asked him
where Katie was. It was not until then that he remembered the horse. He rushed
back to the post office and there stood the deacon still holding Katie. Greatly
embarrassed but chuckling with laughter, father asked him why he did not call
to him and the deacon replied he wanted to see how long it took him to
remember.
After
leaving
He
had some outstanding students. Dr. John Chadwick, later a very prominent
Unitarian minister, studied for some years with him. At one time he had the
Lord Admiral’s son of
Chapter Twelve
– The Air Resisting Train
In
the year 1865, when peace had been declared and both the North and the South
were trying to get their factories and their people back to work, father turned
his attention to things other than the horrors of war. He was a great walker
and frequently walked along the railroad tracks. He observed that the tracks
were worn unevenly and in some places the rails were brighter as from friction.
He also noticed that these places were where the wind blew hardest, pushing the
cars and engine harder against the rails. This hard rubbing delayed the train
and caused it to be behind schedule.
When
traveling by train he would walk from car to car. Often it was all he could do
because of the wind making such a draft through the space between the cars. He
talked with engineers and they told him how they dreaded a high wind because it
delayed them so.
Gradually
the idea of the “Air Resisting Train” became a reality and he began to make a
model of his ideas. He built it in the form of a boat or rowing shell. He
realized that the atmosphere was a very different medium from water and so
designed it more on the principle of an aerial ship. It was made to overcome
the resistance of the air and the friction of wheels on the tracks and to
prevent the back pressure of wind pushing on the machinery and locomotive
piston.
The
engine he envisioned sheathed in a metal casing which tapered at the forward end.
The wheels were completely enclosed and there were openings in the steel plate
to permit oiling of the machinery. The apertures were covered with small doors
or flaps, which were flush with the smooth body surface when shut. The only
thing that projected was the short smoke-stack. There were several little vents
to admit air and through which to expel surplus heat. The tender that carried
coal and water had a rounded roof and slightly curved sides that appeared
continuous with the locomotive. Fuel was loaded through a hatch which was
closed by a tightly fitting panel when the train was in motion. Figure 1 is a
side view drawing of the air resisting train engine and tender.
Figure 1. Side View of Dr. Calthrop’s Invention Figure 1
In
outline the cars or coaches were practically the same as the shape of the
present day streamlined cars. Between the first car and the tender and also
between the other cars were flexible, accordion-like hoods. The platform
central doors were left open so as to make the train a unit, and to let the air
which was admitted at the front of the train pass through to discharge outlets
at the rear. The windows and all side doors were to be kept closed during
transit. All ledges, sills, and similar obstacles to the air flow were
eliminated. Figure 2 provides a perspective of these concepts and they show a
resemblance to the Pioneer
Zephyr trains that began in the 1930s.
Figure 2. Perspective of the Air Resisting Train,
Showing a Close Resemblance to the Zephyr
“Also,”
to quote directly from the patent, “the air may enter as far forward as the
projection of the engine and be conveyed beneath the covering of the tender by
tubes and hence into the cars.” Under the locomotive, tender, and all the cars
was a false bottom with slots through which the wheels passed, greatly reducing
the air friction (see Figure 3). The couplings were planned so as to give
enough play to permit the train to round curves with ease. This arrangement was
in effect like placing of the rear of one car and the front of the unit behind on
the same track.
Figure 3. Bottom Perspective Showing Protruding
Wheels
The
back of the last car tapered gradually to a point, the idea being to lessen the
“air drag” which might cause a train driven at full speed to rock or even pitch
up. Figure 2 shows the train closer to the track so as to insure greater
stability by lowering the center of gravity. The steps by which the passengers
entered were short and hidden by the side doors when the train was running.
Father’s
invention of the “Air Resisting Train” was patented August 8th 1865,
U. S. Patent No, 49,227. The model can be seen in the Patent Office in
In
looking over some papers regarding this invention, I found one showing that
father sold a half interest in his patent to a Mr. R. Morris Copeland, who
professed to be interested in it. He was connected in some way with the New
York Central Railroad and a committee from that company had it under
consideration. This was in 1872 and the country experienced a depression that
year, so that nothing was done with it. People did not think so much about
speed in those days.
Epilogue
(Written by Roger Hiemstra,
Archivist, May Memorial Unitarian Universalist Society)
I can
only speculate that Edith wrote this manuscript with the hope of finding a
publisher as it was typed, double space, and in appearance as though it were
aimed for eventual publication. As of yet, no information has been uncovered
indicating what success or lack of success she had, or even if she received
encouragement from any publisher for resubmission.
Fortunately
for those of us interested in Sam Calthrop, her work provides some interesting
insight into his upbringing, educational background, initial work experiences,
and assimilation within the U. S. culture more than 150 years ago. For Edith to
title her work the boyhood of Rev. Calthrop is somewhat misleading. Yes, we
receive a good look at this younger years, but more than half of the manuscript
describes Sam when he is in his twenties and older. The last two chapters, of
course, relate to his years as a minister which he began at age 31. Perhaps she
felt that the notion of boyhood might be of more interest to publishers. More
likely, the manuscript started with her intention to describe his “boyhood”
years, but then it simply took on a life of its own. At any rate, we are
indebted to her work for it helps us know Sam even better than we did before.
The
language used throughout much of the manuscript feels somewhat awkward or
strange in spots, but, in many respects, it no doubt reflects the manner of
speaking or relating one’s memories within both the context of the time and an
“upbringing” characteristic of an early life and education in an English home
that was filled with love, supported by considerable wealth, and steeped in
ancestral heritage. It was clear that Sam received much attention from those
around him, but his native intelligence and abilities carried him forth into
his many life successes.
If
you are interested in learning more about Sam, check out a brief web site dedicated to
him. A very interesting piece is a published article entitled: Recollections of the Old
Master: Rev. Samuel Robert Calthrop.
Additional information can be found on the May Memorial web
site and an early
history of the church. Finally, here are photos of headstones
for Rev. Calthrop, Edith Calthrop Bump, and other family members.
_________________________
Prepared for web page display
on May 1, 2007