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The duke of Stockbridge : a romance of Shay's rebellion. By: Edward Bellamy: Francis(Julius) Bellamy (May 18, 1855 – August 28, 1931) was a Christian ... and author,Shays' Rebellion, 1786-1787
In the aftermath of the Revolutionary War, America remained very volatile. One outgrowth of this was Shays' Rebellion, an armed uprising in Massachusetts that pitted a group of dissatisfied residents against the nascent state authorities. Edward Bellamy (March 26, 1850 - May 22, 1898) was an American author and socialist, most famous for his utopian novel, Looking Backward, a tale set in the distant future of the year 2000. Bellamy's vision of a harmonious future world inspired the formation of at least 165 "Nationalist Clubs" dedicated to the propagation of Bellamy's political ideas and working to make them a practical reality. *Early years* Edward Bellamy was born in Chicopee, Massachusetts. His father was Rufus King Bellamy (1816-1886), a Baptist minister and a descendant of Joseph Bellamy.His mother, Maria Louisa Putnam Bellamy, was herself the daughter of a Baptist minister named Benjamin Putnam, a man forced to withdraw from the ministry in Salem, Massachusetts, following objections to his becoming a Freemason.Bellamy attended public school at Chicopee Falls before leaving for Union College of Schenectady, New York, where he studied for just two semesters.Upon leaving school, Bellamy made his way to Europe for a year, spending extensive time in Germany.Bellamy briefly studied law but abandoned that field without ever having practiced as a lawyer, instead entering the world of journalism. In this capacity Bellamy briefly served on the staff of the New York Post before returning to his native Massachusetts to take a position at the Springfield Union.At the age of 25, Bellamy developed tuberculosis, the disease that would ultimately kill him.He suffered with its effects throughout his adult life. In an effort to regain his health, Bellamy spent a year in the Hawaiian Islands (1877 to 1878).Returning to the United States, Bellamy decided to abandon the daily grind of journalism in favor of literary work, which put fewer demands upon his time and his health.Bellamy married Emma Augusta Sanderson in 1882. The couple had two children... Francis Julius Bellamy (May 18, 1855 - August 28, 1931) was a Christian socialist minister and author, best known for writing the American Pledge of Allegiance.rancis Julius Bellamy was born in Mount Morris, NY. His family was deeply involved in the Baptist church and they moved to Rome, NY when Bellamy was only 5. Here, Bellamy became an active member of the First Baptist Church; which his father was minister of until his death in 1864. He attended college at the University of Rochester, in Rochester, NY and studied theology and was part of the Alpha Delta Phi Fraternity. As a young man, he became a Baptist minister and, influenced by the vestiges of the Second Great Awakening, began to travel to promote his faith and help his community. Bellamy's travels brought him to Massachusetts. It was there that he penned the "Pledge of Allegiance" for a campaign by the "Youth's Companion;" a patriotic circular of the day. Bellamy "believed in the absolute separation of church and state"and did not include the phrase "one nation under God" within his original pledge....
170 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1900
About the author
Edward Bellamy
405 books95 followersEdward Bellamy, American writer and Utopian socialist, publicized his political views through
Looking Backward
, his popular novel of 1888.
People acclaimed Edward Bellamy, a Christian author.
Many Marxists of the time widely regarded and referenced his work of fiction.
It first succeeded behind only Uncle Tom's Cabin and Ben-Hur .
It inspired a less successful sequel, entitled Equality , more of a tract, and generally spurred movement in the United States and abroad. At one time, people even formed a party of Edward Bellamy in the Netherlands.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_...
People acclaimed Edward Bellamy, a Christian author.
Many Marxists of the time widely regarded and referenced his work of fiction.
It first succeeded behind only Uncle Tom's Cabin and Ben-Hur .
It inspired a less successful sequel, entitled Equality , more of a tract, and generally spurred movement in the United States and abroad. At one time, people even formed a party of Edward Bellamy in the Netherlands.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_...
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
April 9, 2019
The best historical novel I’ve read, pagination from the Harvard Library edition, 1962. It's praised by Samuel Eliot Morrison as better than other, historians’ accounts of Shays Rebellion. Though dense and slow for an appreciative reader like me, it also features wit and Yankee dialect. Amazed I never knew this book, though my ancestor fought under Shays in the Revolution, and maybe a decade later in the Rebellion: Stephen Powers of Shutesbury, whose cousin John Powers headed the committee that chose Shays to lead the Rebellion.
The second chapter, in 1786, resounds such that I feel like quoting from every page. In the tavern, the corncob pipes “largely that expensive weed [tobacco] mixed with dried sweet-fern and other herbs, for the sake of economy”(14). Only two of the score populating the bar are actually drinking, having paid Mrs. Bingham in barter, one, meal from his mill, the other potatoes. The West Stockbridge iron-works, whose remnants I have visited (bringing home pieces of slag), had recently closed, laying off a hundred men.
The Berkshire farmers blame Bostonian women for spending money for English goods: Leghorn hats-wide-brimmed, satin flower-like rolls on brim; “prunelly” shoes/ prunella, heavy black silk, laced from heel up (17). Those farmers thought of joining the Country of Vermont or "New Connecticut" which was proposed (in N.H.), because as Abner says in the tavern, "I can't bear Bosting fellers no more'n I can a skunk, and I kin tell em baout ez fer orf"(254).
Fine account of how the courts and lawyers have all the money; they are filling the jail with debtors, won’t even pay off the land with its own value when confiscated, nor accept Continental dollars printed to pay soldiers in the Revolution. In fact, the courts charge debtors in English pounds and silver shillings. The owner of the Tavern Jail at Barrington charged $1000 for a plate of beans and a pint, hoping for cleaner bills to keep accounts on (31). “The Tories wuz right, arter all..we wuz a dern sight better off under the King,” though Jabez was chased all over Stockbridge Mountain, would have been killed, for saying that back during the Revolution.
Parson West, barely five feet tall, impeccably dressed, gives a rousing sermon agains card games, to two young fellows in the stocks, “devices that do so plainly advertise their devilish origin…Take note of these devilish and defrormed figures…with two heads turned diverse ways…These are images of fiends”(44). The impoverished farmers gather to hear Squire Sedgwick back from the county convention in Lenox; Hampshire convention at Hatfield had voted with their despairing farmers, but Berkshire voted to support the arrests partly to offset their reputation as the latest-joining, radical county.
Chapter 1 features the 1777 muster. Two of the Stockbridge Selectmen are Indian, Johannes Metoxin and Joseph Sausquesquot; the rest, Squire Edwards, Deacon Nash, Squire Williams and Captain Josiah Jones, brother-in-law of Squire Woodbridge.
Chapter 2 commences nine yrs later, 1786, three years after the Revolutionary War closed. Backroom of Squire Edwards’ store, wigged, shoe-buckled gentlemen, versus the barroom of Stockbridge tavern..no cheering fire in late August, just home-made tallow candles, low ceilings, massive crossbeams. Dim figures by the open door—unsettled scores on the Widow Bingham’s slate account—when she stares with fixity, one scuttles out the door. Some are shoeless, no luxuries in summer. Costume, shirt and trousers of homespun, sheared, spun, woven and dyed. “Some of the better dressed wear trousers of blue and white striped stuff, or the kind now-a-days exclusively used for bed-ticking” (13).
Governor John Hancock did not encourage the arrest or imprisonment of farmers for debt, whereas his successor Bowdoin did. The central defeat of the rebels was at the Springfield Armory, a federal facility that nevertheless, without the U.S. Secretary of War Knox’s okay, was used by the State militia. The militia intercepted the communique from the troops in West Springfield, across the Connecticut River, so Shays’ troops in Palmer and Chicopee lost a third of their support, were defeated by grape-shot, and fled north. After the Petersham battle in a snowstorm in February, Shays retreated over the line into N.H. or the Independent Republic of Vermont. He returned to Massachusetts when pardoned (as were hundreds), but moved to New York because of the vilification in Boston.
George Washington re-entered politics partly because of the Rebellion, which alarmed him, though it did not his fellow Virginian Jefferson. His letter to James Madison in late January, 1787 notes that occasional rebellion serves to preserve freedoms, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
The Springfield Armory, built in brick and supplying the Springfield Rifles that won the Civil War, was the marching ground for my Classical H.S. band in 1960. Part of the Armory now constitutes the Springfield Technical Community College.
The second chapter, in 1786, resounds such that I feel like quoting from every page. In the tavern, the corncob pipes “largely that expensive weed [tobacco] mixed with dried sweet-fern and other herbs, for the sake of economy”(14). Only two of the score populating the bar are actually drinking, having paid Mrs. Bingham in barter, one, meal from his mill, the other potatoes. The West Stockbridge iron-works, whose remnants I have visited (bringing home pieces of slag), had recently closed, laying off a hundred men.
The Berkshire farmers blame Bostonian women for spending money for English goods: Leghorn hats-wide-brimmed, satin flower-like rolls on brim; “prunelly” shoes/ prunella, heavy black silk, laced from heel up (17). Those farmers thought of joining the Country of Vermont or "New Connecticut" which was proposed (in N.H.), because as Abner says in the tavern, "I can't bear Bosting fellers no more'n I can a skunk, and I kin tell em baout ez fer orf"(254).
Fine account of how the courts and lawyers have all the money; they are filling the jail with debtors, won’t even pay off the land with its own value when confiscated, nor accept Continental dollars printed to pay soldiers in the Revolution. In fact, the courts charge debtors in English pounds and silver shillings. The owner of the Tavern Jail at Barrington charged $1000 for a plate of beans and a pint, hoping for cleaner bills to keep accounts on (31). “The Tories wuz right, arter all..we wuz a dern sight better off under the King,” though Jabez was chased all over Stockbridge Mountain, would have been killed, for saying that back during the Revolution.
Parson West, barely five feet tall, impeccably dressed, gives a rousing sermon agains card games, to two young fellows in the stocks, “devices that do so plainly advertise their devilish origin…Take note of these devilish and defrormed figures…with two heads turned diverse ways…These are images of fiends”(44). The impoverished farmers gather to hear Squire Sedgwick back from the county convention in Lenox; Hampshire convention at Hatfield had voted with their despairing farmers, but Berkshire voted to support the arrests partly to offset their reputation as the latest-joining, radical county.
Chapter 1 features the 1777 muster. Two of the Stockbridge Selectmen are Indian, Johannes Metoxin and Joseph Sausquesquot; the rest, Squire Edwards, Deacon Nash, Squire Williams and Captain Josiah Jones, brother-in-law of Squire Woodbridge.
Chapter 2 commences nine yrs later, 1786, three years after the Revolutionary War closed. Backroom of Squire Edwards’ store, wigged, shoe-buckled gentlemen, versus the barroom of Stockbridge tavern..no cheering fire in late August, just home-made tallow candles, low ceilings, massive crossbeams. Dim figures by the open door—unsettled scores on the Widow Bingham’s slate account—when she stares with fixity, one scuttles out the door. Some are shoeless, no luxuries in summer. Costume, shirt and trousers of homespun, sheared, spun, woven and dyed. “Some of the better dressed wear trousers of blue and white striped stuff, or the kind now-a-days exclusively used for bed-ticking” (13).
Governor John Hancock did not encourage the arrest or imprisonment of farmers for debt, whereas his successor Bowdoin did. The central defeat of the rebels was at the Springfield Armory, a federal facility that nevertheless, without the U.S. Secretary of War Knox’s okay, was used by the State militia. The militia intercepted the communique from the troops in West Springfield, across the Connecticut River, so Shays’ troops in Palmer and Chicopee lost a third of their support, were defeated by grape-shot, and fled north. After the Petersham battle in a snowstorm in February, Shays retreated over the line into N.H. or the Independent Republic of Vermont. He returned to Massachusetts when pardoned (as were hundreds), but moved to New York because of the vilification in Boston.
George Washington re-entered politics partly because of the Rebellion, which alarmed him, though it did not his fellow Virginian Jefferson. His letter to James Madison in late January, 1787 notes that occasional rebellion serves to preserve freedoms, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
The Springfield Armory, built in brick and supplying the Springfield Rifles that won the Civil War, was the marching ground for my Classical H.S. band in 1960. Part of the Armory now constitutes the Springfield Technical Community College.
September 27, 2018
Fun read with unexpected twist on character conventions. Love the heroine.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews