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About Southern Baptist messenger. (Covington, Ga.) 1851-1862 | View Entire Issue (March 15, 1862)
190 iy fastened on another world, cried out that she desired to suffer with her brethren, unless the ma gistrates would repeal their wicked law. She was saved by the intercession of her son, but on the express condition that she should be carried to the place of execution, and stand upon the gallows with a rope about her neck, and then be carried out of the colony. She was accordingly taken to Rhode Island ; buC her resolution was still unshaken, and she was again moved to return to the “ bloody town of Boston/’ where she arrived in the spring of 1670. This determination of a feeble and aged woman to brave all the terrors of their laws, might well fill the magistrates with as tonishment ; but the pride of consistency had al ready involved them in acts of extreme cruelty, and they thought it impossible now to recede. The other executions were consideie l acts of stern ne cessity, and caused much di. 4 content. A’ hope was entertained until the last moment that the con demtted would consent to depart out of the juris diction ; and when Mary Dyer was sent for by the court, after her second return, Governor Eudicott said, “Are you the same Mary Dyer that was here before ?” giving her an opportunity to escape by a deuial of the fact, there having been another of the name returned from England. But there was no evasion. “ 1 am the same Marv Dyer that was here the last general court.” “ You will own yourself a Quaker, will you not?” 14 1 own myself to be reproachfully so called;” and she was sentenced to be hanged the next day. “ This is no more than thou saidst before,” was fcer intrepid reply, when the sentence of death was pronounced. “ But now,” said the governor, “ it is to be exe cuted ; therefore prepare yourself, for to morrow at nine o’clock yo die.” “ I came,” was the reply, “ in obedience to the will of God, the last general court, desiring you to repeal your unrighteous law of banishment on pain of death, and the same is. my work now, and earnest request, although I told you if you refused to repeal them the Lord would send others of his servants to wimess againsl them.” At the appointed time on the next day she was brought forth, and with a band of soldiers led through town, about a mile, to the place of execu tion, the drums beating before and behind her the whole way. When she was on the gallows it was told her if she would return home she might come down and save her life; to which she replied,— “ Nav, I cannot, for in obedience to tiie will of the Lord I came, and in obedience to his will I abide faithful unto the death” Another said that she had been there before ; she bad the sentence of banishment upon pain of death, and had broken the law in coming again now, and therefore she was guilty of her owa blood. “Nay,” she an swered, “ I came to keep blood guiltiness from you, desiring you to repeal the unrighteous and unjust law of banishment upon pain of death, made against the innocent servants of the Lord; there fore my blood will be required at your hands, who SOUTHERN BAPTIST MESSENGER. I willfully do it; but for those who do it in the sim plicity of thei:* hearts, Id* sire the Lord to forgive them; I came to do the will of my Father, and in obedience to his will I stand even till death.” A minister who was present then sard, “ Mary Dyer, repent, oh repent, and be not so deluded and car ried away by the deceit of the devil.” But she un answered, “ Nay, man, I am not now to repent.” She added that she desired the prayers of all the people of God. “Perhaps,” said one, scofiinglv, “she thinks there is none here.” Then looking* round’, she said, “ I know but few here.” Being again asked to have one of the elders pray for her, she said, “ Nay, first a child, then a young man, then a strong man, before an Elder in Christ Jesus.” She spoke of the other world, and of the eternal happiness she was about to enter ;. and in this well disposed condition was turned off, and died a mar tyr of Christ, being twice led to death, which the first time she expected with undaunted courage, and now suffered with Christian fortitude. “She hangs as a flag for others to take example by,” said a member of the cc uit, as the lifeless bodv huncr suspended from the gallows. Instead of being a warning, her death was only an encouragement. Another Quaker, named Wil liam Leddra, soon made his appearance, and after a tedious imprisonment, during which he was chained to a log of wood, he was brought to trial on the usual charge of returning from banishment. There was a dash ol the ludicrous in the proceed ings. One of the charges against him was that he refused to take cfl’ his hat in court, and another was that he persevered in saying “thee” and “thou.” “ Will you put me to death,” said be “for speaking good English, and for not putting oil my clothes?” “ A man may speak treason in good English,” was the reply 4i Is it treason to say ‘thee’ and ‘thou,’’ to single persons ?' ’ No rejoinder c<i!d here be made by the judges, and while they were try ing to stop his mouth with a few more questions, to their exceeding dismay another Quaker, named Winlock Ch ristison, who bad also returned fi#m banishment, entered the court and placed himself beside the prisoner. The case of Leddra was liist despatched by condemning him to be executed, and this atro city was committed on the 14th of March. Chisti son at a second appearance before the court, re ceived a like sentence, but leaving him the choice of voluntary banishment, and this latter alternative he appears to have embraced. The next culprits of the same class were Judah Browne and Pieison, who, for no offence that v?e can conceive, but that of being Quakers, were condemned to be tied to a cait’s tail, and whipped through several towns in the colony. Immediately after, as appears from the records of the court, a day cf thanksgiving was appointed to be kept iu acknowledgment of the many mercies -‘enjoyed for years past, in thfl re mote wilderness.” According to Mr. Chandler,* from whose inter - esting work wo have derived these melancholy de tails, the persecutions in Massachusetts gave offense *A uerican Criminal Trials, by P. W. Chaudler. Two vole.: 1810 to Charles 11., who had other reasons to be dissat isfied with the colonists. He therefore enjoined all the governors of New England to proceed no far ther with corporal punishments against the Qua kers, but to send them to England with their crimes specifically set forth, in order that they might be disposed of according to law. The Quakers in London immediately chartered a vessel, and the mandamus being committed to Samuel Sliattock, who bad been banished from Massschusetts on pain of death, he arrived in the harbor of Boston in six weeks. The King’s mes senger and the commander of the ship landed the’ day after their arrival, and proceeded directly to the governor's house. Admitted to his presence, he ordered Shattock’s hat to be removed, but after perusing the letters, restored it, and took off his own. After consultation with the deputy governor, he informed the messenger that they would obey the King’s command. In the evening the passen gers of the ship came on shore, and, with their hiends and brethren in the town, held a meeting where they returned thanks, and prai-es to God “ for his mercy, manifested in their wonderful de liverance.” The colonial laws against the Quakers were now 4 abolished, and there were no more executions of this unhappy class of persons ; but the magistracy were hostile to the for years afterwards they contrived to whip and otherwise maltreat any Quakers who fell into their hands; it would seem doubtful whether the tortures and indignities they occasionally inflicted, particularly on the persons* of females, weie not_worse than death. The au thority to which we have referred observes with* justice that the Quakers who exposed themselves to these severities were not by any means blame less. Unlike the orderly society of Friends in the present day, they appear to have taken a delight in annoying the constituted authorities, and dis turbing tbe public peace. Much of this,, however, was produced by tLcir sufferings iu the first in stance ;. and the more violent amongst them from, a variety of causes, were evidently wrought up to a state of religious insanity. Allowing that they, were as troublesome as their worst enemies can possibly represent them, there can now be but one sentiment respecting their treatment —unqualified condemnation of their oppressors. It is tiue (hero were laws equally revere .against the Quakers in. Virginia and elsewhere ; but this does not lessen, the crime of the magistracy of Massachusetts. De scendants of Pilgrim Fathers who fled to the wil derness from persecution, if not themselves refugees,, they ought to have sympathized in the eccentrici ties or convictions of others, when placed in simi lar circumstances. llow true is the remark of our author,that “Religious intolerance was the mistake of the age.” —— Our ignorance and precipitancy lead us to attri-- bute effects to chance, which have a necessary and detenniwate cause. When we say a thing happens by chance, we really mean no more than that it* cause is unknown to us, and nor, as some vaiuly imagine, that chance itself can be the cause of any thing. — Chambers .
