Friend of Friends Friday: The Abolitionist Movement, the Beecher Family and Ellicottville
Did you know there is a connection between Ellicottville and Brooklyn NY? Read on to find out more.
First, let me talk about Schoolcraft, Michigan. I have mentioned before that I subscribe to Michigana, a quarterly magazine of the Western Michigan Genealogical Society. A couple of months ago, I noted a third installment of an article entitled "Everything Has a Story" by Paula K. Vander Hoven. The article mentioned a Beecher/Skinner family that migrated to Schoolcraft, Michigan from Ellicottville, New York. Juliette Beecher Skinner and her daughter Sophia Skinner were some of the early members of the first Episcopal church there in Schoolcraft which was notable for having its membership comprised of mainly women.
Juliette Beecher, the wife of Peter V. Skinner, was born in 1820. Her father Moses Beecher was part of the 1829 organizational meeting of St. John's Episcopal Church in Ellicottville and part of the church's building committee. The church structure (completed in 1838) still stands. If you get a chance to take a tour sometime, I highly recommend it. The church's records includes many references to the Beecher and Skinner families. Peter V. Skinner may have been related to J. King Skinner who married Hannah Saxton and lived in the Baker Leonard house next to St. John's, but research on that has not been completed yet.
What has been researched a little more is the Beecher family. According to rootsweb.com, Moses Beecher of Ellicottville, NY was born in Hartford, CT in 1791. About the year 1814, he and his wife Lydia Dawson left Connecticut and moved to Batavia, New York where he engaged in business as a merchant. Later, Moses became an accountant in the Land Office of the Holland Land Company. In 1827, he was transferred to a similar position in the Company's Land Office at Ellicottville. He continued in that position for about the first twenty years in Ellicottville and thereafter was engaged in a manufacturing business, which he carried on until within a short period of his death which happened in 1868. This information was obtained from an online tree at rootsweb.com entitled "Descendants of John Beecher 1594-1637" posted by James Shaw. The work cites "Dawson source" for the information regarding Moses and provides further footnotes regarding the source. (For additional research questions, you can also contact the author.) Moses had ten children with his first wife and three more children with his second wife, whom he married at St. John's in 1841.
Exploring the online tree further, I was delighted to note that Moses Beecher was a fourth cousin to the famed American novelist and humanitarian, Harriet Beecher Stowe, who wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin. Harriet was the daughter of Lyman Beecher, a Congregationalist pastor and the sister of Henry Ward Beecher. While researching this family, I also noted that Lyman Beecher was president of the Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati, OH which was known primarily for the debates held there in 1834 that influenced the nation's thinking about slavery.
I set this work aside as I got busy doing other things in my day-to-day life. Namely, I had to leave for a two-week trip to New York City for my day job (I label my historical research as an avocation, hobby or obsession depending on my mood). While there, I managed to visit at least seven different museums and historical societies including the Tenement Museum, the 9/11 Memorial Museum and the Museum of the City of New York. I stayed in Brooklyn during my final week there. In anticipation of flying back home, I decided to mail home some books and materials I purchased at a conference. I already had a 50 lb suitcase and did not want to pay additional fees to fly more weight home. I found directions to a post office that had early hours to accommodate my daily work schedule and headed over there one morning. It was about a mile from where I was staying. I did a LOT of walking during my stay, but always enjoyed the different sights along my way. Just before I approached the entrance to the post office in Brooklyn, I noted a statue in the plaza walking area. Coming closer, I was surprised to find the statue depicted none other than Henry Ward Beecher. "Nice to meet you," I thought, "what a coincidence to see you here."
While I had initially recognized his name when I was researching the Beecher family, I did not look into the details of Henry Ward Beecher that closely. I only made connections between Connecticut where the family originated, Ohio where his father was president of the Seminary, and Ellicottville where his fourth cousin Moses Beecher ended up. I never realized I would stumble upon him there in Brooklyn!
The Brooklyn Historical Society was also nearby, so when I had the chance I took another walk to see their exhibits. One of their long-term exhibits through the winter of 2018 is called "Brooklyn Abolitionists/In Pursuit of Freedom." The Society also has a very nice online learning experience about the exhibit which you can find at: http://pursuitoffreedom.org/. This site has a section of biographies including one for Henry Ward Beecher explaining that he was the inaugural pastor of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn Heights. In his role as pastor, Beecher was a very active emancipator and held mock auctions to publicly raise funds to purchase the freedom of real slaves. One of the highlights I noted at the actual exhibit was a facsimile of an old ledger book from that time in which entries showed the names of people who pledged a certain amount of money, say $1 or $2, each for the purchase of a certain slave.
So there you have it, a historical connection between Ellicottville and Brooklyn. There's more to Ellicottville's story of it's involvement in the Abolitionist Movement, but I'll reserve that for a later day.
First, let me talk about Schoolcraft, Michigan. I have mentioned before that I subscribe to Michigana, a quarterly magazine of the Western Michigan Genealogical Society. A couple of months ago, I noted a third installment of an article entitled "Everything Has a Story" by Paula K. Vander Hoven. The article mentioned a Beecher/Skinner family that migrated to Schoolcraft, Michigan from Ellicottville, New York. Juliette Beecher Skinner and her daughter Sophia Skinner were some of the early members of the first Episcopal church there in Schoolcraft which was notable for having its membership comprised of mainly women.
Juliette Beecher, the wife of Peter V. Skinner, was born in 1820. Her father Moses Beecher was part of the 1829 organizational meeting of St. John's Episcopal Church in Ellicottville and part of the church's building committee. The church structure (completed in 1838) still stands. If you get a chance to take a tour sometime, I highly recommend it. The church's records includes many references to the Beecher and Skinner families. Peter V. Skinner may have been related to J. King Skinner who married Hannah Saxton and lived in the Baker Leonard house next to St. John's, but research on that has not been completed yet.
What has been researched a little more is the Beecher family. According to rootsweb.com, Moses Beecher of Ellicottville, NY was born in Hartford, CT in 1791. About the year 1814, he and his wife Lydia Dawson left Connecticut and moved to Batavia, New York where he engaged in business as a merchant. Later, Moses became an accountant in the Land Office of the Holland Land Company. In 1827, he was transferred to a similar position in the Company's Land Office at Ellicottville. He continued in that position for about the first twenty years in Ellicottville and thereafter was engaged in a manufacturing business, which he carried on until within a short period of his death which happened in 1868. This information was obtained from an online tree at rootsweb.com entitled "Descendants of John Beecher 1594-1637" posted by James Shaw. The work cites "Dawson source" for the information regarding Moses and provides further footnotes regarding the source. (For additional research questions, you can also contact the author.) Moses had ten children with his first wife and three more children with his second wife, whom he married at St. John's in 1841.
Exploring the online tree further, I was delighted to note that Moses Beecher was a fourth cousin to the famed American novelist and humanitarian, Harriet Beecher Stowe, who wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin. Harriet was the daughter of Lyman Beecher, a Congregationalist pastor and the sister of Henry Ward Beecher. While researching this family, I also noted that Lyman Beecher was president of the Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati, OH which was known primarily for the debates held there in 1834 that influenced the nation's thinking about slavery.
I set this work aside as I got busy doing other things in my day-to-day life. Namely, I had to leave for a two-week trip to New York City for my day job (I label my historical research as an avocation, hobby or obsession depending on my mood). While there, I managed to visit at least seven different museums and historical societies including the Tenement Museum, the 9/11 Memorial Museum and the Museum of the City of New York. I stayed in Brooklyn during my final week there. In anticipation of flying back home, I decided to mail home some books and materials I purchased at a conference. I already had a 50 lb suitcase and did not want to pay additional fees to fly more weight home. I found directions to a post office that had early hours to accommodate my daily work schedule and headed over there one morning. It was about a mile from where I was staying. I did a LOT of walking during my stay, but always enjoyed the different sights along my way. Just before I approached the entrance to the post office in Brooklyn, I noted a statue in the plaza walking area. Coming closer, I was surprised to find the statue depicted none other than Henry Ward Beecher. "Nice to meet you," I thought, "what a coincidence to see you here."
While I had initially recognized his name when I was researching the Beecher family, I did not look into the details of Henry Ward Beecher that closely. I only made connections between Connecticut where the family originated, Ohio where his father was president of the Seminary, and Ellicottville where his fourth cousin Moses Beecher ended up. I never realized I would stumble upon him there in Brooklyn!
The Brooklyn Historical Society was also nearby, so when I had the chance I took another walk to see their exhibits. One of their long-term exhibits through the winter of 2018 is called "Brooklyn Abolitionists/In Pursuit of Freedom." The Society also has a very nice online learning experience about the exhibit which you can find at: http://pursuitoffreedom.org/. This site has a section of biographies including one for Henry Ward Beecher explaining that he was the inaugural pastor of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn Heights. In his role as pastor, Beecher was a very active emancipator and held mock auctions to publicly raise funds to purchase the freedom of real slaves. One of the highlights I noted at the actual exhibit was a facsimile of an old ledger book from that time in which entries showed the names of people who pledged a certain amount of money, say $1 or $2, each for the purchase of a certain slave.
So there you have it, a historical connection between Ellicottville and Brooklyn. There's more to Ellicottville's story of it's involvement in the Abolitionist Movement, but I'll reserve that for a later day.
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