'The vengeance of God Almighty will burst upon you'

In the chronicles of Stamford, Conn., to which I have referred in the previous couple of post, I encountered Mrs. Richard Crabb, a feisty woman who had no qualms expressing her displeasure with church leaders.

I have mentioned that Stamford answered to the Puritan-led government of New Haven in its early days as a settlement. As happened in other parts of the budding nation that had been established under Puritan leadership, that leadership established the Congregational Church as the only legitimate church in the settlements. 

Though technically the government and the church were different entities, in  reality government leadership was drawn from the ranks of leaders in the churches, whose pastors exerted considerable influence over their decisions. Government leaders had to be freemen and members in good standing in their churches. They then set the rules and policies that governed the colonies and settlements and believed themselves free to impose religious rules on their subjects. 

Having left England to find the freedom to pursue their beliefs free from the dictates of the Anglican church, you might think they'd be understanding of those who'd also fled to America to pursue their beliefs. To the extent those beliefs dovetailed with Puritan understanding, that tended to be true. Otherwise they were not so accepting.

One particular religious group seems to have particularly nettled -- the Quakers. In 1657 the New Haven General Court handed down an order "that no Quaker, ranter or other heretic of that nature, be suffered to come into, nor abide in this jurisdiction, and that if rise up among ourselves that they be speedily suppressed and secured ..."

Unfortunately for the court, Quakers had already moved into the confederated colonies under New Haven's jurisdiction. And they found reception. Now one of the problems with these pesky Quakers was their disregard for certain niceties such as removing their hats for government officials or refraining from criticizing Congregationalist ministers. And the religion they practiced tended to be egalitarian, relying on the light given to their faith communities rather than the pronouncements of clergy. 

Put people like this in the midst of a settlement like Stamford, which we have seen chafed under New Haven's rule, and trouble was bound to arise. A Quaker fellow named Thomas Marshall had been causing discontent and a Stamford official was authorized to arrest him. The official and a group of men he'd brought with him found Marshall at the home of Richard Crabb, one of the earliest members of the Stamford settlement, who was suspected of being a Quaker sympathizer if not an actual Quaker. 

But when he placed Marshall and Crabb under arrest, Mrs. Crabb, um, protested -- vociferously. First she locked herself in a room, refusing admittance to the group, which was searching the house for Quaker literature. When the door was forced opened, "the plucky woman who would not open the door of her castle, now could not shut her mouth," according to the history's author. 

"Is this your fasting and praying?" she said, facing down the posse. "Do ye thus rob us and break into our houses? How can you Stamford men expect the blessing of God? ... You have basely wronged us, and let me tell you what I see without your hireling priests' help; the vengeance of God Almighty will burst upon you. And when it comes, your priest can't help you. He is as Baal's priest, and is no better than the rest of you."

She then proclaimed the group to be the enemies of God and his saints before turning her invective on individual members of the gathering. One she deemed an arch traitor and hypocrite, calling down God's wrath upon him and his children. She upbraided the official in charge for selling himself to do the dirty work of the God-forsaken government at New Haven.

Next she lit into one of Stamford's leading church lights, a man known as a peacemaker. Though he began to calm her and seemed to be making some headway until he expressed a hope she would return to the fold. This only set her off again.

"Never, never, shall I or mine trouble your Stamford meeting more. I shall die first. My soul shall never be cast away to the devil so easily as that."

This was all reported at Richard Crabb's trial. His wife refused to attend, and in her absence, he attempted to apologize for her. I'm pretty sure he'd never have tried that had she been there. In the end, Crabb was fined £30 and required to post a bond of £100 pounds to insure his future good behavior. The rest of the chronicles of the trial are missing, so we don't know if punishment was laid on his bold wife. No other prosecutions exist involving Quakers in Stamford.

Image: Depiction of Society of Friends (Quaker) founder George Fox from an engraving published in 1838 downloaded from en.wikipedia.

Quotes taken from History of Stamford, Connecticut from its Settlement in 1641 to the Present Time, Rev. E.B. Huntington, 1868.