History of Northampton, Massachusetts, from its settlement in 1654;

410 HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTON. [1777.
nental army. In December, the town voted to reimburse
" their last year's poll tax to those who were prisoners in
Quebec, viz : —Joseph Parsons Jr. , Paul Clap, Russell Clark,
Oliver Edwards, Lemuel Bates."
Rev. John Hooker. Tlic fourtli minister of Northampton was
born at Kensington, Ct., now the Parish of
Berlin, in 1729. He was the great grandson of Rev.
Thomas Hooker, one of the founders of the Colony of
Connecticut, and the first minister of Hartford. Gradua-
ting at Yale College in the class of 1751, two years later
he was installed as pastor over the church here, where he
remained till death sundered the connection twenty-three
years afterward. On the 5^^ of December, 1753, he was mar-
ried to Sarah Worthington of Springfield, sister of Col.
John Worthington, one of the most eminent lawyers in this
section of the state. The circumstances attending his call
have already been fully narrated, as well as the sad details
of his last sickness and death. Accepting the pastorate of
this church at the age of twenty-five, he entered without
previous experience upon a duty rendered all the more
exacting on account of the stormy and tempestuous close
of the labors of his eminent predecessor. But he seemed
peculiarly well fitted to meet the special condition of affairs
existing, and the asperity and bitterness of both parties
speedily merged into a mutual and common attachment between
pastor and people. "The gentleness of his deportment,
his sound discretion, and his instructive discourses
in the pulpit, secured to him, to such an extent, the love
and respect of his people, that they were always satisfied
to hear him, and did not care to hear anybody else." ^
While he was looked upon with respect, and treated with
courtesy by the clergy of the valley, he never assumed the
commanding position then held by his predecessors. He
was eminently fitted for the pastoral oflQce, and absorbed in
these duties, he sought not distinction elsewhere. Particularly
he endeared himself to the youth of the congregation,
and is represented as a man of most condescending,
familiar and winning manners. As a preacher he was
earnest and attractive, stating the truth with simplicity
1 Sprague's Annals.
I