Worldfirstlawyer.com

Product Description: This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1907. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... OLIVER ELLSWORTH. 1745-1807. BY FRANK GAYLORD COOK, of the Massachusetts Bar. OLIVER ELLSWORTH narrowly missed being a minister. Born at Windsor, Connecticut, April 29, 1745, he was reared in influences and circumstances that bore him toward the ministry. Through this calling opened paths of knowledge and influence. It was as yet the sole learned profession. For it the colleges at Cambridge and New Haven had been founded and still mainly existed. And it still furnished and contained most of the leaders in thought and society. Such a career appealed to his parents. They felt for it that respect and even reverence that had characterized several generations of his Puritan ancestors. The Ellsworths had dwelt on the same spot since 1665 1 and during that time had been men of property and of good repute, active and faithful in the affairs of the town and the church. Oliver's father, David Ellsworth, besides being a well-to-do farmer and an oft-elected selectman, had acquired the title and dignity 1 Old Windsor, by Henry B. Stiles, vol. I, 153. of captain by leading a company of Windsor men at the siege of Louisburg. He early desired his son to be a minister and to this end, having ample means, directed his education. That the boy might be prepared for college he was placed in the charge of Reverend Joseph Bellamy, pastor of the church at Bethlehem, a little hill town about thirty miles southwest of Windsor. Dr. Bellamy was a graduate of Yale, and was already widely known by his work "True Religion Delineated." In a long career he became one of the most learned and celebrated divines of his day. He was in the habit of eking out his slender salary--originally ninety pounds sterling and fifty cords of firewood--by receiving into his family young men in preparation for co...