Chittenden

BOSTWICK, Erastus

Vermont Historical Magazine, No XI, October 1867, pp 809-810 [extracted from 
a section on the history of Hinesburg, Chittenden County, Vermont]

Erastus BOSTWICK was born 31 August 1767 in New Milford [Litchfield County], 
Connecticut. He was bred to the trade of a carpenter. On 24 May 1790, in 
company with two others of the same name, Austin and Noble, he left New 
Milford, on foot, with a pack on his back, and reached Hinesburgh on the 
first day of June. After a journey to Waterbury [Washington County] and 
Jericho [Chittenden County] he returned to Hinesburgh [Chittenden County] and 
hired himself to Abel LEAVENWORTH, for four months as journeyman carpenter. 
His time being out, he returned to Connecticut again on foot. In February 
1793 he engaged a passage in a sleigh to Hinesburgh, with the whole stock of 
his worldly goods, which consisted of a broad ax, square and compass, a few 
pod augers, a handsaw and two pairs of chisels. He at once entered upon the 
business of building barns.

On 10 February 1795 he [Erastus BOSTWICK] was married to Miss Sally WELCH, 
the only daughter of Rev. Whitman WELCH, who was the first settled minister 
of Williamstown [Berkshire County], Massachusetts, and who died at the siege 
of Quebec, in the Revolutionary War. A few days after his return with his 
wife, he was at the annual March meeting elected first constable, and from 
that time to 1838 he was not for a single year free from official duty in the 
town, holding every office in the gift of the town, save that of grand juror. 
He was town representative two years, postmaster nine years, justice of the 
peace twenty-two years, town treasurer thirty-five years, and town clerk 
forty years. On delivering over his historical papers to the town, he 
accompanied them with the following note: "To the Town of Hinesburgh: 
Gentlemen, I am not insensible to the many repeated tokens of confidence which 
I have received by being often and repeatedly elected to offices of 
responsibility and trust, in the active part of my life. And now I receive 
this last appointment as a compliment of respect, having been named as one of 
a committee to gather up the facts of the early history of this town. I 
entered into this duty under the embarrassment natural to old age, and now 
present to you this document as the result of my diligent researches. I have 
the honor to be your humble servant. "Erastus BOSTWICK, aged ninety-three 
years, six months, this first instant (March 1861), the fifth child and third 
son of Jonathan BOSTWICK, which was the first son of Bushnell, which was the 
first son of John junior, which was the first son of John, who came from 
Cheshire, England, with his father Arthur and two brothers Arthur and 
Zachariah, before 1668. They were of Scotch extraction." Mr. [Erastus] 
BOSTWICK has taken the prescribed oath of entering upon the duties of office 
ninety-one times. He has long been an exemplary member of the Congregational 
church, and still retains a good degree of health and vigor. [October 1861] 

On 03 March 1864 in Hinesburgh [Chittenden County, Vermont], Erastus BOSTWICK 
died, aged ninety-six years, six months, and four days. The closing 
paragraphs of the discourse at his funeral are quoted as an expression of the 
estimate his pastor and his fellow citizens put upon his character and 
usefulness. The text was Proverbs 16:31: "The hoary head is a crown of 
glory, if it is found in the way of righteousness." [The remaining 
paragraphs of this extraction are those paragraphs from the discourse given 
at the funeral of Erastus BOSTWICK.]

As I have pictured the good man whose hoary head was a crown of glory because 
it was found in the way of righteousness, you must have noticed that many 
lineaments of this sketch accord with the life and character of him whose 
body we have today borne to its last resting place. Yet I have attempted no 
eulogy. I could not do this with propriety before these, many of them old 
men, who have known him from their childhood. I have, as best I could, 
traced the features of a good man, as God and my own judgment have given the 
elements of his character for our admiration and our example. If here and 
there in these features you have noticed resemblances to the life father 
BOSTWICK has born before you, it is because he thus approached near to my 
ideal of a perfect man. We do not claim that he was perfect, and he least of 
all would have claimed it. But I may say that I have never known a man so 
universally esteemed as he, or with a reputation so entirely unspotted and 
perfect as his. Since I have known him I have seen nothing to disapprove. I 
have found nothing lacking for which I have sought. I have never known an 
old man, altogether retired from public and social life, in whom his fellow 
citizens continued to hold so strong and fresh an interest. I have never 
heard a word that expressed disapprobation, dislike or disrespect for him. 
He has received more frequently the suffrage of his fellow citizens, and has 
held more trusts for them, than any other man I have ever known, and yet I 
have never heard it hinted that he was vainly ambitious of each preferment; 
or that he failed to fill faithfully and competently every official duty; or 
that any man ever envied the honor given to him.

The freedom from vanity of his own spirit, and the position he held in this 
town, is seen in the manuscript copy of the town's history which he completed 
in his ninety-fourth year. In this he has given a sketch of each of the 
prominent early citizens, all of them are highly appreciative and kindly, 
some of them highly eulogistic. His own is brief and unadorned, yet thus 
most adorned.

Such is the record, but his acts of public and private virtues, who can tell? 
Of him we can heartily and truthfully say, "The hoary head is a crown of 
glory, because it is found in the way of righteousness." I will only add he 
became a member of the Congregational church by profession, 13 October 1831. 
The most distinct image on my memory from my first pulpit labor in 
Hinesburgh, is that of his venerable form listening so reverently to the 
service. Since then he has loved the house of God, and attended more or less 
every year as he was able, always preferring the communion Sabbaths. My 
visits with him have been most pleasant and profitable, always bearing away, 
as I left him, some new views of christian experience learned from him, and 
new encouragement in my work. The character of his piety, and the grounds of 
his faith, may be leaned from one of his favorite psalms, which at one of my 
last visits he repeated with great distinctness throughout, giving it such 
peculiar and heartfelt emphasis as opened to me new beauties in it, and left 
no doubt that his soul rested in its truths, and was sustained and comforted 
by them: "Lord, what is man, poor feeble man, born of the earth at first; 
his life's shadow, light and vain, still hasting to the dust; oh, what a 
feeble dying man, or any of his race; that God should make it his concern to 
visit him with grace; that God who darts his lightnings down, who shakes the 
world above; and mountains tremble at his frown, how wondrous is his love!" 
Such were the thoughts, comfort and trust of this man, who had lived almost a 
century, and received such honors and respect from men.

Submitted by Cathy Kubly