The evening tribune. (Pawtucket, R.I.) 189?-190?, 1896-12-08
OLD BEECHER STOVE.
CELEBRATED CHURCH WAR RECALL
Ed Bv ITS DISCOVERY.

Henry F. Middleton, New York an
tiquarian, has found at the home of Ja-
son Aldrich, farmer living near East
Cornwall, Conn, the old box stove
which was the innocent cause of Litch-
fields celebrated stove war in tho Sab.
bath day house on Litchfield green dur.
ing the ministry of the Rev. Lyman
Beecher, and has carried it off to New
York in triumph. He had been in search
of the stove for several months. Aldrich
had owned the stove for years, having
bought it at an auction.
The stove is box shaped affair, stand
ing on slender wrought iron legs more
than Is inches long. 1t is wood burner
and will take in sticks Q feet long and
10 inches through. The door is at the
front, and the pipe is at the back.
There are still number of Litchfield
people who remember the story of the
stove war. Lyman Beecher, the Congre-
gationalist, preached in the Sabbath day
house from 1910 to 1926, and it was
during his term Of service there that the
trouble occurred Henry Ward Beecher,
his son, was born in this historic town,
and moro than once referred to the mat
ter in his after life as good story illus
trative Of the difficulties encountered by
progressive church people in the early
days.
:. The box stove had already invaded
the sacred but frigid precincts Of num-
ber OF churches in Connecticut Some of
the most influential persons among the
Litchfield Congregationalists deter
mined to get one to see what it would
do toward tempering the frost fingered
gales which howl in the winter across
the bleak Litchfeld hills. An unexpect.
edly determined opposition was imme-
diately encountered in the church, how
ever, and a fierce war was waged against
the stove, the principal grounds for
which were that it would desecrate the
house Of God; that it would promote
disease by rendering the members of the
congregation unduly sensitive to cold,
and, still further, that the auditors
ought to be so imbued with the fire and
glow Of religion as to pass unnoticed the
rigors Of winter during the delivery by'l
the preacher Of the two long midday
discourses, which were then the invari-
able rule on Sunday.
Tho Ochurch split in two factions upon
the matter-the stove party and the
antistove party-and for several weeks
the stove was the topic of the hour. The
deacons Of the church were besought and
buttonholed and the members were ar
rayed individually OIL one side or the 9TH
er The women were especially active,
many Of the older ones who had lowered |
over foot stoves in the old |
church for years being most pronounced |
in their condemnation Of the innovation |
as an invention of tie evil one.
At length the stove party triumphed
in so far that they were permitted to
place stove and pipe in the church Oh
trial, and one Saturday afternoon iii
November tho stove was pat III place.
1t was set we'll into the room, very near
TO the tenor gallery. The members of |
the stove committee were early at church
on the following day TO see how the
much hated, new tangled production
was received.
As the congregation came in the an
tistoveites noticeably turned their steps
as far away as possible, aud one of their
elderly Mrs. Peck, as soon as
she reached her pew, firted open large
fan and began using it vigorously, de-
claring that the heart of the stove made
her faint. At length she created consid-
cradle commotion in the church by
throwing up her hands and apparently
She recovered. Then Deacon
Thomas Trowbridge came in. He was
very venerable and one Of the simplest
and most worthy of men, who had been
induced not to oppose the introduction
Of the stove. He walked up past the Of
Tending article in question, shaking his
head doubtingly as he reached out his
hand and felt the heat from it, and he
gathered up the skirts of his greatcoat
as he took his seat at tia
head Of the broad aisle. Next entered
Uncle" Noah Stowe, wealthy farmer
Of the west end, who was q rank anti
and scowled at the detested
stove which he had been bitterly de-
for weeks. Hezekiah Marsh,
another farmer and also an antistove
man, advanced nearly half way into the
room before he saw the stove, and then
he turned on his heel and walked out,
the maddest man in Litchfield.
All this seemed to strike the stove |
committee as ridiculous, and when they
saw Editor Bunce Of the village news
paper come in and, walking up to the
stove. warm his hands over it in thor
oughly satisfied manner, rubbing them
in evident enjoyment, they came near
bringing down a. reproof upon them
selves in consequence Of their unseemly |
levity.
But the climax came when Mrs Peck,
who had been apparently overcome by
the heat from the sinful stove, was
forced to 60 out in the middle Of the
service, wiping her face with her hand
kerchief and unable to bear mp lonoer
under her suffering. Then it was that |
the stove committee fell over backward