Abstract
Rogers-Stokes argues that the main reason why the Shepard records of trial have not been recognized as such is that the only published transcriptions of them are fundamentally flawed and have therefore seriously obscured and interfered with the meaning of the original records. This realization powerfully challenges not only the two sets of transcriptions, but much of the outpouring of analysis based on those transcriptions that scholars have generated since their publication. Rogers-Stokes presents her argument about the transcriptions and their unfortunate legacy for puritan and early American scholarship by close-reading the original manuscript records and the published transcriptions and providing side-by-side comparisons that emphasize the provocative departures from the primary source that characterize the secondary literature.
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Notes
- 1.
George Selement and Bruce C. Woolley, eds. Thomas Shepard’s Confessions (Boston: The Colonial Society of Massachusetts, 1981), p. 41.
- 2.
Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 27.
- 3.
In fact, the manuscript page they reproduce as an illustration frontispiece, the first page of Nathaniel Sparhawk’s record, shows a clear paragraph break three-quarters of the way down the page, after “That I could walk up and down the room rejoicing in Him and hitting those out of the window that were otherwise employed,” which they do not include in their transcription on page 63. Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 63.
- 4.
Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 27.
- 5.
Writing nine years before Selement and Woolley, McGiffert previews their language by saying that his “paragraphing follows Shepard’s, though editorial discretion has been employed to reflect the sense of the original in a very few instances where Shepard’s intention is not perfectly clear.” Michael McGiffert, ed. God’s Plot: Puritan Spirituality in Thomas Shepard’s Cambridge (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1972): 29–30. While McGiffert includes more of the paragraphing than Selement and Woolley, he still includes very little of it (perhaps a third of the original paragraphing is preserved). It is fascinating to read in Selement and Woolley’s Foreword that Patricia Caldwell was the first, in 1978, to transcribe all or part of the records eventually published by Selement and Woolley. Dr. Charles Cohen at Berkeley was recruited to compare Caldwell’s, Selement’s, and Woolley’s “various transcriptions and note variant readings. Dr. Cohen did an extraordinarily thorough job with this, and the result is that his contribution to this volume is a substantial one.” Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, viii–ix. I have not found any mention by Caldwell of her original involvement in transcribing the early set of records. Cohen complimented their work in his own book, published six years after theirs. “The rough character of the relations is more apparent in the original of the Shepard text … than in the much more readable modern version.” Charles Cohen, God’s Caress: The Psychology of Puritan Religious Experience (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986): 138.
- 6.
M. B. Parkes, Pause and Effect: Punctuation in the West (Routledge, 2016), Chapter five, https://books.google.com/books?id=QCaoDQAAQBAJ&pg=PT130&lpg=PT130&dq=virgula.suspensiva&source=bl&ots=h1g8e6q6wX&sig=rJZoh0m6j0DfKj5p5bzwZvHNvvE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjU5uPQ9MHZAhVNSK0KHVKrAPsQ6AEwBXoECAQQAQ#v=onepage&q=virgula.suspensiva&f=false. Emphasis added.
- 7.
This theory also helps to explain why these narratives were clearly copied out by Shepard from a different manuscript. If someone met with Shepard multiple times, over the course of weeks or months, Shepard’s written records would have been scattered over multiple pages or notebooks, interleaved with other records and notes. Once someone successfully gave their public relation to the church, Shepard might have converted those separate records of multiple trial sessions into one record, noting the conclusion of each session with multiple slashes. A counter-argument might be made that Shepard used the slash as an editorial aid; that he intended to publish the narratives as relations of faith, and so he went back after each narrative and inserted paragraphs or stopping points into so that it would be easier to read and conform to established book form. Since no early New England relations have ever been found published contemporarily in book form, this seems easily discounted. Another suggestion might be that Shepard marked up the relations after the fact in order to give a copy to the applicant that they could read from during their live relation. This argument has a basis in the fact that punctuation, called “pointing” in medieval England, was used to help people to read manuscript aloud. “Pointing was originally done in liturgical manuscripts as an aid in reading aloud, especially by those whose knowledge of the language which they were reading might be less than perfect; thus, pointing for reading aloud tends to correspond quite closely to marking ‘pauses for breath,’ and it may, in fact, owe much to musical notation for ‘breaths.’” Stephen R. Reimer, “Manuscript Studies: Medieval and Early Modern: IV. vii. Paleography: Punctuation” (Edmonton: University of Alberta) https://sites.ualberta.ca/~sreimer/ms-course/course/punc.htm. Again, the actual manuscript pages help resolve this in the negative: the writing is too ornate and too small for someone who was not used to reading handwritten documents to easily and confidently use in front of an audience in a high-stakes, high-emotion context like a live relation. Finally, we must consider whether Shepard, or perhaps one of the elders annotated the draft so that they themselves could read it aloud for the applicant. I believe we can reject this hypothesis. This was sometimes done, but those references we have to it give the decided impression that it was done infrequently, only for those who were physically unable to bear the stress of speaking extemporaneously to the church. Thomas Weld said “we have seene such a tender respect had to the weaker sex (who are usually more fearefull & bashfull) that we commit their trial to the Elders & some few others in private, who upon their testimony are admitted into the Church, without any more adoe … frequently.” Emphasis added. Thomas Weld, An Answer to W.R., 18–19. His emphasis on the rarity of this occasion was part of his argument that delivering a public relation was not an unreasonable burden on the majority of candidates for membership. In this context, the fact that every narrative, not just a few, in Shepard’s notebooks is annotated in some way (some much more than others) proves that this annotation was not done for the purposes of helping the elders to smoothly read someone’s relation aloud.
- 8.
Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 92.
- 9.
Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 139–40.
- 10.
Or, as I will explore in the next chapter, perhaps Shepard collected her incomplete record in this notebook because it did not include that final step.
- 11.
John and Joanna Sill, Goodman Daniel, Mary Angier, Mr. Sanders, John Stedman, Goodwife Holmes, Barbary Cutter, Goodman Manning, Alice Stedman, John Trumble, Mr. Andrews, Mary Parish, Old Goodwife Cutter, Goodwife Willows.
- 12.
The next line begins with “and” but not with a “C”—Shepard uses a “+” sign, which he very infrequently did, much preferring the “C.” It may be that the “+” sign represented some slightly different meaning of “and”; potentially it was different from “and then.”
- 13.
Many other narratives share this use of “&” to signal important pauses and transitions Striking examples are found in the narratives of Mary Parish, Frances Usher, William Hamlet, and Mary Grizzell. Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 137, 182–3, 127, 187–9.
- 14.
Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, p. 86.
- 15.
The crossed-out section reads (with one slash to mark a new line): “For the former [] of my life it was wt out god/in the | world the Ld broght me into a/sad condition & in [] me; wn I layd down/I thought I should never rise up: & so wn rise/up; & burden was put of[f] & offerd to make any/my s. yet
thoghtthoght I had yn yr was/some compassion in a god; yet coming to/London & hearing yt never [] others more sound/yet I saw I could not repent; & heard/mr Simpson out of 36[:26] Ezek I’ll give a new/hart & Sp: yn god would give yt wc he commanded/me to doe. but god gave more & h. I waited/on god in use of means & resolved so to do/& hearing yt I might walke [as] Xt walked/& yn seeing how holy he was; yn I thoght the/Ld [would] draw.” - 16.
If that redacted narrative belonged to someone else, why wasn’t that person’s name written over it? All other times that Shepard crossed out one name he then inserted another, so that it was clear whose narrative he was copying out. And, in the case of Nathaniel Eaton’s wife, Shepard wrote her name in a header at the end of Robert Daniel’s narrative, then crossed it out and left the rest of the page blank, potentially to save the space for a later insertion of her record, or possibly to show that her narrative was not included in this notebook. It is possible that Shepard, consulting his scattered notes of trial, thought he had found Christopher’s and began writing, only to realize he had the wrong person, crossed that writing out and put Christopher’s actual narrative in. But this is not convincing; again, any other time Shepard had to make that sort of change he drew explicit attention to it. There are four other narratives that begin with one name that is crossed out and another inserted. Elizabeth Olbon’s page was originally for George Willows, whose name is crossed out; John Stedman’s page has Mr. Sanders name crossed out; Goodwife Holmes’ page has Mrs. Glover crossed out; and Widow Arrington’s name is written over another name (making that name illegible). All other times that Shepard crossed out one name he then inserted another, so that it was clear whose narrative he was copying out. And, in the case of Nathaniel Eaton’s wife, Shepard wrote her name in a header at the end of Robert Daniel’s narrative, then crossed it out and left the rest of the page blank, potentially to save the space for a later insertion of her record, or possibly to show that her narrative was not included in this notebook.
- 17.
His official narrative begins “The minister shewed god would work a new hart” and this could correspond to the minister Mr. Simpson referenced in the redaction. In the next line, Christopher references Mr. Wilson, so he is clearly in New England at that point.
- 18.
Robert Charles Anderson, et al., eds., The Great Migration: Immigrants to New England 1634–1635, Vol. II C-F (Boston: Great Migration Study Project, New England Historical Genealogical Society, 2001): 2.
- 19.
“In Peter hearing of excellency of fayth, tho I by catechism/kn[o]wige fayth yet it was a new th to me to close/wt Xt in prayer; & hearing by mr Phil: yt was a gift/of god & pray for it I should have it.”
- 20.
Stephen Paschall Sharples, Records of the Church of Christ at Cambridge in New England, 1632–1830 (Boston: Eben Putnam, 1906), 5, https://ia801408.us.archive.org/32/items/recordsofchurcho00firs/recordsofchurcho00firs.pdf
- 21.
“The best and choicest of my time was spent in a civil course of life, friends and others restrained, not questioning my estate. But yet the Lord made me see my case to be miserable and so carried many years under a spirit of bondage and fear of God’s wrath. Yet when my soul was at lowest the Lord held forth some testimony of love, but yet I did depend upon Him without assurance. And after this I had some assurance for whenever I did delight in my pleasures after I felt I did not. And in former times it was from fear of punishment but now all my trouble is because I want a heart to honor God. And now the chiefest desire is that I may live to honor Him though I find myself barren and fruitless.” Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 60.
- 22.
Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 61.
- 23.
It’s a bitter irony, then, that Selement and Woolley conclude their Introduction by saying that it was “wisest [to] render the Confessions into their most readable form [to attract] thereby the widest possible audience.” Selement and Woolley, eds., Thomas Shepard’s Confessions, 28.
- 24.
Mary Rhinelander McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record of Relations of Religious Experience, 1648–1649,” The William and Mary Quarterly 48, no. 3 (July 1991), 432.
- 25.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 440.
- 26.
The first one, dated May 10, 1648, given by Elizabeth Oakes, ends with two slashes and clear paragraphing.
- 27.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 443.
- 28.
McCarl realized this, as there is no [sic] in her original transcription. John’s narrative ended well: “upon examination” he found that “God had let me see I did not rest in anything I did but to come to him through Christ.” Shepard marked this ending with the usual semi-colon. Then a new paragraph began that reads: “I hope of love bec. god hath heard my prayers for the subduinge of my sin. & martif. of sin, I have lived in.” McCarl chooses to represent this new paragraph as a continuation of the previous sentence. This strips some meaning from the conclusion, as John moved from one strength to the next, noting that he had made even more progress since his previous statement. He expressed his hope of assurance (“hope of love”) and concluded his session, ready to make his public relation.
- 29.
McCarl writes, “The fourth relation is almost certainly by Isabell, first wife of Richard Jackson. She died on February 12, 1661. There were three Jacksons in early Cambridge: the brothers Edward and John and their humbler kinsman Richard. Edward and John were gentlemen, referred to as ‘Master’ in the records. Richard was known as ‘Brother’ or ‘Goodman’ Jackson, so his wife was properly Goodwife Jackson.” McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 436.
- 30.
McCarl says this about the narrative: “Leaves 1, 2, 3, 8, 9, and 10 are in Shepard’s hand.” Leaves 4, 5, and 6 were formerly a separate small leaflet that contained only the confession of Isabell Jackson. Shepard had begun to take down Goodwife Jackson’s confession (p. 6 of leaf 3) but was interrupted. Another member of the examining committee, who had begun notes on the testimony with the same quotation from Isaiah that Shepard had written down, took extensive notes on her testimony, including the entire question-and- answer session at the end of the formal deposition. The recorder was probably Edmund Frost or John Champney, lay leaders of Shepard’s congregation, but no corroborative sample of either man’s handwriting has been found. Rather than recopy or edit these notes, Shepard made them part of his larger notebook.” McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 7–18, 433.
- 31.
The elder’s spelling and usage differs from Shepard’s in some key ways. He spells out “Lord” instead of using “Ld,” spells out “and” instead of using “&,” often spells out “Christ” instead of using “Xt.”
- 32.
In her original transcription, McCarl writes “help” instead of “preaching.”
- 33.
As I note in Chap. 5, hearing this Isaiah 38 sermon in December 1639 is also referenced by Mary Parish and Jane Wilkinson Winship. The verse, as McCarl notes, is Isaiah 38:14, and is part of King Hezekiah’s plea to God when he thought he was on his deathbed. In his despair, he says in verses 11–13 that “I shall not see the Lord [in] the land of the living… thou wilt make an end of me… from day to night wilt thou make an end of me.” Then comes verse 14: “Like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter: I did mourn as a dove: mine eyes were lift up on high: O Lord, it hath oppressed me, comfort me.” When Hezekiah was in despair, he mourned, but he turned from this “chatter” to reach out to God to demand comfort. This, Shepard is saying once again, is what you should do when you are despairing—don’t spend your time bewailing it or wallowing in your humiliation, but act. Reach out for God to save you.
- 34.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 449.
- 35.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 452.
- 36.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 455.
- 37.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 458.
- 38.
It’s also very interesting to read Mary saying, “I came hither and planted us under Mr. Cotton,” as if she had made both decisions for her husband. In McCarl’s original transcription she includes the missing line, but with an error: she writes “wr we heard many precious truths.”
- 39.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 464.
- 40.
McCarl, “Thomas Shepard’s Record,” 433.
- 41.
The single exception to this all-encompassing loss is the discovery of nine Shepard-era leaves at the start of the Deacon’s books for the Cambridge church, my annotated transcription of which is at New England’s Hidden Histories, http://www.congregationallibrary.org/nehh/series1/CambridgeMAFirst. These fascinating records list all the recipients of church loans, salary, and charity from December 1638–1646 and include a few of the people included in records of trial in both Shepard notebooks.
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Rogers-Stokes, L. (2020). Close-Reading the Shepard Manuscripts. In: Records of Trial from Thomas Shepard’s Church in Cambridge, 1638–1649. Christianities in the Trans-Atlantic World. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50845-6_2
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