Chapter 1 - The Beginning

"The traveller, journeying through the highways of Bellingham, would see nothing to attract his attention or interest. It has no monuments, ruins nor historic associations; no mountain, nor hill even. The Charles River has travelled so little way from its source as hardly yet to be a river. The soil is stony and pays back not much more than is put into it. The fine forests of white oak have been mostly reduced to ashes in the stoves of Milford, and their oracles have ceased."
 

Except for the hills leveled for their gravel that has been used to fill the highways and lowlands of eastern Massachusetts, and the land cleared of trees to farm and develop for homes, Bellingham has changed little since these words were written. The description then is not far removed from the appearance of Bellingham when founded and the years between.
 

Despite its seeming agelessness, it is a Town that has lived through the travails of New England and America. Usually on the side of the down trodden and the underdog, it has not had its share of the rich and famous. Through all, however, it has been involved. The politician discussing "grass roots" is talking about Bellingham and the multitude of communities throughout America that shoulder the workload when needed, provide the soldiers in war and suffer the worst in bad times. The life is constant and some might even call it dull, because survival is not exciting when it means providing the food for the daily meals and a roof over your head.
 

The Town of Bellingham, Norfolk County, Massachusetts, was a series of paradoxes at birth. Allegedly named for a Governor who presided over the trial of the first Baptists in the colony, one of its first settlers was a Quaker and soon after its founding its only organized church was Baptist. The first settler historically credited to Bellingham probably lived in Woonsocket. Created with the proviso that the town provide a Congregational minister, it has not had one since twenty years after its creation. The largest landowner, probably in its history, never lived in Bellingham, and may never have visited his land in Bellingham.
 

Bellingham was not a typical Massachusetts town at its founding. The Pilgrims in Plymouth and the Puritans in Boston moved out from their areas to settle like minded and like thinking towns throughout the future Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Invariably these settlements were centered around the Puritan church, now more commonly called Congregational. "Puritanism was a way of life based on the belief that the Bible was the word of God, and the whole word of God." Each new town had a minister to oversee the souls of the settlers. These hard working men and women were shunned and even persecuted in England and now were spreading in an area where they felt secure in the practice of their religion. Security in their own religion did not breed tolerance of the beliefs of others. "Persons who read the Bible and sincerely believed in it, adopted or attempted a very exacting code of morals; and as they believed that this code was gospel ordinance, they endeavored to enforce it on others."
 

To believe differently was to tempt banishment. Many went to Rhode Island, Connecticut or were imprisoned or hanged. Most of the first settlers of Bellingham fell outside the tolerated sect.
 

"In their own conception, the Puritans were merely establishing the true Church according to the word of God; they were separating from the corruptions of the Church of England, not from the Church itself."
 

"The relationship between church and state was one of the things that the Puritans knew they must get right. They were certain that God had prescribed the terms of it, and they had thought much about it before leaving England, where church and state were confounded at every level from parish to Crown. In Massachusetts the Puritans drew a firmer dividing line between the two than existed anywhere in Europe. The state was still responsible for supporting and protecting the church: as guardian of the divine commission the state must punish heresy like any other sin. And it did so, inflicting loss of civil and political rights as well as other penalties. But in prosecuting heresy it did not operate as the agent of the churches. It formed its own judgements with the aid of a jury or in the General Court, where the representatives of the people sat in judgement with the magistrates. The church had no authority in the government and the government was particularly careful not to allow the actions of any church to afffect civil and political rights. In England excommunication carried heavy civil disabilities, in Massachusetts none. The right to vote and hold office was not revoked by loss of church membership."
 

"Though the clergy had no political authority of any kind, they did enjoy a very powerful indirect influence. They were highly respected by their congregations, and when unpopular measures had to be adopted, the magistrates counted on their assistance in reconciling people to the necessity of obedience. When a difficult decision had to be made, the magistrates frequently consulted the ministers, who were learned men and wise in the laws of God."
 

This odd relationship of church and state was a constant thorn in the side of the early Bellingham. The settlers of Bellingham were willing to accept and tolerate each others religion, but their neighbors and the colonial government were not.