Authors and Writers Associated with Morristown / With a Chapter on Historic Morristown

by Julia Keese Colles

Rev. Joseph F. Tuttle, D. D.

To the Rev. Joseph F. Tuttle, D. D. we are indebted for the invaluable chronicles of events, of the life of the people, and of Washington and his army in Morristown during the Revolutionary period. Apparently, all this interesting story, in its details, would have been lost to us, except for his indefatigable zeal in collecting from the lips of living men and women, the eye-witnesses of what he relates, or from their immediate descendants, the story he gives us with such pictorial charm and beauty, warm from his own imaginary dwelling in the period of which he writes.

For the following sketch of this author we are indebted to the historian who follows, the Hon. Edmund D. Halsey.

Rev. Joseph F. Tuttle, D. D., son of Rev. Jacob and Elizabeth Ward Tuttle, was born at Bloomfield, N. J., March 12th, 1818. Fitted for college principally at Newark Academy, he graduated at Marietta College with first honors of his class in 1841. He entered Lane Seminary and was licensed to preach in 1844. In 1847 he was called to pastorate of church at Rockaway, N. J., as associate to his aged father-in-law, Rev. Dr. Barnabas King. He left Rockaway to accept the Presidency of Wabash College in 1862, and, after thirty years in that position, resigned in 1892.

During his fifteen years in this county he was a most voluminous and acceptable writer for the press—writing for the Observer, Evangelist, Tribune and other papers. But he is principally remembered more for his work as a local historian. He wrote, "The Early History of Morris County"; "Biographical Sketch of Gen. Winds"; "Washington in Morris County"; "History of the Presbyterian Church at Rockaway"; "Life of William Tuttle"; "Revolutionary Fragments", (a series of articles published in The Newark Sentinel of Freedom); "Early History of Presbyterianism in Morris County", and other shorter articles. At the time his Revolutionary articles were published there were still men living who had personal knowledge of the events of that era and he gathered an immense amount of material which but for him would have been lost.

The following from the pen of Dr. Tuttle appeared in The Newark Daily Advertiser of April, 1883:

A FINE RELIC AND A FINE POEM.

Thirty years ago and more my surplus energy was devoted to the innocent delights of hunting up places, people, facts and traditions associated with the American Revolution as preserved in Morris County. Some very charming rides were taken to Pompton, Mendham, Baskingridge, Spring Valley, Kimball Mountain, Singack, and other places. My rides made me certain that Morris County is both rich in beautiful scenery and historic associations. The results of these rides appeared in a series of "Revolutionary Fragments" printed in the Advertiser, as also in some elaborate papers before the Historical Society.

One day I visited the Ford Mansion, and met that polished and elegant gentleman, the late Henry A. Ford, Esq., then its proprietor. He was the son of Judge Gabriel H. Ford, grandson of Colonel Jacob Ford, Jr., whose widow was the hostess of Washington, the Winter of 1779-80, great-grandson of Colonel Jacob Ford, Sr., who built the "Ford Mansion," and great-great-grandson of John Ford, of Hunterdon County, whose wife was Elizabeth who was brought to Philadelphia from Axford, England, when she was a child a year old. Her father was drowned by falling from the plank on which he was walking from the ship to the shore. Philadelphia then had but one house in it. Mrs. Ford's second husband was Lindsley, and "the widow Elizabeth Lindsley died at the house of her son, Col. Jacob Ford, Sr., April 21, 1772, aged ninety-one years and one month," and so the courtly master of the "Ford Mansion," when I called to visit it, was of the fifth generation from the child-emigrant, whose father was drowned in the Delaware, in 1682.

The pleasure of the visit was greatly enhanced by the attentions of Miss Louisa, daughter of the gentleman named. She afterward became the wife of Judge Ogden of Paterson. The father and daughter with delightful courtesy took me over the famous house and associated in my memory the rooms and halls, and even the antique furniture with the family's most illustrious guest. I was especially interested in the old mirror that had hung in Washington's bedroom. Miss Ford produced a poem on that mirror, written, I think, by an aunt, and at my request she read it. She was a charming reader and promised me a copy.

Under date of Paterson, October 31st, 1856, Mrs. Ogden was kind enough to send me the promised copy with a note apologizing for the delay and adding: "I think, however, you will find the poetry has not spoiled by keeping." I have not ceased to be thankful that my first visit to the Ford Mansion was so pleasantly associated with the attentions of the father and daughter, both of whom have since died.

The mirror is a fine relic still to be seen with other elegant old furniture, belonging to the Ford family, at the "Washington Quarters" at Morristown, and I am sure all will regard the poem which pleased me so much thirty years ago as "one that has not spoiled by keeping."

ON AN OLD MIRROR USED BY WASHINGTON AT HIS HEADQUARTERS IN MORRISTOWN.

Old Mirror! speak and tell us whence
Thou comest, and then, who brought thee thence.
Did dear old England give thee birth?
Or merry France, the land of mirth?
In vain another should we seek
At all like thee—thou thing antique.
Of the old mansion thou seem'st part;
Indeed, to me, its very heart;
For in thy face, though dimmed with age,
I read my country's brightest page.
Five generations, all have passed,
And yet, old Mirror, thou dost last;
The young, the old, the good, the bad,
The gay, the gifted and the sad
Are gone; their hopes, their sighs, their fears
Are buried deep with smiles and tears.
Then speak; old Mirror! thou hast seen
Full many a noble form, I ween;
Full many a soldier, tall and brave,
Now lying in a nameless grave;
Full many a fairy form and bright
Hath flitted by when hearts were light;
Full many a bride—whose short life seemed
Too happy to be even dreamed;
Full many a lord and titled dame,
Bearing full many an honored name;
And tell us, Mirror, how they dressed—
Those stately dames, when in their best?
If robes and sacques the damsels wore,
And sweeping skirts in days of yore?
But tell us, too, for we must hear
Of him whom all the world revere.
Thou sawest him when the times so dark
Had made upon his brow their mark;
Those fearful times, those dreary days,
When all seemed but a tangled maze;
His noble army, worn with toils,
Giving their life blood to the soils.
Disease and famine brooding o'er,
His country's foe e'en at his door;
But ever saw him noble, brave,
Seeking her freedom or his grave.
His was the heart that never quailed;
His was the arm that never failed!
Old Mirror! thou hast seen what we
Would barter all most dear to see;
The great, the good, the noblest one;
Our own immortal Washington!
Well may we gaze—for now in thee
Relies of the great past we see,
Well may we gaze—for ne'er again,
Old Mirror, shall we see such men;
And when we too have lived our day,
Like those before us passed away,
Still, valued Mirror, may'st thou last
To tell our children of the past;
Still thy dimmed face, thy tarnished frame
Thy honored house and time proclaim;
And ne'er may sacrilegious hand,
While Freedom claims this as her land
One stone or pebble rashly throw
To lay thee, honored Mirror, low.

Y. F.