Rev. John Lathrop

Rev. John Lathrop

BY KEITH W. PERKINS

BYU DEPARTMENT OF CHURCH HISTORY AND DOCTRINE

"JOHN LOTHROPP: FORBEAR OF PROPHETS, PRESIDENTS AND OTHERS"

REGIONAL STUDIES IN LDS HISTORY SERIES

The Reverend John Lothrop was Christened December 20, 1584. He was the fifth great-grandfather to Joseph Smith and the ancestor of three other presidents of the Church. It has been estimated that during the early Church of Joseph Smith's time, that one-quarter of the Church members were descendants of John Lothrop. John Lothrop was also the ancestor to four presidents of the United States: George W. Bush, George Herbert Walker Bush, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Ulysses S. Grant.

John Lothrop was a minister in the Church of England in Egerton. He left the Church of England because he didn't approve of their teachings. He believed the church's teachings were not in harmony with the scriptures. In 1623 he moved to London and became a member of the First Independent Church of London, in the Southwark part of London. John became the second pastor of the Independent Church of London in 1624.

A book on the genealogy of the early families in Barnstable, Massachusetts, tells of the belief and teachings of John Lothrop's group of Separatists in England:

"They denounced Popery as the great harlot of Babylon; but they never denounced the doctrines of the church of England as anti-Christian, or asserted that the parish churches were not true churches, and that the members thereof were not true Christians--they warred against the forms and ceremonies that the English Church had borrowed from Rome, against its Bishops and Archbishops, its prelatical rule, and claim to bind men's con¬sciences. They contended that the gospel should be preached in its purity, as it was in the apostolic times, before councils and synods and forged creeds, and that Christians should 'covenant with each other in the presence of Almighty God, to walk together in all God's ways and ordinances, according as He had already revealed, or should further make known unto them, and to forsake all false ways'; that man was not responsible to his fellow man in matters of con¬science, but to God alone, and that the life is the evidence of faith, as the fruit is of the goodness of the tree." Meeting separate from the Church of England and believing such doctrine brought persecution from the government upon John Lothrop and his followers. They met in various private homes at odd hours to avoid arrest and persecution. One of the Reverend Lothrop's followers gives the following description of persecution he received from bishops of the Church of England, upon leaving one of their meetings:

"In the heat of the bishop's severities were forced to meet very early in the morning and continue together until . . . . Meeting one Lord's day on Tower Hill, as I was coming out of the meeting, several rude fellows were about the door, and many stones were flung at me which did me no hurt."

Another one of the Reverend Lothrop's followers, William Kifton, describes their meetings and persecu¬tion:

"I joined myself to an independent congregation, being about twenty-two years of age, with a resolution as soon as it pleased God to open a way to New England, but the Providence of God prevented me; and in a better time it pleased God to provide for me a suitable yoke-fellow who was with me in judgment and who was joined to the same congregation with me. Being then in the heat of the Bishop's severities we were forced to meet very early in the morning and continue together till night, and amongst them, at their desire, I improved those small abilities God was pleased to give me, and although many times our meetings were disturbed yet I was kept out of the hands of the persecutor."

The congregation was always under the threat of arrest, banishment, or death. E. B. Huntington describes:

"At that date the congregation of dissenters to which he ministered had no place of public worship, their worship itself being illegal. Only such as could meet the obloquy and risk the danger of worshiping God in violation of human statute, were likely to be found in that secret gathering. Yet in goodly numbers, in such places in Southwark as they could stealthily occupy, they held together and were comforted and instructed by the minister of their choice. For not less than eight years they worshiped. No threats of vengeance deterred, and no vigilance of officious ministers of the vilated law detected them. More watchful grew the minions of [Bishop William] Laud. Keen-scented Church houndes traversed all the narrow ways of the city whose most secret nooks could by any possibility admit even a small company of the outlaws."

One of the main leaders against John Lothrop and the rest of the Puritans was William Laud, the Bishop of London at that time. Bishop Laud became one of the most zealous attackers of the Puritans and their form of worship. He did much to restore the Anglican Church to a more formal and strict form of worship. He enforced a form of worship that was in strict accord with the Book of Common Prayer and other more ritualistic forms of worship.

The Reverend John Lothrop and his followers met and avoided arrest for eight years. On April 22, 1632, while John Lothrop and sixty of his Separatists met worshiping, John and forty-two of his congregation were arrested and put in prison. Eighteen of the congregation escaped Bishop Laud's group of "ruffians." While John Lothrop was in prison, Laud became the Archbishop of Canterbury. (Although Laud was later arrested and beheaded for high treason). The charge against the reverend and his followers was "holding an illegal conventicle." During John Lothrop's questioning in the High Commission Court, John told Bishop Laud that he was a minister. Laud then asked, "How and by whom qualified?" John Lothrop responded pointedly in return, "I am a Minister of the gospel of Christ, and the Lord hath qualified me."

John Lothrop and his followers were asked by the court to take an oath of allegiance to the Church of England and admit that they had participated in an "illegal conventicle" but they all refused. One woman, Elizabeth Melborne, during her questioning explained why she would not take the oath: "I do not know any such thing as a Conventicle; we did meet to pray and talk of the word of God, which is according to the law of the land." To this remark the Archbishop of York replied, "God will be served publicly, not in your private house." Reading the account of the court records shows examples of the strong, brave women from Lothrop's congregation standing up to questioners.

One woman, Sara Barbone, escaped the prison and seven or eight others had been let out of prison in error or by friendly jail keepers. The jailers were then ordered by Bishop Laud to find the woman who had escaped and the ones let free and return them to the jail.

While some of the imprisoned congregation were treated favorably by the guards, John Lothrop was not. While John was confined "a fatal sickness was preying upon his wife, and bringing her fast toward her end." John asked to visit his wife before her death and Bishop Laud let him if he promised to return. John visited his wife and gave her a blessing. When his wife, Hannah died, John returned to the prison. This left John and Hannah's children helpless, with no one to care for them.

In the spring of 1634, all the prisoners taken during the April 23, 1632 raid, with the exception of John Lothrop, were released from prison. Life in the prison for John Lothrop must have been miserable. A description of a prison at that time is recorded by a Jesuit priest, F. Laithwaite, held in prison on a similar charge as John Lothrop's:

"Eighty men and women were huddled together in one filthy dungeon, where they were all chained by the feet to an iron ring in such a manner that they could only just change their position by sitting standing or lying down. They were eaten up by vermin, and surrounded by filth, which they had no means of removing, and the Jesuit's hands feet and face were so much swollen that he could not sleep for pain, whilst the stench made food loathsome."

Other descriptions of jails at that time describe terrible conditions. One account describes how when a prisoner was removed from the courtroom to be returned to his prison in the dungeon, "a blast of fetid air from the dungeons beneath poisoned the Court, and infected all who were present." Six hundred people in the courtroom became ill that day and 510 had died within the next five weeks, including judges, magistrates and most of the jury. Some rooms were described as being 12 feet square, holding fifty people.

Finally, Bishop William Laud, now the Archbishop of Canterbury, softened his heart after hearing the pleadings of John Lothrop's children, ages twenty to eight. John was released from jail on April 24, 1634 on the condition that he leave the country and never return. It appears that John did not leave the country immediately. He took time to reorganize his old congregation and settle a crisis over the form and age of baptism. This became a serious threat to John being arrested again, since this was a violation of his parole. In fact, a decree was issued for John Lothrop's arrest again but he was already on a boat heading for America where there was "a Church without a bishop and a State without a King."

While crossing the Atlantic Ocean, John Lothrop was reading his Bible and fell asleep when a spark from his candle fell upon the open page and burned a hole through several leaves. John patched the damaged pages and then, according to family tradition, supplied the missing texts from memory since no other Bible was accessible to him. Today, that same Bible is on display in the Sturgis Library in Barnstable, Massachusetts.

John arrived in Boston, Massachusetts on September 18, 1634, on the ship Griffin. Thirty of John's original congregation in London immigrated with America to him. They first settled at Scituate, Massachusetts, and then moved to Barnstable on Cape Cod. John Lothrop established the West Parish Church in Barnstable, Massachusetts, which is the oldest standing Congregational Church in America. Here John married his second wife, Ana. Some of Lothrop's biographers think her last name was Hammond.

"The remarkable thing about Lothrop--and the highest tribute to his character as a pastor--is the way in which his church followed him from point to point throughout his wanderings. Many of his original London congregation had sat under him in Scituate, and with him left Scituate for Barnstable. History can show few more perfect examples of the Shepherd and his flock. It is not without reason that the present Congregational Church in West Barnstable, which is the same organization that Lothrop brought down with him three hundred years ago, assert that their church has the longest uninterrupted history of any church of that denomination in the world."

"John Lothrop became a highly regarded religious and community leader in New England. Many prominent leaders in the United States and in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints claim him as their forebear. It is significant that Orson Pratt, in a letter to his brother Parley, stated, 'You will recollect that Joseph [Smith] had a vision and saw that our families and his all sprang from the same man a few generations ago.' "

Persecuted for His Faith

PAUL R. CHEESMAN, MONTE S. NYMAN AND CHARLES D. TATE JR.

EDITORS OF BOOK OF MORMON SYMPOSIUM SERIES

BYU RELIGIOUS STUDIES CENTER

1988 TO 1995

Even after King Henry VIII's break with Rome, England was not tolerant of religious diversity. The Church of England proved dogmatic and intolerant and vigorously persecuted those who did not fall into line. Many dissenters were burned for heresy. Joseph Smith's fifth great-grandfather, the Reverend John Lathrop, intially a minister for the Church of England, was more fortunate. Finding much Church of England doctrine not in harmony with scriptures, he left the state church and became a minister of The First Independent Church of London. For this breach of policy, the Bishop of London had him arrested and cast into prison.

While he was thus incarcerated, his wife died. He was not so much as allowed to attend her funeral, and his children were left with no one to care for them. He made repeated appeals for clemency, but the bishop refused even to listen to him. Finally the orphaned children went to the bishop as a group and personally pleaded for mercy. So pitiful were they . . . that the bishop was finally moved, and he released Lathrop on condition that he leave the country. This he did, and, with thirty-two members of his congregation, he went to America.

Seeking a Land of Freedom

PHILIP C. REYNOLDS, ED.

COMMENTARY ON THE BOOK OF MORMON, VOL. 6

SALT LAKE CITY, UT

The history of the Pilgrims and Puritans gives ample evidence of the type of captivity they left to come to a land of freedom and liberty. However, we quote herein a story published in the 1933 manual for deacons quorums of the Church to illustrate that the captivity was literal--even a captivity behind jail doors. The story follows:

"If one were to search among all the Prophet Joseph Smith's progenitors for one who best typified his righteous zeal for true freedom and his dauntless devotion to truth, perhaps no finer exemplification could be found than his fifth great-grandfather, the Rev. John Lathrop.

"He was a young minister of the Church of England, happily married, with a family of beautiful children. He labored faithfully until in his conscience he felt he could no longer approve the things he must teach. He resigned his position, left the church, and in 1623 became pastor of the First Independent Church of London.

"Persecution raged against him and his little band of devoted followers. They were forced to meet secretly, to escape the anger of the opposing bishop. One day, as they met in worship, they were discovered by agents of the bishop, who suddenly invaded their meeting place, seized forty-two of their number, and sent them in fetters to the old Clink Prison, in Newgate. Finally all but Mr. Lathrop were released on bail, but he was deemed too dangerous to be set at liberty.

"During these months of his imprisonment a fatal sickness had seized upon his wife, and she was about to die. Upon his urgent entreaty the bishop consented for him to visit his dying wife, if he would promise to return. He reached home in time, gave her his blessing, and she passed away. True to his promise, he returned to prison. His poor, orphaned children wandered about in helpless misery, until someone suggested that they appeal to the bishop at Lambeth. One can picture the mournful procession as they came before him, and made known their sorrowful plight.

"'Please sir', they cried piteously, 'Release our father or we too shall die.' The bishop's heart was softened and touched with pity, and he granted to John Lathrop his freedom, if he would promise to leave the country and never return.

"Gathering around him his children and 32 of his congregation, he sailed to America, settling in New England, where he was warmly welcomed and soon became one of the leaders among the Puritans of his day."

Church News Article

THE CHURCH NEWS

23 DEC 1984, PAGE 14

Joseph [Smith] knew that he had been called in this the greatest of all dispensations. And I think he knew that meant something as to his own calling, a calling that was initiated before this world was created.

That leads to the second point on which he gives us a little insight. "Every man," he said, "who has a calling to minister to the inhabitants of the world, was ordained to that very purpose in the Grand Council of heaven before this world was." And then he added, with some care and caution, "I suppose that I was ordained to this very office in that Grand Council." But he didn't merely suppose. By the end, he knew.

Brigham Young, who went without bread and much else in order to hear the Prophet speak on any subject at any time, even if he was only expressing opinions--that same Brigham Young who would die with the name of Joseph on his lips--once said, in a family reunion in Nauvoo, that what Joseph had in mind in saying, "You do not know me" was essentially a matter of heritage and blood. The Lord God had made covenant with Joseph who was sold into Egypt that in the last days that branch of Israel would indeed run over the wall, and God by appropriate unions of ancestors had watched over that blood until it came pure and unsullied into Joseph.

Brigham Young suggested Joseph was conscious of this preordained role and how the Lord had brought it about. As to the latter, an interesting letter was written from Orson Pratt to his brother Parley P. Pratt in the 1850's that says in effect: "You will recall that Joseph had a vision in which he saw that our ancestral line [meaning the Pratt brothers] and his [meaning the Smiths] had a common ancestor a few generations back." Apparently neither Parley nor Orson was able to confirm the link. The letter remained in an attic until about 1930, but then a granddaughter took it to Archibald F. Bennett, one of the outstanding genealogists of the Church, and he did the research.

He discovered that several generations back from Joseph Smith there was indeed a common ancestor named John Lathrop, and that not only was he the common ancestor of the Pratt brothers and Joseph Smith but also of other early Church leaders, including Wilford Woodruff, Oliver Cowdery, and Frederick G. Williams. In fact one estimate concludes that one-fourth of the early Church members in America were descended from John Lathrop.

The Prophet taught we would one day discover that all of us, regardless of our present guesses and researchings as to the origins and family, have in our veins the cumulative blood of Israel, and whether by actual birth or by adoption into the kingdom, or both, the Almighty intends that we shall belong literally to the family of Abraham. Those of us who have mostly gentile inheritance will find that through the renovating powers of the Holy Ghost we are made, as Joseph said, literally the seed of Abraham. The visible effect of that experience, he said, may be more powerful than is the impact of the Holy Ghost on others who have more of the blood of Ephraim. The kingdom is not a "close shop." It is not a power-mongering super-race. It is an open family into which we are grafted, and through which probably most of us have a heavy genealogical debt.

Joseph was an Ephraimite. He was ordained in the Grand Council before the world was. And he was that great prophet who was to come.

Saviors on Mount Zion

ARCHIBALD F. BENNETT

COMMENTARY ON THE BOOK OF MORMON, VOL. 6

DESERET SUNDAY SCHOOL UNION BOARD (1950)

The forefathers of the Prophet's mother, Lucy Mack, are equally notable. For the sacred principle of freedom of conscience in religion seven of them left England and Holland and came with that devoted band of Pilgrims on the Mayflower in 1690--Edward Fuller and his wife and little son Samuel, John Tilley and wife and daughter Elizabeth, and John Howland, who later married Elizabeth Tilley. The four parents all died from the hardships of that first cruel winter in the new land.

Another of her ancestors was Reverend John Lathrop, a Puritan preacher who was thrust into prison for the principles he taught. On his pledge to return to the jail he was released long enough to go to the bedside of his dying wife, give her a blessing and lay her away in peace. Then back to prison he went, true to his promise. Only upon the appeal of his homeless and destitute children was he released on the understanding that he leave England and never return. In America he was welcomed, and became one of the great religious fathers of his day. "No pastor was ever more beloved by his people and none ever had a greater influence for good. He fearlessly proclaimed views far in advance of his time."

Only in recent years has the name of his wife who died in England been discovered, so that her memory can be honored. She also was the daughter of a minister. Of their children, a son Samuel became the 4th great-grandfather of President Wilford Woodruff and also of Parley P. Pratt and Orson Pratt; a daughter Jane is the 4th great-grandmother of the Prophet. Thus was the Prophet's statement of his relationship to the Pratts verified.

Sealing That Were Accepted

ARCHIBALD F. BENNETT

COMMENTARY ON THE BOOK OF MORMON, VOL. 6

DESERET SUNDAY SCHOOL UNION BOARD (1950)

In 1928 I was instrumental in tracing the ancestry of Lucy Mack through her mother back to these Mayflower passengers and to Reverend John Lathrop and Hannah House [a.k.a. Hannah Howes]. When the records were complete the Smith Family members promptly attended to the temple ordinances for all progenitors then known of the Prophet Joseph Smith. I had been told that all the sealings were completed, and the Prophet was linked up by sealing with all these fore-parents. Later I accompanied Bishop Joseph Christenson to Cardston, Alberta, on a convention. On July 16, 1930 we attended a session in the Alberta Temple. I received the endowment blessings that day in behalf of my 7th great-grandfather, Henry Rowley, a member of Pastor Lathrop's congregation.

Just as I was about to leave the temple, President Edward J. Wood sent a messenger to request me to return to the sealing room. I did so. President Wood said, "Brother Bennett, I don't know just why I want you here, but I feel that you should be here to witness these sealings." I said I would gladly take part.

"We are performing sealings for the ancestors of the Prophet Joseph Smith," he explained, and then to the group of participants, "Who knows but what Brother Bennett may have had some part in tracing the connections with these very people?" The first names he read to be sealed for eternity were those of Rev. John Lathrop and his wife Hannah House. Then I knew why he had been impelled to send for me! This was their way of showing appreciation for being "found." The last couple sealed were Samuel Fuller, the boy who came on the Mayflower and whose parents had died soon after, and his wife, Jane Lathrop, daughter of John and Hannah