NARRATOR : The earnest seeker and hopeful discoverer of this new world always haunts the outskirts of his or her time. Our history is written in the lives of such individuals.
George Beecher was the fifth of Dr. Lyman Beecher’s children, and the third male to be ordained as a minister. He was brilliant, a precocious lad of whom much was expected—perhaps too much.
The family early discovered that George and Hattie were avid readers, and when Catharine brought home many books that Alexander Fisher had bequeathed her, and Dr. Beecher had inspected them, it was George that he told.

LYMAN : George, you may read Scott’s novels. I have always disapproved of novels as trash, but in these is real genius and real culture, and you may read them.

NARRATOR : And later, when the whole family was engaged in making apple butter, Lyman would challenge him to feats of memory.

LYMAN : Come, George, I’ll tell you what we’ll do to make the evening go off. You and I’ll take turns, and see who’ll tell the most out of Scott’s novels.

NARRATOR : Some passages he could recite verbatim, because he’d read the book several times over.
Harriet’s first writing instructor, John Brace, from Sarah Pierce’s school, got George started on investigating rocks.

HARRIET : Mr. Brace was one of the most stimulating and inspiring instructors I ever knew. He was himself widely informed, an enthusiast in botany, mineralogy, and the natural sciences generally, besides being well read in English classical literature. The constant conversations which he kept up on these subjects tended more to develop the mind and inspire a love of literature than any mere routine studies.
The boys were incited by his example to set up mineralogical cabinets, and my brother George tramped over the hills in the train of his teacher, with his stone-hammer on his shoulder, for many delightful hours. Many more were spent in recounting to me the stores of wisdom derived from Mr. Brace, who, he told me with pride, corresponded with geologists and botanists in Europe, exchanging specimins with them.

NARRATOR : At 16, George was very ill, though family matters went on.

LYMAN : This has been a good day; 25 have been added to the Church, and the work of awakening and conversion moves on and increases, on the whole, both here and in Milton.
We have been this three weeks in a state of deep sympathy for George, whose distress precluded sleep, almost, for many nights, and his voice of supplication could be heard night and day. But today, and especially this evening, he seems to be very happy, and, so far as I can judge by conversation, on good grounds. He is now with the girls, singing louder than he prayed. Mary and Harriet communed today for the first time, and it has been a powerful and delightful day.

NARRATOR : Dr. Beecher always observed the state of people’s souls, sick or well.

LYMAN : George seems to be one of the happiest creatures ever I saw. All this quickness and characteristic ardor seems now to be heightened by the contrast of joy with recent distress. He talks rapidly, and with much and unaffected simplicity, and is exceedingly interested now in the meetings, and begs he may stay a little longer to enjoy them.
Our family concert of prayer was held in the study, on Thanksgiving day—your mother, Aunt Esther, Henry, and Charles. It was a most deeply solemn, tender, and interesting time.
Henry and Charles have both been awakened, and are easily affected and seriously disposed now. But as yet it is like the wind upon the willow, which rises as soon as it is passed over.

NARRATOR : When the family moved to Cincinnati in 1832, George was not reluctant to leave Lawrence Academy, where he had been principal, and travel with them. Harriet reports the journey, on a new folio sheet of the Beecher’s round-robin letter.

HARRIET : Well, my dear, the great sheet is out and the letter is begun. All our family are here in New York, and in good health. Mother and her tribe are at Mr. Thomas’s. Father is to perform tonight in the Chathan Theater, ‘‘Positively for the last time this season.’’ I don’t know, I’m sure, as we shall ever get to Pittsburgh. Father is staying here begging money for the Biblical Literature professorship; the incumbent is to be C. Stowe.
He called yesterday on S. Van Rensselaer, and made such representations as induced him to subscribe $1,000 on the spot. They had really quite an affecting time, by all accounts.
Monday morning. Last night we had a call from Arthur Tappan and Mr. Eastman. Father begged $2,000 yesterday, and now the good people are praying him to abide certain days, as he succeeds so well. Father has been this morning in high spirits. He is all in his own element—dipping into books—consulting authorities for his oration—going around here, there, and everywhere—begging, borrowing, and spoiling the Egyptians—delighted with past success, and confident for the future.
Philadelphia, October 18. The truckman carted all the family baggage to the wrong wharf, and, after waiting and waiting on board the boat, we were obliged to start without it, George remaining to look it up. Arrived here late Saturday evening—dull, drizzling weather.
Father does not succeed very well in opening purses here. I saw today a notice in the Philadelphia about father, setting forth how ‘‘this distinguished brother, with his large family, having torn themselves from the endearing scenes of their home,’’ etc. etc., ‘‘were going, like Jacob,’’ etc.—a very scriptural and appropriate flourish.
Downington, Pa., October 19. Here we all are—Noah, and his wife, and his sons, and his daughters, with the cattle and creeping things, all dropped down in the front parlor of this tavern, about 30 miles from Philadelphia. If today is a fair specimen of our journey, it will be very pleasant—obliging driver, good roads, good spirits, good dinner, fine scenery, and now and then some ‘‘psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs,’’ for with George on board you may be sure of music of some kind. Moreover, George has provided himself with a quantity of tracts, and he and the children have kept up a regular discharge at all the wayfaring people we encountered. I tell him he is peppering the land with moral influence.

NARRATOR : George continues the account.

GEORGE : We had poor horses in crossing the mountains. Our average rate for the last four days to Wheeling was 44 miles. The journey which takes the mail-stage 48 hours, took us eight days. At Wheeling, we deliberated long whether to go on board a boat for Cincinnati, but the prevalence of the cholera there at last decided us to remain.
While at Wheeling, father preached eleven times—nearly every everning—and gave them the Taylorite heresy on sin and decrees to the highest notch; and what amused me most was to hear him establish it from the Confession of Faith. It went high and dry, however, above all objections, and they were delighted with it, even those in the strong Old School, since it had not been christened heresy in their hearing.
After remaining in Wheeling eight days, we chartered a stage for Cincinnati, and started next morning. At Granville, Ohio, we were invited to stop and attend a protracted meeting. Being in no great hurry to enter Cincinnati till the cholera left, we consented. We spent the remainder of the week there, and I preached five times and father four. The interest was deep and solemn each day, and when we left there were 45 cases of conversion in the town, besides those from the surrounding towns. The people were astonished at the doctrine; said they never saw the truth so plain in their lives.
From Granville we went to Columbus over corduroy roads, made of logs laid crosswise, for the benefit of dyspeptics.
We arrived safely at Cincinnati November 14th, and found our furniture had arrived the day before, so we were soon settled in our new habitation.

NARRATOR : George was ordained in Cincinnati, facing some of the same of the Old School who had challenged his father, including Dr. Joshua Wilson.

HARRIET : At his ordination, George was examined by Dr. Wilson. ‘‘Mr. Beecher, what is matter and what is mind, and what is the difference ’twixt and ’tween—and what is right and wrong, and what is truth, and what is virtue—and what is intellect, susceptibilities, and will and conscience—and everything else, world without end, amen’’
And the other doctors present: ‘‘Mr. Beecher, do you believe in the doctrine of election?’’ ‘‘Mr. Beecher, do you believe infants are sinners as soon as they are born?’’ ‘‘Do you believe that infants have unholy natures?’’ ‘‘Mr. Beecher, do you think that men are punished for the guilt of Adam’s first sin?’’
There was George—eyes flashing and hands going, turning first to right and then to left—‘‘If I understand your question, sir’’—‘‘Do you mean by nature thus and so? and so?’’ ‘‘Yes, sir’’ (to right). ‘‘No, sir’’ (to left). ‘‘I should think so, sir’’ (in front).

NARRATOR : : George accepted a call to a church in Batavia, New York. Soon after he joined the Anti-Slavery Society.
Within the family, the issue of slavery was considered a political question in broad perspective, and a moral one for individual decisions. Dr. Beecher was of the opinion,, and in this he was not alone, that slavery would slowly disappear in the South as it had in New York and Connecticut just a few years before. Therefore, all the abolitionist agitation of William Lloyd Garrison and his ilk was useless and downright dangerous.
Soon after leaving the Beecher household, George was the first Beecher to make a public stand on the slavery issue. Edward Beecher in Illinois had befriended Elijah Lovejoy in Illinois, but was still trying to establish a moral neutral ground in a rapidly polarizing situation. The following year, Lovejoy’s death by a mob at Alton, Illinois and Edward’s book about it, catapulted Edward into the anti-slavery movement as a national leader, spokesman for conservative abolitionists.
About the same time, Lyman Beecher was married for a third time, to Lydia Beals Jackson, a fine secretary and organizer of his many activities, though not an intellectual.
When Calvin Stowe’s beautiful wife Eliza died, Harriet comforted him, and soon after, married him. And George married; his wife Sarah had money of her own. Henry brought Eunice Bullard back from the East, married her, and took her to his first post, Lawrenceburgh, Indiana, just downriver from Cincinnati. Within a few short years, the Beecher family was scattered from Maine to Illinois.
Keeping in touch by mail was expensive, since letters were charged by the mile, and by the sheet. To solve this expense problem, a family circular letter was started at one end of the country on a single large folio sheet, with messages to be added by the next recipient and then sent on. When both sides of the huge paper was filled, often it would be turned sideways, and the writing continued. This was the letter in which Harriet and George reported their journey to Cincinnati.
On another such sheet, a controversy developed over George’s presumption of the perfectionism doctrine, much discussed but little adopted by ministers. Charles comments:

CHARLES : Brother George’s perfectionism is a curious matter, and lies in a nutshell. That a Christian can be perfect is evident, else God commands impossibilities. Whether they ever are or not, who can decide? Does one think oneself perfect? Amen. I hope s/he is not mistaken. So long as s/he behaves well, let the person pass for immaculate. If one does not behave properly, s/he deceives oneself. If you ask, ‘‘Have I attained?’’ I say, Ask God. The more you try to decide, and the nearer you come to an affirmative, the more probably is it you are deceived. The heart is deceitful who can know it?

NARRATOR : : Henry Ward adds his advice.

HENRY : There are some signs of better things among my people; more feeling in Church and congregation, and more solemn meetings, and some cases of incipient anxiety—just that state of things that encourges, yet makes me feel most powerless.
I wish, George, you could be here a while and help me. I would, if you were here, have continuous preaching, and believe immense good could be done. I thought it possible you might be able to come. Besides, we have grown almost strangers to each other since you groped off to Rochester, and I would fain have some of our long talks again.
As to perfectionism, I am not greatly troubled with the fact of it in myself, or the doctrine of it in you; for I feel sure that if you give yourself time and prayer you will settle down right, whatever the right may be; and I rejoice, on this account, that your judgment has led you to forebear publishing, because, after we have published, if we do not hit exactly right, there is a vehement temptation not to advance, but rather to nurse and defend our published views. The treatises which have had influence in this world from generation to generation are those which have been matured, re-thought, re-cast, delayed. Apples that ripen early are apt to be worm-eaten, and decay early, at any rate; late fruit always keeps best. I have seen people by an injudicious effort run so high aground that there never was a tide high enough to float them again. They dried, shrunk, and rattled. May God never let you run ashore.

NARRATOR : Harriet, now Mrs. Calvin Stowe, adds this.

HARRIET : Well, George, it seems to be the fashion of the day to address you firstly and prime; and I, setting apart metaphysics, will enter only that interesting department of physics which your gift of flower-seeds brings to mind. Many thanks for them, hoping that you and Sarah will be here to see them in all their glory. I have a fine place laid out for them, and shall proceed with them secundum artem.
What is your experience with dahlias? for I was never more puzzled in my life than with the contradictory directions I hear about soil, etc. Some say the richest you can find—can’t be too rich; and the other day a celebrated gardener of New York advocated dry gravel. What do you think? If you don’t write pretty soon it will be too late.

NARRATOR : Catharine writes:

CATHARINE : Where is the eastern circular that started from Hartford, or ought to have started, two months since? I shall recommend that anyone who delays a circular over a week shall lose the reading of the return one, as a penalty to make them remember. I shall flit about here this summer till I find where it is best to settle next. Love to you all.

NARRATOR : And Dr. Beecher.

LYMAN : William, why do you not write to your father? Are you not my first-born son? Did I not carry you over bogs afishing, astraddle of my neck, on my shoulders, and, besides clothing and feeding, whip you often to make a man of you as you are, and would not have been without? And have I not always loved you, and borne you on my heart, as the claims and trials of a first-born demand? Don’t you remember studying theology with your father while sawing and splitting wood in that woodhouse in Green Street, Boston, near by where you found your wife?
Little do those know who have rented that tenement since how much orthodoxy was developed and embodied there; and now why should all this fruit of my labors be kept to yourself? Let me hear from you soon.

NARRATOR : Even Calvin Stowe was a contributor.

CALVIN : Dear Brother George,—As to Perfectionism, Brother Charles ’spresses my mind ’zactly, and I trust you will duly appreciate the patriarchal, paternal, grandfatherly, and most judicious counsel of Brother Henry. Brother Charles’s advice as to faith and Brother Henry’s as to works, on this perfection matter, are just the thing, according to the best judgment of your dutiful brother.

NARRATOR : To which George replies:

GEORGE : I am quite amused with the sympathy of all my brothers, and their fatherly advice touching perfectionism, as if I were on the verge of a great precipice; but I trust in God who is able to keep me from falling.

NARRATOR : And William responds to his father’s plea:

WILLIAM : We received the circular, and forward it today. The Lord has been with us, and there is now a great amount of labor to be done, and great difficulties yet to be overcome. We expect to build a vestry and repair to the amount of $1,000.

NARRATOR : George moved to Rochester, New York to preach for a couple of years, then to Chillicothe, Ohio. In July of 1843, Catharine, on one of her many trips across the country, visited him there. He had just received the family circular letter, and had written the following, but had not sent it.

GEORGE : Dear brothers and sisters, all hail—I only wish I had you all here, and every room in my house stowed full. When, think you, Henry and Charles, shall I see your faces here? Can you not come, one or both, this summer? Our house is completed, except a little painting, and will be ready for everybody that will come in two weeks, so do make haste

NARRATOR : He then went on to list all the flowers and fruits that he had just planted for the fall and spring.
Dr. Beecher was also traveling that summer, stopping off in East Hampton for nostalgia’s sake—

LYMAN : We preached and prayed, exhorted and wept. It was a solemn and joyful time. I never had a visit of such thrilling interest.

NARRATOR : But he was also on business to procure an agent and secretary, when a friend stopped him on the street.

LYMAN : ‘‘Have you heard the dreadful news which has come into the city this morning?’’ I said, ‘‘No.’’ He said, ‘‘Your son George is dead,’’ and handed me the paper containing the account. The shock was like that of a blow across my breast which almost suspended respiration, and left to me only the power of articulating at intervals ‘‘Oh oh oh’’ Tears soon came to my relief, but they were not the tears of the father which flowed first, but the tears of disappointed hope for so much and so needed usefulness in the cause of Christ cut off.
But soon busy memory flashed upon me its thousand tender recollections of feature, and person, and affection, and cooperation, and his life’s history in rapid succession, and then a father’s heart paid the debt of nature in a flood of tears.
I went to my place of letters immediately, and met Catharine’s letter, which opened deeper the sluices of sorrow as I sympathized with you and yours in that overwhelming scene. I returned to my room through the streets of the city sighing and bathed in tears, subsiding and anon bursting out again.

NARRATOR : Catharine had stopped by George and Sarah’s in the morning, on the way to a speaking tour in the East. The next morning at breakfast, she heard the news. This is Harriet’s account, pieced together from eyewitnesses.

HARRIET : Noticing the birds destroying his fruit and injuring his plants, he went for a double-barreled gun, which he scarcely ever had used, out of regard to the timidity and anxiety of his wife in reference to it. Shortly after he left the house, one of the elders of his church in passing saw him discharge one barrel at the birds. Soon after he heard the fatal report and saw the smoke, but the trees shut out the rest from sight. In about half an hour after, the family assembled at breakfast, and the servant was sent out to call him. In a few minutes she returned, exclaiming, ‘‘Oh, Mr. Beecher is dead Mr. Beecher is dead’’
In a short time a visitor in the family, assisted by a passing laborer, raised him up and bore him to the house. His face was pale and but slightly marred, his eyes were closed, and over his countenance rested the sweet expression of peaceful slumber.
And so it is at last there must come a time when all the most heartbroken, idolizing love can give us is a coffin and a grave All that could be done for our brother, with all his means, and all the affection of his people and friends, was just this—no more
Oh my siblings all, let this first blood shed baptize you as soldiers of Christ, to fight in the steps of him who has fallen, but who also has triumphed. Then at last. ‘‘We all shall meet at Jesus’s feet; Shall meet to part no more’’

NARRATOR : Every Beecher felt the shock of it. There was no going back now, no return to innocence. The official explanation of George’s death was accident. Dr. Beecher never acknowledged suicide. Yet all the Beechers recognized that the intense pressures George felt were not his alone, they came with being a Beecher. Roxana Beecher’s last wish in 1816 had been a promise from Lyman Beecher that every one of her sons would enter the ministry. Charles also had suffered from that wish. He graduated from Bowdoin at 19, and knew eight languages.

CHARLES : I went to college too young. Father was in a hurry to get us all through and into the ministry.

NARRATOR : William, the eldest son, had not been suited to be a preacher, had not even been encouraged by his father—yet he had followed his mother’s deathbed wish. And others—Thomas, James, Charles, even Henry—had made serious plans for other careers. Yet every male in the Beecher family became ministers, and every female except Mary launched into fulltime public service careers. Beecherism, at times, was stronger than even the Beechers.

HARRIET : Our circle has begun to break up. Who shall say where it shall stop?

NARRATOR : Some feared that Catharine might be next. She was quite affected by George’s death. George had become a minister to please his father, and had suffered three nervous breakdowns trying to please his congregations. Catharine read through his papers to try to find the answer. If she found one, she never said—but she never returned to the Beecher residence as a dependent again. She no longer was a loyal supporter of Lyman Beecher.
Catharine gathered up George’s papers, and with Sarah’s permission, edited a memorial volume—The Biographical Remains of Rev. George Beecher. He was 34 years old.

CATHARINE : In presenting this book to the public, I intend to awaken hope and encouragement in all who, amid similar embarrassments, are pressing forward to mark for the prize of their high calling.

NARRATOR : Then, dressed in mourning, Catharine Beecher completed an extensive tour of upper New York and western Massachusetts, renewing old acquaintances and making new friends—hearing Charles Grandison Finney preach, staying in a Shaker community. Then, with the help of Mrs. Cortlandt Van Rensselaer, Catharine set out anew on her program to educate the American West.