Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Secular World
From the 1870s to the Present
Zoe Knox
School of History, Politics & International Relations
University of Leicester Leicester, UK
Histories of the Sacred and Secular, 1700-2000
ISBN 978-1-137-39604-4 ISBN 978-1-137-39605-1 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-39605-1
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017955670
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Preface
In summer 2015, my friend Mikey, whom I had not seen for almost a decade, came to stay. There had been many changes in his life since we last met. Most notable was his purchase of shares in a rainforest community in the Sunshine Coast hinterland in Queensland, Australia. Since the early 1970s, the residents have sought to live off grid, creating a self-sufficient eco-community that eschews the pressures of modern life and the suburban sprawl that characterises coastal development. They aim to preserve and protect the native flora and fauna of the regenerating rainforest in which they live. Mikey had spent a year building a house from several trees he had felled on his twenty-three-acre property. A small area was set aside for this modest dwelling; the remainder of the land, he explained to me, was for the creatures.
After discussion of his new lifestyle, the conversation turned to my research. When I told Mikey I was writing a book on the history of the Watch Tower Society, he said that in the four years since he had entered the community, he had only had one visit from an uninvited party: two Jehovah’s Witnesses. He was impressed by their commitment in negotiating the six kilometres of dirt track to his home and their determination to reach him despite the isolated location, physical barriers, and commune arrangement. Why had they gone to all that trouble, he asked me. What had they expected would happen when they reached him?
Mikey received a long reply. The Witnesses’ visit was fascinating to me because it was so typical and yet so remarkable. It was typical in the sense that hundreds of thousands of Witnesses surprise households by knocking on their door or ringing their bell every day, all over the world, sometimes
after traversing more challenging terrain than the driveway to Mikey’s. The visit was remarkable because this one experience encapsulates the determination of ordinary, rank-and-file Witnesses to minister to nonWitnesses, the urgency they feel to share their beliefs, and the curiosity (and occasionally, although not in this instance, animosity) of those they seek to reach with their message of salvation.
The questions my friend asked are at the heart of this study. The reasons for Jehovah’s Witnesses’ emphasis on ministry, and the issues it raises in modern society, for both governments and the public, are explored here. There are many tensions between their theological convictions and the demands of the modern world and yet their spiritual mission has remained largely unchanged since the late nineteenth century: to reach every corner of the earth with the Kingdom Message. It was this imperative that led them down the track into the deep, almost impassable, rainforest wilderness that is Mikey’s home.
Leicester, UK
Zoe Knox
acknowledgments
This book took my research in a new and exciting direction. It started with an interest in religious diversity and democracy in the former Soviet Union and grew into a preoccupation with one particular religious group, which, I discovered, had tested the boundaries of tolerance not just behind the Iron Curtain but worldwide.
Many people helped me to complete this work. A great number of archivists and librarians assisted in locating the primary source materials underpinning this study. Most of them played brief (albeit important) parts, but Jackie Hanes at the University of Leicester library has been consistently helpful and resourceful. Chloe Renwick, a student intern, assisted me for a few fruitful months. Various bodies awarded funding that enabled archival research for other, smaller projects that have fed into this book, among them the Nuffield Foundation, Wellcome Trust, Keston Institute and the College of Arts, Humanities and Law Development Fund. A period of Academic Study Leave from the University of Leicester helped me to finalise it.
By far my greatest debt of gratitude is to George Chryssides. He was very encouraging when I first contacted him with questions regarding Jehovah’s Witnesses in 2007 and in the decade since has been hugely generous with his resources, time, and expertise. I am also very grateful to Emily Baran, who provided valuable feedback on the final manuscript at short notice. The various (and varied) contributors to the JW Scholars listserv have offered keen insights into Witness history and theology, and I am thankful to them. Any errors that appear are of course my own. Portions of chapters 1, 4 and 7 appeared in a different form in Journal of
Religious History 35, no. 2, (2011), Journal of American Studies 47, no. 4 (2013) and a chapter in M. D. Steinberg & C. Wanner (eds), Religion, Morality, and Community in Post-Soviet Societies (2012).
Colleagues at Leicester have been supportive of my endeavours, chief among them Clare Anderson, James Campbell, Andrew Johnstone, and George Lewis. I have benefited from discussions and email exchanges with Miriam Dobson, Jayne Persian, and Tim Richter. Zoe Coulson, Stella Rock, and Susan Venz were important in ways they will likely be unaware of. Firm words from Robyn Woodrow helped during the final push. Conversations with Mikey offered inspiration. I thought often of the late, the great, Grant McLennan.
My family has played a vital part in pushing this project forward by constantly asking when it would be finished. I am deeply saddened that Granny Grey did not live to see its completion. I wish to thank my parents, who read and commented on the manuscript at various stages, and my husband, who accompanied me on fact-finding missions at home and abroad. My sister provided a base in Geneva and was in other ways supportive. This book is dedicated to my sons. It is my hope that one day they will read it and perhaps even find something of interest in its pages.
list of figures
Image 1.1 Charles Taze Russell (1852–1916), founder-leader of the Bible Students, known from 1931 as Jehovah’s Witnesses.
© Granger Historical Picture Archive/Alamy Stock Photo 7
Image 2.1 A typical Kingdom Hall in Antrim, Northern Ireland in 2012. Congregational meetings are now less frequent than this noticeboard indicates. © Stephen Barnes/Alamy Stock Photo 45
Image 3.1 Walter Gobitas with Lillian and William in 1940. The children’s refusal to salute the American flag at school led to important US Supreme Court cases. © Granger Historical Picture Archive/Alamy Stock Photo 69
Image 4.1 A slide from Russell’s The Photo-Drama of Creation, first screened in 1914. It was an innovative ministry tool and a significant development in motion picture history. © Ryan McGinnis/Alamy Stock Photo 117
Image 5.1 The Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses determines policy on all matters, including blood transfusion. It is based at the world headquarters, which was located in Brooklyn (the complex can be seen here to the right of Brooklyn Bridge) until a recent move to Orange County, New York.
© Ryan McGinnis/Alamy Stock Photo 164
Image 6.1 Men awaiting baptism at a Jehovah’s Witness convention at Twickenham Stadium, London in 2014. Temporary pools were erected on the rugby pitch for the occasion.
© Matthew Chattle/Alamy Stock Photo 230
Image 7.1 A Soviet anti-Witness poster produced in 1981. It is rich with symbolism, aligning the organisation with interests allegedly governing capitalist America, including American Jewry, banking and finance, and war-mongering. Image courtesy of The Keston Center for Religion, Politics, and Society, Baylor University, Waco, Texas
Image 8.1 The Watch Tower stand at the Miami-Dade County Youth Fair and Exposition in Florida, USA in 2017. Note the prominence of the web site address. © RosaIreneBetancourt
3/Alamy Stock Photo
260
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CHAPTER 1
Introduction
Jehovah’s Witnesses have their origins in the tremendous religious ferment of nineteenth-century America. The writer Ralph Waldo Emerson captured the energy and fervour of the faithful and the intellectual and spiritual mood of the times in his description of those assembled to discuss the topic of priesthood at the Chardon Street Chapel in Boston, Massachusetts in November 1841. ‘The composition of the assembly was rich and various’, Emerson observed. It drew together,
…from all parts of New England, and also from the Middle States, men of every shade of opinion from the straitest orthodoxy to the wildest heresy, and many persons whose church was a church of one member only. A great variety of dialect and of costume was noticed; a great deal of confusion, eccentricity, and freak appeared, as well as of zeal and enthusiasm. If the assembly was disorderly, it was picturesque. Madmen, madwomen, men with beards, Dunkers, Muggletonians, Come-outers, Groaners, Agrarians, Seventh-day-Baptists, Quakers, Abolitionists, Calvinists, Unitarians and Philosophers—all came successively to the top, and seized their moment, if not their hour, wherein to chide, or pray, or preach, or protest.1
The early part of the century had seen a revival within Protestantism and, alongside this, a rise in premillennialism, the belief that Jesus Christ would return to the earth and take the righteous up to heaven, thus marking the start of the thousand-year epoch before the final judgment. A wide
© The Author(s) 2018 Z. Knox, Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Secular World, Histories of the Sacred and Secular, 1700-2000, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-39605-1_1
interest in premillennialism was further fuelled by the prophecies of William Miller, a Baptist preacher born in Massachusetts and raised in upstate New York. Miller predicted that the second coming would occur ‘about the year 1843’.2 When the year passed uneventfully, the Millerites, as his followers were known, were not discouraged. On the contrary, they identified a precise date for the second coming: 22 October 1844. In Miller’s own estimation, some 50,000 Millerites eagerly awaited the return of Christ.3 The day elapsed without incident. Hiram Edson, a Methodist preacher and dedicated Millerite, wrote vividly of their despair: ‘Our fondest hopes and expectations were blasted, and such a spirit of weeping came over us as I never experienced before. It seemed that the loss of all earthly friends could have been no comparison. We wept, and wept, until the day dawn’.4
While the failure of Millerite prophecy gave many cause for disillusionment, for others it served to reinvigorate their study of biblical chronology. The major denominations that emerged under the broad umbrella of the Adventist movement essentially arose from the varied responses to what became known as the ‘Great Disappointment’. Edson was a prominent figure in the early history of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, for example, along with other former Millerites, among them Ellen G. White. The search to identify the precise date of Christ’s return also animated Charles Taze Russell, a haberdasher from Allegheny City, now a part of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is in his quest for clarity on biblical chronology that the origins of the Watch Tower organisation can be found. Small groups of men gathered in what they called ‘ecclesias’ to discuss scripture, guided by Russell’s own tracts. These study circles prompted the men, eventually known as Bible Students, to forge an identity that marked them apart from the established Christian churches. Russell’s differences from key Adventist figures amounted to no greater a deviation than many of the Second Adventist (sometimes called Firstday Adventist) offshoots, but, in due course, the distinctiveness of their interpretations became more apparent and they developed an independent identity.
Thus, from their humble origins as small, loose-knit groups of Bible Students, Russell and his followers laid the foundations of a highly visible, and frequently controversial, worldwide religious organisation, known since 1931 as Jehovah’s Witnesses. The growth and spread of the faith was remarkable, even by the standards of the day, when spiritual ferment in fin de siècle United States, Great Britain, and Germany led to
the emergence of a great number of new religious communities. Since the 1940s, the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania,5 the corporate body of Witnesses, has become genuinely international, using its distinctive doorstep ministry to spread its teachings (‘the Truth’) around the world. There are congregations of Jehovah’s Witnesses in 240 countries, from Albania to Zimbabwe. Most Witnesses reside outside of the United States, giving the organisation a greater global presence than any other ‘American original’, to use the American historian Paul K. Conkin’s term for ‘homemade varieties of Christianity’.6 Of the 8,220,105 active Witnesses worldwide in 2015, only 1,231,867 were in the United States.7 For this reason, a study of the history of the organisation must look beyond its birthplace and to its global community (Image 1.1).
The number of Jehovah’s Witnesses worldwide is small compared to the major Christian churches. The Vatican counts 1.2 billion Catholics; there are 105 million adherents of Baptist churches; and 125 million Russian Orthodox believers. Despite its modest membership, the Watch Tower Society has historically been at the forefront of debates about a remarkably wide range of issues related to religious toleration. Throughout their history, Witnesses’ unique interpretation of the Bible has repeatedly brought them into conflict with state authorities, in both democratic and authoritarian settings. This continues in the twenty-first century. In 2015, for example, hundreds of Witnesses were imprisoned around the world, the majority of them for refusing to perform military service, organising Bible study sessions in private homes, or evangelising. One Brussels-based human rights group documented 555 Witnesses serving terms in South Korea for refusing to perform military service. It also recorded cases of Witnesses imprisoned for their beliefs in Azerbaijan, Eritrea, Singapore, and Turkmenistan.8 Historically, religious identities have often been forged through shared persecution (the Protestant tradition in England is one such example). In the twentieth century, there were few religious communities that so clearly forged collective identities through oppression, and on such a large scale. This has strengthened their group identity and cohesion. The persecution of ordinary Witnesses around the world is a major theme in the Society’s literature to the present day.
Far from being passive in the face of opposition, the Society has brought cases before the highest courts and won landmark legal decisions. Mark McGarvie, a historian of American law, argued that Witnesses were con-
temptuous of American values: ‘Professing their acceptance of God’s true laws, they [Jehovah’s Witnesses] expressed disdain for many of the legal and cultural values of the United States’.9 By casting Witnesses as opponents of American values we miss the extent to which they have defined and upheld these values, particularly when it comes to legal culture. In addition to its many historic victories, the Society secured a major win in the United States Supreme Court in 2002. The decision in Watchtower Society v. Village of Stratton overturned an ordinance in Stratton, Ohio which required would-be canvassers to obtain a permit from the mayor’s office by completing a registration form. The decision was important for the organisation because it allowed Witnesses to access private residential property without first securing a permit. It benefited other itinerant evangelists in the same way. More broadly, the decision protected free speech, one of the bedrocks of the First Amendment. It declared unlawful the requirement that anonymity be lifted through a registration process before canvassing, thus protecting the right of every American to engage in anonymous speech.10 They have had a defining influence on rights legislation beyond the American context, too: the European Court of Human Rights has made multiple rulings in the Society’s favour, overturning decisions by state authorities particularly in Greece and the former Soviet Union.11 The impact of Witnesses on modern conceptions of religious freedom is far out of proportion to their numbers and cannot be dismissed as merely a product of their hostility towards the secular world.
The determined effort to remain aloof from the world has, paradoxically, drawn the Watch Tower organisation into a remarkably wide range of issues. Some of these are historically linked with religious minorities, such as conscientious objection, and others not so obviously connected with belief, such as medical treatment. M. James Penton, a historian, former Witness and fierce critic of the Society, has argued that Witnesses have provoked a harsh response from governmental authorities because of their interactions with the world and their persistent proselytism. He observed: ‘Most societies can and will tolerate a small, uncooperative religious minority which submits to a ghetto-like existence. But when such a group refuses to be isolated and attempts to make converts by the millions, then in the eyes of many political leaders it becomes a socially disturbing force which should be curbed or outlawed’.12
The Watch Tower Society’s interpretation of biblical verse has led to fundamental challenges to the traditional jurisdictions of modern governments, such as inculcating patriotism and conscripting armies, and to more modern mandates, such as facilitating harmony in interdenominational relations. Coupled with the intransigence of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the face of obstacles to their meetings and ministry, this has meant that Witnesses have suffered for their convictions and have been subjected to both legal and extra-legal persecution in a wide range of geographical contexts. These experiences have, in turn, shaped the culture of this religious community.13 Sustained opposition can entrench, rather than overturn, marginal positions. The persecution of Witnesses has reinforced their conviction of the righteousness of their cause. The Society frequently raises the Nazi Party’s repression of Witnesses in Germany in articles on the challenges that Witnesses must face as the only true Christians. It likens the persecution of the early Christians for their message to the persecution of Witnesses in the modern world.14
This book examines how Jehovah’s Witnesses have challenged the jurisdictions of modern states and influenced understandings of religious tolerance and freedom of worship worldwide. Their influence is all the more remarkable given that they aim to remain aloof from the world. This detachment differs markedly from many other religious organisations, including those derived from Adventist roots. For example, the Seventh-day Adventist Church lobbies for religious freedom around the world through its Department of Public Affairs and Religious Liberty (PARL), which is based in the Church’s headquarters in the United States. PARL reaches beyond the Seventh-day Adventist community to lobby national governments and international organisations as well as to cooperate with other faith communities on a range of policy issues, from health care to prisoners’ rights. In contrast, the Watch Tower Society is remarkably insular. Whilst it engages with the secular state through courts of law, this is to a narrow end, namely opposing attempts to inhibit the public ministry of Witnesses. They have unintentionally championed the rights of a wide range of other religious minorities around the world. The Society has long acknowledged the broader impact of its legal advocacy but has never presented this as a motivation for legal challenges.15
Z. KNOX
In addition to how and why Jehovah’s Witnesses have come into conflict with governmental authorities, this book also explores the ways in which the secular world has shaped the organisation. Like other religious groups, the Society has had to respond to new technologies, secular ideologies, and geopolitical configurations to avoid obsolescence. Its interpretation of scripture has altered along with worldly developments, which has in turn led to new policies, some of which have posed novel challenges to governments. Since 1971, the Society’s doctrines have emanated from the Governing Body, a group of men based at the world headquarters. Between seven and eighteen men have served on the Governing Body at any one time.16 The Body has determined policies and procedures that shape the behaviour of Witnesses worldwide. This includes public conduct, such as deportment when manning information stalls, and intimate acts, such as the sexual positions permitted between husband and wife.17 These behavioural guidelines sometimes shift: sexual relations within marriage are now regarded as a matter of individual conscience, for example. More generally, the rapid pace of the modern world has challenged it to adapt to ever-changing conditions, just as it has the leadership of other Christian churches. The theological foundations of even the best known of the Society’s doctrines have not been investigated by historians, nor has the evolving position of the Governing Body on these issues.
It is a truism that all evangelical churches regard evangelism as a fundamental Christian calling. The emphasis on ministry is not unique to the Watch Tower Society. It is the scale of this endeavour that marks Witnesses apart from other Christian communities. The insistence on public ministry coupled with their unusual beliefs and condemnation of other Christian churches lends Witnesses a presence and a visibility that is far greater than their numbers, from the densest of human societies to the most sparsely populated. For the Mam people in Chiapas on the southern border of Mexico, for example, Witnesses’ ‘presence in the Sierra [Madre de Chiapas] and rain forest regions stands out more for the confrontational character of their religious and antinationalist discourse than for their numerical importance’.18 It is not only their approach to evangelism but also their lifestyle that attracts attention to Witnesses and marks them apart from other religious communities. The earliest analysts of Witnesses saw in their day-to-day practices an entirely different way of living to that of other faiths.19
Image 1.1 Charles Taze Russell (1852–1916), founder-leader of the Bible Students, known from 1931 as Jehovah’s Witnesses. © Granger Historical Picture Archive/Alamy Stock Photo
Making Witness History
In 1967, W. C. Stevenson, a sociologist (and ex-Witness), wrote: ‘Considering the size and influence of Jehovah’s Witnesses as a movement, there has been surprisingly little written about it, and much of that has come from sources so hopelessly prejudiced that their contribution is quite worthless’.20 Precisely the same may be said half a century later.
Z. KNOX
There is a vast ocean of literature on Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Watch Tower Society, much of it so partial and methodologically impoverished as to be of limited use to those seeking an understanding of the history of the Society and the beliefs and practices of its members. Serious historians have paid little attention to the subject. There are four main bodies of literature on Witness history: the material produced by the Society itself; memoirs and accounts by former Witnesses; critiques written by opponents of the organisation; and historical studies. From the mid-1990s, there was a brief flowering of Witness apologetic material, although this has largely disappeared. Each of these will be outlined briefly here.21
The publication of religious literature has been of paramount importance to Witnesses since Charles Russell began publishing Bible tracts with proceeds from his family’s haberdashery business. Even today, members engaged in house-to-house ministry are known by the Society as ‘publishers’ and figures on membership are given as ‘publishing statistics’.22 Consequently, historians of Witnesses have a wide range of printed material at their disposal, including books, yearbooks, magazines, and brochures, dating back to the earliest days of the movement. This body of material offers unique opportunities and challenges for the historian.
There is a remarkable degree of uniformity in the Society’s literature worldwide. The literature distributed by its branch offices (the national or regional headquarters) around the world is produced by the Writing Committee, one of six committees charged with articulating the policies of the Governing Body. After translation into the vernacular by a linguistic team 2500-strong, this material is published in its own printing plants. The flagship magazine The Watchtower Announcing Jehovah’s Kingdom (hereafter The Watchtower) is published in 303 languages simultaneously, which includes thirty-six sign languages. It is also published in Braille in twenty languages.23 The Society maintains a website (www.jw.org) with countless pages of easily accessible and searchable information about Witnesses’ beliefs and the organisation’s activities worldwide. This publicly available material presents a sanitised and selective version of its history. This does not mark it apart from other religious bodies, most of which make efforts to manipulate their public image, although of course they would not use those terms.
The organisation is unusual in that it places little importance on the production and preservation of sources on its past history, which has led to a limited engagement with historical inquiry. Witnesses generally do not publish material on their own spiritual journeys or provide accounts of congregational life independent of the official organisation, although these do
appear.24 Historians are largely denied the insights of rank-and-file Witnesses into their organisation. The sociologist Ronald Lawson (an Adventist himself) observed that Seventh-day Adventist universities and colleges have historically had strong history departments due to the early preoccupation with the fulfilment of prophecy.25 As a result a great deal of work has been done on the early history of Adventism. Similarly, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ emphasis on record keeping, archival collection, and history writing has led Mormon scholars to produce important work on the origins and development of the Church.26 In stark contrast, there is no serious academic study even of Russell, the founder-leader of the organisation.27 This oversight has served to obscure the origins of the organisation. There is a vast body of ‘apostate’ literature penned by former Witnesses who have either defected (in the Society’s parlance, ‘disassociated’) or been ex-communicated (‘disfellowshipped’). The purpose of these publications is usually to tell the author’s story and, in doing so, uncover the inner workings of the world headquarters, expose the inhumanity of the Governing Body, or reveal how the organisation ‘controls’ ordinary Witnesses. The sociologist Bryan R. Wilson argued for the necessity of treating the testimonies of ex-members of any faith with caution:
The disaffected and the apostate are in particular informants whose evidence has to be used with circumspection. The apostate is generally in need of selfjustification. He seeks to reconstruct his own past, to excuse his former affiliations, and to blame those who were formerly his closest associates. Not uncommonly the apostate learns to rehearse an ‘atrocity story’ to explain how, by manipulation, trickery, coercion, or deceit, he was induced to join or to remain within an organization that he now forswears and condemns.28
The material produced by former Witnesses must be analysed with Wilson’s caution in mind. As a rule, apostate literature can be identified by its title; two widely read books are Blood on the Altar: Confessions of a Jehovah’s Witness Minister and 30 Years a Watch Tower Slave. 29 For the most part, these kinds of accounts do not purport to contribute to the reader’s understanding of Witness history and theology beyond exposing the evils of the organisation, but are nonetheless often cited uncritically, even in academic publications. This speaks to the paucity of historical scholarship on the group.
A third type of literature is produced by those who write from a Christian denominational perspective. Very often the explicit aim is to help Witness readers to escape from the Society’s clutches and to find ‘true
Z. KNOX
Christianity’ (which takes any number of forms). Its authors use the emotive language of the Christian Countercult Movement (CCM), which has its origins in the early twentieth century, and the Anti-Cult Movement (ACM), which emerged in the United States in the 1970s, and usually aims to expose the fallacies in the Watch Tower Society’s interpretation of scripture. These authors have, by and large, failed to engage with academic studies, as Religious Studies scholars George D. Chryssides and Benjamin E. Zeller have observed: ‘… the ACM has largely decided to disparage academic study, frequently referring to prominent academics in the field [of New Religious Movements] as “cult apologists”’.30 Although most of this material has very little scholarly value, it is relied upon by scholars outside of the discipline of history who seek to understand the fundamentals of Witness history. It has had a profound influence on public perceptions of Witnesses (explored in Chap. 7) despite its inherent biases. Related to this is a genre of literature that has now largely receded but is important by virtue of its very existence, however diminished: Witness apologetics. The best known Witness apologist, Marley Cole, wrote his popular Jehovah’s Witnesses: The New World Society (1955) in the voice of an outside observer, but Cole was a Witness and the book was commissioned by the Society.31 At the turn of the millennium, the apologetic genre flourished as a number of Witnesses published defences of their faith independent of the organisation’s oversight.32 This was partly in response to the ongoing campaign against them by members of the CCM and partly in response to the new opportunities afforded to them by the Internet to foster a network of like-minded believers. In addition to books, in contributions to conferences, websites, blogs and chat rooms, Witnesses discussed elements of Watch Tower theology free from official scrutiny. By 2007, however, this activity had become too high profile for the Governing Body to ignore. A short piece in Our Kingdom Ministry unequivocally condemned the ‘independent groups of Witnesses who meet together to engage in Scriptural research or debate’.33 The emerging apologetic community was largely silenced in the wake of this opprobrium.34
Finally, there is a slowly expanding body of literature written by professional historians. There are only two scholarly books focusing on the organisation’s history, which is remarkable given its renown. Herbert H. Stroup’s The Jehovah’s Witnesses (1945) was published more than seventy years ago, and is thoroughly outdated. It does not address the dramatic international expansion after World War II, for example. M. James Penton’s Apocalypse Delayed: The Story of Jehovah’s Witnesses (first published in 1985 and most recently revised in 2015) is deservedly regarded a
landmark study in the field of Witness history. His estrangement from the Witness community colours his analysis, however.35 Penton was disfellowshipped from his congregation in Lethbridge, Canada in 1981 and experienced a traumatic exit from the organisation, one which was covered in the national media and has since been well documented.36 A recent book by Chryssides matches Apocalypse Delayed in its comprehensive coverage of the Watch Tower Society’s teachings. Jehovah’s Witnesses: Continuity and Change (2016) is important for its recognition of the pressing challenges facing the Society and examination of how these shape the modern organisation. Chryssides is not a historian and his treatment of the history of the community is therefore not detailed.37
In the last decade there has been a surge of interest in Witness history that is overturning historical orthodoxies in some areas. For example, rather than regard them as a unique case, recent scholarship has sought to situate the Bible Students/Jehovah’s Witnesses more firmly within the Protestant tradition (this is directly opposed to the position taken by ACM and CCM writers, who emphasise their departure from it). The historians Gerhard Besier and Katarzyna Stokłosa, for example, identify many Witness beliefs, such as the denial of the Trinity, as ‘merely part and parcel of the history of Christian minorities’. They note that such minority groups have always been viewed as heretics and ‘dismissed as irrelevant by the majority’.38 The denigration and dismissal of Witnesses by the mainstream Christian churches might therefore be seen as part of a broader effort to marginalise newcomers. The efforts of amateur historians B. W. Schulz and Rachael de Vienne to uncover the origins of the Bible Students and trace their transition to a distinctive community revealed not Russell’s radical departure from the Protestant dissenters of the day but, on the contrary, many shared positions, at least initially, and a more organic process of community formation than previously appreciated.39 It was during the Rutherford era that the Bible Students/Jehovah’s Witnesses became further removed, indeed irrevocably separated, from other premillennial groups. Despite these recent studies, there remains a dearth of historical scholarship on Witnesses. Besier and Stokłosa, co-editors of two essay collections on the community, went so far as to refer to the contributing authors’ ‘pioneer spirit’ in their efforts to chart Witness history.40
There are only two areas on which there is a sizeable body of historical literature on Jehovah’s Witnesses: Nazi Germany and the United States and Canada in World War II. The focus of these studies have been remarkably narrow. Histories of German Witnesses have centred on the reasons for Nazi persecution of the community and, more recently, the Society’s
stance towards Nazism in the first years of the regime.41 Histories of Witnesses in Canada and the United States have largely focused on their role in shaping civil liberties and religious rights.42 Complementing legal historian Shaun Francis Peters’ important work, which examined the implications of the Society’s landmark legal trials for the development of civil rights,43 Jennifer Jacobs Henderson has opened up a new area of inquiry by drawing on local, regional, and state rulings, tracing the Society’s campaign of litigation down to the local level.44 This offers insights into the priorities of the organisation’s leadership in the 1930s and 1940s, decades when, as Chap. 2 explains, Witnesses further consolidated their position as a community standing apart from other Christians.
Examining the historical contexts of Nazi Germany and wartime America is useful for pointing to instances of sharpest conflict between Jehovah’s Witnesses and twentieth-century governments. It is not only during wartime that Witnesses have historically been persecuted, however, although the historiography would suggest this. In the Soviet Union, for example, the communist regime portrayed Witnesses as a highly politicised, fanatically anti-Soviet, bellicose, misanthropic, conspiratorial religious organisation directed from the heart of the capitalist West, New York City.45 In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Witnesses in Malawi were beaten and even lynched for their refusal to buy membership cards for the ruling Malawi Congress Party and expelled from the country en masse 46 During times of peace the community has continued to test the limits of what is acceptable in any number of countries and has often been defined explicitly in opposition to it. Moving the historiography beyond wartime experiences is essential to appreciate the influence of Witnesses across the modern world.
Historians have yet to analyse the confrontation between Jehovah’s Witnesses and modern governments outside the United States, Soviet Union, and Germany in a detailed manner. Important articles on Japan by Witness researcher Caroline Wah and Australia by historian Jayne Persian have expanded the geographic scope in crucial ways, but these analyses focus on wartime experiences.47 There have been essays on a range of other countries, most notably in three edited collections published in 2016.48 These essays tend to be rich in detail, often providing extensive information about individual or family biographies or cases of intense or sustained persecution, but weak on analysis, generally failing to connect these developments with broader trends in religious history, compare the experiences of Witnesses with other religious minority groups, or consider the treatment of Witnesses across different countries or continents. The
tendency of the existing literature to focus on a single country precludes insights that might be gained from examining the broader context. This book situates Jehovah’s Witnesses more firmly in the broader field of religious history by attending to these historical lacunae.
It is not so much the history of the movement per se that has interested historians but almost exclusively their persecution. The literature therefore appraises the historical role of Witnesses in very narrow terms. Typical is the opening sentence of an essay on Greece: ‘The modern history of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Greece has largely been a history of persecution’.49 It is rare that historians have moved beyond this to consider the contributions Witness communities have made in other areas of history, although there have been some recent efforts.50 As such, this book also aims to move the field beyond the current preoccupation with casting Witness history as a story of repression. It examines the historic tensions between Witnesses and governmental authorities, civic organisations, established churches, and the broader public, focusing on what in Watch Tower theology has led to conflict between Witnesses on the one hand and state and society on the other, rather than charting a history of persecution.
The shortcomings of the existing literature is partly a reflection of the way the history of the organisation has been presented in the Society’s own materials. The Society tends to focus on individual countries, from the first missionaries and converts, to obstacles overcome, and finally growth and current status. This book draws on a wide range of sources to offer the reader an alternative to the Society’s own publications and to the material produced by critics of the organisation, which together largely comprise the existing body of literature on Jehovah’s Witnesses. It also looks beyond the limited historical contexts that have preoccupied Witness historians. In doing so, it attends to spheres of conflict in Witnesses’ relations with the world which have been hitherto largely ignored.
structure
The next chapter (‘Watch Tower, Witnesses, and the World’) examines the growth of the movement from its earliest incarnation as groups of Bible Students in Pennsylvania to its current status as an international organisation of more than eight million active (i.e., evangelising) members in 240 countries. It focuses in particular on how the organisation maintains unity given this global reach. The chapter also explains how the Society’s biblical literalism determines Witnesses’ interactions with the world and shapes
their lifestyle. Readers desirous of a primer on the history of the Society and the beliefs and practices of Witnesses are advised to consult Penton’s Apocalypse Delayed or Chryssides’ Jehovah’s Witnesses, which both take a more systematic, chronological approach to the subject than here.
Chapter 3, ‘Politics’, examines the historical junctures at which both public and political hostility towards Jehovah’s Witnesses has been sharpest: during times of war. Since 1915, the Bible Students/Witnesses refusal to serve in the military has led to persecution. The chapter examines the organisation’s position on secular war, which derives from the doctrine of political neutrality. The claim to neutrality has been rejected outright by some states; in the Soviet Union, for example, the Watch Tower Society was identified as an anti-Soviet political organisation and Witnesses were subjected to state reprisals, among them mass arrest and deportation. The refusal to bear arms has led them to be regarded with hostility by regimes of various political stripes all over the world. The question of why Witnesses, who repeatedly claim to be politically neutral, are so often regarded as a highly politicised group is a key concern of this chapter.
Chapter 4, ‘Ministry’, considers how the Watch Tower organisation’s distinctive emphasis on public ministry has brought Jehovah’s Witnesses into conflict with governmental authorities. The imperative to spread the truth in the Bible is not merely one component of Witnesses’ belief system (the way field service is for Mormons, for example), but integral to their very definition of who is considered one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. The imperative to evangelise has brought its adherents into direct conflict with state authorities in arenas that are not traditionally the domain of religion, such as trespass laws and child labour laws.
Jehovah’s Witnesses’ doctrinal position on blood is entirely unique. They do not object to medical treatment per se but to the ingestion of blood and the primary components of blood, which they believe the Bible proscribes. Since 1945, the doctrine on blood has been the most contentious of the Watch Tower Society’s teachings. It banned the storage, donation, and transfusion of blood for Witnesses of all ages. Chapter 5, ‘Blood’, examines the scriptural basis of the Society’s teachings on blood and the response of governments to this stance. In the modern era it has brought into particularly sharp focus questions about the respect of the informed refusal of treatment and the legal rights of patients, parental rights and the welfare of children and adolescents, and the legal issues surrounding the treatment of minors.
Chapter 6, ‘Religion’, charts the dramatic shift in attitudes towards other religions by the organisation. Russell spoke alongside Jewish leaders at public events and was open to dialogue and debate with clergy from other Christian groups, regarding them as capable of achieving salvation. His position hardened towards the end of his life, however, and the Bible Students came to regard themselves as the exclusive bearers of ‘the Truth’. Under Russell’s successor, Joseph Franklin Rutherford, the position towards the mainstream Christian churches became openly hostile. He mounted scathing attacks on the established churches, blaming Catholic and Protestant clergy for Witnesses’ persecution throughout the world and, after Witnesses were present on Soviet soil in large numbers after World War II, the Orthodox Church. It examines how the Society has presented the Christian churches and how, in turn, they have responded to this vitriol.
Chapter 7, ‘Opposition’, examines how the mainstream media has drawn on the issues examined in the previous four chapters (neutrality, ministry, blood, and religion) to present Witnesses as deviant, both religiously and socially. It examines how popular understandings of the Society have been shaped by coordinated campaigns against Witnesses and by media representations of them as a deviant, marginal community. Witnesses were cast as the enemy other in both the United States and Soviet Union during the Cold War, and the chapter considers why they were appropriated in this way by these ideological opponents. It also assesses the transmission of the ACM’s agenda to governmental policy, focusing on initiatives prompted by the European Parliament in 1984 that stigmatised, marginalised and, in some countries, even criminalised the Society.
The concluding chapter identifies the major challenges for modern states arising from the Watch Tower organisation’s unique doctrinal system. In doing so, it demonstrates that Witnesses have repeatedly challenged the traditional jurisdictions of the state. It is not the size or spread of the organisation that has encouraged opposition to Witnesses, both popular and political, but instead their departures from mainstream Christian beliefs and practices. These have resulted in challenges to understandings of religious freedom, civil liberties, and individual rights, from Russell’s day to the present. As this book will show, this has led Witnesses to be viewed as subversive by governments of all ideological stripes.
sources and MetHodology
This book is not a critique of the Watch Tower Society’s theology or an exposé of its inner workings. There is plenty of published material with those foci. Readers interested solely in criticism of the Society’s teachings are advised to consult the voluminous body of literature written by its countless critics in the Christian churches rather than the research of an academic historian. This is a historical analysis of the organisation that is at once respectful of its adherents’ convictions whilst also casting a critical eye on what the Society’s teachings have meant for the Bible Students/ Jehovah’s Witnesses since the 1870s and the historical conflict, oftentimes of their own making, with the government authorities and agencies which have sought to monitor, control, and sometimes restrict their activities at the international, national, and local levels. The author is an ‘outsider’ rather than an ‘insider’ and has no claim to unique knowledge of Jehovah’s Witnesses or perspective beyond her academic training.51 The historical sources informing this study are, for the most part, accessible to any serious visitor to the relevant archives and libraries.
The deliberations of the Governing Body are almost entirely unknown to those outside this small circle.52 The lack of access to sources frustrated the earliest scholars of Witnesses. Stroup, whose The Jehovah’s Witnesses was the earliest book-length study of the community, wrote: ‘Since the movement is in many ways a “secret” one, the membership were loathe to give me openly any information. Moreover, the leaders issued orders to all local groups that I should not be aided in any direct way in securing my information’. Stroup reported receiving a letter from Nathan Homer Knorr, who became president in 1942 after Rutherford’s death. Knorr informed Stroup that the Society ‘does not have the time, nor will it take the time, to assist you in your publication concerning Jehovah’s witnesses’.53 This was not merely obstructionism; as we shall see, there is an urgency to the Witnesses’ message, which means, to them, time really is of the essence. There is no blanket policy of non-cooperation, however. The Watch Tower Society has been willing to help researchers with their inquiries in some areas, as shown by the fruitful correspondence from the early 1950s (when Knorr was still president) between the world headquarters and George Shepperson, a historian at Edinburgh University, who sought to trace the influence of the organisation on independence movements in southern Africa. It is notable that one response was from Milton Henschel, who became president of the Society in 1992 (succeeding Frederick W. Franz).54
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strength of your crews could be increased if you require it. Of course, the whole will be under your direction, and success must depend upon secrecy, rapid preparation and action.
"Major-General Brisbane, therefore, begs you will ascertain if the report of the strength and number of vessels in Plattsburg Bay be correct, and at all events, he requests that you will lose no time in coming here to arrange matters, or should you not think such an undertaking practicable, you will be so good as to point out in what the difficulties consist. It is, however, obvious, that when affairs of this nature are once proposed, the sooner they are carried into execution the better, or else entirely laid aside."
This well arranged attack, which, if successful, would have greatly improved our situation upon the Lake the following spring, had the war lasted, was, however, put a stop to only a few hours before the departure of the expedition, by an express from the General commanding the forces, who had become apprehensive that the attempt was too hazardous.
I am induced to continue this subject for various reasons, but principally because much that occurred during the last war in North America, is at this moment becoming interesting; and useful conclusions, in both a naval and military point of view, may be drawn from what has already taken place there.
After the disappointment to our hopes of retaliating upon it, the whole of the enemy's fleet were laid up for the winter at Whitehall, at the head of Lake Champlain. It was again proposed by Sir Thomas Brisbane, and agreed to by Sir George Prevost, to destroy them by an expedition of five thousand men, which were to have started suddenly under the orders of the former, to be conveyed to the point of attack, with their supplies of provisions, and combustibles for destroying the ships, &c. over the ice and snow in sledges. This also, from the excellent information we had been able to procure, held out every prospect of complete success; but the same timid councils again prevailed, and this second, but much more important expedition, when about to start, was almost similarly countermanded; and the disappointment was particularly felt by us,
for several of the regiments which were to have been employed in this enterprise, formed part of the force which was not long after assembled under Sir Thomas Brisbane at Paris, and when the Duke of Wellington inspected it, he was pleased to say, that had these fine regiments (and they amounted to nearly nine thousand men) been in time for Waterloo, the Prussians would not have been wanted upon that occasion. I must also add, that most of these corps had been formed and accustomed to war under his Grace in Portugal, Spain, and the south of France; and having been found at the end of the war to be the most efficient of the army, they had been at once ordered off to North America, where, from the way in which things were managed, they had not the power of farther distinguishing themselves.
But I could, if necessary, show that at last we would have completely effected our object in destroying the American fleet at Whitehall; but in a very different manner, and which, from the share I had in the transaction, and from the secrecy I thus feel imposed upon me, I do not consider myself at liberty to disclose, and which the notification of peace with the United States alone prevented. At that moment it was quite evident that the effects of the war had begun to be most seriously felt; and it was also an expensive, and as the Duke of Wellington would pronounce it to be, a useless little war for Great Britain to be so long engaged in. If we are again provoked to hostilities, which is very probable, the people of the United States should be made to feel what are the effects of a war carried on in earnest in their own country, by such a powerful empire as Great Britain; but for this our navy and army must be properly prepared.
I have for several years past given the subject of our Boundaries with the United States much consideration, and I have endeavoured to obtain, by all the means I could bring to my aid, a correct view of it; but what has been published in the "Times," of the 27th of April, and 26th of May, 1840, as communications from Mr. Waddilove to the Editor, puts the whole of that long misunderstood question, in so much clearer a light than what I had prepared for this work (though I had come nearly to the same conclusion) that I hope I shall be excused for giving them in this place.
THE TREATY BETWEEN GREAT BRITAIN AND THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES.]
Extract from the definitive treaty of peace and friendship between his Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, signed at Paris, September, 3, 1783.
The first article recognizes the several States. The second proceeds as follows:—
"And that all disputes which might arise in future on the subject of the boundaries of the said United States may be prevented, it is hereby agreed and declared that the following are and shall be their boundaries viz.,—from the north-west angle of Nova Scotia, viz., that angle which is formed by a line drawn due north from the source of the St. Croix to the highlands, along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the St. Lawrence from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean, to the north-western-most head of the Connecticut River, thence down along the middle of that river to the 45th degree of north latitude."
"If it can be shown, as it easily may, that there existed a then known tract of country called "the Highlands," which had been in use in former official documents, and which did separate the river flowing south into the Atlantic Ocean from others flowing into the St. Lawrence and into the St. John, which emptied itself into the Bay of Fundy, not into the Atlantic Ocean,—if also the documents of the period show that it was a leading object with Great Britain to preserve to their dependencies the exclusive navigation of the river St. John, and that the river St. Croix, and the line drawn north from it to the said highlands, were fixed as boundaries to the land conceded to the States, for the purpose of securing this exclusive possession, —if it can be shown that a tract of country so circumstanced was one of the concessions specially objected by Mr. Fox, Mr. Burke, Lord North, and Mr. Sheridan, in the debates upon the peace (wherein upon a division, the numbers were, against the Ministry 224, in favour 208), under the name Penobscot, the principal river of the
tract, which, with its tributary streams did rise on the south side of these highlands, and did fall into the Atlantic Ocean—if, too, as appears from all these circumstances, the district now called Maine, was no other than the district ceded to Massachusetts, under the name Penobscot, the very objections made by these leading oppositionists afford the strongest possible proof that the claims of an additional extent now made by Maine and Massachusetts were unjust and unreasonable, and more palpably absurd and untenable, when it is considered, that with a view to obtaining a right to the navigation of the St. John, the negociators did actually endeavour to obtain the portion of country lying between the St. Croix—the St. Croix line and the St John, then first attached to the government of Nova Scotia—and that the secret articles of Congress prove it to have been a subject of debate, whether the war should be continued on account of such additional territory, (a question which was decided in the negative). The very contest about the navigation of the St. John, also is in itself a proof of the unsoundness of the claim, for it would be of little value to shut out the mouth of the St. John, and the extent of its course cut off by the St. Croix, and the northern line, if, by allowing America possessions beyond the then known highlands, you had conceded a territory connecting them with the St. John; and such would be the case by allowing the extension of their settlements beyond the highlands to the Aristook. I take it this fact of itself is sufficient to prove the injustice of the claim.
"Moreover, the district so conceded, under the name Penobscot, and which is no other than the present Maine, does actually fulfil the special conditions laid down in the second article. It includes all the rivers which flow from the highlands, and fall into the Atlantic, and includes no other, and after crossing these said highlands, not one river, except the St. John, does flow south towards the Atlantic, except as a tributary stream of the St. John, through the Bay of Fundy.
"Neither can it be said that these tracts were then as little known at the conclusion of a war, in which every part had been traversed, as they have been to later Colonial Ministers, for the Government of that day met the objections made to the cession of Penobscot in this
way:—One objector had stated that it ought not to have been ceded by a maritime state, on account of the wonderful supply of excellent timber for masts which it was known to afford. In opposition to which, the Minister stated, "that it was proved by the certificate of Captain Twiss, one of the ablest surveyors in the service, that there was not a tree in the tract capable of making a mast."
"And one leading member of the Opposition, condemning the neglect of Government in not making terms for the deserted loyalists, who had forfeited their property by adhering to Great Britain, put his question in these terms—"Could not all the surrenders we were to make—the surrender of New York, the surrender of Charleston, of Long Island, Staten Island, Penobscot, and Savanna, purchase security for these meritorious persons?" Now, how much stronger would have been the argument, if the cession of Penobscot had not been limited, as the British boundary line limits it, by the highlands, but had extended further, so as to entitle the States to the waters of the St. John, and enable them to cut off the communication between Canada and Nova Scotia? He adds also, that the inhabitants of these very places were armed with us in the defence of their estates, and therefore we can only attribute the rise of Maine as a State to the circumstance of Massachusetts becoming possessed of the confiscated estates of Penobscot, the boundaries of the state of Massachusetts having previously been in a direct line from the Connecticut River to the Bay of Passamaquoddy.
"That the description given in the treaty of 1783, Art. 2,—'A line drawn due north from the heads of the St. Croix to the highlands, along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the St. Lawrence from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean,' was a description known and acknowledged in 1783 both to American and British commanders and negotiators, is proved by the fact of that description being used not only in the act of 1774, but in the Royal proclamation of 1763. And this point is confirmed by another fact—viz. the movement of a detachment of the American army under Colonel Arnold for the invasion of Canada from the side of New England, while General Montgomerie invaded it by the upper side and the lakes, in September, 1775, in not more than seven
years before the preliminaries of peace; and it is also to be observed that no part of Arnold's route came near the northern ridge of highland to which the Americans lay claim, and which in fact does not divide the rivers falling into the St. Lawrence from those falling into the Atlantic Ocean, but only divides those falling into the St. Lawrence from those falling into the St. John; whereas the ridge claimed by Britain, referred to in the 14th George III., 1774, and in the Royal proclamation of 1763, does actually separate all the rivers flowing southward into the Atlantic from all the rivers which flow north and north-east, whether they fall into the St. Lawrence or into the St. John; and further, upon the north side of the ridge claimed by Britain as the bound there does not rise a single river which falls into the Atlantic, while all the rivers rising on the south of the British boundary do fall into the Atlantic. It is a long passage to copy, but the whole may give your readers a better notion of the country traversed than were I merely to transcribe the passage which proves my point. Under that passage I shall therefore place a score:—
"'On the 22d of September, 1775, Arnold embarked upon the Kennebec (one of the rivers rising on the south of the British ridge, and flowing towards the Atlantic), in 200 batteaux, and proceeded with great difficulty up that river, having a rapid stream, with a rocky bottom and shores, continually interrupted by falls and carrying places, with numberless other impediments to encounter. In this passage the batteaux were frequently filled with water, or overset, in consequence of which arms, ammunition, and stores were lost to a great extent. At the numerous carrying places, besides the labour of loading and reloading, they were obliged to convey the boats on their shoulders. The great carrying place was above 12 miles across. That part of the detachment which was not employed in the batteaux marched along the banks of the river, and the boats and men being disposed in three divisions, each division encamped together every night. Nor was the march by land more eligible than the passage by water. They had thick woods, deep swamps, difficult mountains, and precipices, alternately to encounter, and were at times obliged to cut their way for miles through the thickets. The constant fatigue and labour caused many to fall sick, which added to their difficulties, and provisions became at length so scarce, that some of the men ate
their dogs, and whatever else of any kind which could be converted into food.
"'Arriving at the head of the Kennebec, they sent back their sick, and one of their colonels took that opportunity of returning with his division, without the knowledge or consent of the Commander-inChief. By this desertion Arnold's detachment was reduced about one-third: they, however, proceeded with their usual constancy: and having crossed the Heights of Land, as a ridge that extends quite through that continent is called, and from whence the waters on either side take courses directly contrary to those on the other, they at length arrived at the head of the Chaudiere, which, running through Canada, falls into the River St. Lawrence near Quebec. Their difficulties were now growing to an end, and they soon approached the inhabited parts of Canada; on the 3d of November a party, which they had pushed forward, returned with provisions, and they soon after came to a house, being the first they had beheld for 31 days, having spent the whole time in traversing a hideous wilderness, without meeting anything human.'
"Now, here you have, in the report of a campaign made by an American general eight years before the peace, viz. in 1775, and printed in an English Annual Register five years before the peace, viz. 1799, as direct a reference to the same marked distinction of rivers flowing different ways, in consequence of the peculiar nature of the country, as it is possible to desire; and you have an acknowledgment, totidem verbis, that the then known designation of such tract was no other than that used in the article of the subsequent treaty, as it had been also used in the 14th of George III. by the British Legislature and in the Royal proclamation of 1763, and upon examining any map, that of the Useful Knowledge Society or any other, it will be seen that all the rivers rising on the south side of the British boundary do fulfil the terms of the above treaty, and that all on the other, or north side, do, as the above account of Arnold's march expresses it, 'take courses directly contrary.' The rivers on the south side flow towards the Atlantic Ocean, not one on the other side does flow towards it—in itself the most indisputable proof that the American claim cannot stand with those words of the article which
assign to them only that tract of territory wherein the rivers flow towards and 'fall into the Atlantic Ocean.'
"I may here remark, that as the proclamation of 1763 is the earliest reference I know to these highlands so dividing the rivers, and as that proclamation proceeds from west to east, and as General Arnold found at the west end the peculiar marks required, the only really amicable, and perhaps the only certain, mode of ascertaining the bound, would be not to start on a loose cruise for highlands at the line of St. Croix, which can itself only be determined by its abutment with the specified highlands (in fact, I believe this loose and handover-head mode of proceeding has produced all the difficulty), but to start the search where General Arnold crossed, and run the line eastward according to the direction of the rivers, giving all the territory wherein 'the rivers fall into the Atlantic,' as by the treaty, to America, that wherein 'the rivers flow the contrary way' to Britain; for with this report of General Arnold's march seven years before under our view, it is impossible to believe that General Washington would have sanctioned a reference to so marked a distinction as these socalled 'highlands' in one sense, while he meant, in future times, the reference to be interpreted in another. Viewing the matter according to these lights, which is the only just mode of viewing it, as a case between Christians, Penobscot, the cession of which was reprobated in the British Parliament at the time (and when many officers who had been employed in Canada and in the States were present in both Houses), does fulfil the terms required by the treaty—namely, it embraces all the rivers which, rising on the south of Arnold's ridge, flow towards and 'fall into the Atlantic Ocean;' whereas, neither the boundary claimed by America nor the line set out by the King of Holland as a fair compromise, acceded to by the sufferer, Britain, and refused by the gainer, America, can in any wise be said to meet.
"I know not, Sir, whether you will think these remarks, and this information, upon a question likely to terminate in a war, or a disgraceful concession of the just rights of the British nation, may be useful or acceptable to you; but, such as they are, you are welcome to them, and may use them as you please; and allow me at the same time to add, there are other parts of the history of the same period
which would cast considerable light upon the present extraordinary proceedings of the British Government in regard to Canada.
"I have the honour to remain, Sir,
"Your obedient servant,
"W.J.D. W ."
TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES.
"My intention is now to show you, from a document already quoted, the Royal proclamation of 1763, a further confirmation that the division expressed, 'Rivers falling one way, and rivers falling directly contrary into the Atlantic,' was a distinction perfectly well understood, and that this peculiar expression being applicable to "Penobscot," was the probable reason why that district was ceded in 1783, and many tribes of Indians driven from a hunting ground previously enjoyed, under the protection of the British Crown. If I recollect right, some influential member of the opponents of Lord Shelburne's peace stated in debate, that above 20 tribes, whom we were bound by previous treaties and wampum belts to protect, were driven from their homes by this unnecessary cession, for it may be here remarked that one uniform condition of all treaties with that ill-used race of men, by whomsoever made (Sir W. Johnson or others), was this—for the sole purpose of guarding themselves against the wanton aggression of the settlers, provided the tracts ceded be always appropriated to His Majesty's sole use, and that the lines be run in the presence of the British authority, and some of their own chiefs, to prevent disputes hereafter.
"The 11th clause of the proclamation, evidently with a view to this feeling on the part of the Indians, runs thus. After setting out the limits and grants, &c. in the previous part of the instrument (binding upon America, as well as upon ourselves, except where they may be specifically relieved from its effect by the express words of the treaty of 1783, since they were at the time British subjects) we read—
"'Whereas, it is just and reasonable, and essential to our interest and the security of our colonies (the States then included), that the
several nations or tribes of Indians, with whom we are connected, and who live under our protection, should not be molested or disturbed in the possession of such parts of our dominions and territories as, not having been ceded to, or purchased by, us, are reserved to them, or any of them, as their hunting grounds; we do therefore, with the advice of our Privy Council, declare it to be our Royal will and pleasure that no governor or commander-in-chief, in any of our colonies, Quebec, &c. do presume, upon any pretence whatever, to grant warrants of survey, or pass any patents for lands beyond the bounds of their respective governments, as described in their commissions.' Now mark: 'As also that no governor or commander-in-chief of our colonies or plantations in America do presume for the present, and until our further pleasure be known, to grant warrants of survey, or pass patents, for any lands beyond the heads or sources of any of the rivers which fall into the Atlantic Ocean from the west or north-west, or upon any lands whatever, which not having been ceded to, or purchased by, us, as aforesaid, are reserved to the said Indians or any of them.' Now, will any man of common reflection say, that under such circumstances, known to all our governors and commanders-in-chief, of course also to all engaged in the internal legislation of the plantations, there could be any obscurity to admit of dispute in the reference made to this precise mark of distinction—'beyond the heads or sources of any of the rivers falling into the Atlantic?' the same mark being again referred to in the Imperial Act 14th George III., 1774, in nearly the same words, only adding 'the highlands,' &c., dividing, &c., again expressly described in the account of General Arnold's march over the very country; and lastly, briefly referred to in the treaty of 1783, the very brevity and looseness of the expression being the strongest possible proof of the notoriety of such division and landmark. I confess, Sir, I cannot divine any mode of escape from the dilemma in which the sticklers for this unreasonable claim are placed—either to recede from what is palpably an unjust pretence, or to stamp Washington, Dr. Franklin, Mr. Adams, and Mr. Jay as the most consummate knaves, adopting a loose phraseology to escape at a future time from the effects of their own treaty. To the latter alternative no Englishman acquainted with the history of
Washington's glorious, and—except in one point, too stern an adherence to what he conceived to be justice-unblemished career, will ever be disposed to accede.
"The next point on which I engaged to remark was the probable reason which induced Lord Shelburne to cede a country which the Indians had possessed, and thereby drive so many tribes from their homes, and the tombs of their ancestors, to them a heavier blow than any other That the Indians did possess it, is proved not only by the statement in the Imperial Parliament, but also by the fact of sundry raids occasionally made by them from this tract upon the settlers of Nova Scotia, known to be at that time altogether confined to the region about Pasamaquoddy Bay, which now forms the southern part of New Brunswick.
"Now the clause which I have quoted above I conceive to afford that probable reason. The governors, &c. are restricted not to grant warrants of survey on any pretence 'beyond the heads and sources of the rivers which fall into the Atlantic.' Though I believe it admits a question whether any patents were passed extending the British settlements beyond the 45th degree of north latitude, for the old geographers carry the line along that degree to the Bay of Pasamaquoddy, and bound Massachusetts on the west by New Hampshire—though the description of General Arnold's march is a traverse of a wild wilderness, wherein 'human face divine' seems never to have been seen, yet this clause most decidedly leaves a discretion in the Governor of Massachusetts, when population required it, to extend his surveys and his patents as far north as the heads of those rivers which fall into the Atlantic. The district now called Maine, then Penobscot, is exactly a tract so situated, and, whatever might have been the original intentions of the Crown as regarded the Indians within this tract, the discretion so given formed a just and proper reason, when peace was to be established, why the territory so described should be ceded to the United States, and that very cession of a country so circumstanced affords the strongest possible confirmation that 'the heads and sources of the rivers falling into the Atlantic' literally were the limits referred to in 1783, and that no just claim can be made out in the face of this evidence to a
territory in which, by the confession of General Arnold's march, the rivers fall 'the contrary way.' I shall not trouble you further. A war founded on unjust aggression can never expect God's blessing upon it. A calm produced by concession to unjust aggression can never end in lasting peace.
"'If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter, for he that is higher than the highest regardeth." Eccles. v. 8.
I remain, Sir, your obedient servant.
W.J.D. W .
"Beacon Grange, April 28."
After Great Britain had acknowledged the independence of the several States, if the true spirit of this treaty were not to be strictly adhered to, it must have been obvious at the time, that it would be impossible for her to defend her remaining North American possessions; much less be able at any future period to make them sufficiently powerful to cope with the United States. But surely with the Treaty, and the various documents alluded to by Mr. Waddilove, in their hands, a commission, composed of able military men, sent out to that part of the world, could so well define the boundary between the two countries, as to leave no further doubts upon the minds of our Government, as to the line of conduct to be with justice pursued towards the United States and also towards our North American possessions; and they would then be enabled also to act with that firmness and decision with which these republicans should be met in all our dealings with them. The idea of umpires ought not for a moment be tolerated—the treaty and the features of the country render them quite unnecessary. Without having any ambitious views, Great Britain evidently wants this disputed territory, if it were only for the security of her North American Provinces; and it might reasonably be expected that this point could be amicably arranged, if
there is a sincere wish for peace, and any thing like good will towards us to be found in the United States. If therefore we are provoked to war, by simply working on both flanks of any body of troops hazarded by the States into the country alluded to, their fate may be pretty easily guessed or calculated upon; for we could have no difficulty in acting at once from Quebec, Halifax, &c.; and if hereafter emigration from the United Kingdom were duly and liberally encouraged, as it should be, into a country rightfully belonging to the British Empire, abounding in small lakes and fine rivers, we might soon begin to talk not only of our valuable but also of our powerful American colonies; especially if convicts, in place of being all sent to New Holland, were employed to make good roads to connect the countries lying between the Atlantic and the St. Lawrence. These convicts should never upon any account be allowed to become settlers.
Having so far entered upon the subject, I think I ought to proceed in what I hope may be useful; and whilst I speak from observations made upon the spot, I must take the liberty of reminding the reader that during the period occupied by "improvements" in the States; the Canadas, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, &c., though somewhat retarded by late events, have not been standing still.
The country behind the line running from Lake St. Francis, to Lake Memphremagog, ought as soon as possible to be secured from sudden incursions, by a few respectable forts, or strong redoubts; capable of affording good cover for a certain number of cavalry and infantry; situations for which, upon or close to the present frontier, can be found, so that that entrance into Lower Canada may be covered. The line mentioned being taken as a base, and Isle aux Noix, Ash Island, and the part of the frontier extending along from the La Colle river towards Lake St. Francis being judiciously protected, the Lower Province would thus be secured from the inroads of brigands from the adjoining States; and if they, or if even an army should venture forward in that direction, it would not be quite easy for them to return; especially if the redoubts I speak of, are by the labour of soldiers made strong enough to require a week's regular siege for their capture, and which might be scientifically
thrown up at no great expense. They should, however, be connected with each other by military roads; the making of which, as well as constructing the redoubts, would be excellent practice for the regular troops I am so anxious to have called out; who could never be better employed, (for habits of labour are essential to them,) than in works of this kind; and I hope I have already shown, that veterans are quite unfit for the duties of our North American frontiers.
The thick, in some places, almost impassable woods and swamps, extending often for a considerable distance along the frontier line of the Lower Province, render it difficult to make arrangements to oppose inroads from the States; for it is impossible to calculate upon the direction in which an enemy's force may make its appearance, and in order to watch all the roads or approaches, especially in winter, our troops must necessarily be too much scattered over the country; for owing to want of cover, they cannot be kept in sufficient bodies, but so far to the rear as to expose the advanced posts to be overpowered and cut off.
The following documents, which appear to be official, will show clearly, that I have not without good reason made the foregoing observations respecting the state of our affairs with the United States, and which call for energetic measures on our part.
"MILITARY AND NAVAL PREPARATIONS ON OUR NORTHERN FRONTIERS.
"The Chair submitted the following message from the President of the United States:—
"TO THE SENATE.
"I communicate to the Senate, in compliance with their resolution of the 12th instant, a report from the Secretary of War, containing information on the subject of that resolution.
"M. V B .
"Washington, March 28."
"War Department, March 27.
"S ,—The resolution of the Senate of the 12th inst. 'That the President of the United States be requested to communicate to the Senate, if in his judgment compatible with the public interest, any information which may be in the possession of the Government, or which can be conveniently obtained, of the military and naval preparations of the British authorities on the northern frontiers of the United States, from Lake Superior to the Atlantic Ocean, designating the permanent from the temporary and field works, and particularly noting those which are within the claimed limits of the United States,' having been referred by you to this department, it was immediately referred to Major-General Scott, and other officers who have been stationed on the frontier referred to, for such information on the subject as they possessed, and could readily procure; and an examination is now in progress for such as may be contained in the files of the department. General Scott is the only officer yet heard from, and a copy of his report is herewith submitted, together with a copy of that to which he refers, made upon the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 9th instant. As soon as the other officers who have been called upon are heard from, and the examination of the files of the department is completed, any further information which may be thus acquired will be immediately laid before you.
"Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
"J.R. P .
"To the President of the United States."
"Head Quarters, Eastern Division, Elizabethtown, New Jersey, March 23, 1840.
"S ,—I have received from your office, copies of two resolutions, passed respectively, the 12th and 9th instant, one by the Senate, and the other by the House of Representatives; and I am asked for
'any information on the subject of both, or either of the resolutions, that may be in [my] possession.'
"In respect to the naval force recently maintained upon the American lakes by Great Britain, I have just had the honour to report to the Secretary of War, by whom the resolution of the House of Representatives (of the 9th instant) was directly referred to me.
"I now confine myself to the Senate's resolution, respecting 'military (I omit naval) preparations of the British authorities on the northern frontiers of the United States, from Lake Superior to the Atlantic Ocean, distinguishing the permanent from the temporary and field works, and particularly noting those which are within the claimed limits of the United States.'
"I will here remark, that however well my duties have made me acquainted with the greater part of the line in question, I have paid but slight attention to the forts and barracks erected by the British authorities near the borders of Maine, above Fredericton, in New Brunswick, or in Upper Canada, above Cornwall, being of the fixed opinion which need not here be developed, that all such structures would be of little or no military value to either of the parties in the event of a new war between the United States and Great Britain.
"I was last summer at the foot of Lake Superior, and neither saw nor heard of any British fort or barrack on the St. Mary's River, the outlet of that lake.
"Between Lakes Huron and Erie the British have three sets of barracks—one at Windsor, opposite to Detroit; one at Sandwich, a little lower down; and the third at Malden, 18 miles from the first; all built of sawed logs, strengthened by block-houses, loopholes, &c. Malden has been a military post, with slight defences. These have been recently strengthened. The works at Sandwich and Windsor have also, I think, been erected within the last six or eight months.
"Near the mouth of the Niagara the British have two small forts— George and Messisanga. Both existed during the last war. The latter may be termed a permanent work. Slight barracks have been erected within the last two years on the same side, near the Falls,
and at Chippawa, with breast works at the latter place; but nothing, I believe, above the works first named, on the Niagara, which can be termed a fort.
"Since the commencement of the recent troubles in the Canadas, and (consequent thereupon) within our limits, Fort William Henry, at Kingston, and Fort Wellington (opposite Ogdensburg old works,) have both been strengthened within themselves, besides the addition of dependencies. These forts may be called permanent.
"On the St. Lawrence, below Prescott, and confronting our territory, I know of no other military post; 12 miles above, at Brockville, there may be temporary barracks and breastworks. I know that of late Brockville has been a military station.
"In the system of defences on the approaches to Montreal, the Isle Aux Noix, a few miles below our line, and in the outlet of Lake Champlain, stands at the head. This island contains within itself a system of permanent works of great strength. On them the British Government has, from time to time, since the peace of 1815, expended much skill and labour.
"Odletown, near our line, on the western side of Lake Champlain, has been a station for a body of Canadian militia for two years, to guard the neighbourhood from refugee incendiarism from our side. I think that barracks have been erected there for the accommodation of those troops, and also at a station, with the like object, near Alburgh, in Vermont.
"It is believed that there are no important British forts or extensive British barracks, on our borders, from Vermont to Maine.
"In respect to such structures on the disputed territory, Governor Fairfield's published letters contain fuller information than has reached me through any other channel. I have heard of no new military preparations by the British authorities on the St Croix or Pasamaquoddy Bay.
"Among such preparations, perhaps I ought not to omit the fact that Great Britain, besides numerous corps of well-organized and well instructed militia, has at this time within her North American
provinces more than 20,000 of her best regular troops. The whole of those forces might be brought to the verge of our territory in a few days. Two-thirds of that regular force has arrived out since the spring of 1838.
"I remain, Sir, with great respect,
"Your most obedient servant, "W S .
"Brigadier General R. Jones, Adjutant-General United States Army."
BRITISH ARMED VESSELS ON THE LAKES.
"The papers on this subject submitted to Congress by the President, in compliance with a resolution of the House, show that at the close of navigation last fall, two steamers (owned or hired by the British authorities), one schooner, and a number of barges, were employed on Lake Ontario, and the river St. Lawrence, as a security against an apprehended renewal of the troubles of the preceding year; and from the annexed communication of Mr. Forsyth, there is reason to expect that even this small force, or at least a part of it, will be soon withdrawn."
"Department of State, Washington, March 13.
"The Secretary of State, to whom has been referred a resolution of the House of Representatives of the 9th instant, requesting the President to communicate to that body, 'if compatible with the public service, whether the Government of Great Britain have expressed to the Government of the United States a desire to annul the arrangements entered into between the two Governments in the month of April, 1817, respecting the naval force to be maintained upon the American lakes; and that, if said arrangements be not annulled, whether there has been any violation of the same by the
authorities of Great Britain,' has the honour to report to the President a copy of the only communication on file in this department on the subject to which the resolution refers. Prior to the date of that communication, the Secretary of State, in an interview invited for that purpose, called Mr. Fox's attention to the disregard by Her Majesty's colonial authorities of the conventional arrangement between the two countries, as to the extent of naval armaments upon the lakes.
"In the autumn of the past year the Secretary of State made known verbally to Mr. Fox, that the cause assigned in his note no longer existing, the President expected that the British armament upon the lakes would be placed upon the footing prescribed by the convention. Mr. Fox engaged to communicate without delay to his Government the substance of the conversation between them: and expressed his own conviction, that if the winter then ensuing passed without renewed attempts to disturb the tranquillity of the Canadas, there could be no sufficient motive for either Government maintaining a force beyond that authorized by the convention of 1817.
"All of which is respectfully submitted.
"J F .
"To the President of the United States."
The instructions which were deemed expedient to be given to Colonel Sir William Williams of the 13th Regiment, commanding Isle aux Noix and its dependencies in 1814, after we lost the superiority on Lake Champlain, will clearly show that what I have proposed should be seriously considered; and also support my opinion of the necessity of establishing the fortresses I have mentioned, in which troops could at all times be comfortably quartered; indeed, with such neighbours as the Americans, our possessions can never be safe from insult without them.
"St John's, November 9, 1814.
"S ,
"I am commanded by Major-General Brisbane to transmit, for your guidance, the following instructions, which are to be acted upon as far as circumstances will permit, in case of an attack upon any of the advanced posts; not that the Major-General has reason to conclude the enemy have such an object in view; but the confusion always arising out of unexpected occurrences in time of war, must as far as possible be avoided or guarded against; and you ought also to be aware of his intentions in case of such events happening.
"1st. The enemy appearing in force in the direction of Caldwell's Manor, coming from Missisquoi Bay.
"It is not probable that the enemy would appear in that direction with any other intention, but for a demonstration, unless he came with the determination of attacking Isle aux Noix, in which case it is to be expected he will bring with him, if before the frost sets in, the means of water conveyance on the south river, or if afterwards, means of transport for heavy guns on the ice. His intentions, therefore, in these respects can be easily ascertained. If the former should be his object, a force must be detached into the Manor, or the concessions, (say five companies under a field-officer) to keep him in check, and to prevent the country from being over-run and plundered; this may in a great measure be effected by the choice of favourable situations or positions, but no general affair must be permitted without the consent of the Major-General.
"Whilst the enemy might be thus manœuvring, a real attack would likely take place on the line of the La Colle and Ash Island. Such an attack is not improbable, although the enemy could have no other object in view but to beat up our cantonments, and cause the troops, in some measure, to take the field exposed to the inclemency of the season, and might be effected with only a small part of his force. The whole of the posts upon that line must be ordered to hold out till reinforcements can arrive from this place; for until then it would not be safe to detach but small parties from the garrison of Isle aux Noix. A force from L'Acadie could only be brought up in support of the bridge. La Colle Mill and its dependencies must look to Isle aux Noix alone for assistance.
