Here, February 2, 1768, Alvan Hyde, grandfather of Charles Hyde, was born. He attended a spindly institution, Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 1788.
After graduation, instead of returning to his family home in Norwich, Alvan chose Lee, Massachusetts, in the southern Berkshires as a place to settle. He was "called" by the Congregational Church of Lee, June 6, 1792 where he ably and faithfully ministered to a grateful community for 41 years.
In his diary he warmly acknowledged the character and worth of his father, Joseph, ". . . a farmer of reputable character in that town (Norwich), a friend to religious orders and institutions, a constant attendant at public and family worship; but not a professor of religion. From him I received much good advice in my early years . . ." Thus the continuity of Puritan mentality and culture reached down through the Hyde generations, finally to emerge in the personality, character, and attainments of Charles Hyde.
The Rev. Alvan Hyde left an imprint of love and fidelity upon his church community. He was one of the most eminent divines of a time when the clergy were dominant in civil and religious affairs. Dignity, propriety and consistency pervaded all his actions. In his 41-year pastorate he built his church into Lee's most outstanding institution. Its widening circle of religious influence extended far into the countryside.
Because Alvan Hyde's reputation as a preacher was spreading, he was invited by the first president of Williams College, the Rev. Ebenezer Fitch, D. D., to be a trustee. He accepted in 1802 and continued as such through 1833. In 1812 he was elected vice-president and held that largely honorary title throughout the remainder of his trusteeship. The presidency itself was pressed upon him several times but he declined as frequently, in his sense of obligation to his pastorate at Lee.
Williams was chartered in 1793 and named after Colonel Ephraim Williams who had no idea he was founding a college. He had long preceded the chartering. He was killed in the battle of Lake George, September 9, 1755, but in his will had provided for the founding of a free school in its present location in the northern Berkshires. It was his trustees who opened the free school, October 26, 1791. These men ambitiously arranged the organization of the free school under the name of Williams College and applied for a state charter.1
Congregationalism permeated the halls of Williams College. The first four presidents, Ebenezer Fitch 1793-1815, Zephaniah Swift 1815-1821, Edward Dorr Griffin 1821-1836, and Mark Hopkins2 1836-1872, had degrees of Doctor of Divinity. Mark Hopkins also had an LL. D. and a medical degree. The D. D. after the names of all four is clear indication of the religious auspices under which the students were educated.
It was arranged that Alvan's four sons should go to Williams and all four completed the requirements for graduation. The fourth son, Joseph, graduated with the class of 1822 and stayed on an extra year as a tutor. Thinking of becoming a lawyer he took the stage to New York where he was accepted "to read law books" by Burr and Benedict, partners in a law firm and themselves members of old line Puritan stock. He was admitted to the New York bar and began the practice of law. In New York, he found his bride, Catherine Maria McEwen, daughter of a New York jurist, Charles McEwen. She was a lineal descendant of one of the Scottish Covenanters, the first McEwen having been engaged in some of the bloody battles of that stormy period of Scottish history. Towards the end of the seventeenth century a later McEwen sought refuge in hospitable colonial New England.
The couple tried living in Palmyra but soon returned to New York, where, shortly thereafter, a boy was born, the first of seven children. He was named Charles McEwen Hyde; the date of birth was June 8, 1832. Father Joseph Hyde and family joined the Broome Street Presbyterian Church and here became a hardworking lay family. Joseph's interest in the church encouraged him to give up the profession of law to become treasurer and general agent of the American Bible Society.
Charles entered the Collegiate School of Forrest and McElligott, of which the former, William Forrest, was principal. This preparatory school gave him a thorough start in Latin and Greek and a quick mastery of his other subjects. At the age of fourteen he was ready to enter Williams College. His father wisely delayed matriculation for two years and in the interim sent him to Ware, Massachusetts, for a taste of business life in an uncle's bank.
Experience behind a bank counter, involving contacts with farmer, storekeeper, and manufacturer and laborer, was as important to his education as formal schooling. An indelible experience this was and would forever be a resource of great value to him in his ministerial career.
At sixteen he packed his few possessions in a portmanteau and took the stage to Williamstown and enrolled in Williams College.
For a picture of his life at Williams, reference is made to an early abbreviated biography of Charles M. Hyde by his son Henry Knight Hyde, in which two classmates are quoted, affirming the continuity of Puritan background and upbringing characteristic of the Hyde line. These college years were a profound influence in shaping his character and directing his hopes towards the ministry. One of the classmates was Professor A. L. Terry who later established an enviable record as professor of political economy. He commented in part:
It was the middle of September, 1848, when the young fellows who were afterwards to constitute the core and bulk of the college class of 1852, came together.
The first term had not passed before it was well settled in the councils of the class that Charles Hyde would be their valedictorian, and that opinion was never really shaken till the end. . . His personal acquaintance was easily made and retained; he drew the confidence of everybody as a man and a Christian; and I think it may be truly said in the best sense of that much abused word, that Charley Hyde was throughout the most popular man in this college class.3
The other classmate, the Rev. Lewellyn Pratt, D.D., of Norwich, Connecticut, adds his bit:
It is a great pleasure to recall a student life so nearly ideal as that of Charles M. Hyde. . .one of the youngest of its members, took first place in scholarship at once, and held it steadily through the whole course, and at his graduation was the valedictorian. He never appeared to be driven or in haste but was always prepared; was about equally successful in all parts of the curriculum, and had leisure enough to do a large amount of general reading.
In manner he was always a gentleman, careful in dress and in speech, considerate of others, unwilling to give or take offense, affable and companionable, so unhurried that he could give time and help to others; and commanded the respect and confidence of the whole college. He had inherited virtue, had been well trained, he had made duty his guiding star. Reverent, faithful, true and pure, he had a charmed life in the midst of the whirls and tempests and temptations of college life, merited and obtained a good report. . .his memory will be cherished in the hearts of all his surviving classmates.4
His college years were marked by development in one intellectual talent which would signally mark his subsequent professional life: a facility in literary expression. Many of his numerous college essays have been preserved in the records of his literary society, Philologian, the oldest such group at Williams.
There was a halcyon touch to the tenth reunion of the class of 1852. The members met in Williamstown, at the home of Mrs. Bridges, August 5, 1862,5 and according to the Williams College Bulletin had a merry time.
It was just as well for Charles Hyde that he would depart with happy memories, for in all his future travel he would never be able to schedule a single visit to coincide with another reunion. However, he did visit Williams College to receive a Doctor of Divinity degree, June 1872.
He also returned in 1883 to speak at the Williams College commencement. This would be his first trip back to the United States from the Kingdom of Hawaii where he was to go in 1877 on a permanent assignment.
When commencement with its honors, its ringing speeches and its chapel bells was concluded, young Hyde faced financial problems were he to enroll immediately in Union Theological Seminary for graduate work. He was offered rather lucrative terms to tutor. This he undertook at New Haven and then Savannah, Georgia. He not only received all lodging and transportation at the latter town; he had a sail on a coastal schooner from New York, through the stormy offshore waters bordering Cape Hatteras, to the seaport town of Savannah. He had never been so far away from home and