Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 154, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 June 1910 — TOOK THE GUARD’S PLACE, [ARTICLE]

TOOK THE GUARD’S PLACE,

Dr. Byles Shouldered a Gun and Kept Himnelf from Eseaping. One of the most famous of the old Puritan divines was Dr. MaSher Byles, who was born in Boston, in 1706 and who was the first pastor of the Hollis Street Congregational church, to which he ministered for more than 40 years. Dr. Byles was famous as a humorist and wit, and innumerable anecdotes are related of his clever quips and retorts. He was a zealous Tory and warmly advocated the cause of “the mother country" Against the colonies. In November, 1777, he was arrested as a Tory, tried, convicted and sentenced to be confined on board a guard ship and sent to England with his family within 40 days. The sentence was afterward commuted by the board of war to confinement in his own house, a guard being placed over him with instructions not to permit him to leave his residence for a moment under any circumstances. On Thanksgiving morning, observing that the sentinel, who, like many of the colonial soldiers, was a simple rustic, had disappeared and that Dr. Byles himself was pacing up and down before his own door with a musket on his shoulder, the neighbors crossed the street to inquire the cause of this singular spectacle. ‘ You see,” said Dr. Byles, “I begged mv guard to let me go out to procure some cider with which myself and family might celebrate Thanksgiving day, but he would not permit me to stir. I argued the point with him, and he has now gone to get the cider for me on condition that f keep guard over myself during his absence.”