These two posts are adapted from a reflection given at the UUCAS worship service on Sunday, March 26, 2023.

The early Universalists were distinguished from their “orthodox” Christian neighbors by their belief that everyone would be reunited with God after death.  In the early 1800s, most Christians of other denominations believed that only a few select people would go to heaven, and the rest would spend eternity in hell.

The Universalists believed that we suffer for our misdeeds in this life, rather than the next, and that the way to be happy in this life is to do good.  Universal salvation meant that God loves everyone equally, and we should, too.

Here is the first of three stories about how the Universalists of Sheshequin put these beliefs into practice.

Joseph Kinney and the Sack of Corn

Joseph Kinney was among the first group of white settlers who came to Sheshequin after the Revolutionary War in 1783.  He was originally a Baptist but was converted to Universalism by the Rev. Noah Murray about 1793.  There were many generations of Kinneys among the members of the Sheshequin and Athens Universalist congregations.

In 1871, a former Sheshequin resident named Larman Elliott wrote a letter to the Athens newspaper describing his experiences with Joseph Kinney 30 or 40 years earlier.  I don’t know if Elliott was a Universalist himself, but his uncle John Elliott was a member of the Sheshequin church in the 1830s.

Elliott wrote:

“Some of the older inhabitants of Sheshequin may remember that for many years after the organization of the township, there was no poor tax assessed or collected; yet the probability is that there was no township in the State in which the poor were better cared for.

“The custom was, if a family was found to be needy, for someone to go about among the neighbors, and they would soon obtain enough provisions and other necessaries to make them comfortable.

“At one time a poor man by the name of Weed had the misfortune to lose his only cow, and I was requested to go around the neighborhood and see if I could obtain money enough to buy him another.  Accordingly I went, and among others, called on Esquire Kinney, and found the old gentleman and his wife comfortably seated in their room.

“After some pleasant conversation with them, I told them my business.  When the old gentleman arose to go to his desk where he kept his money, his wife remarked that they had nothing to give away.  He stopped, and, turning to her with a smiling countenance, said: “I am not going to give away anything, my dear; it’s a debt that we owe Brother Weed.  You always want me to pay my honest debts, don’t you?”  He then proceeded to hand me a dollar.

“The following story, about Mr. Kinney, was related to me soon after the event, by Mrs. Hicks, an old widow lady who lived over the hills, east of Sheshequin.  She said that she called at Mr. Kinney’s to tarry all night, and that after supper the old gentleman inquired of her as to how she got along in those hard times – flour, grain, and other provisions being very scarce and dear at that time.  She told him that she sometimes found it rather difficult to procure the necessaries of life; however, she got along some way or other.  He then asked her if she ever used any corn meal in her family.  She told him that she did when she could get it.  There was no more said on the subject.

“The next morning, after breakfast, when she wished to start home, Mr. Kinney saddled her horse and stood ready to help her on.  To her surprise, she discovered a bag with something in it on her horse.  She said to Mr. Kinney: ‘What does this mean – this bag on my horse?’  He replied: ‘It is that bushel of corn that I owed you.  I thought you might better take it with you now.  As you are going by the mill, you can stop and get it ground on your way home, without much trouble.  I wish when you have the opportunity, that you would send the bag back.’

“Such was the character of Joseph Kinney, Esq.  He never considered that he was giving away anything.  He appeared to firmly believe that in all such cases he was only paying his just debts.  But Mr. Kinney was not the only liberal, benevolent man in the place, for I got money enough that day for Mr. Weed to buy him another cow, besides several bushels of grain from those that would rather give that than money.”

Mr. Elliott wrote that most of the people he had called on for donations for Mr. Weed were Universalists.  In the 1800s, most of the families who lived on the stretch of Sheshequin Rd. from the Ulster bridge north to the Athens township border were Universalists.

Continue to “Part 2” to read the second and third stories.