Reverend Benjamin Colton
College
Profession
1710
1713 - 1756
Yale University
Congregationalist Minister
Benjamin Colton was born in 1690 at Longmeadow, Massachusetts to Ephraim Colton and Esther Marshfield. The town was part of Springfield, Massachusetts at the time. He was the seventh of eighteen children.
Yale University was founded in 1701 as the Collegiate School to provide training to students in southern New England without a need to travel all the way to Cambridge, Massachusetts to study at Harvard University. Benjamin was accepted into the college and studied in Saybrook, Connecticut, where the university was housed at the time. The classes fluctuated from three to nine students in the first few years and there were only two members of Benjamin's graduating class. His fellow graduate, John Bliss, also became a minister but eventually became a member of the Episcopal Church (Church of England). Benjamin received his A.M. (Master's degree) from Yale in 1710.
In May 1711, the General Assembly of Connecticut allowed twenty-seven families in the western portion of Hartford form a separate parish. Benjamin was brought in as a candidate for the pastorate and the parish decided to offer him salary proposals for a number of years during a meeting on 5 October 1713. Benjamin was ordained pastor of the Fourth Church of Christ in West Hartford, Connecticut (which then included 29 members) on 24 February 1714. Sources indicate that the church was prosperous during the First Great Awakening of 1740. During that time, he was classified as an "Old Light," meaning that he was suspicious of the Awakening movement. On 2 July 1754, when Benjamin was about 64 years old, an argument arose between Benjamin and the church members. They formed a committee to discuss personal matters with him as well as to come to an agreement regarding his salary. No conclusion could be reached between the parties and the committee voted in September 1756 that Mr. Russel would be hired to preach. On 11 December 1756, the committee moved to remove Benjamin from the pastorate, indicating that he had not been able to perform his duties due to ill health for more than seven months. They voted to provide him with 25 pounds in new tenor bills if he would resign the office. The following year, the committee granted 12.5 pounds annual allowance for the rest of his life, provided that he not "meddle not with the affairs of the ministry or the government of the church for the future."
He married Ruth Taylor on 3 December 1713. She was the daughter of Reverend Edward Taylor and Ruth Wyllys of Westfield, Massachusetts. The couple had four children before she died on 30 May 1725 at the age of thirty-two.
He married secondly to Elizabeth Pitkin on 1726.
His daughter, Theodosia, married one of his students in theology. His eldest son Eli also studied theology under him.
Children (by Ruth Taylor- all born in West Hartford, Connecticut):
Children (by Elizabeth Pitkin- all born in West Hartford, Connecticut):
Benjamin died on 1 March 1759 in West Hartford, Connecticut.
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