HISTORICAL SKETCH OF ST. ALBANS LODGE, NO. 38
ANCIENT FREE AND ACCEPTED MASONS
TWO HUNDRED THIRTY-NINE YEARS
1771 – 2010

by
Louis P. Anderson
with Revisions and Updates by
MWB Gustaf R. Bodin and WB Richard S. DiNardo

 

On July 10, 1771, a warrant was issued by Right Worshipful John Rowe, Esq., Provincial Grand Master, at Boston, Massachusetts, by the trust and authority of Most Worshipful Henry Somerset, Duke of Beaufort, etc., Grand Master of England, to Brothers Timothy Ward Bilious Ward, David Landon, Timothy Ludington, Eber Waterhouse, Asher Fairchild, Benjamin Stone, Giles Trubee and William Johnson, all of Guilford in the County of New Haven, Colony of Connecticut, forming them into a regular Lodge, to be held at said Guilford, and appointing Brother Bilious Ward to be their first Worshipful Master, to be known as the First Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons in Guilford; all of which may be learned from our Colonial Charter.

Thus, the birth of St. Albans occurred five years before the Declaration of Independence; six years before Betsy Ross sewed the stars on the American Flag, and eighteen years before the organization of the Grand Lodge of Connecticut on July 8, 1789.

The warrant, elaborately penned and with some brilliantly colored lettering, established St. Albans Lodge as the sixth Lodge among the early Colonial Lodges of Connecticut that worked under known authority and have preserved records of their activities. Four other warrants were issued, two by the Provincial Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, and two by New York, for lodges in Connecticut, earlier than ours, but aside from the records of these Grand Lodges, nothing is known of them.

The following record of the first meeting held under this warrant is taken from the original minute book:

“Guilford, September 19th, 1711. At a Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, held at the house of Brother Asher Fairchild, present: Brothers Bilious Ward, Timothy Ludington, Asher Fairchild, William Johnson, Joseph Bradley, Francis Brown, Timothy Ward and Amos Bull. The commission appointing our Right Worshipful Brother Bilious Ward to be the first Master of this Lodge was read, and he accordingly took the chair with the usual ceremonies, and calling forth Brother Timothy Ludington, appointed him Senior Warden; after which, the Lodge was opened in due form. Mr. Thomas Powers, Mr. Eli Foote and Dr. Isaac Chalker were this evening proposed, balloted for, and made Entered Apprentices; Brother Eli Foote was then appointed Secretary, and Brother Isaac Chalker, Treasurer of the Lodge”.

Our colonial brothers had a somewhat unique system of dues to the Lodge. They paid one shilling to attend Lodge, and were fined one shilling if they did not. They “got it coming and goingas we would say. This, and the fees for initiation, seems to have been their only source of revenue.

The convivial element was somewhat in evidence also, as we find under numerous dates, charges to the Lodge of certain mugs of flip, bottles, quarts and gallons of wine and brandy. Apparently the Eighteenth Amendment and the Volstead Act had not yet been dreamed of. But the most prohibitive of us should consider that those early Brothers were practically living a frontier life, in scattered communities with few social advantages.

We find the names of our oldest Guilford families as members of the first Lodge: the Footes, Wards, Landons, Stones, Lopers and others. Bilious Ward, the first Master of the Lodge, was a silversmith by trade, and there are a few specimens of his handiwork still in existence in the town.

A footnote under the personal account of several of the earliest members, evidently written after the Revolutionary War and the re-organization of the Lodge, reveals the fate of some of those who were active under the original charter. Thus, Bilious Ward, the first Worshipful Master, moved to Wallingford and died of the smallpox. David Landon died at his own house in Guilford of a consumption. Asher Fairchild was lost at sea, vessel and all hands never heard of. Samuel Fairchild moved to Middletown, and died in 1798. Timothy Ludington was killed by the English troops in the battle in East Haven. Giles Trubee died of sickness eastward of Boston, after being a prisoner of the English. Eli Foote died in North Carolina of yellow fever. William Johnson joined the English, commanded a privateer and was killed on board it off Stratford.

The last meeting of the first Lodge of Guilford was May 2nd, 1775, when it vas adjourned until the first Tuesday of October next, a meeting never held.

At the May session of the Grand Lodge of Connecticut in 1797, a petition was presented from sundry Brethren residing in Guilford, praying that the Grand Lodge recognize their old charter and grant them a new one, the Lodge to be known and designated as St. Albans. The petition was granted free of expense save for the Secretary’s fee of office, and it took the next number in succession on the list of the Grand Lodge, which was number thirty-eight (38).

The Lodge’s records from this time until 1827 are continuous. Several incidents and characters in this period are worthy of special note. On the 7th of January 1800, the Lodge voted to wear crape on the left arm between the wrist and the elbow for six months, in respect to the memory of George Washington. Dr. Isaac Chalker, who was the Worshipful Master in 1773, under the Colonial Charter, was the first Master under the new charter in 1797. Jedediah Lathrop, who was Master in 1800, was also in the chair in 1826 and 1827, and figures prominently in the affairs of the Lodge from 1797 until 1852, when he was Secretary. Merritt Foote, who was Worshipful Master of the Lodge in 1823, 1824 and 1825, was a charter member and the first Worshipful Master of Widow’s Son Lodge, No. 66, of Branford in 1826, and for a total of seventeen years altogether.

The minutes of June 26, 1799 inform us that:

Special Lodge met at dwelling House of Mr. Roswell Woodward in Guilford for the purpose of celebrating the festival of St. John the Baptist. The Lodge was opened in the first degree of Masonry. Then the brothers of St. Albans Lodge together with 17 Brethren from neighboring Lodges attended by a Band of music, moved in order of procession to the Meeting house of the first Ecclesiastical Society in

new moon; the Lodge is to be opened at six o’clock P.M. from the tenth of March to the tenth of September, and at five o’clock from the tenth of September to the tenth of March, and always closed at nine o’clock, special emergencies excepted. N.B. If the moon change on Tuesday, the Lodge will meet the next Tuesday after”. In those days before train, trolley, or automobile, Brothers from New Haven or Branford must have had rather a late home-coming. In 1827, owing to the anti-Masonic excitement, the Lodge became dormant for a long period. Its charter, with that of several other Lodges, was revoked in 1838 and restored in 1851, with Charles A. Ball as Master. The Lodge was incorporated May 23, 1856.

The early Lodge records from 1856 to 1662 were destroyed by fire in Congress Hall which was on the opposite side of the Green from the Masonic Hall, then located at 71 Whitfield Street. Fortunately, all the other records and our old Charter were kept elsewhere. After the fire, a committee was appointed to restore as far as possible, the destroyed records. Their report consisted of the names of officers and members for those years; the minutes, of course, were lost.

On March third, 1862, resolutions were adopted on the death of their youngest member, who died at Port Royal, South Carolina, in the service of his country. A clause mentions the gratification of the Lodge to learn that brothers were present at his burial and his grave was marked with our emblems. We may mention here that members of this Lodge have been soldiers in every war in which the United States has engaged.

The first Lodge rooms in 1771 were in the house of Asher Fairchild which was approximately between where the present library and the Jedediah Lathrop house now stand. Brother Fairchild was lost at sea in 1795, but his widow, Thankful Stone Fairchild, rented the same rooms to St. Albans Lodge when meetings were resumed in 1797. From 1802 to 1825, the south chamber and two adjoining rooms in the house of Joel Griffing became the place of meeting. This building, erected by Seth Bishop on what is now Fair Street, is five houses north of the old Spencers Foundry. The records indicate that during this period, several meetings were canceled so that a sick member of the Griffing family would not be disturbed.

Between 1822 and 1825, many meetings were held in Branford to accommodate the many members of the Lodge who came from there. In 1825, the house of Joseph Griffing on Whitfield Street, which is next to the hotel on the corner of Water Street (now the Monroe Building), and in 1826, the house of “Mr. Vail in Liberty Street” were used for the meetings. Mr. Vail’s house stood for about a hundred years near the site of the present Octagon House on Fair Street, but disappears from the town records about 1840. Meetings were held for some time prior to the fire of 1862 in Congress Hall which stood facing the Green at about 71 Whitfield Street. A new Lodge room was secured in the upper part of the Academy on 19 Church Street. This building, moved in 1820 from the Green to its present Church Street location just north of the First Congregational Church (the former home of Luther Clark). The land records of Guilford prove that the lower story was leased for Sunday “religious meetings,” 1870-1873, and the upper story was leased to the St. Albans Lodge, No. 38, of the Masonry Order, 1870-1875.

In 1876, the rooms over Henry Hale’s store, at what is now 25 Whitfield Street, were rented and used until the Lodge moved into rooms on the second floor of the new Town Hall Building in 1895, where it stayed until 1954.

Upon the sudden death of the Worshipful Master, Samuel W. Landon, in 1890, Grand Master dark Buckingham and sixty-six Brothers conducted the funeral services in Alderbrook Cemetery. By

Through the efforts of one of the members and the Committee named, final steps were taken to consummate the sale in 1964 and the Church was converted into the present Masonic Temple. This Temple was dedicated by The Most Worshipful Grand Lodge, A.F. & A.M, of Connecticut on June 20, 1964, by Grand Master lrving E. Partridge and members of the Grand Lodge. A dinner for all followed in the Calvin Leete School.

In 1971, a dinner dance was held to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the Lodge. To further commemorate its anniversary the Brothers entered a float and marched in the Guilford Fair Day parade. Also, commemorative medals were struck in silver and in bronze, and offered for sale as part of the celebration.

At a special meeting of the Guilford Temple Association on July 15,1985, it was voted to sell the existing buildings and property due to increasing operational costs and repairs and improvements required to comply with the town’s building code requirements. The Lodge then entered into an agreement with Widow’s Son Lodge No. 66, of Branford, to hold meetings of St. Albans Lodge and use their Masonic Temple, starting in January 1986.

Although St. Albans Lodge’s association with Widow’s Son Lodge was an amicable one, some of the Brothers of St. Albans Lodge felt the Lodge should return to Guilford where it had its original roots. At a meeting of the Lodge on February 13, 1989, it was voted to relocate to Guilford, and to rent the Odd Fellow’s Hall located at 16 Water Street, for the purposes of holding lodge meetings. The move back to Guilford and to the Odd Fellow’s Hall a second time, took place on April 4, 1989.

In 1996, due to the sale of the Odd Fellow’s Hall and a notice from the Odd Fellow’s to vacate the property immediately, St. Albans Lodge requested a Dispensation from the Grand Lodge of Connecticut to hold its meetings at Widow’s Son Lodge No. 66, Branford, Connecticut. On December 10, 1996, the Grand Lodge of Connecticut “authorized St. Albans Lodge to move its Charter and other paraphernalia to Widow’s Son Lodge No. 66, Branford, Connecticut and to hold their subsequent communications at Widow’s Son Lodge until April 9, 1997 at which time the newly installed Grand Master, Brother William Carpenter may elect to extend this dispensation through June 30, 1997. The notice will serve to provide St. Albans sufficient time to find a permanent meeting location”.

On June 30, 1997, another Dispensation was granted by the Grand Lodge of Connecticut “authorizing St. Albans Lodge to continue holding its communications through April 8, 1998, at Widow’s Son Lodge No. 66, located in the Masonic Building, 8 Fades Street, Branford, Connecticut”On April 8, 1998, a second Dispensation was granted “Authorizing St. Albans Lodge No. 38, A.F. &A.M. effective on Wednesday, April 8, 1998, to hold all Regular Communications at Widow’s Son Lodge No. 66, located in the Masonic Building, 8 Fades Street, Branford, Connecticut”.

The Lodge presently meets on the first and third Tuesdays of the month, except for the months of July and August, with the Annual Meeting of the lodge held on the third Tuesday in December.

To date, the Lodge has elected 198 Worshipful Masters and 125 men have served in that office. Asabel Morse holds the record for longest service, having served the lodge as Master ten years. In 2001 St. Albans Lodge was honored to have the first of its members become a Grand Master. Gustaf R. Bodin was elected and served in the office as the Grand Master of Masons in the State of Connecticut in year 2001-2002.