SALEM, Sept 1 - A statue of Roger Conant, by Henry
Hudson Kitson, is soon to be unveiled in this city by his descendants.
In this work Mr Kitson has tried hard to express the personality of one of the founders of Massachusetts, and the story of how he came to undertake the execution of the memorial and what was required of the artist is of unusual interest.
The statue differs somewhat from the ordinary memorial to the man whose personality stood out in bold relief, even among those strong characters to be found in the time in which he lived.
First, this monument is erected by members of Roger Conant's own family - his own immediate descendants, and not by the public at large; and second, the artist's conception has aimed to embody not only the individual man to whom the statue is raised, but the fearless, undaunted spirit of the time in which he lived.
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Begins Work on the Statue
About four years ago one of a committee composed of members of the Conant family, who were desirous of raising a memorial to their common ancestor at Salem, the place he had worked with such dauntless energy to colonize, called on Mr Kitson, and the latter consented to make a sketch model. As he worked over this he became more and more absorbed by the history and personality, as well as the facial lineaments, of the rugged old settler, though the modelling of these latter was in itself a task sufficiently difficult, since there appeared to be no actual portrait of Roger Conant extant. However, aided by photographs of several of his descendants, showing family as well as individual facial characteristics, the sculptor obtained what might be termed a sort of composite likeness of the whole Conant family, which was quite satisfactory to everyone save the artist himself.
Perhaps it was the wish, as he says, "to make this statue of Roger Conant not only the very best thing I've ever done, but one of the best things made in America" that made Mr Kitson supercritical.
From the first the general form of the design had been clear in his mind - the strong, upright, commanding figure, one of whose hands rested lightly on a young oak tree, which, to Mr Kitson, seemed the visible emblem of Roger Conant's character.
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Loved Peace, But Could Fight.
"You can't pull the oak tree up when once it's taken root," he said, in speaking of his conception of the old settler's personality, "and they couldn't pull him - he was rooted to Massachusetts just as firmly as the oak tree was rooted in the ground.
"Moreover, he was a sort of anomaly in his time - not only a man of peace but essentially a peace-lover, and these facts alone differentiate him from the strict Puritan element. He loved peace, he ever strove for it, yet, once convinced of the justice of his quarrel, he would fight - fight to the last ditch, and win out against odds to all appearances overwhelming, because, before he began to fight he knew that he had right on his side.
"I've tried to show all this in my figure of Roger Conant - the indomitable purpose of the man who could write such words as these - part of a letter cherished in the Conant family:
" 'And when, in the infamy thereof, it was in great hazzard of being deserted, I was the means, through grace assisting me, to stop the flight of those few that then were here with me and that by my utter deniall to goe away with them, who would have gone either for England or mostly for Virginia, hereupon we stayed to the hazzard of our lives.'
"Moreover, I have tried to depict in the countenance the kindly nature of this man - one of the very few among America's early settlers who was ever looked upon by the Indians as their true and staunch friend.
"Though making this figure has been peculiarly difficult, it has been, at the same time, wonderfully fascinating; since, in my ardent desire to visualize for the people of this day this man to whom the town of Salem in particular and Massachusetts in general owes, perhaps, more than has been justly understood, I have been drawn to study minutely this unique character - one of the greatest men of his time and yet one, curiously enough, whose personality is still comparatively unknown."
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Conant Settled It Peacefully
No less an authority than John Fiske says of the settlement of cape Ann (in which Roger Conant bore a leading part), "It deserves special mention as coming directly in the line of causation which led to the founding of Massachusetts by the Puritans."
For several years prior to 1621 a small body of men, locally known as the "Dorsetshire Adventurers" since the majority of them were English merchants from Dorset, the chief town in the English shire of that name), had sent men to fish off the New England coats near the present site of cape Ann; it was, however, not until the year just mentioned (1621) that the "Adventurers" decided to plant there a permanent colony, to be a sort of fishing station, but having the special advantages of a place of worship and a resident preacher.
It was thus the small band came to occupy cape Ann, but within two years difficulties arose with their neighbors at Plymouth; for, though the new settlement adjoined this town, the men of Plymouth laid prompt claim to It and as the rights vested in grants and assignments had become, in many instances, hopelessly entangled, it was by no means easy to discover just where the real ownership of property lay.
Roger Conant finally caused a peaceful settlement of this dispute. He was an independent leader who had, virtually, withdrawn from the Plymouth colony, being by no means in sympathy with the narrow and bigoted views held by the settlers there. The "Adventurers" at once made Roger Conant their head and, for the moment, all seemed secure. But internal dissentions arose among the "Adventurers" themselves and their next important step was to abandon the cape Ann colony, dissolving the existing partnership and leaving the tiny remnant of the settlers entirely dependent on their own resources, though each man was permitted to retain his tools and his cattle.
Here it was that the marvelous executive ability of Roger Conant came to the front. He promptly assumed charge of the now almost discouraged little band, finding for them an adjacent and far more advantageous place of settlement at Naumkeag, the present site of the town of Salem.
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His Tact and Diplomacy.
When, a little later, this now thriving colony was menaced by the 60 men sent by John Endicott, ostensibly to re-enforce, but actually, for the purpose of forcing Roger Conant from the place of chief authority, the Naumkeag settlers were immediately up in arms and for a short time what a writer of the period turns [terms] "a dangerous jarre" appeared inevitable. But again the tact and diplomacy of Roger Conant saved the situation, and under his management all were conciliated and an entirely amicable arrangement was speedily arrived at, in token of which the name of the settlement was changed , to Salem, the Hebrew word for peace.
Roger Conant appears to have possessed a perfect genius for getting on with the Indians of the Agawam tribe, which dwelt in the neighborhood. Not only were they passively friendly but they seemed actually glad to have the white men settle on their lands, since they lived in mortal fear of their fierce neighbors, the Tarratines, and hoped to have the aid of the settlers in repelling their attacks.
In one of the most charming of his essays, "Main Street," Nathaniel Hawthorne says of Roger Conant:
"Roger Conant, the first settler of Naumkeag, has built his dwelling months ago on the border of the forest-path and. at this moment, he comes eastward through the vista of the woods with his gun over his shoulder, bringing home the choice portions of a deer. His stalwart figure, clad in a leather jerkin and breeches of the same, strides sturdily onward with such an air of physical force and energy that we might almost expect the very trees to stand aside and give him room to pass.
"And so indeed, they must for, humble as is his name in history, Roger Conant is still of that class of men who not only merely find, but make their place in the history of human affairs; a man of thoughtful strength, he has planted the germ of a city.
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He Could Not Be Moved.
So we have here a memorial to this sturdy, fearless, vigorous Roger Conant, of whom a writer of a later time said: "They tried to Induce him to go with them, but he had taken his position and pledged his faith unconditionally that here he would stand, thru perils from savages and all the hardships of the new settlement clustered around him, and he could not be moved."
And this figure, stamped as it is with this unquenchable courage, this endurance and, most marvelous of all in that age of fierce intolerance and bigotry, the kindness of one "who loved his fellow men," is a statue worthy to be placed among those glorious memorials that are the spontaneous tributes to Massachusetts founders!
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