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Facts and Events
References
- GEN OF THE BLISS FAMILY
p 21, 27.
'maltreated, impoverished, and imprisoned, and finally ruined inhealth by the indignities forced upon him by the intolerant church party inpower.'... was a Puritan. Died in England about the time his sons came to
America [1635].
- ↑ Demos, John Putnam. Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England, Isbn: 0-9-503378-7. (Oxford University Press, Inc., New York, 1982)
page 258.
- ↑
The Tribulation of the Bliss Family
The New England experiance of this man appears, in sum, undistinquished. However,
his ealier life may well have been very different. Such at least is the burden of a
remarkable story of the Bliss family during the years just prior to their departure
from Old England. Unfortunately, the story comes to us without firm documentation:
it stands therefore as a provisional addendum to the main thread of the current
chapter.
Thomas Bliss, the emigrant, was by this account the son and namesake of a
well-to-do, locally influential citizen of the village of Belstone, county Devon.
In the opening decades of the seventeenth century the father became a determined
advocate of the Puritan cause and had participated with like-minded neighbors in
acts of protest against religious 'oppression'. On one particular occasion he and
three of his sons (George, Jonathan, and Thomas, Jr.) had accompanied a party, led
by the local member of parliament, in riding up to London to engage both king and
archbishop in direct confrontation. The upshot was their imprisonment and the
levying of heavy fines (said to have been in excess of £1000) in lieu of their
freedom. Payment of the fines required the virtual liquidation of the family
estate, and even then there was not enough money to free all four Blisses.
Thus one of the sons - Jonathan - remained in jail for some while longer,
was severely whipped in the public square at Exeter, and never thereafter recovered
his health.
Impoverished and broken in his own health, Thomas, Sr. subsequently returned
to Belstone and lived in the household of his daughter, Lady Elizabeth
Calcliffe. She was the wife of a knighted 'gentleman' who had remained a regular
communicant of the Anglican church (thus avoiding persecution). As the crisis of
the realm deepened, the father summoned his sons, divided among them what patrimony
he still retained, and advised them to remove to New England. Thomas, Jr., and
George left soon thereafter; Jonathan was too ill to join them, but sent at least
one of his sons in their care. During the years that followed, Lady Calcliffe
sought to temper the privations of her relatives across the sea by sending them
periodic shipments of clothing and food. And it was in her personal
correspondence - regrettably, long since lost - that this part of the Bliss family
history was remembered for succeeding generations.
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