In 1751, the North Church was built on the site of the present-day Walker School Media building across the street from the Old North Cemetery. It was indeed a grand structure made of wood with a solid foundation. Being a center of activity, it was enlarged in 1755 by adding a pentagonal addition, enlarged again in 1802 and continued to be used until the fire of 1842. It was constructed again and in use until the next fire struck years later.
There were many very important functions held in the North Church, later referred to as the Old North Church, over the years. The Lord was celebrated and many a marriage vow was said. Election sermons were even preached for many years. The North Church even hosted the convention to ratify the United States Constitution back in June of 1788, which meant that as the ninth state to approve the Constitution they set the wheels of the United States in motion.
This North Church was the center of community and maintained with pride by our ancestors. During the 1802 renovations the meeting house was enlarged and thoughts drifted toward acquiring a bell for the belfry. The belfry existed for a period of time surmounted by a tall spire and weathercock. The members of the community voted as early as the year 1800 to purchase a bell but the years passed still without a bell being purchased for the empty belfry. It was this perseverance and the pride held by the people of Concord that eventually brought a large bell to town. The selectmen marked out the ground around the two front seats in the church and sold them to raise revenue, raising a little more than $300 with this subscription. The people within the community also donated funds to ensure the bell would indeed finally be purchased and installed. It was in the year 1810 with the community’s approval and the bell funds in hand, the bell was finally purchased.
The men worked diligently to raise the bell one morning and secured it in the belfry which certainly delighted every person in Concord. This is where the bell remained, up in that belfry overlooking our little town, until the church burned down. This bell was very symbolic for many. Perhaps it represented liberty or a sense of wellbeing and comfort. This was a rural community back in the early 1800s and it meant something to the people that cold morning as the men hauled the bell up to the belfry.
With the new bell seated in the belfry at the Old North Church there was a need for a set of rules to manage the ringing of the bell at the most appropriate times. The 1810 town meeting votes decided the bell should be rung seven times at seven o’clock in the morning each day, nine times at nine o’clock each morning too. The bell should then be rung 12 times at noon each day and nine times at nine o’clock each evening. Sunday bell ringing was not mandated by the town but left to the discretion of the church.
It was four years later, after the bell stayed on schedule for ringing, the town felt there should be additional times for bell ringing. So, it was in 1814 the town ordered the existing bell ringing to remain the same with the addition of the ringing of the bell for all funerals too.
The bell ringing, with this schedule, remained in place for the next 37 years until March, 1851. At that time Asa McFarland offered a bell resolution to the town and it was adopted. His resolution stated “Whereas the tolling of the bells on funeral occasions is productive but of no good, and may, in the case of the illness of the living, result in evil; therefore, Resolved, that the practice be discontinued here, as it has generally been in other populous places.”
So, it was in March of 1851 the bell that constantly rang in the belfry at the Old North Church fell silent for extended periods of time. Peace and harmony restored for some people perhaps, though for others the bell ringing was indeed missed.
When fire struck the Old North Church on June 29, 1873, burning the building to the ground, the bell was still in the belfry.
Concord’s very own Frank West Rollins stood on North State Street with many as the Concord Fire Department attempted to douse the flames consuming the Church.
Governor Rollins was a skilled artist and the author of multiple books and he practiced his art across the street in his home, the Rollins Mansion. Rollins documented the fire with a magnificent ink sketch of the flames consuming the Church, leaving future generations a very sad image of the fire.
In addition to his sketch, he also wrote of the disaster in vivid detail. Rollins is quoted as saying “The bell went first, and many a man felt sad as it crashed into the fiery furnace below, there to be turned into the molten mass from which it was cast.” Sometimes late at night, when Concord is settled in a deep slumber, it has been said the Old North Church bell still rings forlornly in the north end of Concord.
Vintage Views is a local history column that explores Concord and its surrounding towns. It runs every week in the Sunday Your Life section. The author is a historian and not a member of the Monitor’s staff.