1742 March 20 (Saturday). Rainy. Mr. Buel and Three young Men with him here. I found him willing to Submitt to any Examinations concerning his Doctrines, or Opinions, or Life; where upon I made several Enquirys to which he made ready Answers and told me he had made up with Mr. Noyes[1] at New Haven above a month after Commencement and was Examined and licenced by the Ministers of that Association to preach. I urged him to preach, but he said he was under such obligations to preach at Concord that he must proceed thither. After Dinner they all sett off in the Rain and the Roads very bad. N.B. I had received an Excellent as long Letter from Mrs. Pierpoint,[2] by which also I pleaded with him to stay, but in vain.
[1]Joseph Noyes (1688-1761), Yale 1709, minister of New Haven, 1715-1761; DYG, 1:85-89.
[2]Sarah (Breck) Pierpont, daughter of Nathaniel and Martha Breck and wife of James Pierpont (1699-1776), Yale class of 1718. Ebenezer Parkman and Hannah Breck were married at the Pierponts’ home in Boston where Hannah lived after the death of her parents. The Pierponts moved to New Haven, where they became leading New Lights. The Parkman Family Papers at the American Antiquarian Society include “Memoirs of Mrs Sarah Pierpoint” (Box 2). After Sarah’s death, James Pierpont (whose sister Sarah married Jonathan Edwards) brought her “private Papers” to Parkman along with a draft of her life and character by the Rev. Jacob Johnson of the second church in Groton CT (Ledyard). He asked Parkman to review the draft and her diaries and, if Parkman thought it would be “for the Divine Glory and for the Service of the Christian World to publish Memories of her, to prepare them accordingly.” Parkman accepted the papers, but, as he wrote, “under my present Circumstances, can’t give him Encouragement that I will do it” (Oct. 24, 1756). Over the next year Parkman spent many evening reading through Sarah Pierpont’s diaries, but there is no indication that he read Johnson’s draft or wrote anything of his own despite having been urged to do so by Jonathan Edwards (Oct. 26, 1756). Finally, in mid-1760, Pierpont asked Parkman to return Sarah’s diary (May 7, 1760). Thus, the manuscript memoirs of Sarah Pierpont that are attributed to Parkman may be Johnson’s draft.