Manuscript
Page: 5

Diary of Justus Forward

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Date: 1786 - 1787
Creator: Justus Forward
About this artifact

Justus Forward (1730-1814) was born in Suffield, Connecticut in 1730. A graduate of Yale, he taught at Hatfield Academy in Hatfield before being ordained as a Congregational minister in Belchertown. During his 56 year-tenure in Belchertown, the Reverend Forward wrote and published on theological subjects, and practiced medicine. He also kept a daily diary in which he recorded the growing tensions and outright rifts in communities in 1786 and 1787. Forward wrote that Belchertown was "greatly divided in sentiment, a great Number favored the Mobb The steady Men however were for support of Authority." Forward also reported on the confrontation at the Arsenal in Springfield in January 1787, and its aftermath.

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Courtesy American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, MA