From Generation to Generation in the Church

A History of Trinity Episcopal Church

Apalachicola, Florida

George L. Chapel

In late 1835, the Rev. Fitch W. Taylor of the Diocese of Maryland, who was sojourning in Florida, held services and organized churches in St. Joseph and Apalachicola. He had just been inspired by a General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Philadelphia in which the Rev. Dr. W. A. Mulenberg, a great grandson of the Lutheran pioneer and an Episcopal priest, had called for a wider outreach in that the church should regard itself as a missionary society of great breadth. Later 1888, this would result in the call of the Lambeth Quadrilateral on church unity. The acquisition by purchase of the John Forbes Spanish land grant, from the heirs and assigns of the Pailton, Leslie, and Forbes fur trading interests (1783-1847) by the Apalachicola Land Company consortium, (1835-1866) had just been declared a legal transaction by the U. S. Supreme Court in the last decision handed down with John Marshall as Chief Justice. Shipping cotton downriver from Georgia, Florida and Alabama since 1822, the City of Apalachicola, as platted in 1836, was intended to be the metropole of this million acre grant. Florida had become a U. S. Territory in 1821. Apalachicola would become the third largest cotton port on the Gulf, and the largest shipping center in Florida.

The Episcopal Church in the 1840's was harmoniously expanding from the period of the American Revolution. Although Washington, Franklin, Henry, Jay, Morris and others had been members; the clerical oath of allegiance required by the British Crown had left shattered the 150 year old institutions of the colonial church in what had been British North America.

However, by 1789, with its polity and episcopacy established, and its liturgy in place, the Episcopal Church had become an independent, self-governing, United States' branch of the Anglican Communion. A product of the major contending forces, Protestant and Catholic, of the Reformation, it was at heart a tolerant church.

In the years that followed, there were established new churches and church institutions, Sunday schools, colleges, boarding schools, guilds for men and women, sisterhoods, the fresh air movement, the first major free church in New York, and the first church hospital of any Christian group in the United States - St. Luke's, New York. New bishops moved into new areas, Hobart in New York, Griswold in New England, Channing Moore in Virginia, Chase in Ohio, and Olcy and Polk in the South.

As was typical of 1840 cotton ports in the South many of Apalachicola's first settlers were from the mid-Atlantic and New England states. There were also a large number of  transients who would swell the population of the town during the cotton shipping months in winter, and leave during the summer. The early efforts to have a church in Apalachicola were well received by the factors in the town. George Field, a layman conducted services in Apalachicola from late 1836 until late 1837 when the Rev. Charles Jones of the Diocese of New York arrived as missionary. Originally congregational in organization, Christ Church, renamed Trinity Church, Apalachicola, and St. Joseph's Church, St. Joseph, were incorporated by the Florida Territorial Legislative Council in 1837. Signed into law by Richard Keith Call, a communicant of St. John's Tallahassee, on February 11, 1837, a charter "to incorporate the Episcopal Church into the city of Apalachicola," was granted to the "Rector, Wardens, and Vestrymen of Trinity Church." The incorporators and first vestrymen were Colin Mitchell, John Morrie, Eli Wood, George Middlebrooks Hiram Nourse, William G. Porter, Cosani E. Bartlett, Ludlum S. Chittenden and George Field. They were all re-elected to the vestry after the incorporation. A strong desire to build a church was in evidence, and the Apalachicola Land Company conveyed land for the proposed building.

Mary Ann Ross is the first entry in the baptismal register, with the date of November 23, 1837. Another early entry is "John Gardner Doubleday, born July 12, 1832, baptized April 6, 1838, sponsors and witnesses, Edward W. and Mary Doubleday, parents, and Richard Fitzpatrick".

Among Trinity's incorporators were John Gorrie sometimes called the "'Father of modern refrigeration," and the subject of one of two authorized statues from Florida in Statuary Hall in the United States capitol. General Edmund Kirby Smith from St. Augustine, who later taught mathematics at the University of the South, Sewanee, Tennessee, was the other Floridian so honored. Originally from Charleston, South Carolina, Dr. Gorrie came to Apalachicola in 1833 having studied at the New York College of Physicians and Surgeons at Fairfield, New York. At one time or another, he was Intendent of Apalachicola, postmaster, city treasurer, city councilman, and secretary of the Masonic Lodge. Dr. Gorrie left Apalachicola in 1839 in a manner suggesting that he might not return he did return in 1840, however, did his refrigeration work between 1843 and 1851, and becoming somewhat of a recluse, died in 1855 in Apalachicola. His remains are now in Gorrie Square in Apalachicola. His wife, Frances Myrick Beman and his son, John Myrick, are burled in St. Luke's cemetery in Marianna. His daughter, Sarah, died at Milton, Florida, in 1908.

Another incorporator was Cosam Bartlett, editor of Florida's first daily newspaper, The Apalachicola Gazette. Described as "the greatest of Florida editors of the Territorial 'period," he and Albert G. Sommes confirmed in 1850, and later a Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice, represented the Apalachicola area at the Florida Constitutional Convention in 1838.

Among the remaining incorporators were commission merchants, bank directors, an owner of the Mansion House Hotel, a Collector of the Port, and a cardinal director of the Apalachicola Land Company. One of the incorporators, William G. Porter, and Ills brother Richard, emigres from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, operated one of the city's largest commission houses, or factors, of the antebellum period. William G. Porter also served as the Belgian Consul.

The organizing convention of the Episcopal Church. in the Diocese of Florida was held oil January 17, 1838 at St. John's Church, Tallahassee. Francis Eppes a lay delegate from Tallahassee, and grandson of Thomas Jefferson served as secretary. George Hand represented Apalachicola. There were seven organized parishes - St. Augustine, Key West Pensacola, Tallahassee, Jacksonville, St. Joseph, and Apalachicola. Six of these had clergy in residence Three had church buildings - Pensacola, a brick church, St. Augustine, a stone church, and Tallahassee, a wood church. At the time, the Greek Revival church and Tallahassee was the largest religious building in the territory, having been built at a cost of $10,000.

The Rev. J. Loaring Woart of St. John's, Tallahassee, presided over the convention: resolutions uniting the parishes into a diocese were passed; rules of order and a constitution were adopted; the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in the United States was petitioned to receive the Florida convention as a Diocese, delegates to the General Convention were elected and tile Rev. James Hervey Otey Bishop of Tennessee and later, Missionary Bishop of Mississippi, Arkansas, and the Indian Territories, was invited to perform Episcopal offices in Florida. Mr. Field was elected to the Standing Committee, and the minutes were amended to read "Trinity" not "Christ Church" for Apalachicola. Key West, "Apalachicola," and Jacksonville were identified as mission stations.

The year 1839 was one of tile worst in the history of tile antebellum church in Florida. Tile Seminole War, death, disease, inadequate supervision and removal, had seen every cure vacant except that of the Rev. David Brown of St. John's, Jacksonville. George Field reported in 1839, "a subscription had been filled to the amount of $7,500 for the erection of an Episcopal Church edifice in Apalachicola, and the building, which is to be complete by March First next, is in a very considerable state of forwardness.'' Fellow churchman General William Wing Loring, later an Egyptian Pasha as the Commander of the Egyptian Army, marched in tile Franklin Guards. George Washington Sully painted an exterior view of tile church building in 1838.

The Greek Revival building was built cut to measure of white pine in upper New York state, taken apart, shipped in sections by sailing vessel, and reassembled with wooden pegs and hawsers in Apalachicola. The darkened area within the posts and lintel of tile front door gave the illusion of the opening to a Greek temple Large Ionic columns, and a square flat-roofed belfry with rectangular louvered windows completed this bit of frontier sophistication. One could not do such finished work on the frontier. The smooth tongue-in-groove front walls were built to simulate stone and a fourth window was painted onto the exterior of each side to give symmetry. The choir loft and pew doors had the wood grain painted on - faux bois. Gilded cloudbursts with tile monograms, IHS and XP, were on the altar and loft, i.e. Jesus Christ. An 1840 hand-pumped, Erben organ provided the music. This was replaced in 1859 by another Erbin, now considered the most historic organ, in situ, in the state.

The renting of the box pews went back to a 16th century way of raising money, and although sonic pews had to be made available to all, this method of funding was the subject of much debate; the church was likened to a den of thieves; and stories of young men being locked out and joining the Methodists abounded. Originally the box pews at Trinity were laid out in the manner of the Baptist Meeting House in Providence, Rhode Island, with two side aisles and no central one. The renting of pews did not last past the mid-century

In early 1840, the Diocesan Convention met in Trinity, the Rev. A. Bloomer Hart became rector, and a Christmas "Oratorio" by Baron Le Fleur, "a finished performer on the organ and piano for the, admission "one dollar for the church," was given. In 1841, Bishop Otey visited Apalachicola and consecrated the church. He stayed in the home of David G. Raney a commission merchant and sometime mayor. Mrs. Raney was president of the womens Guild of Trinity in 1841. The Guild gave the silver communion set in 1842. Their daughter would later marry the Rev. John Oven of Trinity Church. Her brother, George, would become a Chief Justice of the Florida Supreme Court.

Apalachicola in 1841 was severely scourged by Yellow Fever during the summer. Of those who had not left the city, a hundred died. The hurricane that same year, along with economic problems, sounded the death knell for the neighboring town and church of St. Joseph. Through the years, the church records have continued to reflect the pathos of tragedies on land and sea.

In 1845, Christ Church, Pensacola, founded the first educational adventure in the Diocese, its own "Collegiate Institute. "In Apalachicola, the fluctuating character of the population, and the composition of mixed religious societies, provided a veritable kaleidoscope of religious activity. The struggling churches of the Diocese of Florida would not have survived had regular funds not been coming from the mission board of the national church and various churches in the Diocese of South Carolina. In 1842, only two Episcopal churches were self-supporting -Christ Church, Pensacola, and St. John's, Tallahassee. Florida became the 27"' State on March 3, 1845.

Bishop Elliot of Georgia, later the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the Confederacy, confirmed and preached in

adult and infant baptisms, a third of Apalachicola in 1843, 1846, and 1850. The Rev. John Gay became rector in 1846, and recorded 61 whom were African Americans.

The antebellum church was greatly concerned about the souls and religious culture of tile African Americans indirectly committed to its charge, but with exceptions such as Absolom Jones, it, as an institution, had not focused on the problem of their freedom. Trinity had a Sunday school class of sonic 60 African Americans. The servants of the parsonage had been taught to read. But as the Rev. William Saunders would write, "many seemed inclined to prefer other instructions than those of the Episcopal Church."

Dr. Alvan Wentworth Chapman arrived in 1847. Tile son of a "blue" Presbyterian as he once told Winfield Kimball, he became the leader ill botanical studies in the South. His authoritative Flora of the Southern United States was published in 1860. A member of Trinity choir, and in the 1860's, a Union sympathizer, he assisted escapees from Southern prisons during tile War, and sometimes hid himself in Trinity Church.

The church was prosperous and progressive as it approached the 1850's. On October 15, 185 1, Francis Huger Rutledge of South Carolina, a blue blood descendent of Huguenot refugees, was consecrated as Florida's first bishop. Bishop Gadsden of South Carolina was the principal consecrator standing in for the Presiding Bishop, Bishop Chase, and assisted by Bishop Elliot of Georgia and Bishop Cobbs of Alabama continuing an Apostolic Succession that continued back through St. Augustine of Canterbury to the primitive Church In 1857, Southern nationalism in education reached its culmination in the founding of the University of tile South ill Sewanee, Tennessee. An American Oxford of 32 schools was envisioned under the auspices of the Episcopal Church. Destroyed by tile Civil War, or War Between the States, one college of it survived as a child of Reconstruction, and with its seminary, continues as the foremost liberal arts undergraduate institution In the Deep South. Ill 1859, additional side galleries for seating were being considered at Trinity in Apalachicola.

With the outbreak of the Civil War, disruption again threatened the Episcopal Church, but it did not conic. Neither the Roman Catholic nor the Episcopal churches suffered division. There may have been abolitionist church people in New England, Harriet Beecher Stowe may have later joined the Episcopal Church in Mandarin, Florida, and Louisiana's Bishop Polk may have been a general with his fellow churchman, Robert E. Lee, but the Church remained One. When Bishop Rutledge of Florida, a nephew of a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and Madam Murat, a parishioner of St. John's Tallahassee, and great-niece of George Washington, announced for secession, Bishop Otcy and Governor Call branded it a "criminal action" or described it as the "gates of Hell". A temporary church in the Confederate States was organized as a political expediency, but once the war was over, tile Church quietly reassembled at its General Convention with tile names of tile Southern bishops still oil tile roll call.

The Rev. William Saunders was the pastor of Trinity at the time, and found his parish spread up and down the river by war. He celebrated Easter, 1863, in Marianna, and while there, baptized the children of Emily and tile Honorable George S. Hawkins, the first Chief Justice of Florida's Supreme Court, and at one time, Florida's only U. S. Congressman. Goods were becoming scarce. The town had. suffered shellfire during a skirmish in 1862 when a captured blockade runner sailed past the town into the bay. There were Federal forays into the town during July and October of 1863, and many salt works were destroyed.

Defended by the "Cradle and Grave Regiment," Marianna fell on September 27, 1864. The new Episcopal Church at Marianna was destroyed. The Bible from the ruined church was sent by messenger to the priest in charge, William Saunders, through the good offices of Major Nathan Cutler, 2nd Maine Cavalry. On April 1, Governor Milton shot himself near Marianna. Abraham Allison, an early pew holder at Trinity Church, succeeded Milton as Governor. On April 2 , 1865, by the register of Trinity Church, the Rev. William Saunders buried Governor Milton "on Episcopal ground' at Marianna. Oil April 9th, Lee surrendered to Grant. Oil April 14, President Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theater.

The Church was affected by a number of fresh forces: the plea for freedom of thought and discussion; Darwinism; the high church movement of Newman Pusey and Keble the search for origins; social concerns; modernist theology and biblical criticism. The restrained low churchmanship of the 18th century stemming from a state-imposed Hanoverian dislike of religious excesses, was over. The Church was beginning to contain within itself something answering the heady fights of the outside world.

Church academies for blacks were opened in Fernandina and Lake City, with a combined enrollment of over 500 students in 1868. The school at Fernandina was the first to venture into integrated Christian education in Florida. These schools were feared for political reasons rather than religious or educational reasons. Lack of funds and a lack of interest in blacks in the North, ultimately caused this program to fail.

Schools for whites included Christ Church School, Pensacola, St. John's, Tallahassee, St. Mary's Priory with its plan for an order of teaching nuns, and St. John's Male Academy, Jacksonville. During this period, their combined enrollment seldom exceeded 200 Students. The Bishop's missionary program was to be successful.

Between 1868 and 1880, with the failure of a Cuban revolt, and the movement of the cigar industry into Florida, St. Paul's and St. John's in Key West enjoyed phenomenal growth. The local Roman Catholic Church was overwhelmed, and because of the high churchmanship of St. Paul's, a formidable group Of Cubans began attending the Episcopal Church. The congregation was served by a Spanish speaking priest. The bulk of the funds to meet this need came from the Ladies Auxiliary Missionary Aid Society. It was during this time that the Ladies prevailed in their argument with the Bishop that to "send forth laborers into the vineyard," they would have to raise money by dances, lotteries, and what In the heat of things someone called "wicked entertainments". Mrs. D. G. Raney was the Aid Society president in Apalachicola, and Mrs. Rob Knickmeyer, treasurer.

In 1878, a preaching mission was undertaken at Fort Marion, Florida, for David Oakerhater and 69 other Cheyenne warriors captured at the battle of Adobe Wells, Texas, in 1874. This later resulted in the Whirlwind Mission of the Holy Family near Watonga, Oklahoma, under the direction of the Rev. David Oakerhater who as the "'Holy Man" or ""Peace Chief," brought the entire Cheyenne nation into Christianity.

In 1869 and 1882, Bishop Young ordained the first blacks in the history of the Diocese the Rev. Joseph Love and the Rev. Jacob R. Ballard. Jacob Ballard, taking charge of the Florida Negro School in Tallahassee, now Florida A&M University, organized a congregation there. Another African American, the Rev. Brook C. White organized St. Phillip's in Jacksonville. The largest and oldest African American Episcopal congregation in Florida, St. Peter's, Key West, was organized in 1875. British West Indian subjects accustomed to its form of choral services and high churchmanship soon filled its pews

In Apalachicola, the failure to deepen the harbor, the depressed plantation belt and the re-routing of its river trade to railroads, had resulted in continued depression. "it is a day of adversity with us" read a parochial report. Trinity Church could not pay its own way even when its expenses were shared with St. Luke's, Marianna. In 1870, Saunders left Trinity for Key West. Basically, Trinity was a mission station on the Bishop's clergy assignment list. Asa Gray, the leading botanist in the North, while staying with Dr. Chapman in 1875 wrote, "...then- followed a week and more at dead and dilapidated, but still charming, Apalachicola...". The Rev. B. W. Huson served from 1877 to 1879 when he resigned to go to Memphis, Tennessee, to take part in the heroic efforts of the Sisters of Saint Mary in the memorable yellow fever epidemic that was raging there. He is remembered In Marianna for raising the money for the new church and for erecting the gilded cross on tile roof of the east end by moonlight the night before he left for Memphis.

Steamers were rotting at their moorings in Apalachicola when with the arrival from Maine and Philadelphia of James Coombs in 1878, the cypress and yellow pine in the marsh around the city became the basis for a major lumber -milling and naval stores boom. By 1900, two large sawmills, one of them the largest in the South, were within city limits. The Coombs family gave the pulpit in Trinity Church. Oliver Hudson Kelly, founder of the American Grange movement, started the town of Carrabelle just before the lumber boom, as a vacation community. Naming the town for his niece Carrie Hall, he also played a major role in establishing tile Church of tile Ascension in Carrabelle in time the original altar from Trinity Church was moved to the church of the Ascension. Henry Grady, a major ship chandler during tile lumber boom, became Trinity's perennial Senior Warden. The Ruge brothers with their oyster canning, Coca-Cola holdings, and other interests, built the Chapel of the Resurrection and Ruge Hall (Episcopal) at Florida State University, provided scholarships to the then Florida State College for Women, and the University of the South, provided funds for infirm Episcopal clergy, gave support to the Dunbar Colored Public School in Apalachicola, provided Christmas presents for Trinity's Sunday School children, supported the May Day Fete at Trinity, and provided an endowment for the Diocese of Florida. Fannie Ruge was always amused that the plaque at the entrance to Ruge Hall read, "Erected by John G. Ruge to the blessed memory of Fannie Ruge his wife''. She outlived him by 14 years and two husbands.

The plan to build rectories along with churches attracted summer pulpit exchanges during the 1880's and 1890's. Trinity's rectory was built in 1900 by the Women's Rectory Association, Mrs. Carrie Kimball, President, Mrs. George Ruge Treasurer, and Miss Mary Raney, Secretary. George Marshall built the structure. Seth Kimball had his lumber mill near where Gorrie Bridge now enters the city. Pearl Porter Marshall was apt to recall the confirmation of her father, Edward G Porter at the lighthouse keeper's cottage on Little Saint George, by Bishop Weed, with the 1552 words that went with the laying on of hands, "Defend O Lord, this thy Child with thy heavenly grace; that he may continue thine forever; and daily increase in thy Holy Spirit more and more, until he come unto thy everlasting kingdom".

Sponges became a short lived, but colorful industry after extensive beds were located in the Gulf of Mexico north and south of Cedar Key. In the 1880's and 1890's, Italian and Greek boat builders and spongers operated out of Apalachicola, Carrabelle, Cedar Key, and Tarpon Springs. Apalachicola Bay produced 90% of Florida's oysters and 10% of the nation's supply each year. In 1927, through an agreement reached by Anglican Church representatives and the Ecumenical Patriarch, isolated Greek colonies dispersed throughout the world, were encouraged to join in fellowship and use the facilities of Anglican and Episcopal churches without having to change their religious allegiance or participate in the Anglican Liturgy. Some became Episcopalians, others remained Orthodox as was intended in the spirit of the agreement, and others became Roman Catholics. The First World War had caused major upheavals in Orthodoxy.

In 1936, Trinity Church celebrated her one hundredth year. Gorrie Bridge and causeway had been opened in 1935, with enthusiastic approval of Sarah Orman Butterfield. World War II turned the area of Franklin County into an amphibious training area, with over 30,000 troops. The tragic loss of life in the gulf of Mexico in the summer of 1943, with over 50 sinkings was brought home to Trinity with the memorial service for those who died in the torpedoing of the HMS, Empire Mica, south of St. George. Fred Sawyer Sr., Apalachicola's layreader conducted the service.

This article is (excerpted and printed)

by permission. Sources upon request.

I am here to speak to you this evening about the Henry Erben organ here at Trinity Episcopal Church. I suspect that a number of you may already be familiar with this historic and lovely instrument, having heard it perhaps during worship services or in concert. The paper that I am about to read to you,, is the product of research conducted during a recent sabbatical leave from Illinois Wesleyan. Another version of this presentation is to be published by the Organ Historical Society, in its journal The Tracker, later this calendar year, commemorating the bicentennial of Henry Erben's birth on March 10, 1800.

I paid my first visit to Apalachicola during the spring of 1995. Already familiar with my interest in historic pipe organs, the Watkins' were quick to introduce me to the little organ in their newly adopted church. Well, I guess you might call it "love at first sight and sound"

I was somewhat familiar with Henry Erben's reputation as an organ builder, from my knowledge of the history of the American pipe organ, but I had never actually heard or played one of his instruments in person. I was intrigued how an instrument by this prominent New York builder ended up down here in a small Gulf Coast town. At the time, I knew nothing of Apalachicola's history or it's importance as a coastal shipping port in the early nineteenth century. George Chapel however, was very happy to provide me with ample historical material to fill this lamentable gap in my education. In addition to George's own, fine essay on the history of Trinity Church, I am greatly indebted to William W. Rogers two volumes on Apalachicola, Outposts on the Gulf, and At the water's edge, as well as Harry P. Owens, 1966 doctoral dissertation, Appalachicola before 1861. Wiley L. Housewright's, A History of Music and Dance in Florida: 1565-1865, contains numerous references to early musical life in Apalachicola. There is no shortage of scholarly publication on the life and career of Henry Erben, including many articles, and a substantial monograph by John Ogasapian of the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. I also made extensive use of Diocesan journals of the Episcopal Church in Florida at the State Archives in Tallahassee.

Henry Erben

Long regarded as one of the most important figures in the history of American pipe organ building, Henry Erben was certainly also one of the most colorful. During his long career, spanning nearly six decades, Erben's reputation for unwavering excellence as an organ builder, his forays into Tammany Hall politics, as well as his intransigent personality, far out-distanced the boundaries of his native New York City, where he spent his entire life.

Henry was born on March 10, 1800 to Peter and Elizabeth Kern Erben, the daughter of a Reformed pastor from Heidleberg, Germany. Peter was a church musician, serving as organist in several New York City churches, and ending his career at the prestigious Trinity Episcopal Church, Wall Street, where in 1846, his son Henry was to install perhaps his most famous instrument. Later in life, Henry recalled that the organ was an every day part of his rearing and "a sweet memory of childhood".

An interesting anecdote describes Henry's formal introduction to organ building. During December 1813, John Lowe, an English organ builder working in Philadelphia, completed a large organ for St. John's Episcopal Chapel in New York, where Peter Erben was organist. Knowing that the British had a blockade in New York Harbor,, Lowe agreed to have the organ shipped to New York, but only after the captain of the sloop "Ann-Marie" assured him that he could successfully race and penetrate the blockade. Plans went awry however. The sloop was sighted by the British, seventy-four gun, "H.M.S. Plantagenet". A chase ensued, and before the Ann-Marie could reach the safety of port,, she was captured by the Plantagenet.

At first, the British captain refused to release the organ, and according to one newspaper account, plans were to send it to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where it would be erected in a new Anglican church there. Following lengthy negotiations however, the British captain agreed to release the organ for a ransom of 2,000 Spanish dollars. Thomas S. Hall, an apprentice of Lowe later recalled carrying the currency across the docks under a flag of truce.

Meanwhile, John Lowe rushed to New York by stagecoach, but the December journey was damp and cold; he contracted pneumonia en route and died in New York on December 13, four days after arriving. Hall,, Peter Erben and Peter's 13-year-old son Henry, erected the organ in the church, where it was first used on Easter Sunday,, 1814. Following the completion of the instrument, Hall returned to Philadelphia where he took over Lowe's business.

Henry Erben became Thomas Hall's apprentice in 1816. For the next seven years, he assisted Hall with several prominent installations,. including large instruments in New York, Baltimore and Charleston. Henry was frequently sent to the southern United States to set up organs built by the Lowe firm. Thus from an early date, Erben began to establish Southern connections which were to play an important role in his later career.

By the middle of 1823, we get our first glimpse of Erben as the direct and no-nonsense businessman, which later made him famous. Henry presumably needed cash to enter into partnership with Thomas Hall. Turning to his father, Peter Erben, he requested $6,000. For some reason, Peter declined the request, so Henry-like any good nineteenth century businessman-took his father to court. Settled by the Supreme Court, State and County of New York, Peter was ordered to pay his son the $6,000, plus court costs.

During the following June, 1824, a Charleston, South Carolina newspaper announced that HALL & ERBEN, Church and Chamber Organ Builders, New York respectfully inform their Southern friends, that having considerably enlarged their establishment, they are prepared to execute orders for organs of every description upon shortest notice, and upon the most accommodating terms'.

It should probably come as little surprise, based on Henry's previous dealings with his own father, that the business marriage between Erben and Hall, was not one "made in heaven", for within three years, the partnership between the two was dissolved, with Erben becoming the sole owner of the establishment.

From 1827 until the beginning of the Civil War,, the firm of "Henry Erben-Organ Manufacture" continued to expand, enlarge its work force and increase production. During the later 1820s, the firm produced an average of eight instruments annually, and the 1855 Industrial Census records that the firm manufactured 110 instruments in the twelve months preceding, July 1 9th. The census also indicated that Erben engaged 45 employees, used $50,000 in raw materials and the aggregate value of organs sold totaled just less than $100,00.1 No other American organ builder matched this production for another twenty-five years.

Henry Erben was one of the most sought after organ builders of his generation. His work, numbering in excess of perhaps 1,000 instruments (his obituary actually cited 1,734 organs) was to be found throughout North and South America. The country's most prestigious churches, as well as most cathedrals built in the United States during the 1840s and 1850s, boasted large Erben organs. Yet Erben also had a significant market among rural congregations, providing small, one manual (i.e., keyboard) instruments built to same,, exacting standards as his large organs. His business acumen made him a formidable competitor. He is believed to be the first American organ builder to aggressively use advertising literature to promote his work. During his career he is known to have published at least three opus lists, in 1843, 1874 and 1880. These lists were not arranged chronologically as a historical record of his work to date, but rather geographically by state, and then city or town. They were intended for the practical purpose of providing prospective clients with a reference tool for locating examples of Erben's work in a particular region, prior to ordering an instrument from him. Erben customers were almost always pleased with the product they received from his hand. If a customer decided to replace their existing organ with a new or larger instrument by Erben, Henry generally provided them with financial incentives, such as accepting the previous organ in trade, providing cash rebates, or both. Consequently, Erben succeeded to out-build, out-class and out-rate virtually all his competition in New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Baltimore for the greater part of the 19th century.

Among the builders of pipe organs, it is doubtful if any displayed more eccentricity, or was awarded a greater measure of tolerance than Henry Erben of New York. He had a decided genius for work, recognized no degrees of good or bad, and never sacrifice "his" ideals to the spirit of commercialism. This adherence to a fixed principle is reflected in every organ built by him ... 11