Background
The son of the Rev. Leonard and Elizabeth (Hopkins) Worcester, he was reared at Peacham, Vt. , where his father taught him to farm and to set type.
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Samuel Austin Worcester
Edit ProfileEducation
In 1819 he graduated from the University of Vermont, of which his uncle, Samuel Austin [q. v. ], was president.
He graduated from the Theological Seminary at Andover in 1823.
Career
Under his supervision in 1827 types were made in Boston for the Cherokee alphabet, invented by Sequoyah [q. v. ].
He soon afterward went to New Echota, Ga. , where he served as missionary, translating portions of the Bible from Greek to Cherokee.
His case was appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States, which decided in 1832 that the act of the Georgia legislature was unconstitutional (6 Peters, 597), but Worcester was not released from prison until Jan. 14, 1833.
Soon after his release from prison he transferred his activities to the Cherokee living west of the Mississippi River in what is now Oklahoma.
He reached their country in May 1835 and after a short stay at Dwight Mission removed to Park Hill and began the work of establishing the Park Hill Mission.
In time the mission grew to be the largest and most important institution of its kind in the Indian Territory.
Unlike many of the earlier missionaries he was quick to see the possibilities of the Cherokee written language invented by Sequoyah and earnestly urged the Cherokee to learn and to use it.
[Letters among missionary letters, Andover-Harvard Theological Lib. , Cambridge, Massachussets, in Alice Robertson Coll. , Tulsa Univ. , Tulsa, Okla. ; letters and copies in possession of Okla.
Hist.
Soc. ; Althea Bass, Cherokee Messenger (1936); R. S. Walker, Torchlights to the Cherokees (1931); S. A. Worcester, The Descendants of Rev. Wm. Worcester (1914). ]
Religion
He was ordained a minister in Park Street Congregational Church at Boston, on Aug. 25, 1825, and departed almost immediately for Brainard Mission in the Cherokee Country of eastern Tennessee, where he remained as supervising missionary for two years.
He was for many years secretary of the Cherokee temperance society, which numbered more than fifteen hundred Cherokee among its members.
Connections
He was buried beside the body of his first wife in the little Worcester Cemetery a short distance southwest of Park Hill.
- Mother:
- Ann
- married:
- Erminia
- married:
- Ann
- Wife:
- Erminia
- Daughter:
- Ann
Their daughter Ann Eliza married William Schenck Robertson q.v. and became the mother of Alice Mary Roberston q.v..
On Apr. 3, 1841, he married, as his second wife, Erminia Nash, who had been born at Cummington, Massachussets She died at Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, on May 5, 1872.
Their daughter Ann Eliza married William Schenck Robertson q.v. and became the mother of Alice Mary Roberston q.v..
On Apr. 3, 1841, he married, as his second wife, Erminia Nash, who had been born at Cummington, Massachussets She died at Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, on May 5, 1872.
Their daughter Ann Eliza married William Schenck Robertson q.v. and became the mother of Alice Mary Roberston q.v..
