The Church of the Good Shepherd, Hartford, CT (Parroquia el Buen Pastor Hartford)
Our History and Architecture
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Our History, and Architecture

HISTORY
 
Good Shepherd Parish was founded in 1868 by Elizabeth Colt, a wealthy Victorian lady with a vision of a church where the owners, management and laborers at the Colt Armory could worship together.  Its church was consecrated, the following year. In 1895, Mrs. Colt built a spacious, three-story parish house to be a community center for the parish and its neighborhood.  When she died in 1905, she left a trust fund to help provide for the parish’s continuing maintenance and ministry.  While this legacy still exists, its has been broadened into a dynamic vision of urban ministry in the 21st century.
 
As the neighborhood has changed, so has Good Shepherd.  In the late 1950’s and early 60’s, Good Shepherd actively recruited African American families living in the neighboring housing projects.  More recently, the church has been aware of and responsive to the growing Spanish speaking population in the neighborhood.  Current social ministries and outreach efforts are offer to people of all races, ethnic backgrounds and socio-economic levels, which have been an essential component of the church’s ministry throughout the years.

 

MISSION

 
The Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd is a diverse community of faith and hope committed to worshipping and serving God in the midst of the city.  The church is located in one of the most needy neighborhoods of Hartford, CT.  Within a one block radius of the church there are close to 1,000 units of publicly funded housing.  Poverty, lack of education, crime, and violence are all challenges which the church has worked to address over the years.  The parish membership forms a racially, culturally and economically diverse community drawn from throughout the greater Hartford region to this historic church.  
 

Good Shepherd is a founding and member congregation of Hands-On-Hartford, (formerly Center City Churches), an agency which runs a residence for persons living with AIDS, a senior center, two youth and family centers, a halfway house for the mentally ill, a soup kitchen, a social service office for relief and advocacy.  Parishioners actively support all these enterprises.  Several years ago the national Episcopal Church honored this historic commitment to justice and healing by according Good Shepherd Parish status as a Jubilee Center of Ministry.

The Church of the Good Shepherd

Past and Present:

The Church of the Good Shepherd is a diverse community of faith and hope committed to worshipping and serving God in the midst of the city.  In our historic parish we seek through Jesus Christ, the Good Shepherd, to grow spiritually, to care for one another, and to reach out to our neighbors.

 

In an ever changing neighborhood which has hosted wave after wave of immigrants to this country, Good Shepherd has endeavored to maintain a constant witness to God’s all-embracing love.

 

The church was built in memorial to Colonel Samuel Colt and three of his children who died in infancy.  The consecration was January 28, 1869.  Its architect was Edward Tuckerman Potter of New York.  The style was early English / Gothic with Portland freestone and Ohio sandstone. 

 

Of particular interest inside are the floor tilings which grow richer in color as one moves toward the altar.  Surrounding the altar are stained-glass windows representing our Lord at the Last Supper, blessing the loaf of bread, with six apostles on either side.  Saint Paul replaces Judas, however. The figures were taken from the work of Friederich Overbeck (1789 – 1869).  The chestnut beams and the hand-made windows (Heaton, Butler and Bayne of London, England) attract one’s attention.

 

The baptistery is in the form of three children holding a shell.  A gift from Mrs. Colt’s sister, Mrs. C. Nichols Beach, carved from a single piece of white marble, it is in special memory of the three small children. 

 

Because the chapel (on the north side of the church) was originally a church school meeting room, it has a separate entrance at the exterior arch which reads, “Feed My Lambs” (John 21:15).  The windows contain an image of the Child Jesus and scripture texts deemed especially suitable for the young.

 

The special memorial is located at the great west window.  One figure is of Joseph (his face resembles Sam’s) in Egypt, distributing food with the legend “And God blessed him and made all that he did to prosper” (Genesis).  The other figure is of the Good Shepherd with a flock, having this legend, “He shall gather the lambs with his arm.”  The multi-foiled window above represents the Angel of Peace bearing three children in her arms.  The entire memorial is surrounded by a painted border containing this verse from Revelation, “The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.”

 

This structure is markedly different from Hartford’s earlier churches designed to be filled with light.  The Victorians held that architecture should reflect life, and that since life is full of so many shadows, a beautiful building should be full of shadow, as well.  Yet there are many points at which the light breaks into the shadow: the windows symbolizing God’s Light, and the bright brass of the eagle shaped lectern which holds the Bible, the Word of God.

 

Of particular interest in the exterior of the building is the southwest entrance, “the armorer’s porch.”  Potter believed in embellishing his edifices with decorative details related to his patron’s life, and the exterior of this entrance is adorned with stone images of gun barrels, pistol handles, and other details of the gun making craft which decorate the crosses and other religious symbols. 

 

Like so many of the great cathedrals of Europe, the church’s foundation is supported by wooden pilings driven into the soil beneath.  After two disastrous floods in the mid-1930’s, dikes were constructed around the city to control the waters of the Connecticut River.  As a result, the pilings began to dry and to rot, the foundation began to deteriorate, and the 150-foot tower began noticeably to lean.  The church was condemned for some years in the early 1970’s, while the foundation was reinforced with concrete and steel.

 

History of the Colt Family

 

1814          Samuel Colt born (July 19)

1826       Elizabeth Hart Jarvis born (October 5)

1856          Marriage (June 5)

1857          Residence at Armsmear (“Arms meadow”) established, Wethersfield Avenue, Hartford

Samuel Jarvis Colt (Feb. 1857-December 1857)

1858              Caldwell Hart Colt born (November 24)

1860          Elizabeth Jarvis Colt (October 1860 – December 1860)

1861      Henrietta Selden Colt (May 1961 – December 1861)

1862        Samuel Colt died, aged 47, (January10)

                  Stillborn child (July 1862)

1869          Church consecrated (January 28)

1894          Caldwell died in Florida (January 21)

1895          Parish house erected

1896          Parish house dedicated (September 10)

1905          Elizabeth Hart Jarvis Colt died, aged 79 (August 23)

Armsmear willed as home for Connecticut Episcopal clergy widows

 

 

The Caldwell Colt Memorial Parish House

 

Commodore Caldwell Hart Colt, Mrs. Colt’s only child to reach adulthood, drowned mysteriously in Florida at the age of 36 in 1894.  Edward Tuckerman Potter (also architect of the Twain House in Hartford) was brought out of retirement to build a “companion building,” 30 years after his work on the church.  It celebrates the world, creation, nature, and the sea.  Caldwell was a yachtsman who traveled the world on his ship, “The Dauntless.”  This building, with “WELCOME” inscribed over the front door, captures the image of a ship: with portholes, symbols of the sea, and vocational themes.  It expresses the grief of a mother whose love could not be quenched by the waters that drowned her only adult son.

 

The tribune, located in the ballroom on the south side, is raised a step above the floor of the hall and is separated by a bronze grille. It was furnished with a full-length portrait (now hanging in Armsmear) of Commodore Colt standing on the deck of the Dauntless (painted by Eastman Johnson).  Around the portrait, the stone setting is carved in leaves of bay (the laurel of the ancients), and on both sides are inscribed tablets of white Egyptian onyx.  On either side of the tribune are carvings of the Dauntless:  to the left, as starting out on a voyage under full sail, while to the right, the yacht is shown with sails furled, the anchor down, the voyage ended.  But the light streaming over the water from the lighthouse on shore symbolized the peaceful rest of the heavenly haven.  The Colt seal, majestic windows, scriptural text, and missive structures enhance the entire memorial.

 

Note the bell from the Dauntless that hangs in the balcony.  A ship’s watch runs across the ceiling, like that of an ocean vessel.

 

Words from Mrs. Colt’s Letter of Dedication of the Parish House:

“May this [place] be an incentive to all connected with it to do a far better, nobler and more self-sacrificing work in the Master’s service than ever before.  And may He without whom our labor is in vain have it in His holy keeping, making it an increasing blessing to those for whose use it is intended, and to their children’s children, that thus may be fulfilled the heartfelt prayer of their and your friend, Elizabeth Hart Jarvis Colt.”   -September 10, 1896.