The Ghost of Joshua Guerin - 11/3/02
If you missed the October 24 program of the Madison Historical Society, you missed an amazingly good time. The guest speaker was a ghost. Does history get any better than that?
The ghost’s alter ego, Eric Olsen, is an historian and Park Ranger with the Morristown National Historical Park. A Rutgers graduate, Olsen writes articles for various publications and leads tours of Morristown and Historical Park sites.
Mr. Olsen explained that the presentation would be a “first person interpretation”, as opposed to a “ghost interpretation”, allowing his character, Joshua Guerin, to speak as someone from the 18th century with knowledge of the present day. After a short delay, Joshua Guerin, a charming, engaging fellow, entered the room dressed in a homespun tunic and britches, with a black hat. His speech was lilting, and words were pronounced with great precision.
He began by telling some riddles of his day, for example: How much dirt is in a hole measuring one yard deep and one yard wide? None! It’s a hole! Guerin also told a story from the New Jersey Journal about a soldier whose clever explanation of how a deck of cards could be used as both a Bible and an almanac saved him from court martial.
Joshua Guerin told about how the war affected his and his neighbors’ lives. Guerin lived on a farm in Jockey Hollow and raised crops, cattle and horses.
All men, by law, served in the militia for one month, every other month. Guerin did guard duty, and manned the alarm beacons which were bonfires strategically placed on hills for long distance visual communication.
Eric Olsen, still in character, described the effects of 13,000 soldiers being stationed in Morristown, Madison and Chatham in December of 1777. Troops were quartered in civilian houses, and brought with them theft, lice, dysentery, and smallpox. Some wives and children were forced to accompany their soldier husbands because they had no homes. Although General Washington discouraged their presence, the soldiers’ families were housed and fed by civilians as well. Joshua Guerin described having one of his pigs stolen by his guests, as well as tools, clothing and food. All the timber on his property was chopped down for construction of soldier huts, and reimbursement was not available for 10 years. Despite all the hardship he described, Guerin was remarkably cheerful.
Questions from the audience prompted more description of the general environment in Morris County: about one third of the population favored the war, one third were loyal to England, and one third changed their opinions depending on the company. It was illegal to speak against the American government, and one could be arrested for making a derogatory comment about George Washington. Travel outside the county was restricted and required a special pass. The prevalent religion at the time was Protestant, mostly Presbyterian. Lastly, Guerin gave a fascinating lesson in terminology for outhouse, or necessary house matters. He told of one communal privy set up in a horseshoe shape with six seats, apparently to encourage conversation.
As if a presentation by a “ghost” weren’t interesting enough, the actual descendents of Joshua Guerin were watching from the front row! Beth and Glenn Guerin and their two boys, Steven and Joshua, brought a feeling of continuity to the story
of the original Joshua Guerin. By the end of the evening, the year 1777 didn’t seem quite so long ago.