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(JOHN CUTLER 1723-1805)
(JOHN CUTLER 1723-1805)
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==JOHN CUTLER 1723-1805==
 
==JOHN CUTLER 1723-1805==
  
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'''''Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts, 1792-1794'''''
 
'''''Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts, 1792-1794'''''

Revision as of 15:19, 1 August 2010

JOHN CUTLER 1723-1805

<Cutler.jpg>

Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts, 1792-1794

On Thursday, October 31, 1805, a solemn procession moved through the streets of Boston to the sound of a funeral dirge. Led by Grand Pursuivants with black rods, followed by Tylers and Stewards, Deacons and Wardens, members of Grand Lodge and of Saint John’s Lodge, and finally the oldest Past Officer bearing a purple cushion covered with black crepe holding the golden urn with the lock of George Washington’s hair marching in front of Grand Master Isaiah Thomas, the Masons of Boston made their way from Trinity Church to the house of the late John Cutler.

Joining with the family of the deceased and the pall holders escorting Brother Cutler’s remains, the procession – now including “a large number of carriages” – made its way along the streets of Boston to Trinity Church. As the Brethren parted to right and left, the remains of Brother Cutler were escorted into the house of worship where he had prayed and played the organ for so many years. A great number of Bostonians, including many members of the Craft, paid their final respects to the man who had been so instrumental in the union of the Grand Lodges a decade and a half before. It was a fitting end to a Masonic career that had spanned half a century, during which remarkable change and almost unthinkable growth had occurred in the Masonic world.

John Cutler is less renowned than his immediate successor, Paul Revere, but he was accorded the greatest respect during his lifetime, and his funeral – the first such spectacle for a departed Grand Master of Massachusetts since the memorial for Joseph Warren, who fell at Bunker Hill in 1775 – was singular enough to be recorded in exacting detail by Grand Secretary John Proctor in the Proceedings of the Grand Lodge for 1805. Though he does not occupy as prominent a place as Revere or Warren in the pantheon of Boston’s patriots, he was certainly a luminary in Masonic circles.

Cutler was born in 1723, the adopted son of a physician of the same name, whose father had emigrated to Plymouth Colony in 1647. The death of his birth father at age five left his family destitute, but after being adopted the young man was apprenticed to a brass-founder, and ultimately was established in a shop on Hawley Street in Boston, in the rear of the old Cutler mansion. He was active in Trinity Church, where he played the organ with great skill; his musical knowledge and ability as a craftsman is evident even in the portrait above, which shows him as a young man of 23 standing before a pianoforte he built himself.

From the outset of his Masonic career he was recognized as a “bright Mason”. He was made a Master Mason in 1761, and by 1764 was installed as the Worshipful Master of the Second Lodge; three years later he assumed the chair of the Master’s Lodge, the only Lodge empowered to make Master Masons. From 1767 onward, he filled a number of important offices in St. John’s Grand Lodge, and worked diligently as a member of the committee empowered to effect a merger with the Massachusetts Grand Lodge, which had held its own charter from the Grand Lodge of Scotland from 1769 onward. This effort took nearly five years – from the appointment in 1787 to the final merger in March of 1792 – and John Cutler served as its Chairman. When the arrangements were complete, the two Grand Lodges at last met together and elected Cutler as the first Grand Master of the united Grand Lodge.

Grand Master John Cutler presided over the establishment of many of the customs and traditions enshrined in our Grand Lodge to the present day. In April 1792 he issued an edict that designated quarterly Communications; during his first year, a committee wrote the first Massachusetts Book of Constitutions. In September 1794 he wrote to the Grand Lodge of Rhode Island indicating that the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts would not issue Charters in geographical areas where another Grand Lodge had jurisdiction. These legacies set the tone for Masonic procedure, custom and jurisprudence for the two centuries to follow.

During Cutler’s administration, he granted eight additional lodge Charters, six in Massachusetts proper (three of which still meet: Old Colony in Hanover, Morning Star in Worcester, and Republican in Greenfield) and two in what is now the State of Maine (both of which still meet: Hancock #4 in Castine, and Lincoln #3 in Wiscasset). While this number is far exceeded by the large number of charters issued by his successor Paul Revere, the holders of the “Cutler charters” were strong supporters of our early united Grand Lodge.

After his term as Grand Master, Brother Cutler served on many committees and participated in numerous activities in Grand Lodge and elsewhere in the craft. In January 1800, he was one of the six pall supporters that escorted the Golden Urn during the Funeral Obsequies for George Washington, officiated by Grand Master Samuel Dunn; this was nearly the last occasion on which he was recorded as present for a Grand Lodge communication.

As with many distinguished brethren, John Cutler was honored by having a lodge named for him. John Cutler Lodge was constituted in September 1859 in Abington; this lodge, now meeting at the Tri-Town Masonic building in East Bridgewater, recently celebrated its 150th anniversary, and continues to honor this “bright Mason” who did so much for the Craft in Massachusetts.

The Proceedings record a letter from John Cutler’s family, written a few days after the funeral service in November 1805. His son and son-in-law wrote: “Deeply impressed with a sense of gratitude for the respectful attention you were pleased to bestow . . . the family of the deceased beg leave to return their most sincere and unfeigned thanks for this honorable testimony of respect and affection for their late parent . . . they feel particularly indebted for the early attention paid . . . being well acquainted with the affectionate, respectful and sincere regards the deceased bore towards the Fraternity.” Their words certainly echo the sentiments of many contemporaries of this distinguished Past Grand Master.

© 2010, Walter H. Hunt, from an article in the Autumn, 2010 TROWEL. Media:Example.ogg