"Roswell Shurtleff, the son of William and Hannah (Cady) Shurtleff, was born at Ellington, then East Windsor, Ct., August 29, 1773. He was the youngest of nine children, two of whom died before he was born. From his earliest years he was fond of reading, and at school he was called a good scholar. His religious training was carefully attended to, and to this, and the Christian example which accompanied it, he ascribed his conversion, and the views he subsequently embraced of the Christian doctrines. "When he was seven or eight years old he had many serious thoughts of God and duty. The requirement that he should give up all for God, as he understood it, filled him with gloom. "During several of the subsequent years, the subject of religion dwelt on his mind, and he was occasionally deeply impressed. One of the difficult things was to comprehend the notion of faith. The promise was: 'He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.' He believed, as he supposed, and he had been baptized, but he could not feel that he was safe. Must he believe that he, personally, should be saved? But what if he mistook his own character, and believed what was false; would his opinion of his safety _make_ him safe. He was ashamed to be known as a religious inquirer, and, therefore, remained longer in darkness. Finding that he had been observed by his father to have become a more diligent student of the Scriptures, he left the practice of reading them before the family. Sometimes, assuming a false appearance of indifference, he carried his difficulties to his mother, who was able to furnish a satisfactory solution. She seems to have been a person of unusual intelligence as well as goodness. Her memory was ever cherished by him with the most grateful affection, as it regarded his own spiritual progress. He believed that he suffered unspeakable loss from the concealment of his early feelings on the subject of religion, and did not doubt that many failed of conversion from this foolish reserve. It was not till a number of years after this that his religious life commenced.