At the session of the Illinois Conference, held Sept. 27, 1837, Rev.
Philip W. Nicholas was sent to Green Bay, and Rev. Salmon Stebbins was
assigned to the District. The congregations had now become highly
respectable both in numbers and position. Hon. M.L. Martin had settled
at Green Bay, and his good lady, who was a Methodist, had become a
member of the Society. Sister Martin had been raised in affluent
circumstances, and was a lady of fine culture and rare judgment. Her
husband, a member of the legal profession, and subsequently a Delegate
to Congress and Member of the Constitutional Convention of the State,
was a man of good attainments and superior abilities. His family not
only formed the nucleus of cultivated society, but also furnished a
pleasant home for the Itinerant.
Besides this excellent and cultured family, the congregation embraced
Col. Ryan and family, as before stated, Mrs. Gen. Brooke, and Mrs. Capt.
Kirby Smith, whose husband was killed in the Mexican War, she being now
the wife of Gen. Eaton, Quartermaster General of the U.S.A. In addition,
Gov. and Mrs. Doty were constant attendants upon the Chapel, as were
also Gen. and Mrs. Marcy, whose daughter, Mrs. George B. McClellan, was
born here, and the most excellent of all the officers, Capt. Merrill and
his young wife.
Referring to the class of society that constituted at first the class
and congregation at Green Bay, reminds me of a case of Church discipline
which occurred there about the days of which I am now writing. It
happened on this wise: