Nathaniel S. Wheaton, born in 1792 in Washington, Connecticut, graduated from Yale College and was one of the founding members of Washington College (now Trinity College), serving as secretary of the Board of Trustees until he was elected president of the College in 1831. Wheaton was also a respected member of the Episcopal Diocese of Hartford, as assistant rector of Hartford’s Christ Church. As part of his duties as a member of the board, Wheaton was tasked with raising funds for the new college, and was sent by the trustees to England after the Washington College charter was established in 1823 to gather money, books, and scientific equipment. He traveled for 13 months from September 1823 to October 1824, during which time he raised about $2,000. A portion of this funding he spent on new scientific instruments and about a thousand books. It was these books that became the first materials held in the Washington College Library. The Trinity College Library retains 334 of the 400 titles that Wheaton originally obtained during his travels, as well as a collection of notebooks, journals, correspondence, account books, records of expenditures, and invoices for books that he purchased for the College in “The Nathaniel S. Wheaton papers,” housed in the Trinity College Archives at the Watkinson Library.

Wheaton’s mission was complicated by differing sentiments about the religious affiliation of Washington College at the time. The College’s promoters had under-emphasized the new institution’s Church influence in speeches to the public, assuring non-Episcopalian prospective students that proselytizing from the Church would not have a place in their education. However, Wheaton was sent to gather funding and materials with a letter, signed by Bishop Thomas Church Brownell as president of the College and addressed to “the Bishops, Clergy, and Laity of the Church of England,” which bemoaned the “extremely difficult position of the Church in Connecticut, ‘planted in the midst of Dissenters from her ministry and worship, and opposed by many prejudices, numerous difficulties have heretofore retarded her progress.’” The letter, printed in the Connecticut Courant in March 1824, sparked outrage among those who had been told of Washington College’s lack of close ties with the Church of England. Glenn Weaver, in his History of Trinity College, framed Wheaton’s travels in the broader context of a still relatively new America finding its footing after cutting ties with England: “He had been sent to secure the assistance of the English Church in setting up an Anglican college in what before the American Revolution had been English missionary territory, and much of Wheaton’s coming and going was incidental to the most serious purpose of re-establishing the ties between the Church in America and that of the Mother Country which had been, to all intents and purposes, severed with the War for American Independence.” During his time at Trinity College in Cambridge in December 1823, Wheaton detailed his efforts to solicit book donations in a journal of his experience, which is still preserved in the Trinity Archives. Wheaton wrote: “I have been engaged in making my object known among the officers of the Institution, with the view of preparing the way for obtaining from the University a copy of such works as have been printed at their press, & remain unsold.” Throughout this journal, Wheaton detailed the troubles he encountered in trying to solicit donations from a staunch English clergy who were resistant to the idea of contributing to a college undergoing controversy, which to their minds was indicative of schism in American religious life. Wheaton pointed to the source of this conflict in a later journal entry, attributing his troubles to a “Note” written by Bishop Hobart of New York, a staunch opponent to Wheaton’s soliciting in England, who was making his opinion widely heard. On December 10, 1823, Wheaton wrote:

“I really do not see that I have much chance of success in pursuing my object further. Wherever I turn; whatever scheme I undertake to promote collections for the Library, I find the effects of the unfortunate ‘Note.’ …Professor Lee entered into the cause, with all the candor and ingeniousness natural to his character. He undertook, amidst his numerous avocations, to get the Masters enlisted, & went round to many of them with my papers. To-night he has informed me, that he found their minds poisoned with the unfortunate ‘Note’, which artfully represents us as a divided Church, & pursuing opposite views…. Curiosity and interest are both awakened for us; but the intimation that the project is opposed by an American Bishop has spoiled all.”

Despite the resistance he met in England, Wheaton was largely successful in obtaining books in Europe, as can be seen by the documents of sale preserved in the Trinity Archives. According to invoices that are still retained, Wheaton made his first purchases in Paris, sending five cases to Havre to eventually be set on a journey to Hartford, Connecticut via New York. Wheaton then traveled to London, where he purchased 78 titles from booksellers Rivingtons and Cochran. Though many of the books listed in these invoices were purchased by Wheaton, he also received 158 titles by donation during his time in Paris and London. One such donation took the form of funding given by Thomas Horne and the Rev. Dr. George Gaskin, which Wheaton used to purchase 110 titles from bookseller William Sior in Brighton. Wheaton also received donations from various Anglican clergymen throughout his journey in Europe; all in all, these purchases and donations amounted to 1,146 volumes to form the beginnings of the Washington College Library.

The distribution of these titles reveals that religious literature makes up the most robust category in the collection. Greek and Latin classical authors make up the second largest portion of titles, followed by English and French Literature, the Natural Sciences and Mathematics, History, Economics and Politics, Philosophy, Biography, and other miscellaneous topics. Wheaton’s personal library, willed to the College upon his passing in 1862, accounts for some of the titles in the Wheaton Collection. From the titles he chose to collect, it is evident that Wheaton’s interest spanned broader than just the study of religion to include the sciences as well. Bishop Brownell’s own interest in the incorporation of the sciences into the College’s curriculum likely influenced the distribution of topics included in the initial Library collection. In examining a journal containing circulation records for the period of 1827 to 1840 which is housed in the Trinity Archives, we find that the Wheaton Collection was considerably used by students and faculty. It was not common for students to be required to use library books for their courses, since most students used textbooks; however, especially inquisitive and multilingual readers made use of the collection’s books in Greek, Latin, and French, as well as the numerous other books offered for the College community’s enrichment. Peter J. Knapp notes that such students are listed in the circulation catalogue of the time, and that the names of future College presidents such as John Williams (Class of 1835), Abner Jackson (Class of 1837), and Thomas Pynchon (Class of 1841) checked out books from Nathaniel Wheaton’s collection in the early years of the Library.

Trinity College Archives: Nathaniel S. Wheaton papers

Trinity College in the Twentieth Century: a History (2000) by Peter and Anne Knapp.

Trinity Reporter, May 1976.

History of Trinity College (1967) by Glenn Weaver, pp. 18-96.