"Sept. 19, Ebenezer Baldwin from Norwich was ordained Pastor of the First Church in Danbury, by the Consociation of the Eastern District of Fairfield County."
At that day no class of citizens was more conspicuous for patriotism than the Congregational clergy of New England, and among them Mr. Baldwin was noted for his zeal and signal ability.
In 1774 Mr. Baldwin prepared and published a spirited address to the people of the western part of the colony to arouse them to a sense of the danger in which their liberties were involved.
Mr. Baldwin, with other ministers of the Association, arranged a series of circular fasts in the churches of Fairfield County in the spring of 1776 on "account of the threatening aspect of public affairs."
Ebenezer Baldwin, of Danbury, for it is to that great and excellent man that the individual who has now the honor to address you stands indebted for the best part of his early classical education.
His zeal for learning was ardent, and his acquisitions and reputation rapidly increasing, when he was doomed to fall prematurely in the flower of his age, and while engaged in his country's service.
Though his career was painfully short, he had lived long enough to attract general notice and the highest respect by his piety, his learning, his judgment, and his patriotism.
Mr. Baldwin fell a victim to the sickness that prevailed in the army, having only strength sufficient to reach home, where he died October 1st, ' honored by the deepest sympathies of his own people, and with the public veneration and sorrow.'
Ebenezer Baldwin, A.M., late pastor of the First Church in Danbury, who was born at Norwich, July 13th, 1745; received his education at Yale College, where he was graduated in 1763, and officiated several years with singular reputation as a tutor in that university; ordained a minister of the Gospel, September 19th, 1770, and died October 1st, 1776.