Paul Field (1721-1778) was born in Northfield, Massachusetts, in 1721, the seventh of ten children born to Zecheriah and Sarah (Mattoon) Field. Paul married Christian Hubbard of Sunderland and the couple had ten children. Paul was a deacon in the Northfield church. He died of smallpox in 1778, aged 58. This epitaph was carved on his gravestone:
Thus the bereaved church and all
Sorrowing friends lament his fall
Help Lord the Godly laborers cease
O heal the breach and give us peace. (J.H. Temple and George Sheldon, A History of Northfield, 1875, p. 580)
Deacon Paul Field was taxed "for one slave" in the 1771 tax valuation. This was likely Meshek, identified as "African slave, owned by Dea. Paul Field" in the 1875 history of the town. (Ibid. p. 497) Phinehas Field shared information and numerous anecdotes about Meshek (spelled Meshach) in his essay, "Slavery in New England," published in History and Proceedings of the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, Vol. 1, p. 483.
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