Few Remain as Last Eldress of Shaker Sect Dies

Bertha Lindsay, the last eldress of the Shakers, a celibate religious sect that promoted communal living and pacifism for more than 200 years, has died. She was 93.

Lindsay, who died Wednesday, was one of the last members of the religion that once boasted 6,000 members in 24 communities. One woman in her 90s remains in Canterbury, once home to 400 Shaker residents. Fewer than 10 live in Maine.

Able to add to their ranks only by taking in orphans or converts, Shaker spiritual leaders decided to halt new membership in 1965, but Lindsay often said the movement’s beliefs would not die with the last Shakers.

“Mother” Ann Lee, who brought the religion to the United States in 1774, prophesied that ultimately Shakers “would diminish to as many as a child could count on one hand, and then there would be a revival of the spirit,” Lindsay once said.

Lindsay, born July 28, 1897, in Braintree, Mass., died nearly 2 1/2 years after Eldress Gertrude Soule, who also lived at Shaker Village in Canterbury.

Only 94-year-old Sister Ethel Hudson remains in the New Hampshire village. A small community in Sabbathday Lake, Me., includes five pre-1965 members and at least three admitted afterward despite the decision by Canterbury leaders.

The Shakers, formally the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, gained their nickname from trembling brought on by religious fervor. They advocated living apart from society at large in communal villages.

Everyone was considered equal and Shaker government offered women leadership roles little known in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Two eldresses and two elders formed the ministry that made decisions for the society.

Lindsay came to Canterbury in 1905 as an orphan. Orphans taken in by the Shakers had to decide at age 21 whether to take a vow of celibacy and remain in the community or leave. The day after Lindsay’s 21st birthday she signed the Shaker covenant and donned the white starched bonnet that would identify her as a Shaker sister for the rest of her life.

When she turned 90, Lindsay lost her sight and put her energies into recording her life story and memories of Shaker life.