I love to think of old Ipswich town,

Where Whitefield preached in the church on the hill,

Driving out the Devil till he leaped down

From the steeple's top, where they show you still,

Imbedded deep in the solid rock,

The indelible print of his cloven hoof,

And tell you the Devil has never shown

Face or hoof since that day in the honest town.The old North church has always had a steeple. From the earliest of times, the church steeple standing on the hill overlooking the town, was a beacon to the traveler and the faithful, drawing them to the center of Ipswich and to the Sunday service. In Puritan times, the Sunday service was a very serious business. Every person was expected - No! - required to attend. Sickness and death were the only excuse and the former had better be close to the latter. The colonists in their Sunday finery, the better the higher the class, walked up the hill to the door below the steeple to hear their minister preach the good word. It was a serious business. Services lasted several hours, some, all day.

Ipswich had its great men in the pulpit. Thomas Parker, Nathaniel Ward, Nathaniel Rogers, John Norton and Thomas Cobbett spent their Sundays haranguing their flock. They were hardly able to keep the devil from their door. The great orators of the time were the ministers. To the local ones were added the visiting ministers from surrounding towns and Boston. To Ipswich came the greatest of the great -- Cotton Mather, Increase Mather, Gilbert Tennant and the greatest of the orators George Whitfield.

Sometime around 1740, Rev. Rogers thought his flock was going astray and needed help to return to the one true road. To help him he invited Rev. Whitfield to come to Ipswich and to bring the sinning parishioners back into line. On the appointed Sunday, Reverend Whitfield took the pulpit in the old North Church. It was a particularly dark day suitable to the occasion. The minister in his conservative Sunday preaching suit moved before the people and began to preach. Minutes turned to hours and hours to more hours and still Whitfield went on, glorifying God and condemning all evil.

It happened that the tumult coming from the Church attracted the Devil. He jumped onto the steeple to better hear what was being said inside. Whitfield went on. His voice got louder and louder. His praise for the Lord was great, his condemnation of the Devil was overwhelming. The Devil listened, but the words going to Heaven were deafening. The more he listened the harsher it was to his ears. The sound was enough to push him toward the edge.

Finally the Devil could stand no more and he leaped from the top of the steeple to the hard rock below. He landed with a crash and ran off from the Church defeated by the words of the great Whitfield that day.

You may not believe that this could have happened but there is proof. Even today if you look carefully enough at the outcropping of rocks in front of the present church where he landed, can still be seen the imprint of the cloven hoof of the Devil testifying to the greatness of the oratory of that day when Whitfield drove the Devil from the North Church.

Has he ever returned?

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