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The Chronicle 
A Baptist Historical Quarterly
Copyright (c) 1940 American Baptist Historical Society
610 Walnut Avenue,
Scottsdale Pennsylvania

Vol. III No. 1
Jan. 1940
[p.10]

The Trials and Triumphs of Western
Pennsylvania Baptists *

William R. Pankey
Pastor, Union Baptist Church, Pittsburgh, Pa.

American Baptist history falls into three periods which correspond with the three periods of our national history. 
First, the colonial period (1620-1776), which was marked by faithful witnessing and bitter persecution; second, the 
period of territorial and national expansion (1776-1865), which was marked by rapid growth through missionary activities; 
third, the period of industrial expansion, from 1865 to the present time, which has been marked by an intensive program 
of evangelism and education. The history of Western Pennsylvania Baptists is a continuous story datinu from the closing 
decade of the first period to this good hour.

In relating the thrilling story of "The Trials and Triumphs of Western Pennsylvania Baptists" this presentation will 
follow three general lines of thought; First, the story of Baptist beginnings in western Pennsylvania prior to 1776; 
second, the origin and history of the Redstone Baptist Association (1776-1832); third, the origin and history of the 
Pittsburgh Baptist Association (1839-1939).

Baptist Beginnings in Western Pennsylvania

Prior to 1692 the vast territory extending westward from the Allegheny mountains was inhabited only by the native 
Indians. In that year the first trader, Arnold Viele, made a journey across the head-waters of the Allegheny river 
from the upper Delaware and Hudson valley, and traveled down the Allegheny and Ohio rivers to the Shawnee Indian 
country, near the Mississippi valley. Upon his return he brought a group of Shawnee Indians who established themselves 
in a village on the upper Delaware river. About the year 1725 they became dissatisfied with the measurement of the 
"walking purchase" of the Penns, and migrated to the Forks of the Ohio where they established several towns.

__________
* Centennial address delivered before the Pittsburgh Baptist Association, First Baptist Church, Pittsburgh, Pa., 
June 7, 1939.


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.11]

Traders from the east soon followed the Indians across the mountains. The winding trails soon became the highways for 
the pioneering settlers and the marching military forces.

The first religious foundations were laid by itinerant preachers who rode horse-back over rugged mountain trails, 
suffering many hardships, in order to minister to the spiritual needs of the new settlers on the frontier. Untold 
dangers lurked by the wayside. Heavy storms and swollen streams never discouraged them in their purpose to plant the 
banner of Christianity in the new settlements.

In an endless procession the oppressed people of the east, disgusted with the unfair Stamp Act of 1765 and the spirit 
of religious intolerance existing there, moved westward in ox-carts and wagons, settling for a while among the quiet 
hills and peaceful valleys of western Pennsvlvania, each family claiming as much land as a man could walk around in 
one day. Those with long legs obviously had a distinct advantage.

In 1768 William Penn made his famous purchase of the area west of Laurel Hill and south of the purchase line between 
Cherry Tree and Kittanning. This vast territory embraced what is today twenty-fotir counties, and was purchased for 
the sum of only $50,000 from the Indians. The way was immediately opened for legal settlements. Land was advertised at 
the rate of twenty-five dollars for one hundred acres. The response was immediate.

About the year 1768 there came into the Redstone country of western Pennsylvania the Reverend Henry Crosbye, pastor of 
the Mount Olive Branch Baptist Church, New Jersey, and the Reverend Isaac Sutton, also from New Jersey. They made their 
journey on horse-back across the mountains to Beesontown (Uniontown), founded bv John Beeson, a Virginia Quaker. Here 
they organized the Great Bethel Baptist Church, November 8, 1770. This was the first church of any denomination to be 
organized in western Pennsylvania. Henry Crosbye probably returned to New Jersey, as nothing more is heard of him in 
this section. The Suttons settled in Greene and Fayette counties, where many of their descendants reside today. There 
were five Sutton brothers, all of whom were Baptist preachers.

Prior to the organization of the Redstone Baptist Association in 1776, the Great Bethel Church was affiliated with 
the Ketocton Btptist Association in Virginia. The old records


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.12]

indicate that the church was located in "Monongahela County Virginia" at the time of its organization. The strict 
discipline of the congregation is to be seen in an entry in the church minutes of October 3, 1829, charging Patrick 
Bradley with "being long absent from the church services, unchristian deportment in laying wagers, and rabbit hunting 
on Sunday."

The main stream of Baptist life in western Pennsylvania flowed down the Mononcraliela valley from Virginia. Numbered 
among these early Virginia pioneers was the distinguished John Corbly. He probably became affiliated with the Great 
Bethel Church upon his arrival on the frontier. In 1773 he assisted in the organization of the Goshen church (John Corbly 
Memorial), the North Ten Mile Church and the Peter's Creek Church. In 1775 he helped organize the Turkey Foot Baptist 
Church, Somerset county.

The story of John Corbly is one of sacrifice and heroisim. Born in Ireland in 1738, he came to America at the age of 
fourteen, settling first in eastern Pennsylvania, but later moving to Virginia, where he was soundly converted under 
the preaching of James Ireland. Shortly thereafter he became a Baptist preacher, and preached with such power that the 
Episcopal Establishment in Virginia considered him worthy of imprisonment, rewarding him shortly thereafter with a 
cell in the Culpeper jail. On the very site of that old jail there stands a thriving Baptist church today. When brought 
into court, John Corbly conducted his own defense, and was acquitted of all charges in 1768, although he suffered much 
abuse and physical violence later.

In 1769 he was a delegate from the Mount Run Baptist Church, Culpeper County, Virginia, to the Ketocton Baptist 
Association, and served as clerk. The next mention of his name in the Ketocton minutes represents him as being a 
delegate from the Redstone country.

About 1770 John Corbly and John Garard established their new homes near the present village of Whitley, Greene County, 
Pennsylvania. The strono, house erected by John Garard became known in history as Garard's Fort. It was here in 1773 
that Corbly assisted in the organization of the Goshen church, becoming its first pastor, and remaining in that capacity 
until his death in 1803, a pastorate of thirty years.

During the American Revolution John Corbly was loyal


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.13]

to the cause of liberty. Being a justice of the peace, he frequently had the Tory traitors arrested and imprisoned. 
In 1777 he arrested sixteen Tories at one time and conducted them personally to Winchester, Virginia, for trial and 
imprisonment.

On Sunday morning, May 2, 1782, deep tragedy struck the Corbly family. While on their way to church services they were 
attacked by the Indians. The baby was snatched from its mother's arms and its brains beaten out against a tree. The 
terrified mother was hacked to pieces trying in vain to hold on to her baby, and was then shot down in cold blood. 
Three other children were also killed. Another daughter was scalped and left for dead, but she recovered and lived 
until she was twenty-one years of age. A son, John, escaped because of the protection of his faithful dog. He later 
became a Baptist preacher in Ohio, where he lived to be eighty years of age. Mr. Corbly's life was spared because the 
slaughter took place while he had returned to his house to get his Bible which had been forgotten.

Twelve years later John Corbly was unjustly accused of giving aid to the whiskey rebellion in western Pennsvlvania. He 
was taken to Pittsburgh and thrown into jail, and in the winter of 1794, with about twenty others, marched on foot 
through mud and snow, under a heavy guard of cavalry, across the mountains to Philadelphia. On the journey Corbly was 
elected chaplain of the group, and preached frequently to the prisoners and guards along the way. Upon their arrival 
in Philadelphia they were brought to trial and immediately acquitted.

John Corbly was known as the ablest preacher of his day. For thirty years he directed the planting of Baptist churches 
in western Pennsylvania. Imprisoned three times and married three times, these experiences of sunshine and shadow 
served only to deepen his spiritual life and magnify his usefulness. Active to the very end, he entered into rest 
June 9, 1803, his funeral sermon being preached by Elder Divid Phillips, pastor of the Peter's Creek Baptist church. 
His mortal remains lie buried in the cemetery within the shadow of the old Goshen church, Whitley, Pennsylvania.

The complete list of Baptist churches established in western Pennsylvania prior to 1776 is as follows: Great Bethel 


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.14]

(1770), Goshen (1773), Ten Mile (1773), Peter's Creek (1773) Pike Run (now extinct, 1775), Turkey Foot (sometimes 
known as the Jersey church, 1775). All of these churches were affiliated with the Ketocton Baptist Association in 
Virginia prior to 1776.

The Redstone Baptist Association

The Redstone Baptist Association was organized at the Goshen church, Greene County, Pennsylvania, October 7, 1776 with 
the following constituent churches: Great Bethel, Goshen, Ten Mile, Peter's Creek, Turkey Foot and Pike Run. John Corbly 
was elected moderator and William Wood was made clerk.

The introductory sermon was preached by James Sutton, pastor of the Ten Mile church. Among the first items of business 
was the presentation and the granting of a request for assistance in the organization of a church at Cross Creek, Brook 
County, Virginia, and also another church at the Forks of the Cheat (now Stewardstown, W. Va.). The committee appointed 
to assist in this important work consisted of John Corbly, William Wood and James Sutton. Before adjournment, the body 
elected William Wood, pastor of the Pike Run church, to preach the introductory sermon at the next annual meeting of 
the Association, to be held at the Great Bethel Church, October 18, 1777.

The Redstone Association was the second to be organized in Pennsylvania, the first being the Philadelphia Association 
in 1707. For about twenty years the body was known as the "Annual Association of Baptists West of the Laurel Hill 
Mountains," and embraced the territory of western Virginia, western Pennsvlvania and eastern Ohio. By 1809 the 
Association had thirty-three churches with 1323 members. Numbered among its preachers the old Redstone Association could 
boast of such spiritual giants as John Corbly, Isaac Sutton, James Sutton, William Wood, Isaac Morris, David Phillips, 
James Estep, William Shadrach, William Brownfield, William Penny, Samuel Williams, Charles Wheeler and others.

The Redstone Association had a continuous history for a period of fifty-six years prior to its death in 1832. Three 
bitter controversies brought about its tragic collapse, and thereby almost destroyed the Baptist cause in western 
Pennsvlvania. The three sparks of heresy that touched off the mighty explosion 


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.15]

concerned the teachings of Alexander Campbell, Sidney Rigdon and the anti-missloiiary Baptists. Let us look at them 
separately.

The Campbell Controversy: In the year 1809 Thomas Campbell organized a group of believers in Washington County, 
Pennsylvania, into what he called "The Christian Association of Washington." He and his son, Alexander, had been 
Presbyterian seceders in Ireland, but had withdrawn from that faith. In 1810 Thomas Campbell applied to the Synod of 
Pittsburgh for recognition of his Association, but the application was refused. The following year members of The 
Christian Association organized a church at Brush Run and on June 13, 1812, Thomas and Alexander Campbell and their 
wives with three other persons were immersed in Buffalo Creek by Elder Matthias Luce, a Baptist preacher of the 
Redstone Association. The following year, 1813, this Brush Run church was received into the Redstone Association. In 
1816 Alexander Campbell preached the annual sermon, -- his famous "Sermon on the Law," which gave grave offence to 
many Baptists and Thomas Campbell prepared the Circular Letter, a treatise on the Trinity which, in contrast to the 
Sermon, was most acceptable to all delegates, ministers and laymen alike.

For the next ten years, the annual meetings of the Redstone Association were torn with bitter dissensions and debates 
over the peculiar doctrines of the Campbells, especially those of Alexander. A climax was reached at the association 
meeting of 1824, held with the old Redstone church, Franklin township. There was a crowd both inside and outside the 
buildings The bitter oratory was pitched on a high key, and feelings ran strong. Finally Alexander Campbell picked up 
his hat and walked out, announcing as he left the meeting that he would continue his address, outside. Making his exit 
from the crowded room, he mounted a nearby stump and resumed his speech. The curious crowd gathered around to see and 
hear, as he declared his doctrine of the necessity of baptism for the remission of sins.

For a decade the Campbellite controversy raged at white heat in the churches of the Beaver Association (organized 1809), 
the Redstone Association and the Mahoning Associcition (Ohio), resulting in the withdrawal in 1826 of some of the 
churches favorable to Campbell. This caused the gradual


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.16]

weakening of the Redstone Association until it ceased to be an active body in 1832, and out of its remnants were 
organized the Monongahela Baptist Association that same year, and the Pittsburgh Baptist Association seven years later, 
in 1839. Thus the Baptists of western Pennsylvania had to start all over again sixty years after the planting of the 
first churches in this area. This was a tremendous handicap from which we have never fully recovered.

The Sidney Rigdon Controversy: Sidney Rigdon was born on a farm twelve miles south of Pittsburgh, near Library, 
Pennsylvania, Februarv 19, 1793. He was baptized by the Reverend David Phillips at the Peter's Creek Baptist Church in 
1817. It is said that some time later David Phillips remarked to a friend "as long as Sidney Rigdon lives he will be a 
curse to the church of Christ."

Through the influence of Alexander Campbell, Sidney Rlgdon secured a call to the First Baptist Church, Pittsburgh, in 
1822. He was a printer by trade, but had obtained irregular ordination in Ohio, and had at one time served as Pastor of 
the Baptist Church at Sharon, Pennsylvania. At the beginning of Rigdon's pastorate at the First Church, Pittsburgh, 
the membership was 113, but a year later it had dwindled to twenty-two,

Before Rigdon had been pastor of the First Church for twelve months he had used his influence in bringing about the 
excommunication of fifteen members because they had protested some of his strange doctrines. These excommunicated members 
soon organized themselves into a group and conducted worship services under the guidance of the Reverend John Winter in 
a small room over a harness shop on Wood street during the winter of 1822-23. Under the skillful guidance of John Winter 
this minority group wrote a carefully prepared letter in which they protested against their exclusion, claiming to be 
the real First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh, and asserted that the majority of the members had departed from the 
principles and doctrines of Baptists, and were no longer a Baptist church, and therefore had neither legal nor moral right 
to the church property. The protest charged Rigdon with teaching (1) that the moral law was abolished by Christ, (2) that 
change of heart consists merely in change of views and baptism, (3) that there is no such thing as a religious experience, 
(4) that preachers should not be paid salaries, but instead


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.17]

the members should bring their possessions and lay them at his feet. He accused the salaried preachers of "milching the 
goats," His reference to members being "goats" instead of "sheep" seemed to irritate the brethren greatly, and they 
declared that Rigdon "took the goats, hide, horns, tail and all."

On October 11, 1823, the church council decided that the minority was right, and were entitled to the church property. 
Rigdon was found guilty of preaching baptismal regeneration and other abominable heresies, and was immediately excluded 
from the church and deposed from the Baptist ministry. His surrender of the church property was without further 
resistance. Had it not been for the courage of a few loyal Baptists who were willing to fight for their faith the mighty 
First Baptist church of Pittsburgh would have been lost to our denomination more than one hundred years ago.

The Anti-Missionary Controversy: About the year 1832 there arose a serious contention in the churches over the question 
of missions. Luther Rice had delivered a strong missionary sermon at the annual meeting of the Redstone Association, at 
the Turkey Foot church, in 1828. Many of the preachers and laymen opposed the movement as being unscriptural. Once again 
the Baptist churches of western Pennsylvania were split asunder, resulting in tremendous spiritual and numerical losses. 
All Baptist progress was stopped for at least a generation while some of the anti-missionary pastors cooled off.

The anti-missionary controversy was so great in the Great Bethel church that both groups claimed the right to the 
property, insisting upon the exclusion of the opposing group. The question was finally settled in court, when the 
missionary group was given the right of the property, and the anti-missionary group was restrained. This is the only 
case I have ever known where a court ruled that a Baptist church must be missionary.

These three controversies did much to weaken the Baptist cause in western Pennsylvania prior to 1839.

The Pittsburgh Baptist Association

The Pittsburgh Baptist Association consisting of six churches with a combined membership of 612 was formed in the First 
Baptist Church, Pittsburgh, October 19, 1839. The constituent churches were Peter's Creek with 95 members,


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.18]

First (Pittsburgh) with 283 members, Forks of Yough (Salem) with 119 members, Deer Creek (now extinct) with twenty-four 
members, Mount Hope (now extinct) with nine members and Second (Pittsburgh) with 82 members. All of these churches were 
in Allegheny County with the exception of Forks of Yough. The only other Baptist church in Allegheny County at that time 
was the church in Allegheny (Sandusky Street church), which had a membership of one hundred and fifty-five.

One hundred years ago the population of Allegheny County was approximately eighty thousand, which meant that one out of 
every 125 persons in the county was a Baptist. Fifty years ago the ratio was one Baptist for every ninety persons in 
the county. At the present time the ratio is approximately one Baptist for every fifty persons in the county, which 
includes the negro Baptists as well.

The first moderator of the Pittsburgh Association was James Estep, pastor of the Forks of Yough church (Salem). The first 
clerk was Zebeon Packard, a member of the First church, Pittsburgh. The opening prayer was offered by Levi Severance, 
pastor of the Mount Hope church (now extinct).

The historical highlights of the past one hundred years can best be evaluated by dividing the century into four periods 
of twenty-five years each. Such a comparative method will give us a true perspective of the important developments in 
each of the four periods.

The First Period (1839-1864): During the first quarter of the century twenty-five new churches became members of the 
Pittsburgh Association, which together with the six original churches, brought the total to thirty-one. During the same 
period ten of the churches were closed or merged, leaving a net gain of fifteen churches, with a total membership of 
2,314, at the end of the first twenty-five years.

The Associational minutes for the first quarter of the century consisted largely of Circular Letters written in the form 
of essays, and dealt largely with questions of doctrine, discipline and temperance. In 1860 a resolution was adopted 
authorizing the clerk to purchase a trunk with a strong lock on it for the safe keeping of the associational records. 
No trace of that historic trunk has ever been found.


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.19]

In 1850 the first negro church, with twenty members, was admitted to membership in the Pittsburgh Association. Eight 
more negro churches later became affiliated with the Association and remained members of the body until 1891 when the 
first negro Association was formed. Three of the negro churches, however, remained in the Pittsburoh, Association 
until 1903.

In 1852 the Association met at McKeesport. At that meeting a joke was circulated among the delegates concerning the 
dignified Samuel Williams, pastor of the First Church, Pittsburgh. It appears that Mr. Williams was a noted 
controversialist on the subject of infant baptism, denouncing it whenever he could in severe terms. In view of the fact 
that the Associational meeting was held on Sunday, the visiting pastors were invited to occupy the pulpits of the 
McKeesport churches that morning. Mr. Williams accepted the invitation to preach at the First M. E. Church. After he 
had taken his seat in the pulpit the Methodist pastor announced that he had a special service to perform prior to the 
sermon, and, upon invitation, twenty-three babies, in their parents' arms, were ranged in front of the pulpit, and the 
rite of sprinkling administered.

In 1856 the delegates to the Association unleashed a great deal of high sounding oratory in behalf of the new Western 
Seminary at McKeesport. This was the first attempt to establish a Baptist Academy for higher culture west of the 
Allegheny mountains. Lack of financial support soon made it necessary for the school to close its doors.

In 1862 a special committee on Sunday school work was appointed, and the following year the Sunday School Convention 
became a reality. The same year witnessed the beginning of a definite movement in behalf of local missions. The first 
twenty-five years was therefore a period when permanent foundations were being laid.

The Second Period (1864-1889): During the second quarter of the century forty-five new churches were admitted to 
membership in the Association, while twenty-one were closed or merged, leaving a net gain of twenty-four churches for 
the period, with a total membership of 5,838, which was slightly more than double the membership at the close of the 
first quarter.


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.20]

In 1865 the Association passed a resolution authorizing the establishment of a Baptist Book Store in Pittsburgh. Shortly 
thereafter such a store was opened at 11 Fifth Avenue Pittsburgh, with F. G. Reineman in charge. Within a few years the 
store was closed because of inadequate financial support.

In 1866 the day of the annual meeting of the Association was changed from Sunday to Tuesday because of criticism coming 
from the churches that pastors should not be away from their own pulpits on the Sabbath.

In 1868 there was a heated debate over the question of distributing uniform statistical blanks to the churches for their 
convenience in sendino, in their annual reports. Some thought that this proposal was an infringement on the independence 
of the local church. The resolution was passed however by a substantial majority.

Again in 1868 the constitution of the Association was revised. The old one was pronounced defective. The new one has 
proved equally as defective inasmuch as we have been revising it ever since. It ought to be nearly perfect by now.

In 1871 the Association adopted some very flattering resolutions in praise of "The Mount Pleasant Institute." This was 
the second attempt to establish a permanent Baptist school in western Pennsylvania.

In 1873 the First and Union churches, Pittsburgh, entered into an agreement of merger, and in the property settlement 
the Association came into possession of $10,000.00, which was the beginning of its Permanent Fund. This Fund has been 
increased by substantial gifts from time to time.

In 1874 the Association adopted resolutions recommending the formation of Women's Missionary Circles in all the churches. 
This plan has produced fruitful results throughout the years.

Beginning about 1875 a religious journal was published in Pittsburgh called "The Baptist Witness." Lack of financial 
support brought about the early collapse of this noble experiment.

On June 4-5, 1889, the second quarter of the century was brought to a close with a special program in observance of the 
fiftieth anniversary of the Association. This celebration took place in the Fourth Avenue church, Pittsburgh. 
James K. Cramer 


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.21]

preached the annual sermon. The Hon. A. B. Campbell was moderator.

The Third Period (1889-1914): During the third quarter of the centurv sixty-three new churches were organized, while 
twenty-five were closed or merged, leaving a net gain of thirty-eight churches with a total membership of 15,979, which 
was about triple the membership at the beginning of the quarter.

The two outstanding achievements of the third quarter of the century were the developments along the lines of evangelism 
and foreign speaking organization. No similar period in the entire history of the Association has shown greater expansion 
and growth. A growing spirit of evangelistic passion and missionary vision characterized the churches.

Shortly after 1890 there was considerable agitation in favor of dividing the state of Pennsylvania into two bodies, east 
and west, for missionary purposes. On October 1, 1891, there was held in Pittsburgh a conference of western Pennsylvania 
Baptist Churches to consider the wisdom of such action. No practical results cai-ne from the conference however.

In 1893 a resolution was adopted by the Association authorizing the young people to proceed with plans to organize 
themselves into a B. Y. P. U. of the Pittsburgh Association. This was the beginning of their organized work.

In 1897 the Pittsburgh and Allegheny Baptist Union extended an invitation to Northern Baptists to hold their annual May 
Meeting in Pittsburgh. The invitation was accepted.

In 1900 a resolution was adopted requesting all future preachers of the annual sermon before the Association to discuss 
some of the practical phases of Christianity along with their discussions of doctrinal questions. Some of the delegates 
had evidently been seen sleeping during that part of the program.

In 1904 the four missionary and trust societies of the Association were merged into one body, under the name "The 
Pittsburgh Baptist Association."

Beginning about 1900 a great number of foreign-speaking people began to move into the Pittsburgh district. The Pittsburgh 
Association was quick in its response to this new challenge. Mission stations and chapels were erected to minister to 
their religious needs. Some of these missions have since


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.22]

developed into strong churches. Others have been closed because of the shifting currents of population.

From 1900 to 1907 the Reverend W. E. Pritchard served the Association as the Superintendent of Missions. In 1908 the 
Reverend Henry G. Gleiss began his leadership of the Association as Corresponding and Financial Secretary, serving until 
1917. During the first year of his administration more than two thousand new members were added to the churches, the 
majority of whom were received by baptism. It soon became necessary to employ an Associational evangelist to assist in 
this evangelistic crusade. Many of the strongest churches in the Association today were organized under the administration 
of Mr. Gleiss.

In 1909, upon the recommendation of the Pittsburgh Baptist Ministers Conference, the Association organized a Permanent 
Council to examine and recommend for ordination to the Christian ministry all candidates who were deemed worthy. In 
recent years the Association has co-operated with the Northern Baptist Convention in establishing definite and uniform 
standards of ordination.

Also in 1909 we witness the beginning of the Daily Vacation Bible School movement in the Association, organized under the 
leadership of the Reverend E. A. Harrar, who was at that time pastor of the Homewood church, now of the First Church, 
Camden, New Jersey.

The Fourth Period (1914-1939): The fourth quarter of the century embraces the past twenty-five years. It is difficult to 
evaluate the events of this period because we have been a part of it ourselves. The Reverend John A. Erbe is the only 
active pastor in the Association who was listed twenty-five years ago. All the other Pastors in the Association began 
their pastorates since that date. It has been a period of moral collapse, spiritual depression, false prosperity, social 
upheavals, economic reverses and devastating pessimism.

During the past twenty-five years there have been only three new churches organized in the Association, while at the 
same time twelve have been closed or merged, which is a net loss of nine churches. If we continue at that rate there will 
be only thirty-eight churches left in the Association one hundred years from now, and none left two hundred and 
twenty-five years from now.


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.23]

During the past one hundred years a total of 142 churches have been affiliated with the Pittsburgh Association, of which 
number sixty-eight have been closed or merged or dropped from membership, leaving seventy-four, with a combined 
membership of approximately twenty thousand, with which to begin the second century.

The two greatest achievements of the past quarter of the century have been along the lines of Christian education and 
social service. In 1919 the Association employed the Reverend A. J. R. Schumaker as Director of Christian Education, who 
served until 1928, arousing the churches to see the great importance of Sunday school work. In 1925 Miss Helen Darby was 
put in charge of Christian Americanization work, which had been started so auspiciously by Miss Meta A. Stephens. Under 
Miss Darby's able leadership this work has been expanded so that it now embraces Morals Court work as well.

Also in 1919 the Reverend W. C. Chappell became Executive Secretary of the Association. serving until 1932. During his 
administration the churches were urged to erect parsonages for the pastors. A survey in 1923 disclosed the fact that of 
the eighty-two churches, only thirty-four of them had a parsonage. Of the seventy-four churches in the Association today, 
forty of them have a parsonage.

In 1922 the Association authorized the establishment of a Christian Center at Rankin, Pennsvlvania. Dr. Chappell took a 
great interest in the developing of this worthy home mission project.

The years from 1924 to 1930 witnessed an extensive church building program. Many of the churches erected new houses of 
worship and were left "holding the bag" following the financial panic of 1929. Within the past two years some of these 
congregations have emerged with a sense of victory.

In 1930 the Reverend David W. Witte became Director of Christian Education, which position lie has filled until the 
present time. Shortly after he took office the Sunday school enrollment reached the highest peak of the century. Under 
his direction a vital program of leadership education has likewise been projected. For the past several years Pittsburgh 
has consistently led all the cities of the Northern Baptist Convention in the number of Leadership Training Certificates 
awarded 
   

The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.24]

each year. This excellent program will bear fruit in the churches for many years to come.

In 1932 the Reverend Lester W. Bumpus became Executive Secretary on a half-time basis, devoting the other half of his 
time to the Baptist Orphanage and Home Society of Western Pennsylvania. He has served in this dual capacity until the 
present time. This arrangement has made it necessary for him to devote the greater part of his time to the routine duties 
in the Association office. Consequently very little time is available for field work among the churches. This situation 
isobviously not his fault, but rather that of the schedule bywhich he is employed. The time seems to be near at hand when 
the Association will again see the wisdom of employing a full-time Executive Secretary to promote and advance the Baptist 
cause in this area. We cannot hope to move forward until that has been done.

Within the past seven years we have come to look upon our multiplied Associational activities as a united program of 
work. To that end the Board of Directors has been reorganized with official representation from every department of the 
Association. The confusion and overlapping of programs has thereby been avoided.

Another important advance of the past several years has been the formation of a Committee on Pastoral Changes, which has 
sought to co-operate with all pastorless churches in the calling of new pastors. The committee does not in any way 
interfere with the independence of the local church in the calling of a pastor, but is often in a position to make 
helpful suggestions, thereby saving the church much heartache in the future. In my judgment this committee should consist 
of not less than five of our ablest and wisest pastors, together with the Executive Secretary and the Director of 
Christian Education.

Still another important development during the past several years has been the monthly Baptist broadcast over station 
KDKA. In spite of the fact that some individuals have attempted to minimize the importance of these broadcasts, they yet 
afford an excellent opportunity for inspirational messages and music, the o-ood results of which can never be fully known
or estimated. One indication of their value is the fact that following the recent centennial broadcast I received 118 
letters,


The Chronicle Jan. 1940
[p.25]

cards and telephone calls, exclusive of those from my own congregation. I am also informed that one of the listeners to 
that program was a Methodist preacher who was so favorably impressed and stirred that he immediately expressed his desire 
and intention of seeking ordination papers in the Baptist denomination. I hope the broadcast may be continued next fall.

During the past twenty-five years the churches of this Association had a grand total of 568 pastors, which means that 
the average pastorate has lasted only about four years. This indicates a spirit of restlessness among the preachers and 
the congregations. Such a schedule of short and sometimes stormy pastorates is suicidal to the churches and the Kingdom 
of God. The hope of the future lies largely in long and stable pastorates.

Another distressing fact emerges from the records of the past twenty-five years. Between 1914 and 1939 the churches 
reported 20,289 baptisms and 15,838 erasures and exclusions from their memberships. This means that out of every one 
hundred members we have baptized we have lost seventy-eight by erasure or exclusion. As we have opened the front doors 
of our churches we have at the same time forgotten to close the back doors. We have been successful evangelists but we 
have utterly failed as pastors and teachers. We have played the role of cowboys rather than shepherds. The Deacons and 
Sunday School teachers have been equally as guilty as the pastors in this respect. They have become afflicted with a 
deadly spiritual paralysis. Our greatest need as we enter the new century is the rekindling of the fires of a mighty 
spiritual revival in every church.

As we stand tonight at the portal of this new century of Associational activity let us gird ourselves with the armor of 
faith and the breastplate of righteousness! The challenge of the hour is upon us. We have the message that the world 
needs, and the Saviour that it wants. "Let us not become weary in well-doing", but "look unto the hills from whence 
cometh our strength," for "the harvest truly is great and the labourers are few."

-----

"It is a law in the spiritual realm as well as in the natural that added responsibility is given to the faithful." 
Rev. F. Robinson, Australia.



=========================



The Chronicle 
A Baptist Historical Quarterly
Copyright (c) 1940 American Baptist Historical Society
610 Walnut Avenue,
Scottsdale Pennsylvania

Vol. V. No. 3
July 1942
[p.133]


The Redstone Baptist Association of
Western Pennsylvania


James A. Davidson, Ph.D.

The strongest and most influential religious body west of the Allegheny Mountains in the last quarter of the 
eighteenth century and the early part of the nineteenth was the Redstone Baptist Association. For thirty years 
it was the only Baptist Association west of the mountains, and included the territory now covered by the Monongahela, 
Ten Mile, Pittsburgh, and Beaver Association in Pennsylvania, and the Goshen and Panhandle Associations in 
West Virginia, and reached as far west as parts of Eastern Ohio. The Philadelphia Association was organized in 1707. 
Redstone, therefore, was the second Association organized in Pennsylvania, and it far outstripped the older body 
in numbers and in the ability of its ministers, [1] until a premature and abnormal decline in its activities and 
influence brought what might have been a glorious chapter of American Baptist history to a dismal close. After nearly 
seventy years of history, this great body ceased to exist, and the center of Baptist work gradually shifted from 
Uniontown to Pittsburgh. Out of the Redstone Association the following Associations were organized: Beaver (1809), 
Monongahela (1832), and Pittsburgh (1839).

The Redstone Association was constituted October 7th, 1776, at the Goshen Baptist Church in Greene County, six years 
after the first church west of the mountains was organized. Six churches were charter members of the Association, 
namely: Great Bethel (1770), Gosben (1773), Tenmile (1774), Turkeyfoot (1774), Pikerun (1774), and Yough (1774). 
Many of the representatives at the first meeting were pioneers who were moving west from New Jersey and Virginia with 
their families (occasionally with slaves), who settled in the fertile valleys of Greene County. After a time many of 
them moved farther west into Kentucky and Ohio, taking their church letters with them. The Redstone churches therefore 
did not grow out of the evangelistic efforts of the early ministers alone, but were composed chiefly of Baptists who 
migrated from the east. The leaders at Redstone who had taken part in association meetings east of the mountains 
directed the first meetings in the customary way. Reverend John Corbly, who had been the clerk of the Ketocton 
Association in Virginia, was elected the first moderator, and William Wood, clerk. The organizational meeting proceeded 

__________
[1] O. J. Sturgis, Early BaptiSt Churches in Southwestern Pennsylvania, p. 25.


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[p.134]

with an introductory sermon delivered by Rev. James Sutton, who had migrated from New Jersey. A business session 
followed. Problems of mutual concern among the churches were discussed, and special issues were presented in the form 
of "Queries," such as, "In what state did Adam stand in Paradise, whether be partook of the Divine nature or not?" 
and "Did Christ die spiritually?" [2]

The first constitution mentioned was adopted in 1809, and it is reasonable to assume that a similar one was adopted 
at the first meeting. It had sixteen characteristic Baptist declarations.

It was voted at the first meeting to hold the annual meetings at Goshen, but the 1777 meeting was gathered at 
"Great Bethel, Monongalia County, Virginia." [3] Thereafter the annual meetings rotated among the constituent churches. 
Ten churches were represented at the second meeting of the Association; The Forks of the Cheat, Simpson's Creek, 
George's Creek, and Cross Creek churches were added to the list.

At the end of five years the Association had grown from six to thirteen churches, which represented a total membership 
of one hundred and ninety-five. Only fourteen delegates attended the fifth meeting of the body. Each church presented 
for the first time a letter indicating the number of persons baptized, received by letter dismissed, excluded, deceased, 
and the total membership. The custom continued thereafter. By the year 1794 there were twenty-four churches in the body 
which represented three hundred and forty-five members. The minutes of the meeting in 1800 show a total of over five 
hundred members divided among thirty-four churches. After the turn of the century, the Baptists of this area began to 
grow more rapidly and in 1808 there were seventy churches with over fifteen hundred members. Theological disputes began 
to appear among the ministers at about this time, which divided the churches and hindered the progress of the work until 
the membership had fallen to one thousand and thirty-nine by 1813.

The Beaver Association was organized in northwestern Pennsylvania and Ohio in 1809 with churches which were too far 
awayfrom the Redstone Association to maintain fellowship. The new association did not affect the other body in any 
appreciable manner

Several outstanding controversies swept through the churches

__________
[2] 2 Minutes of the Redstone Baptist Association, 1776.
[3[ For several years the settlers did not know whether they lived in Pennsylvania or Virginia, The extension of 
the Mason and Dixon Line settled the question.


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[p.135]


with devastating force after 1813. These included the Mormon movement, of which Sidney Rigdon of the First Baptist 
Church of Pittsburgh was a leading figure; the Disciples' schism, headed by Thomas and Alexander Campbell, and the 
Missionary controversy. The Association was finally divided, and its energies dissipated. After the Disciples' schism, 
which came to a climax in 1827, and the Missionary dispute out of which the Washington Association grew in 1826, 
the Baptist cause continued to lose ground within the bounds of the Association until 1836, the last year the minutes 
were published. Only twelve churches sent delegates to this meeting, which represented a total constituency of four 
hundred and twelve persons. The Brush Run Baptist Church, with which the Campbells were connected, had been admitted 
into the Association in 1815, and was excluded in 1824. Other exclusions followed as the churches began to doubt the 
theological soundness of sister churches.

The activities of the Association were numerous and varied. Its chief duty was to act in an advisory capacity in 
helping the individual churches deal with certain routine problems. In the minutes of 1780 the following example of 
helpful admonition is found:

Resolved by the association for to recommend to the serious consideration of the 
several churches to which we stand connected the following few, but necessary, 
things to be put in practice, Viz: (1) That there be men chosen and appointed to 
the office of elders and deacons among you that they may take the several charges 
upon them that do devolve upon such according to the order of the gospel church, 
that those who labor in the word and doctrine be somewhat freed from the incumbrances 
and disadvantages which without their assistance they must necessarily labor under.... 
(2) We would recommend to you the necessity of appointing stated times as may seem 
convenient to the state and circumstances of the church to have the ordinances of 
the gospel administered unto them.... (3) We further exhort you to examine well 
all those you receive in the fundamental doctrines of our holy profession, that 
none be suffered to creep into our churches... that are enemies to any of the previous 
truths which we hold and endeavor to maintain. (4) We would have you give diligent 
heed to the exhortation of the great apostle, that those who are weak in the faith,
 you are to receive.... that they may become perfectly acquainted with those things 
that tend to the Christian comfort and consolation while in this howling wilderness.... 
These few hints we leave with you, and the blessing of God for Christ's sake. Amen.

The churches were advised by the Association that children should be instructed in the principles of religion, and 
that children


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[p.136]

might be prayed for in public worship services. [4] Days were often set aside for "Humiliation, fasting and prayer" to 
be observed by members of the churches. After the close of the War of 1812, "a day of Thanksgiving for the restoration 
of peace to our land," and for "the bountiful production of the earth" was set aside. [5] Disciplinary problems of 
individual churches were presented often to the Association for solution. The churches were advised upon "The necessity 
of Discipline to the Growth and prosperity of the churches." [6] The circular letter for the year 1819 further stated 
that "By the term (discipline) we intend the proper exercise of all those duties which Christ the great shepherd of his 
flock requires of them for their comfort and edification in the truth."

When the local church was split by dissensions the Association was often ca4led upon to arbitrate, as in the case of 
Sidney Rigdon, the Mormon leader who for several years was pastor of the First Baptist Church, [7] Pittsburgh, and 
the schism which occurred in the Great Bethel Church over theological issues. In the latter instance, the Association 
sought to determine which division of the church was entitled to the church property. The case was brought finally 
before the civil courts for settlement. [8] The Campbell controversy was a matter of associational concern and the 
schism actually occurred at the annual meeting of that body in 1827.

The most important function of the Association was the Annual meeting, held usually on the Saturday before the first 
Sabbath in October. Each church was allowed to send three voting delegates with a written report from the church. The 
first three meetings were of one day duration. The 1780 meeting covered three days opening in the afternoon on Friday 
before the first Lord's Day is October. After 1796 the Annual Meeting usually, covered three days. The purpose of the 
meetings was stated in 1825 in the following resolution:

Resolved, that meeting of the churches by their delegates is of special use. 
1st. To gain acquaintance with, and knowledge of one another. 2nd. To preserve 
uniformity in faith and practice. 3rd. To detect and discountenance heresies. 
4th. To afford assistance and advice in all difficult cases. 5th. To contribute 
pecuniary aid when necessary. 6th. To afford supplies for destitute 

__________
[4] Minutes of the Association, 1781, p. 13.
[5] Ibid., 1781, p. 14.
[6] Ibid., 1819.
[7] Ibid., 1823, p. 3.
[8] Ibid., 1836, p. 4,


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[p.137]

churches, & every way advance & secure the interest of religion, and strengthen 
and draw closer the bonds of union and fellowship.

The meetings were workers' conferences to which were brought problems and suggestions. It was customary for certain 
ministers to be selected to go outside of the church in which the meetings were held and preach to the people who 
gathered. A note in the minutes of 1810 indicated that "While the representatives transacted the business, the preachers 
went outside and preached to the people. Sermons delivered in the vicinity by the ministering brethren in a number 
of places this evening."

The individual congregations were informed of the activities of the Annual Meeting by the delegates, and by circular 
letters sent from church to church. After 1800, the minutes were printed and distributed. The Circular Letter took 
many forms. Often it was an evangelistic sermon, or a warning against entanglement with the evils of the day, or a 
scathing denunciation of certain unworthy ministers, or doctrinally unsound persons in their midst, or a call to 
greater seriousness in the work. The form depended upon the particular need of the time.

After the Association was organized each new church applying for membership was examined, as to seriousness and doctrine, 
and admitted into the body by vote. No church or delegate not a member of the body was allowed to have a part in the 
business meetings without special permission from the body. When the Campbell controversy came to a climax, it became 
the duty of the Association to exclude from its fellowship churches which were found to bold spurious doctrines. In 1826, 
the Washington and Pigeon Creek churches were excluded, together with Brush Run, the principal Campbell church. In the 
same year, Big Whitely (or Goshen), having had a schism among its members, was excluded, as both wings of the division 
were unorthodox. The most extreme use of power by the Association is found in the minutes of 1826 when Big Whitely was 
declared extinct. During this period of controversy, each church was required to declare its faith in the annual letter 
to the Association, and the annual letters of churches refusing to comply to this demand were not published in the 
minutes.

At practically every associational meeting, requests came for ministerial supply from some struggling congregation. 
At the very first meeting in 1776 "A Request from the Forks of the Cheet for ministerial supply was granted, and 
Reverend Brother James Sutton appointed to attend there the third sabbath in this instant." These


The Chronicle July 1942
[p.138]

small congregations became mission stations, the responsibility for which was shared by the local Baptists and the 
Association until the churches grew sufficiently strong to support themselves. The first six churches were constituted 
by ministers who came from the east and Virginia. After the formation of the Redstone Association, new churches were 
organized under the supervision of the Association. A typical example is found in the minutes of the first meeting. 
"A request from Cross Creek for the constitution of a church. Granted. And our brethren John Corbly and William Wood 
appointed to officiate in constituting the said church." These new churches continued to function under the care of the 
Association until they were able to proceed alone. Many of the small churches were not able to support a minister on 
the field and requested ministerial supplies from the other churches. This usualy was granted. In 1802 it was thought 
wise to send ministers to visit successively the constituent churches of the Association in order to aid the weaker 
ones. It was resolved at that meeting that any minister free to do so might visit the churches. A plan was then 
adopted to provide financial support for "a missionary or two within certain limits to be agreed upon by the churches 
and people in connection."

The plan was enthusiastically welcomed by the churches and the Association recommended that the churches make 
contribution "to defray the expenses of travelling abroad to preach the gospel in destitute places within the bound 
of this association." This small beginning led the Association into enthusiastic home and foreign missions enterprises 
as the years passed.

The Association aided the local churches in ordaining, educating, and conferring with the ministry. When a young man 
desired to "exercise his gifts" his own church examined him, heard him present an exhortation, and if he were considered 
worthy and promising, he would be given a license to preach by vote of the church The Association, after due trial of 
the candidate proceeded with his ordination. Typical examples are found early in the records of the Association.

A request from the church at Cross Creek for the ordination of William Taylor over that church as pastor was read. 
4th. Resolved that our brethren William Wood, John Corbly and John Whittaker be appointed to consider his talents, 
and to act agreeable to their results, and the said church to appoint the time for performing their resolution, and 
to give notice to the messengers.


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[p.139]

The duties and privileges of the preacher often were specified in resolutions passed in the business meetings. Queries 
concerning the relationship of the minister to his church, community, and state were answered as in the following 
cases from the minutes of 1777:

Query 9th. What is the relationship of a minister to his church. 
Ans. Brotherhood.

Query 3. What rule shall our i-ninisterial brethren observe in 
marrying. Either by publication or not? 
Ans. By legal publishing.

Query 4th. Is it rioht for a minister of the gospel to take part 
in state affairs? 
Ans. No.

Query 6th. Has a minister or ministers any right to ordain a minister 
over a Church before he first becomes a member of that church? 
Ans. In the negative.

Query 7th. Is it agreeable to order for an elder (minister) to accept 
a military commission? 
Ans. Yes.

Query 8th. Should a candidate for the ministry accept a call from a 
church, his wife (a professor) being not willing? 
Not ansd.

Irregularities among ministers concerned the Association. A minister who persisted in procedures pronounced unlawful 
by the Association was excluded from its fellowship. A query was presented in the 1781 meeting: "Is it lawful for 
a minister to marry a man or woman in his wife's or husband's life time? Ans. No." "Ought such ministers to be held 
in fellowship without giving satisfaction? Ansrd. No." Another query asks, "What shall be done to a minister, a member 
of this Association that does not observe regularity in marriage? Ans. The several churches are enjoined not to wink 
or connive at their minister's irregularity in respect of marriage."

The Association sought to caution the churches regarding ministers of doubtful standing who came through the country 
preaching wherever they could secure a hearing. Such a warning was sent to the churches in 1797:

Whereas of late sundry persons pretending to be Baptist ministers have 
taken upon themselves to travel into this part of the country and preach 
where they could get admittance and whose characters are a reproach to the 
religion we profess, we therefore earnestly recommend the several churches 
to be very cautious in admitting strangers to preach among them, except 
they come well recommended, or have satisfactory credentials.

The difficulty continued and in 1803 the Association "Being sensible that the churches are liable to be imposed upon 
by designing men" requested the churches to require of travelling preachers


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[p.140]

satisfactory credentials. It also requested the churches to give their ministers proper credentials.

When necessity arose, impostors were named, described and condemned as in the following case:

On information relative to the character of John Johnson calling himself 
a Baptist minister, about 5 ft. 5 inches high, somewhat fleshy, light hair 
and complexion, (his language partakes of the Welsh and Scotch dialect) 
Resolved, that the churches in our connexion, do esteem him an impostor.

Although the Redstone Association was an entirely independent body, it maintained the position that it was a part of 
a great denomination which labored in many lands. Early it felt the necessity of contacting regularly and reporting 
progress of work to other associations in America and abroad. At the end of the first year of its existence, the 
Association sent messengers to the "Virginia Association," presumably the Ketocton Association, from which many of 
the Baptists had come. In 1778, at the second annual meeting messengers from the Ketocton Association were received. 
The churches were asked to provide one dollar each to send John Corbly as messenger to the Virginia Association in 1788. 
The custom of personal contact among the associations through visiting delegates continued through the years, and was 
the most direct and satisfactory means of communication between the Baptists of different sections of the country. In 
1829 the Redstone Association sent two official messengers to the meeting of the Baptist General Association of 
Pennsylvania held at Milesburg, Center County.

Another method of contact with outside bodies was the corresponding letter which was sent to distant associations when 
it was impossible to send a messenger. Record of the corresponding letter is first found in the minutes of the 
Association for 1803, when Benjamin Jones, M.A. was appointed to prepare such a letter to the Philadelphia Association, 
"to request the Philadelphia Association to correspond with us." So pleasant and valuable was such a contact with other 
Baptist bodies that they would have been glad "were it practicable, to extend our correspondence to all the Associations 
in the United States, and throughout the world." Letters and Associational minutes from various associations were 
received often with visiting messengers.

The Association had relations with other denominations only through the individual churches, and it was a matter of 
doctrine or church polity that such should be the case.



=========================



The Chronicle 
A Baptist Historical Quarterly
Copyright (c) 1940 American Baptist Historical Society
610 Walnut Avenue,
Scottsdale Pennsylvania


Vol. XIV. No. 4
Oct. 1951
[p.147]

The Anti-Missionary Controversy Among Baptists

Ira Durwood Hudgins

The ideal of congregational independence as the basis of denominational unity is not without its price. The lack of an 
authority to resolve differences between the churches is an invitation to schism and division. The Baptists learned that 
lesson in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. Between the years 1813 and 1845 missionary-minded leaders set 
into operation a central society for the promotion of foreign missions. That organization was soon augmented by missionary 
publications, a tract society, some mission organizations, and theological seminaries. Opposition to these innovations 
soon manifested itself and in time became so vehement that churches and associations were helplessly divided.

The reactionary conservative group withdrew into a shell of exclusiveness and proceeded to organize its own churches 
and associations. They were known by such various names as Anti-Means, Anti-Effort, and Hard Shell Baptists.  Assuming 
to maintain the true Baptist tradition the conservatives preferred the names Old School, Primitive, Predestinarian, 
and Regular Baptists. [1]

From the first skirmish to the final division there occurred endless debate in which each side endeavored to prove it 
was the true descendant of the primitive Baptists. "We ask the community to contrast the course of those Apostles and 
pioneers with that of the advocates for the modern inventions of men to evangelize the world and determine who are Old 
School Baptists," wrote Elder Thomas P. Dubley [2] The missionary-minded were too enthusiastically engaged in foreign 
missions to await history's verdict on that question. The opposition was too adamant to tolerate their further 
fellowship. There was no balm in Gilead to heal the disaffection; no pope to legislate. Division was the final answer.

Standing behind the breastworks of theological purity and firing shots of Biblical authority, the opposition waged an 
effective warfare against the new program and its agencies. On this ground it has been assumed that the controversy was 
anti-missionary in nature and theological in source. There is reason to believe, however, that the differences between 
the two were not basically anti-missions 


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.148]

nor the source primarily theological. It is the purpose of this paper to delve into the controversial materials and 
seek out the primary causes and motives of the opposition.

BACKGROUND OF THE CONTROVERSY

The first quarter of the nineteenth century was a period of feverish missionary activity among the Protestant churches 
of America. Stimulated by the work of the English Baptist Missionary Society and the dramatic accounts of William Carey's 
successful. work at Serampore, American Protestants began to organize mission societies and found missionary publications 
with the intent of arousing every Christian in America to the cause.

Numerous societies were formed in the New England and Middle States by the Baptists, Congregationalists, Presbyterians, 
and Dutch Reformed. They were local in scope and primarily concerned, originally, with the conversion of the Indians and 
the promotion of Christian knowledge in the new settlements in the western areas. A growing interest in foreign missions 
gradually manifested itself and contributions were forwarded to English missionaries who had already established their 
stations in India and China. [3]

The natural connection between the English and American Baptists early led the latter into the movement. Many of the 
American Baptist churches had within their membership those who came from the Mother Country. Prominent ministers on 
both sides of the Atlantic shared their enthusiasm for the cause. Andrew Fuller,  the gifted pastor of Kettering, 
England, one of the constituent organizers of the Baptist Mission Society, 1792, exerted a profound influence through 
his pamphlets which circulated freely in this country. The Gospel Worthy of all Acceptation was widely read, and 
promised to become a classic in the realm of theological thought.

Perhaps the greatest single influence was the firsthand witness of Dr. William Staughton who had been present at 
Kettering when the British movement was inaugurated. His removal to America served as an invaluable connecting link 
between the two groups, while his own magnetic personality and proved ability lent strength and favor to the new cause.

Correspondence was naturally carried on between Staughton and his friend Carey which grew in porportions with the years 
and as other friends in the two countries became acquainted and interested in the enterprise. Many of these letters 
found their way into such religious publications as the Massachusetts Missionary Magazine and other periodicals of 
missionary intelligence, and spread the


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.149]

knowledge of the progress of the Gospel among the "heathen" to the scattered churches of the land.

The American Baptist Foreign Mission work really began, however, as is well known, with the conversion of two 
Congregational missionaries to the Baptist principle of believer's baptism by immersion. Adoniram Judson and Luther Rice 
were sent by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions in 1813 to establish a mission station in India. 
The story need not be repeated here. When they became Baptists it was necessary to adjust their relations with the 
Congregational Board and enter into fellowship with the Baptists.

Luther Rice returned to America to accomplish this but he found a lack of organization among his new friends. The 
Baptist ideal of congregational independence offered no effective bond of unity for the 2,000 or more Baptist churches 
in the country. The district associations held no authority to bind constituent churches to any program or policy. No 
systematic effort had been made, further than the abortive attempt of Morgan Edwards in the late eighteenth century to 
co-ordinate associations.  There was only one state foreign society in the country and only a few small societies in 
the larger urban centers of the East. Rice's immediate task, therefore, was twofold: to continue the organization of 
local societies and to co-ordinate their activities. Efforts to achieve the latter led to the controversy out of which 
emerged the Old School Baptists.

Opposition to the foreign mission cause did not manifest itself during the first few years of intensive organization. 
Toward the end of 1813, and in the first months of 1814, Rice made a historic journey through the South and West. 
Amazing results attended his labors. His indefatigable energy and unsurpassed zeal resulted in a general awakening of 
the Baptists to the cause and their opporunities. Society after society was formed, taking as their pattern the one 
organized previously in Boston. In October, 1813, largely as a result of his inspiration, a society was formed in 
Richmond, Virginia. By February of 1814 others had been established in Philadelphia, New York, Baltimore, Washington, 
and Fredericksburg.

During the course of this journey Rice had occasion to write his friend Judson of the rapid formation of foreign mission 
societies and of a general plan to co-ordinate the activities of these scattered groups. "While passing from Richmond 
to Petersburg in a stage," he said, "an enlarged view of the business opened upon my contemplations. The plan which 
suggested itself to my mind, was that of forming one principal society in each state, bearing the name of the


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[p.150]

state, and others in the same state, auxiliary to that; and by these large, or state societies, delegates be appointed 
to form one general society."

It was this plan he presented to the "General Convention of the Baptist Denomination in the United States for Foreign 
Missions" held in Philadelphia in May, 1814. Thirty-three delegates were present from all over the country. Missionary 
societies and individual churches constituted the original representation. A president and general board were elected to 
transact business. It was decided to hold a general convention once every three years and to organize a foreign mission 
board to carry out the main purpose of the Convention. Judson and Rice were appointed the first foreign missionaries. 
It was resolved, however,

"That Mr. Rice be appointed, under the patronage of this Board, as their missionary to continue his itinerant services 
in these United States for a reasonable time; with a view to excite the public mind more generally, to engage in 
missionary exertions, and to assist in originating Societies or Institutions, for Carrying the missionary design into 
execution." [4]

His heroic labors in the accomplishment of this assignment are without parallel in the annals of Baptist history. The 
banner was carried to the field; from house to house, church to church, and association to association. The response to 
his campaign was little short of amazing. From the beginning of this undertaking until his death in 1836, he was 
instrumental in organizing some seventy societies and raising large sums of money for missionary and educational work.

According to a report made by Rice to Dr. Staughton in 1815, practically all the Baptist associations, 115 in number, 
were favorable to the foreign mission enterprise. Even in the South where he had expected to encounter opposition, a 
generous response had been the rule. That of the Georgia Association may be taken as typical of the entire country:

Received from the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions for 
the United States, through its agent, Rev. Luther Rice, 
the report of the Board, accompanied by letters desiring 
the aid of this Body in their laudable exertions, to spread 
the Gospel of Christ among the heathen in idolatrous lands. 
The Association unanimously agreeing to co-operate in the 
grand design, and the more effectually to do so, resolved 
itself into a body for missionary purposes. [5] 

True, certain associations did not respond but Rice was inclined to attribute this failure to general carelessness 
or indifference


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.151]

in the conduct of their affairs rather than to actual anti-mission sentiment. Little serious opposition was met in 
the West. When he visited Kentucky and Tennessee and presented the cause he received larger contributions than in 
any other state.

Around the year 1818, however, the first shadows of discontent began to cloud the bright prospects of the future. 
Social conditions and personal attitudes had been present from the beginning to give rise to criticism and objection 
should any particular disaffection give occasion for it. The first public manifestation of a lack of harmony appeared 
in the West, where evangelical ministerial work of a missionary kind had been carried on for some time among the new 
settlers of the frontier. Spreading rapidly it soon found adherents throughout the country. Many churches and 
associations which formerly had expressed support for the foreign mission program reversed their position to the extent 
of vehemently declaring their opposition to the Foreign Society and its agencies. Scarcely an association in the country 
escaped the neccessity of coming to grips with the problem.

The first agitation was of a mild, interrogative type. A query sent to the Wabash Association (Indiana) in 1818 will 
illustrate the trend. "Are the principles and practices of the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions, in its present 
operations, justifiable and agreeable to gospel order?" The following year the Association answred: "It is not agreeable 
to gospel order." In 1820 the Maria Creeck Church asked that the Association "point out to us the wickedness of the 
Baptist Board of Foreign Missions, and it will be our happiness to avoid everything that we conceive contrary to the 
mind and will of Christ." Five years later this same church was expelled from the Wabash Association "for holding and 
justifying the principles and practices of the Baptist Board of Foreign of Missions and failing to give satisfaction to 
their aggrieved brethren." [6]

By 1820 the agitation had become more pronounced. Agents for the Foreign Mission Board and its friends met with 
resistance on every hand. Anti-mission sentiment had become so strong in Tennessee that no one dared to champion the 
foreign cause. One contemporary wrote :

Not a man ventured to open his mouth in favor of any benevolent 
enterprise or action. The missionary societies were dissolved, 
and the associations rescinded all their resolutions by which they 
were in any way connected with these


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[p.152]

measures, and, in this respect, the spirit of death rested upon the 
whole people. [7]

Although opposition in the older Southern states was not as widespread as it was in such frontier states as Tennessee, 
Kentucky, Illinois, and Indiana, it was just as real. Many of the associations in Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia 
withdrew from the schemes of the day. Likewise some of the older churches in New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were 
numbered among those carried away by this opposition to "the works of man." By 1840 the schism seems to have been fairly 
complete. In 1844 the Almanac and Baptist Register, published by the American Baptist Publication Society, reported 401 
mission- and 184 (evidently a misprint for 134) anti-associations. The 1845 issue lists 391 and 149 respectively.

With this general picture of the background of the controversy we turn to consider the nature of the opposition. It has 
generally been presented as a crusade against missions themselves. However, if that be the case, it is strange that prior 
to 1813 they gave enthusiastic support to home missions and even after that date, for a time, favorably responded to the 
appeal of missions in foreign lands. It would seem, therefore, that, originally at least, the opposition was directed 
against something other than the spread of the Gospel by missionary means.

NATURE OF THE OPPOSITION

A thorough study of the movement would seem to indicate that the term "anti-missions" is really a misnomer. In the natal 
stage of the foreign work the Old School was not opposed to missions, per se, but before long did object to the methods 
used is carrying out the missionary impulse. Basically the opposition was aimed at the new organizations. Effective 
argument to support this position was easily found in a hyper-Calvinistic theology. For hyper-Calvinism, with its 
emphasis on Scripture patterns, led inevitably to antagonism of the missionary organization Luther Rice had been 
instrumental in establishing.

This thesis finds substantiation in the larger facts of our history. From the time of their origin Baptists have been 
missionary minded. How other can be explained the phenomenal growth of the denomination from a mere handful in the 
mid-seventeenth century to some 200,000 by the beginning of the nineteenth?  Ministers, churches, and associations 
considered it their sacred duty to carry the Gospel of free salvation to the steadily growing communities in the new 
land of America. Most ministers thought of themselves


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.153]

as missionaries in the generally accepted meaning of that term.

Elder John Leland, the famous and familiar figure so intimiately associated for many years with the Baptists of Virginia 
and in Massachusetts in the Revolutionary and early National periods, was Old School in all his sympathies, emphatically 
declared:

Without any aid from missionary boards or funds, I have 
followed the missionary work fifty-seven years; in which 
time I have traveled a distance that would girdle the globe 
four times, and still have health and spirit to persevere. [8]

Many of the leading churches of such obdurate Old School associations as the Kehukee of North Carolina and the Ketockton 
of virginia owed their existence to the zealous activities of such preachers as Leland. These churches, in turn, assisted 
in the establishment of new preaching stations and in the sending of itinerant preachers to destitute regions. In those 
early days missionaries were sent to the Indians and collections were taken for the education of young men who aspired to 
the ministry. In fact, few indeed among these early Baptists could be found who did not think of missions as their 
imperative duty.

In the light of this historical background it is not surprising that the first overtures of the foreign mission program 
were received with enthusiasm. In 1816, for example, the Ketockton Association considered the important subject of its 
relationship to the cause. This item of business appears in the Minutes:

The mission business being taken up, Association are 
of opinion that the work is laudable and resolve to use their 
influence to promote it by recommending it to the churches 
to raise funds within the several districts, and forward 
them on to the next association by their messengers, to be 
appropriated to foreign or domestic missions as they 
themselves may think proper, or if they please, to leave it 
to the discretion of the Association to be appropriated as 
their better information shall direct. [9]

The initial response of the Kehukee Association was also entirely favorable. An active correspondence was held with the 
Board of Foreign Missions and contributions were faithfully forwarded to augment its program. Evidence is abundant that 
the County Line Association (North Carolina) was also a missionary body up to 1832. When Rice visited the Baltimore 
Association (Maryland) in 1821 he was most cordially received and invited to a seat in the Association. Previous to that 
year the Association had taken


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.154]

notice of foreign missions in the most commendatory language and had invoked the blessing of Jacob's God upon every 
effort thus to promote the interests of the kingdom.

Before many years, however, these same associations were set in violent opposition to the Board and its subsidiary 
agencies.  For this reason they were accused of being anti-mission minded. This they vehemently denied. "Because we do 
not co-operate with the Missionary Baptists in their measures and methods of sending out missionaries," declared Elder 
P. D. Gold, "they say we are opposed to preaching the gospel to the heathen." This he asserted was a false accusation. 
"When the Lord sends one to preach to the heathen, and by the Holy Ghost says, Separate me Paul and Barnabas for the 
work whereunto I have called them, then we can encourage such to go, and help them on their journey of a godly sort, by 
ministering to their necessities, and praying the Lord to bless and prosper their journey." [10] Gabriel Conklin 
expressed similar sentiments in rebuttal to a missionary tract accusing the Old School of this opposition. "I know the 
pamphlet before us, and those engaged with it, charge us with opposing the spread of the gospel because we oppose 
Missionary and other societies. Not so," he asserted, "it is exactly because we are in favor of the spread of the gospel; 
and they, instead of being the means of spreading the gospel, are the means of spreading another gospel, which is not 
another, but a perversion of the gospel of Christ."

Daniel Parker, eloquent and dominant defender of the ancient landmarks in Indiana, when accused of his hostility to the 
cause, stated, "We are pleased with the spread and growth of Immanuel's kingdom throughout the world. But we wish it 
under his direction  and government, and crown him with glory which we believe is not the case in the mission plan."

A group of disaffected ministers and laymen from churches in Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New York, met at 
the Black Rock Meetinghouse, Baltimore, in 1832, for the purpose of affirming their protest to all the societies and 
institutions which has been formed since 1813. This significant statement appears in the Minutes of that meeting:

We will now call your attention to the subject of Missions. 
Previous to stating our objections to the mission plans, we 
will meet some of the false charges brought against us 
relative to this subject, by a simple and unequivocal declaration, 
that we do regard as of the first importance the command given of 
Christ, primarily to his apostles, and through


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.155]

them to his ministers in every age, to "Go into all the world, 
and preach the gospel to every creature" and do feel an 
earnest desire to be found acting in obedience thereunto, 
as the providence of God directs our way, and opens a door 
of utterance for us. [11]

Elder Coffey, an authority among the Old School men in the West, in his protest said, "I wish to be understood to mean 
the modern system of missions, or man-made institutions, and not Bible missionaries." And D. J. B. Link, tracing the 
course of the opposition in Texas, wrote:

There have been probably seven or eight of these Associations 
formed in the State, but there are perhaps not half as many now. 
Their churches are mostly small, and far apart. They were not 
anti-missionary, and denied being so, on their first separation 
from the Missionary Baptists, but claimed that it was the 
organizations outside of the churches they objected to, such as 
conventions, boards, Sunday Schools, societies, etc. [12]

Elder William Beebe, editor of The Signs of the Times, an Old School publication which circulated extensively 
throughout the East, voiced the general sentiment of this group in both the North and the South. "In short," reads one 
of his editorials, "if by the term Missionary, we are to understand, one who is sent of God, to preach the Gospel; we 
are in favor of Missionaries. But we must protest loudly against all Missionary Societies, except 'the Church of God, 
which he has purchased with his own blood.'"

It was not long before such objections were made to include the related agencies of the foreign program and ultimately 
extended to such nondenominational organizations as the Bible, Temperance, and Sunday School Societies. Gabriel Conklin 
was quite insistent that he did not object to the term "missionary" when applied to a minister sent out by Christ but 
he did object to "Missionary Society operations, including all the links in the chain, from the British or American, 
Foreign or Domestic Missionary, Bible, Tract or Sunday School Union Society, down to the most trifling (mite) Society 
in Europe or America." An article in the constitution of the White Oak Association (North Carolina), organized as an 
anti-mission association in 1842, illustrates the attitude :

We, as an Association, declare a non-fellowship with Masonry, 
Missionary, Bible, and Tract Societies, Campbellism, State 
Conventions, Theological Seminaries, and all other 


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.156]

new institutions that have the appearance of a speculation 
on the gospel; we know of but two societies, viz; Civil and 
Religious. [13]

The controversy is to be seen, therefore, as a conflict between those who favored organization and those who opposed 
it. Nor were the Baptists alone in this respect. The Disciples of Christ experienced great difficulty over the question 
of a centralized mission project. Jacob Creath, one of their strong leaders, consistently pposed both the organization 
of a mission society and a convention. A schism occurred among the Presbyterians in 1837-38 largely because of the 
objections on the part of some to the Plan of Union and the activities of the American Home Mission Society. These 
Old School Presbyterians were not primarily concerned about doctrine but about the dangerous trend of the new 
organizations in the Christian framework.

REASONS FOR THE OPPOSITION

In seeking to explain this anti-mission movement, which at times was bitter and angrily hostile, it is easy to emphasize 
some one factor as the reason. But a thorough study of all the facts proves that there were many reasons, some less 
obvious than others, but perhaps, much more real as motives than those generally expressed. Some historians, for 
instance, enamored with the appeal of a novel and captivating thesis, have characterized this as a frontier movement -- 
an omniscriptive explanation of all American historical phenomena. But evidence goes to prove that the pioneer areas 
simply set the stage on which all motives, as actors, might play their part.

The first reason for the opposition on the part of the Baptists was doubtless due to their fear that the security of 
their time-honored, and to some, the peculiarly Baptistic principle of the freedom of the individual and the independence 
of the local church was endangered. Impassioned sermons and published articles warned that these missionary leaders were 
establishing an ecclesiastical hierarchy which would ultimately rob the local congregation of this cherished right. The 
General Convention was not insensitive to this criticism and at its 1826 meeting sought to allay the danger.

As fears have existed to some extent in the Western States, 
and elsewhere, that at some future day, this body might 
attempt to interfere with the independence of the churches -- 
therefore

Resolved, in accordance with its former views, and with well 
known and long established Baptist principles, this Convention


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.157]

cannot exercise the least authority over the government of the churches. [14]

Such pronouncements, however, had little effect. "I consider these great menu wrote John Taylor, "as verging close on 
an aristocracy, with an object to sap the foundation of Baptist Republican government."

It will be readily apparent that these arguments had all the more effectiveness because of the Baptist insistence upon 
separation of State and Church -- and Baptists were still suffering discrimination in this respect in Massachusetts. 
The oppression their ministers had experienced in Virginia was yet fresh in their minds, and it was no difficult matter 
for the pulpit orator to arouse his hearers to the danger that these old evils might again be forced upon them should 
centralized authority become established in their own midst. Elder Theodorick Boulware, who had migrated from Virginia 
to Missouri, spared no effort in exciting and intensifying the opposition to the movement. He did not hesitate to make 
inflammatory appeals to local politicians, warning them "that the Providence [Missouri] Baptists did not propose to 
stop short of union and state and the taxation of the people for ecclesiastical support." [15] John Leland wrote to Elder 
Samuel Trott of Virginia, that "if the modern scheme does not call in the civil arm to enforce its dogmas and punish 
non-conformists, it will be better than my fears."

Since it is difficult, if not quite impossible, for a person to separate his political views from his religious 
sentiments it is not unlikely that these leaders were conditioned in their latter convictions by equally firm opinions 
in civil affairs. John Taylor was, for instance, a Jacksonian Democrat as were other Old School die-hards such as 
Daniel Parker, John Vawter, and Thomas Lincoln. In the East the Democratic viewpoint was well represented by such men 
as Gilbert Beebe and John Leland.  Against the Whig theory of "national religion" they set up their principle of 
completely free and voluntary religion. So wrote a correspondent from Ohio to the Western Predestinarian Baptist: 
"In my humble opinion, every individual who contributes to the missionary operations is ignorantly contributing to the 
downfall of the American Republic."

Moreover, the Foreign Mission Society had arisen in the North and the concentration of all related agencies in that 
section "money-power" to betray the democratic liberties of the people. The various Boards had their headquarters in 
the cities of the [sic] could readily be represented as an attempt of the ambitious

The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.158]

North and East. When, in 1825, Columbia College failed in Washington, Newton Theological Institute was founded in 
Massachusetts. The Baptist Tract Society was moved from Washington to Philadelphia in 1826. By 1832 the Home Mission 
Society was located in New York and the Foreign Society was in Boston.

In the second place, then, the opposition found strength in the money phase of the new movement. John Leland, tireless 
messenger of the good news, and Baptistic to the core, declared in his characteristic trenchant and picturesque style, 
"This machine is propelled by steam (money) and does not sail by the wind of heaven. Immense donations and contributions 
have already been cast into the treasury; and we see no end to it, for the solicitors and mendicants are constantly 
crying 'give, give,' with a blushing audacity that makes humble saints hold down their heads." Those phrases of the old 
Gospel warrior gave rise to such favorite exprsions of contempt as, "the gospel going on silver wheels" "money begging 
missionaries." And the spicy pen of Gabriel Conklin gave wings to the attack:

They pursue a worldly policy in that, silver and gold is 
positively necessary, in order to the accomplishment of their 
object, viz: The conversion of the world. Hence it is very 
common to hear them complain that the pressure of 
times has blocked the wheels, and to some considerable 
extent retarded the motion of the machinery, we carry out 
their own doctrine on this point, and the irresistible 
conclusion is, that in proportion to the money given, 
sinners will be converted, consequently, if there is no 
money given, there will be no converts made. [16]

When it is remembered that old veterans had given lifetime service to the Christian cause with little -- at least, no 
adequate -- compensation it is not strange that they resented the assured salaries of the missionaries of the Society, 
especially when some of that compensation came from people who may not have contributed largely to them as their pastors. 
One writer of an associational letter stresses this very point:

Brethren, there is another matter that is detrimental to the 
feelings of your preacher. He has been laboring for you, 
for years, perhaps, and you have paid little or no attention, 
to him -- but there comes along a preacher from a distance, 
perhaps an agent from some board, and your hearts, purses, 
and all are open to him, throwing in your five, ten or twenty 
dollars for himself or some society. [17]


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.159]

It is impossible not to feel a large measure of sympathy for these men who had borne the burden and heat of the day in 
the more primitive conditions of the new land. And emphasis may again be placed on the evidence that there was no lack 
of a benevolent spirit. Once more Leland was the spokesman: "To honor the Lord with their substance -- to contribute for 
the relief of the poor and widows -- to administer to the saints, and communicate all good things to those who teach the 
word, are sacrifices, with which the Lord is well pleased." No, these men had not tied their purse strings!

But, since even these old saints of the Cross were human, the appeals for missionary funds and the generous response of 
the people naturally gave rise to resentment, at times extreme and ungracious. Luther Rice, than whom no man labored 
more sacrificially among the Baptists of the day, was stigmatized as a "modern Tetzel, and the Pope's old orator was 
equally innocent with Luther Rice and his motives about the same." [18] And missionaries were sometimes likened to Judas 
"who was a lover of money."

The extent to which wild rumors in this respect spread is recorded by Justin A. Smith on page 129 of A History of 
Baptists in the Western States. In certain communities where "ignorance and intolerance" were to be found, he says, 
one man

sees in the benevolent societies of the time the last plagues 
of the Apocalypse; another believes, that Luther Rice is 
living somewhere in luxury and splendor, as he "raised funds 
all through the country, then mysteriously disappeared, and 
has never been heard of since"; while a third has reason to 
believe that a gentleman rode on horseback to Burma, and 
saw Dr. Judson at the head of a bank established with 
money swindled out of the ignorant by lying agents. 

It may also be justifiable to link the "money" phase of the opposition to the financial conditions of the country at 
certain periods. Is it merely a coincidence that the first faint hostility to effort rose in the early twenties when 
an economic depression prevailed following the panic of 1819? Trade became stagnant and prices of farm produce were 
ruinously low. Nor is it without significance that the greatest increase in Old School numbers came around 1837 which 
ushered in one of America's severest depressions, which gave rise to the Millerite doctrine of the end of the world. 
Again, their membership doubled during the three years following the Civil War and another increase was recorded after 
the Spanish-American War. This close relationship of increase 


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.160]

in numbers and periods of economic austerity cannot be neglected in seeking reasons for the opposition.

A third reason for the criticism of the new organizations lay in the field of education. At the beginning of the second 
decade of the nineteenth century -- when Rice's work began -- few Baptist ministers had received a formal theological 
education. And Rice forwarded that cause coextensively with missions. Between 1819 and 184S no less than ten institutions 
of higher education were founded by the Baptists in the country and in most of these institutions theological education 
was given prominence, and protests against the course were soon voiced.

In these objections to theological training may be found, as perhaps not elsewhere, the personal prejudices of the 
provincial-minded and unlettered preachers. They felt that they had successfully carried the banner of the Christ to 
the field without formal education, and the self-made men resented the implication that only those of the schools were 
efficient for missionary labor. In defense they argued that only divine appointment was a necessary prerequisite for 
the pursuit of the Christian ministry. One association was so assured of this that it affirmed:

We view theological schools unwarranted in the word of 
God and dangerous to religious liberty. And where they 
have been organized, whether Jewish, Pagan, Heathen, 
Roman Catholic, or Christian, they have been a source of 
persecution and bloodshed on the church of Christ. [19]

This personal jealousy and resentment was heightened on occasions by the assumption of some bright-eyed young men, 
fresh from the schools, that little in the way of evangelization had been accomplished prior to their coming on the 
field. Their reports of a general moral and spiritual impoverishment, especially in the West, brought forth a storm 
of indignant protest from those who had given a lifetime to the spread of religious truth in these areas. Such an 
attitude roused the ire of John Taylor: "To hear or read their reports," he said, "it would seem as if the whole 
country was almost a blank as to religion," Local ministers in rural districts were unwilling to admit that their 
communities were in any way inferior to the more settled centers, or that they stood in any particular need of 
missionary assistance.

This resentment was particularly virulent when the man of culture" gave evidence of expecting deference and esteem. 
Such men were properly an affront to the self-taught and consecrated servants of the church. The frontierman, in 
particular, could not


The Chronicle Oct. 1951
[p.161]

be "patronized or high-hatted." One such preacher is quoted as giving vent to his feelings in these words:

I am a poor, humble man -- and I doesn't know a single letter in the A.B.C.'s, 
and couldn't read a chapter in the Bible no how you could fix it, bless the 
Lord! -- I jist preach like Old Peter and Poll, by the sperit. Yes we don't 
ax pay in cash or trade nither for the Gospel, and aren't no hirelings like 
them high-flow'd college-larned sheepskins.... [20]

And many a rural pastor reacted similarly.

The vituperation, it may be hoped, reached its extreme in this vile and ugly jargon by a preacher of the Gospel of 
good will:

Do not forget the enemy (the missionaries); bear them in mind: 
the howling, destructive wolves, the ravenous dogs, and the filthy 
and their numerous whelps. By a minute observation and the consultation 
of the sacred, never-failing descriptive chart, even their physiognomy 
in dress, mien, and carriage, and many other indented, indelible, 
descriptive marks, too tedious at present to write. The wolfish smell 
is enough to alarm, to create suspicion, and to ascertain; the dogs' 
teeth are noted, and the wolves for their peculiar and distinct howl.... [21]

Basically and humanly the untrained preacher feared the loss of his prestige and his ultimate replacement in the pulpit 
by his educated brother. There is a delightful little story which came out of the West. At an association a preacher 
arose and expressed his feelings about the Society's missionaries:

"We don't care anything about them missionaries that's
gone amongst them heathens 'way off yonder. But what do
they want to come among us for? We don't want them here
in Illinois." When the moderator urged him to give his
full reasons, he replied: "Well, if you must know, Brother
Moderator, you know the big trees in the woods overshadow 
the little ones; and these missionaries will be all great, 
learned men, and the people will all go to hear them preach, 
and we shall all be put down. That's the objection." [22]

He must, at least, be given credit for frankness and honesty -- under pressure!

John Mason Peck, first of the Society's missionaries in the Mississippi Valley, was intimately acquainted with the 
attitudes of


Oct. 1951
[162]

the opposition, which his biographer, Rufus Babcock, thus describes:

It is vain to pretend that these ministers and churches were 
only opposing some (to them) objectionable methods of 
complying with the risen Saviour's commission, for they 
did not prosecute any other method. Jealousy, least they in 
their ignorance should be cast into the shade -- prejudice 
which shuts itself in and will not come to the light -- and 
the covetousness which grudges any expense for educational 
or evangelizing purposes, were probably the main elements 
of this opposition. [23]

David Benedict, authoritative Baptist historian, and a contemporary of this period, agrees with Peck but is not 
quite so harsh in his censure:


The fact is, that personal altercations, rivalships, and jealousies, 
and local contests for influence and control, have done much to set 
brethren at variance with each other. The mission question is the 
ostensible, rather than the real cause of the trouble, in many places. 
New men and new measures have run faster than the old travelers were 
accustomed to go, and they have been disturbed at being left behind. [24]

CONCLUSION

The conclusion to be drawn from  this study is, as is usually the case in such human affairs, that there were mixed 
motives in this Old School attitude toward the Foreign Mission Society. Undoubtedly it had its origin in the 
hyper-Calvinism prevalent among the Baptists of the time which looked with suspicion upon any Christian doctrine, 
principle, or organization which did not have a Scripture pattern or sanction. The church and the church alone finds 
mention in the Word of God. It is presumption, then, for men to establish any other organization in connection with 
Gospel work,

Nevertheless, and once again, human nature being what it is, as the activities of the Society spread and its associated 
agencies more and more affected the status of the older and less privileged ministers, more personal sentiments and 
interests entered into the differences of opinions and methods, resulting in bitter rancor and implacable animosities.

So, this historical episode has its lesson, as all such should have Whatever is new is not thereby necessarily bad 
nor is it necessarily good.  It is good or bad -- it is of God -- as it helps to create character


Oct. 1951
[163]

to lead folk into the likeness of Christ, as it builds the kingdom of God upon earth.

Above all, "Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumblingblock 
or an occasion to fall in his brother's way."


1 The term "Old School" is used throughout this paper in reference to the Anti-Mission group.

2 Cushing BiggsHassell, History of the Church of God, p. 557.

3 Oliver Wendel Elsbree, The Rise of the Missionary Spirit in America, 1790-1815.

4 Proceedings of the Baptist Convention for Missionary Purposes Held in Philadelphia, May, 1814, p. 13.

5 Jesse Mercer, A History of the Georgia Baptist 4ssociation, 1815, p. 55.

6 Wm. T. Stott, Indiana Baptist History, 1798-1908, p. 57f.

7 Albert H. Newman, A History of Baptist Churches in the United States, p. 437f.

8 The Writings of the late Elder John Leland (Greene's Edition), p. 616.

9 Minutes of the Ketockten Baptist Association, 1816, p. 6.

10 Hassell, op. cit., p. 354.

11 "'Minutes of the Proceedings, and Resolutions Drafted, by the Particular Baptists, Convened at Black Rock, Md., 
September 28th, 1832,' at which time the division ('or split') took between the Old School, and the New School 
Baptists." Published in The Feast of Good Things," G. Beebe's Son.

12 Elder Henry Sheets, A History of the Liberty Baptist 4ssociation, North Carolina (1907), p. 240. Citing, 
Texas Historical and Biographical Magazine, Vol. 2, p. 672.

13 David Benedict, A General History of the Baptist Denomination in America, p. 692,

14 Proceedings of the Fifth Triennial Convention, 1826, p. 20.

15 William Pope Yeaman, History of the Missouri Baptist General Association, p. 48.

16 Gabriel Conklin, Examination of a Pamphlet, Titled, Truth as It Is, p. 15.

17 John F. Cady, The Baptist Church in Indiana, p. 44.

18 John Taylor, Thoughts on Missions, p. 10.

19 Benjamin F. Riley, History of the Baptists in the Southern States, p, 170.

20 Merle Curti, Growth of American Thought, p. 269,

21 B. F. Riley, op. cit., p. 935.

22 Rufus Babcock, Memoir of John Mason Peck, p. 111.

23 Ibid., p. 229.

24 David Benedict, op. cit., p. 935.



=========================
Foundations 
A Baptist Journal of History and Theology
Vol IV No. 4


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.321]

The Discipline of Ministers
An Historical Survey

By ROBERT G. TORBET *

The purpose of this study is to discover to what extent Baptist churches have disciplined ministers for failure to 
conform to the standards of faith and life called for by the churches and what procedures have been followed in the 
exercise of this discipline. Sources of information have included church manuals, church and association records 
dating back to the seventeenth century, and biographical materials. Since the survey has been perforce a sampling 
rather than an exhaustive examination, generalizations have been drawn with care and with considerable trepidation.

This article will first summarize the basic principles which seem to have been followed as guide lines by the churches 
in the exercise of ministerial discipline. The second step will be to provide an examination of selected examples of 
disciplinary cases which will illustrate the types of action taken and the occasions for such action. It should be 
remembered that the past can never be reproduced. Circumstances change, and the mores of each generation vary. It 
would therefore be the better part of wisdom to avoid drawing too close parallels to the present and seek only general 
directions as to what to do and what not to do, rather than to seek to follow in detail the practices of previous 
generations of Christians.  With such caution and an understanding of its limitations, this study may be useful,


Principles Followed in the Discipline of Ministers

Fundamentally, the concern of the churches for an adequate discipline of its ministry has been the protection of 
the community of faith from unworthy or heretical leadership which might T)ervert and mislead its members and embarrass 
their witness before the world. Thus, the motives have been: 1.) to safeguard the church from the shame of scandal, 
and 2.) to protect the gospel from error.

The Baptists of London provide an early example. From, the early seventeenth century the tenure of office of ministers 
was governed by good behavior, There were a few instances in the eighteenth century, however, when churches were 
obliged to expel the minister for disgraceful conduct. When, in 1810, the Calvinistic Baptists of

__________
* ROBERT G. TORBET, dean and professor of church history at Central Baptist Theological Seminary, conducted research 
on the subject of this article for the Commission on the Ministry.


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.322]

the city founded an academy at Stepney (now Regent's Park College, Oxford) for the training of their ministry, the 
character of London ministers began to change. Prior to that time the leadership of the churches had been more of a 
drag than a help because of the illiteracy of many, the, rigid conservatism of most and the low moral standards of 
some. [1]

In the American colonies during the same period, the Philadelphia Baptist Association performed a valuable contribution 
by maintaining standards for the ministry, by Refining the faith and by educating a leadership for the churches. From 
its organization in 1707 this Association set the pattern for Baptist standards and practice in the Colonial period. 
Because the need to improve standards for the ministry was so urgent, these early Baptists were willing to grant a larger 
measure of authority to the Association in this area of responsibility than perhaps in any other. At the very first 
meeting of the Association it was agreed that only those men who could produce credentials of church membership and a 
licence to preach would be allowed to occupy pulpits in the associated churches. [2] In 1723 the Philadelphia Association 
took the authority to examine "all gifted brethren and ministers that came in... from other places." In 1753 the 
Association recommended that "any brother called by any of our churches to exercise his gift, when approved of at home, 
should, before his ordination, visit other churches, and preach among them, and obtain from these churches concerning  
evidence of their approbation, that it is proper and convenient that such may be ordained."[3] In 1791 the Vermont 
Association advised the churches in a circular letter that it was the duty of the Association "to give information of 
apostates and corrupt their in the ministry, that the churches may not be imposed upon by them." The power of 
discipline was reserved, however, to the churches. But if a church failed to maintain a pure ministry, the Association 
reserved to itself the right to exclude the church from membership. [4]

Ordination very naturally was the point at which the churches needed to protect themselves. The Strawberry Association 
in southern Virginia described in 1791 a uniform procedure by which the church should "call the Presbytery of ministers 
to exarnine him, and, if found qualified, to ordain him by fasting and imposition of hands." Ordination of itinerant 
preachers was universally rejected as unscriptural by Baptists in the colonies. In this vein, the Sandy Creek 
Association of North Carolina concluded in 1809 that a man must be


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.323]

ordained to a church, except "it shall be clearly manifest that a preacher is about to go to a place where he might 
be useful, and cannot be conveniently ordained at the place to which he is going." In 1841 this Association, while 
recognizing the right of the local church to ordain, agreed that "the common good of the churches would be realized 
by each church agreeing to send up their candidates for the ministry to the association for examination, to be licensed 
and ordained by that body." [5]

Although not every association went this far, the early Baptist tradition in America was clearly in support of 
ministerial authority's coming from Christ through the community of faith rather than by self-authentication. 
A statement of the Kehukee Association of North Carolina issued in 1785 entitled "A Minister's Call and Ordination" 
may be cited in support of this observation. It was common practice in the churches as late as 1840 to control and         supervise the gifts     of
ministerial candidates within their membership.

The discovery of gifts was sought in prayer meetings and at other informal services.... 
As the gifts were improved, license was given to preach in neighboring churches, 
usually within an association as opportunity was offered.... The candidate's activities 
were carefully observed by his church, who never ordained a member without first 
testing his gifts over a long period.  As the need for ministers became acute, however, 
after 1840, the process of testing was accelerated and becameless thorough. [6]

The Dover Association in Virginia advised early in the nineteenth century:

...that ministers should not baptize within the bounds of another pastor's 
church. that a church might silence a minister and yet retain him in membership; 
that more than one minister was necessary in the ordination of elders or deacons;... 
that excluded ministers might be restored to membership, but not to the ministry; 
that ordination ought to be repeated when a minister comes from another 
denomination; ... that a church ought to follow the advice of an Association or 
show the reason why not. [7]

Among the General or Arminian Baptists, with their English background of greater centralization than allowed by the 
Particular or Calvinistic Baptists, ordination was lodged with the quarterly meeting. In 1834, for instance, the 
Liberty Association in Indiana advised the churches to refer the licensing and ordaining of ministers to the quarterly 
meetings, which had arisen as a home mission project but which were developing at the time into something of a 
presbytery.

The unique character of this institution among Baptists is emphasized by an historian of the General Baptists in the 
following statement -

Obviously, the principle of the Presbytery is that of the old English doctrine 


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.324]

that one shall be governed by his equals. The minister is not reponsible to 
the laity, but to his ordained brethren --  both as to securing official 
position, and to being degraded therefrom.... The Calvinistic Baptists and 
Congregationalists assume that the authority for ordination, as well as for 
everything else, is in the local church, and regard all officials as servants 
of the local congregation. [8]

That this practice was not entirely unknown among Calvinstic Baptists is indicited by a record of the Dover Association 
in Virginia for 1786:

A presbytery of ministers are fully empowered to ordain any faithful man properly 
recommended, whom they shall judge to be able to teach others; and that ministers 
shall be subject to ministers with regard to their call to the ministry and the 
doctrines they preach. The church where the minister is a member shall take cognizance 
of his moral character. [9]

The laying on of hands administered to a candidate for ordination by his peers, the ministers of the association, is 
still practiced today to signify the authority of the larger church of which the local congregation which ordains is 
a part.

This reliance upon a council of ministers or presbytery, to control ordination and acts of ministers seems to have 
been a natural expression of the laity's confidence in the leadership of the clergy to protect the standards of 
the ministry set by the gospel. In 1822, for example, the Sandy Creek Association in North Carolina responded to 
a query concerning the validity of the acts of minister and the control of ordination with the following Statement

If a minister acts without church authority his ministerial acts are invalid. 
If he be clothed with valid church authority, his acts are valid, though he 
may be a bad man; that is, the validity of his official acts depends upon his 
being a member of the church, and clothed with ministerial authority. If he 
has no church membership, and is without ordination, his acts are invalid...

Resolved, That, for the purpose of preventing the ordination of persons who 
are not sound in the faith to the ministry, and the constituting of churches 
built upon any other than the plan which we conceive to be scriptural, that 
the association annually appoint one or more presbyteries to perform those 
functions, and that no ordinations or constitution will be deemed valid, 
unless performed by the presbyteries thus appointed. The churches are to call 
upon these presbyteries when wanted, and no other. [10]

In Indiana special councils were called on occasion "to confirm the action taken by a church in dropping a man from 
the ministry for un-Christian conduct or heterodox opinions." [11]

Hiscox's manual for Baptist churches, widely used in the United States since its publication in 1859, summarizes the 
practices which had come into general use during the second half of the nineteenth century with respect to the 
discipline of ministers. He advised 


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.325]

special consideration in administering such action to pastors and other officers of the church because of their 
prominent position. It was common practice to require two or three witnesses to validate a charge. The church of which 
the accused was a member was then to appoint a council of persons to assist them in determining what course of action 
to follow. The council was invested with no ecclesiastical authority to try the minister or to depose him. Judicial 
action belonged alone to the church of which he was a member. The minister was not obliged to appear before the 
council; his responsibility was to the church alone. Nor was the church obliged to follow the advice of the council. 
Thus, it was plain that a council had no power to expel a man from the ministry; this authority belonged only to the 
church of which he was a member. The action of the church might be acquittal, admonition, "withdrawal of fellowship 
from him as a minister of the Gospel, with a declaration, that in their opinion he is unworthy of, and unfit to 
continue in, the ministerial office," or "withdrawal of fellowship from him as a Church member  thus excluding him from 
the body." The last two actions constituted the utmost act of the church's disciplinary power. [12]

This pattern of testing complete authority within the local church is still generally accepted among Baptist churches. 
It is the logical corollary of the conviction that the local church alone can ordain. It should be observed, however, 
that the resort to a council parallels in disciplinary actions the reliance upon a similar type of assistance in taking 
action to ordain a minister. Thus, the local church recognizes its need of the larger church without abdicating its 
prerogatives and authority. It should be admitted, however, that Hiscox went beyond the traditional viewpoint of 
Baptists in this respect by insisting that "the claim that the action of a Council or a Presbytery can accredit a 
minister to the whole denomination is to be emphatically denied." [13] It is with reference to this point of difference 
that Baptists today need to restudy the implications of early English and American Baptist practice prior to the period 
of extreme emphasis upon local autonomy which developed in the earlv nineteenth century and which became normative in 
Hiscox's manual.

Examples of the Discipline of Ministers

Examples of ministerial discipline fall into three categories: infringements of ministerial authority, deviations 
from accepted theological views and violations of moral standards. The illustrations selected are sufficiently far 
removed from current readers to avoid


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.326]

embarrassment to persons still living. Moreover, they are presented only to indicate the procedures followed and not 
to indulge in the spread of information concerning instances better forgotten.

The Kiokee Baptist Church in Georgia affords an instance in which a local minister, James Sanders, was dealt with on 
June 20, 1795 "for disorder in administering the ordinance of baptism." it appears that he was a licentiate who had 
gone beyond his privilege of preaching by administering baptism. The action of the church proved to be effective, for 
several months later he gave the church satisfaction that he had been wrong. The method followed by the church was to 
cite the erring member to the next conference of the church for disciplinary action. This was done either by an 
individual or a committee appointed for that purpose. [14]

In the prevailing theological climate of the late eighteenth century, deviations from accepted doctrinal views were 
occasion for grave concern. One of the major issues troubling the churches of that period was universalism, the belief 
that everyone will be saved. Perhaps the best known instance of this kind concerned Elhanan Winchester, pastor of the 
First Baptist Church in Philadelphia. Less than a year from the time he had accepted a call to this pastorate, he was 
accused on March 5, 1781 by ninety-seven persons of holding the doctrine of the "final restoration of bad men and 
angels from hell." So seriously was the charge taken that he was forbidden to preach and the meeting house was actually 
locked against him and his adherents. He and his followers did not take this action kindly, and on March 6 they broke 
into the church, where he preached that evening and administered the Lord's Supper the following Sunday. On Monday, 
April 21, the church invited six neighboring clergymen to advise them. The council thus appointed met with 
representatives of both sides, and then "gave it as their opinion that the doctrine of universal restoration was a 
deviation from the Philadelphia Confession of Faith, and that those of the church who had pronounced against the 
doctrine constituted the rightful church." Upon the council's recommendation, Winchester was dismissed and his 
followers were excluded from membership. Not to be outdone, the Winchester party initiated a lawsuit in which they 
sought to obtain possession of the church property. In this they were defeated, for on July 9, 1784 the court decided 
against their claim. [15]

The Philadelphia Association became involved in the matter when several churches brought queries concerning the doctrine 
of "universal 


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.327]

restoration." A committee was appointed to report the facts concerning the proceedings of the First Baptist Church 
against its pastor. The Association approved the committee's report which advised "all the churches to beware of 
Elhanan Winchester, and not adniit him, or any who advocate 'universal salvation,' to the office of public teaching, 
or suffer any who avow the same to continue in their cominunion." [16] In 1788 the Association declared universalism 
to be a heresy and defined it as the erroneous belief "that Christ died for all mankind, and that every individual 
of the human race will finally be saved." [17]

A second notable example of a charge of heresy levelled against a Baptist minister occurred in Boston in 1743. Seven 
members of the First Baptist Church became dissatisfied with the preaching of the pastor, Jeremiah Condy, on the 
grounds that he denied the doctrines of election and predestination. Although no formal disciplinary action was taken 
by the church, the opposition withdrew to form the Second Baptist Church, which was later renamed the Baldwin Place 
Baptist Church. [18]

A third example is the Shaftsbury Baptist Church in Vermont, which became concerned about the wavering doctrinal 
beliefs of one of its members, John Millington, who was seeking ordination. The objections were so pronounced that the 
church refused to ordain him. In May 1773, Millington's open denial of the doctrine of "God's election and the 
perseverance of saints" brought further censure. About a year later he retracted his views and was restored. But the 
next year he made public withdrawal from the church. Then, in November 1775, he made public confession of his wrong in 
withdrawing from the church and rededicated himself, whereupon he was restored to fellowship. In the presence of a 
council and with its approval, the church voted their satisfaction with his qualifications to become pastor of the 
church. Accordingly, he was ordained on Saturday, November 23, 1782, although not without opposition from several 
members who withdrew  to form the Third Baptist Church in Shaftsbury. Five years after his ordination, Millington was 
again in trouble. He "was summoned before a council and admonished, on account of neglect of the duties of his office, 
and for having changed his doctrinal sentiments from that of particular election to that of belief in universal 
salvation of all the human rice, and on account of personal conduct Having the appearance of evil." [19] In view of such 
evident instability, our sympathies in this instance can be clearly with the church which exercised


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.328]

extraordinary patience with Millington over a period of years.

Sometinies the theological issue became involved in a larger context. This was the case in the Cedar Spring Church in 
South Carolina, which not only charged its minister, John Williams, with careless handling of the doctrine of election 
but with the offense of joining the Freemasons In a formal trial before a council of ministers representing Williams 
and the opposition, he was excluded from his church. [20]

A fourth instance of discipline for heretical teaching occurred in the Second Hopewell Church in New Jersey in 1823, 
when the pastor, a Mr. Boswell, began to preach a Swedenborgian doctrine of universalism. The church called a council 
of ministers from neighboring churches to confer with him. When he refused to meet with them, the council reported to 
the church:

We the undersigned having heard, are of the opinion that he Mr. Boswell has 
departed from the faith of the particular Baptist churches, and demand that 
he be immediately notified that until he renounces his errors he cannot have 
our fellowship as a regular Gospel minister. 

The church adopted the report of the council and excluded the pastor. By the end of the year sixty-three members of 
the church had also  been excluded for their sympathy with and acceptance of Boswell's views. Under his leadership 
they formed a second Baptist church. Following Boswell's death in 1833, his church building was sold to all evangelical 
congregation, thus ending his influence. [21]

The Canipbellite controversy between the followers of Alexander Campbell and the Baptists was very divisive in western 
Pennsylvania in the 1820's. In 1822-23 the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh was Sidney Rigdon, who had 
come under the influence of Campbell and whose teachings were "strange" to the members. Accordingly, the membership 
dwindled from 113 to 22 within a year. When fifteen members protested against his teachings, Rigdon used his influence 
to bring about their excommunication. The excommunicated members then organized themselves into a group for worship under 
the ministerial guidance of John Winter. They drew up a formal protest against their exclusion, claiming to be 
the real First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh. They asserted that the majority of the members were no longer a Baptist 
church because they had departed from  the principles and doctrines of Baptists, and accordingly had no legal or moral 
right to the church property. On October 11, 1823, a church council decided that the minority was right and was entitled 
to the church property, Rigdon was found guiltyty of preaching baptismal regeneration and other heresies. He was 
excluded from the church


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.329]

and deposed from the Baptist ministry. The case was ultimately settled in the civil courts in 1836. [22]

The most troublesome and scandalous cases of discipline concerned laxity in moral standards. Shortly after the 
organization of the Philadelphia Association, its peace was disturbed by Thomas Selby, who created a rupture in the 
church at Philadelphia and Pennepek. When the situation was laid before the Association in 1712, eleven persons were 
nominated to arbitrate the differences between the factions aroused by Selby's actions. Under the committee's 
recommendation, the church paid Selby the money subscribed to him and discharged him from any further work in the 
ministry. Because of his general reputation, he was also banned from communion. [23]

One of the saddest cases of church discipline concerned the illustrious Morgan Edwards, pastor of the First Baptist 
Church in Philadelphia from 1761 to 1771 and first historian of Baptists in America. During the American Revolution his 
Tory background caused him to come tinder suspicion. In August 1775 he was obliged to make a public declaration of his 
loyalty to the American cause in order to quiet the opposition. Whether because of these trying circumstances or for 
some other reason, he yielded to intoxicants, and was brought under church discipline. The charges was "inatention [sic] 
to publick worship, joining yourselfe with Drunkards, Frequenting Taverns, Being often Intoxicated." After a lapse of 
four years, he was restored to good standing in 1788. He died in 1795. [24]

Associations in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries frequently warned the churches against persons who 
pretended to be Baptist ministers in order to exploit the members. An example of this kind of waarning may be found 
in the records of the Redstone Baptist Association of western Pennsylvania:

On information relative to the character of John Johnson calling himself a 
Baptist minister, about 5 ft. 5 inches high, somewhat fleshy, light hair and 
complexion, (his language partakes of the Welsh and Scotch dialect) Resolved, 
that the churches in our connexion, do esteem him an impostor [SiC]. [25]

In Indiana the Baptist church at Rome found Elder George F. Mayer, a retired minister, guilty of "deliberate falsehood 
and unchristian conduct." He was excluded from membership in the church and his license as a minister of the gospel 
was revoked."

When the Liberty Baptist Church in Altoona, Pennsylvaiiia failed 


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.330]

to accept the recommendation of a council appointed by the Centre Baptist Association to investigate charges against 
the pastor, it was excluded from the association in 1904. In this instance, the council had voted "to withdrew the 
hand of Christian fellowship from [him], to depose him from the Baptist ministry; and to recommend the Liberty Church 
to exclude him from membership. [26] 

A second instance in which a church was disfellowshipped by its Association so long as it retained a pastor ",Iiicli 
a council found to be unworthy was in connection with the Cohansie Baptist Church in New Jersey in 1894. For two years 
the church stood by its pastor, accepting ostracism until it became convinced that the charges made against him were 
correct. Whereupon the church excluded him and reported its action to the Association and was warmly reinstated. [27]

Summary

From these scattered examples of church discipline of ministers, a pattern may be seen. It consisted of several steps, 
the first of which was the issuance of complaints or charge, by an individual or individuals. The second step was 
appointment of a committee or council of the peers of the accused minister, usually representing both sides of the 
issue, to bear evidence and make a recommendation to the church. Sometimes the council was appointed at the instigation 
of the church: at other times, by the association. If a church failed to accept the recommendation of the council for 
the exclusion of a minister who was believed to be unworthy of his position, the association withdrew fellowship from 
the church. In this way the larger fellowship exerted pressure on the local congregation on behalf of standards for 
the ministry which were important to the witliess of the whole church.


1. W. T. The Baptists of London, 1612-1928 (London: The Kingsgate Press, n.d.), p. 23.               

2. Raymond J. Bean, "The Philadelphia Baptist Association," The Chronicle, vol. xx, no. 2 (April 1967), pp. 54f.

3. A. D. Gillette, ed., Minutes of the Philadelphia Baptist Association from 1707 to 1807 (Philadelphia: American 
Baptist Publication Society, 1851), pp. 27, 70.

4. Henry Crockur. History of the Baptists in Vermont (Bellow Falls, Vt., 1913), pp. 37f., 72.

5. E. E. Harkness. "Some Early Practices of  Baptists in America," The Chronicle, vol. vii, no. 1 (January 1944), p. 21.

6. William L. Lumpkin, "The Baptist Doctrine of the Ministry," The Review and  Expositor, vol. lv, no. 3 
(July 1958), pp. 25f.

7.  J. L. Burrows, "Centennial Discourse: Dover Baptist Association, 1783-1883," The Chronicle, vol. iii, no. 2 
(April 1940), pp. 73f.

8. Ollie Latch, History of the General Baptists (Poplar Bluff, Mo.: The General Baptist Press, 1954), p. 139.


Foundations Oct. 1961
[p.331]


9. William Warren Sweet, ed., Religion on the American Frontier: the Baptists (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 
1931), p. 138.

10. George W. Purefoy, A History of the Sandy Creek Baptist Association, 1758-1858 (New York, 1859), p. 122.

11. John F. Cady, The Origin and Development of the Missionary Baptist Church in Indiana (Franklin, Ind., 1942), p. 150.

12. Edward T. Hiscox, The New Directory for Baptist Churches (Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 
1894 edition), pp. 190, 206-15.

13. Ibid., p. 385.

14. James D. Mosteller, A History of the Kiokee Baptist Church in Georgia (Ann Arbor, Mich.: Edwards Bros., 1952), 
pp. 200f.

15. William W. Keen, ed., The Bi-Centennial Celebration of the Founding of the First Baptist Church of the City of 
Philadelphia, 1698-1898 (Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1899), p. 68.

16. Minutes of the Philadelphia Baptist Association from 1707 to 1807, p. 174.

17. Ibid., p. 237.

18. T. F. Caldicott, A Concise History of the Baldwin Place Baptist Church (Boston, 1854), pp. 5-12.

19. Crocker, op. cit., pp. 17f.

20. Leah Townshend, South CarolinAa Baptists, 1670-1805 (Florence, S. C., 1935), p. 134.

21. Thomas S. Griffiths, A History of Baptists in New Jersey (Hightstown, N. J., 1904), pp. 128f.

22. William R. Pankey, "The Trials and Triumphs of Western Pennsylvanian Baptists," The Chronicle, vol. iii, no. 1. 
(January 1940), pp. 16f.

23. Gillette, ed., op. cit., p. 26.

24. Dean H. Ashton, "Morgan Fdwards: First Historian of American Baptists," The Chronicle, vol. xiv, no. 2 (April 1951), 
p. 79; Keen, op. cit., pp. 52f.

25. James A. Davidson, "The Redstone Baptist Association of Western Pennsylvania," The Chronicle, vol. v, no. 3 
(July 1942), p. 140.

26. Harold W. Brown, "Baptist Churches as Moral Courts," The Chronicle, vol. v, no. 2 (April 1942), p. 88.

27. Minutes of the 75th Anniversary of the Centre Baptist Association (Oct. 4-5, 1905 at Milesburg, Penna.), with 
historical sketches of the Association, pp. 139, 141, 160.

28. Griffiths, op. cit., p. 43.



=========================
Foundations
A Baptist Journal of History and Theology
Vol X No. 1


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.36]

Missionary Support by Baptist Churches
and Associations in Western Pennsylvania, 1815-45

By HAROLD L. TWISS

Kenneth Scott Latourette has characterized the nineteenth century as "the great century" of missionary endeavor. This 
period saw not only the formation of missionary societies in England and the United States, but also the growth of 
numerous other societies devoted to humanitarian purposes and social reform. The Congregationalists and Presbyterians 
in New England had begun to form such societies in support of missionary work by the turn of the century. [1] In 1814 
American Baptists organized to support the work of Adoniram Judson in Burma. These societies were supported, not by 
the denominations as such, but by groups of interested individuals. This was one part of a whole movement concerned 
with spreading the humanitarian ideals of the Enlightenment as well as the Christian Gospel to those who did not 
share this light and life.

There were various reasons for the rapid spread of this movement, not the least of which was a series of revivals in 
the last decade of the eighteenth century in the United States. Opposition to these movements soon developed, honvever, 
with as varied motivations as the movements themselves possessed. The way in which this worked out on the local level 
is revealed in the records of associations of Baptist churches in southwestern Pennsylvania during the first half of 
the eighteenth century. In 1815 the Baptist churches of the Redstone Association of Western Pennsylvania, Virginia and 
Ohio responded enthusiastically to the appeal for missionary support made by the newly organized Triennial Convention 
of Baptists. However, ten years later these churches were giving little or no support to Baptist missionary work. Not 
until 1845 did the Pittsburgh Baptist Association wholeheartedly endorse the American Baptist Missionary Union and 
begin to support its work.

Various factors seem to have played a part in these changes in attitude. One was undoubtedly the suspicion which 
individualistic Americans felt for any attempt to establish a centralized body which

__________
HAROLD L. TWISS, pastor of First Baptist Church, Tonawanda, N.Y., is a member of the Board of Managers of the 
American Baptist Historical Society.


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.37]

would have authority over their personal decisions. Gaylord P. Arbaugh has suggested that this fear of centralized 
authority was the basic cause of the whole anti-mission movement. [2] As early as 1809 the Circular Letter of the 
Redstone Association warned the member churches to beware "lest aspiring prelates should destroy their liberties, and 
bring them into bondage." [3] This individualistic reaction in religion was part of a whole climate of reaction to the 
growing power of centralized authority in a growing nation. This same reaction was evident in the political battles 
fought over John Quincy Adams' American Plan and Andrew Jackson's attack on the Bank of the United States. Residents 
of western Pennsylvania did not have to go far from home to see the foreshadowing of the future pattern of urban, 
industrial America. In 1815 Pittsburgh was styled the "Birmingham of America" in Niles Weekly Register. [4]

In addition to social and political fears of centralized power, the Panic of 1819, resulting from the overexpansion 
of credit which financed American growth, brought financial hardship. The desperate need for money at home was 
reflected in a letter to the editor of the American Baptist Magazine in 1820. The writer felt that, in the light of 
the great need in this country, "A regard to economy would justify our inattention to Foreign Missions." [5] Related 
to these was the effect of theological controversies sparked by the teaching of Alexander Campbell and debate over 
the implications for missions in the traditional Calvinist theology held by most Baptists.

This article is an investigation into the interplay of these various factors, both in the associational alignments 
of Western Pennsylvania Baptists and in their support of missionary work in the first part of the nineteenth century.

II

The Redstone Baptist Association, the first association of Baptist churches in Western Pennsylvania, was organized 
in 1776. This included churches in the area now covered by the Mononoahela, Ten Mile, Pittsburgh and Beaver 
Associations in Pennsylvania, the Panhandle and Goshen Associations in West Virginia, and some of eastern Ohio. [6]

Missionary work by the Redstone Baptist Association began in response to the problem of reaching people within the 
area of the Association who were not church members. In 1813 the Association recommended that the churches take a 
collection to support such missionary work within the bounds of the Association, and a collection


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.38]

was taken at the Association meeting for this purpose. At the 1814 meeting Matthew Luce was designated as the 
missionary for one month to visit destitute churches. [7]

In 1815 the Redstone Association became concerned with missionary work on a broader scale. Luther Rice, the 
representative of the Triennial Convention, visited the Association meeting and local churches in Mount Pleasant, 
Pittsburgh and Washington. A collection for foreign missions totalling $25 was taken at the time of his visit to the 
Association. At that 1815 meeting the Redstone Association adopted the following motion:

This Association resolves itself into a Missionary Society auxiliary to 
the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions; and for the future, the society 
shall consist of the Elders and Messengers of every church who shall 
collect and forward to the Treasurer of this society annually, at least 
five dollars.

The last day of September was also designated as a day for the taking of a collection for the Baptist foreign mission. 
In addition, the Massachusetts Baptist Missionarv Magazine, which in 1817 became the American Baptist Magazine, was 
recommended to the churches. [8]

Little evidence is available about the response of the local churches. The Great Bethel Baptist Church of Uniontown 
agreed to assist in supporting the foreign mission, [9] and in Washington, Pa. a Female Mite Society was formed as the 
channel for the support of missions by women. [10]

The best indication of the response by the churches appeared at the next Association meeting, held in 1816. Fifteen 
churches and two missionary societies reported a total of $288.54 1/2, contributed to foreign missions, including the 
collection taken at the Association meeting. Again the Redstone Association went on record endorsing the missionary 
cause. [11] In the Corresponding Letter sent to sister associations it made the following report:

Among the brethern [sic,'] of a number of churches there has been much 
a missionary spirit appeared, and we think they have manifested a degree 
of praise-worthy liberality; and even where nothing has been done, we 
cannot attribute it so much to a spirit of opposition as to a want of 
better information on the subject. [12]

In 1817 John Mason Peck, newly appointed by the Triennial Convention as missionary to the West, preached at the 
Association meeting and received a collection of $56.35. At the same time thirteen churches and the Washington Female 
Mite Society reported a total of $190.61 given for missions. The next year the peak of missionary giving was reached, 
with $322 coming from eight churches and three Female Mite Societies. [13]

But in 1819 the mission giving dropped to $124.18, and in 1820 


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.39]

the total was down to $112.01. In 1821 only $38.72 1/2 was contributed, and that year's minutes gave the last itemized 
report of contributions by churches. In 1822 the sole item regarding missions was this cryptic notation, "Missionary 
Business -- Joseph Phillips, A. Campbell, William Brownfield, Ephraim Estep and John Rush, a committee to settle with 
all persons concerned on that subject." The following year the Association merely endorsed the work of the Board of 
Missions in "sending the Gospel to the heathen." [14]

How can this rapid decline in missionary support by the Redstone Association be explained? In 1821 the Corresponding 
Letter of the Association had this to say on the matter:

You may have observed in our minutes of this year, that considerable 
less money has been contributed for the foreign mission this year than 
formerly.  We wish you to understand however that this circumstance 
has been owing to the pecuniary embarrasments of the country and not 
to a disregard of that great and important object. [15]

From this it appears that the rapid decline in mission giving, beginning in 1819, was a result of the panic of 1819. 
A letter to the editor of the Pittsburgh Gazette complained that, "The times are indeed alarming. Our difficulties are 
increasing every day. Many have already failed and hundreds more are on the very verge of bankruptcy and ruin." [16]

This was not peculiarly a Baptist problem. A Presbyterian minister wrote to the Pittsburgh Recorder in 1822 saying 
that he could not tell "men who had no money, and men who could not obtain money sufficient to keep their property 
out of the fangs of the sheriff and constable, that it was their duty to advance money liberally for the benevolent 
purposes." However, he went on to add that, "I confined my efforts to raising the usual collections for the 
Commissioners and Missionary Funds." [17] While the Presbyterians were troubled by the Panic, their mission support 
went on. The Baptists, however, experienced a complete change in outlook which cannot be explained by the Panic of 1819 
alone, although it did provide the occasion for a complete re-evaluation of the structure of missionary support [18]

The first response of Baptists to the financial crisis following 1819 was to take up the support of a mission nearby, 
so that gifts in kind could be given. In the 1821 meeting of the Redstone Association, the group resolved, in 
consideration of the problems of the time, to "make their contributions in the produce of the country, or money, for 
the purpose of aiding the Fort Wayne Mission." A collection taken at the Association meeting for this mission amounted 
to $3.30. Two years later in 1823, it was reported that in 1822 articles worth


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.40]

$40.00 had been given, and in the current year articles valued at $23.80 had been contributed to the Fort Wayne 
Mission. [19]

The Fort Wayne Indian Mission had been founded by Isaac A. McCoy in 1820 under the auspices of the Triennial 
Convention. Two years later McCoy also established the Carey Mission in Niles, Mich. [20] McCoy told of naming an Indian 
orphan girl who came under his care Rebecca Blaine, "out of respect for a lady of that name in Washington, Pa., who 
zealously promoted in that place a female society which liberally contributed to the support of this mission." [21] The 
Redstone Association Minutes report that the Washington Female Mite Society contributed $52.50 to the Carey Mission 
in 1823, [22] and the Anierican  Baptist Magazine reports a gift of $56.50 from this same group to the Carey Mission in 
1825. [23] By supporting Indian Missions relatively nearby, Baptists of the Redstone Association were able to continue 
their mission support although they had little money as such to contribute.

This attempt by Baptists in western Pennsylvania to continue their support of missions was severely hampered by two 
controversies in the years following the Panic of 1819. The first of these concerned the teachings of Alexander 
Campbell. In May 1811 Alexander Campbell and his father, Thomas, reorganized the Christian Association, a group of 
their followers, into the Brush Run Church, near Washington, Pa. [24] Essentially, the Campbells wanted to overcome 
sectarian differences by attempting to build a church directly upon the teachings of the New Testament. Alexander 
Campbell was attracted to the Baptists because, as he described them, "They read the Bible, and seemed to care for 
little else in religion than 'conversion' and 'Bible doctrine.'" [25] He recalled how the Baptist congregations to 
which he preached in southwestern Pennsylvania pressed him to join their Redstone Association. As a result, in 
September 1815 the Brush Run Church was received as a member of the Redstone Association. [26] Campbell himself became 
one of the leaders of the Association.

A controversy between Alexander Campbell and the other leaders of the Association led in 1825 to the exclusion of 
the Brush Run Church, with which Campbell had been associated, from the Association. This controversy over the 
relationship of Old Testament law and New Testament grace did not directly involve missions. Indeed, Campbell was in 
theological agreement with the Redstone Baptist 


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.41]

Association on the matter of predestination. [27] The relationship of the doctrine of predestination to missions will 
be discussed at greater length below.

Campbell attacked missionary societies because of his insistence upon the literal following of New Testament practices. 
The following statement made in 1823 regarding the primitive church is typical: "Their churches were not fractured into 
missionary societies, bible societies, education societies; nor did they dream of organizing such in the world." [28 ]
This approach is similar to an earlier attack upon missionary societies by John Leland, a Baptist, in which he 
contrasted the simple evangelism of Jesus with the techniquies of the missionary societies. [29]

Campbell believed that missionary work should be carried out by a church emigrating to a heathen land and teaching 
Christianity there by example. Upon the commissioning of Jonathan Wade and his wife by the Triennial Convention in 
1823, he wrote,

It is much to be desired that the Baptists in the western country will 
not imitate these proceedings of pompous vanity, so consecrated in the 
east; and that they will rather cherish the spirit and copy the style of 
that much despised little volume called the New Testament. [30] 

It must be noted that this anti-mission sentiment was expressed by Campbell after the Brush Run Church, alone, with 
other churches in the Association, had passed the peak of missionary giving. Prior to that, the Brush Run Church had 
been one of the leading contributors to missions.

Campbell's teachings must have been one factor in the decline of missionary support by the Redstone Association for 
the following reasons: First, because of the controversy which led to the exclusion of the Brush Run Church, the 
Association was weakened and member churches were disturbed. Second, Campbell's denial of the propriety of missionary 
societies apparently supported the growing opposition to missions.

Alexander Canipbell was not alone in attacking the missionary societies. A second controversy over the anti-mission 
movement soon began to be felt. In 1822 the editor of the Pittsburgh Recorder inserted an article copied from the 
New Haven Gazette regarding this anti-mission movement which was at work in the east as well as the west. [31] The 
inclusion of a lengthy dialogue intended to answer the popular objections to missions in the Cramer's Magazine 
Almanac for 1824 shows the interest in Pittsburgh in this subject at the time. [32]

The causes of this anti-mission movement were complex. As well


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.42]

as being part of the reaction to the inevitable centralization of political, economic and religious power in the United 
States, it was a reaction to other factors as well. People in the West resented the patronizing attitude of well-meaning 
persons in the East who singled them out as objects of missionary concern. Writing home in 1814, Samuel Mills reported 
regarding those living in the Allegheny Mountains of western Pennsylvania, "From what we could learn with respect to 
these people, we should be led to fear that they are becoming more ignorant and vicious as the settlements advance in 
age. [33] Also, just as the missionary movement, in part, stemmed from the example of the British missionary societies, 
it shared the onus of that British affiliation during and after the War of 1812. Niles Weekly Register, protested that, 
"In a thousand other things we are the most humble copyists every gim crack about religion or politics or address that 
becomes popular and makes a noise in England, is introduced here: missionary societies and Wellington boots." [34]

The records of the Redstone Baptist Association and its churches reflect only the theological dimensions of the 
struggle. In 1825 the Redstone Association refused to modify its insistence upon the Philadelphia Confession of Faith 
as the theological standard of the Association. [35] The relationship of this confession to missionary efforts is more 
readily understood by looking at relevant sections.

Chap. III, 3. By the decrees of God, for the manifestation of his glory, 
some men and Angels are pre-destined, or fore-ordained to Eternal Life, 
through Jesus Christ, to the praise of his glorious grace; others being 
left to act in their sin to their condemnation to the praise of his 
glorious justice.

4. These Angels and Men thus predestined and foreordained, are particularly, 
and unchangeibly designed, and their number so certain and definite, that it 
cannot be either increased or diminished....

Chap. X, 2. This effectual Call is of God's free and special grace alone, 
not from anything at all in man, nor from any power, or agency, in the 
creature co-working with his special Grace, the creature being wholly 
passiVe. [36]

This emphasis upon the unchanging plan of God, literally accepted, became the basis of an argument denying the validity 
of any missionary endeavor.

At the meeting of the Redstone Baptist Association iti 1826 six churches refused to include in their annual reports to 
the Association their subscription to this Philadelphia Confession, as required by the Constitution of the Association. 
Consequently, they were disciplined by having their reports rejected by the Association. At the same session the Pigeon 
Creek, Somerset and Washington churches were excluded from the Association for deviation from the doctrinal


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.43]

standard. The following words from the Circular Letter adopted that year by the Association are indicative of the 
feeling:

Were all the world a BIBLE SOCIETY, and every habitable spot of the earth a Missionary post, and every family a 
professed household of faith, and every individual a translator of his own Bible, still the whole case might be 
destitute of a particle of living faith, or knowledge of essential truth. [37]

Divided opinions over the issue were manifest during a visit of Luther Rice' to the Association meeting in 1828, at 
which he had been invited to preach at the Sunday session. [38] His sermon met with a mixed response, because many of 
the preachers and laymen opposed missionary societies as unscriptural. [39]

This theological and missionary controversy is well documented in the records of the Great Bethel Baptist Church of 
Uniontown, whose pastor, William Brownfield, was one of the leaders of the fight against Campbell and against missions. 
In 1830 the church recommended that the Board of Missions appoint a comniittee to investigate the activities of 
missionaries. [40] Brownfield is quoted as declaring, "if the Lord wanted the heathen saved, he would save them in His 
own good way." [41] However, opinion in the church was not unanimous, and the dissension increased. In 1836 the Redstone 
Association was invited to meet with the church to try to reach a settlement. [42] The Association upheld Brownfield.  
Consequently, the church was completely divided, and the new pro-mission faction assunmed the status of the regular 
church declaring,

Brethern (sic!), we are Satisfied that we hold the Doctrine of Regular 
Baptists as firm and Sound as any of our brethern (although there may 
be Some with a difference of opinion respecting what is called the 
benevolent institution) [43] 
  
This group apparently joined the Monongahela Association and supported missionary work. [44] Brownfield's faction 
continued to meet together and to participate in the Redstone Association until 1846. [45]

From this brief investigation it appears that many factors were involved in the decline of missionary support by 
western Pennsylvania Baptists during this period. The Panic of 1819 appears to have been the immediate cause of the 
decline in missionary revenue, and thus provided an occasion for other factors to come to the surface. As long as 
missionary support was a success story, few questions seem to have been raised. But when it faltered, then these 
other factors were brought out as reasons. There were those who suggested that the whole idea of missionary societies 
had been inspired by a powerful clique taking its inspiration from the proud British rather than


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.44]

directly from the Bible. Alexander Campbell's insistence upon a literal reading of the Bible was used to support this 
contention. Then, upon examination, some Baptists claimed that their basic confession of faith did not leave any room 
for missionary endeavor so that they either had to give up support of mission societies or change the confession of 
faith. In western Pennsylvania the struggle continued in succeeding years over this issue of providing a sound basis 
for the revival of missionary support.

III

Out of these controversies came two new associations of Baptist churches in the area, the Monongahela and Washington 
Associations. Following the exclusion of the churches of Washington, Somerset and Pigeon Creek from the Redstone 
Association in 1826, representatives of these and the other churches whose letters had been rejected for 'lack of 
refeence to the Philadelphia Confession of Faith met to form a new association. Included in this group also was the 
Brush Run Church, which had been excluded in 1824 for its adherence to Campbell's teaching. Alexander Campbell 
predicted in the Christian Baptist that it was probable that the new association would be constituted on a more 
liberal principle than that of the Redstone Association. [46] The Washinuton Baptist Association was organized on 
Nov. 11, 1826. [47] The constitution of this association did not mention the Philadelphia Confession of Faith, declaring 
the "Scriptures as the only rule of faith and practice." [48] Records of this association are not available for study, 
so there is no way of knowing if this reliance upon Scripture alone was because of a reaction against the predestinarian 
emphasis of the Philadelphia Confession or because of Campbell's desire to return to the simplicity of the New 
Testament.

The Washington Association had a short life. A fragment included in the minute book of the Ten Mile Church reports that 
it was dissolved at its meeting in August 1832. Perhaps this was because of a lack of interest by the member churches, 
for at this last meeting messengers were present from only the Somerset, Washington and Ten Mile churches. [49] Many of 
the other churches which had formed the Washington Association became active again in the Redstone Association, as 
reflected in the minutes of that group. The Washington church itself joined the Monongahela Association in 1835. [50]

In 1831 the churches at Loyalhanna and Forks of Yough applied to the Redstone Baptist Association for a division of 
the Association 


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.45]

because the large area made travel to meetings at the distant points very inconvenient. This application was accepted, 
with the provision that the churches could receive a letter of dismissal only after their new constitution had been 
approved by the Redstone Association. Evidently the new constitution was satisfactory, for in 1832 these two churches 
and the Turkeyfoot church were dismissed to form tyhe Monongahela Association. However, in 1835 the Redstone Association 
withdrew its fellowship from the Monongahela Association because that group had revised its constitution and had also 
received what was termed a faction of Campbellites. [51] While the Constitution of the Monongahela Association is also 
not available for study, some indication of this change may be reflected in the Declaration of Faith adopted by the 
Loyalhanna church at its organization in 1828. This statement declared, "We believe it right to entreat men to repent 
and believe the Gospel." [52] This shows some movement awav from the rigid attitude of the Redstone Association, which 
denied the validity of evangelistic or missionary endeavor.

Two other references give some insight into the missionary spirit of the Monongahela Association. A letter from Rev. 
E. -NI. @liles, who had been pastor at Uniontown beginning in 1841, recalled that, "The Redstone Association 
co-operated with them (Triennial Convention) for several years, then they took the anti-mission ground and some of the 
churches organized the Mononoahela Association." [53] In February 1839 a Missionary Society auxiliary to the Monongahela 
Baptist Association was formed. [54] Some of the churches that had joined the Monongahela Association later joined the 
Pittsburgh Baptist Association.

The Redstone Association continued in existence for some years after these controversies. There were even some feeble 
steps taken in the direction of missionary support. In 1829 two delegates were appointed to attend the meeting of the 
Baptist General Association of Pennsylvania, meeting at Milesburgh. In 1830 the member churches were advised to "form 
Societies Auxiliary to the Baptist General Association of Pennsylvania for Missionary Purposes." [55] The American 
Baptist Magazine reported gifts from the General Association of Pennsylvania from 1828 to 1834, but in none of the 
itemized accounts of these gifts was there mention of any church or group in western Pennsylvania. A mere recommendation 
by the Association was not enough to stimulate the churches to support missions after all the controversy that had 
preceded it.


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.46]

The Redstone Association continued to demonstrate the narrow spirit which was a part of the anti-mission controversy. 
The Mount Moriah Church withdrew from the Redstone Association in 1836 because of the opposition by the Association to 
missions and Sunday schools. [56] In the same year the Goshen Baptist Church withdrew because it saw "no prospect of 
doing good by a continuance." [57] In 1839 the Simpson's Creek Baptist Church withdrew because it refused to be bound 
by the Confession of Faith. [58] The last existing minutes of the Redstone Baptist Association record the expulsion of 
two more churches, the Big Whitely and the Big Crossing churches. The Circular Letter to the churches of 1836 indicates 
continuing reaction to appeals for the support of missions and education, or any organization beyond the local church: 
"Theological Seminaries to make ministers -- Missionaries -- Tract and other societies -- money - money - money, are 
their theme." [59]

IV

Little evidence is available concerning activities of the Baptist churches in the area between 1836 and the organization 
of the Pittsburgh Baptist Association in 1839. The Constitution of the Pittsburgh Association, adopted at the first 
meeting in 1839, was almost identical with that of the Redstone Association with two exceptions, one of which is 
significant for this article. In reference to the Philadelphia Confession of Faith, which was accepted as "generally 
expressive of the meaning of Scriptures," the churches were required in their Annual Letters to state their faith, 
"referring to the Regular Baptist Confession of Faith (Philadelphia Confession) aforesaid, or given such other view of 
their faith and practice agreeing therewith, as will be satisfactory to the Association." [60] The Redstone Association 
had consistently resisted any such alternative to the Philadelphia Confession. The Circular Letter to the churches 
adopted in that first year also shows a shift in attitude. It urges the attention of the churches to be directed to the 
Bible, tract, missionary, anti-intemperance and anti-slavery movements of the age. [61]

Of the five churches which formed the Pittsburgh Baptist Association, few had been active in the Redstone Baptist 
Association since the controversies in that group. Of these, the Forks of Yough Church had been active the longest in 
the Redstone Association. That church had been dismissed in 1832 to help organize the Monongahela Association. In 
subsequent years other churches from the Monongahela Association joined the Pittsburgh Association, McKeesport in 1841,


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.47]

and Loyalhanna and Mars Hill in 1844. The pro-mission faction of the Uniontown church came into the Pittsburgh 
Association in 1845. [62]

It is perhaps significant that the First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh, in the urban center of the area, continued 
to contribute to missions while reaction continued in the outlying rural areas. Reports of the receipts of the 
Treasurer of the Foreign Mission Society from 1833 to 1835 in the American Baptist Magazine show regular receipts from 
Samuel Williams, pastor of that church. [63] The Pittsbiirgh Directory of 1837 lists the First Baptist Church as having 
one adult missionary society and one junior missionary society. In 1841 the Directory lists a missionary society and 
a female benevolent society in the church. [64]

In 1845 the Loyalhanna Church, then a member of the Pittsburgh Association, heard Rev. George Miles, an agent of 
the Pennsylvania Home Missionary Convention, and agreed to take a collection for that group. [65]

Missionary concern was expressed at the first meeting of the Pittsburgh Baptist Association. As with the Redstone 
Association, interest was first directed to the local area, but with few results. The Association recommended to the 
churches that a fund be raised to support a missionary to work in the area of the Association. However, by 1843 efforts 
were still underway to solicit funds, and no such missionary had yet been appointed. The Executive Committee appointed 
in 1843 to select this missionary reported back to the Assosociation in 1844. As a result of their report, resolutions 
relating to this associational missionary project were rescinded. [66]

In 1840 the churches of the Pittsburgh Baptist Association formally recognized the need for co-operation on a wider 
scale. They approved the foundation of the American Baptist Publication and Sunday School Society, and resolved that 
it was their duty to circulate the standard works of the denomination. [67]

The support of foreign missions grew within the Association.

In 1843 the Association recommended that the churches aid the Foreign Mission Society. This motion was supported by 
a subsequent one in 1844:

That we cordially approve of the objects and actions of the American 
and foreign Bible Society, and the Baptist Triennial Convention for 
Foreign Missions, and recommended them to the fervent prayers and 
liberal contributions of the chufches composing the Association. 

This was again ratified in 1845. More tangible evidence of support was a collection of $10 for foreign missions 
received at the meeting


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.48]

in 1845. [68] Unfortunately, no record kl7as made in the minutes of gifts received from individual churches until 1854. 
In that year a total of $96.77 froin five churches was reported. [69] In the Circular Letter to the churches in 1845 
answers were given to those who objected to foreign missions. The following statement from that letter may well be 
taken as the position of the Pittsburgh Baptist Association in 1845:

For us then, to decline the missionary cause, or to look upon its progress 
with indifference, is to inerit the execration of the people we neglect; 
and of the church we are refusing to assist; but to aid this cause is to 
put ourselves in harmony with God's design, and to assist in the great 
work of tile world's recovery. [70]

By 1845 the Pittsburgh Baptist Association had wholeheartedly declared itself in favor of the foreign missionary 
endeavor.


Conclusion

Western Pennsylvania Baptists were very much involved in the controversies that spread across the nation concerning 
the degree of participation in centralized bodies formed to achieve the support of missions and other worthy causes 
during the first part of the nineteenth century. It appears that such missionary societies gained immediate support 
until the hard times of the Panic of 1819. Then, with some somber second thoughts, the churches began to question the 
giving up of old and familiar ways. In order again to take up the support of denominational work in general, and foreign 
missions in particular, the Baptist churches of western Pennsylvania had to reallign themselves with those of 
kindred spirit. The old Redstone Baptist Association was left alone and isolated, as indeed her supporters claimed 
they wanted. And in time the anti-mission-spirit itself disappeared from the life of the churches and their 
associations.

1. Kenneth Scott Latourette, The Great Century in Europe and the United States of America, 1800-1914 (New York: 
Harper and Bros., 1941), pp. 203-7.

2. Gaylord P. Arbaugh, "Anti-Missionary Movement in the United States," in Vergilius Ferm, ed., An Encyclopedia of 
Religion (New York: Philosophical Library, 1945), p. 27.

3. Minutes of the Redstone Baptist Association. 1809, p. 6. Hereafter, this source will be identified as Redstone 
Minutes.

4. Niles Weekly Regiser, vol. viii (Apr. 1815), p. 141.

5. American Baptist Magazine and Missionary Inteligencer, vol. ii (1820), p. 329.

6.  O. J. Sturgis, Early Baptist Churches of Southwest Pennsylvania, n.p., n.d.; an address delivered before the 
Washington County Historical Society, Jan. 14, 1907 (in pamphlet form at the Carnegie Librtry, Pittsburgh), pp. 27f.

7. Redstone Minutes, 1813, p. 5; 1814, p. 3.

8. Ibid., 1815, pp. 5, 7.

9. Minutes of the Great Bethel Baptist Church," Sept. 30, 1815, in James Allie Davison, ed., "Source Materials for 
Baptist History in Western Pennsylvania," (unpublished typescript in Carnegie Library, 1941), vol. 1, bk. i, p. 109.

10. Alfred Creigh, History of Washington County (Alfred Creigh, 1870), p. 359.

11. Redstone Minutes 1816, pp. 6f.

12. Ibid., 1816, p. 23.

13. Ibid., 1817, pp. 5f.; 1818, p. 4.

14. Ibid., 1819, p. 5: 1820, p. 4; 1821, p. 3; 1822, p. 4; 1823, p. 3.

15. Ibid, 1821, p. 8.

16. Pittsburgh Gazette, Aug. 21, 1819.


Foundations Jan. 1967
[p.49]


17. Pittsburgh Recorder, vol. i (1822), p. 265.

18. Winthrop S. Hudson, "Stumbling Into Disorder," Foundations, vol. i, no. 2 (Apr. 1958), p. 53.

19. Redstone Minutes 1821, pp. 3f.; 1823, p. 3.

20. William Warren Sweet, Religion in the Development of American Culture (New York: Charles Scribners' Sons, 1952), 
p. 250.

21. Isaac McCoy, History of Baptist Indian Missions (Washington: William M. Morison, 1840), p. 203.

22. Redstone Minutes, 1823, p. 3.

23. American Baptist Magazine, vol. v (1825), p. 192.

24. Thomas Elmer Pletcher, "Alexander Campbell's Controversy with the Baptists" (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation; 
at the University of Pittsburgh, 1955), p. 31.

25. Mllenial Harbinger, 1848, p. 344; cited in Robert Richardson, Memoirs of Alexander Campbell (Cincinnati. Standard 
Publishing Company, 1913), vol. i, p. 440.

26. Redstone Minutes, 1815, p. 5.

27. Ibid., 1817, p. 9.

28. Christian Baptist, vol. i (Aug. 3, 1823), p. 6, in bound volume, 1823-1830, D. S. Burnet, ed. (H.S. Bosworth, 1861).

29. Edwin Gaustad, "The Backus-Leland Tradition." in Winthrop S. Hudson, ed., Baptist Concepts of the Church 
Philadelphia: Judson Press, 1959), p. 126.

30. Christian Baptist, Sept. 1, 1823, pp. 16 f.

31. Pittsburgh Recorder, vol. i (1822), p. 4S3.

32. Cramer's Magazine Almanac (Pittsburgh, 1824), pp. 36-9.

33. Samuel J. Mills and David Smith, Report of a Missionary Tour through that part of the Utiited States which lies 
west of the Allegheny Mountains (Andover: Flagg and Gould, 1815), p. 7.

34. Niles Weekly Register, vol. xxiii (Sept. 28, 1822), p. 51.

35. Redstone Minutes, 1825, p. 3.

36. William L. Lumpkin, Baptist Confessions of Faith (Philadelphia: Judson Press, 1959), pp. 254, 265.

37. Redstone Minutes, 1826, pp. 3, 12.

38. Ibid. 1828, p. 3.

39. William R. Pankey, "Trials and Triumphs of Western Pennsylvania Baptists," in Annual Report of the Pittsburgh 
Baptist Association, 1939, p. 15.

40. "Minutes of Great Bethel Baptist Church," Oct. 2, 1830, in Davidson, op. cit., vol i, bk. 1, pp. 139f.

41. James Hadden, A History of Uniontown (James Hadden, 1913), p. 711.

42. Redstoite Minutes, 1836, p. 5.

43. "Minutes of Great Bethel Baptist  Church," Oct. 1, 1836, in Daividson, op. cit., vol. i, bk. 2, p. 9.

44. Ibid., p. 17, editorial note.

45. D. M. Hertzog, "History of Great Bethel Baptist Church," in Franklin Ellis, ed., History of Fayette County 
(Philadelphia: L. H. Everts Compaany n. d.), p. 321.

46. Christian Baptist, vol. iv (Sept. 7, 1826), p. 277.

47. Boyd Crumrine, ed., History of Washington County (Philadelphia: L. Everts and Company, 1882), p. 518.

48. Richardson, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 166.

49. Davidson, op. cit., Vol. ii, p. 62.

50. William Russell Pankey, History of Churches of the Pittsburgh Baptist Association (Philadelphia: Judson Press 1939), 
p. 19.

51. Redstone Minutes, 1831, p. 5; 1832 5; 1835, p. 7.

52. "Book of Records of the Loyalhanna Baptist Church" (ms. at First Baptist Church, Pittsburgh, Pa.), p. 6.

53. Letter from the Rev. E. M. Miles in One Hundred Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Booklet of the Great Bethel Baptist Church, 
1895, p. 45.

54. Address by the Rev. J. W. Hayes One Hundred Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Booklet, p. 12.

55. Redstone Minutes, 1829, p. 4; 1830, p. 5.

56. Cf. supra., n. 54.

57. "Minutes of Goshen Baptist Church," July 23 and Sept. 24, 1836 in Davidson, op. cit., vol. i, bk. 2, pp. 92-4.

58. "Minutes of Simpson's Creek Baptist Church," Aug. 3, 1839, ibid., Vol. ii, p. 122.

59. Redstone Minutes, 1836 pp. 4, 11.

60. Minutes of the Pittsburgh Baptist Association, 1839, p. 5. Hereafter source will be identified as Pittsburgh Minutes.

61. Ibid., p. 12.

62. Ibid., 1841, p. 2; 1844, p. 3; 1845, p. 1.

63. American Baptist Magazine, Vol. xiii, p. 120; vol. xiv, p. 244; vol. xv, pp. 312, 340.

64. Pittsburgh Directory, 1837, p. 121; 1841, p. 102.

65. "Loyalhanna Church Book of Records," Jan. 4) 1845, p. 77.

66. Pittsburg. Minutes, 1839, p. 4; 1843, p. 4; 1844, p. 4.

67. Ibid., 1840, p. 4.

68. Ibid., 1832, p. 3; 1844, p. 4; 1845, pp. 2f.

69. Ibid., 1854.

70. Ibid., 1845, p. 12.



=========================
THE SHANE QUARTERLY 
(became "Encounter" in 1956 with Vol. 17)

by Butler University School of Religion, 
Christian Theological Seminary (Indianapolis, Ind.) 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
Vol. I No. 4
[p.323]

THE BACKGROUND OF ALEXANDER CAMPBELL'S THEOLOGY

To the average man of this practical western World of ours, -- the thinker -- or, as he is sometimes called, the 
philosopher -- has very little, if anything, to do with the changes, whether political or religious, which are being 
wroight on our actual life. But it is certain that the average man is wrong. It is a moot  question whether history 
gives rise to philosophy or philosophy gives rise to history, but it is certain that the two are very closely 
connected, whether we think of religious or of secular history. The thinker or philosopher, may seem to be a man 
very much up in the, clouds, and it may take some time for his philosophy to wield an influence on the concrete 
things of everyday life. He may even need a "populariser" or several generations of "popularisers." But in the end, 
although it may be difficult for some of us to see it. He is the chief instrument in raising up institutions and 
changing the course of events.

I. THE END OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

For this reason, in order to understand the theology of Campbell, we must seek to understand the culture and genius 
of the eighteenth century and the movement in revolt against eighteenth century standards which took place in the 
latter years of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries. Both of these  found expression, in 
their most violent forms, in the frontier life of the New World, rather than in Europe itself.

The tendency has been to over-simplify the life of the eighteenth century -- to think of it as the Age of 
Rationalism, or the Age of Good Sense, or the Age of Reason. Strictly speaking, the life of the eighteenth century 
is a little more complex than this. The century produced, not only rationalists of the type of John Toland, Samuel
Clarke, and William Paley, but mystics such as William Whiston and William Law; not only was it under the domination 
of empiricists like John Locke and David Hume, but it also produced a first class philosophy of the transcendental 
type -- that of Joseph Butler, in some senses superior to its Continental counterpart -- that of Immanuel Kant. If 
it had of itself no moral vigour, but practised an easy-going complaisance, it produced two of the greatest moral 
philosophers -- Butler and Kant. It also saw the beginnings of Biblical criticism of a thorough-going historical 
kind, though in its Deistical tendencies it held itself aloof from history. This work was done by Jean Astruc, the 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.324]

first scholar to make an analysis of the Pentateuch; and by Robert Loeth and Johann Herder, who began the study of 
of Hebrew poetry. Again, the age which exalted reason above either experience or dogmtic pronouncements, and in which 
natural theology wholly displaced revealed theology, saw the rise of the most thorough-going reduction of religion 
to the content of experience that has ever appeared -- the Methodist revival; and, towards its end, the resurgence 
of the most creed-bound and hard shell systems of revealed theology which have ever held sway over men's minds. 
Especially did this latter movement manifest itself in New England amongst the Reformed (Presbyterian) Churches and 
the Calvinistic Baptist Churches.

Added to this we have to take into account the Romantic Revival which appeared at the end of the century. It 
manifested itself in one form in Jean Jacques Rousseau and other educational reformers. In another form it was seen 
in the work of Goethe in Germany and the poetry of Burns, Blake, and Goldsmith as forerunners of a new style and 
a new theme copied by the later Romanticists. In another form it appeared in the teaching of the group of Scottish 
philosophers associated with the University of Edinburgh, known as the Scottish Realists, or Scottish Common Sense 
School, or Scottish Intuitionalists -- Hamilton, McCosh, and their school.

Long before the end of the eighteenth century rationalism and empiricism were out of tune with the world of human 
needs, though they were to provide the foundation for the work of the Industrial Revolution and the progress in 
science which characterised the Victorian age. This fact explains the rapid rise of Romanticism, which had such 
potent results not only in the sphere of religion but in the spheres of art and literature. The Meth6dist Revival 
in England and in America, Pietism and the work of Schleiermacher on the Continent, the rise of the Evangelicals 
in the Established Church in England, and later the Catholic Revival under Newman, Pusey and Keble, were all 
expressions in the religious sphere of the movement we call Romanticism in the realm of philosophy, history and 
literature. In the field of literature this same urge finds its expression in the writings of Shelley, Keats, 
Wordsworth, Scott and a dozen others. 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.325]


Wesley, who caught some of his zeal from the Moravians, who in turn owed much to the German Pietists, was reacting 
against the cold dry intellectualism and self-satisfied worldliness of the bu;k of the Anglican Church. It was a 
healthy reaction, and he not only succeeded remarkably in his own work, but he gave a new life and energy to the 
Nonconformists of his day. This was the age which saw the birth of Protestant Missions and the rise for the redress 
of many social evils, notably that of slavery. Sunday Schools ushered in a new age of education. Men began to see 
visions and to dream dreams. But it was also an age of confusion, and nowhere was this confusion so apparent as in 
the religious world, and perhaps in no country so much as in the American States. Enthusiasm ran wild; emotionalism 
triumphed over intellect. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, religious men in many parts of America had lost 
their sanity. There was, in many places, a total lack of organised religious effort. Sects were everywhere. Bitterness 
and hatred between them was the rule. New prophets, each with some fantastic interpretation of the Bible, were 
constantly arising, and in most cases even the prophets themselves had no real knowledge of the Bible. Their systems 
were usually founded on the interpretation of one or two obscure texts, chosen indiscriminateiv from any part of 
the sacred Book. Impromptu Camp-Meetings with wild emotionalism and sometimes accompanied by gross immorality, were 
the rule of the day. There were Seventh Day Baptists, Free Will Baptists, Hard Shell Baptists, Soft Shell Baptists, 
Glory Alleluia Baptists, Perfectionists, Shakers, Comers Out, and a hundred other varieties of pseudo-Christianity, 
all of which claimed an infallibility peculiar to themselves. Such was the harvest which was reaped from the wave of 
emotionalism which swept over Europe and America. It was a harvest due largely to the fact that in the hands of 
ignorant and self-appointed men, with minds totally unaccustomed to grapple with theological difficulties. Many of 
them had but the slightest acquaintance with the elements of the Christian Faith itself, but possessed a good deal 
of natural ability and sheer force of personality.

Amongst the more organized bodies themselves, there was a great deal of bitterness and party strife. The method of 
toleration had given place to religious bigotry and sectarian zeal of a very unlovely type. One good thing may be 
said about it all. Indifference had gone. There was a zeal for something, even if that something were wrong. 
Undoubtedly there was much charlatanism, but this condition of affairs itself witnessed to a real interest in vital 
things, and was the expression


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.326]

of a deep-felt need of humanity, oniy dimly conscious of its own nature, seeking to express itself in manifold forms. 

It was on the background of all this bitter sectarian strife, with its many new systems of Christianity, many of 
them weird and curious, that there arose the movement of which Alexander Campbell was the chief prophet and leader.

II.  How THIS INFLUENCED CAMPBELL

Of the things which influenced Campbell in all this we have to note:

1. The dominant influence of John Locke's emphasis on Reason and Common Sense as dependable guides for judgement. 
This had a tremendous influence on Campbell, making mystical and pseudo-mystical attitudes abhorrent to his nature. 
But it had an even more important influence on him, and one which has not always been appreciated by his followers. 
It led him to reject the Protestant doctrine of private interpretation of the Scriptures, and to substitute for it 
a doctrine more in keeping with Common Sense. This was the doctrine that the Scriptures were to be submitted to the 
consensus of judgment of the competent, qualified, spiritual scholarship of the Church throughout all ages. What was 
sought was an authoritative interpretation free from sectarian bias and private prejudice, and not a final 
interpretation.

2. He was tremendously influenced by Locke's work on Revelation and Holy Scripture. (This influence many American 
scholars, who have written on Campbell, have failed to notice.) Thus, whilst he took a most Common Sense, and for 
his time a most advanced, attitude to the interpretation of Holy Scripture, declaring that the Bible, as literature, 
was to be subjected to the same canons of criticism which applied to all ancient literature; yet at the same time 
he did not land himself in Naturalism. He had no illusions about the supernatural character of Revelation. Neither 
had John Locke, who is now being held up by some Disciple scholars as the patron saint of Biblical Naturalism! But 
in his understanding of Revelation, Campbell went much further and deeper than Locke had done, and anticipated a 
result which, though hinted at by F. D. Matuice, is only now becoming understood by modem theologians. He declared 
that Revelation had to do with facts, i. e., historical happenings, and not with communicated knowledge. Further, 
he declared that the Bible contained a revelation of the character of God, rather than of His metaphysical nature. 
In keeping with this he regarded the Word of God as an acted word/

Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.327]


rather than a spoken word. But he had no illusions about Revelation being "a given," though he did regard it as 
"a given" which had relati6pship to the needs of man for whom it was given. He did not, therefore, as some of the 
Moderns do, set an unbridgeable gulf between God and man, nor reject reason as having no part to play in the sphere 
of the revealed. If Disciples had understood the implications of this element in Campbell's teaching, and its meaning 
for "the faith once for all delivered to the saints" and the relationship of that Faith to theologies, they would 
have revolutionised theology in a generation, and made Barth and his School an unnecessary event in history. Instead 
of this, with few exceptions, they grasped no more than the legalistic alphabet and contented themselves with prating 
about "man-made creeds" and abusing theology and theologians in general.

3. His reverence for Locke also probably saved Campbell from the prevailing experientialism of the time. But in 
him, behind Locke, we can trace the influence of Scholastic philosophy and the Scholastic theologians, and a 
tremendous influence of the early Fathers of the first four centuries. It is not an exaggeration to say that this 
influence was almost as strong on Campbell as it was later on Keble and Pusey. That is why, in belief and worship, 
his emphasis is on the objective and not on the subjective. He is as thorough-going in his objectivity as Barth and 
the Moderns, but he does not, like Barth, reject the subjective element in religion altogether, or consign it to the 
realm of evil. He allows it a real place by stressing that what is objectively given is suited to the subject for 
whom it is given. As with von Hugel the "given-ness" is always uppermost.

His interest in the Early Fathers of the Church also explains his most Catholic conception of Christianity, with 
strong emphasis on the doctrine of the Church and on the Sacraments and the priestly nature of worship, together 
with his most Catholic interpretation of the New Testament, in which he anticipated the findings of critical 
scholarship by a century.

4. There are also definite traces in Campbell of the influence of the Scotch Intuitionalists, which were undoubtedly 
laid upon him on his contacts in Glasgow University and Scottish religious life. This comes out of his admission of 
the existance of a sphere in which reason breaks down. This attitude is apparent almost everywhere in his writings, 
but nowhere so  much as in his discussions on the Trinity. He can be said to anticipate Newman in his emphasis on 
the "illative sense," though he does not actually use the expression. It is all part of 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.328]

(under construction)

his deeply personal, dynamic, and concrete understanding of the nature of the relationship between God and man. 
There is in personality, a abiding mystery, and in personal relationships there is an area of understanding which 
is outside the province of reason. Hence his emphasis on "the understanding distance," a rich metaphor which he 
often uses. In his emphasis on the relationship between God and man being personal, rather than legal or mechanical, 
he anticipates much which we find in the theologies of John Oman and P. T. Forsyth. For him, as for all Disciples 
since, it made the prevailing quarrels between Calvinist and Arminians on the Doctrine of Grace quite irrelevant.

5. The discussions in the eighteenth century on Church and State, carried on bv John Locke, Charles Leslie, 
Benjamin Hoadley, William Law, William Warburton, William Paley, Edmund Burke, and Joseph Priestley, left their 
influence on Campbell. Added to this we must place the influence of John Glas and the Haldanes of Scotland, 
which I think Campbell himself underestimates, claiming to be original where he was not original. This influence 
left him in no doubt as to the freedom of the Church from State control -- "the crown rights of the Redeemer in His 
Kingdom." But at the same time it freed him from sectarian conceptions of the Church, and from pietist attitudes 
which conceive of the Church as unrelated to the State and to secular life in any form. He did conceive of the 
Church as organized according to the political divisions of humanity, and as expressing its life in differing 
political structures; while at the same time he held to an intensely Catholic view of the Church as one and 
indivisible and as transcending the limits of language, race, and country. Of Protestant individualism he knew 
nothing and could bear nothing. As to Church polity, it is clear that he would himself have preferred a Presbyterian 
form, but when his Movement began to expand rapidly, forces were too much for him, and it eventually took a 
Congregational form. This emphasis in Campbell ought to have made Disciples the most important factor in the 
Ecumenical Movement, and the people with the greatest contribution to make. It may still do so if we can become 
sufficiently liberal to cease hankering after an obsolete liberalism, and sufficiently Catholic to recognise, not 
in the spirit of slavish literalism, butin the spirit of informed scholarship, the rich heritage which we have in 
the teaching of Campbell.


-----------------------


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.329-344 (not copied)]


-----------------------

Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
Vol. I No. 4
[p.345]

THE CAMPBELLS AND THE REDSTONE BAPTIST ASSOCIATION.
(By W. H. Hanna)

A. INTRODUCTION 

Late in 1810 or early in 1811, Alexander Campbell engaged in a fireside discussion on baptism with a travelling 
Baptist preacher in the home of his future father-in-law on BUffalo Creek and found himself bested by the simple 
quotations of scripture. The discussion was to have been renewed on a first and then a second occasion, but 
neither materialized. On March 12, 1811, the younger Campbell was married to Miss Margaret Brown, On May 4, 1811, 
the Brush Run group of the Christian Association recognized itself as a church; on Sunday, May 5, it held its 
first communion service and began weekly communion on the Lord's Day. From May 8 on until about the middle of 
June, Alexander Campbell made his first itinerary which took him into such places as Steubenville, Cadiz, 
St. Clairsville and Wheeling. He cites meeting with Presbyterians, Methodists and others, but does not mention 
Baptists. While he was absent the meeting-house at Brush Run was begun, and on June 16 he preached his first sermon 
therein even though it was incomplete.

At this time, Thomas Campbell was forced to face the question of baptism in its disputed phases. Three members of 
Washington Association had not communed on the ground that they had never been baptized. Their leader had some 
misgivings about baptizing already recognized church members, but in the case of the (three) persons involved, not 
one had ever received any sort of baptism. Thomas Campbell conferred with the two men of the group, Joseph Bryant 
and Thomas Sharp, and at that time seems to have admitted that immersion was the primitive action. On July 14, 1811, 
the elder Campbell introduced immersion into the Brush Run Church which was striving toward the primitive faith, 
by burying in the waters of Brush Run, the two mentioned men and a woman, all having a conviction as to the rightness 
of immersion.

On January 1, 1812, Alexander Campbell was ordained to the Christian ministry, but not until September 1, 1812, was 
this fact registered in the Brooke County Court of Virginia so that he might have the right to celebrate marriages. 
He became a father on March 13, 1812, and had to face the question of what to do with his new daughter, -- 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.346]

baptize her or not. For more than a year, as we have seen above, the twin questions of the action and subject of 
baptism had been pushing themselves to the fore; but neither of the two Campbells seems to have  entered into the study 
of the questions exhaustively. Both were slower than some of the members of Brush Run Church, for some had reasoned it 
out that if infant baptism was unwarranted by the Scriptures and believer's baptism was commanded, then those who had 
been baptized in infancy had not been scripturally baptized. Alexander Campbell began his personal investigation of 
the subject of baptism as thoroughly as he possibly could, and in some weeks was brought to discard infant baptism and 
to embrace imniersion as an obedience to the command of Christ. He sought out the Rev. Mathias Luce, a Baptist 
minister, and made his own arrangements as to his immersion. He was not to submit to any other question than that 
about his faith in Jesus of Nazareth, nor was he being baptized into the Baptist fellowship or church. In face of 
these requests, quite contrary to the usual Baptist procedure, Mr. Luce agreed to perform the baptism. It was a happy 
surprise to him and his wife to see a sister, his father and mother and two others outside the family join him at the 
pool in Brush Run on June 12, 18I2. It was a seven hours' service, both Campbells speaking. Two Baptist elders were 
present, but neither one had any part in the service.  On the following day (Lord's Day) thirteen others, members of 
Brush Run Church, requested immersion and Thomas Campbell was their baptizer. Still later others desired and received 
the new-old baptism, some who could not see their way to the act withdrew from the church, and Brush Run became an 
immersionist congregation. This made it a parish [pariah?] in the region in the eyes of the sprinkling-for-baptism 
churches and brought on petty persecutions at the times of baptisms. Some touch  had been had with a few Baptists, 
lay and minister, and the way of fellowship with Baptists was ready for agitation.

B. REDSTONE BAPTIST ASSOCIATION

The Redstone Baptist Association had adopted its constitution on Sept. 2, 1809, at Indian Creek, Monongalia Co., 
Virginia, but had been in existence some years before that act. Three articles of the said constitution concern the 
Campbells and us Christians and Disciples of today. Article 2 contains."The Association receives the Old and New 
Testaments as the word of God and the Regular Baptist Confession of Faith adopted by the Philadelphia Regular Baptist 
Association, Sept. 25, 1742, as generally expressive of the meaning of the Holy Scriptures." Article 3 states "This
Association shall be known by name as the Redstone


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.347]

Baptist Association and always consist of the representatives of the several churches in union with this body, by 
them duly chosen." Section 8 runs "Churches that apply for admission into this association, having their petition 
signed by their clerk or other satisfactory evidence, and their faith and practice as a church agreeing with the 
Redstone Baptist Confession of Faith aforesaid, shall be received by their Moderator, giving the first mentioned 
representative the right hand of fellowship." Those were the main hurdles which the Brush Run church would have to 
negotiate in order to enter as a church into the Association. The Minutes of the Redstone Baptist Association, 
complete and beautifully bound, are in the  Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. The librarian assures the reader that it 
is the one complete copy in existence and it is kept under lock and key. In the following paragraphs, pertinent 
paragraphs will be taken from these Minutes to show just what was the relationship of the Campbells and the Brush 
Run Church and the Redstone Baptist Association for a period of years. So far as the writer has been able to 
determine, these Minutes have not been used either by Baptists or by Disciples (Christians) in fixing dates and 
writing history. It seems quite sure that the Redstone Minutes were not before Robert Richardson as he wrote, nor 
Dr. Newman, who has been the most diligent historian among the Baptists.

In the Millenial Harbinger of 1848, page 344, Alexander Campbell writes his recollections of fellowship with the 
Baptists. He relates that he first attended Association at Uniontown (Pa.) as an auditor and spectator. "They invited 
me to preach, but I declined it altogether. except one evening in a private family to some dozen preachers and twice 
as manv laymen. I returned home not intending ever to visit another Association." At the close of Redstone Minutes for 
Sept. 4-6, 1812, occurs: "A third discourse of very uncommon length by a Mr. Campbell, late of Washington Co., Pa., 
from Galatians c. 6. v. 14 and onward." That was on the Lord's Day. Services began at 10 a. m. and there were three 
sermons, in morning, afternoon and evening. The clerk dignified Mr. Campbell's effort in the evening as a real sermon. 
(Was his recollection faulty?)


YEARS 1813 AND 1814

Great attention ought to be paid to these two dates. for there is nothing whatsoever in the Redstone Minutcs that 
deals with the Campbells and Brush Run Church. A fundamental date error has crept in, using 1813 as the dale of the 
beginning of fellowship with the Redstone Association and the Brush Run Church.


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.348]

Big Restone was the Association meeting-place in Sept. 1-3, 1815. Item 6 of business runs: "Likewise a letter was 
received makiner a similar request from a church at Brush Run which was also granted." Alexander Campbell touching 
the subject of joining the Redstone Baptist Association say: "We laid it before the church in the fall of 1813. 
We discussed the propriety of the measure.  After much discussion and earnest desire to be directed by the wisdom 
which cometh from above, we finally concluded to make an overture to that effect, and to write out a full view of 
our sentiments, wishes and determinations on that subject. We did so in some eight or ten pages of large dimensions, 
exhibiting our remonstrance against all human creeds as bonds of communion or union amongst all Christian Churches, 
and expressing a willingness upon certain conditions, to co-operate or unite with that Association. provided that 
always we should be allowed to teach and preach whatever we learned from the Holy Scriptures, regardless of any creed 
or formula in Christendom... The proposition was discussed at the Association, and, after much debate, was decided 
by a considerable majority in favor of our being received." We have seen that Alexander Campbell's first attendance 
on Association was in 1812. He informs us that the church took up the discussion of fellowship or union in 1813, but 
the Minutes tell us that admission occurred in 1815.

If the church began to discuss its course toward the Baptists in 1813, then the discussion must have continued for 
two full years. There could have been nothing hasty or ill-considered in the move. Moreover the terms under which 
Brush Run was admitted were out of conformity with the constitution of the Association. This accounted for the fact 
that there was a minority that opposed the admission. It is not the fashion of the Minutes to give a total picture 
of discussion in connection with motions that were carried. Item 5 in the 1815 Minutes tells us "A letter from a 
church in Washington was read requesting union to this Association which was unanimously Granted." While in the case 
of Brush Run, the request was merely "also granted." At this initial meeting, Brother A. Campbell,  Luce and Frey 
were to attend quarterly meeting in Uniontown. Brother T. Campbell, Wheeler and Spears were a committee to inspect 
the corresponding letters. Item 18 shows prophetic vision: "The Association recommends to the churches to put away 
from them the evil of slave-holding." Item 21 assigns to Thomas Campbell the writing of the circular letter for next 
year on Trinity." "On Lord's Day T. Campbell preached, expounding Hebrews


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.349]

About 25 dollars was collected during intermission for the foreign mission. Bro A. Campbell spoke from Pas. 98:2. 
Then Bro. Segur spoke. The several addresses from the stage were received with deep attention. Things new and and 
old were exhibited from the treasure of the gospel with much attention to a numerous and deeply affected 
congregation." Brush Run reported 32 members.

YEAR 1816

Cross Creek, Brooke Co., Va., had the Association in 1816. Brush Run reports 4 baptisms, to dismissed by letter, 
1 deceased, total 20. (The fi-tires as to membership do not agree. One wonders at 10 being dismissed bv letter.) 
Item 7 says: "A letter was presented by brother T. Campbell from a number of baptized professors in the city of 
Pittsburgh requesting union as a church of this association" and item 8 continues: "Voted that as this letter is 
not presented according to the constitution of this Association the request cannot be granted." But Item 9 welcomes 
Brother T. Campbell to a seat in the Association. A. Campbell was on the committee of arrangements. Thomas Campbell's 
treatise on "The Trinity" (In which the word Trinity does not occur) was read and accepted. Next year's circular 
letter was assigned to brother A. Campbell on "The purpose of God in respect to creating angels and men as exhibited 
to us in the Sacred Scriptures as the grand end of all his works." On Lord's Day, Sept. 1, A. Campbell preaclied on 
Rom. 8:3, the afternoon sermon and his famous sermon "On the Law." The clerk writes in the Minutes: "The good order 
which prevailed among the thousands which composed the assembly and the listening attention to the word of life 
envinced that the gospel of the Kingdom was preached not in word but in power." Richardson in Memioirs of A. Campbell 
states that the hearing of "The Sermon on the Law" was far from sympathetic and decorous, taking issue with the 
clerk.  Brush Run raised $15.50 for foreign missions.

YEAR 1817

Peter's Creek, Washirigton Co., Pa., was host to the Association of 1817, A. Campbell was designated clerk and on 
the business committee. Item 5: "Bro. T. Campbell of Pittsburgh was present and invited to a seat." A. Campbell was 
on a committee to consider a letter from the Beaver Association. His circular letter was read and accepted. Item 11: 
"Having reccived several charges and complaints against the doctrines maintained by the church of Brush Run, and more 
especially against a sermon preached before the last Association by Alexander


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.350]

Campbell, one of their elders, Resolves that having heard a written declaration of their faith as well as verbal 
explanations relative to the charges made against him, we are fully satisfied with the declarations of said church." 
Item 13: "Appointed Bro. A. Campbell to preach the introductory sermon next association." Brush Run showed A. Campbell 
and J. Foster as ministers; John Brown, Esq. and John Collins as messengers. It contributed $20 for Foreign Missions; 
had 4 baptisms, 10 by letter, 2 dismissed, 1 deceased, total 39.

YEAR 1818

Connellsville, Fayette Co., Pa., had the Association in 1818. A. Campbell opened the sessions with a sermon on 
2 Tim. 4:2, "Preach the word." He is again clerk and with Bro. Newcomb was to attend circular meeting at Washington. 
Item i6: "During the interim an address on Baptism was delivered by Bro. Campbell and baptism was administered to 
three candidates." Item 19 tells that Bro. Forrester of Pittsbtirah was invited to a seat. Item 23; "Whereas the 
resolve contained in the 11th item of the Minutes for 1817 has been construed to amount to an approbation of a sermon 
preached bv Bro. A. Campbell referred to in said minute. -- Resolved that it was not the sense of this Association 
in the above resolve to pass a sentence of approbation or disapprobation on the sermon above referred to." Item 24 
refers to some trouble between Cross Creek Church and Brush Run Church and the former having declared non-fellowship, 
the Association cannot give them a letter of dismission. (The trouble arose over the fact that A. Campbell at the 
instance of a few members in Charlestown (Wellsburg), Va., had gone east and solicited about $1,000 from Baptist 
people in Philadelphia, New York, Baltimore and elsewhere. It would seem that 1815 was the year and Cross Creek Church 
felt agrieved and weakened). Item 26 needs to be remembered: "Resolved that all documents belonging to this 
Association shall be deposited in the hands of Wm. Brownfield for sale-keeping." (Was that a straw to show that the 
wind was already blowing to keep its original letter of request and admission out of the hands of Brush Run people?). 
Brush Run gave $19 and some cents for foreign missions, had 1 baptism, 8 by letter, 2 excluded. total 44. A. Campbell 
and James Foster are ministers. J. Brown and Joseph Briant are messengers.

YEAR 1819

At Horseshoe, Washington Co., Pa., the Redstone Association met in 1819. Wm. Brownfield is Moderator and A. Campbell, 
clerk.


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.351]

The latter is to attend two circular meetings during the year. Item 17: "Resolved that each church in this Association 
shall in their annual letter attend to the fifth article of the constitution of thos association (i. e. each church 
shall avow their faith by referring to the Regular Baptist Confession of Faith aforesaid in Article 2). Item 23: 
"Appointed brother A. Campbell to write the corresponding letter for this year year and brother Wheeler and Brownsfield 
a committee to examine it." Brush Run Church gave $10 to the missionary fund, no baptisms, 6 by letter, 1 dismissed; 
total 49. In the circular letter occurs "A strict adherence to those fundamental maxims and rules established in the 
New Testament as to the order of Christ's house and to which the churches professing the sentiments of the Baptists have 
in all ages of the Christian church professed subjection." Beaver Association received the corresponding letter.

YEAR 1820 

Washington Co., Pa., at Plum Run had the 1820 Association. Brush Run Church reported 4 baptisms, total 53 
members and $5 for missions (there were but nine sources of gifts for missions). Bro. A. Campbell was chosen 
as moderator. Item 11 notes the following from Pigeon Creek: "Would it not be sufficient for each church annually 
to state in their letter that they hold the same faith which they held when they were first received into the 
Association?" Five brethren were appointed to consider the propriety of amending the fifth article of the 
constitution of the Association: Brownfield, Luce, Spears, John Patton, and James Estep. Brother Campbell and Luce 
to attend a circular meeting at Wheeling Creek. (in the Minutes for 1820 occurs for the first time the use of 
Sabbath for Lord's Day). In the circular letter it was speculated that if each member should give one-half cent 
a week, in a year there would be  nearly $300 and "What individual professor would ever feel this?"

YEAR 1821

Ruff's Creek, Greene Co., Pa., had the Association.Both the Campbells and James Foster were ministers of the Brush 
Run Church. Eight baptisms were reported, 3 by letter; total 66 members and $10 for missions. A. Campbell seems to 
have been moderator for he introduced the business of the day. Both A. and T. Campbell were chosen to attend several 
circular meetings. T. Campbell is to preach the introductory sermon next year and A. Campbell is to write the 
corresponding letter for this year. A. Campbell showed receipt of $112 from the Baptist Board of Missions. A committee 
of D. Philips 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.352]

and T. Campbell appointed brother Brownfield, T. Campbell and A. Campbell to preach on the Lord's Day. 
A. Campbell received $60.05 toward the tuition and board of Jacob Osborne (a ministerial student in 
Buffalo seminary). T. Campbell preached on Hebrews 1 and A. Campbell on Mat. 28:18-20.

YEAR 1822

The Association met in Washington, Pa., Thos. Campbell's first home in the new world, in 1822 and 
he preached the introductory sermon from Mat. 13:44-46 and served as Moderator of the Association. 
A. Campbell was on a committee of five on arrangements. Brush Run reported 3 baptisms, 8 by letter, 
1 dismissal, 1 excluded, total 72. Both Campbells and James Foster were ministers. For a third time, Thomas 
Rigdon of Beaver Association was present and given a seat. Brother Sidney Rigdon was present and sent as 
an immediate messenger to the Mohikan Association. $7.95 was raised for his travel expense. Bro. Brownfield 
did not write the circular letter as ordered, so A. Campbell was ordered to prepare a letter 
within three weeks. T. Campbell, Luce and C. Wheeler were to inspect the same. In A. Campbell's letter, 
reference was made to the exertions of the churches for domestic and foreign missions. Also a second purpose 
of the churches in the association "to promote unity in all points of faith and practice, according to the 
oracles of God, the only acknowledged standard of faith and obedience." On Lord's Day night, A. Campbell spoke 
on 1 Cor. 15:3. The corresponding letter was sent to Beaver, Mohiken and other associations. 


YEAR 1823 

In 1823 Pittsburgh, Pa., was host to the Redstone Association. T. Campbell "opened the session with singing 
and prayer." Brush Run reported 1 baptism, 32 dismissed leaving a total of 38. T. Campbell and James Foster 
were the elders and Joseph Briant the messenger. (During the year Alexander Campbell was one of the thirty-two 
who were given letters from Brush Run to Wellsburg). A letter from Mohiken Association was read and Brother 
Rigdon was given a seat. A. Campbell and brother Wheeler were to attend circular meetings. On the Lord's
Day, John Rigdon preached in the morning and T. Campbell in the afternoon. The corresponding letter contained 
this sentence: "Within the ;ast two years there has been some discord in out association, owing either to different 
views on the important doctrine of the Trinity; or differing modes of expressing those views on that high and 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.353]

mysterious subject. Wm. Brownfield did not complete his circular letter and so the Minutes for the year were Published 
without it. This was his second default but no reason was assigned. Ten dollars were received for the Carey Mission. 
The constitution of the Association was ordered to be again published.

YEAR 1824

George's Creek, Fayette Co., Pa., held the Association in 1824. Wm. Brownfield preached from Jude 3. Brush Run showed 
T. Campbell and J. Foster as elders; 7 baptisms, total 35. Item 6 noted the informality in a number of church letters.  The following were 
The following were acquitted: Uniontown, Peter's Creek,  Pigeon Creek, Bait's Fork, Ruff's Creek, Somerset, Wheeling 
Creek, Head of Whitely, Indian Creek, and Washington. Iten' 7 states: "The representatives of the church of Brush Run 
not being able to give satisfactory reasons for the informality in their letter were objected to." Item 8 runs: "A 
letter from the Stillwater Association was read and two messengers were seated." Then Item 9 declares: "Resolved that 
this Association have no fellowship with the Brush Run Church." (The carrying of this resolution makes 1824 the date 
of separation from the Baptists, or being driven forth from the Baptists, the co-operation having begun in 1815).

YEAR 1825

At the Association held at Ten Mile, Washington Co., Pa., Lawrence Greatrake preached the opening sermon from Acts 
20:28-30. Item 5 contains: Query from Uniontown last year: "will the Association continue to hold those in fellowship 
who'essentialy differ from us?" Item 6: "Resolved that no correspondence be held with the Stillwater Association." 
Item 10 sets forth reasons for the associations and among them were 2. To preserve uniformity in faith and practice; 
3. To detect and discountenance heresies. It was resolved that the 11th article in the Minutes of 1816 be null and 
void. (This referred to the approval of Thomas Campbell's circular letter on The Trinity). Item I3: "A memorial from 
several persons at Brush Run was presented for consideration which was postponed until next meeting of the Association." 
(This might indicate the presence of those people at the Association).

YEAR 1826

Again at Big Redstone in 1826, Association was held. Item 8 is of deep interest: "A letter of correspondence from 
the Mahonianing


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.354]

(for Mahoning?) Association was presented to be read by Alexander Campbell who stated that there had been a 
correspondence for several years. On account of an objection being made to the statement as incorrect, the reading 
of the letter was indefinitely postponed "for further inquiry." A footnote to the Minutes says: According to the 
Records, Files and Mintites of this Association no such correspondence ever existed!" That plainly was meant to give 
the lie to Mr. Campbell. He may have made a mistake; he might have meant to say that inasmuch as several of the 
churches of Beaver had gone into Mahoning Association, there had been correspondence; or the Association loaded up 
by Mr. Brownfield really deceived its members for Brownfield had the documents. There is a discrepancy in the matter, 
but it will be recalled that Mr. Campbell had been clerk for several years and had sent out the correspondence letter.

At this Association of 1826, Pigeon Creek was excluded, Washington was found heterodox and likewise Somerset. Item 11: 
"Resumed consideration of the memorial presented last year by the persons at Brush Run. After mature deliberation 
Resolved that the memorial be returned to them. (Then there is a footnote: "This memorial demanded (in short) a 
restoration to the fellowship of this association or as an alternative that their original letter (i. e. the letter 
that they were received into the Association upon) be returned to them: the former request was little short of insult 
to the Association. The latter request was superseded by the known fact, that the Brush Run people had and have a 
copy of that letter! Their motive for demanding the original was of course highly suspicious and the letter could not 
be granted them." (It will be noted that the italicizing of some words indicates some animosity on the part of the 
clerk. He refuses to call the church a church. The ungracious insinuation concerning the original letter upon which 
membership had been granted in the Redstone Association had been touched upon by Alexander Campbell in his 
recollections of associations with the Baptists as found in the Millenial Harbinger of 1848, 344....

He states that Brush Run Church had requested a return of the letter because it did not make a copy of the letter. It 
took several years for the subtlety of Wm. Brownfield in obtaining the documents of the Association to appear, for he 
has been the chief prosecutor of the heretics).

To Lawrence Greatrake had been assigned the task of preparing the circular letter for 1826, and the opening section 
is interesting indeed and reflects how the Campbells were thought of by some in their day.


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.355]

You know, that for years past our association has been in a state of distressing agitation.... All have felt, or seen 
the effects, but few comparatively have known the cause. That cause we for a moment advert to and remark upon as a 
beacon to you hereafter.... Several years ago a couple of THEOLOGICAL ADVENTURERS by good words and fair speeches 
deceived the hearts of the simple and unsuspicious among you, and by a bare majority of votes they got ingress among 
you as Baptists. There were those however in your Association, whose experience, reflection and intelligence, led 
them to suspect both the theology and design of those two men; and who opposed their admission into your Association, 
in the first instance of [sic - as?] being of very equivocal character. In a short time after these Adventurers 
became united to you, and in a moment of rampant vanity, they insolently professed in the hearing of several persons 
that it was their intention to revolutionize the Regular Baptist Church; and to that end they had joined themselves 
to it: while in their writings and harangues, they were introducing among you in artful disguise the most pernicious 
heresies. This necessarily called forth a stern and unyielding opposition on the part of those among you who saw 
through the gauze of sophistry in which all the former's theology was clothed. As faithful sentinels on the walls of 
Zion, they sounded the alarm, they endured the obloquy and persecution incident to their being thought disturbers of 
the peace of Zion. 

"The warning song was for a length of time sung in vain 
But few would hear and fewer heed the strain."  

At length infantile credulity itself had to give way, and the greater part of your Association shook themselves from 
their lethargy, and rose in opposition to these Adventurers. By this time there were churches (so-called) introduced 
into connection with yours which were the product or creatures of the said two would-be Revolutionizers. While some 
of your former churches, of whom you had hoped better things, became, in the persons of their ministers and leading 
members, the busy agents in the circulation of the writings and blustering echoes of the harangues of these 
revolutionary Elymasses. (Acts xiii, 8-10). Others of your churches were so far [led] astray by the dissimulation 
and fancied liberty of this revolutionary device, that they united with the former churches in an attempt to destroy 
your constitution and suppress your good confession of that faith once delivered to the saints. To accomplish this, 
the GENIUS of RIBALDRY, in the person of the junior of those two adventurers, went through the country, in written 
and oral philippick against the association, as being clothed with superstitious reverence for the old fashioned 
theology: Filled with bigoted attachment to the confessions of faith: Grossly ignorant of the scriptures: swayed by 
the spirit of popish tyranny; and acting out a part of more (than) inquisitorial barbarity over the mental freedom 
and conscience of individuals and the rights and independence of the churches! While hundreds who had caught this 
more than Persian flame of ondependence 1


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.356]

stunned the ears of the community in vociferations of this declamation. 2 All this WINDY hubbub availed nothing with 
the association: she now saw through this ill-disguised machination. She felt satisfied that there had been no demur 
against her confession of faith, UNTIL that confession had condemned the faith of its condemners! She saw that it was 
detecting heretics and heretical churches: -- that it set in a blaze of rage and malignant opposition, the disguised 
errorists that had got into her churches. This taught her to prize that good confession of faith the more highly, as 
being of profitable for defence against heretics as well as being explanatory of the doctrine of the Scriptures. Under 
the circumstances noticed, the Association has been, for years past, not only struggling for the preservation of her 
faith and order, but also putting forth her best efforts to restore to their proper mind and bring back to the 'good 
old way' those churches of her body whom she conceived had been made victims of a varied IMPOSTURE! Nor have her 
efforts been unattended with a pleasing degree of success. Where she has failed in her affectionate attempt to 
recover (RECOVER), it has not been for the want of as much gentleness and effort as respect to her own existence 
would possibly admit of. She has borne with the informities of the weak and the insolence and guile of the ANARCHICAL; 
until forbearance ceased to be a virtue and further attempt to continue them in our fellowship would assume the 
character of a design to put a negative upon the word of God itself, which declares that 'two cannot walk together 
unless they are agreed.' 

"Hence at our last session, we felt it our duty to bring the case to an issue, and to that end avowed non-fellowship 
with those churches that continued hostile and refractory to our faith and order. For the particulars of which we 
refer you to our Minutes. The churches that we have put away from us, we esteem as so much excrescence of which we 
are happily disburthened! Of those churches whose letters were not received (at least most of them) we hope better 
things and things that accompany salvation. These churches we esteem as still worthy of our ministerial attentions 
and christian sympathies. To God we commend (with hearts warmed by his grace) in the exercise of every friendly and 
prayerful solicitude on their behalf: and beseech the great Shepherd of Israel to save them, if vines, from the old 
fox and the young one too; who have already robbed them of many a cluster of their grapes. Perhaps they have departed 
from us for a season that we may receive them again hereafter to be more than ever profitable unto us, and we to them. 
Amen.

"Having, brethren, briefly noticed the cause, progress, and termination of that contention which so long prevailed 
in our Association; we shall now affectionately invite your attention to a few remarks on the subject of 
SANCTIFICATION..."

__________
1 See James 3:6, for its name and character.

2 And yet not one church was necessitated to stay in the Association one hour longer than it was pleased to continue!!! 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.357]

YEAR 1827 

At the Association meeting in Uniontown, Pa., in 1827, it was moved to make it possible for any church in 
fellowship to make charges of heresy against any other church and make out a written statement to that 
effect, which should be answered at the next associaon. This was to be made a part of the Constitution


YEAR 1828

At Somerset, the Association decreed that they would have no fellowship with the people calling themselves 
The Washington Associa- ion on account of errors for which many of them were excluded from us. (Brush 
Run Church had joined with other excluded churches to form the new association). The circular letter of 
the year held that it was in no way incumbent on the Association to receive people into their christian fellowship 
merely because they bore the christian name.

Year 1829

This year found the Association meeting with Mt. Moriah (Smithfield) church. A report was given concerning 
the Mahoning Associaion. Here it is in part: "We believe it to be our duty to the public and to our brethren 
in general to give some information respecting that Association. It arose chiefly out of Beavere and 
progressed regularly until A. Campbell and others came in. They now disbelieve and deny many doctrines of 
the Holy Scriptures on which they were constituted. They contend that there is no salvation without baptism -- 
that it should be administered to all that say they believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God without 
examination on any other point, -— that there is no direct operation of the Holy Spirit on the mind prior 
to baptism, —- that baptism procures the remission of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit, -— that the 
Scriptures are only evidence of interest in Christ, -— that obedience places it in God's power to elect to 
salvation, -- that no creed is necessary for the church but the Scriptures as they stand, -- that all 
baptized persons have a right to administer the ordinance. All which sentiments have been taught by the messengers 
of that Association."

(Redstone Association suffered a split when churches formed the Monongahela Association and this new organization 
became a particular mark for the spleen and attack of Redstone because it was a refuge for renegade Baptists and 
Campbellites.


vOct. 1940
[p.358]

With the 1830 meeting of the Association at Indian Creek, Monongalia Co., Va., the Campbells pass out of the picture 
and there is no recurrence of their names in the Minutes. Item 10 finds the Association trying to reestablish its 
orthodoxy: "Whereas the items of business of business contained in the minutes of 1824 and numbered 7 and 9 
concerning the exclusion of the Church at Brush Run (of which Thomas Campbell and his son Alexander were members) 
are indefinite as to the cause of their exclusion: And this Association having received some communications from 
a distance requesting more specific information as to the cause of their exclusion: Therefore unanimously Resolved 
for the satisfaction of all concerned, we now further state, that their exclusion was on account of being 
erroneous in doctrine, maintaining namely the essential derivation and inferiority of the true and proper 
Deity of Christ and the Spirit; that faith in Christ is only a belief of historical facts recorded in the scriptures, 
rejecting and deriding what is commonly called christian experience; that there is no operation of the Spirit on 
the hearts of men, since the days of pentecost, &c." (Pentecost is spelled here penticost),

SOME CONCLUSIONS FROM THE REDSTONE BAPTIST ASSOCIATION MINUTES

As has been indicated above a diiferent year must be assigned for the beginning of fellowship between the Campbells 
with Brush Run Church and the Baptists, instead of 1813, as Alexander Campbell twice writes (Christian Baptist, 
Vol. II, page 92: "We united with the Redstone Association in the fall of 1813"; Millenial Harbinger, 1848, p. 344. 
"We laid the matter before the church in the fall of 1813"). The Redstone Meetings were always the last two or three 
days of August or combined one or two days of August with one or two of September, if not the first three days of 
September, so if the matter was laid before Brush Run Church in the fall of 1813, there was not time enough to attend 
the Association meeting. Surely the Redstone Minutes are to decide the real date. But one author seems to have gotten 
it right -- W. T. Moore in his biographical sketch of A. Campbell as a preface to "Familiar Lectures on the 
Pentateuch." but he is wrong in asserting that several other churches of the type of Brush Run (five or six in 
Washington County) entered Redstone Association about 1815. From time to time other churches were admitted into the 
Association. The years 1813 and 1814 must have been spent in considering 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.359]

the project, but the Campbells and Brush Run Church were going it alone up to 1815.

2. From the above it must follow that there was nothing precipitate or ill-considered in the conclusion to unite with 
the Redstone Association, as might have been the case if such union had taken place in 1813. The eight or ten large 
pages that Alexander Campbell refers to as containing the reasons and conditions of their entrance call for deliberation 
and discussion. In the Christian Baptist it is written, "The church of Brush Run did finally agree to unite with that 
association on the ground that no terms of union or conimunion other than the Holy Scriptures should be required. On 
this ground, after presenting a written declaration of our belief (always distinguishing betwixt making a declaration 
of our faith for the satisfaction of others and binding that declaration on others as a term of communion), we united 
with the Redstone Baptist Association."

3. It seems clear as daylight that Brush Run Church did not become a Baptist Church by entering into the Redstone 
Association. It refused to follow the constitution in accepting the Philadelphia Confession of Faith, and that fact 
remained a sore spot with a few of the Regular Baptists who were overruled when Brush Run Church was admitted to the 
Association. The Baptist name was never used by Brush Run Church and it never could qualify as a "sister church of 
like faith and order" among Baptists. Moreover none of the pronouncements of the two Campbells can be found which 
fasten the name Baptist upon the Brush Run Church nor upon themselves. When in August (31st) Of 1823, Alexander 
Campbell and thirty-one others were dismissed from Brush Run Church it was to "constitute a church of Christ at 
Wellsburg." The fact that they were "reformers" (or "revolutionizers" as Mr. Greatrake says) would enable them to be 
among the Baptists but not of them in a real sense. Real Baptists and a few Baptist Church would have escaped the 
decree of non-fellowship which was meted out to them.

4. The ministerial labors of the Campbells seem to have been un- and non-denominational among the Baptists, in other 
words, purely and solely christian. They had no sense of trying to make partyists; and engaged in no effort to make 
individuals other than christian.

5. Both the Campbells enjoyed the privileges Of serving as Moderators of the Association and Alexander was again and 
again the clerk. They were entrusted with every kind of service that pertained to a member of the Association and 
served with all fidelity. No charge 


Shane Quarterly Oct. 1940
[p.360]

of delinquency was ever suggested as to practical service to the Association and the churches.

6. The fellowship, teaching and influence of the Campbells, whether it was planned from the beginning as Mr. Greatrake 
declares or whether it just resulted so, seems to have acted as a leaven contrary to "Baptist faith and order." Several 
Baptist churches were revolutionized and suffered the decree of non-fellowship as did Brush Run Church. The Association 
that grew out of the dis-fellowshipped churches (Washington Association) had a constitution that made no reference to 
the Philadelphia Confession and its second article reads: "We receive the Scriptures as the only rule of faith and 
practice to all the churches of Christ."

7. In the Christian Baptist, page 92, Alexander Campbell writes: "In the close of 1814 and beginning of 1815, I made 
an extensive tour through a part of the eastern region, visiting the cities of New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and 
Washington, and did to my present shame, by milking both the sheep and the goats, obtain about 1000 dollars for the 
building of a meeting-house in Wellsburgh, a place then destitute of any house for religious meetings." Richardson has 
the proper dates for this trip: In 1815 and 1816, following on the act of being received into the Redstone Association. 
This building gave offence to the Church at Cross Creek and led it to declare non-fellowship and desire to unite with 
another Association. This Redstone would not allow. Minutes of 1818, Item 24.

8. During its fellowship with Redstone Association, the Brush Run Church was always missionary and almost outclassed 
all other churches in the money that it gave for the work of Judson and Carey that were to the fore in those years.

W. H. HANNA
April-June of 1940.






=============================
http://f.fay-west.com/articles/history/union1913.php

(see also: History of Fayette County Pennsylvania, 1882, page 321 
for a biographical sketch of Wm. Brownfield)



A History of Uniontown
The County Seat of Fayette County, Pennsylvania

By James Hadden
Author of Washington's and Braddock's Expeditions

Copyright 1913 by James Hadden, Uniontown, PA 



History of Uniontown
708

CHAPTER XXX.

Great Bethel Baptist church was constituted November 7, 1770, by Rev. Henry Crosby, and on the following day an 
organization was formed by the installation of Isaac Sutton as the first pastor and Jacob Vanmetre, Richard Hall, 
Zepheniah Blackford, Rachel Sutton, Lettice Vanmetre, Sarah Hall, Thomas Gaddis, James McCoy, Owen Davis, Moses Carr, 
Philip Pierce, Joseph Thomas, Joseph Boutenhouse, Philip Jenkins, Richard Reed, Thomas Bowel1 and James Littell as 
original members, to which were added soon after by baptism John Carr, Elizabeth Carr, Sarah Baccus, David Morgan, 
William Murphy, Vanmetre, James McCloy and Mary Anderson.

At a meeting held March 18, 1780, it was resolved that a meeting house for public worship be built, and in July 
following it was resolved that two meeting houses be built.

It would appear that the first meeting house was built on the Rogers farm some six miles south of Uniontown, near 
Ashcraft's fort. And at a meeting held September 15, 1787, it was resolved that a meeting house be built on the great 
road about one-fourth of a mile from Uniontown. This was the second meeting house


------------
History of Uniontown
709

decided upon seven years before. In Deed Book D, page 295 is recorded an article of agreement made March 12, 1789, 
between Joseph Tomelston and William McCoy in which Tomelston allows McCoy to remove the logs already cut for the 
construction of the Baptist meeting house by the first of April next. Tomelston and McCoy owned the land adjoining 
that on which the meeting house was to be built, and this article of agreement certainly fixes the date of the erection 
of the first Baptist meeting house in Uniontown.

In Deed Book F, page 47, is recorded a deed made by Henry Beeson, the founder of the town, to the members of the 
Regular Baptist church, called Great Bethel, for one acre of land on the east side of Morgantown street, and fronting 
330 feet on said street. The deed bears date of May 26, 1804, and the price was five pounds Pennsylvania money, equal 
to $13.33. This is the lot on which the second of the log meeting houses was built, in 1789, and included the old 
Baptist burying ground adjoining the meeting house.

In 1787, Rev. David Loofbower was called as an assistant to Rev. Isaac Sutton, but in 1790, trouble arose; some 
accusations having been preferred against several members of the church, was the cause, and Rev. Sutton withdrew and 
continued services at his house, and the Great Bethel church and the Loofbower faction occupied the meeting house. 
Rev. Sutton resigned as pastor, March 21, 1790, but was recalled by one branch in September following, and services 
were thus conducted by the two parties until October 4, 1791, when a compromise was effected by which both factions 
were permitted to use the meeting house, and the coolness soon died out.

The Loofbower faction had formed themselves into the Uniontown Baptist church, but on November 6,1790, the Church of 
Christ, called Great Bethel, met the Church of Christ, called Uniontown, according to appointment. At this meeting 
the church of Uniontown was dissolved and the members received into fellowship with Great Bethel. Loofbower continued 
to preach until October 5, 1793, when he resigned and left for New Jersey. Isaac Sutton was granted a letter of 
dismission on September 21, 1793, but continued to preach part of his time until May 26, 1794, at which time Benjamin 
Stone was called as supply to preach once a month, and afterwards as pastor, and

------------
History of Uniontown
710

he continued until September 7, 1805, when he was granted a letter of dismission, but was recalled June 11, 1806, 
to preach once a month, and he continued as pastor until 1812. Rev. William Brownfield succeeded Rev. Stone as pastor. 
Mr. Brownfield presented himself as a candidate for Christian baptism December 1, 1798, and was licensed to preach the 
gospel in January 1799, and was ordained December 6, 1800, and on February 6, 1802, he was called to preach the second 
and fourth Sabbaths of each month, though Mr. Stone was still pastor, and Mr. Brownfield assumed full charge, February 
12, 1812, which position he held alone until April 6, 1833, when Rev. Milton Sutton was called to preach once a month.

Minutes of the 'Great Bethel Baptist church of December 9, 1826, state that Samuel Littell accused Rev. William 
Brownfield of "preaching false doctrines of which the church were the ignorant receivers," namely: "that it was the 
divinity of Christ that suffered; that he suffered just so much as would atone for the sins of the elect alone, and 
that more would have been unjust, etc." Resolved, unanimously, that whereas Samuel Littell has wilfully misrepresented 
the doctrine taught by Rev. William Brownfield, our minister, and received and maintained by the church, that he be, 
and is hereby excluded from our communion and fellowship. Rev. Brownfield mastered the Greek and Hebrew languages 
although he was never inside a college. He was a diligent student, a fine linguist and was well versed in polemics and 
church history. His father was known as Tory Tom Brownfield from the fact that his sympathies were with England during 
the struggle of the American colonists against the mother country. Rev. Brownfield was a carpenter by trade, and did 
considerable contract work as such in the erection of some of the dwelling houses about the town. He turned the large 
wooden columns that supported the galleries in the brick meeting house that is still standing and which was built in 
1831-33, on the site of the former log building. In turning these columns he had a man at each end of the log turning 
the same by hand while he held the turning tools.

Rev. Brownfield was ultra Calvanistic in his views which he sought on every occasion to enforce upon his hearers. In 
1832, serious contentions arose as to missions and benevolent societies in the church. The home and foreign missionary 

------------
History of Uniontown
711

societies were endeavoring to push these organizations to all parts of the state, but Rev. Brownfield opposed these 
movements as unscriptural and un-Baptistic, and objected to any one preaching in his pulpit who advocated the cause of 
missions, declaring that if the Lord wanted the heathen saved He would save them in His own good way. Finally the 
Rev. John Thomas preferred charges of perversion of testimony against Rev. Brownfield, but the church sustained Mr. 
Brownfield at a meeting held in April, 1835, which action caused some members to withdraw from the church. At this same 
meeting Rev. Milton Sutton was asked to continue another year as assistant pastor. At a meeting held October 3, 1835, 
Rev. Brownfield was asked to withdraw as pastor because he would not allow other preachers to fellowship. The motion 
was declared carried; a protest was entered, and some more members withdrew from the church.

In January, 1836, Rev. Brownfield petitioned the legislature, asking that body to pass an act vesting the title of 
the church property in the Regular, or Old School Baptist church, as the opponents to missions styled themselves, but 
Rev. Milton Sutton read a protest against the petition. The two pastors then contended for possession of the meeting 
house. The matter was referred to Redstone Association which body decided in favor of Brownfield as representing the 
Great Bethel Regular Baptist church. Thus fortified, they closed the doors against the other branch, but the opponents 
of Brownfield forced the doors and held services. Moses Nixon was appointed to notify the New School or mission party 
to cease making appointments in the house. Being unheeded, in February, 1837, Moses Nixon and Isaac Hytchinson fastened 
the doors and windows and posted warnings against trespassers, with threats of prosecution. The doors were again forced 
and Milton Sutton and others preached to the New School or mission party. The threatened suit followed and was tried 
at a special session of court in 1843, when a verdict was rendered in favor of the New School or mission party, as 
constituting the Great Bethel Baptist church.

At a meeting held April 30, 1836, Rev. Brownfield was dismissed by a majority of the members present, but he was 
permitted the use of the house and continued to preach to the Old School or Anti-Mission Baptists at such times as did 
not conflict with the appointments of the other party.


------------
History of Uniontown
712


"Some members present. Read a portion of scripture. Prayer. Adjourned." This being accomplished, missions, Sabbath 
schools and other church work were inaugurated and made speedy headway.

At a meeting of Redstone Association held at Redstone church on Redstone creek in Franklin township, near now Smock 
station, September 1, 2, and 3, 1826, the controversy concerning church doctrines between Thomas and Alexander Campbell, 
father and son, and other ministers, which had been raging for ten years, was renewed by William Brownfield. The 
Campbells withdrew from the Association and took quite a following with them and organized a church independent of 
the Baptists.

Rev. Milton Sutton, on April 6, 1833, was again requested to preach once a month, and on May 2, 1835, was requested 
to continue his services along with Rev. Brownfield, and he continued his services until 1853. William Wood was the 
first minister called by the New School or Mission party. He was called June 1, 1833, to preach once a month for six 
months. He was called again in 1839, and began April 1st of that year to preach once a month for one year.

Elder James Seymour was called by the New School, December 24, 1836, to preach once a month. Revs. Milton Sutton and 
James Seymour were each called on June 24, 1836, to preach once a month. On February 29, 1840, Rev. William Wood was 
called for another year, and on February 28, 1841, Rev. E. M. Miles was called for one year. Rev. Isaac Wynn was called 
to the pastorate May 3, 1834.

He had united by baptism in December, 1831, was licensed July 6, 1833, and ordained to the ministry in July, 1835, and 
preached the gospel at intervals for fifty years.

During all this time Rev. William Brownfield preached to the Old School party once a month. He owned and resided on a 
farm adjoining Uniontown on the south. His house stood on almost the exact spot now occupied by the residence of the 
late Porter Craig. Being quietly located, and a pleasant walk from town, it became the Gretna Green to which many 
lovers wended their way to be united in marriage. And from the many years Rev. Brownfield was in the ministry, it was 
conceded that he married


---------
History of Uniontown
713

more couples than all the other ministers in the community combined. He continued to preach until 1846.

A monument that marks his grave in the old Baptist graveyard recites that Rev. William Brownfield died January 19, 1859, 
in the 86th year of his age, and that he was a sound and able divine, a fearless advocate of the truth, and after 
serving his master in the work of the ministry for sixty-five years, has passed to his reward. This same monument 
reveals that Sarah West, wife of Rev. William Brownfield, died December 29, 1856, aged 83 years, 4 months and 4 days. 
They had no children.....



============================

FORTY YEARS OF PIONEER LIFE:  
MEMOIR OF  JOHN MASON PECK D,D. 
EDITED FROM HIS JOURNALS AND CORRESPONDENCE. 

[BY] RUFUS BABCOCK. 

PHILADELPHIA: 
AMERICAN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY, 
1864


[[Modern Introduction -- 1965 reprint edition]]


Peck, 1864
[p. liii]

The Antimission Controversv

According to the Memoir the first overt antimissionary act involving Peck occurred in a little church in Missouri 
in 1818. The people voted to burn voluntary pledge notes which they had given Peck for the support of his work. A 
large portion of the Baptist constituency across the entire frontier was sympathetic to the breaking of the pledge. 
Antimission sentiment flared spontaneously in the southern and western states. By 1820 virtually every Baptist church 
and association in the Mississippi Valley was divided over the issue of missions. "Not a man ventured to open his 
mouth in favor of any benevolent enterprise or action. The [local] missionary societies were dissolved, and the 
associations rescinded all their resolutions by which they were in any way connected with these measures, and in 
this respect, the spirit of death rested upon the whole people! [72]

Three men, John Taylor, Daniel Parker, and Alexander Campbell, stood out as antimission leaders. In 1819 Taylor 
published a pamphlet called "Thoughts on Missions," in which he said that the resident preachers were aroused by the 
assumption on the part of the new missionaries that the frontier was a religious desert and that the missionaries 
were the first to introduce true religion. He said the primary object of missionaries was to get money. Their efforts 
also were illegitimate because the missionary system was unscriptural.


Peck, 1864
[p. liv]

He compared the missionaries with Judas and to horseleeches which suck blood "with a forked tongue." The missionary 
society, he said, was an aristocracy which was absolutely contrary to Baptist theology.

Parker, the founder of the Two-Seed-in-the-Spirit Pre-destinarian Baptists, agreed that missions would destroy Baptist 
democracy and church government. He observed that the national society usurped the work of God by calling men to preach, 
assigning them to fields, and requiring an educated ministry. The "denomination" he founded still exists, reporting 201 
members in 16 churches in 1945. [73] Parker taught that two seeds, good and evil, entered the life stream of humanity 
in Eden, the evil seed being planted by Satan. Every child is born with one seed or the other and is, therefore, 
predestined. Since nothing can be done about this, missions are useless and a paid ministry is blasphemous since Christ 
came to save sinners and his work is completed. Parker was also an extensive pamphleteer.

Alexander Campbell and his father Thomas withdrew from association with the Presbyterians in 1809 to form the Christian 
Church (Disciples of Christ). The Disciples count this as their historic beginning but actually the denomination formed 
about twenty years later after several abortive attempts to unite all Protestants under one denominational banner. 
Alexander was a Baptist from 1813 to 1830. In 1829 he published the Millennial Harbinger in which he attacked every 
practice for which he could not find scriptural proof including creeds, mission societies, associations, synods, 
presbyteries, doctors of divinity, bishops, confessions, constitutions, titles such as "reverend," etc. He claimed to 
favor missions but not national agencies, those "great engines" which seek to dominate the nation. He opposed 
ministerial education and asked, "did God ever call a man to any work for which he was not fully qualified, and in 
the performance of which he was not successful?" [74]

The causes and reasons for the antimissionary controversy were more complex than their immediate participants realized.


Peck, 1864
[p. lv]

Peck, as the Memoir indicates, recognized that the dispute was neither purely theological nor exclusively religious in 
the widest sense. It was also a matter of class and educational competition. It was an important struggle for power 
within the denomination and reflected deep-seated tensions which existed, and still exist, between the East and the West.

Theologically the antimission groups were ultra-Calvinistic and Antinomian. Newman hypothesized that this was a reaction 
to the encroachment of the Methodists whose Arminian teachings stimulated the radical reaction, but he offered no 
support for thiS. [75] More likely, hyper-Calvinism offered an appropriate theological apology for opposition to all 
organized activity generated in the East. The antimission Baptists taught that God would bring his elect to repentance 
and redemption without any human aids. Such assistance was presumptuous and wicked. Of course, the antimission forces 
neglected to observe that they used human means to oppose the missionary work. Had they been theologically consistent 
they would have done nothing to oppose or assist the mission endeavor.

They argued that God's acts were absolutely free and always arbitrary and that it did no good to attempt to support the 
divine predestinations. The movement was radically individualistic and dependent upon "intuition" rather than "reason" 
to perceive God's will. Parker said that God did not send Jonah to Nineveh through a mission society, nor was he "sent 
to a seminary of learning to prepare him to preach to these Gentiles; but was under the tuition of a special order of 
God, and was in no case under the direction of any body of men whatever, neither did he look back to a society formed 
to raise money for his support." [76] On the grounds of their radical individualism and emphasis upon personal 
responsibility for one's acts -- or on the grounds of the complete opposite that one could do nothing about his acts 
due to the arbitrary predeterminations of God -- the antimission preachers were adamantly opposed to cooperative welfare 
programs of all kinds, religious or social. These were a 


Peck, 1864
[p. lvi]

proud people who wanted to control through their own leaders the social instruments by which they assisted each other.

They were fanatically anxious to preserve the autonomy of the local congregation. The formation of missionary societies 
with officers and field secretaries was a direct threat to the authority of the local church. The activities of the 
missionary agencies reminded John Taylor of the operations of Tetzel, the "hawker of indulgences when the Pope of Rome 
and the Mother of Harlots were at their zenith."

This represents the substance of the arguments based on theology and on the "intention of Scripture" for church 
government. The issues were serious but they were never seriously discussed or resolved on the theological level by 
the more sophisticated intellectual powers from the East. It was judoed by them to be purely a non-theological issue 
arising out of jealousy and threatened loss of status on the part of the indigenous preachers. At both the theological 
and non-theological level the debate still goes on in all Christian groups regarding the "essential" and "unessential" 
in ecelesiastical polity, the nature and method of salvation, thelegitimate locus of authority in the church, the nature 
of the ministry, the proper role of ecclesiastical benevolent and welfare agencies, and so on.

The theological issues, then as now, were complicated by secular factors. The anti-missionary preachers were threatened 
by a loss of prestige, money, and authority. The missionaries from the East were far better educated men than the 
farmer-preachers of the frontier. Opposition in one church minute was generated because "our land suffers a vast loss of 
money.... Money and theological learning seem to be the pride, we fear, of too many of the preachers of our day." [77] 
Peck observed that the antimission preacherswere not paid but that they dearly loved the power andinfluence which they 
exercised over the population of theWest. He reported that one preacher said, "you know the


Peck, 1864
[p. lvii]


big trees in the woods overshadow the little ones; and these missionaries will be all great, learned men, and the 
people will all go to hear them preach, and we shall all be put down."

As a causal factor the tension between East and West cannot be underestimated. The sections feared and distrusted each 
other with greater intensity than exists in the present political era. The cleavages in the churches reflected the 
divisions in the larger society. The anti-mission Baptists were concentrated in Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, 
Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Missouri, Indiana, and Illinois. The established power of the churches resided in the East 
and was supported by all the resources of the settled American communities. The Westerners knew that the seaboard 
aristocrats looked down upon them and feared the tremendous population shift that was occurring in the nation. Like the 
Baptists in the seventeenth century, the frontiersmen developed theological support for their anti-aristocratic notions. 
The East was commercial and urban in relation to the agricultural and rural West. The West, in turn, was a debtor 
section while the East was the creditor. Philosophically, the East was conservative, tending to emphasize natural law, 
social harmony, and justice for all men through the alleviation of hardship through benevolent and philanthropic 
societies. The West was more inclined to favor natural rights, equality, and the immediate cooperation of kinship and 
communal groups for the help of the poor and the sick. The average Westerner, moreover, did not view himself as an 
eternal backwoodsman but as an entrepreneur and capitalist on the make. [78]  At least for the time being, higher 
education and the cultural refinement of the arts were superfluous and would never, in any case, operate as an effective 
substitute for common sense and practical judgment.

The Baptists were the only denomination which experienced the dissension of the antimissionary movement. The reasons 
are not easy to detect. It has often been suggested that Methodist doctrine which emphasized the Arminian


Peck, 1864
[p. lviii]

principles of free grace and personal responsibility was in accord with the secular hopes and ideologies of the 
frontier people, but this does not explain the successful reaction of the antimission Baptists which was expressed in 
hyper-Calvinistic terriis. More likely the reason is to be discovered in the differences between the Methodist and 
Baptist theologies of the church than in their theologies of salvation. The Baptists had a longer history of resentment 
toward absentee authority, and more to the point, the authority of the Methodist church was focused in the bishop who 
was resident in the area in the person of the very able frontier missionary, Bishop William McKendree, who lived in 
Illinois and was the chief ecclesiastical officer of the Western Conference. Thus, when the Methodist circuit preachers 
received orders or sought advice, they did not have to refer to New York, Boston, or Philadelphia. The Methodist 
hierarchy was directly represented in the West. Further, the hierarchical system of the Methodist church penetrated to 
the lowest levels of the denomination, and a greater number of people seemed to have a part in the policy and 
decision-making process as well as in the work of the church. The local Methodist churches had "lay-elders," who stood 
immediately below the preachers in the hierarchy, and who were ordained by the bishop. Peck commented on the efficacy 
of this post in conducting religious duties and in meeting the needs of the people.

This office, now unknown in Baptist churches was regarded in Virginia and afterwards in Kentucky, as an appendage to the 
pastoral office. Lay-elders had no authority in government and discipline, as in a Presbyterian church, but aided the 
pastor in conducting religious meetings by exhortation and prayer, visiting the sick, instructing the ignorant, and 
confirming the wavering. [79]

Thus, the duties of absent or heavily burdened preachers could be met by the ablest lay officers while at the same time 
their status was officially limited and clerical authority strictly maintained. The Disciples was the only group which 


Peck, 1864
[p. lix]

approximated the Baptists in doctrine and polity, and they appeared on the frontier in part as an antimissionary 
protest. William Warren Sweet expressed a dominant opinion oflater historians when he assessed the antimissionary 
controversy as "harmful to religion generally and to the progress of the Baptists in particular," and that it had a 
critical influence on the development of the West at a time when educational foundations were most sorely iieeded. [80] 
But such an opinion should not close the books. Thus far, specialized research on the influence of religious movements 
on the development of the ideologies of the western states has been sparse, and for the most part has been confined to 
the "purely religious" effects.

National Baptist Agencies and the Mission Controversy

The mission controversy can be analyzed in terms of the church-sect typology. The anti-mission preachers would be called 
sectarians and the missionaries would be representatives of the church, Christian realists who recognized that no 
religious and moral goals can be achieved and "no ideal can be incorporated without the loss of some of its ideal 
character." [81] Troeltsch observed that this paradox was resident in the form of an ambiguity in the Gospel ethic, 
the sayings of Jesus registering both a positive and negative evaluation of the world. The simplicity of the church-sect 
analysis, however, results in a tendency to overlook the morally ambiguous character of the sects as well as the 
churches. Troeltsch emphasized the "ethical rigor" of the sectarian type, but this generally persists for no more than 
a generation, and the motives of the first-generation rigorists are never purely moral. In an effort to correct the c
hurch-sect hypothesis several scholars observed that sects tend to evolve into churches or denominations, and more 
recently it has been noted that all churches possess "sectarian" inclinations in certain of their sub-groups.


Peck, 1864
[p. lx]

It can be said that this inclination was present in the antimission controversy. An emerging Baptist sect conflicted 
with a "more advanced" sectarian group -- also Baptist -- which was well on its way to achieving denominational status. 
This kind of analytical confusion occurs in part because both groups needed to organize in order to achieve religious 
and moral goals which, in turn, would be compromised by the tendency of their organizations to frustrate the attainment 
of their goals, and by the further complication that a minority within the church-type will always seek to alter the 
organizational status-quo in order to remain true to the rigorous ethic of the Original Founder.

According to contemporary usage, Peck would be called a conservative, an organization man, one who believed that religion 
could not progress effectively apart from the traditions, institutions, and civilized philosophy of western culture.  
For example, he argued for the associational form of church government and in this sense he was opposed to one of the 
main tenets of Baptist tradition. He was disinclined to recognize any virtue in the argument of the farmer-preachers, 
who, however self-interested they may have been, recognized correctly that the civilizing influence tends to secularize 
religion, and from the perspective of the primitive Christian ethic it does corrupt the gospel. This is the valid 
emphasis of every "fundamentalist" group, and it is almost universally ignored and deplored by the members of the 
"churches" until their institutions have become so accommodated to society that they are rendered ineffective as 
critics of civilization. The organizational delemma is inescapable. Although the disadvantages of organization may be 
greater for religion than for other types of social institution, there is no effective alternative for the achievement 
of goals and communication of ideals to succeeding generations. Peck was sensitive to these issues. He was fully aware 
of the civilizing power of religion, and in turn, of the essential contribution that culture makes to religion. He 
thought and acted in the spirit of Tillich's observation that "religion is


Peck, 1864
[p. lxi]

the substance of culture, and culture is the expression of religion."

The development of the State Convention in western New York is illustrative of Baptist intentions and problems. Its 
proximity to the seaboard states contributed to a more rapid advancement of organizational structures. Nonetheless, it 
did not escape the destructive impact of the anti-mission controversy as the following report demonstrates.

The object of the convention is... to produce a greater sum of good: not by 
destroying, superseding, or opposing, those benevolent missionary societies 
already in operation; but by combining, improving, and maturing them.

The benefits which it is devoutly hoped will result from this institution, 
are, (1) a combination of energies, efforts, and funds. And let it be 
remembered that "combined exertion is powerful exertion."... In relation 
to doing good, the strengh of the churches of Christ... consists in a union 
of their wisdom, their talents, their graces, their charities, and their 
exertions, in mutual and friendly co-operations.... (2) A collection of 
important and extensive information. A convention of delegates from every 
part of this State and its vicinity will bring together numerous interesting 
and essential facts, concerning the want of the church, destitute portions 
of country, and the operations of the hand of God in different places. And 
through the medium of that correspondence, which the constitution provided, 
the moral as well as the local situation of that vast and gloomy region in 
the west will be laid open to the view of the Board, and by them to that 
benevolent public.... (3) A judicious distribution and destination of 
missionaries. Owing to an ignorance of each other's proceedings, different 
societies, in some instances, send more-missionaries to some particular 
places than are needed, while others are left entirely destitute, and, for
 want of proper information, often direct them to fields of labor far less 
important and promising than many that remain unoccupied. [82]

It would be difficult to find a statement that more precisely reflects John Mason Peck's interests, interpretation of 
the Bible, and social philosophy than this report from the area in which he was converted and ordained to the Baptist 
ministry, and to which he  often returned on his eastern visits. At the same meeting in which the above report was


Peck, 1864
[p. lxii]

given, the President of the Convention, Elon Galusha, answered the objections of the antimissionary preachers, who 
said of the convention,

that it tends to aggrandizement, by promoting some of the brethren to 
more honor than others share; that large ecclesiastical bodies are 
dangerous to the cause of Christ. In answer to the first objection, we 
need onlv say that no honor is conferred on any brother by this body 
but that of a servant. And if any are desirous of the honor of devoting 
much time, much labor, and some cash, too, (without pecuniary reward) 
to the precious cause of truth, let them share it largely as their 
benevolent hearts may crave; for the heavier they are laden with it, 
the more will God be glorified, and suffering humanity relieved.

To the second objection, we would reply, that all ecclesiastical bodies 
are dangerous, in proportion, not to their numbers, but to the 
independent power they possess, the temptation they are under to abuse 
it, and the encouragement they give to unholy ambition. But this 
Convention, as may be seen by its constitution, is invested with no 
such power -- can acquire none; consequently can abuse none.

Its members are chosen annually by the brethren. Its funds are all 
derived from free donations, and must be appropriated according to the 
direction of the donor. It affords no encouragements to unholy ambition, 
as it enjoys no emoluments, pays its officers no salary, no perquisites, 
and eonfers no honorary titles.... 

System, so essential to the efficiency of our missionary operations, 
is less visible in the accumulation than in the distribution of our 
funds. [83]

This statement is of historical importance because it ex-presses ideas and principles which are still accepted in both 
the American and Southern Baptist Convention and which continue to operate as the fundamental rationale for these 
national organizations. In these sentences Galusha explained the procedures which were used by the New York Convention 
and which were adopted by the American Baptist Convention at its founding in 1907, and for the most part, still remain 
in force. For example, the officers of the national convention -- president, vice-president, etc. -- who are elected on 
a one year basis are still paid no salaries; the professional agents -- executives, administrators, missionaries, etc. 
-- are


Peck, 1864
[p. lxiii]

appointed by the boards of elected officials; they are salaried and oftentimes enjoy life tenure on the basis of 
successive appointments.

Although Peck fully recognized the necessity for the rationalization of religious work, he was not idealistic and naive 
about the nature of the organizations in which he participated. He recognized that controversy and jealous competition 
were not confined to the antimission groups. In several instances he regretfully alluded to the rivalries among the 
officials of the missionary societies. It is unfortunate for historical and sociological interests that he did not 
amplify these difficulties, or that Babcock did not include them in the Memoir, but we do know that most of the 
controversies centered around the competing interests of foreign and home missions. The Memoir alludes to a conflict 
between Luther Rice and William Staughton on the one hand and the advocates of foreign missions on the other. Torbet 
says, "in 1826 the Triennial Convention took steps to extricate itself from involvement in home mission work and 
Columbian College [of which Staughton was President].... Many [were] accusing Rice of negligence and even of dishonesty 
(these charges were proved to be unfounded).... The result was a loss of financial support from some quarters." [84]

Peck's deep interest in the rationalization of denominational efforts did not signify for him a need to proliferate 
and extend organizations. He futilely sought, as have many of his Baptist heirs, to unite publication efforts whenever 
possible. Long before Parkinson was born Peck was aware of the ubiquitous tendency to amplify bureaucracy as an end in 
itself. Peck was the grandfather of the conservative western politician and religious man in the sense that he actively 
opposed the multiplication of executive and administrative posts in the East. Efficiency of operation meant for him the 
reduction of expenses and elimination of new offices whenever possible, limitation of power whenever feasible, and the 
creation of new offices only when no alternative existed. He was probably the only man in Baptist history who succeeded


Peck, 1864
[p. lxiv]

in reducing all executive salaries by 20 per cent -- including his own -- when he assumed office in the Publication 
Society. Nevertheless, as mentioned above, he was fully aware of the need for organization and efficiency. He called 
it "comprehension and distribution of duties," which are respectively similar to Weber's concept of "rationalization" 
and Durkheim's "division of lajor." Finally, the Memoir indicates that Peck was ahead of his time in his sensitivity 
to the problem of depersonalization in bureaucracy. He insisted that the highest executive officials must maintain 
personal contact with their constituency. When he was executive secretary of the Publication Society, he found it 
within his power to maintain a correspondence and travel schedule that would overwhelm most men and may have contributed 
to his comparatively early death.

There can be no doubt that the antimission forces lacked a great deal in terms of the finesse that is the companion of 
cultural advantage and theological sophistication. It is also true that they often placed their personal concerns above 
the apparent needs of the developing frontier, and that in this they were shortsighted and self-interested. But there 
was truth in many of their charges, and they fully recognized that they were enuaging a powerful and implacable 
antagonist. The Protestant establishment was concentrated in the East and consisted of an impressive interlocking 
directorate of which Peck was an influential itinerate representative. What Foster calls a "convention circuit" started 
to develop as early as 1820. Most of the major denominations and interdenominational organizations held their 
"Anniversary Meetings" in May in Philadelphia, New York, and Boston. Many of the same people traveled from one city to 
another as delegates to these various meetings. The Memoir indicates that Peck proceeded from convention to convention 
in his effort to attract support for the western enterprises. The American Bible Society was the crucial organization. 
"Since essentially the same people formed the nucleus of each successive 'national' Evangelical enterprise, the best 
time to


Peck, 1864
[p. lxv]

organize a new venture was when the Bible people got together." [85] The formidable power of the eastern forces was due 
in part to the fact that in the nineteenth century the religious establishment consisted much more than today of people 
who also were active in the highest political and economic affairs of the nation.

But ignorance, in the form of inadequate information and poverty of experience, was not monopolized by the 
farmer-preachers. There is no evidence that any but a minority of the most influential religious leaders of the East 
had ever been west of Pittsburgh or St. Louis.  Peck fought a battle against ignorance on two impressive fronts, not 
one, as the histories tend to emphasize. There was an influential anti-mission faction in the East as well as the West, 
although their argument was based on different premises. On theological grounds the eastern leaders favored the "settled  
pastors" rather than the missionaries. Only a minister was believed to be the legitimate instrument of God for a 
congregation; therefore, missions should be established only in those places that are unchurched. It was partly on this 
basis that foreign missions were favored over domestic enterprises. The Triennial Baptist Missionary Convention withdrew 
support from Peck and other home missionaries in 1820 on the grounds, which Peck called "erroneous," that ministers 
were moving to the West in sufficient numbers to obviate the need for missionaries. The eastern people did not share 
Peck's knowledge of the character and training of the itinerate preachers. He was one of the few men of his time who 
knew the East as well as the West and could deal intelligently and effectively with both parties.,,,



CHAPTER XV. 

1823, 1824. 

Extracts from Journal -- Anti-mission Baptists -- Bible Societies Formed 
-- Report to Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Society -- Baptism of Green, 
a Murderer; His Execution -- Sun day-schools 183-192


Peck, 1864
[p.183]


CHAPTER XV. 

Bible Societies in Illinois -- Domestic Missions -- Green, the Murderer -- First Sunday-school Societies in the West. 

The closing months of the year 1823, with the beginning of the following year, were filled up actively and usefully 
in the various preaching tours which Mr. Peck took, both in Illinois and Missouri. In the former State, particularly, 
he just now witnessed an increased and, as he feared, an implac able opposition, on the part of, some of the ministers, 
especially, to all missionary endeavors, which much grieved  and perplexed him. We give a few extracts from his 
journal, indicating his experiences, both merciful and disquieting : 

FRIDAY, October 31st. This is my birthday: thirty-four years of my life 
are fled. It deserves remark that every year seems to fly away more 
rapidly as I advance. The last year of my life has been free from 
domestic affliction. Praise the Lord for his goodness. 

November 1st. Rode to St. Louis, and at night attended church-meeting 
with the blacks. Each one conversed on the religious state of their 
minds, and I gave them advice. 

Lord's-day, 2nd. Yery cold weather. In the morning I preached from 
the parable of Dives and Lazarus. Solemn attention. Some affected. 
Afternoon, preached again, from "Behold the Lamb of God," etc. In 
the evening I addressed the blacks from the Lord's prayer with much 
feeling and good effect. My mind is much led out to God, and I feel 
resolved to be more circumspect, and more engaged in private devotion. 
Oh, for grace and strength! 

I have lately learned, much to my disappointment, that the new 
association up the Illinois river (the Sangamon, probably) has made 
a rule to debar missionaries from a seat. Several of the friends of 
missions were prevented by sickness from attending at its formation, 
hence this untoward result. Oh, tell it not in Gath. There is a regular 
conspiracy formed in the Illinois, to put down missionaries. The root 
of all this opposition is from the preachers. They fear losing their 
influence, which must be small indeed. 


Peck, 1864
[p.184]

After writing the above, I searched for and read my "Secret Diary" 
of 1815 and 1816, in which I solemnly pledged myself in covenant with 
God to submit to all the trials of a missionary life; and particularly 
to have my motives impeached and my name cast out as evil. It is my 
sincere desire not to harbor a particle of ill will toward those who 
oppose and persecute me; but to cherish great desires for their salvation. 
To the grace of God be all the praise, that I have not felt much irritation 
of mind at what has taken place, and what my enemies are disposed to do. 
I grieve, however, to think of the injury they are inflicting on the cause 
of the dear Redeemer. 

November 5th. My mind this evening has been much occupied on the subject 
of making some more efficient exertions to promote the Bible Society, by 
ascertaining, in the first place, the exact state of destitution in this 
county. While reading the Seventh Annual Report of the American Bible Society, 
my mind has been all aglow with desire for the full accomplishment of the 
noble work aimed at. 

This is the first intimation we have found, in a careful examination of his journals and letters, of special interest 
in this subject, which afterwards occupied so much of his time and labors. A two-fold motive might very appropriately 
lead him at just this crisis to entertain with favor some effort of this kind. In the first place, there was palpable 
evidence of much need of Bibles and Testaments in families and schools; and then again he could readily see that it 
would be more difficult for the opponents of all those evangelizing efforts with which his mission was identified, 
to oppose the diffusion of God's word, than any other form of evangelization. Hence the wisdom of beginning on this 
impregnable ground, and exercising the intelligence and the benevolence of the churches on this branch of evangelical 
effort, that by exercise it might be strengthened and expanded, and thus be less exposed to be carried away by such 
anti-mission prejudices as were now artfully excited among the ignorant and the selfish. 

Twenty days later the following occurs in his journal : 


Peck, 1864
[p.185]

For some time I have had many thoughts about undertaking an agency to 
form Bible societies, and thus endeavor to promote the gospel in this 
country, by a more general circulation of the Scriptures. My greatest 
desire is to pursue that course which will most speedily and effectually 
pave the way to more systematic and enlarged efforts to promote the kingdom 
of a dear Redeemer. 

The middle of the following month, on occasion of forming the Greene County Auxiliary Bible Society in Illinois, 
and the second at Edwardsville for Madison county, he says, "I have no doubt but this will be a death-blow to 
opposition to missionaries in this quarter." 

We have been the more careful to fortify this view from his own recorded statements and convictions at the time; 
because it fully redeems the policy he was pursuing from any thing like fickleness. He was a missionary with his 
whole heart, but when he thought the very cause of missions could for the time be better promoted by his turning to 
the work of establishing Bible societies, he could not hesitate to become an agent for this object. 

Soon after his first successful demonstration in this work distributing the Scriptures, and awakening interest in 
behalf of the object, getting individuals of chief standing and influence to pledge him their aid, and preaching 
frequently on this theme, and forming two county societies and taking measures for a third he accepted an agency 
from the American Bible Society to further prosecute this important work. The records of this memorable year may be 
appropriately closed with his report to the Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Society, setting forth in a summary 
manner his labors, and the plan on which they were prosecuted...


Peck, 1864
[p.212]


CHAPTER XVIII. 

A Nine-months tour to the Eastern and Middle States. 

The time had at length arrived when imperative duty as well as strong inclination led Mr. Peck for the first time 
after his removal to the West to set his face towards the scenes and friends of his earlier years. The nine years of 
his separation from them had in no degree dimmed his perceptions of their worth, or chilled his heart towards them. 
On the other hand, so free and frequent had been his correspondence, and so vividly was all the past impressed on his 
mind, that soon as circumstances permitted he yearned to revisit the loved ones he had left so long. But stronger 
inducements than any mere personal gratification impelled him to this journey. He had borne into the deep mine the 
explorer's torch, and felt an intense solicitude to rally to his aid the requisite assistance to secure the rich 
treasures which he had discovered....

Peck, 1864
[p.213]

... The record of this tour fills nearly ninety pages of a quarto volume of his journal, besides another folio volume 
of sixty-seven pages, full of memoranda of various observations in regard to weather, soil, topography, statistics, 
and whatever he deemed most interesting not falling within the range of his ordinary diary. These materials are 
superabundant, besides which personal recollections in ample fullness and variety here come to the aid of the 
biographer. But necessity seems to demand the compression of the most permanently important of all these into the 
limits of a single chapter. 

Mr. Peck left his home and family on the 22d of February, and journeyed on horseback to Cincinnati, a distance of 
three hundred and forty-eight miles....

On reaching Cincinnati, which he now visited for the first time, he found a more interesting state of things, both 
in the city, where he remained five days...


Peck, 1864
[p.214]

214 MEMOIR OP JOHN M. PECK. 

... he was induced to put both on board a steamer, and in this way accomplished with ease and satisfaction the next 
four hundred miles to Wheeling. It seems to have been his first experience of traveling any considerable distance in 
this manner, by which subsequently he was to experience so much of benefit and peril. He remarks on the rattling and 
crashing of the engines, and the bustle and confusion on board, as rendering it impracticable to have public worship 
on the Sabbath as he had desired, and as on the large boats was often practicable. In three and a half days he arrived 
at Wheeling, and thence proceeded on horseback with ease and expedition over the national road towards Washington city. 

In Washington, Pa., he mentions an interesting interview which he had with Rev. Charles Wheeler, pastor of the Baptist 
church in that place (subsequently President of Rector College, Western Virginia), who gave him a pretty clear idea of 
the continued difficulties in the Redstone Baptist Association, where there was a hyper-Calvinistic party, very rigid 
and bigoted, and where Alexander Campbell was more and more manifesting his opposition to the above party and their 
shibboleth, while still a third and more numerous portion of that body maintained a middle ground....


========================


BAPTIST BEGINNINGS IN WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA

BY

James Allie Davidson

Bachelor of Arts, Baylor University, 1930
Bachelor of Divinity, Newton Theological Imtitution, 1933
Master of Sacred Theology, Newton Theological Institution, 1936


Submitted to the Graduate School of the University
of Pittsburgh in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosoph7

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
1941



{Davidson 1941, p. 143}


X.

THE EARLY RELATION AND SEPARATION
OF
BAPTISTS AND DISCIPLES

The beginnings of the Reformation represented by the "Disciples" were among the Baptists of western 
Pennsylvania. Ot cannot be truthfully said that the new denomination came out of the Baptists, but 
rather that the Baptists received Thomas and Alexander Campbell and their church into their fellowship 
until it became evident that the doctrines of the Campbells were not Baptist, as at first believed. 
Upon the separation of the Campbells from the Baptists of the Redstone Association, many of the 
Baptist churches left the Association, to become a part of the reformation. The Baptists of western 
Pennsylvania were for about fifteen years hosts to the movement, centering in the Campbells, father 
and son. They were men of superior ability and unusual energy. Thomas Campbell, the father, was a 
preacher of the Seceders, a Presbyterian sect of Scotland, the formation of which dates from 1735, 
when the General Assembly suspended the Reverend Ebenezer Erskine and his followers. From 1820 this 
body was called the United Secession Church, and since its union with the Relief Church in 1847 
has been called the United Presbyterian Church. When Thomas Campbell came to this country in 1807, 
he was a minister of the Seceder church in good standing. He labored with the Brush Run Church in the 
Presbytery of Chartiers near Pittsburgh, but soon became dissatisfied with its sectarian spirit. In 
the Autumn of 1809, he organized what he called "The Christian 



{Davidson 1941, p. 144}

Association of Washington, Pa." In the lengthy declaration of the purpose of the organization, he expressly stated 
that it was not a church, and that it was not the intention of the Campbells to separate themselves from the existing 
denomination, or to found another. The fundamental principle of the Association was to secure Chrustian union on 
the basis of the Bible alone. Creeds and articles of faith, as terms of communion, were opposed. Thomas Campbell put  
the principle in [terse form] at the organization of the society in these words: "Where the scriptures speak, we 
speak; where the scriptures are silent, we are silent." [1]

Alexander Campbell, who was [21] years of age and who had just finished a year at the University of Glasgow, joined 
his father in [1809]. Alexander had been in nominal fellowship with the Seceders, but had in his heart renounced 
their doctrines and practice, and had refused to partake of the communion at their last communion season. At the 
University of Glasgow, he had associated with Granville Ewing, one of the leaders of the Sandemanian sect, and was 
strongly influenced by the Sandemanian doctrines. [2] Upon reading his father's declaration, he gave it his hearty 
approval, and became a member of the Christian Association. Before that group, on July [12, 1810]. he preached his 
first sermon. The Association applied for membership in the United Presbyterian Synod of Pittsburgh in October, 
[1810], but was refused, mainly because the Campbells opposed the fundamental tenets of that denomination.

__________
1. Tyler, History of the Disciples, American Church History Series, Vol. XII, pp. 1-155.
2. [Richardson], op. cit., p. ____.



{Davidson 1941, p. 145}

Finding that fellowship with any religious body probably would be impossible, the Christian Association on May 4, 1811, 
organized itself into a church. The subjects and form of Baptism necame, to the Campbells, a point of serious inquiry. 
Following the principle enunciated in 1809 of "Where the Scriptures speak, we speak; where the Scriptures are silent, 
we are silent," infant baptism, which had until this time been practiced, became optional in the Brush Run Church. 
This optional compromise explains, in part, why the Association was refused entrance into the Pittsburgh Synod. During 
the next year or two, Alexander Campbell engaged a Baptist preacher in a warm debate on the subject of baptism. [3] 
In 1810 Alexander Campbell, through a thorough study of the scriptures concerning the original meaning of the Greek 
word _baptize_, concluded that immersion was the true form, and that believers only were proper subjects for the 
ordinance. He became convinced that sprinkling of infants is unscriptural, and that he had not been truly baptized, 
Campbell's sister, Dorothea, his father and his mother arrived at the same conclusion independently, and were baptized 
on the 12th day of June, 1812, by Rev. Matthias Lice, the pastor of the Ten Mile Baptist Church.

David Jones, the Missionary, visiting Pittsburgh eight days after the baptismal service, described the event in a 
letter to a Philadelphia friend in the following words:

"God is doing wonders in this western country. 
In the first week in this month, the Rev. 
Thomas Campbell a Seceder minister in Washington 
(county) and his wife and daughter, and also his 
son, young Mr. Campbell, and his wife, with one 
more were baptized in Buffaloe Creek, by our 
brother Luce, who is pastor of a church at Ten 
Mile, Washington County, Pennsylvania. On this 


__________
3. Vedder, op. cit., p. 177.


{Davidson 1941, p. 146}

interesting occasion, Mr. Campbell Senior spake 
three hours and a half at the water, to a large 
auditory.... He sweeps all before him. He has 
batized a number since his own baptism, and his 
church bids fair soon to be the largest in the 
State.

Young brother Campbell is a good scholar, and a 
man of talents; he spake on the occasion one hour 
and a half; wherein he made an eminent display of 
his knowledge in Greek, &c. This whole country 
seems moved." 4

At the next meeting of the Brush Run Church, thirteen other members were baptized, and in a short time the majority 
of the church were baptized believers. The rest soon withdrew. [5]


In 1848 Alexander stated that at the time of their baptism they "had no idea of uniting with the Baptists more than 
with the Moravians or the mere Independents." [6] The Baptist churches of that region had adopted the Philadelphia 
Confession of Faith as a bond of union, and the Brush Run Church violently opposed all creeds. The Baptist ministers 
of the Redstone Association were mostly uneducated, and were considered narrow by the Campbells. However, as news 
of the action of the Brush Run Church spread, it was considered Baptist in all but name, and suggestions were made 
repeatedly that the church join the Redstone Association. The matter came before the church in 1813 and after much 
discussion, it was concluded that application should be made to the Redstone Association with a full statement of 
their views. This statement declared the church's objection to all human creeds as

__________
4. Letter from David Jones to his Correspondent in Phila. In _Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Magazine_, Vol. III 
(September, 1812) Bound Vol. VII, p. 206.

5. Richardson, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 403. 

6. Campbell's own words in _Millennial Harbinger_, Series 3, Vol. V. p. 344.



{Davidson 1941, p. 147}

bonds of union or communion, but it expressed a willingness to co-operate with the Association, provided they should 
be allowed to teach and preach whatever the scriptures revealed.

A considerable majority of the Association favored the acceptance of the church on the grounds stated, and the Brush 
Ryn Church, with the Campbells, became Baptists.

From the very first, the Campbells were active participants in the progress of the Association. In 1815, Alexander 
Campbell was named on the Quarterly Meeting committee. Thomas Campbell was appointed to the committee to 
examine the corresponding letters, and was appointed to write the Circulating Letter for the same year. On 
theLord's day, both Thomas and Alexander Campbell preached. The latter preached the famous "Sermon on the Law" 
which was the basis for much contention in the future. [7] Also at the 1816 meeting, the Circular Letter "prepared 
by brother T. Campbell was read and accepted without amendment." [8] Alexander Campbell was Clerk of the Association 
in 1817 and 1818, and Moderator in 1820. [9]

The first complaint against the doctrines of the Campbells came at the close of Alexander Campbell's "Sermon on the 
Law," but the complaint was voted down. By the time of the next annual meeting (1817) the Association had

"Received several charges and complaints against 
the doctrines maintained by the Church of Brush 
Run and more especially against a sermon preached 
before Last Association by Alex'r Campbell 
one of their elders."


__________
7. Redstone Minutes

8. Redstone Minutes for 1817, 1818 and 1820.

9. Vedder, _History of Baptists in the Middle States_, p. 177.



{Davidson 1941, p. 148}

The opposition was overrulled again and the following resolution voted:

"Resolved that having heard a written declaration 
of their faith as well as verbal explanations 
relating to the charges made against him, we are 
satisfied with the declaration of said Church."

Then, as if to show their confidence in Alexander Campbell, the following entry is made:

"Appointed brother A. Campbell to preach the introductory sermon next association."

During the following year, dissension arose over the new reformation doctrine among the churches of the Association 
and the Cross Creek Baptist Church asked to be dismissed from the Association. The reason is seen in the minute of 
the refusal.

"Resolved, that as the church of Cross Creek, has 
not availed itself of any opportunity to come to 
a good understanding with the church of Brush Run, 
with whom they have declared non-fellowship, this 
association cannot grant them a letter of dismission. [10]

The sermon Alexander Campbell had preached in 1816 was still a point of contention. By 1819 the Association was not 
so "fully satisfied" with its doctrines. The body tried to be neutral.

"Whereas, the resolve contained in the 11th item of 
the minutes of the Association for 1817, has been 
construed to amount to an approbation of a sermon 
preached by brother A. Campbell, referred to in 
said minute. Resolved, That it was not the sense of 
this Association in the above resolve, to pass a 
sentence of approbation or disapprobation on the 
sermon above referred to." [11]

Vedder says of the sermon that "it is difficult in the extreme to understand why this discourse should have aroused 
such a furore. It seems orthodox to the point of truism." [12]

__________
10. Redstone Minutes, 1818.

11. Ibid.

12. Vedder, _The History of Baptists in the Middle States_, p. 177.



{Davidson 1941, p. 149)

From the first, there was a party in the Association, led by Rev. William Brownfield, which opposed the Campbells 
and the Brush Run Church. The Baptists were strong Calvinists and preached a doctrine which was more doctrinal than 
practical, which is evidenced by the sermons published in the Circular Letters of the Association. The Campbells were 
what was in those days called Arminian, a belief upon which the Baptist preachers of the Association continually 
heaped anathemas. The Campbells believed in a general atonement, and gave the free will of a man a place of greater 
importance in conversion [than] was welcome among the Calvinists. By the time charges of heresy were made, Alexander 
Campbell was the recognized head of the new movement, to which the name of Reformation was apploed. When the attempt 
was made to secure a protest against the heresy of the 1816 sermon on the spot, the objectors were discouraged by 
one of the wiser preachers who said "That would create too much excitement, and would injure us more than Mr. Campbell. 
It is better to let it pass, and let the people judge for themselves." [13]

In spite of their differences, the Campbells continued in the Association. In 1818 Alexander Campbell delivered the 
introductory sermon, and gave an address on Baptism at the recess. He also wrote the Corresponding Letter a year later. 
Both Campbells preached at the annual meeting in 1881, and again in 1823. Thomas Campbell was elected moderator in 1822.

In August 1823, Alexander Campbell, moved by the constant opposition and accusations of heresy, with a group of thirty 
members of the Brush Run Church, obtained letters of dismission

__________
13. Richards, op. cit.


{Davidson 1941, p. 150}

from that church and constituted a church at Wellsburg, and a year later the Wellsburg church was received into the 
Mahining Baptist Association of Ohio. On this occasion, Mr. Campbell presented a brief statement of doctrine. The 
churches of this Association formerly had been a part of the Beaver Association, and had withdrawn to form a separate 
body. Alexander Campbell remained a member of this Association until it disbanded in 1827, the majority having come 
to believe that there is no warrant in scripture for such an organization. Campbell did not favor dissolving the 
Association, but held that a specific, "Thus saith the Lord" is not required in such a case. [14]

More serious divergences from the gospel than had appeared on the Sermon on the Law began to appear in the meantime. 
In a debate with Rev. John Walker, a Presbyterian minister of the region, in 1820, Alexander Campbell mentioned for 
the first time publicly what was to become one of his peculiar teachings. "Baptism is connected with the promise of 
remission of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit." [15] In August, 1823, he began publication of the _Christian 
Baptist_, a newspaper published solely for "the eviction of truth and the exposing of error in doctrine and practice." 
Vedder writes his opinion of this publication in no uncertain terms:

"No polemic literature in this country has surpassed, 
if it has equaled, the issues of the "Christian 
Baptist" in sarcasm, bitterness, and unrelenting 
severity of attack upon the chief existing religious 
institutions and methods. Campbell included in one 
sweeping condemnation the building of costly churches, 
the use of organs, the selling or renting of pews, 
"Missionary wheels" and other forms of church gambling, 

__________
14. Tyler, op. cit., p. 71

15. Richardson, op. cit., Vol. II. p. 20.



{Davidson 1941, p. 151}


Sunday-schools, missionary societies, education 
societies, Bible societies. The violence of his 
language is so absurd that one is at a loss to 
know how so sane-minded a man could have used it, 
or why it was not received as the ravings of a 
madman." [16]

Campbell had not broken with the Baptists and was considered a champion of Baptist tenets, especially baptism. In 1823, 
he debated the subject with Rev. W. L. McCalla, a Presbyterian minister. He maintained at this time that,

"The blood of Christ, then really cleanses us who 
believe from all sin. Behold the goodness of God 
in giving us a formal token of it, by ordaining a 
baptism expressly 'for the remission of sins.' 
The water of baptism, then, formally  washes away 
our sins. The blood of Christ really washes away 
our sine. Paul’s sins were really pardoned when 
he believed, yet he had no formal pledge of the 
fact, no formal acquittal, no formal purgation 
of his sine, until he washed them away in the water 
of baptism. To every believer, therefore, baptism 
is a formal and personal remission, or purgation 
of sins." [17]

In the meantime, the Campbells and the Brush Run Church were falling into serious disrepute in the Redstone Association. 
A formal query, presented in 1824, asking "Will the Association continue to hold those in fellowship who essentially 
differ from us in the doctrine of the gospel" was answered in the negative. At the same meeting, the action taken in 
1817 favoring the "Sermon on the Law" was declared to be "null and void." Yet the Circular Letter, prepared by Thomas 
Campbell at that time was "accepted without amendment." The sermon texts reveal the spirit of the exhortations. William 
Brownfield, the leader of the opposition, preached in 1824 on "Contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the 
Saints," and Rev. Lawrence Greatrake preached

__________
16. Vedder, op. cit., 178.

17. Richardson, op. cit., Vol II, p. 82.


{Davidson 1941, p. 152}

in 1825 on, "For I know this, that after my departure shall grevious wolves enter in among you, not 
sparing the flock." A resolution was presented after the latter sermon, "charging Lawrence Greatrake 
with an heretical sentiment delivered in the introductory sermon, which was promptly negatived." A 
letter of correspondence from the Mahoning Association was presented by Alexander Campbell in 1826, 
but the reading of the letter was "postponed." The Brush Run Church which, with the Campbells, had 
been officially excluded in 1824, again was refused fellowship in the Association. O. J. Sturgis 
reports a large attendance at the 1826 annual meeting. William Brownfield and Campbell were the chief 
disputants. Finally Campbell picked up his hat and walking out of the church, mounted a stump and 
began to preach. Soon he had a great crowd about him as he proclaimed his views, and soon afterward 
ceased his connection with the Baptists. [18] The Circular Letter for the next year, written by 
Lawrence Greatrake, is a scathing denunciation of the Campbells, in which they are called "a couple of 
Theological Adventurers.... who deceived the hearts of the simple and unsuspicious among you." [19]

The step which actually brought the break with the Baptists was taken, not by either of the Campbells, 
but by a new Reformation preacher, Rev. Walter Scott. Scott had been a teacher in Pittsburgh where he 
lectured weekly to a little church not in fellowship with the First Baptist Church of that city. Scott 
was not an ordained minister, but was an enthusiastic preacher of the Campbells' doctrines. In November, 
1827, he was preaching in the 

__________
18. O. J. Sturgis, Historical Sketch of Great Bethel Baptist Church, 1907.

19. The letter is printed with the Redstone Minutes, 1827.


{Davidson 1941, p. 153}

Mahoning Association and at the close of the service, in which he had taught that the early believers were baptized 
immediately into the name and into the death of Christ, receiving in this symbolic act the remission of sins and the 
Holy Ghost, he gave an invitation for any present to come forward and receive baptism. One man presented himself and 
was baptized immediateky. The congregation was captivated by the new doctrine and practice. Both Alexander and Thomas 
Campbell were somewhat dubious about the wisdom of the procedure but upon hearing Scott and witnessing his methods, 
Thomas Campbell saw that what he and his son had been teaching was now reduced to practice and that the simple primitive 
method of administering the gospel, to his way of thinking, was really restored. [20]

The Baptists discussed and completely rejected this new doctrine and practice regarding baptism, They maintained that, 

"To reduce faith to the mere assent of the intellect 
to the teachings of the gospel regarding Christ is 
to nullify the gospel; that to baptize people, even 
on their personal confession of faith, without any 
evidence whatever of regeneration, is to introduce 
unregenerate persons into the church, to protest 
against which is the one thing for which Baptists 
have existed from the first." [21]

The Redstone Association in 1827 withdrew fellowship from the followers of Alexander Campbell, and in 1829 the Beaver 
Association issued a circular denouncing the Mahoning Association and giving a list of the alleged heresies, the most 
important of which were,

"They contend that there is no promise of salvation 
without Baptism -- that baptism procures the remission 
of sins, and the gift of the Holy Spirit, that the 
Scriptures are the only evidence of interest in 
Christ, -- that obedience places it in God's power 
to elect to salvation, -- that no creed is necessary 
for the church but the Scriptures as they stand, 
and that all baptized persons have the right to 
administer that ordinance." [22]

__________
20. Richardson, op. cit., II, 209-220.

21. Vedder, op. cit., p. 170

22 Redstone Minutes published the Beaver Report in 1829, p. 3.



(Davidson 1941, p. 154}

In 1830 queries had come to the Redstone "from a distance" concerning the exclusion of the Campbells and the Brush Run 
Church. The Association deemed it wise to issue the following statement clarifying the cause of its drastic action:

"Resolved, that for the satisfaction of all concerned, 
we now further state, that their expulsion was on 
account of being erroneous in doctrine, maintaining, 
namely, the essential derivation and inferiority 
of the true and proper Deity of Christ and the 
Spirit; that faith in Christ is only a belief of 
historical facts, recorded in the scriptures, rejecting 
and deriding what is commonly called Christian 
experience; that there is no operation of the 
Spirit on the hearts of men, since the days of 
penticost...." [23]

The Dover Association of Virginia in 1832 advised its constituent churches "to separate from their communion all such 
persons as are promoting controversy and discord under the specious name of "Reformers." [24] They contended that the 
new doctrines were "Not according to godliness, but subversive of the true sporit of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; 
disorganizing and demoralizing in their tendencies, and therefore ought to be disavowed and resisted by all lovers of 
truth and sound piety." Twenty years after, Rev. Jeremiah B. Jeter, one of the group that presented this report to the 
Dover Association and who was instrumental in procuring its adoption, frankly admitted that it contained "some 
unguarded and unnecessarily harsh expressions," and that his representation of the doctrine of Campbell was unjust." [25]

At the Centennial celebration of the Baptist work in Pittsburgh in 1912, Dr. A. J. Bonsall stated that there was

__________
23. Ibid., 1830.

24. Vedder, op. cit., p. 21.

25. Ibid.



{Davidson 1941, p. 155}

"a legend in almost every Baptist family in western Pennsylvania: that 'if Alexander Campbell had been treated kindly 
he never would have separated from the Baptists.'" [26]

The New Reformation from this time on began to assume the characteristics of a denomination, and soon came to be 
known as "Disciples." Vedder sums up the matter significantly, stating that the Disciples' story adds "one more 
instructive instance to the large number existing, of men who have set out to secure union of all Christian sects 
and have ended by adding another to the number." [27]

__________
26. _Baptist Centenary of Pittsburgh, 1812-1912_, p. 102.

27. Vedder, op. cit., p. 194.



{Davidson 1941, p. 156}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 157}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 158}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 159}

(not transcribed)



{Davidson 1941, p. 160}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 161}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 162}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 163}

(not transcribed)




{Davidson 1941, p. 164}


Mormonism

Mormonism was never a controversy among Baptists of western Pennsylvania, some Baptist historians [14] to the contrary 
notwithstanding. The Mormon question is of importance to Baptist history because of a conflict which arose over the 
preaching and teaching of Sidney Rigdon, who for over a year was the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh.

Sidney Rigdon was born and reared in southern Allegheny county, Pennsylvania, near the present town of Library. Little 
is known of his early life and education, but as a young man he was ordained as a Baptist minister. As 
<a href="http://sidneyrigdon.com/RigdonPA.htm#1913-057b">described by</a> Dr. David Spencer:

"He was a sharp and shrewd manipulator for the 
advancement of selfish ambitions. He soon 
manifested a flagrant erroneousness of doctrine, 
preaching a baptismal regeneration, even more 
advanced than Alexander Campbell, and advocating 
a community of ownership in all things belonging 
to the members of the church, as well as other 
false dogmas." [15]

He became pastor of the First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh in 1822, and first appears in the Redstone Association 
minutes in that year. Rigdon was one of the preachers in the evening in the town and the country [16] and was also 
chosen messenger to the Mohicken Association. Because of his peculiar and erroneous doctrine, he was deposed from 
the Baptist ministry and excluded 

__________
14. David Spencer, "Baptist Controversies of the Century," a paper read before the Baptist Centenary in Pittsburgh, 
1912. Published in _Baptist Centenary 1812-1912_, Pittsburgh, 1913, p. 56.

15. Ibid., pp. 57-58.

16. Minutes of the Redstone Association, 1822, p, 4. 



{Davidson 1941, p. 165}

from the denomination in 1823. He continued to study, preach, and travel until he met Joseph Smith, the nominal founder 
of Mormonism. George T. Fleming, writing in _History of Pittsburgh and Environs_ [17] pieces together a strange but 
crediblr story of the under-handed work of Rigdon, which  proves presumably that "The Book of Mormon" was prepetrated 
by Rigdon in co-operation with Joseph Smith. Spencer says thar "There seems to be sufficient evidence extant to prove 
that Sidney Rigdon had as much to do in the preparation and palming off of what is now known as 'The Book of Mormon' as 
any other man." The story goes back to Rev. Samuel [sic - Solomon?] Spalding, a Congregational minister, who after 
graduation from Dartmouth College migrated to what is now Conneaut, Ohio, to regain his health. After having visited 
the Indian Miunds near his home, and speculating upon the meaning of them, Spalding wrote an imaginary story about 
their origins, calling it "The Lost Manuscropt." In 1812, he took the manuscript to Pittsburgh in an attempt to have it 
published. The printer, Rev. Robert Patterson, a Presbyterian minister, who had hired the young Sidney Rigdon in his 
job-printing shop, did not think the material worth printing, and the manuscript lay in the shop for several months. 
Other employees of Patterson stated later that they remembered well the contents of "The Lost Manuscript." The writing 
finally was lost, or disappeared, and the conjecture is that Sidney Rigdon read it, as did the other employees, became 
interested in the story and appropriated it.

__________
17. George T. Fleming, Editor, _History of Pittsburgh and Environs_, pp. 424-427.
RigdonAL.htm#1922-424b



{Davidson 1941, p. 166}

"Rigdon conceived the idea of founding a new 
religion based on pretended revelations. He 
accordingly set to work to revise this manuscript 
and to adapt it to his purpose as to warrant its 
acceptance as the 'Bible of the new faith.'" [18]

Rugdon, "requiring some one more bold in the art of deception and sin," [19] moved to Manchester, New York, where he 
met Joseph Smith, and the manuscript of Spalding, revised by Rigdon, evidently became the basis of the new 
"revelation." It is known that Rigdon and Smith were associated closely in the Mormon movement, and after the death 
of Joseph Smith in 1844, Rigdon was one of the chief claimants to the presidency. [20] 

Although the activity of Sidney Rigdon was detrimental to the Baptist cause at Pittsburgh, and especially to the 
First Baptist Church, it did not continue to be a problem after Rigdon's exclusion.

__________
18. David Spencer, op. cit., p. 58.

19. Ibid., p. 58.

20. Reed Smoot, "Mormons and Latter Day Saints," _Encyclopedia Brittanica_ Vol. 15, p. 809.



{Davidson 1941, p. 167-177}
(not transcribed)



{Davidson 1941, p. 178}

Bibliography

I. Original Sources


A. Manuscript Material

1. "Source Materials for Baptist History in Western Pennsylvania." 

A collection of iriginal documents made as a part of this study of "Baptist Beginnings in Western Pennsylvania." Each 
manuscript has been transcribed carefully and thoroughly collated. Two copies are available, one in the Pennsylvania 
Room, Carnegie Library, Pittsburgh, and the other in the Library of the University of Pittsburgh. The collection 
contains the following materials:

(a) Minutes of Churches.

(1) Goshen Baptist Church, also called Whitely Creek Baptist Church.

Book I. Minutes of the proceedings of the church in regular business sessions dating from December 11, 1773 
to November 4, 1789. The first pages contain notes regarding the Muddy Creek Church, which was, at the 
beginning, the original body, later a branch of Goshen, and finally became extinct. The original is bound 
in hair-covered cowhide.

Book II. Dating from January 4, 1802 to the Civil War. Both of these original manuscripts are kept in a 
lock box in the First National Bank of Waynesburg, Pennsylvania.


(2) Great Bethel Baptist Church.

Book I. Minutes of the proceedings of the regular business sessions of the church from its origin, November 7, 1770 
to February 4, 1837. From April, 1836 the book is a record of one division of the church.

Book II. The record of the other division of the church, which was excluded by the main body, dating from April 30, 
1836 to June 24, 1853. The original Manuscripts are kept in the church office at Uniontown, Pennsylvania.


(3) Mount Moriah Baptist Church, also called George's Creek Baptist Church.

Minutes of the proceedings of the regular business sessions of the church from its origin, October 30, 1784 to 
December 11, 1811. The original manuscript is kept in a lock box in the Smithfield Bank.


{Davidson 1941, p. 179}

(4) Salem Baptist Church, also called Forks of the Youghiogheny Baptist Church.

Minutes of the proceedings of the regular business sessions of the church from its origin, December 17, 1803, to 
May 28, 1855. The original manuscript, during this study, has been placed in the Pennsylvania Room, Carnegie Library, 
Pittsburgh.


(5) Simpson's Creek Baptist Church.

Minutes of the proceedings of the regular business sessions of the church from 1780 to November 30, 1839. The original 
manuscript is kept in the home of a member in Bridgeport, West Virginoa. A longhand transcript, imperfectly made, was 
done in the eighteen hundred seventies, and is available in the same place.


(6) Tenmile Baptist Church, also called North Ten-mile Baptist Church.

Minutes of the proceedings of the regular business sessions of the church from its origin, December 1, 1773, to 
January 4, 1840. The original manuscript is in the possession of Mr. Elijah D. Day, Amity, Pennsylvania.


(b) A Deed, a Will, a Diary, and Letters.

(1) Deed of the Meadow Run Baptist Church.

The original deed of the lot on which the meeting-house was built. Present members of the church state that the 
original minutes were destroyed by fire. The deed is in the possession of Mr. E. M. Brewer, Davistown, Pennsylvania.


(2) The Will of John Corbly.

The Will is available in the County Courthouse, Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, Will Book #1, page 38.


(3) The Diary of David Jones.

A Diary of The Several Campaigns in The Indian Wars. Jones was chaplain to General Wayne from 1794 to 1798. The 
original manuscript is available in the American Baptist Historical Society Library, Bucknell Library, Crozer 
Theological Seminary, Chester, Pennsylvania.


2. Letters written to David Jones, several of importance, viz.: John Marshall to David Jones (three letters) 
August 2, 1800, June 12, 1800, and April 14, 1797; Anthony Wayne to David Jones, October 5, 1796, October 10, 1796, 
and October 14, 1796. These letters are available in the American Baptist Historical Society Collection, Chester, 
Pennsylvania.



{Davidson 1941, p. 180}

3. Minutes of the Mount Herman Baptist Church.

Minutes of the proceedings of the regular business sessions of the church. The original manuscript is available in 
the Pennsylvania Room, Carnegoe Library, Pittsburgh.


B. Published Materials and Diaries.

1. Minutes of Associations.

(a) Redstone Baptist Association.

Book I. Minutes of the proceedings of the annual meetings from its organization, October 7, 1776, to 1804. A typed 
transcript is available in the Pennsylvania Room, Carnegie Library, Pittsburgh.

Book II. Minutes from 1805 to 1836. Minutes were printed each year for distribution. This is the only collection of 
the yearly publications known to exist. Book II is also available at Carnegie Library.

(b) Philadelphia Baptist Association.

Minutes of the proceedings of the annual meetings from 1707 to 1809, edited by A. D. Gillette, Philadelphia, 1881.

2. Monographs and Diaries....


{Davidson 1941, p. 181}

...

7. Sturgis, O. J. _Early Baptist Churches of Southwestern Pennsylvania_. An address before the Washington Historical 
Society, January 14, 1907. Peoples Tribune Print, 1907.

...

1. Sturgis, O. J. _History of Great Bethel Baptist Church_, in the record of the one hundred and twenty-fifth anniversary 
of the church, 1895.

2. _Sandusky Street Baptist Church_, Pittsburgh. A historical sketch of the church, 1835-1910.



{Davidson 1941, p. 182}


{Davidson 1941, p. 183}





===================================


The Making of the Primitive Baptists
A Cultural and Intellectual History of the Antimission Movement, 
1800-1840

by James R. Mathis

Published in 2004 by
Routledge
29 West 35th Street
New York, NY 10001

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor and Francis Group.

Copyright (c) 2004 by Routledge

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be printed or utilized in any form or 
by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including Photocopying and recrding, or in any information storage or retrieval
system, without Permission in writing from the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Mathis, James R.
The Making of the Primitive Baptists: A Cultural and Intellectual History of the 
An-timission Movement, 1800-1840.
ISBN: 0-415-94871-1 (hardback)


Contents


vii Acknowledgments   

1 Chapter One
Introduction: The Primitive Baptists and American
Christianity, 1800-1840

13 Chapter Two
The Historical Background of the Primitive Baptists

35 Chapter Three
The Coming of the Missionaries

49 Chapter Four
"The Empire of Jesus Is Rising": The Missionary Spirit of American Baptists

65 Chapter Five
The Beginnings of Antimissionisim

83 Chapter Six
From Opposition to Sect: Joshua Lawrence and the Kehukee Association 

103 Chapter Seven
Creating the Remnant Church: The Spread of the Primitive Baptists

127 Chapter Eight
The Spiritual Narratives of the Primitive Baptists 

149 Chapter Nine
Conclusion 

153 Notes

169 Bibliography

175 Index


Mathis 2004
[p. 1]

Chapter One
Introduction: The Primitive
Baptists and American
Christianity, 1800-1840

It is well established in the historiography of antebellum America that evangelicalism was one of the major -- 
if not the major -- forces shaping American society in the decades leading up to the Civil War. Studies too 
numerous to mention here have shown the impact of evangelical Christianity on men, women, slaves, workers, 
politics, and the economy. Historians have carefully described the often-subtle intersection between 
individual belief and behavior, and the even more tangled relationship between theology and institutions.

While invaluable, these studies have tended to distort the picture of religion in antebellum America, 
particularly in the South. Most works focus on Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians. This leaves out the 
numerous smaller denominations and sects that inhabited the margins of antebellum religious life but, 
nevertheless, lived within the same geographical and social space as the more visible groups. Likewise, 
historians have used the terms "evangelical" and "evangelicalism" as terms to encompass a wide variety of 
groups without differentiation. There was not a monolithic "evangelical" or "evangelicalism" in the 
nineteenth century any more than there is today. The fact that "evangelicals" fragmented along sectional 
lines, and often came into conflict over a variety of economic, political, and even theological issues, 
means that historians are in fact studying a very complex matrix of beliefs, theologies, and practices.  
Also, many historians treat religion and religious belief as mere epiphenomena; they seek explanations for 
activity and belief in social and economic forces. They ignore the simple, obvious answer: that individuals 
joined churches and participated in religious life because they believed in what those churches taught. 
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changed or split because of theological conflicts; other issues they understood through the prism of theology.

Historians' lack of attention to smaller denominations and sects, lack of sensitivity to the factions among 
different "evangelical" religious groups, and the treatment of belief as epiphenomena and theology as secondary 
hasaffected the study of one group in particular. That group is the subject of the current study. The Primitive 
Baptists have suffered from neglect because of their existence outside of the mainstream of evangelicalism. The 
small sect numbered less that 70,000 adherents in the South and West, primarily in the upland or wiregrass regions 
away from the Plantation belt and the few cities scattered through the regions. Their strict traditional Calvinism 
put them at odds with the moderate Calvinism or outright Armenianism of the times. Their rejection of missionary 
societies, benevolent organizations, bible and tract societies -- in other words, the entire institutional structure 
of nineteenth century evangeticalism -- place them outside the main narrative of most histories. Those studies 
that have looked at this group have either dismissed them because of their theology or looked for other sources 
for their grievances and eventual separation from the missionary BapLists. This book seeks to correct this 
imbalance.

This book offers a new interpretation of the antimission movement and the rise of the Primitive Baptists. Rather 
than focusing on sectional, political, economic or social grounds to explain the division, this study focuses on 
cultural and intellectual factors. The antimission movement and the rise of the Primitive Baptists were a 
theologically based cultural response to the religious, doctrinal. and structural changes sweeping through American 
denominations, including the Baptists, during these decades. This response was a conservative defense of traditional 
religious practices grounded in a primitivist interpretation of scripture. The Primitive Baptists believed they 
were defending themselves against a rising tide of innovation that threatened to sweep away their traditional 
religious ways. These innovations were replacing the true church of God with a false religion based on money. In 
separating from the missionary Baptists and opposing the entire range of modern religious institutions, the 
Primitive Baptists saw themselves as a remnant preserving the true church of God as found in the New Testament. 
Within their separated churches, this "remnant" sought to maintain purity, order, and continuity. [1]

The standard interpretation of the Primitive movement in the early nineteenth century has two major elements. 
Historians have traditionally classified the entire antimission movement as an expression of Jeffersonian and 
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elites. The rapid process of institutionalization of American Christianity, the argument goes, bred hostility 
towards Northern and Eastern ministers and elite lay leaders in the various denominations. Older ministers in the 
West and South saw a threat to their livelihoods from younger, more educated ministers coming into their communities 
at the behest of societies and boards based in New York City to "Christianize the heathen." Lay people resented the 
constant appeals from the boards for money. In reaction, anti-mission Baptists led hundreds of local churches out 
of the major Baptist denomination in the late 1820s and 1830s. More recently, historians have examined the Primitive 
Baptists and the larger antirnission movement within the context of a broader primitivist or restorationist 
dimension in American religious life. While both approaches help us understand the rise of the Primitive Baptists, 
they give slight attention to the specific historical and doctrinal background of the movement. [2]

Few works on the antimission movement take theological or doctrinal factors seriously. Most historians of the 
movement see these as secondary to social or economic causes and are in fact dismissive of the cultural and 
intellectual foundations of the Primitive Baptists. William Warren Sweet asserts that "opposition to missions and 
education developed first on the (social and economic] grounds mentioned... and then a doctrine was evolved to 
uphold that position," and that "the unevangelical type of Calvinism which it fostered led to bigotry and 
intolerance." In addition, he ascribes opposition to missions primarily to a fear or centralized authonty. [3] 
T. Scott Miyakawa states that the theological arguments of Primitive Raptists against missions "were essentially 
symptoms or... rationalizations after the fact." "The extreme predcstinarians," he says, "as the poorer and 
less-educated elements, were more likely to need compensating rationalizations for their unfavorable status." "For 
the antimissionists," Miyakawa concludes, "predestinarianism as a compensating belief perhaps belonged to the same 
category as modern racism, which often gives the less-favored classes of one race a feeling of superiority over 
another race... and an extreme isolationism which creates in other less-favored people similar illusions of 
superiority over 'foreigners." [4] Walter B. Posey, the pioneering historian of religion on the southern frontier, 
blames antimission sentiment on "ignorance and prejudice." The antimission movement was based on a Jacksonian "fear 
of centralized authority and the notion that missions were money getting schemes." Much of this opposition, he 
claims, was motivated by the jealousy on the part of the illiterate, unpaid frontier preachers directed at the well 
educated, paid, younger missionaries who were sent to the West and the South." Even a more recent historian of 
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Johnson, relies primarily on economic and class issues, with doctrinal issues being secondary. [6] While clearly 
there were economic and social issues involved, it was how the antimissionists understood the issues that are 
primary. Without looking at their cultural and intellectual foundations and taking them seriously, these 
descriptions of the Primitive Baptista are condescending and dismissive.

To date the most sophisticated attempt to understand the cultural and intellectual foundation of the antimission 
movement has been an article by Bertram Wyatt-Brown published in 1970. Substantially reworked for inclusion in his 
recent book, The Shaping of Southern Culture, Wyatt-Brown links the Primitive Baptists back to their theological 
roots in emphasizing their strict Calvinism. "Theological objections to the mission scheme," he states, "served as 
more than merely convenient screens to hide social and economic misgivings." He also links the Primitive Baptists 
to their place in the culture of honor in the antebellum South. While in many respects critical of the South's 
dominant honor code and its emphasis on hierarchy and authority, Wyatt-Brown states that the Primitive Baptists 
could not "escape the encumbrances that a sense of honor and shame engendered." While the Primitive Baptists used 
the terms differently, the Primitive Baptists were concerned with defending the ancient values of family, community, 
patriarchy, faith, and tradition that honor encompassed. The Primitive Baptists, for all that they opposed aspects 
of honor and hierarchy, nonetheless understood that the innovation in religious belief and practices threatened the 
traditional values of Southern culture. "The antimissionists," Wyatt-Brown says, "represented the persistent 
Southern struggle to preserve old values in an alien, changing, and often self-righteous world." The Primitive 
Baptists, Wyatt-Brown concludes, were "continuing the sort of resistance against 'atistoracy,' clerical and planter 
"that earlier Baptists had conducted before and during the American Revolution. They remained true to a 
strict Calvinistic theology that left little room for concepts of honor and hierarchy. However, their emphasis on 
patriarchy, family, and community over gender equality, emotionalism, and extra-local authority placed them within 
Southern culture. [7]

Wyatt-Brown's interpretation at points parallels the emphasis of the current study. Unlike Sweet and Miyakawa, 
Wyatt-Brown does not dismiss cultural and intellectual factors. Nor does he ignore the social, political, and 
economic forces of the time. He does, however, place too great an emphasis on hyperclvinism as the theological 
foundation for their opposition to missions. Calvinism, while forming their basic theology, was not as great a 
contributor to the opposition to missions as other historians have claimed.


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Chapter Three
The Coming of the Missionaries

The years from 1780 to 1840 were remarkable years in the history of the United States. Independence, a new 
constitution, a peaceful revolution and change of government, a second war with England, the rise of the party 
system, the geographic and economic expansion of the fledgling republic, and the beginnings of sectional animosity 
over slavery all occurred during this sixty-year period. As rapid as the changes in the political, economic, and 
social life of the republic were the changes in the religious life. These changes, consequences of the heady 
atmosphere of freedom spawned by the Revolution, deeply affected the existing religious institutions and worldviews 
of American Christians. Traditional structures were overthrown, long held orthodoxies were challenged, and 
traditional practices and norms had to compete with new ones. A new religious free market replaced the restricted, 
state-controlled market of the past. Individuals could choose to go to one church, several, or none; they could 
choose more traditional religious beliefs or adopt one of the new religions that were marketed to eager audiences. 
Churches had to compete with one another for members. Those of a more populist bent prospered. Churches too closely 
associated with old hierarchies faltered. To some, in and out of churches, it was a liberating, even invigorating 
time of Heaven-sent blessings. For others, particularly in New England and the Northeast (and in pockets of the 
South), it was a dark time of spiritual chaos, where infidelity and indifference threatened the very soul of the 
new republic.

Leading churchmen, both North and South, of various denominations and shades of orthodoxy shared this evaluation of 
the shape of things. While there were differences in perspective and motivation, leaders of the major evangelical 
churches in the country -- Congregational, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Baptist -- each arrived at a similar 
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and millennialism, lay and religious leaders of the churches sought to bring order to the American religious 
marketplace by attracting large numbers of unchurched and underchurched Americans.

While the solutions were similar, there were sharp differences between denominations and sections. This is important 
to keep in mind, particularly as we look at the rise of antimission sentiment among Baptists, particularly in the 
South. We should see missions, revivals, and millennialism not as monolithic structures but as streams of thought. 
Each denomination in each section shaped their activities and beliefs within their specific cultural context. This 
context shaped and supported the types of activities undertaken, how they were organized, how they were carried out, 
and how they were defended. Thus, how churches responded to change depended on their denominational heritage and 
sectional culture. The way denominations in the North organized new institutions and encouraged revivals differed 
from the ways of denominations in the South.

The antimission Baptists responded to separate but parallel streams of evangelical innovation. One stream was the 
rise of missions and new institutions within the  denomination; this they saw as the abandonment of primitivism and 
was the immediate cause of antimission concern. The other strain was the larger transformation of evangelicalism 
emanating from New England in the form of interdenominational voluntary societies, modifications to orthodox 
Calvinism, and benevolent reform movements. Primitive Baptists saw thew as undermining true religion as well as 
being a direct threat to religious liberty. The missionists and reformers believed they were bringing God's order 
into Satan's darkness and chaos; the Primitive Baptists believed they were undermining God's order and replacing it 
with man-made institutions and philosophies.

The forces of disestablishrnent, the rise of democratic individualism, and the commercial revolution hit New England 
particularly hard. As one historian of the rise of the reform ideology in New England succinctly put it, "in the 
first years of the nineteenth century, many New Englanders had the sense that a spiritual free-for-all had replaced 
cosmic order." [1] While New England clergy endorsed religious freedom in principle, many believed it created a 
spiritual void in their region and in the country as a whole. Factors other than religion fed this sense. The 
expansion of the nation economically and geographically was for New Englanders a source of disorder and vice. This 
anxiety over the spiritual and moral state of the nation led to particularly sharp responses. New England's strong 
adherence to the Federalists, their staunch opposition to the "infidel" (and Southern) Jefferson, their opposition 
to the War of 1812 and the Hartford Convention were fed as much by


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Chapter Four
"The Empire of Jesus Is Rising":
The Missionary Spirit
of American Baptists


For American Baptists, missions symwized several things. Inspired by the example of British Baptist William Carey, 
considered the father of the modern mission movement, American Baptists formed missionary societies to better 
fulfill Christ's command to spread the Gospel to the entire world. But there was more. In a real sense, the adoption 
by Baptists of the mission society was part of a larger movement away from marginalind sect to respected 
denominations. The antimissionists would later accuse Baptists of adopting the "worldly" ways of other churches in 
order to gain popularity among men. In a sense, they were correct.  During this period, Baptists, particularly in 
the South, adjusted themselves in relation to the surrounding culture. No longer content with being outsiders, 
leaders wanted to be as central to their society as their brethren in the more elite churches of the North. In 
shifting from confronting society from the outside to desiring to have a prophetic voice within, however, 
pro-mission Baptists were forced to abandon their traditional commitments to upholding the primitive church.

Along with their evangelical Congregationalists and Presbytenan brethren, American Baptists saw the changing state 
of religion and society in the early republic with a mixture of joy and trepidation. Particularly in the South, 
however, the underlying views of the situation differed. Seeing events as the Great Revival and the overthrow of 
the colonial establishment as presaging the triumph of the Kingdom of God rather than indications that it was under 
assault, Baptists nevertheless viewed the scene and saw much that was wanting. Motivated in part by a genuine 
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by their desire for respectability in society, Baptist leaders in the 1810s and 1820s transformed their 
loosely-organized sect into an institutionalized (if not centralized) denomination. They accomplished this 
primarily through the creation of Baptist societies that mirrored the mission of the interdenominational societies 
of New England and through limited cooperation with those societies. Such efforts, while spurned by Northern 
Baptists, for the most part, were supported by Southern Baptists from the beginning. The transformation of American 
Baptists, particularly in the South, precipitated a reaction among ministers and laity that saw in the institutions 
a rejection of traditional Baptist principles and beliefs.

The antimissionists were only partially correct in their claims that the missionary Baptists had rejected their 
old traditions. In the years since the unification of Reformed and Separate Baptism, the groups had combined and, 
in effect, cross-pollinated. By the beginnings of the 1800s, and certainly by the 1820s, there were two distinct 
groups within Baptist associations. These groups cannot be identified with the earlier Regulars and Separates, as 
some would argue. Instead, the two groups combined beliefs and practices derived from both. The pro-mission Baptists 
combined the evangelistic bent and dmirinal latitudinartanism of the Separates with the Regular's emphasis on 
organization and an educated clergy. The antimission Baptists combined the Separates' emphasis on a pure church 
and a spirit-led ministry with the Regular's strict Calvinism and adherence to creeds. Tracing the exact course of 
this process is almost impossible. What is clear, however, is by 1814, when the General Missionary Convention met 
in Philadelphia, there were identifiable groups among American Baptists -- particularly in the South -- with very 
different ideas concerning the nature of the church and the means of salvation.

The Baptists who formed the Board of Foreign Missions and many other denominational boards and societies in the 
1810s combined a concern for the religious state of the nation, Separate and Regular elements, a desire for 
respectability, and a forward looking millennial outlook that had been simmering in local and regional Baptist 
missionary societies since the late 1790s. In this, they were not that different from their Congregationalist and 
Presbvterian counterparts. Unlike New England churches, however, Baptists in the South did not phrase their 
millennialism in terms of a national covenant, in which America was a "spiritual Israel." Instead, their 
millennialism spoke less in terms of covenant and more in terms of destiny. America, because of the special blessings 
granted it by God, was destined to serve as a primary means of evangelizing the heathen areas of their own continent 
and the world. By converting the lost, they would usher in the millennium


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the means of communicating the same?" To the voices who questioned whether or not these were indeed the times 
prophesied in Scriptures, they pointed to the accounts in different denominational periodicals "of the wonderful 
things that the Lord has done through the instrumentality of their missionaries," all of which testified to the 
idea that "all things are ready but our willingness." [59]

The circular letter of the Baptist State Convention of Alabama in 1824 expressed similar views.

This is the 'era of good feelings,'when men, formed for Society, are willing 
to associate for the purpose of doing good. It is the age of light, and zeal, 
and charity. It opens as the morning -- is it not the dawning of the Millennium? 
The Sun of Righteousness is rising, at once in both hemispheres... and many, 
awakening from the long sleep of Pagan darkness, are running Lo and fro to 
disseminate knowledge -- saving knowledge. Many, who had buried their Lord's 
money, amidst earthly cares and the rubbish of a stinking world, are now 
cultivating their talents.  Missionaries are sent to the uttermost parts of 
the earth with 'the glad tidings of the kingdom of God.' The isles are waiting 
for his law -- Ethiopia stretching out her hands -- nations risingto meet Him -- 
kings bowing to his scepter, and queens are nursing mothers. Let every virgin 
in Christendom arise, and 'trim her lamp,' for the coming of the bridegroom, 
and 'wisdom shall be justified of all her children.' [60]

In the wake of the Triennial Convention, thanks in part to Rice's continuing advocacy of missions throughout 
the South, many associations either gave their support to missions or local Baptists formed societies. Between 1814 
and 1816, the missionary spirit spread rapidly in Georgia. The session of the Georgia Assiociation in 1814 read 
and approved the circular and Constitution of the Savannah Baptist Society for Foreign Missions. In 1815 Rice gave 
a report from the Board of Foreign Missions to the Georgia Association, requesting the association's assiscance. 
The association agreed to cooperate and set up the Mis5ion Board of the Georgia Association in 1816. In July 1815, 
the Ocmulgee Association organized the Ocmulgee Missionary Society. In February 1816, the Hephzibah Baptist Society 
for Itinerant and Missionary Exertions was formed in the Hephzibab Association. In June 1816, Baptists in the 
Sarepta Association formed a missionary society. [61] In 1818, the Georgia and the Ocmulgee Associations established 
an Indian mission about 30 miles 5outh of present day Montgomery, Alabama. [62] This organization building by local 
associations stimulated interest in renewing efforts at a statewide organization of Georgia Baptists. In 1822, 
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"General Baptist Association of the State of Georgia," later the Georgia Baptist Convention. The purposes of the 
association were to unite the efforts of Baptists on various projects; support for the missionary movement; and 
improvement and education of the ministry. In what would foreshadow later events, however, of the eight associations 
in the state, only three were favorable to the General Association. [63]

A similar process of organization and advocacy for missions occurred among Mississippi Baptists. We have noted the 
circular Address in 1817 from the Mississippi Society for Baptist Missions advocating support for missions. Earlier, 
howevera 1814 mecting of the Mississippi Association received a letter from the Baptist Board for Foreign Missions 
soliciting the support of the Association. In response, the Association issued a circular letter to its member 
churches that encouraged them to "contribute as liberally as they may find it convenient" to the next associational 
meeting. It also encouraged ministers to preach on the subject of missions and encourage contributions. Ministers 
were to keep an account of the names and the amounts contributed in their churches for presentation to the next 
meeting. This effort apparently raised $20.00 for the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions. [64] Support continued over 
the years; in 1816 the association forwarded contributions to the Board. [65] Activities were not limited to 
financial support of the Board. The Association also took an early interest in improving the education of ministers 
by drawing up and approving a plan to fund such an effort. This plan led to the formation in 1818 of the Mississippi 
Baptist Education Society. [66] Also in 1817, the Association appointed two ministers to visit the Creek Indians to 
investigate establishing a mission and school. [67]

The general enthusiasm for missions, however, would not continue unabated. The creation of a national denomination, 
complete with boards, an official newspaper, a theological school, and the means of raising money represented an 
abandonment of traditional, biblical practice in the minds of a growing minority of Baptists. Before, this minority 
believed, Baptists had taken great care to model their institutions on the exact forms they believed they found in 
Scripture. Now, Baptist leaders looked to other denominations and even "the world" for their examples, thus 
abandoning their historic traditions. Before, all power and authority was seen as arising from the local church. 
Now came a centralized structure. While each church retained its autonomy, critics feared that these new 
institutions would eventually struggle with the local church for the allegiance of individual Baptists.

In addition, this modern institutional situation required new ways of thinking about the relationship between man 
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threatened the ways of knowing God of thousands of their coreligionists. The man-made joined the sacred as equal 
routes to encounter God. Divisions between the spiritual and the material eroded, but did not collapse entirely. 
The missionary society, the theological school, the newspaper, the Sunday school, the bible society -- God worked 
through these man-made institutions as well as those explicitly ordained in Scriptures to bring about His kingdom. 
The kingdom itself encompawd Christians in all denominations, and bringing it about required close cooperation in 
both non-church and church settings -- including the Lord's Supper. The perspective of the missionary Baptists 
seemed to threaten the Baptist primitivists' ways of knowing and understanding God. A challenge to this perceived 
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Chapter Five
The Beginnings of Antimissionism


By 1820, Baptists on the Southern and Western frontiers encountered two streams of missionary and society activity. 
One stream, emanating primarily from New England, sought to reconstruct the United States in the image of that 
region through the use of voluntary societies. Another stream, emanating from the Baptists themselves, sought to 
construct a denominational structure uniting Baptists for the purpose of spreading the gospel and the development 
of an educated clergy. Both streams emanated from similar sources; at their base was the desire of religious leaders 
to reassert their authorityin the new republic and direct the religious development of the country. Doing so meant 
not only the creation of institutions but the transformation of doctrines and beliefs. For the New England 
reformers it meant adjusting their theology to an audience grown increasingly uncomfortable with traditional 
orthodox Calvinism. For Baptists, even more than adopting a looser form of Calvinism, it meant abandoning their 
primitivist assumptions and adopting a forward-looking time orientation, one that emphasized progress at the 
expense of tradition.

As the mission and society movement engulfed American Evangelicals, a variety of opponents arose to confront the 
missionaries, the revivalists, and the reformers. These opponents vigorously fought the new institutions and 
methods, while approaching them from different perspectives. Freethinkers and Deists in New England opposed the 
missions as attempts to reestablish a state church under the control of the Calvinists of New England. In the West, 
Alexander Campbell and his Christian Church opposed the societies and questioned the new methods of revivalism, 
while rejecting Calvinism. [1] Conservative confessionalists such John Williamson Nevin at the German Reformed 
Church's theological seminary at Mercersburg in his tract The Anxious Bench attacked the new methods of revivalism 
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societies, played a role in the conflicts between Old School and New School Presbyterians culminating in their 
schism in 1837. [3] In each of these instances, opposition to missions and other new measures had little impact 
and resulted in the formation of no new denominations.

Among no other group were the questions concerning missions, new methods, and societies more bitterly argued -- 
and more destructive -- than among Baptists in the South and West. From about 1820 onward, according to Sweet, 
"there was hardly a Baptist church in the West, nor an association, that did  not experience internal troubles over 
the question of missions." [4]

These troubles did not arise because of a handful of agitators, one or two vocal opponents here and there. The 
antimission sentiment among American Baptists grew out of a widespread belief that the missionary Baptists had 
abandoned their traditions for 'the aristocracy of mission boards." [5]

The feroity and depth of the opposition was particular to the Baptists and arose from elements that were 
distinctively Baptist. These elements were primitivism, a strong belief in the authority of the local church, and 
the spiritual equality of all members. Against this background the Primitive Baptists defended traditional 
understandings of the sovereignty of God and how he worked. The key element of the Primitive Baptist's objection 
to missions and to other new measures was their argument that the new organizations, institutions and practices, 
because of their emphasis on human instrumentality, violated the expressed dictates of Scripture. God had laid out 
precisely how he wanted his work done. The advocates of the new measures, the Primitive Baptists argued, were 
guilty of displacing God's ways with man-made institutions founded primarily on money. In the process of diluting 
His sovereignty in salvation they usurped God's sovereignty in every other area. The leaders of the antimissionists 
were motivated by a desire to preserve what they saw as the purity of the primitive order as they found it through 
their reading of Scripture. This order was under attack, they believed, because the missionary Baptists sought to 
replace what the antimissionists believed was the God-ordained institution of the church with what they saw as 
man-made ones. In usurping the divine order of things, the missionary Baptists had precipitated the split, forcing 
the Primitive Baptists (they claimed) to separate from them in order to preserve the purity of the gospel tradition.

The antimissionist's argument against missions had several components. They expressed disapproval of the missionary 
society's methods of soliciting funds, arguing that the societies were guilty of 'Priestcraft' and the creation of 
a 'moneyed ministry.'  Because of their emphasis on money, the missionary societies and their advocates disrupted 
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proved that they were not the 'true church' but were associated with 'false churches' identified as having their 
origins from the Catholic Church, which they identified as the 'Mother of Harlots.' In the minds of many was a fear 
that the organization of mission societies, theological schools, and the benevolent, bible, tract, and Sunday 
school societies were the first steps to the re-establishment of a State Church. They also expressed a distrust of 
the missionaries' motives and their origin; for just as clerics in New England and other areas of the North viewed 
the South and West as harboring the infidelity and indifference to religion that threatened their social order and 
the divine mission of the new republic, these southern and western antimissionists saw New England as harboring 
threats to religious liberty. The Primitive Baptists added the argument that thenew methods were wrong because they 
had been created by man using "human wisdom" instead of biblical precedent. The new evangelical's language of human 
ability, progress, science and utility was foreign to Primitive Baptists accustomed to a language of human 
depravity, divine sovereignty, and adherence to primitive Scriptural models. The new evangelicalism, symbolized for 
the Primitive Baptists  by missionary societies, theological schools, and a host of other institutions, threatened 
these categories and forced the Primitive Baptists to defend the old order against the perceived assaults of 
the new methods.

The Primitive Baptists rooted their argument against missions in the  primitivist approach to scripture. Underlying 
their croticism was their concern for purity and simplicity. In Christian primitivism, the categories of purity and 
simplicity were related to the strict separation between the sacred and profane in worship. It is particularly 
evident in the plain style and unadorned quality that marked reformed piety from the 16th century onward. The 
primitivist element in Christianitt was always concerned with the maintenance of purity and held that simplicity 
through strict disciplone and  self-denial on both an individual and corporate level in all aspects of the 
Christian polity was the best way to preserve that purity. Among New England Puritans, the theme of purity and 
simplicity was reflected in the plain style of preaching, the simplicity and unadorned quality of Puritan meeting 
houses, and the "suspicion of adornment and artificial complexity" which  "forms a kind of center about which much 
Puritan teaching and practice in the areas of diet, dress, speech, worship, preaching, and the like might be 
organized suggestively." [6] The primitivist dimension in Puritan thought, which fed into Baptist primitivism that 
provided the foundation for Primitive Baptist polermical and irenical writings, was conductive to a view of 
social order that had little place for modern market economics. While behavior may have been to the contrary, 
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money were seen as violating scriptural norms of purity and simplicity, explicitly breaking commands by Christ not 
to be concerned with worldly pursuits and attainments. [7] 

Such concerns with purity and simplicity came to the antimission Baptists out of Separate Baptist tradition. They 
maintained a strict separation between themselves and the surrounding society, adopting simple dress and forswearing 
the popular amusements of the dominant culture. This brought them into direct conflict with local gentry, 
particularly in the Southern colonies through their criticism of the gentry and their Anglican defenders. Baptists 
continued their cultural and social criticisms through the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, only to 
give it up as Baptists became more accepted and the influence of evangelical Christianity grew in the South and 
West. [8] It was from the Separate tradition of social and cultural criticism that Primitive Baptists derived their 
anti-commercial, anti-monetary language. Unlike their ancestors in the faith, however, the Primitive Baptists did 
not criticize the behavior and attitudes of society in general. Instead, they focused on what they saw as the greed 
and avarice of the missionary preachers, the grasping nature of the mission societies, and those societies' practice 
of allowing all who could pay [to] become members without regard to their spiritual condition.


Along with criticisms of their methods the Primitive Baptists questioned the motives and character of the 
missionary preachers themselves. According to the antimissionists, the major problem with mission societies was 
not their goal, the spreading of the gospel to the nations, but the character of the individuals who were 
commissioned by the societies. These ministers did not resemble the examples of a called gospel minister they found 
in Scripture. Frequent comparisons were made between modern ministers and the Apostles with the former found 
wanting. Instead, the Primitive Baptists saw the missionaries as modern examples of Baalam and Judas from Scripture 
of priests of the "Mother of Harlots," the Church of Rome.

These criticisms did not arise in a vacuum. Nor did they draw arguments from Scripture in the abstract. In order to 
understand the Primitive Baptists' argument against missions, we have to understand the experiences of the men who 
were writing. Most of the leaders of the Primitive Baptists were ministers of an older generation, many of whom had 
endeavored for decades to spread the gospel to places where families had no churches, where infidelity and sin 
existed without the light of the Truth to illuminate the dark hearts of men, relying on no other means of financial 
support save that of the work of their own hands and the gracious provision of God. Their lives reflected a 
different experience, indeed a different attitude, than that seen in the missionary


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preachers. This older generation of ministers viewed missions through the lens of these experiences and at the same 
time filtered their concerns and arguments against missions through the same experiences.

Biographies of frontier Baptist ministers are filled with descriptions of the hard conditions they labored under. 
Wilson Thompson's autobiographical account of his life and ministry reflects both the nature of the call ministers 
like him experienced and the cost involved in preaching the gospel. Thompson, by his recollection, came under the 
conviction that "God had a work for me to do" in the Missouri Territory. "I knew very little of the country, the 
manners of the people, or the state of religion there; but from some cause, unknown to me, my mind had become so 
led out for the people there, that I could see them, in my imagination, gathering into crowds to meeting, while a 
wonderful reformation was going on among them. To that place I thought God had directed my steps, and thither I 
felt I must go." When his father announced plans to move to the Territory and asked his son and daughter-in-law to 
go with him, Thompson saw it as a clear indication of God's call. "From that time I believed that God had opened 
the way in his providence for me to go," he wrote later, "and that I should see the work manifested in Missouri." [9] 

Ater an arduous and treacherous journey, Thompson and his family arrived in the Missouri Territory in January of 
1811. "I now was the possessor," he recalled of his family's economic condition, "of one two-year old colt, 
one-quarter of a dollar in cash, one bed and bedding, some broken chairs, one small table, some clothing that was 
badly mildewed, and not a thing to live on even for one day." This lack of money, combined with the high prices 
demanded on the frontier -- "Corn was fifty cents per bushel, wheat one dollar, and pork ten dollars per hundred, 
and these were very scarce" -- forced Thompson to rely on hunting to provide food for his family. "In a short time" 
he had "procured plenty of venison, turkeys and ducks" and had borrowed a bushel of corn. From that time on, 
Thompson and his family led a hardscrabble existence, surviving at a bare subsistence level. "I worked for bread," 
he recalled of those times, "and made sugar and molasses in plenty, and in a short time rented a small farm. The 
house was filled with flax, and I dressed one half of it for the other half. This gave my wife some business, for 
she was a spinstress. I repaired my cabin and we moved into it." [10]

Thompson's economic state remained desperate even after having been in Missouri for some time, preaching regularly 
in churches. Yet Thompson pointedly wrote, just before he talks about continuing financial problems, of a speaker 
who stated "Every preacher... should love his Lord well enough


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to obey Him, feeding both lambs and sheep, even if he got no money for it; nay, if it cost him all he had, and even 
his life beside." [11] In this context, Thompson recalled of hos struggle to balance his labor for the Lord and his 
need to provide for his present physical needs...

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of their labors and support them, or a seminary of learning laying between those disciples and the place the 
Lord was about to send them?" [39] He concluded that this command to his disciples "as representatives of the 
church" would accomplish "the work of salvation throughout the world, agreeable to his own council, and 
admits of no alteration." [40] The sole source for the propagation of the gospel was to be the Church 
established by Christ as governed according to Scripture, not missionary societies established by men.

Aside from the Great Commission, the missionaries used Acts 12 -- the sending out of Paul and Barnabas by 
the church in Antioch -- to justify the formation of missionary societies. Parker challenged their 
interpretation of this text. To Parker, the entire story showed "the order of God in his Church, and the 
union that exists betwetn Christ and his church; first His calling His preachers...and then the church, (not 
a missionary society) sending them out in gospel order to preach and administer the ordinances of the 
Gospel." [41] God in His Word placed sole authority in the local church to spread  the Gospel, not in 
extra-local bodies. "The principle and practice" of missions, Parker insisted, "is according to the spirit 
of this world, and not according to the spirit of the Gospel." [42]

The advocates of missions often granted the point that scripture did not explicitly sanction missionary 
organizations -- were not explicitly sanctioned in scripture. But, they went on to argue, God worked 
through these new institutions because they had been formed by his people to accomplish the greater end of 
spreading the gospel. This utilitarian argument for missions reappeared in arguments in favor of new measures 
in revivals. Parker rejected this argument. "We all agree that the object is good," Parker said of spreading 
the Gospel, "but for us to step in the places of God to send means to accomplish the birth of the heirs (of 
the Kingdom] must be horrid and wicked." [43] The missionary society, then, derived its inspiration not from 
God, but from the world. Human reason may justify the organization of missionary safeties, but the gospel 
does not.

Missionary societies, Parker argued, derived their inspiration from worldly models rather than models drawn 
from God's Word. "When we try the principles and practice of the mission system for the spread of the gospel 
by the word of God, they are different, for the mission plan is to look to the world for qualification and 
support, while the scriptural plan is to look for God for both." [44] The formation of mission societies, 
in Parker's view, was at odds with the church as Christ established it, which they found in the New 
Testament. Nothing in Scripture, Parker said, had ever authorized man "to alter his law or change the method 
of government, that he gave his church, nor arresting the authority he has given into their hands." [45] 
Because


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the mission societies and their supporters were altering Christ's method of government and replacing it with 
worldlY models, Parker declared that "they have most certainly rebelled against the authority of Christ, for 
we Baptists prefer to believe that the internal work of the calling and sending of preachers is as evidently 
performed by the Spirit of God on the heart." In addition, their rebellion manifested itself in investing 
themselves with the authority of a church, even though not contituted as one. [46]

Like Taylor, Parker was another frontier Baptist preacher who objected to the seeming obsession the 
missionists had with money. Parker argued that themissionists reduced the Gospel to a commodity to be traded. 
"It seems like making the sacred character of religion," says Parker, "no greater than the merchandise of 
this world, and putting it in a long line of trade, and traffic." [47] Like Leland and Taylor, Parker was 
very critical of the appeals made by missionists for money. "We see the mission society opening the door and 
using every exertion to collect money from the world" for the purpose of ushering in the Kingdom of God, 
which in Parker's view could only come though God's activity. [48]

The concerns of Leland, Taylor, and Parker were expressed in conventional forms -- sermons and tracts. In 
laying out the outlines of the arguments against missions, they enabled Baptists throughout the South and 
West to articulate their misgivings and fears over the new methods and institutions. A particularly 
interesting source for the development of antimission thought is The Harp of Zion, a massive rendering of the 
life of Christ in verse written by "a regular (Primitive) Baptist."

The author of the Harp of Zion believed that the wisdom of God dwarfed that of man. Indeed, Christ had come 
to make wise men fools.

'Twere well, said Jesus, if you could afford
A standard for the fool or wise man's word;
Did human thoughts of largest compass stand
A text book for the rest, then all were damn'd;
Damn'd in the tumult of their steadfast views
A wretchedness the fruit of their best truths. [49]

Reason could not bring men to a knowledge of God and the infinite.

Tho' finite man may not know what is truth,
Reason alone will prove his guarantee,
From views disgraceful to the Deity;
Nor suffer him to think the Lord of all
Who spread the heavens and formed the earthly ball --
Was thus possesed with the great Deity,
The Scorn of wise men, and a life of shame. [50]



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A faulty understanding of God's revelation, in the view  of the author, led to men wanting to blend reason and 
Scripture. When faced with Jesus, Nicodemas in Scripture was "struck with sacred awe."

In terms of adulation, he salutes
The lowly Jesus, and there from computes
The object of his homage, would observe
Much deference to himself, and truths reserve
Of harsh and vulgar import; or dispense
His words selected and of polish's sense.
Thus, vain men still, on little learning dress'd.
Or raisd in power, somewhat o'er the rest;
Coincides e'en God should speak to him,
In soften'd language of a hell and sin;
'Tis this, that prompts the liberal support
Of Teachers, who their very words assort
To please the ear, to fan the innate pride
Of fiends incarnate, who the truth deride. [51]

A particular heinous mixture of the world and scripture was the role that money played in the missionary's 
schemes. To the authort the model Missionary was Judas.


This said arch Judas, not that once he cared,
Or if the Poor were fed, or if they starved.
The name of charity, or Christ he would press
Into his service, that he might possess
Himself of money. This dear aim, here was crossed --
He deep deplored that all these pence he lost;
Nor could he rest, until he made it good --
And to that end, he sold the Saviour's blood.
Such Judas was -- and such was Judas' God!
No lack of likeness in the present brook
Of begging teachers -- Who compass earth and sea,
So they get money for self charity,
They cry for gold -- rebuke -- exhort and treat --
Nor can they good perform, till that they get! [52]

A few lines later, the author continued in an even harsher vein.

E'en Judas here, exaults himself above
The God of Jacob, in his claims to love!
Ten thousand thousand, shall the world afford,
Who, Judas-like, shall rise above the Lord;


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More full in charities -- in grace still higher --
Save all the world and Devils from their fire.
Should not my doctrine and claims agree,
They'll fill the measure of their charity,
By cloaking that, and telling lies for me. [53]

Drawing the connection between Judas and the missionary preachers of his day, the author said that Judas appeared 
more committed to the work of ministry than Christ, "and yet he was a devil. Who may not after this," he comments, 
"suspect mere appearances! May we not suspect those popular Baptists D.D.'s who build splendid, round meeting 
houses in large commercial cities, and [cheat] orphan and widow, friend and stranger, out Of 50.000 dollars to 
accomplish it! Or who build Baptist colleges and theological seminaries, and defraud the community out of 100,000 
dollars." [54]

The author of Zion said of the missionary preacher "Thyself, a sample of a host to some / In after times; who, 
throe' the earth shall run / As sent of God, and moved from above, / When gold's their God, and only self they 
love." [55] He also criticizes the missionists for merchandising the gospel.

All but my sheep, do only force their way
into the fold, to make the sheep their prey,
Make merchandize of pasture and of flock --
Insult -- betray -- and artfully provoke,
To their BASE PROJECTS, those who think no guile,
And glory in the infamy and spoil. [56]

The author of The Harp of Zion expressed the Primitive Baptists' disdain for the new measures linked to the pursuit 
of money in verse, using Jesus' cleansing of the temple from the moneychangers as his inspiration.

Full well that scene out modern forms describe,
Or rampant vanity or wounded pride.
The ample temple, fretted aisles and dome,
The Gilded pulpit, and the organ's tone,
Feed thousand's vanity, and bid them rise
in self-esteem, above the very skies.

The Primitive Baptists, in this author's views were the upholders of truth, the ones who challenged the claims of 
the advocates of the missionary societies: "But should some one by accident appear within their temple, and the 
truth declare." Their actions in condemning missions and the other new measures provoked the wrath of the 
missionists and their allies.


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How would their pride, insulted, urge them on,
To curse the doctrine and the preacher stone 
With calumny -- contcmpt, and each bad name,
Until they murdered all his honest fame."

By the mid-1820s, the basic outilnes of the antimission Position were laid out. Leland, Taylor, Parker, the author 
of The Harp of Zion, and other more obscure Baptists expressed the basic distrust of the motives and methods of 
the missionists. They saw in the denominational organizations and doctrinal innovations an abandonment of Baptist 
tradition. Other Baptists were following after the ways of other, higher-status congregations. With mission's 
origin in the North among New England denominations, sectional and cultural differences were a very important part 
of their arguments. In opposing the money-raising activities of the missionists, the antimissionists opposed the 
merging of market methods and religious ends. Once the outlines of the argument were made, all that was needed was 
a catalyst to move opposition to missions to separation from them. In the case of the antimission movement, this 
catalyst came primarily as the result of the actions of one man and one association.


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Chapter Six...

(under construction)