In Truth's Service: The Roots of Quakerism in Maryland, 1655-1700
by Kees de Mooy
The Society of Friends, or Quakers as they were called from early on, arrived in Maryland during a time of turbulent conditions.2 The weather and geography combined to cause oppressively hot and humid summers and long, cold winters. In addition, there were uncertain economic, political and social realities with which to contend. Tobacco prices rose and fell precipitously, the Governor of Maryland had difficulty administering the fledgling colony, and religious diversity created many tensions. In a letter to the archbishop of Canterbury, Anglican minister John Yeo wrote of Maryland, "it is become a Sodom of uncleanliness and a pesthouse of iniquity."3 Yet, despite these difficult conditions, Quakers survived and prospered, partly due to a strong set of beliefs that placed a high priority on industry and simplicity. The ideals they had shaped in England had a profound effect on their deportment in the new colony of Maryland.
Of particular consequence, Quakers were committed to the 1660 declaration of purpose, which stated, "We utterly deny all outward wars and strife and fighting with weapons to any end and under any pretense whatever."4 This dedication to Quaker principles can be traced to the founding of the movement in England, as well as its introduction very early in the history of Maryland.
The Protestant Reformation led to the development of many religious splinter groups which sought to rid the Christian Church of what were considered to be "worldly" elements, such as the pope, creeds, sacraments, and priesthood. One of these groups was the Quakers, whose movement originated in England in 1652 with George Fox, a man from middle-class origins who studied the Bible avidly as a youth. He, like so many others during this period of spiritual and political upheaval in England, wondered about the role of God in his life. As a boy of nineteen, he began to travel through the countryside in a quest to answer his spiritual yearnings. In a religious revelation that Fox experienced in 1648, he became convinced that "every man [is] enlightened by the divine light of Christ."5 Quakerism truly began in 1652 after he had another vision of "a great people to be gathered," and it was then that he began preaching in earnest, converting ("convincing") many in the English countryside in a regional awakening that stressed the equality of all people under God.6 Fox's teachings spread rapidly: over ten thousand Quakers lived in London by 1678, and Bristol, the second largest city in England, was a "veritable hotbed of Quakerism."7 By the time that Fox dictated his published journals in 1691, he had developed the central tenets of Quaker belief.
Quakers grouped these beliefs under four basic concerns, or "testimonies"-honesty, equality, simplicity, and peace. Honesty applied to the use of "plain language," which included addressing all persons with the familiar thee or thou regardless of social position, and rejecting all swearing and oaths. Honesty was especially important in relationships between people, and it was expected that each person be taken at his or her word. In business matters, Quakers expected to pay or receive only the fair price for an item. The concept of equality was taken directly from the teachings of Jesus and consisted mainly in the belief that God could speak through any receptive person, regardless of gender or status. In the late 1650s, Quakers spoke out regularly against paid pastors and the practice of tithing. The testimony of equality was also applied to foreign cultures, even those considered non-Christian.8
Simplicity was expressed mainly in dress. Quakers shunned such excesses as silver buckles and buttons and exhibited a preference for plain colors, such as brown, black, or gray. Wasteful use of cloth, food, and drink was frowned upon. The testimony of peace had its origin in the teachings of Jesus. In a Quaker tract of 1657, James Nayler described nonviolence and patient suffering as God's way of conquering His enemies. The intolerance and persecution expressed by non-believers were considered to be defenses used to shield the individual from inner truth. Quakers took it for granted that they would be tested by and subjected to violence and oppression in the external world.9
Persecution led many Quakers to depart for the New World, but the much sought-after religious toleration which would al-low dissemination of their ideas was not easily gained. Maryland-with its 1649 Act Concerning Religion, the first religious toleration act in North America-appeared to be an exception and drew many of the persecuted to its shores. The promise of religious converts and economic opportunity was a powerful incentive, and they capitalized on the chance to begin anew. In the following decades, Quaker contributions would prove to be an important part of the religious, political, economic, and social fabric of the Maryland colonial experience.
Although it is difficult to pinpoint the exact date of Quaker entry into Maryland, Kenneth Carroll places them in the colony as early as 1655, thus predating their arrival in New England by almost a year.10 Although Pennsylvania features prominently in Quaker history, settlement there occurred later. Elizabeth Harris of London was the first Quaker visitor to Maryland in 1655 or 1656, converting settlers in Calvert County, Anne Arundel County, and Kent Island. The acting governor of Maryland, William Fuller, became one of Harris' earliest converts, and between five and eleven of the twenty-four provincial commissioners under the Bennett-Claiborne parliamentary commission of 1654-58 were also "convinced."11 The conversion of Puritans while in office was an unparalleled event in Maryland politics.12 Through the remarkable determination of Elizabeth Harris and other Quakers who traveled throughout the colonies, usually in twos or threes, many settlers were drawn into Quakerism and began to congregate into meetings.
Towards the end of 1657, Josiah Cole and Thomas Thurston traveled on foot from Virginia through Maryland, where Thomas Chapman joined them. Cole and Chapman had been imprisoned in Virginia for their beliefs, while Thurston had been banished from Boston.13 New England was especially notorious for its mistreatment of Quakers, with steep fines for ship captains who brought Friends into Boston and severe penalties for any Quakers who failed to take oaths, obey laws, doff hats to magistrates, or serve in the militia. Quakers were perceived as seditious fanatics and were punished with brandings, ear-croppings, fines, prison sentences, whippings, banishment, and hanging. In 1659, three Quakers-two men and one woman-were hung in Boston Commons after repeated banishments had failed to deter them from reentering the colony.14
In Maryland, an Order of Council was enacted in 1658 that required an oath of fidelity to the Lord Proprietor from all settlers. Additionally, every man capable of bearing arms was to be enrolled in the militia. Refusal to comply was punishable by banishment, and any attempt to return resulted in the offender being whipped from town to town until he was out of the province.15 Thomas Thurston, for example, was banished from Maryland and threatened with thirty-eight lashes if he did not comply.16 In a pamphlet entitled The Deceiver of the Nations Discovered, published in London in 1660, Francis Howgill relates the intense persecution of Quakers in Maryland:
And Oh! What havock and spoil hath these Rulers in Mariland made upon their own people,.and how have they exceeded in cruelty, & what tortering and Prisoning, and Whipping, & Scourging have they made,.And how have they grinded the faces of the poor,.And instead of protecting them in that Province, and saving them from wrong, hath themselves been the chief instrument of doing them harm and wronging them, and oppressing them, and yet not for evil doing, it may be for not doffing a Hat, or because they cannot learn to be swift to shed blood.17
Regardless of the personal dangers that they faced, Quakers travelers continued in their efforts, and many more settled in the province. Their reputation for honesty, coupled with the prestige and wealth that were gained through their labors, began to bring an end to the persecution. In April of 1658, three Friends-William Fuller, Michael Brooke, and Richard Preston-won election to the new assembly. In 1660, these men were reelected, and Quakers Robert Clarkson and William Burgess joined them in the legislature. Despite Fuller's participation in a briefly successful rebellion against the proprietary government in 1660, Charles Calvert continued to allow religious diversification and toleration. On the invitation of Lord Baltimore, hundreds of Quakers from Virginia came to Maryland, and became increasingly involved in the governance of the colony.18
In an effort to make it even easier for Friends to serve in the Maryland colonial government, Lord Baltimore did away with the oath of allegiance that was demanded in other colonies and in England.19 The difficulty of attracting settlers, including those who could serve in the administration of government, was not lost on the proprietors of Maryland. Living conditions were very harsh, and a constant influx of immigrants was needed to ensure financial stability for the colony. Especially in the mid-seventeenth century, immigration was vital to the economic survival of the Maryland colony. The average life expectancy of young men was in the low forties and as many as 85 percent of male settlers died without sons.20 Quaker immigration contributed significantly to the population boom that Maryland experienced in the 1660s.
By 1661, a Quaker traveler named George Rofe-who would die an untimely death when the canoe he was traveling in overturned in the Chesapeake Bay during a squall, illuminating the dangerous conditions that were faced by many settlers-noted, "many settled meetings there are in Maryland."21 The "settled meetings" that Rofe referred to were mainly in present-day Annapolis, Kent Island, and Talbot County. Talbot County became a prominent area for Quakers, perhaps due to the refuge it afforded from the travails that plagued them in other parts of the colony. Frederick B. Tolles has surmised that, in general, Quakerism flourished in areas where the standard of living was relatively low,22 a description that matched Talbot County in the seventeenth century very well. From the Friends' perspective, the rich farmland of the area was important to their philosophy that farming was the least corrupting form of employment.23
In the mid 1660s, Betty's Cove Meeting was established near the Miles River in Talbot County. It was one of the earliest organized meetings in Maryland, and its ancestor, the Third Haven Meeting, survives to this day as the longest continually occupied place of worship in the state. The earliest surviving record from Betty's Cove Meeting is a marriage certificate dated 11 September 1669.24 Carroll states that Betty's Cove was the only meetinghouse on the Eastern Shore at this time, and most weekly and monthly meetings were held at the homes of individuals.25
Quakerism's founder, George Fox, visited Betty's Cove in 1672, and reported:
We came to the General Meeting of all Maryland Friends,.and many of the world were at the public meetings, some Papists, clerks of the courts, and there were eight justices of the peace, and one of the judges and his wife,.and many considerable persons of quality. And they judged that there was a thousand people.And there was never seen there so many boats together.it was almost like the Thames.26
George Fox traveled through many parts of Maryland during 1672 and 1673, ministering to white settlers and Indians alike. Upon the death of Fox in 1690, a number of books were forwarded to the membership at Betty's Cove Meeting, thus forming the core of the first public library in the county and possibly the state.27
By 1680, there were five meetings on the eastern shore of the Chesapeake: Sassafras, Chester, Bayside, Tuckahoe, and Choptank. The western shore meetings at this time consisted of Patuxent, Herring Creek, West River, Severn, and South River. In 1683, John Edmondson sold three acres of his land to the membership of Betty's Cove in order that they could build a new meetinghouse. The building, which would be called the Third Haven Meeting, was completed in 1685, and by 1691, the membership of Betty's Cove was incorporated into the new site, the older location having fallen into disrepair.28 Third Haven produced a large number of traveling male and female Friends who were crucial to the spread of Quakerism.
The emphasis on equality of men and women was a very important and controversial aspect of the Quaker belief system. English women of the seventeenth century were relegated into subservient positions far removed from public life, and religious life was no exception. Women flocked to the Friends in large numbers, even establishing separate meetings, a move which increased persecution and ridicule from the outside and which became the subject of extreme controversy-eventually resulting in a schism-within the group. George Fox, faced with considerable resistance from other Friends, used biblical argument to support the right of women to conduct separate meetings.29
The first Women's Meeting in the New World was established in Maryland. The meeting alternated between the eastern and western shores of the Chesapeake Bay. By 1677, regular meetings were held to raise money for poor Friends, and a regular correspondence was established with the women Friends of London. Quaker women became involved in the moral instruction ("conversation") of young Quakers, spoke to members who strayed from the teachings, helped care for the poor and ill, and provided for the education of children.30
Quakers insisted on strict adherence to proper procedures for courtship and marriage. A marriage could be refused on the basis of the religion of the applicants, outward deportment, or compatibility. George Fox suggested in 1652 that Friends hold two meetings for determining the suitability of a couple for marriage. Friends at men's and women's monthly business meetings were consulted when a young couple desired to marry, a time-consuming process requiring proof of religious and financial stability on the part of the petitioners.31 The consideration of marriages took up a substantial part of the order of business in Quaker monthly meetings. Marriage outside of the faith was an offense that could result in being disowned. The Quaker faith would be challenged in the succeeding century over this issue, as many members left the faith rather than marry within the strictures of the religion. Marriage requirements, coupled with religious ideas about children, contributed to the trend of relatively late marriages and fewer children for Quaker men and women.32
Rules of discipline covering all aspects of behavior, including courtship and marriage, were standardized in 1676 with the following regulations. Disciplinary proceedings would result:
1. If Any walk not in the Truth that have beene Convinced and goe From the truth and is not faithful in their Testimony in Every particular.
2. If any follow Drunkeness, pleasures or Gameing or is not faithful in their callings and Dealings nor honest and just.
3. If any disorderly together in Marriage.
4. If any widdows have Children and doe Intend to Marry to Enquire what She hath Done for her Children.
5. If widdows have Children to put forth-prentices or Servant to take Care to Ease Them if they be Burthened.
6. If any go to the Priest or Magistrate to be Married.
7. If any wear their hatts on when Friends prays in ye power of God in Opposition to the power of God.
8. All Friends to take Notice of the Poore to Ease one another.
9. If any men or women Hunt after one another and then Leave one another and goe to Others.
10. If any be Evill Speakers, Backbiters, Slanderers, foolish Jesters or Talkers.
11. If there be any Tale Carriers and Railers that Loves Dissention.
12. If any differences between Friends to be Speedily Ended.
13. All Friends to Traine up their Children in the feare of the Lord and good Order of Truth.
14. Friends to Buy Convenient Burying Places.
15. Friends to Buy Convenient Books for Registering Births, Burials, Marriages and all other things appertaining to the Order of Truth.
16. Friends should take Spetiall Care and not be Slack in Coming together to Meeting betwixt the 10th or 11th Hour which is the time appointed.33
These rules not only formed the basis for personal behavior but also codified the attention to record keeping with which Quakerism later became synonymous.
Contrary to the abolitionist image that arose later (especially in Pennsylvania, but also in Maryland), many Quakers owned slaves in the seventeenth century. Winthrop D. Jordan writes that geographic conditions coupled with the success of tobacco as a staple crop contributed to the rapid development of slavery in Maryland.34 Kenneth Carroll examined fifty Quaker wills dated from 1669 to 1750. Of the twenty-one in the sample who were slaveholders, the majority owned between four to six slaves. For example, Thomas Evernden, a prominent Quaker who lived in Somerset County, owned six slaves and a Native American servant.35 By all accounts, Evernden was a pious man who was very active in the Annemessex meeting, and traveled extensively throughout the American colonies to spread the Quaker religion.36
George Fox had preached to slaves in Barbados in 1671 and then tried to convince their masters to limit the slaves' terms and have them educated. William Edmundsun, one of the most prominent Quaker missionaries from England, traveled through the Eastern Shore of Maryland around 1676. From Newport, Rhode Island that same year, Edmundsun issued the first Quaker indictment of slavery. However, social and economic conditions within the tobacco economy of Maryland were such that the emancipation of slaves could not be considered. It would not be until the following century that the Philadelphia Meeting, to which some of the northernmost Maryland meetinghouses belonged, would begin the long process of abolition in America with the condemnation of slaveholding among its membership.37
The political participation of Quakers was severely curtailed in Maryland following the Glorious Revolution of 1688. The accession of William and Mary to the throne in England resulted in a renewed period of intolerance towards religious minorities. Catholics and Quakers in Maryland were systematically eliminated from holding office for almost a century thereafter. The conditions in 1688 prompted many prominent Quakers-including John Edmondson, John Pitt, Ralph Fishbourne, Edward Talbot, Samuel Chew, William Holliday, Howell Powell, and twenty-three others to send a letter to Lord Baltimore begging for relief from "Ruin by the Malice and Envy of Evil-minded Men" and promising that "quiet, upright and peacable Deportment under thy Government shall ever be such."38 Although between 1660 and 1689, twenty-three of the one hundred and eighteen assemblymen whose religious affiliation is known were Quakers, subscription to the test oath or "oath of abhorrency" became mandatory for all provincial officeholders after the Glorious Revolution. The government of 1691 excluded almost all second-generation council members, and politics became a bastion of Anglicans, Protestants and other newly-arrived immigrants in the colony.38
Despite oppressive circumstances, Quaker religious activity continued to expand. Shortly before the close of the century, two well-known Quakers traveled throughout Maryland, and wrote a detailed account of the state of Quakerism. In 1698, Thomas Chalkley journeyed through Somerset and then across the Chesapeake Bay, stopping later at a Native American town on the Pocomoke River where he wrote in his journal, "When we came to the town, [the Indians] were kind to us, spoke well of Friends, and said [Quakers] would not cheat them, as some others did."39 Thomas Story traveled more widely than Chalkey, and his journal mentions meetings on the Chester River, Tuckahoe, Little Choptank, Nanticoke, and Monie Creek. At Little Choptank, he had a long discourse with an Episcopal priest over the subject of baptism and spoke with a Justice of the Peace and a lawyer about the principles of Quakerism.40
In the last five decades of the seventeenth century, Maryland provided Quakers with a relatively safe haven in which to become established and to prosper. With quiet persistence, Quakers made lasting contributions to the political, economic, and social well-being of their adopted colony, and laid the moral groundwork for later advancements in women's rights and the emancipation of slaves. Despite renewed oppression after the Glorious Revolution, Quakers continued to thrive in Maryland and elsewhere. Adhering to a simple and yet profoundly universal philosophy, Maryland's first Quakers survived and even prospered in the turbulent colonial period, and succeeded in preserving and passing on the moral ideals that continue to guide the work of Quakers today.
End Notes
1. William Evans and Thomas Evans, eds., "Journal of the Life of William Edmundson" in The Friends' Library, Comprising the Journals, Doctrinal Treatises, and Other Writings of Members of the Religious Society of Friends,vol. 2. (Philadelphia: Joseph Rakestraw, 1838).
2. During a year of research for Historic Easton, Inc., I became interested in the Society of Friends and began to appreciate the role of Quakers in the early history of Easton and Talbot County. It seemed a natural step to expand this work to include the rest of Maryland when I enrolled in a course in early American history taught by Robert Fallaw at Washington College. I want to thank the following people who helped me with this paper. Polly Shannahan kindled my interest in Quakers and patiently shared her knowledge of Talbot County. Robert Fallaw helped with source information and encouraged me to submit this article to the Washington College Review for publication. Patricia O'Donnell, archivist at the Friends Historical Library, graciously pointed me to important publications in the collections at Swarthmore. At Washington College, Carol Wilson, Michael Harvey, Donald McColl, and Kathy Wagner provided editorial guidance and support. J. William Frost, Director of the Friends Historical Library made helpful comments on the final draft. Writing is truly a collaborative effort.
3. Robert J. Brugger, Maryland: A Middle Temperament, 1634-1980 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988), 36.
4. Clarence E. Pickett, For More Than Bread Alone: An Autobiographical Account of Twenty-Two Years' Work With the American Friends Service Committee (Boston: Little, Brown, 1953), 306.
5. John L. Nickalls, ed., The Journal of George Fox (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1952), 33.
6. Hugh Barbour and J. William Frost, The Quakers (New York: Greenwood Press, 1988), 5.
7. Frederick B. Tolles, Meeting House and Counting House: The Quaker Merchants of Colonial Philadelphia, 1682-1763 (New York: Norton, 1963), 29.
8. Barbour and Frost, 43; Tolles, 9.
9. Barbour and Frost, 45.
10. Kenneth Carroll, Quakerism on the Eastern Shore (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1970), 9.
11. David W. Jordan, 'God's Candle' Within Government: Quakers and Politics in Early Maryland," William and Mary Quarterly 39 (1982): 630.
12. Bliss Forbush, A History of Baltimore Yearly Meeting of Friends: Three Hundred Years of Quakerism in Maryland, Virginia, the District of Columbia, and Central Pennsylvania (Baltimore: Baltimore Yearly Meeting of Friends, 1972), 2; and Carroll, 13.
13. J. Saurin Norris, The Early Friends (or Quakers) in Maryland, (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1862), 7.
14. Barbour and Frost, 51.
15. Clayton C. Hall, ed., Narratives of Early Maryland, 1633-1684 (New York: Charles Scribner's sons, 1910), 391.
16. Norris, 8-9.
17. Qtd. in Carroll, 16.
18. Jordan, "God's Candle," 631-32.
19. Ibid., 634.
20. David W. Jordan, "Political Stability and the Emergence of a Native Elite," in The Chesapeake in the Seventeenth Century: Essays on Anglo-American Society and Politics," eds. Thad W. Tate and David L. Ammerman (New York: Norton, 1979), 246-47.
21. Carroll, 21.
22. Tolles, 30.
23. Barry J. Levy, 'Tender Plants': Quaker Farmers and Children in the Delaware Valley, 1681-1735, in Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development, eds. Stanley N. Katz, John Murrin and Douglas Greenberg (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1983), 159.
24. Carroll, 28.
25. Ibid, 29.
26. Nickalls, 636.
27. An Historical Sketch of Third Haven Meeting House (Easton: Press of the Star Democrat, 1932), 8.
28. Carroll, 43-44.
29. Margaret H. Bacon, Mothers of Feminism: The Story of Quaker Women in America (New York: Harper, 1986), 49.
30. Ibid., 50.
31. Barbour and Frost, 112; Carroll, 73.
32. Levy, 176; Bacon, 57.
33. Carroll, 60-61.
34. Winthrop D. Jordan, "Enslavement of Negroes in America to 1700," in Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development, eds. Stanley N. Katz, John M. Murrin and Douglas Greenberg (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993), 309.
35. Carroll, 130.
36. Ibid., 49-50.
37. Jean R. Soderlund, Quakers and Slavery: A Divided Spirit (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), 3-4.
38. Joseph Besse, A Collection of the Sufferings of the People Called Quakers, For the Testimony of a Good Conscience, From the Time of Their Being First Distinguished By That Name in the Year 1650, To the Time of the Act, Commonly Called the Act of Toleration, Granted to Protestant Dissenters in the First Year of the Reign of King William the Third and Queen Mary, in the Year 1689, Taken From Original Records and Other Authentic Accounts (London, Luke and Hind), 387-88.
Works Cited
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