Ballou Family

The Ballou family of New England produced some of the most well-known and distinguished American Universalists, including Hosea Ballou, the leading theologian and evangelist of early 19th-century Universalism; Hosea Ballou 2d, Universalist historian and first president of Tufts University; and Adin Ballou, a significant theorist of pacifism and the founder of the Hopedale utopian community. Many other Ballous served in the Universalist ministry or, as laypersons, played significant roles in Universalist history. 

The first member of this Huguenot family to come to New England was Maturin Ballou (d.1662). Some Ballous had fled from France to England, probably late in the 16th century. Maturin, who may have been born in England, emigrated to Massachusetts around 1640, at the end of the great wave of Puritan migration. By 1646 he had moved to Providence, Rhode Island, a “shelter for persons distressed of conscience,” founded by Roger Williams. Like Williams, the early American Ballous were Baptists. Some were Calvinist Baptists, others were Six-Principle Baptists, a kind of General Baptists which originated in Rhode Island.

Maturin Ballou had three sons, two of whom, John Ballou (c.1650-1714) and James Ballou (c.1652-c.1741), each had numerous Universalist descendants. John’s family settled just north of Providence. James’s family clustered in the northeast corner of Rhode Island in Cumberland, near what would later become the city of Woonsocket, Rhode Island. Hosea Ballou was descended from John Ballou, while Adin Ballou was in the line of James. Hosea and Adin were third cousins, once-removed.

Descendants of Elder Maturin Ballou

Elder Maturin Ballou (1720-1804), a Calvinist Baptist minister, was a grandson of John Ballou. He moved his family from Scituate, Rhode Island to Richmond, New Hampshire in 1767. This was part of a substantial migration of members of both main branches the Ballou family to Richmond. Four of Maturin’s sons became Universalists: Benjamin, David, Nathan, and the celebrated Hosea.

Hosea Ballou’s Siblings and Their Descendants

1) Benjamin Ballou (1747-1834), a farmer-preacher, was at first an occasional preacher for the Baptists and was converted to Universalism in middle age by his youngest brother, Hosea. He wrote a Universalist poem, “Thoughts on the Sun,” sometimes attributed to Hosea. Ballou biographer Thomas Whittemore recorded that Benjamin was “a man of good sense, but not of great activity.” He followed his brother David from Richmond to Monroe, Massachusetts in 1802.

Benjamin Ballou’s son Asahel (1771-1851), the same age as his uncle Hosea Ballou, was young Hosea’s friend and playmate. Hosea later said that they were like twins. When grown, Asahel was a farmer who lived with his wife Martha Starr (1776-1839) in Halifax, Vermont. Among their nine sons were three Universalist ministers: Hosea Ballou 2d, Levi Ballou, and William Starr Ballou.

William Starr Ballou (1808-1865) was ordained in 1833 and itinerated in Windham County, Vermont before settling in Hartland, Vermont, 1832-38; East Randolph, Vermont, 1838-42; Brattleboro, Vermont, 1843-46; Springfield, Vermont, 1847-48; Brattleboro again, 1849; Strafford, Vermont, 1851-52; and Cheshire, Massachusetts. He moved to Illinois in 1858. There, his preaching activities restricted by health problems, he made money in real estate for himself and for his brother Levi. He was a founder and supporter of several Universalist schools, including the Green Mountain Perkins Institute, Melrose Academy, and Lombard University.

Levi Ballou
Levi Ballou

Levi Ballou (1806-1865), self-taught in classics, was a teacher and singing instructor before he became a minister. He studied theology with his older brother, Hosea 2d, and his younger brother, William, and entered his new career around the age of 30. He worked with William in Hartland, Vermont, 1837-38, then settled in Randolph, Vermont, 1840; Chester, Vermont, 1841; and at the Second Universalist Society of Orange, Massachusetts, 1843-65. In Orange he was superintendent of the public schools. Serving an old church that had been the First Congregational Parish and Society of Orange, and which was then both Unitarian and Universalist, he was known as the “bishop” of the area.

Levi had a son, William Ballou (1864-1941), who was the first Universalist minister in Fargo, North Dakota, serving that church in 1890-97 and 1904-1919. Because William Ballou was a pacifist and a socialist, in 1919 the church was attacked by rioters. When the society disbanded shortly afterwards, he purchased the property and used the building to stage cultural events.

2) David Ballou (1758-1840) was the first of Elder Maturin’s children to become a Universalist. He was converted by Caleb Rich in 1789. David then helped to convert his younger brother, Hosea. A farmer-preacher, David never entered the full-time ministry because he did not like to accept payment for his religious services. He first preached in the Richmond area, then, in 1799, moved to a farm in Monroe, Massachusetts, from which base he itinerated throughout northwest Massachusetts and southern Vermont. In 1812 he organized the Universalist society in Whitingham, Vermont. He attended the New England Universalist General Convention at least a dozen times.

Moses Ballou
Moses Ballou

Moses Ballou (1811-1879), a son of David, started preaching Universalism in 1833, itinerating in the area around his home in Monroe, Massachusetts. He was considered a powerful preacher. After receiving fellowship in 1834, he settled in Bath, New Hampshire, 1835; Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 1836-43; New York City (Fourth Universalist), 1843-45; Portsmouth again, 1845-48; Bridgeport, Connecticut, 1848-54; Hartford, Connecticut, 1854-57; Philadelphia (Second Universalist), 1857-59; New York City (Third Universalist), 1859-65; New Haven, Connecticut (supply preaching), 1865-66; and Philadelphia (Second Universalist again), 1866-72. In retirement in Atco, New Jersey, he preached to a small society that he had helped to found. In addition to writing for the Universalist Quarterly and other denominational papers, he wrote The Divine Character Vindicated (1854), a book subsidized by P. T. Barnum.

3) Nathan Ballou (1760-1838) was an industrious farmer who cared for his father, Elder Maturin Ballou, in old age. He followed his older brother David to Monroe, Massachusetts in 1804 and there became a Universalist.

Russell Arnold Ballou (1830-1895), a grandson of Nathan Ballou, was brought up on the family farm in Monroe. After obtaining Universalist fellowship, 1849, he studied with Hosea Ballou 2d in Medford, Massachusetts, 1850-51. He settled in West Bridgewater, Massachusetts (which was a Unitarian society as well), 1852-56; Chelmsford (also Unitarian as well), 1856-58; and Augusta, Maine, 1858-62. From 1862 to 1864 he edited the Gospel Banner, a Universalist paper in Maine. He then worked as general agent of the Universalist Publishing House, 1864-67. He lost the wealth he had subsequently amassed in the real estate business in the Great Boston Fire, 1872.

4) Maturin’s daughter, Sarah (1763-1824), had a son, Asa Wheaton (1794-1823), who studied for the Universalist ministry under his uncle Hosea Ballou. He died of tuberculosis, however, before his career was underway.

Hosea Ballou’s Children

1) Hosea Faxon Ballou (1799-1881) married his cousin Mary Ballou (1801-1883). They lived in Monroe, Massachusetts until 1832, when they moved to Whitingham, Vermont. He was a schoolteacher, shopkeeper, and farmer until he was 32, then studied for the ministry under his brother-in-law, Benjamin Whittemore. He settled in Whitingham, Vermont, 1832-57, and Wilmington, Vermont, 1857-72. He was engaged in town and state politics, serving in the state legislature and attending constitutional conventions. He was president of the Wilmington Savings Bank, 1874-81.

2) Massena Berthier Ballou (1800-1890), like his older brother Hosea Faxon, was born in Dana, Massachusetts. He studied for the ministry under his father, began preaching when he was 20, did itinerant ministry, and then settled in Charlton, Massachusetts, 1827-31. Edward Turner, once his father’s friend and colleague in the early Universalist ministry, came to Charlton as Unitarian minister in 1828, offending Ballou senior by competing with his son. Both churches struggled and their ministers were compelled to leave Charlton in 1831. Massena Berthier Ballou’s main settlement was at First Parish in Stoughton, Massachusetts, where he served 22 years, 1831-53. His tolerant and non-controversial attitude brought harmony to a congregation emerging from the Unitarian controversy and undecided between Unitarianism and Universalism. Late in life he wrote, “It has always been my endeavor and most earnest desire to live in peace and the exchange of kind offices with all the people with whom I am associated, without regard to religious or political opinions.” After his retirement, due to ill-health, he remained in Stoughton for 37 years until his death.

3) In 1823 Mandana Ballou (b.1804), married Benjamin Whittemore (1801-1881), a Universalist minister and the younger brother of Universalist minister and journalist Thomas Whittemore. Benjamin, educated at academies in Lancaster and Groton, Massachusetts, studied for the ministry with Hosea Ballou. He was ordained in 1823 and served churches in South Scituate, Massachusetts, 1823-29; Troy, New York, 1829-30; and South Boston, Massachusetts, 1830-43. He organized societies in the area of Lancaster, Massachusetts, 1843-54, and served at Norwich, Connecticut, 1854-62. Shortly after retiring to Lancaster, he went blind. He received an honorary degree from Tufts in 1867. During the Restorationist controversy, it was he who extracted the crucial admission from Jacob Wood that the signers of the notorious “Appeal and Declaration” were motivated by envy of Hosea Ballou. Most of Benjamin and Mandana’s children died young. Their eldest daughter, Mandana Mary Whittemore (1824-1857), married Universalist minister Quincy Whitney.

4) Elmina Ruth Ballou (1810-1856), like her sister Mandana, married one of her father’s students. Josiah Crosby Waldo (1803-1890), ordained in 1827, settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, 1828-32. He married Elmina in 1831. In Cincinnati he started a Universalist newspaper, the Sentinel and Star. He later served in Lynn, Massachusetts, 1835-41; Arlington (West Cambridge), Massachusetts, 1841-45; Quincy, Massachusetts, 1845-47; Troy, New York; and New London, Connecticut.

5) Hosea Ballou’s youngest son, Maturin Murray Ballou (1820-1895), was a notable journalist, travel writer, and author of lurid adventure novels. He wrote for the Olive Branch, 1838; wrote for and edited the Bay State Democrat, 1840-46; edited the Flag of Our Union, 1846-58; and edited Ballou’s Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion, 1851-59. He was the founder and first editor of the Boston Globe, 1872-73. The subjects of his travel books include Alaska, Mexico, the West Indies, Russia, Australia, and the Pacific Islands. Representative of his many novels are The Midshipman’s Revenge, 1845, and The Masked Lady; or the Fortunes of a Dragon, 1889. The book that he is best remembered for is the Biography of Rev. Hosea Ballou, 1852. This memoir preserves information on Hosea Ballou, and the Ballou family in general, not available anywhere else.

Descendants of the first James Ballou

There are five sub-branches of James Ballou’s family, stemming from his sons, James, Nathaniel, Obadiah, Samuel, and Nehemiah. The first three sons had numerous Universalist descendants.

Descendants of James Ballou (1684-1764)

1) James Ballou (1723-1812) was the grandson of the first James, the son of the immigrant Maturin. He was born in a part of Wrentham, Massachusetts that was later attached to Cumberland, Rhode Island. At that time this northeast corner of Rhode Island, served by the Six-principle Baptist “Elder Ballou Meetinghouse,” was known as the “Ballou District.” In 1775, after the death of his parents, he and his sons moved to Richmond, New Hampshire, the new home of many emigrant Rhode Islanders. While still in Cumberland, James had been a leader a breakaway group from his family’s Baptist church. When “spiritual wifery” was adopted by members of his Baptist church in Richmond, he withdrew and did not return even after the congregation repudiated the practice. An independent thinker, he decided to consider alternatives to his childhood faith. He ultimately chose to believe in universal salvation, and gave Universalist evangelists his public support.

James’s son, Silas Ballou (1753-1837), was in his youth a whaler and a Revolutionary War privateer. Although poorly educated, he read much and collected a “library” of books. In the Richmond area he was celebrated as poet, writing occasional verse for his friends and neighbors. In 1785 he compiled and published the first American Universalist hymn book, New Hymns on Various Subjects, viz: On the Creation of the World; and the Formation of Man—the State Wherein He was Created, and His Sad and Shameful Fall. On the Early and Extensive Promises of God—the Coming of Christ, and the Completion of the Father’s Promises: or, the Eternal Redemption and Victorious Salvation of Mankind through Him. A century later, Adin Ballou characterized Silas’s religious verse as obsolete, “partly on account of its rusticity or inelegance of poetic diction,” and chiefly because his doctrine of the Trinity and belief in vicarious atonement were no longer shared by Universalists.

2) Adin Ballou was great-nephew of the James Ballou who moved to Richmond, New Hampshire. His grandfather Ariel Ballou (1715-1791) was James’s older brother. His father, Ariel (1758-1839), led the family out of the Six-principle Baptist church into the Christian Connexion. Adin and his family went from Universalism to Unitarianism via the Practical Christianity that was the official faith of the Hopedale Community.

Adin’s daughter, Abigail Sayles Ballou (1829-1918), was the only one of his children to survive past early adulthood. She was born just before the death of her mother, Adin’s first wife, Abigail Sayles. As a young girl living in the utopian Hopedale Community founded by her father, she took care of babies while their mothers worked. As she grew older, she started teaching in the community school. She was trained at the State Normal School in West Newton, Massachusetts. In 1851 she married William Sweetser Heywood (1824-1905), who had come to Hopedale to train for the ministry under her father. Heywood stayed with his wife at Hopedale, where he became community president and associate editor of the community paper, the Practical Christian. Abigail and William founded the Hopedale Home School in 1856 and ran it as a coeducational, progressive boarding academy. He taught ancient languages, science, mathematics, and literature; she taught French, history, botany, physiology, art, and other subjects. They tried to instill in their students a “spirit of inquiry, rather than dogmatism.” Among the students were children of Samuel J. May and William Lloyd Garrison. The school was disrupted by the Civil War and closed in 1863.

The Heywoods left Hopedale in 1864. Having obtained Unitarian fellowship, William served churches in Scituate, Massachusetts; Hudson, Massachusetts; Holyoke, Massachusetts; and at Parmenter Street Chapel in Boston, Massachusetts. He ended his career as a minister-at-large, serving the poor in the north end of Boston. After his father-in-law’s death, he edited and completed the Autobiography of Adin Ballou, 1896, and edited History of the Hopedale Community, 1897. He also wrote a history of Westminster, Massachusetts, 1893. After his death, Abigail lived in New York City with her married daughter, Lucy Florence Holden. In her contribution to Hopedale Reminiscences, 1910, Abigail called Hopedale “one of the grandest experiments ever attempted for the good of mankind” and predicted that “the seed sown by [Adin Ballou] and his co-workers for a higher civilization will one day be realized, and a truer, better order of society will then supplant the present disorderly and crude state.”

Adin’s son, Adin Augustus (1833-1852), born of his second wife, Lucy Hunt, was groomed to be his successor in the Hopedale Community. While a child, Adin Augustus edited a Community children’s newspaper, the Mammoth, ran the Hopedale printing office, and managed the Community post office. He attended the State Normal School in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, 1850-52. Upon graduation he became an assistant teacher at the normal school. Unfortunately he soon after died of typhoid fever. Crushed by this loss, Adin and Lucy Ballou turned to Spiritualism. Adin wrote Memoir of Adin Augustus Ballou, 1853, which preserved some of Adin Augustus’s writings. “Be an independent man, a free thinker, a mighty actor,” Adin Augustus wrote when he was 17. “Be a wise man, a careful discriminator. Be a good man, blending humanity with impetuosity, humility with power. Be independent and hold for the right and let your whole strength go to improve and not destroy God’s creatures.”

Descendants of Nathaniel Ballou (1687-c1747)

1) Oliver Ballou (1763-1843) was a grandson of Nathaniel Ballou. Born in Cumberland, Rhode Island, he was a carpenter and builder who did work for Samuel Slater, who, with his textile mill in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, brought the Industrial Revolution to America. In 1814 Oliver and his son, Dexter Ballou (1789-1849), both Universalists, built their own cotton mill in Cumberland. They moved the business to Woonsocket Falls, Rhode Island in 1817. Overcoming losses due to an 1829 mill fire, Dexter expanded the firm into one of the largest in Woonsocket and purchased another mill in 1841. He promoted temperance and was interested in employee welfare. He started the Woonsocket Falls Bank, of which he was president, 1828-49, and hosted early organizational meetings of the Universalist society. His younger brother George Colburn Ballou (1798-1876), also a Universalist, began his own Woonsocket spinning mill in 1829. He built up his own business, bought control of several other mills, and acquired hundreds of acres of farming lands. By the time of his death he was a millionaire.

Sullivan Ballou
Sullivan Ballou

Major Sullivan Ballou (1827-1861) was the grandson of Oliver’s brother Ziba (1765-1829). Sullivan’s father, Hiram (1802-1833), and his Universalist uncles Jonathan Ballou (1792-1869) and Henry Green Ballou (1806-1882) were tailors in Woonsocket. Orphaned young, Sullivan was encouraged and sponsored by Universalist relatives and helped by the eminent Woonsocket Universalist lawyer and politician, Christopher Robinson (1806-1889). After growing up in Smithfield, Rhode Island, Sullivan worked for a year in a store in Rochester, New York. He then studied at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, 1846-48; Brown University, in Providence, Rhode Island, 1848-50; and at the National Law School in Ballston, New York. Admitted to the Rhode Island Bar in 1853, he practiced law in Smithfield and in Providence. He was clerk of the Rhode Island House of Representatives, 1854-56, and, starting in 1857, member of the House for Smithfield. He was chosen Speaker of the House.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Sullivan Ballou organized the 2nd Rhode Island Regiment of Militia and was chosen its major. At the first Battle of Bull Run (Manassas) in 1861 he was hit by a cannon ball and shortly afterwards died of his wounds. He is today best remembered for a letter that he sent to his wife on the eve of battle. “A pure love of my country,” he wrote, “and of the principles I have often advocated before the people, another name of honor that I love more than I fear death, has called upon me and I have obeyed. Sarah, my love for you is deathless: it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break, and yet my love of country comes over me like a strong wind, and bears me irresistibly on, with all these chains, to the battle-field.” The following year, the Rhode Island Universalist Convention paid “a high and deserved tribute” to Major Ballou “who was largely instrumental in organizing the Convention.”

3) Another grandson of the first Nathaniel Ballou was his namesake, Nathaniel Ballou (1750-1838). His sons, New York State farmers Stephen Ballou (1778-1866) and Michael Ware Ballou (1780-1865), became Universalists.

Their nephew, Eli Ballou (1808-1883), was born in Leroy, New York. His father, Chester, died when he was eight and Eli was bought up by his mother, Rachel Hayworth, a Quaker. He later lived with a Universalist family and was converted by listening to their preacher and reading their religious literature. Inspired to become a preacher, he studied theology and in 1831 was given Universalist fellowship by the St. Lawrence Association. Like the Restorationists, he believed in a period of discipline in the afterlife. He preached in northern New York State and nearby Canada, 1832-33, then settled in Swanton, Vermont, 1833-37, and in Stowe and Morristown, Vermont, 1837-40. After recovering from a severe illness, he bought the Christian Repository, which he published and edited, 1840-70. In this editorial post he was widely influential amongst Universalists. He preached in Kansas and Iowa, 1870-72. Returning to Vermont, he settled in South Woodstock, 1872-79; Barnard and Bethel, 1879-1882; and East Montpelier, 1882-83. He received an honorary D.D from a college in Kentucky around 1860.

Descendants of Obadiah Ballou (1689-1768)

Grandchildren of Obadiah Ballou were Captain Jesse Ballou (1741-1800) and Levi Ballou (1744-1805), brothers who farmed in the Ballou neighborhood of Cumberland, Rhode Island. Jesse was converted to Universalism by the preaching of Hosea Ballou. Levi, who became a Universalist as well, was a justice of the peace and a representative in the Rhode Island House.

Jesse’s son, Darius Ballou (1762-1829), became an outspoken advocate of Universalism. According to Adin Ballou, “there were few laymen in all the country who could more ably argue in its defense. He was clear-headed, a remarkably fluent talker, and never turned his back to an opponent.”

Levi’s son, Levi Ballou, Jr. (1782-1836), a local civic leader in the Ballou neighborhood, was also an advocate of Hosea Ballou’s theology who in 1822 debated with his friend Adin Ballou, then a minister of the Christian Connexion. That spring Levi invited Adin to attend a meeting of the Southern Association of Universalists in Wrentham, Massachusetts. There Adin met Hosea Ballou 2d, who befriended him and eventually helped him into Universalist fellowship.

Levi Jr.’s younger brother, Olney Ballou (1784-1849), a Universalist, was a brick and stone mason and a prominent state politician, serving in both the House and the Senate. He was a friend and supporter of Thomas Dorr, who led the abortive Dorr Rebellion in 1841.

Barton Ballou (1791-1844), the youngest of Levi Sr.’s sons, studied at Brown University, 1809-16, receiving an M.A. degree. While at university he taught at an academy in Wickford, Rhode Island. He was hired to teach at Nichols Academy, a new Universalist school in Dudley, Massachusetts, but, shortly after he began work, the school burned down. He then went to Baltimore, Maryland and worked as a private tutor. After barely recovering from yellow fever, in 1820 he returned to New England, where he studied for the ministry under Hosea Ballou. He was given Universalist fellowship at the 1822 meeting of the Southern Association, the first Universalist meeting attended by his cousin Adin Ballou. Although he was promoted by his mentor for his intellectual qualities, Barton Ballou, a poor preacher and in uncertain health, was unable to get a call from any Universalist church. He returned to the Ballou neighborhood and worked again as a schoolteacher. When in 1831 Adin Ballou listed him as an agent for the new Restorationist newspaper, the Independent Messenger, Barton complained that his Universalist reputation had been injured by having his name associated with the Restorationists. According to Adin Ballou, “the closing years of Rev. Barton’s life were draped with somber mental depression.”

Levi Ballou Jr. had two notable Universalist sons, Eliab Metcalf Ballou (1805-1857) and Latimer Whipple Ballou (1812-1900). Eliab, a mason and an owner of the Woonsocket Baking Company, was an active member of the Woonsocket Universalist society and a teacher in the Sunday school.

Latimer W. Ballou
Latimer W. Ballou

Latimer W. Ballou was trained as a printer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He then worked for the Harvard University printing office and was a founding partner of the Cambridge Press. In 1842 he moved back to Woonsocket where he worked in a brother-in-law’s store. In 1850 he began a long and successful career in banking, eventually becoming treasurer of the Woonsocket Institution for Savings. A local organizer and leader of the Republican Party, he introduced Abraham Lincoln when Lincoln made a campaign speech in Woonsocket and served as an elector for Lincoln in the 1860 Electoral College. Ballou served in the United States House of Representatives, 1874-80. A close friend of his minister, John Boyden, he was the leading layperson in the Woonsocket Universalist church and for decades the superintendent of the Sunday school. He published several Universalist pamphlets, including Questions in Relation to Sin and Its Consequences, Salvation, and Destiny, 1883. In 1887 he was awarded an honorary LL.D. by Tufts University.

Sources

A great deal of information about the Ballou family can be drawn from Adin Ballou’s An Elaborate History and Genealogy of the Ballous in America (1888). In the introduction he lays out a theory of the Norman origin of the Ballous which is critiqued by Lynn Gordon Hughes in “The European Origin of the Ballou Family,” available at test.ballewassociation.org/about-us/origins Some of the ministers in the family have obituaries in the Universalist Register. There is information on Ballous who served churches in Vermont in Edith Fox MacDonald, Rebellion in the Mountains: the Story of Universalism and Unitarianism in Vermont (1976). For Ballou ministers in Massachusetts, see Works Projects Administration, Inventory of Universalist Archives in Massachusetts (1942). On the family of Hosea Ballou, there is Thomas Whittemore, Life of Rev. Hosea Ballou, vol. 1 (1853), Maturin Murray Ballou, Biography of Rev. Hosea Ballou (1852), and Ernest Cassara, Hosea Ballou: the Challenge to Orthodoxy (1961). There is information on Adin Ballou’s family, and on some distantly related Ballous, in Adin Ballou, Autobiography of Adin Ballou (1896); Adin Ballou, History of the Hopedale Community (1897); Adin Ballou, Memoir of Adin Augustus Ballou (1853); Hopedale Reminiscences (1910); and Edward K. Spann, Hopedale: From Commune to Company Town, 1840-1920 (1992). There is mention of Sullivan Ballou’s Universalism in the Woonsocket Patriot (June 20, 1862) and correspondence of Barton Ballou in the early 1831 issues of the Independent Messenger. Benjamin Ballou’s poem is in Hosea Ballou, A Voice to Universalists (1849). See also Thomas Whittemore, “History of the Universalist Society in Portsmouth,” Universalist Miscellany (September, 1848); Erastus Richardson, History of Woonsocket (1876); Richard Eddy, Universalism in America, 2 volumes (1884 and 1886); New England Historical and Genealogical Register (1906); Elmo Robinson, The Universalist Church in Ohio (1923); Donald Watt, From Heresy Toward Truth (1971); and Russell Miller, The Larger Hope, vol. 1 (1979). The Sullivan Ballou picture is courtesy of the Medusa/S.S. Foss Media Center.

Article by Peter Hughes
Posted February 12, 2007