Apr 26, 2018
by Janet Thorngate
Part 1: An Indian whose name is Japeth
Second in a series of spinoff articles from recent research on the Newport, Rhode Island, Seventh Day Baptists
Several Native Americans joined the Newport, RI, Seventh Day Baptist Church, but none of them lived in Rhode Island.1 A letter from Ruth Burdick in Westerly, Rhode Island Colony, to her father Samuel Hubbard in Newport, records the actual circumstances of the three earliest baptisms after the founding of the church in 1671.
I judge it my duty to make use of this opportunity to impart to you the dealings and good hand of our God unto us. He hath been at work, as we believe in ye hearts of some of the inhabitants of New London, and bowing their hearts to be obedient unto the Lord Jesus: The names of them is John Rogers, James Rogers his brother & ye third an Indian whose name is Jepheth, who gave a very satisfactory account of ye work of grace wrought upon his heart.
That was in February. The Rogers family of New London, Connecticut Colony had called John Crandall over from nearby Westerly. He had preached among them and baptized John, James, and Japeth.2 Later a third brother, Jonathan, decided he wanted to be baptized “but judged himself unfit.” John Crandall was too sick with a winter fever to go again to New London and do another baptism so “they sent to Newport, and Elder Hiscox, Mr. Hubbard, and his son-in-law Clarke, were sent to visit them in March 1675, when Jonathan Rogers was also baptized, and all four of them were received as members of their church by prayer and laying on of hands.”
Japeth and the Rogers Family
That was the first of many trips back and forth between Newport and New London. Japeth always accompanied the three brothers as they sailed one of the family ships the long day’s trip up Long Island Sound to Narragansett Bay, usually returning the next day with William Hiscox and a couple other church members. Hiscox preached and eventually baptized most members of the extended Rogers family. Samuel Hubbard refers warmly to “our precious brother Japeth” in several of his letters. In one to John Rogers, he says, “I pray remember my true love to brother Jepheth, the first of New England Indians: encourage him in the Lord.”
James Rogers, the father of John, James, and Jonathan, was a wealthy landowner and merchant in New London. Probably Japeth was one of the slaves or indentured servants who worked in the family’s fields and commercial interests. His Christian commitment, however, seems to have been his own decision. “Old father Rogers” and his wife and daughter were not baptized until the next year. Eventually, his son John led most of the family away from the SDB church forming the group that became known as the Rogerenes.
Japeth Disciplined by the Church
Ironically it was the youngest son Jonathan—who remained a faithful SDB all his life—who, along with Japeth, was a target of the first recorded disciplinary action of the Newport church. “A letter of reproof was written to Jonathan Rogers, for carrying a burden on the sabbath…” signed on behalf of the church by eight members. “And they sent another letter of reproof at the same time to Japeth, Indian, for growing cold and vain.” We can only guess at the myriad possible reasons why Japeth may have become “cold and vain.” Alas, that is the last we hear of him.
Japeth was, indeed, “the first of New England Indians” baptized as a Sabbathkeeping Baptist. The others lived
on Martha’s Vineyard, the large island about forty-five miles southeast off the coast of Newport. Relationships between the Native Americans and the English colonists on Martha’s Vineyard followed a very different pattern than those on the southern New England mainland.
Most of what we know about the church members there also comes from Samuel Hubbard’s correspondence (before official records begin). However, a curious note in later Ist Hopkinton church records reopens the mystery of what became of them.
More on this in the next article in this series!
1 Sources for the Newport Church information in this article may be found in Baptists in Early North America: Newport, Rhode Island, Seventh Day Baptists by Janet Thorngate (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2017), particularly pages 35-37, 43-47, and 58. In addition to a history of the church in its historical context, the book includes the previously unpublished church records and the collected writings of Samuel Hubbard pertinent to the church’s history. The book may be ordered from the publisher for $60: www.mupress.org or Mercer University Press, 501 Mercer Univ. Dr., Macon GA 31207. A few copies are available from the SDB Center.
2 The name Japeth was variously spelled including Jepheth and Jephtha. All we know of him is from Samuel Hubbard’s correspondence, portions transcribed by several different people before the originals were lost.