Page:History of Barrington, Rhode Island (Bicknell).djvu/239

 ACTION OF THE BAY COUNCIL. 189 Signed, Samuel Low, Daniel Allen, Benj. Viall, Israel Peck, Samuel Humphrey, Zachariah Bicknell, Nathaniel Peck, James Smith, Benj. Carey, Simon Davis, Thomas Turner, Joseph Chaffee, Thomas Tiffany, Jonathan Viall, Ebenezer Allen, John Chaffee, Josiah Ticknor, Daniel Allen, Jr., Obadiah Pettis, Elisha May, William Corbett, John Toogood, Samuel Jay, John Rogers, Joshua Phinney, Wm. Salisbury, Wm. Salisbury, Jr., Jonathan Phinney, Ebenezer Tiffany." This petition was the voice of earnest men. It set forth in the clearest language the sad condition of the people and their temporal and spiritual necessities. The reference to " the deplorable privation of " pious, learned, orthodox min- isters," had special point from the fact that the Baptists did not as a rule require an educated ministry and that the Swansea minister, Elder Luther, though a lineal descendant of the great reformer, was only an unlettered layman who had been promoted from the plough to the pulpit. The Bay Council read the petition on the 7th of June, 1 711, and ordered that the selectmen of Swansea be served with a copy, and that the parties should be heard thereto at Boston, on the second Wednesday in the next session of the Court. The selectmen of Swansea, Messrs. Carpenter, Anthony, and Mason, issued their warrant for a town meeting to be held on the 7th of July, 1711, to consider the prayer of the would-be seceders, and to give answer thereto if occasion should warrant. The town meeting was a full one as one might suppose, and after a heated debate, and "after due