Very rare work on early Baptists in America by Southern Baptist firebrand and controversialist, J. R. [James Robinson] Graves [1820-1893]. After briefly recounting the history of Baptists from the book of Acts through the early 17th century, he gets to his point, i.e. that Baptists have always existed in America, even prior to Roger Williams and the church at Providence [1638], and that they have always been persecuted and champions of true religious liberty. It is also implied that much of the true Baptist heritage lies in the south.
Graves was founder of the South-Western Publishing House, and this seems to be one of, if not "the," earliest of their publications. Importantly, he would gain the rights to publish stereotyped pocket New Testaments in 1861 in Tennessee to distribute to the Confederate troops during the Civil War.
Graves, J. R. [Ed.]. Trials and Sufferings for Religious Liberty in New England. The Oldest Baptist Church in America not the Providence Church. Nashville. South-Western Publishing House. 1857. 215pp.
A good copy, bound in rubbed and dulled cloth. Lightly shaken with moderate foxing as shown, and handled pages. The blank ffep lacking. Ex library markings.
