1571: A group of Spanish Jesuits in the Chesapeake Bay area,
led by Fray Batista Segura, were murdered by the Indians they had come six months earlier
to convert. The massacre led ultimately to the withdrawal of all Jesuits living in Florida
as well.
1678: John Bunyan's
"Pilgrim's Progress" was first published, in England. Bunyan was frequently
imprisoned for preaching without a license. During these sequestered times, between
1660-72, Bunyan collected the ideas enabling him to pen this masterpiece of Christian
literature.
1688: At a monthly
meeting in Germantown, PA, a group of Quakers and Mennonites became the first white body
in English America to register a formal protest against slavery. The historic
"Germantown Protest" denounced both slavery and the slave trade.
1781: Birth of
Henry Martyn, Anglican missionary to Persia. Martyn first sailed for the East in 1805. His
great linguistic gifts led him to translate the New Testament both into Hindustani and
Arabic, before his premature death at 31.
1867: The Augusta
Institute was founded in Georgia. Established as an institution of higher learning for
black students, it moved to Atlanta in 1879, and in 1913 changed its name to Morehouse
College.
Source: William D. Blake. Almanac
of the Christian Church, Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987. Additional
information supplied by the author. Contact via E-mail: William D. Blake. (pilgrimwb@aol.com)
