Baptists in Readfield - "Bowdoinham Association"

Dedicated Baptist missionaries spread the word in
the backcountry of Central Maine in the 1790's.

By 1790 in the Central part of the state (where Readfield is located) newcomers were rapidly settling the area. That led to the development of the Bowdoinham Association, which began its gradual development simultaneously with the York Association (see below FMI). Churches organized prior to 1800 in the Bowdoinham Association included: Bowdoin 1783; Lewiston 1792; Readfield 1792; Fayette 1792; Greene 1793; Wayne 1794; 2^nd Lewiston (Webster) 1794; Litchfield 1798; Wales 1799; and Jay 1799.


Elder James Potter, Rev. Isaac Case and Rev. Eliphalet Smith were responsible for bringing the Baptist's message to Readfield and the immediate area, where the Baptists were established even before the Methodists, for which Readfield is best known. See this blog for more information about Potter, Case and Smith. 


"The first Baptist association in the Province of Maine was in York County and was called the York Association. It was begun in 1776 with three churches, one of them being in New Hampshire. By 1790 when the population of Maine included 3,572 families living in 2,789 houses, there were only 11 Baptist churches with not more than 500 members.
It appears from dates given that the third Baptist church in Maine to be recognized was the one in Sanford in 1772 and in Oct.1780 fourteen persons were set apart under newly ordained Nathaniel Lord in the town of Wells. Shapleigh (1781) was next as a few pious Baptists united together for worship under Nehemiah Davis and in nearby Lyman twenty-nine members were constituted a Baptist church where Simon Locke faithfully presided until he died in1821. Davis and Locke succeeded in establishing a Baptist church in Waterborough in 1791 which later joined the Saco River Assoc. Other late Baptist churches in the York Association was Buxton in 1799 from which later the churches in Hollis and Scarborough owed their existence."
Source: "Old Maine Pastor, History of Baptists in Maine http://www.oldmainepastor.com/baptist-history-in-maine.html