Abel Turner, The Life and Travels of Abel Turner 1839

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Abel Turner, The Life and Travels of Abel Turner MS 708 bd., 1839

Abel Turner, The Life and Travels of Abel Turner 1839

http://asteria.fivecolleges.edu/findaids/umass/mums708.html

As a young man in Foxcroft, Maine, Abel Turner was caught up in the evangelical revivals and converted to Free Will Baptism, becoming a minister by the age of 21. Beginning in the backwoods settlements, Turner spent the better part of a decade attempting to "convert sinners" in Piscataquis and Penobscot Counties and the in the Burned-Over District of New York state, from Utica to Penn Yan and Cattaraugus County. Written for his wife, Abel Turner's long and detailed autobiography is a remarkable record of a young Free Will Baptist minister's labors during the Second Great Awakening. Beginning with his childhood in Maine and his conversion experience, the manuscript provides insight into Turner's experiences preaching in the rough-hewn interior settlements of Maine and the Burned-Over District of New York from roughly 1821 through 1839. In addition to some wonderful commentary on evangelical religion in the heart of the Awakening and on Turner's own spiritual development, the memoir includes fascinating descriptions of the towns and people he met along the way.

451p.; (0.2 linear feet)

eng,

Special Collections and University Archives, UMass Amherst Libraries