American foreign missions

The missionary undertakings in Great Britain attracted the attention of Americans, and soon they were contributing to the expenses of the English stations. Yet it wasn’t until the nineteenth century that any national foreign society was organized. A group of Williams College students in 1806 formed the Haystack Band of volunteers. This group helped form the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, officially organized by the Congregationalists in 1810. Adoniram Judson and Luther Rice were the first missionaries sent by this society, sailing to India in 1812; although Judson and Rice soon transferred their allegiance to the Baptists over a dispute over baptism with their mission board. Judson and his wife Anne moved to Burma where they lived in the English Baptist mission home. He began an earnest study of the Burmese language, although it took him nearly six years to gain the necessary linguistic skills to preach in the native tongue. It was another six years before he led the first person to Christ. In 1824 the Anglo-Burmese war broke out and Judson was imprisoned for two years. Shortly after his release Anne died. Judson continued his work and in 1833 he completed a translation of the Bible into Burmese. During this time he married Sarah Hall Boardman, returning to America in 1845 due to her failing health. Sadly she died on the voyage. He went back to Burma in 1846 and spent the rest of his life working on a Burmese dictionary. Like his second wife, he also died at sea while sailing to Martinique where he hoped to recuperate from an illness.

Impact: For nearly thirty years Presbyterians and other Reformed churches contributed to the American Board, but at the end of that period denominational organization seemed to each group a better arrangement. Both Methodists and Episcopalians followed the example of the rest. Smaller denominations carried on independent operations in various regions.