The Church Militant: The American Loyalist Clergy and the Making of the British Counterrevolution, 1701-92 Peter W. Walker Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2016 © 2016 Peter Walker All rights reserved ABSTRACT The Church Militant: The American Loyalist Clergy and the Making of the British Counterrevolution, 1701-92 Peter W. Walker This dissertation is a study of the loyalist Church of England clergy in the American Revolution. By reconstructing the experience and identity of this largely-misunderstood group, it sheds light on the relationship between church and empire, the role of religious pluralism and toleration in the American Revolution, the dynamics of loyalist politics, and the religious impact of the American Revolution on Britain. It is based primarily on the loyalist clergy’s own correspondence and writings, the records of the American Loyalist Claims Commission, and the archives of the SPG (the Church of England’s missionary arm). The study focuses on the New England and Mid-Atlantic colonies, where Anglicans formed a religious minority and where their clergy were overwhelmingly loyalist. It begins with the founding of the SPG in 1701 and its first forays into America. It then examines the state of religious pluralism and toleration in New England, the polarising contest over the proposed creation of an American bishop after the Seven Years’ War, and the role of the loyalist clergy in the Revolutionary War itself, focusing particularly on conflicts occasioned by the Anglican liturgy and Book of Common Prayer. The dissertation proceeds to follow those loyalist clergy who left the Thirteen Colonies as refugees, tracing their reception in Britain, their influence on conservative churchmen there, and their role in rebuilding the imperial Church of England in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Particular attention is given to the relationship between the loyalist refugees, the English high church movement, and the Scottish Episcopal Church. Bridging British, Canadian, and colonial American history, the dissertation suggests that the American Revolution galvanised an Anglican religious revival in the British Empire and shaped an emerging alliance between the Church of England and conservative politics. It ends in the 1790s, as this alliance solidified under the influence of the French Revolution. Most scholarship on religion and the American Revolution is ultimately concerned with the politics of the revolution. This dissertation, by contrast, asks how the politics of the revolution affected the religious lives of those who lived through it. It provides a sympathetic account of the loyalist clergy’s religious identities and beliefs, and situates them in the context of early-modern British religious history. In doing so, it reconstructs a distinct spiritual culture which was concerned with the holiness of suffering, persecution, and martyrdom. It locates the clergy’s loyalism in the longer history of political martyrdom, a category that has been overlooked by secular-minded historians of loyalism. The loyalist clergy were also preoccupied with the lack of state support for the colonial Church of England. Together with their allies and sympathizers in Britain, they formulated a powerful critique of the British Empire’s religious pluralism: an important but overlooked contribution to counter-enlightenment and counter-revolutionary thought in Britain. By studying that critique, this dissertation highlights the limits of state support for the colonial Church of England prior to the American Revolution, and identifies a turn towards greater state support in the wake of American independence. TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ iii Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................ iv Note on Spelling ........................................................................................................................... vii Introduction ................................................................................................................................... 1 “A War of Religion”? The Loyalist Clergy and the American Revolution ............................ 5 An Ecclesiastical Conglomerate: The Loyalist Clergy and the British Empire .................... 19 Chapter Outline ..................................................................................................................... 34 1. Episcopizing New England: Anglican Missionary Enterprise in America, 1701-63 ........ 39 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 39 The SPG and the American Mission Field ........................................................................... 43 The Anglican Great Awakening in New England ................................................................ 59 The SPG and the New England Churches: Denominational Competition or Religious Warfare? ................................................................................................................................ 69 “The Maintenance of an Orthodox Clergy”: The Mayhew-Apthorp Controversy ............... 74 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 81 2. “The Fountain of all our Misery”: The Bishop Campaign and the Growth of Anglican Disaffection, 1763-70 ............................................................................................................ 84 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 84 The SPG Missionaries and the Bishop Question, 1701-63 ................................................... 92 The Ecclesiastical Settlement of Quebec ............................................................................ 103 “The Principles of the Toleration”: Thomas Secker’s Proposal for a Bishop .................... 107 The SPG Missionaries’ Campaign for a Bishop ................................................................. 113 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 126 3. Loyalist Martyrs: Praying for the King in the American Revolution.............................. 130 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 130 Voices in the Wilderness: The Emergence of Anglican Loyalism, 1766-74 ...................... 137 Oaths, Perjury, and Prayers for the King: Anglican Loyalism as a Religious Test ............ 142 i Suffering, Persecution, and Martyrdom: Agency and Victimhood in Anglican Loyalism 153 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 161 4. His Majesty’s Suffering Church: The American Refugee Clergy and the Roots of Imperial Reform ................................................................................................................ 164 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 164 Trauma, Displacement, and Exile: The Experience of the Loyalist Refugee Clergy ......... 168 Sympathy, Suffering, and Memory: The Identity of the Loyalist Refugee Clergy ............ 179 Church, State, and Nation: The Reception of the Loyalist Refugee Clergy ....................... 189 The American Loyalist Claims Commission ...................................................................... 196 “Immortal Honour”: Samuel Peters’s Loyalist History ...................................................... 204 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 207 5. The Church Triumphant? American Independence and the Rebirth of the Imperial Church of England ............................................................................................................ 210 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 210 Loyalist Proposals for Imperial Church Reform ................................................................. 216 The Reconstruction of Ecclesiastical Sovereignty after American Independence ............. 231 “Paroxysm of Moderation”: The American Émigrés and the English High Church Movement ........................................................................................................................... 243 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 254 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 258 Bibliography .............................................................................................................................. 273 ii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Map of the northern colonies in 1730 p. 52 Figure 2: Seal of the SPG p. 58 Figure 3: Chart showing number of SPG missionaries by region, 1719-75