Browse the Abraham Hill sermon

Rev. Abraham Hill (1719-1788) was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1719. He graduated from Harvard in 1737, and taught at a school in Weston for a few years, where he married Thankful Allen. Hill was ordained as the first settled minister at the organization of the Congregational church in Shutesbury, Massachusetts in 1742 and served there for more than thirty years. When the Revolutionary War broke out, Hill was suspected of being a loyalist after he discouraged young men from joining the Continental Army. As a result, Hill was banned from preaching to his congregation. In February 1778, Hill was formally dismissed by an ecclesiastical council. He was also placed under house arrest. He moved to Oxford, Massachusetts and died there in 1788.

Materials in this collection have been digitized and made available through our New England's Hidden Histories project.