Letter from Samuel Wolcott, Longmeadow, [Massachusetts], to Amos Augustus Phelps, 1846 March 9

Samuel Wolcott writes to Amos A. Phelps regarding information concerning the native converts and church relations in the Syrian Mission. He writes, "The members of the mission form of course a separate commission; but they have no distinct church organization. Some are of the Congregational, some of the Presbyterian, & ours is of the Reformed Dutch persuasion; & they all retain this connnection with the churches & scale." He continues to explain the work they are doing in Syria by stating "the expectation of reforming the native churches, though conversions within them, may have been entertained in its earliest stages, but the Syrian Mission had abandoned this line of policy; & as far as I am informed, it is still the only mission among the oriental churches, whose converts are admitted to a Protestant & separate communion."
Courtesy of Boston Public Library