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Baptist Church Records

The Church's own website can be found at www.sandhurstbaptistchurch.org.uk/. Pastor Ken Slater has allowed me access to material compiled by members a few years ago, and some of the files below are based on this.

G.J. Ballard lists the Baptist Pastors from 1731, as follows:

Rev. Thomas Potter(Petter?), 1731, died 1756

Rev. William Copping, 1757, died April 25th 1805

Supplies from 1805 to 1811

Rev. James Gates, 7th August 1811, died Jan 29th 1845

Rev. Daniel Jennings, October 21st 1845, resigned 20th April 1851.

To which should be added: Thomas Petter, Pastor from 1691 (or earlier) - died 1733. Father of the Thomas Petter above and the first homegrown Baptist Pastor. Also Samuel Petter, listed in SBC records as the first Pastor of the new Church building in 1733. Samuel is elusive, served only a short time and otherwise mostly escaped the records. However he did exist, though his relation to the Thomas Petters is unclear.

Registers 1785-1837. (So far as I know, there are no formal Church Registers of vital events before 1785)

Births registered 1785-1814 1812-1826 1823-1837 (you may be even more confused if you look at the original)

Burials 1785-1837 Not comprehensive.

Additional list of Burials in three files: A - E, F - RE, RO - W. A list compiled by members of the congregation from various sources, including monumental inscriptions, which may supply useful additional detail. See also the diary of John Pinyon.

Members 1853 and 1867. Based on lists compiled by members from unreferenced sources. Entries in John Pinyon's diaries suggest that these lists may not be comprehensive: see the notes below the 1853 table.

Minute Book 1761-1851. Original at Regent's Park College, Oxford. In four files:

File 1. Loose papers, & first part of Minute Book

File 2. Minute Book

File 3. Minute Book

File 4. Minute Book

Accounts. Original at Regent's Park College, Oxford. A partial transcription in two files, with a few sample pages fully transcribed. Includes all names and some entries of general or personal interest.

File 1.

File 2.

Wills of testators whose descendants may have had Baptist connections. File begun and currently stalled: surnames A & B only. Original transcriptions done by members of SBC. But see also the wills of Andrew Robbins Solomon Bate & Mary Mercer

Oddments: Chronology, Names, Meeting House Applications & Certificates, &c.

Reference

The following pamphlets, essays and books should help towards an appreciation of Baptist history locally and in the Weald:

W.T. Whitley; Baptists in the Weald of Kent; The Baptist Quarterly, July 1931.

General Baptists in the Weald; The Baptist Quarterly 1925, Vol. 2, pp 374-384.

G.J. Ballard, 200 Years History of Sandhurst Baptists; (local pamphlet) Copies obtainable from Regents Park College Library, Oxford.

C.W. Chalklin, The Compton Census 1676 for the Diocese of Canterbury & Rochester, Kent Records vol. 17, 1960, pp. 153-174

Eric H. Ballard, Three Centuries of Ballards; 1992, ISBN 0 9517656 04

David Espenett, Our Hugenot Ancestors; 1870

For Baptists in Maidstone & Tovil see:

Leonard J Maguire, The General Baptist Assembly, Occasional Paper No. 26, October 1999.

J M Russell, The History of Maidstone, 1881, Chapter 7: 'Nonconformity in Maidstone'

M C Thomsett, The Memorial Inscriptions of the Anabaptist Burial Ground at Tovil, Kent, 1979. This has lately been revised by Roger Thornburgh and is on the KAS website.

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