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Digital Collections

bMS 366

Ballou, Hosea. Papers, 1810-1890.

Summary Information:

Call Number: bMS 366
Title: Ballou, Hosea. Papers, 1810-1890
Repository: Andover-Harvard Theological Library, Harvard Divinity School, 45 Francis Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138-1911
Quantity: 2 boxes

Administrative Information:

Acquisition Information: Gift of the Universalist Historical Society, 1976.
Access: There are no restrictions on access to this collection.

Biographical Information:

Hosea Ballou (1771-1852) began his career as an itinerant preacher in Vermont and Massachusetts in 1791. He was ordained during the Universalist Convention in Oxford, Massachusetts, in 1794, and he served the "Sister Societies" of Barnard, Woodstock, Hartland, Bethel, and Bridgewater, Vermont, from 1803 to 1817. He accepted a call to the Second Universalist Church of Boston in 1817, and became known as the most influential preacher in the second generation of the Universalist movement. His most well-known works, A Treatise on Atonement (1805) and An Examination of the Doctrine of Future Retribution (1834), altered the philosophies of many of his ministerial colleagues and their congregations. Ballou's theology was based on reason, which led him to reject the Trinitarian doctrine, and as early as 1795, he was preaching a unitarian form of Universalism. Ballou founded the Universalist newspaper known as the Universalist Magazine (later the Trumpet and Universalist Magazine) in 1819 to further the ideals of Universalism. He served as pastor of the Second Universalist Church (Boston) from 1817 until his death in 1852. For further information about the Ballou family, please see bMS 128, bMS 351, bMS 359.

Container List:

bMS 366/1 (1) Workbook containing sermon notes dated on cover Nov. 17, 1848.
bMS 366/1 (2) "Gems of Thought," 1853. Volume 1. This is a collection of excerpts from Ballou's published and unpublished writings compiled by his sons and intended for publication but apparently never published.
bMS 366/1 (3) "Gems of Thought." Volume 2.
bMS 366/2 (1) "Gems of Thought." Volume 3.
bMS 366/2 (2) "Gems of Thought." Volume 4.
Note: The first six of these letters were published in A Series of Letters between the Rev. Joseph Buckminster, D.D., the Rev. Joseph Walton, A.M., Pastors of Congregational Churches in Portsmouth, N.H., and the Rev. Hosea Ballou. (1811).
bMS 366/2 (3) Joseph Walton to Hosea Ballou, Nov. 19/Dec. 7, 1810. Copy in Walton's hand.
Two copies.
bMS 366/2 (5) Joseph Walton to Hosea Ballou, 28 Dec. 1810. (?) Copy in Walton's hand. In the published edition of these letters, this letter is dated Jan. 11, 1811, and Ballou's letter of Jan. 15 would seem to support this date.
bMS 366/2 (6) Hosea Ballou to Joseph Walton, Jan. 5, 1811.
bMS 366/2 (7) Hosea Ballou to Joseph Walton, Jan. 15, 1811.
bMS 366/2 (8) Hosea Ballou to Joseph Walton, Feb. 1, 1811.
bMS 366/2 (9) Hosea Ballou to the Universalist Society of Salem, Oct. 22, 1817.
bMS 366/2 (10) Hosea Ballou to John M. Niles, April 19, 1824.
bMS 366/2 (11) Hosea Ballou to Pitt Morse, July 29, 1824.
bMS 366/2 (12) Theophilus Fisk to Hosea Ballou, Dec. 29, 1827.
bMS 366/2 (13) Hosea Ballou to Ruth Ballou, Nov. 3, 1834.
bMS 366/2 (14) William Hooper to Hosea Ballou, fragment, n.d. On the back, Ballou, or somebody, has listed expenses and set the beatitudes to verse.
bMS 366/2 (15) Ballou family correspondence: Resolution of Second Universalist Sunday School on Hosea Ballou's death. Letter from Ruth Ballou in reply. Letter to Ruth Ballou from Second Society of Universalists, 11 June 1852, with her answer. Letter from Thomas J. Sawyer to Massena B. Ballou, April 18, 1890, on Hosea Ballou's belief in miraculous birth of Christ.
bMS 366/2 (16) "O thou who hast the battle fought. . ." Poem signed H.B.
bMS 366/2 (17) Copy of Hosea Ballou's will, September 24, 1844, with probate order, June 14, 1852.
bMS 366/2 (18) Miscellaneous documents: Notice of shares to be paid, April 18, 1825; City and country tax bill, Boston, Sept. 8, 1837.
bMS 366/2 (19) Order of service at Ballou's funeral, June 9, 1852. Printed broadside.
bMS 366/2 (20) Miscellaneous newspaper clippings with writings of Ballou.
bMS 366/2 (21) Miscellaneous newspaper clippings with contemporary references to Ballou, principally on his death.
bMS 366/2 (22) Photographs.