Ziba Pope Papers

Collection

Identifier: yhm-spe-pop

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The collection includes Pope’s personal journals from August 1812 to October 1832, regarding his travels. It includes 18 letters written to Pope by various correspondents between 1822 and 1851, mostly concerning money owed by Pope and other business matters. It also includes 2 letters written to Chloe by her niece Mrs. Otis in 1832 and 1838, 2 checks written by Pope to a Mr. Croful in 1848, a miscellaneous Vermont land deed copied in 1835, and Pope’s reading glasses.

There are also 2 account books of the John Miles & Co. lumber mill in the collection, covering the years 1818-1823, where Ziba Pope held an account. He also sometimes settled the accounts of others at this mill, records of which appear throughout the account books.

Three photos (printed in 1985) are included with the collection, showing a church in St. George, New Brunswick, Canada. A note on one of the photos tells us that Ziba Pope preached there. A letter transcribed in Journal 5 from a Reuel Hanks is dated St. George, possibly the same town. The addresses written on these letters are mostly to Lincoln VT, in Addison County. This was likely the home of Pope’s family for most of his traveling career.

In his journals, which include almost daily entries beginning August 25th, 1812, Pope notes the meetings he holds in various towns and his visits with fellow worshipers. His travels are mostly in Vermont but extend as far as the Boston area. His record-keeping entries are interspersed with some special memorial entries, frequently written to mark his birthday (July 4th), Christmas, or New Year’s, that are often prayers of thankfulness.

Dates

Creation: 1812-1851

Creator

Merrill, Thomas A. (Thomas Abbot), 1780-1855 (Person)
Pope, Ziba, 1779-1852 (Person)

Biographical / Historical

Ziba Pope was born on July 4th, 1779, according to his journals. Pope was a trader/smuggler established in the Passamaquoddy Bay region by ca 1805. For a time he lived at Eastport (Me), for a time he lived on Pope’s Folly (NB) where his smuggling warehouse was located, and for a time (ca 1808-1814) lived in the Magaguadavic River valley (St George parish) of Charlotte County. In 1814 he established his home at Randolph (Vt) but continued active in St George parish for a few years. Between 1809 and 1817 he bought or sold land 19 times, all transactions relating to sawmilling interests at Second Falls in St George parish. In 1817 he sold his last milling interests to Jacob Hanks, his foster brother, and centered his business in Vermont, first at Randolph and then Lincoln.

In 1812, in the course of driving a herd of smuggled cattle on the Great Road from St Andrews to Fredericton, Pope attended a religious meeting and was converted. An excerpt from the “History of the Baptists in Vermont” included in the collection lists him as being officially ordained in 1822. He immediately became a preacher and began a journal. The journal runs from 1812 to 1832 and deals exclusively with his spiritual life and gospel itineracy, not business. Pope was the first official preacher of the Free Will Baptist Church of Lincoln, established around 1832, and hosted its first official quarterly meeting in his barn. During the earlier years covered by the journal, he preached mostly in Charlotte County and in the townships of Yarmouth, Argyle and Barrington in Nova Scotia. From 1812 to 1821 he preached as a New Light in the tradition of Henry Alline. From 1822 until 1832 he preached as a Freewill Baptist. In 1832 he stopped preaching and concentrated on business for the rest of his life. His wife Chloe was from the Waters family of Massachusetts. His only son William Pope was born in Hingham, Massachusetts in 1807. He died in 1852.

- Smith, Henry Perry. A History of Addison County Vermont. D. Mason & Co., 1886. - https://search.canbarchives.ca/zibah-pope