MAKEMIE, FRANCIS

Presbyterian minister, missionary, and businessman, a leader of the presbyterians in the American Middle Colonies; b. Ramelton, County Donegal, Ireland, 1653;d. 1708. He was trained at Glasgow, Scotland, and ordained (1682) for service in America. From correspondence with Increase mather, the Boston, Puritan leader, who helped English Presbyterians unite with Congregationalists after the breakdown of English state Presbyterianism, Makemie derived some of the concepts that formed American Presbyterianism. He was sent to Maryland (1683) by the Presbytery of Laggan, Ireland, and resided in Accomac County, VA, and Rehoboth, MD (1691, 1698–1708). He disputed with the Quaker, George Keith, advocating a reformed ecclesiology. Beginning in 1698, Makemie organized Presbyterian congregations in Maryland, recruited clergy in England, and took the lead in founding the Presbytery of Philadelphia (1706), the parent body of American Presbyterianism. He was its first moderator (chairman). In a famous incident, Makemie was arrested by Lord Cornbury, Governor of New York, and imprisoned six to eight weeks on a charge of being a "strolling preacher." Makemie claimed the protection of the English Act of Toleration of 1689 and the validity of his previous license to preach, issued in the Barbados, British West Indies. His victory disgraced Cornbury, who was recalled, to the advantage of religious liberty in the colonies.

Bibliography: l. j. trinterud, The Forming of An American Tradition (Philadelphia 1949). Journal of the Presbyterian Historical Society (Philadelphia 1901–) v.4, 15, 18. Some materials are deposited in the Presbyterian Historical Society, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

[e. a. smith]