Contains 26 pages of manuscript bound with the original publication
An offshoot of the original Congrgational Church in Woodstock, the parish was established about 1766 under the pastorship of the Reverend Abel Stiles. This volume, published in 1840, contains the Covenant and Confession of Faith, as well as a list of pastors and members of the congration as of that date. It also contains 26 pages of additional church history and membership by an unknown contributor.
Woodstock is a town in Windham County, Connecticut.
In the mid-17th century, John Eliot, a Puritan missionary to the American Indians, established "praying towns" where Native Americans took up Christianity and were expected to renounce their religious ceremonies, traditional dress, and customs. One Praying town, called Wabaquasset, six miles west of the Quinebaug River in present-day Woodstock, was the largest of the three northeastern Connecticut praying towns.
In 1675, when King Philip's War broke out, some of the town's Indians, (especially in the southern part of the town) sided with the Mohegans and the English while others sided with the Indians led by Philip, rallying to arms on what is now Curtis Island in present Holland, Massachusetts and Brimfield, Massachusetts. During the war, the Praying town became deserted, and the English with their Indian allies marched through Woodstock to present day Thompson in the summer of 1676 burning any crops or stored corn they could find.
In 1682, Massachusetts bought a tract of land, which included Woodstock, from the Mohegans. A group of 13 men from Roxbury, Massachusetts (home of the Pastorate of Woodstock's earlier visitor, John Eliot), settled the town in 1686 and named it New Roxbury. Judge Samuel Sewall suggested the town change its name to Woodstock in 1690, and in 1749 the town became part of Connecticut.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodstock,_Connecticut
