The Trans-Atlantic Quaker Book Trade

Abstract

In addition to the traded goods discussed in the previous chapter, Thomas Lurting carried books on his ships and Maryland Quakers were grateful for a shipment of books from George Fox delivered by Lurting in 1688.¹ Quaker ministers, like Thomas Chalkley, wrote accounts of their travels, which could then be distributed to Friends. Lurting and Chalkley are just two examples that demonstrate that Quaker trans- Atlantic networks supported the exchange of books among dispersed Quaker communities, as introduced in Chapter 2. Books were part of a strategy developed by Quaker ministers to spread and defend the faith, then later to keep colonial Quakers informed of emerging discipline from London. Those involved in the trans-Atlantic Quaker book trade, from the Morning Meeting to printers to Quaker merchants, combined the use of the London Yearly Meeting’s structure and networks with a process both under the meetings for discipline and outside of them. The book trade was one aspect of the larger Quaker Atlantic world, bring- ing together doctrine, religion, and commerce. With procedures in place for printing their own works, as well as increased travel and communi- cation across the Atlantic, Quakers had an opportunity to utilize one to strengthen the other. The London Yearly Meeting’s emerging role as disseminator of faith and protector of the public representation of Quakerism relied heavily on the mobility of print, first in Britain, then in Ireland, Europe, and finally in the American and Caribbean colonies.