Joseph Bates Jr.
"Founder of the Seventh-day Adventist Church"
(1792-1872)
Joseph Bates Jr. was about a year old in 1793 when his parents, Col. Joseph and Deborah (Nye) Bates, moved with their family into the house in Oxford Village that they purchased from Zerviah Wood. Built in 1742, the house, now numbered 191 Main Street, was one of the oldest in the area. Here young Joseph grew up in a well educated and devout household, his father being both a Deacon of the Congregational Church and a founder of the New Bedford Academy.
Living in a busy seaside community, young Joseph dreamed of sailing on the world’s oceans. With his parents’ permission, he became a cabin boy on the ship Fanny at the age of fifteen and went to sea. Not long afterward, though, he was impressed into service by the British navy and locked up Dartmoor Prison during the War of 1812. Finally released in 1815, he returned to Fairhaven after a lengthy absence, but soon shipped out as a second mate on a merchant ship. Bates rose through the ranks to become a captain by the age of 28.
During the time his career was advancing, Joseph Bates Jr. married Miss Prudence Nye and joined the Christian Church that his wife had become involved in. This liberal group promoted individual freedom of thought and adult Baptism. By 1824, Bates had signed a personal covenant to serve God. He also gave up all alcoholic drinks as well as coffee and tea and adopted a more healthy lifestyle.
During the time his career was advancing, Joseph Bates Jr. married Miss Prudence Nye and joined the Christian Church that his wife had become involved in. This liberal group promoted individual freedom of thought and adult Baptism. By 1824, Bates had signed a personal covenant to serve God. He also gave up all alcoholic drinks as well as coffee and tea and adopted a more healthy lifestyle.
In August of 1846, Bates wrote a 48-page booklet titled “The Seventh-day Sabbath, A Perpetual Sign,” and had it printed by Benjamin Lindsey of New Bedford. A copy of Bates’ tract was sent to James and Ellen White, prominent Adventist preachers. When Ellen White claimed that a vision from God confirmed the Joseph Bates’ theory, the Seventh-day Adventist message quickly spread.
Bates sold all of his property in Fairhaven in 1858, paid off his debts and moved to the vicinity of Battle Creek, Michigan, which was a center for the growing Seventh-day Adventist movement. There, on May 21, 1863, the Seventh-day Adventist Church was officially organized. Nine years later Joseph Bates Jr. died, on May 7, 1872.
“It is my earnest desire,” Bates wrote in his autobiography, “to spend the remainder of my days in the service of God . . . that I may have a place in his soon-coming kingdom.”
SITES ASSOCIATED WITH JOSEPH BATES JR.
JOSEPH BATES BOYHOOD HOME (1742)
191 Main Street, Fairhaven, MA
Hours by Appointment
The front part of this house was built about 1742 by William Wood, who had purchased the entire Oxford area from Philip Taber a year or two earlier. The house was bought in 1793 by Joseph Bates, Sr. a prominent businessman who helped found the New Bedford (later Fairhaven) Academy in 1798.
Bates’ son, Joseph Bates Jr., grew up here before going to sea at the age of fifteen. After retiring as a sea captain, Bates began the local temperance movement and was one of the builders of the Washington Street Meetinghouse. He became a follower of William Miller who was predicting the Second Advent of Christ. Following the “Great Disappointment” when the predicted event did not occur, Bates wrote a treatise proposing that in order for the Biblical prophecies to come to pass, the Sabbath should be celebrated on Saturdays, the seventh day of the week. Thus Bates founded of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, which was officially established in 1863.
The house, visited by thousands of Seventh-day Adventists over the years, was purchased in 2006 by the Adventist Historical Properties, Inc., which has undertaken a restoration. It is open to the public by appointment during the spring, summer and early fall. You may call 774-328-6247 to arrange a group tour or email communityevents@comcast.net. You may visit the website at https://www.adventistheritage.org/ahm-sites/joseph-bates-home.
On the property, directly to the east of the Bates house, stand the remains of the Capt. Thomas Taber house (ca. 1678).
FAIRHAVEN ACADEMY BUILDING (1798)
141 Main Street, Fairhaven, MA
Hours by Appointment
The building, once a private school financed by a group of prominent residents including Levi Jenne, Noah Stoddard, Killey Eldredge, Thomas Delano, Joseph Bates Sr., Robert Bennett and others, opened in 1800 as the New Bedford Academy. The name was changed to Fairhaven Academy after the incorporation of the town in 1812. In 1815, the Academy’s operators gave Joseph Bates Sr. the “whole care and superintendence” of the school.
WASHINGTON STREET MEETINGHOUSE (1832)
32 Washington Street, Fairhaven
(now Northeast Maritime Institute)
In 1832 Warren Delano I, Jabez Delano Jr. and Joseph Bates Jr. raised funds to build the Washington Street Christian Meeting-House on the northwest corner of Washington and Walnut streets. Prior to the building of the church, a group of Christian worshippers had been meeting at private homes and the Fairhaven Academy. In 1841, at the invitation of Joseph Bates Jr., William Miller delivered a series of lectures promoting his theory that the Second Advent of Christ would soon transpire, prompting a number of the congregation to break from the church and form the Second Advent Society.
CAPT. JOHN BUNKER HOUSE (1790)
209 Main Street, Fairhaven
(Private residence, not open to the public)
Once a Robert Bennett property, it is unknown who built the house or precisely when it as built. Captain John Bunker was originally from Nantucket and commanded several whaling vessels. He moved here about 1826 after buying the house from the heirs of his father-in-law Benjamin Sisson. The eastern portion of Oxford St. was once known as Bunker’s Lane. Bunker sold the “Chapel Lot” on North Street in 1850. He died in 1854 and is buried in Woodside Cemetery.
In an 1845 letter to his daughter Rebecca, Capt. Bunker reported that “Mr. Bates family is well and in the house with us,” an indication that Joseph Bates Jr. was living here after having sold his own Fairhaven property. The Bates family appears in census records with the Bunkers. According to the stories of a later owner of the house, it was here where Bates penned the religious treatise suggesting the Sabbath should be celebrated on the Seventh Day.
All historical information on this page was researched and written by Christopher Richard, who served as Fairhaven’s Tourism Director from 1996 to 2024.