JOANNA SOUTHCOTT AND HER FOLLOWERS

This collection consists of papers and correspondence of James Hayward of Bridgewater, a wholesale confectioner, and one of the most energetic of Joanna's followers in the West Country, with a wide circle of correspondents throughout the country. He also collected, during the middle and later nineteenth century, the papers of many other of Joanna's followers, most notably Edmund Baker, who was minister of a chapel held by the sect in Teddington, Middlesex from about 1809 to 1811, and later minister in Dowlish, Somerset. The collection includes a roll of members, and register book for the Teddington chapel (ACC/1040/1-3) and lists of members and signed testimonies from Dowlish and Ilminster c. 1812-1892 (ACC/1040/4-9) It also includes a large number of printed books by and concerning Joanna, many of them from the libraries of James Hayward and Edmund Baker.

• <persname>Southcott, Joanna, 1750-1814</persname>
• <persname>Hayward, James, fl 1860-1891</persname>

Joanna Southcott, the religious fanatic and prophetess, was born at Gittisham, Devon in April 1750, and died in London on 27 December 1814, following an illness which had been thought to herald the birth of Shiloh, "the Second Christ". An account of her life can be found in the Dictionary Of National Biography.