Five years ago this church went through a very traumatic time when somebody out of state thought they had a deed and tried to sell it.”

Town Council President Keith Hamilton

PORTSMOUTH — The Portsmouth Compact, the 1638 document that marked the founding of what was then known as Pocasset, was let loose from its shackles at the R.I. State Archives for its annual visit back home last Friday.

This time, however, the public viewing didn’t take place at Town Hall as usual, but diagonally across the street at the Portsmouth Friends Church.

“We’re celebrating 325 years and thought, wouldn’t it be fun to have the Compact here,” said Matthew Kent, a member of the Quaker church that dates back to 1700.

Despite its rich history, many local residents have never stepped foot in the building at 11 Middle Road, which along with the Great Friends Meeting House in Newport is one of the oldest meeting houses in the United States and among the earliest houses of worship in Rhode Island. It keeps a low profile for a very simple reason.

“This is not a historical museum; this is a church,” Kent said.

Craig Clark, president of the Portsmouth Historical Society, reminded visitors of how close the town came to losing the historic property — including the 10,561-square-foot church building and its 1,541-square-foot parsonage — in 2020.

“It’s almost five years ago today when the COVID pandemic was happening,” Clark said, recalling an open house in March 2020 that was held to show off the property’s potential after it was put on the market following an order by the Society of Friends Eastern Region in Canton, Ohio to close the church three years earlier. Fortunately, an agreement was reached just a few days later and church members got the keys to the property back.

“I just love this building, I think it’s one of the prettiest and most substantial buildings we have in the town,” Clark said.

Town Council President Keith Hamilton said he was also grateful the town was able to hold on to the church. “Five years ago this church went through a very traumatic time when somebody out of state thought they had a deed and tried to sell it,” he said.

‘Amazing structure’

“This is an amazing structure,” added Stephen Luce, a member of the church who's also on the historical society’s board of directors. The first Quakers came to Portsmouth in 1657 and for the next 35 years their meetings were held in members’ homes. It wasn’t until 1692 that a proper meeting house was built at the corner of Hedly Street and West Main Road. That church was used until August 1699 when the first stones for the new building’s foundation were laid.

Interestingly, the building used to be about 30 feet closer to the road, but was moved sometime before 1837, Luce said, most likely because it was creating traffic jams on Middle Road. 

As for the burial ground off Hedly Street, the oldest stone is marked 1808, but there were internments far earlier than that, Luce said. Many of the older stones, which were unmarked, were unwittingly used to build a stone wall, he said.

R.I. Sen. Linda Ujifusa, who presented Luce with a Senate citation celebrating the church’s 325th anniversary, drew attention to the church’s history fighting for social justice.

“I am Japanese-American and the Friends Church was one of the only organizations that was against the Japanese internment,” Ujifusa said, referring to the United States’ policy of forcibly relocating and incarcerating about 120,000 people of Japanese descent in concentration camps during World War II.

’Seeds of democracy’

Secretary of State Gregg Amore said Rhode Islanders are lucky to still have documents such as the Portsmouth Compact, which help share stories about state history.

“The seeds of democracy, the seeds of self-governance, were planted by documents like the Portsmouth Compact. This was the beginning of self-governance in the new world,” Amore said.

There are more than 200 countries in the world, but only 38 are liberal democracies, he said. “The concept of we the people managing our own affairs, choosing our own leaders, welcoming a difference of opinions” is vital to a democracy, he said.

Today that message is more important than ever, Amore said, “as the world moves back and forth from authoritarianism and democracy.”