''The Trail of Blood'' is a 1931 book by American

Southern Baptist The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), alternatively the Great Commission Baptists (GCB), is a Christian denomination based in the United States. It is the world's largest Baptist organization, the largest Protestantism in the United States, Pr ...

minister James Milton Carroll, comprising a collection of five lectures he gave on the history of

Baptist Baptists are a Christian denomination, denomination within Protestant Christianity distinguished by baptizing only professing Christian believers (believer's baptism) and doing so by complete Immersion baptism, immersion. Baptist churches ge ...

churches, which he presented as a

succession Succession is the act or process of following in order or sequence. Governance and politics *Order of succession, in politics, the ascension to power by one ruler, official, or monarch after the death, resignation, or removal from office of ...

from the first Christians. The work has been criticized for linking together numerous unrelated sects and historical heresies that have no relation to Baptist theology or polity and also for being

pseudohistorical Pseudohistory is a form of pseudoscholarship that attempts to distort or misrepresent the historical record, often by employing methods resembling those used in scholarly historical research. The related term cryptohistory is applied to pseudoh ...

. However, supporters postulate that these disparate groups held beliefs similar to current Baptists, and many of the charges against these groups were raised by their enemies. It is considered to be doctrine primarily among Independent Baptist churches.

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The full title is ''The Trail of Blood: Following the Christians Down through the Centuries: or, The History of Baptist Churches from the Time of Christ, Their Founder, to the Present Day''.William Hull, "William Heth Whitsitt: Martyrdom of a Moderate," ''Distinctively Baptist: Essays on Baptist History'', ed. Marc A. Jolley, John D. Pierce, pp. 237-78, p. 255, note 70. Carroll presents modern Baptists as the direct successors of a strain of Christianity dating to apostolic times, reflecting a Landmarkist view first promoted in the mid-nineteenth century by James Robinson Graves (1820-1893). Graves had started an influential movement in

Tennessee Tennessee (, ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Kentucky to the north, Virginia to the northeast, North Carolina t ...

and the

western states The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to various nations and states in Western Europe, Northern America, and Australasia; with some debate as to whether those in Eastern Europe and Latin America also constitute the West. ...

. The Landmark controversy divided many Baptists, and ultimately led to the formation of the

American Baptist Association The American Baptist Association (ABA) is a Baptist denomination in the United States with offices, a book store, and a publishing house in Texarkana. One of the principal founders was the Reverend Ben M. Bogard (1868–1951), a pastor of An ...

in 1924, as well as of Gospel Missions and unaffiliated churches. This is a belief called

Baptist successionism Baptist successionism (or Baptist perpetuity) is a controversial theory on the origins of the Baptist tradition. The theory postulates an unbroken lineage of churches (since the days of John the Baptist or the Book of Acts) which have held beliefs ...

. Carroll claims that modern Baptists descend from such earlier groups as: * the

Waldensians The Waldensians, also known as Waldenses (), Vallenses, Valdesi, or Vaudois, are adherents of a church tradition that began as an ascetic movement within Western Christianity before the Reformation. Originally known as the Poor of Lyon in the l ...

(founded in the 1170s, based in the Cottian Alps) * the Novatianists (or Cathari) (founded in the 3rd century) * the Paulicians (founded 650 in Armenia) * the

Donatists Donatism was a schism from the Catholic Church in the Archdiocese of Carthage from the fourth to the sixth centuries. Donatists argued that Christian clergy must be faultless for their ministry to be effective and their prayers and sacraments to ...

(originating in North Africa in the 4th century) Carroll acknowledges a number of other writers, including G.H. Orchard (1796–1861) and John T. Christian (1854–1925). The title is taken from James Robinson Graves' '' The Trilemma''. The book was published in the year Carroll died. James Edward McGoldrick wrote a response to Carroll's work called ''Baptist Successionism'' which gave researched opposition to the theory of "

." Ashland Avenue Baptist Church in

Lexington, Kentucky Lexington is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city coterminous with and the county seat of Fayette County, Kentucky, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census the city's population was 322,570, making it the List of ...

held the copyright to Carroll's book.

References

External links

''Trail of Blood''
Challenge Press is one of the sole distributors of the print copy this book * ''The Trail of Blood'' at archive.org Pamphlets Pseudohistory 1931 non-fiction books Landmarkism {{Christianity-book-stub

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See also

References

External links