Theodore Clapp (March 29, 1792 – April 17, 1866) was an American minister. Clapp was born in

Easthampton, Massachusetts Easthampton is a city in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States. The city is in the Pioneer Valley, near the five colleges in the college towns of Northampton and Amherst. The population was 16,211 at the 2020 census. History E ...

, March 29, 1792. He graduated from

Yale College Yale College is the undergraduate college of Yale University. Founded in 1701, it is the original school of the university. Although other Yale schools were founded as early as 1810, all of Yale was officially known as Yale College until 1887, ...

in 1814. He was for one year, 1818-19, a student in

Andover Theological Seminary Andover Theological Seminary (1807–1965) was a Congregationalist seminary founded in 1807 and originally located in Andover, Massachusetts on the campus of Phillips Academy. From 1908 to 1931, it was located at Harvard University in Cambrid ...

. In 1822, he became pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of New Orleans in which relation he continued till 1834, when having adopted Unitarian views, his connection with the

Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a historically Reformed Protestant tradition named for its form of church government by representative assemblies of elders, known as "presbyters". Though other Reformed churches are structurally similar, the word ''Pr ...

Church was dissolved. He continued, however, to preach in the same church edifice, which had in the meantime become the property of a wealthy Jewish philanthropist,

Judah Touro Judah Touro (June 16, 1775 – January 18, 1854) was an American businessman and philanthropist. Early life and career Touro's father Isaac Touro of Holland was chosen as the hazzan at the Touro Synagogue in 1762, a Portuguese Sephardic congr ...

, a personal friend of Clapp, and to a congregation composed in part of his former parishioners. Clapp possessed great power as a pulpit orator, and by his devotion to the sick on repeated occasions when the city was visited by epidemics, endeared himself to all classes of the population. He was made President of Orleans College in 1824, but did not last long in the post as it closed soon thereafter. Clapp publicly defended the institution of

slavery Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...

, but by 1849 he had come to see it as sinful. He opposed

abolitionism Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the political movement to end slavery and liberate enslaved individuals around the world. The first country to fully outlaw slavery was France in 1315, but it was later used in its colonies. ...

, however, on the grounds that he saw no precedent in the New Testament for such political action. Clapp served on the board of trustees of the Medical College of Louisiana, which was to become The Tulane University School of Medicine.
Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography In 1847, he travelled in Europe, and in 1857, his health failing, and his church having been burned, he resigned his pastorate. He published in 1858, a volume of ''Autobiographical Sketches and Recollections'' of a 35 years' residence in New Orleans. The last nine years of his life were spent, chiefly in retirement, in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville is the List of cities in Kentucky, most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeastern United States, Southeast, and the list of United States cities by population, 27th-most-populous city ...

. He died there on April 17, 1866, aged 74 years. He left a widow and two children.

References

External links

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''Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography''

Our History - First Unitarian Universalist Church of New Orleans
{{DEFAULTSORT:Clapp, Theodore 1792 births 1866 deaths People from Easthampton, Massachusetts American Presbyterian ministers American Unitarian clergy 19th-century American memoirists Yale College alumni 19th-century American clergy Memoirists from Massachusetts