Rockport Church

Universalist Church of Sandy Bay // 1829

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This Unitarian Universalist Church in Rockport was built in 1829 after 23 founders came together to sign a compact to build a new church. The Gothic Revival church building was given its 93-foot steeple in 1867 and it has stood tall since! The church stands just off Main Street and has long been active in local and national events since its founding. The church’s website states, “In 1843, we prepared resolutions against slavery, intemperance, and war. In 1861, a person threw a smoking bomb through a window into our sanctuary, during an anti-slavery lecture by a noted abolitionist. The crowd evacuated, but later returned to hear the rest of the talk. In 1884, our Society hired its first female pastor, Lorenza Haynes, past Chaplain to The Maine Senate and House.“ Today, the church collaborates with the Cape Ann Slavery and Abolition Trust, which investigates and shares the role the slave trade played in Cape Ann’s families, industries, and economies and in the lives of enslaved people.

First Congregational Church of Rockport // 1805

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Fondly referred to as the “Old Sloop” in town (a name conferred by local fishermen in the 1800s), the First Congregational Church of Rockport stands as one of the most prominent landmarks in the old village. The village of Sandy Bay (now downtown Rockport) had a growing population since the 1700s. Prior to 1755, churchgoers from Sandy Bay made the journey every Sunday by horse or foot in good weather to the parish in Annisquam or the First Parish in Gloucester, and in poor weather, met in a small log schoolhouse on this site. Eventually, a church building was erected in town, which was used until after the Revolutionary War. In 1805, a new meetinghouse was built where it stands today. In 1814, the British invaded Sandy Bay colony and residents rang the Old Sloop’s bell to sound the alarm. British forces fired a cannon at the bell to silence it, but hit the steeple instead. A replica cannonball can be seen to this day in the steeple as a nod to that historic event. In 1840, the people of Sandy Bay voted to establish the Town of Rockport. At that time, the meetinghouse was completely redecorated and the steeple enlarged. After the Civil War, the church was outgrown, and in 1872, the Old Sloop building was cut in half and separated by about twenty feet with an addition built in the middle. At that time the steeple was enlarged and strengthened to accommodate a new and heavier bell and the Town Clock. In 2015, the church began a campaign to replace the deteriorated steeple, which was rebuilt, faux cannonball and all!