What Is the Westport Meeting House?
This Quaker Meeting House memorializes merchant and sailor, Paul Cuffe!
What Makes It Historical?
Despite fleeing religious persecution themselves, the Puritans were more than content to persecute on their own. So other groups like the Society of Friends (Quakers) spread south from Boston to places like Westport, where they settled in 1699. Many years later, this one became the home meeting for Paul Cuffe, the son of a Ghanaian father and Wampanoag mother!
Raised on a farm in Dartmouth (now New Bedford), 14-year old Mr. Cuffe (from “Kofi,” a name for adventurers born on a Friday) set sail on his first whaling voyage in 1773, and the sea kept hold on him! After making supply runs to Nantucket through British blockades, petitioning for the right to vote, and getting attacked by pirates, he and his brother-in-law, Michael, started their first shipping business in 1783, dealing in fishing and Transatlantic trade!
Mr. Cuffe became one of America’s wealthiest folks of color, and he used his fortune to build a smallpox hospital, one of the first integrated schools, and this Quaker meeting house! He consulted on the budding colony of Sierra Leone, set up by the British to “repatriate” formerly enslaved folks, as though these very different groups of folks would just naturally get along (like a big Round Valley). Mr. Cuffe’s role was to work with locals to build up their industries, but the War of 1812 set back his efforts when his ship got seized in Newport! His Quaker friends pulled some strings, giving him an audience with James Madison (a first for a Black person!), who ordered his ships to be released. He lived in Westport until 1817 and is buried behind the meeting house he helped to build.
How Can I #HelpTheHelpers?
- Become a member of the Westport Historical Society!
- Donate to the Annual Westport Friends Meeting Book Fair!
- Be a responsible visitor! Please respect the signs and pathways, and treat all structures and artifacts with respect. They’ve endured a lot to survive into the present. They’ll need our help to make it into the future!
How Do I Get There?
938 Main Rd
Westport, MA 02790
(Take Me There!)
When Should I Visit?
Services are held on Sundays at 10:00 AM!
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