In 1842, George Bourne engaged in gathering support for the publication of an American edition of the London Christian Observer. This volume includes 175 pages of signatures and brief comments from his supporters. The list of signatories reads like a Who's Who of evangelical clergy along the east coast. The volume is something more than a de facto autograph book, though, in that many of the signers write brief sentiments or words of encouragement.
The following denominations are represented among the subscribers: Baptist (General Association Baptist Missions), Episcopal/Protestant Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian (Associate Presbyterian, Associate Reformed Presbyterian, Reformed Presbyterian, Scottish Presbyterian), Reformed (German Reformed, Reformed Dutch), and Wesleyan. Several colleges, including Marshall College, Pennsylvania College (Gettysburg), Rutgers University, and Union College are represented, as well as Princeton Theological Seminary, and the subscribers were located in various towns in the mid-Atlantic states and Ohio.
Emigrating from England to Virginia, George Bourne was installed as pastor of the Presbyterian church in South River in 1814. This first direct experience with slavery convinced Bourne of its moral peril, and he quickly became an immediatist abolitionist, bringing down upon his shoulders not only the wrath of the local community, but the persecution of his own church. Convicted on charges of heresy for his views, Bourne was forced to leave Virginia, and he held pastorates in Pennsylvania, New York, and Quebec, where he adopted an ardent anti-Catholicism. By 1833, Bourne had become affiliated with the Dutch Reformed Church, which was more tolerant of his radical antislavery views, and had drawn close to William Lloyd Garrison. He was author of numerous works on religion, slavery, and other topics, and was editor of the Christian Intelligencer at the time of his death in 1845.
