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Reverend Gideon Blackburn, Alice Jacobson

Bound Away: The Liberty Journal of History

Gideon Blackburn (1772-1838) was a Presbyterian minister, missionary to the Cherokees, church planter, college president, and anti-slavery leader. His career in the ministry was not static, owing to his drive to evangelize as well as his pioneer restlessness to move further west into the frontier. Born in Virginia, Blackburn and his family moved into the area of east Tennessee while he was still a youth and where he converted at age 15. Following his theological education, in 1792 Blackburn moved to the Maryville, TN, area and served as an itinerant chaplain to Tennessee militia while pastoring two churches and planting …