Many Fairfield County slave owners were as confident in the Bible's justification for slavery as they were serious about their duty to provide religious instruction to their slaves. Masters included them in household worship and prayer and taught them to read so they would be able to read the Bible. Slaves were baptized, admitted to full communion and married within the church. Often, no special section for slaves was created in church records, as illustrated in the records of the First Congregational Church in Fairfield: slave names are recorded along with those of white members.

Image: Records of the First Congregational Church, Fairfield, 1694-1806. Courtesy Connecticut State Library, State Archives, Hartford, Connecticut.