The Great Awakening of the 18th century influenced Native Americans as well as English colonists. Samson Occom, the grandson of a Mohegan chief, converted to Christianity at sixteen. Eager to study the Bible, he later became a student of Rev. Eleazar Wheelock, with whom he learned English and Hebrew despite poor eyesight. He went on to become one of the first Native Americans to publish in English.

Occom devoted his life to evangelizing Native Americans. He founded a school, taught about thirty students, and on August 30, 1759, was ordained by Presbyterian leaders on Long Island as a missionary to his people. He lived in poverty, supplementing his small missionary income through bookbinding and carving.

Wheelock eventually planned to establish a school for Native American students. In 1765, he sent Occom and Nathaniel Whitaker to England to raise funds. Occom preached nearly 300 sermons in two years and raised £12,000. Wheelock used the money to establish Dartmouth College, but when Native American enrollment remained low, he redirected the funds toward educating English students.

Occom felt deeply betrayed, believing Wheelock had broken his promises and treated him as an inferior rather than an equal Christian. Nevertheless, Occom continued preaching among Native American tribes and used his knowledge of English society to defend their rights.

Occom died on July 14, 1792. His hymn Christ’s Sufferings, published after his death, closes with the words:

Shout, brethren, shout with songs divine,
He drank the gall to give us wine.

Also On This Day

AD 70: Titus concludes the Roman siege of Jerusalem and destroys Herod’s Temple, a monumental turning point separating early Jewish-Christian dynamics.

1856: The Methodist Episcopal Church founds Wilberforce College in Ohio, marking it as one of the earliest American higher-education institutions established for Black students.

1916: Evangelist Juan Lugo arrives in Ponce and delivers the first recorded Pentecostal sermon in Puerto Rico, sparking a major spiritual surge across the island.

1943: American missionary pilot Nate Saint, famous for pioneering aerial support and outreach for mission fields, is born.