Christopher Blackwood was an able preacher. He was born in 1606, graduated at Cambridge in 1624, and became curate of Rye, in Sussex. When he embraced Baptist principles, he became pastor of a church which met at Spillshill House, near Staplehurst, Kent. After laboring there some years, he went into the army, accompanied the forces sent to Ireland, and was for some time pastor of a church at Dublin, exercising, as it would seem, a general superintendence over the other Baptist Churches in that country. In a letter sent to Secretary Thurloe, in the year 1655, he is styled, "The Oracle of the Anabaptists in Ireland." He appears to have returned to England about the time of the Restoration, as his name is affixed to the Baptist declaration against Venner's rebellion. In 1661 he went to Holland, where he remained a year. Shortly after his return he resumed his residence in Dublin, where he died in 1670. He was a learned man, well read in the fathers. Both he and Mr. Cornwell were warm advocates of soul-freedom, and protested in their writings against the intolerance of the Presbyterian party. His first publication was entitled, The Storming of Antichrist in his two Last and Strongest Garrisons, - Compulsion of Conscience and Infants' Baptism.^*

     ^* See Baptist Magazine for June, July, August, and September, 1867, for a valuable collection of letters written by Mr. Blackwood.

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[From J. M. Cramp, Baptist History, 1871; reprint, 1987, p. 351. Scanned and formatted by Jim Duvall.]

     Some books written by Blackwood:
Apostolic Baptism, London, 1645.
A Treatise Concerning Denial of Christ, London, 1648.
A Soul Searching Catechism, London, 1653.
A Treatise Concerning Repentance and the Doctrine of Restitution, London, 1653.
Four Treatises, London, 1653.
An Exposition Upon the First 10 Chapters of Matthew, London, 1659.

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