Andover Independent Meeting

Andover Independent Meeting was located in East Street, Andover, where the Wakefords, a family of bankers and merchants and relations of the Steeles of Broughton, attended. Among the early pastors were John Cumming (1739-90), Thomas Eisdell (1790-1806), Lewis Winchester (1807-1813), and William Seaton (1814-18). Mary Steele (1724-72) the half-sister of the Baptist poet and hymn writer, Anne Steele (“Theodosia”) (1717-78), married Joseph Wakeford (1719-85)  in 1749. He had previously been married to Hannah Towgood Wakeford (1724-45), niece of Micaiah Towgood, a prominent Presbyterian minister at Exeter for many years. See J. S. Pearsall, Historical Memorials of a Christian Fellowship (London: John Snow, [c. 1845]); for  a biography of Mary Steele Wakeford and her complete poems, see Timothy Whelan, gen, ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840, 8 vols (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), 4.129-50.