Adoniram Judson (1788-1850), Baptist missionary, was the first American clergyman to devote himself to Christianizing Burma.

Adoniram Judson was born in Malden, Mass., on Aug. 9, 1788. His father, a Congregationalist minister, encouraged Adoniram's ambitions, and he was pressed toward intellectual excellence by his forceful mother as well. He entered the sophomore class of Brown University at the age of 16. Graduating first in his class in 1807, he taught school at Plymouth while preparing The Young Lady's Arithmetic and Elements of English Grammar. In 1808, uncertain about a permanent vocation, he began a short tour of the North. He entered Andover Seminary in 1808 but did not announce his ministerial intentions until 1809.

Influenced by contemporary romantic sentiments for preaching to the heathen, Judson joined other youthful seminarians in forming the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1810). In 1811 the board dispatched him to seek joint missionary action with the London Missionary Society. The...