The Cult Dossier · No. 025 · Christian-Derived

The Shakers

United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing

1747 – present (2 members) · Manchester, England; then New York and New England, USA

III. THE LONG NINETEENTH CENTURY

Fully religious — millenarian Christian communal sect

Who led it

MOTHER ANN LEE (1736–1784), an illiterate Manchester factory worker who, after the deaths of all four of her children, received visions identifying sexual intercourse as the root of all sin. Her followers held her to be the second appearing of Christ in female form. Successors: James Whittaker, Joseph Meacham, LUCY WRIGHT.

What it worshipped and taught

God as dual male and female; Christ's second coming already accomplished in Ann Lee. Total celibacy, confession of sin, communal property, pacifism, separation from the world, and equality of the sexes and races — remarkable for the period. Worship involved ecstatic shaking, dancing, whirling and gift songs, hence the nickname.

Who was in it

Ann Lee; her brother William Lee; James Whittaker; Joseph Meacham; Lucy Wright; the songwriter Joseph Brackett (Simple Gifts, 1848); Sister Frances Carr and the two remaining members at Sabbathday Lake, Maine.

How it ended, or where it stands

Reduced to two members by 2017 and to THREE in 2025 — the first increase in living memory. Celibacy meant recruitment was always the only means of reproduction, and it has not entirely stopped working.

The dead

—

Of note

Usually classified as a benign NRM rather than a coercive cult: no violence, high transparency, members free to leave, and a real record of innovation in furniture, agriculture and gender equality. Included because the celibate-communal-prophetess template recurs constantly.

Its timeline

1747 The Wardley Society, a Quaker offshoot, forms in Manchester; Ann Lee joins in 1758.
1770 Ann Lee's key vision in prison; recognised as leader.
19 May 1774 Sails for America with eight followers.
1780s Growth during the New Light revivals; Ann Lee dies 8 September 1784 after a violent mob beating.
1826 Peak: 18 communities, roughly 4,000–6,000 members.
1837–1850 The Era of Manifestations — mass spirit possession, trance drawings, messages from Mother Ann.
2017 Sister Frances Carr dies of cancer aged 89, leaving TWO members at Sabbathday Lake, Maine — BROTHER ARNOLD HADD, who entered nearly half a century ago, and SISTER JUNE CARPENTER, born 1938, who converted in 1987 at the age of 49.
AUGUST 2025 FOR THE FIRST TIME IN DECADES, THE COMMUNITY GREW. SISTER APRIL BAXTER, AGED 59, JOINED — raising the number of Shakers in the United States to THREE, alongside Sister June Carpenter (87) and Brother Arnold Hadd (68). The requirements remain exacting: a candidate must be single, in good physical and mental health, free of debt and without dependents, and must live at the village FIVE YEARS before being considered for full membership. After nearly a century of uninterrupted decline, the last Shaker village added a member.

Its people

Ann Lee

Mother Ann; Ann the Word

Founder, the Shakers · 29 February 1736 – 8 September 1784 · active 1770–1784

An illiterate Manchester textile worker who bore four children, all of whom died in infancy or early childhood. In prison in 1770 she received a vision identifying sexual intercourse as the root of all sin. Her followers came to regard her as the second appearing of Christ in female form. She sailed for America in 1774 with eight followers and preached through New England during the New Light revivals, drawing violent mobs. Shaker leaders were horsewhipped; at Harvard, Massachusetts the militia was called out to drive them from town on rumours they would not support the revolutionary cause; and Ann Lee herself was dragged from a dwelling and thrown into a carriage to be, in the contemporary phrase, shamefully and cruelly abused. SHE RETURNED TO NEW YORK IN SEPTEMBER 1783 IN A WEAKENED CONDITION AND DIED A YEAR LATER, AGED 48. Her death was widely attributed not to a single assault but to THE CUMULATIVE STRAIN OF THE MISSION AND THE BEATINGS SUSTAINED ON IT. WHEN HER BODY WAS REPORTEDLY REINTERRED IN THE 1820s, A FRACTURED SKULL WAS FOUND. She taught celibacy, confession, communal property, pacifism, and the equality of the sexes and races, a century before any of that was respectable.

Before the law. Repeatedly imprisoned in England and America for blasphemy, sabbath-breaking and, during the Revolution, suspected treason.

Where things stand. Deceased 1784. Two Shakers remain at Sabbathday Lake, Maine.

1758 Joins the Wardley Society in Manchester.
1770 Imprisoned; receives the founding vision.
19 May 1774 Sails for America.
1781–1783 Missionary tour of New England; repeatedly assaulted by mobs.
4 September 1783 Returns to New York from the New England mission in a weakened condition, as does her brother William.
8 SEPTEMBER 1784 Dies at Watervliet, New York, aged 48. Death was attributed to the cumulative strain and violence of the mission rather than to any single beating. WHEN HER REMAINS WERE REPORTEDLY REINTERRED IN THE 1820s, A FRACTURED SKULL WAS FOUND.

Checked

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