Noel, Silas Mercer

Noel, Silas Mercer D.D., a Baptist minister, was born in Essex County, Va., Aug. 12, 1783. He studied medicine, afterwards law, and settled to practice in this profession at Louisville, Ky. In 1811 he turned his attention to theology, and was finally ordained in 1813 as pastor of the Church at Big Spring, Woodford County, and afterwards took charge of the Church at Frankfort. During his ministry there he was instrumental in establishing a number of churches in the, adjacent country. In 1833 he became pastor of the Church in Lexington. In 1818 he had the honor to be appointed circuit judge of the Fourth Judicial District, in which he resided. Dr. Noel all his life greatly exerted himself in behalf of missions, ministerial education, African colonization, and was the original projector of the Baptist Education Society of Kentucky, of which he was president for several years. He died May 5,1839. See Sprague, Annals of the Amer. Pulpit, 6:627.