Thomas Moor Rice was a Baptist preacher for two short years. He was born in Kentucky on this day (December 7) in 1792 to a Baptist mother and a Presbyterian father. His dad was a farmer who also ran a still. After only ten months of formal education Thomas was put in charge of his father’s still, but that gave him a lot of free time which he spent in reading – reading everything he could lay his eyes upon. He became a master mathematician and an expert in Greek, Latin and Hebrew. After fighting for the Americans at the 1811 Battle of Tippecanoe, he married, professed Christ as his Saviour, joined the Methodists and began a preaching career. He loved controversial subjects and became an expert at debating, publically taking on a variety of heretics. Eventually, he decided to debate with a Baptist on the subject of immersion. As he studied, he was overcome by scriptures, he’d never considered before, finally reaching the conclusion, prior to the debate, that the Baptists were scriptural. Without hesitation he was immersed and joined the Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in Jefferson County, Kentucky. Later that year, 1840, he was ordained. One of the questions posed to him was how he, as a classical scholar, had so long held to sprinkling as baptism. He honestly replied that he had simply taken the word of his denominational leaders, rather than actually listening to God and his word. Brother Rice only lived two more years, but in that time he served as a Baptist pastor until his death in October 1842.
Source – “This Day in Baptist History III” by David Cummins.