Baptisms in the Bellows Falls Canal

From The Connecticut River Valley in Southern Vermont and New Hampshire:  Historical Sketches by Lyman S. Hayes, Tuttle Co., Marble City Press, Rutland, VT., 1929, page 227:

BAPTISMS IN THE BELLOWS FALLS CANAL

From the time of the organization of the first Baptist church in Bellows Falls in 1856, until the year 1871, this church observed the ordinance of baptism in the Bellows Falls canal at a point near where the Claremont Paper Company's mill now stands. The present changes being made at that point by the new hydraulic development remind' a number of the older residents of the observance of the rite there in those early years. The canal at that time flowed wide open, and formed a large pond at that point, in which at times logs were stored to be cut up by the two saw mills and other manufacturies of those days. Large audiences gathered on the bank back of the Fenton and Howard stores to watch the immersions, the ordinance often being observed in the winter time when it was necessary to cut holes in the ice for the purpose. In 1871 changes were made in the canal and at that place it was covered over. Then the church had a baptistry placed in its house of worship, and the use of the canal for that purpose was discontinued.