Joseph Bates was born in Rochester, Massachusetts on July 8, 1792.
When he was young his family moved from Rochester, Massachusetts, to the port city of Fairhaven, Massachusetts, where he became fascinated with the sea. He set out from Fairhaven at the age of 15 as a cabin boy.
In 1811, Bates was forced into servitude for the British navy after experiencing shipwreck, capture and spending time as a prisoner during the War of 1812. After his release in 1915 he continued his career, eventually becoming captain of a ship, beginning in 1820.
Joseph Bates had a faithful and devoted wife by the name of Prudence Nye. As a childhood friend of Joseph Bates in the town of Fairhaven, Massachusetts, Prudence Nye very much looked forward to his returning from his trips at sea. One year younger than Joseph, she had lost her father when she was three years of age, and her mother had raised her and her sister, Sylvia. On his return from a sea voyage in January 1818, Joseph proposed to her. Loving him and having waited for him, she was concerned about family life and what the future would bring. She asked him, “Do you expect to spend all of your life on the sea?” He too had thought about this, and assured her that he would seek some other line of employment when he had made his fortune on the sea and would be able to keep the family from poverty the rest of their lives. But Prudence was true to her name and pursued the conversation further, asking him, “Just how much do you expect to get before you call it a fortune?” He had thought this through also, and answered her, “I would like to have around $10,000.” This satisfied her, and they were married February 15, 1818. Six weeks later, he was back at sea. (He retired from the sea ten years later, having achieved what he had purposed). After they were married, they walked the road of life together for fifty-two years. For the first ten of these years she indeed was the typical sea captain’s wife, waiting through long voyages in hope, happily in her case never disappointed, of seeing him again. . Prudy’s widowed mother lived with Joseph and Prudy for some time, easing the long, lonely periods when Joseph was away at sea. Prudy gave birth to their first child, Anson Augustus, November 15, 1819, who died before he was two years of age. Helen, their second child, was born in 1822, and she was 16 months old before Joseph even saw her. Joseph and Prudy had 3 other children, Eliza, Joseph, and Mary. Their only surviving son, Joseph, became a whaler and was lost at sea at the age of 35. Mary and her son Willie lived with Joseph and Prudy during the last few years of their lives.
Prudy, as her husband and friends called her, was a very patient and faithful wife, and a godly influence on her family. When Joseph left on another voyage in 1824, without his knowledge she placed a pocket New Testament on the top of the novels and romance books he had planned to read. On opening his trunk to find an interesting book, he took up this Testament and found a poem in the opening page which arrested his attention, and his novel and romance reading ceased from that hour. Bible reading and religion then became of special interest to him. Bates was converted in solitude on board his ship through fears and spiritual struggles as he read the book his wife had placed in his chest. Bates became reformed from evil habits of drinking, smoking, and swearing and soon became a model of health reform and spiritual power for the cause that was so dear to his heart. In 1821 he gave up smoking and chewing tobacco as well as the use of profane language. He later quit using tea and coffee and in 1843 became a vegetarian. He later joined Prudy’s church, Christian Connection when he came to land before his last voyage. Bates retired from the sea in 1827 with $11,000, a small fortune for the time.
After his retirement at age 35 Bates became associated with several reforms, including temperance and antislavery. In 1839, he accepted the Second Advent preaching of William Miller and became an active successful Millerite preacher. He eventually invested all his money in the Advent Movement. Bates experienced the 1844 disappointment without losing faith. In 1845 he read Thomas M. Preble’s tract on the Sabbath, published near Washington, New Hampshire. The next year he wrote a tract called “The Seventh-day Sabbath—a perpetual sign,” published in August 1846.
This tract came to the attention of James and Ellen White around the time of their marriage in August of that year. They accepted the seventh-day Sabbath from studying the Bible evidence for it that Bates shared. Joseph Bates soon became known as the “apostle of the Sabbath” and wrote several booklets on the topic.
Prudence, with her husband, looked forward to the second coming of Christ in 1844. With the others, they were disappointed. But when Joseph accepted the Sabbath truth in March, 1845, she thought it would be against her Christianity to observe the “Jewish Sabbath.” It was over five years before she saw the importance of the Sabbath; but when she became fully convinced in her own mind that it was important for God’s people, she fully accepted it and joined Joseph in the third angel’s message. Some time later she wrote to the Review and Herald:
“I feel an increasing desire to be filled with all the fullness of God. . . . I love the Holy Sabbath better and better, and pray that it may be sanctified to all the dear children who are trying to keep it. I want to be sanctified by obedience to the truth, to be more holy, have a pure heart and clean hands.” –The Review and Herald, December 23, 1851
Bates traveled to many places, preaching and winning converts to Sabbatarian Adventism. He was often the chairman at the “Sabbath conferences” of 1848–1850. He became more closely associated with the Whites at that time, the three working together in presenting “the third angel’s message”.
Ellen White’s visions in 1863 and December 1865 on the importance of health reform is what opened the door for him to join her and James in promoting it as part of the third angel’s message that would help prepare for translation
His trips took him to Battle Creek, Michigan, where he won the first convert there. After initially opposing it, he was convinced of the need for a formal organization by James and Ellen’s writings on “gospel order” in 1853 and 1854. He actually chaired the meetings in the early 1860s that led to the establishing of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
After 52 years of marriage, on August 27, 1870, two years before her husband’s death, Prudy passed to her rest to await her Lifegiver.
Joseph remained active in church work into his old age, preaching at least 100 times the last year of his life. Joseph Bates died March 19, 1872, at the age of 79, at the Health Reform Institute in Battle Creek, and is buried at Monterey, Michigan.
From the perspective of Ellen G. White, we read the testimony of her experiences with Joseph Bates.
“While on a visit to New Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1846, I became acquainted with Elder Joseph Bates. He had early embraced the advent faith, and was an active laborer in the cause. I found him to be a true Christian gentleman, courteous and kind.
“The first time he heard me speak, he manifested deep interest. After I had ceased speaking, he arose and said: ‘I am a doubting Thomas. I do not believe in visions. But if I could believe that the testimony the sister has related tonight was indeed the voice of God to us, I should be the happiest man alive. My heart is deeply moved. I believe the speaker to be sincere, but cannot explain in regard to her being shown the wonderful things she has related to us.’
“Elder Bates was resting upon Saturday, the seventh day of the week, and he urged it upon our attention as the true Sabbath. I did not feel its importance, and thought that he erred in dwelling upon the fourth commandment more than upon the other nine.
“But the Lord gave me a view of the heavenly sanctuary. The temple of God was open in heaven, and I was shown the ark of God covered with the mercy seat. Two angels stood one at either end of the ark, with their wings spread over the mercy seat, and their faces turned toward it. This my accompanying angel informed me represented all the heavenly host looking with reverential awe toward the law of God, which had been written by the finger of God.” –Christian Experience and Teachings, p. 85
“August 30, 1846, I was married to Elder James White. In a few months we attended a conference in Topsham, Maine. Elder Joseph Bates was present. He did not then fully believe that my visions were of God. It was a meeting of much interest; but I was suddenly taken ill and fainted. The brethren prayed for me, and I was restored to consciousness. The Spirit of God rested upon us in Brother C.’s humble dwelling, and I was wrapt in a vision of God’s glory, and for the first time had a view of other planets. After I came out of vision I related what I had seen. Elder B. then asked if I had studied astronomy. I told him I had no recollection of ever looking into an astronomy. Said he, ‘This is of the Lord.’ I never saw him as free and happy before. His countenance shone with the light of heaven, and he exhorted the church with power.” –Life Sketches of Ellen G. White, p. 238
“That same year he became convinced that Ellen had the prophetic gift after observing her in vision relating information on astronomy that he thought she could not have known on her own. Early in 1847 he connected information on the heavenly sanctuary to the Sabbath, and outlined the great controversy theme drawn from Revelation 12 to 14. In April Ellen White had her great controversy vision. James White published “A Word to the Little Flock” in May, containing works by the Whites and Bates, including his affirmation of the spiritual gift Ellen White had received. ‘I can now confidently speak for myself that I believe the work is of God.’” –A Word to the Little Flock, p. 21
“From the first, the faithful band of commandment keepers took a firm and uncompromising position against the use of intoxicating liquor. In this reformatory movement, they had a faithful leader in Capt. Joseph Bates, with whose remarkable experience in abandoning the use of alcoholic beverages, tobacco, tea, and coffee, many of the readers of the Review are familiar.” –The Review and Herald, April 2, 1914