 Following Black Loyalist preacher David George, Baptist minister John Burton was one of the first ministers to integrate black and white Nova Scotians into the same congregation.In 1811 Burton's church had 33 members, the majority of whom were free blacks from Halifax and the neighbouring settlements of Preston and Hammonds Plains.According to historian Stephen Davidson, the blacks were "shunned, or merely tolerated, by the rest of Christian Halifax, the blacks were first warmly received in the Baptist Church."