The Congregationalists and plain Baptists held their services in the same house of worship, each taking its turn, yearly I think, in providing a clergyman. Elder Lincoln was the choice of the Congos at that time, a dear, simple-hearted old man...
1922, Wisconsin Congregational Association, Wisconsin Congregational Church Life, volumes 41–45, p. 13:
The first speaker talked out of an experience in the church of fifty-two years. Rev. W. H. Zielger closed, with “Until the 70th.” Evidently, as the paper said, the “Congos had a large time.”
1981, Stephen King, “The Reach”. Reprinted 2008 in Wesley McNair (ed.), Today’s Best Maine Fiction, Down East Books, →ISBN, p. 267:
Bill was out there, beckoning. Beyond him, beyond the Reach, she could see the Congo Church over there on the Head, its spire almost invisible against the white sky.
1989, Nancy Chadbourne Maze, The Paul Chadbourn Family of Waterborough, Maine, 1748–1990, Chadbourne Family Association, p. 101:
Three churches were in all these old towns as is true today: Congregationalists (Puritan), Baptist, and Methodist. Up until about 1820 the “Congo” church was supported by each town by taxes. Some younger members of their families broke way from the “Congo” and became Baptists or Methodists.
2011, Jim Nichols, Hull Creek: A Novel of the Maine Coast, Down East Books, →ISBN, chapter 16:
I hear people talking and look between two houses at the Congo Church, where the service has ended and everybody’s coming outside.
