WETMORE, James, clergyman, born in Middletown, Connecticut, 25 December, 1695; died in Rye, New York, 15 May, 1760. After graduation at Yale in 1714 he studied theology, and in November, 1718, was ordained minister over the 1st Congregational society in New Haven. In September, 1722, he declared himself converted to the Episcopal church, but retained his office for several months. He went to England in 1723, was ordained in the Chapel royal, St. James's, London, on 25 July of that year, was appointed a missionary of the Society for propagating the gospel in foreign parts, and, returning to New York, was catechist and assistant to the Reverend William Vesey in Trinity church. Afterward he became missionary to Rye, a charge that included the villages of White Plains, Mamaroneek, North Castle, and Bedford, besides missionary labors in Connecticut. Here he served from 1726 until his death, he was spoken of as "a gentleman of extensive usefulness; a father and exemplary pattern to the clergy in those parts." He published several pamphlets, including "A Letter to a Parishioner" (New York, 1730) ; "Quakerism, a Judicial Infatuation represented in Three Dialogues" (1731) ; "A Letter from a Minister of the Church of England to his Dissenting Parishioners, showing the Necessity of Unity and Peace and the Dangerous Consequences of separating from the Established Episcopal Church " (1732); "Eleutherius Enervatus: or an Answer to a Pamphlet by Jonathan Dickinson intituled 'The Divine Right of Presbyterian Ordination'" (1733); "A Vindication of the Professors of the Church of England in Connecticut against the Invectives contained in a Sermon by Noah Hobart" (Boston, 1747); and other polemical discourses.--His son, TIMOTHY, became attorney-general of New Brunswick.