He was born on April 21, 1737 in Hempstead, Long Island, United States, the son of Peter and Rebecca (Nichols) Smith.
In his youth the family moved to Morris County, New Jersey. Here, in 1756, he was baptized by John Gano and immediately began to contemplate entering the ministry, notwithstanding the opposition of his father, who, however, yielded his consent at the solicitations of an older son and Gano.
After preparatory studies at Hopewell Academy, he entered the College of New Jersey as a sophomore, graduating in 1762.
After studies, partly in the interest of his health, he started southward on horseback, preaching constantly during an itinerancy of fifteen months, during which time he covered over four thousand miles. At Charleston, South Caroilina, he united with the Baptist Church, where he was ordained September 20, 1763. After his return north, he accompanied James Manning to Newport, and became associated with the founding and development of Rhode Island College (Brown University).
Continuing his itinerant preaching, on July 27, 1764, he reached Haverhill, Massachussets, which was to become his home. After preaching for some weeks at a Congregational Church, he was invited to become its pastor. He organized the First Baptist Church of Haverhill. On November 12, 1766, he was installed as its pastor.
In the developing life of his denomination he was a positive factor, notably in the counsels of the Warren Association, of which he was one of the organizers (1767). He was selected to go to England to confer with eminent Baptists, with a view to obtaining from the British government relief from the intolerable situation in which the Baptists felt themselves placed, but other responsibilities compelled him to decline this mission.
In the field of education, his great work was done for Rhode Island College. From his own student days the intimate friend of President Manning, he was one of the first fellows appointed and for some forty years attended assiduously to his duties. He devoted eight months, including the winter of 1769-70, to traveling in the South in behalf of the college, securing for its needs about $2, 500. At the last meeting of the Corporation which he attended, only a few months before his death, Asa Messer, one of several young men whom Smith had in part prepared for college while carrying on his ministerial duties at Haverhill, was elected to the presidency.
As regimental (1775 - 78) and later as brigade chaplain (1778 - 80) in the Continental Army, Smith gained a wide fame and thereafter was generally known as Chaplain Smith.
He died in 1805.
His character and ability won for him the esteem of the higher officers, including Washington himself.
According to his diary (Guild, post), he was married to Hephzibah Kimball of Boxford on June 27, 1771, though the vital records of Haverhill give the year as 1770. Four of their six children lived to maturity.
