Another great response.  Again, I would never claim people like this in 
my karate lineage as being "masters" and yet some want to claim them:

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Baptists-954/Trail-Blood.htm
Dear Pastor Carpenter,

Thank you for referring me to the book 'The Trail of Blood' by Dr. 
Carroll.  I must say I found it entertaining.  He attempts to show that 
historical heretical groups, the Montanists, Novatianists, Donatists, 
Paulicians, Albigensians, Catharists, Waldenses, and Anabaptists were 
really early Baptists, and that they were pursued by Catholics and wiped 
out. There is no evidence of this because the 'evidence' was destroyed 
by the Catholic Church. Apparently, many Baptist theologians reject this 
story as unfounded and not credible.

Here is some information on those groups:

1. Montanists denied all second marriages, even after the death of the 
spouse. They required all virgins to wear veils in church and denied the 
forgiveness of sins, thus making a movement without hope.

2. Novatianists taught that no sin was to be forgiven after Baptism. 
They too denied second marriages under any circumstances. Novatian 
covertly had himself declared a Bishop and was subsequently ex-communicated.

3. Donatists taught that the true church consisted only of the elect and 
that Baptisms were only valid when performed by a Donatist.

4. Paulicians believed in the plurality of gods, held that all matter 
was bad, rejected the Old Testament, denied the incarnation, and said 
Christ was an angel. They refused to honour the cross by saying Christ 
had not been crucified.

5. Albigensians believed in two gods, one good and the other evil. They 
rejected all sacraments, and declared it was sinful to marry. This 
promoted sexual permissiveness. Pregnancy was to be avoided and abortion 
was promoted.

6. Catharists were followers of all the heresies of the Albigensians.

7. Waldenses taught that the Church should have no property and 
condemned tithing. Interestingly, they accepted the Holy Eucharist as 
the Body of Christ.

8. Anabaptists, practiced polygamy and communism. They condemned oaths 
as unlawful. Anabaptists were founded by Thomas Munser in 1521. I think 
this fact alone refutes the Baptist claim to antiquity.

My question to you is this:  Having recounted the
deeds of these heretical groups, why would anyone want to claim any as 
ancestral proof of origin?
My final question is this:  If we can only believe what is in the Bible, 
does the Bible ever even hint that John the Baptist founded a church?

If Evangelical Baptists have existed since the time of John the Baptist, 
then I think history books should have many references to them. The 
writings of the early church fathers, the historians of their day, do 
not mention Evangelicals or Baptists at all. But what is very 
interesting is that the writings of scores of them mention the Catholic 
church by name, hundreds of times. In the writings of Saint Augustine 
(354-430) alone, he mentions the Catholic Church, by name, over 300 times.

Regards,

Les