m^<----- ¦

DIVINITY SCHOOL
TROWBRIDGE LIBRARY

LIFE AND LABORS

FRANCIS ASBURY,

BISHOP OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH
IN AMERICA.

GEORGE G. SMITH, D.D.,
Aitt/ior of "Life and Letters of James O. Andrew," "Life and Times of
George F. Pierce" "History of Methodism in Georgia?' etc.

Nashville, Tknn.:
Publishing House M. E. Church, South,
Barbee & Smith, Agents.
1898.

KH5

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1896,
Bt George G. Smith,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at "Washington.

Be&fcation.
K» foAn Christian JVeener, 2).&.,
Sen/or 33ts/iop of the V/etAodist Spiscopat C/iurcA, SoutA,
"Uhis Sftoo* fs 'Dedicated.-
not only docauso of the AiyA respect S Aave for Ais office
and my lofty admiration for Ais mental yifts
and moral excellences,
but as a ioAen of ' tAo tender love & fool for one ufAo for tony
years S ' Aavo called my friend.
George G. Smith.
(iii)

PREFACE.
Soon after the death of Bishop Asbury measures were
put on foot to have a full biography of him prepared.
Dr. S. K. Jennings, at that time one of the most schol
arly men of the Church, was selected to do the work.
After a considerable lapse of time, he returned the ma
terial placed in his hands and declined to go any farther.
In the meantime the journals of Bishop Asbury were
published; and as they partly served the purpose of a
memoir, none was prepared. Then the history of Dr.
Bangs and the more extensive work of Dr. Abel Stevens
gave a full account of his labors; and over forty years
ago the Rev. Dr. Strickland sent to press " The Pioneer
Bishop," which was a biography of Bishop Asbury. The
Bev. Dr. Janes made selections from his journals, and
thus prepared also a memoir in Asbury's own words.
It has seemed to me, however, that a new life was
demanded, and I have written it. I have relied very
largely on his journals, but have by no means confined
myself to them. I have freely availed myself of the la
bors of those who have gone before me. I do not think
I have allowed any available source of information to be
neglected. I do not think a biographer is an historian
in a general sense, and think that, however one may be
tempted to turn aside from the direct line his work
marks out, he should resist the temptation, and so I
have confined myself as strictly as I could to the part
which Asbury himself acted in the history of the
Church. Nor do I think a biographer is an advocate or
00

vi Preface.
an apologist. It is his business to tell what the subject
of his writing was, and what he did, and leave others
to form conclusions for themselves. There are always
matters in which the biographer and the subject of his
writing are not fully agreed, and things of whose non
existence he would have been glad; but above all else,
he must be honest and conceal nothing. There are few
things in Asbury's life which ask for defense, and none
which ask for concealment. He was so closely con
nected with the beginnings of things in the Methodism
in America that the story of his life is largely the story
of early Methodism, and I have traced his journeys and
given an account of his personal connection with men
and places with a particularity which may sometimes
seem monotonous.
I do not think Asbury has had the place he is entitled
to in the history of the nation or of the Church. To no
one man was America more indebted than to him,
I have not given my authority for statements in
many cases. Those familiar with his journal will see
how closely I have followed it and how freely I have
used it. I have found it difficult, if not impossible, to
point out the page on which the statements were found
ed in many cases. Where I could give my author, I
have done so.
I think this book is needed, and I hope it will do good.
Geokge G. Smith.
Macon (Vineville), Ga.

CONTENTS. CHAPTER I.
1745-1771. page
Asbury's Birth — Family of Joseph Asbury— Childhood —
Conversion — Apprenticeship— The Local Preacher — On a
Circuit — The Missionary  1
CHAPTER II.
1771-1772.
The Young Missionary— Passage from Bristol — Incidents
of the Voyage — Arrives at Philadelphia — Goes to New
York — View of New York in 1771 — Journey to Mary
land . ,  6
CHAPTER III.
1772.
Journey to Maryland — Bohemia Manor — Strawbridge —
Frederick County — View of Maryland — Asbury's First
Round — Goes to Baltimore — View of Baltimore— Into
Kent County — Conflict with the Parson — Sickness  14
CHAPTER IV.
1778-1774.
Asbury in Maryland Again — Goes to New York — To Phil
adelphia — Mr. Rankin's Arrival — The First General Con
ference — Maryland Once More  26
CHAPTER V.
1774.
Mr. Asbury in New York and Baltimore — New York Again
— Discouragements — Mr. Rankin and Mr. Asbury — Rich
ard Wright Goes Home — Asbury's Discipline — Religious
Experience — Feebleness of Body — Goes Southward —
Maryland Again  34
(vii)

viii Contexts.
CHAPTER VI.
1775. Page
Asbury's First Work in Virginia— Norfolk — Portsmouth —
Isaac Luke— County Work — Brunswick Circuit  42
CHAPTER VII.
1776.
The War Time— Mr. Wesley's Mistake — Asbury's View —
Asbury Sick — Berkley Bath — Preaching — Conference at
Deer Creek — Discussion on the Sacraments — Trouble
with Mr. Rankin — Asbury left Out of the Minutes —
Goes to Annapolis — Test Oath — Retires into Delaware . . 47
CHAPTER VIII.
1778.
Life in Delaware — Thomas White — Asbury's Studies —
Stormy Times — The Conference at Leesburg — Asbury's
Called Conference — Troubles in the Conferences — As
bury's Hard Condition — A Truce Made  53
CHAPTER IX.
1781-1783.
General Assistant — Conference in Baltimore — Settlement
of Troubles — Through the Valley of Virginia — Allusion
to Strawbridge — Through Eastern Virginia — First Visit
to North Carolina — His Friends Among the Episcopal
Clergy — Visits New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey —
Barratt's Chapel, 1784 — Letter from Asbury to Shad-
ford  60
CHAPTER X.
178J,.
Dr. Coke— Mr. Wesley's Will— Mr. Asbury Refuses to be
Ordained Till a Conference is Called — The Conference
Meets — Mr. Asbury and Dr. Coke Elected Bishops and
Called Superintendents  72
CHAPTER XI.
1781,.
Mr. Asbury's Views on Episcopacy  77

Contents. ix
CHAPTER XII. PABE
Thomas Coke — The Welsh Gentleman — In Oxford —
Coke's Curacy — His Conversion — Mr. Wesley's Favor —
His Labors — His Death  81
CHAPTER XIIL
1785.
The New Bishop — Tour Southward — Henry Willis — Jesse
Lee — Visits Charleston, S. 0. — Edgar Wells — Journey
Northward — Cokesbury College — Visit to Mount Vernon
—Corner Stone of College Laid  89
CHAPTER XIV.
1786.
Asbury's Second Episcopal Tour — Hanover, Virginia —
North Carolina — Sinclair Capers — Charleston — Hope
Hull — John Dickins and the Revised Discipline — Cen
tral North Carolina — The Baltimore Conference — The
Valley of Virginia — Religious Experience at Bath — Re
turn Southward  96
CHAPTER XV.
1787.
The Tour of the Two Bishops— Dr. Coke Again— The Blue
Meetinghouse in Charleston — Prosperity of the Work in
South Carolina and Georgia — Central South Carolina —
Journey Northward — Virginia Conference — Baltimore
Conference — Dr. Coke in Trouble — The New Discipline
— Mr. Wesley's Displeasure — Effort to Appoint a Bishop
—Failure  101
CHAPTER XVI.
1788.
Charleston Again — Riot — Georgia — Holston — Greenbrier —
Conference at Uniontown, Pa. — College Troubles  107
CHAPTER XVII.
1789.
Mr. Wesley's Famous Letter and the Council — Georgia-
Daniel Grant— Wesley and Whitefleld School— Mr. Wes
ley's Letter— North Carolina— The Council  116

x Contents.
CHAPTER XVIII.
1790. Page
Over the Continent — North Carolina — Charleston — Geor
gia, — Western North Carolina — Over the Mountains —
General Russell's — Kentucky — Virginia — Pennsylvania
Cokesbury  124
CHAPTER XIX.
1791.
Arminian Magazine — Coke's Arrival in Charleston — Wil
liam Hammett — Georgia Conference — Virginia — Wes
ley's Death— Coke's Return to England — Jesse Lee —
New England— Asbury's Visit  128
CHAPTER XX.
1792.
Returns Southward — Cokesbury Troubles — Virginia Confer
ence — North Carolina Conference — Troubles in Charles
ton — Georgia Conference — Beverly Allen's Expulsion
— Tour to Kentucky — Northward Again  136
CHAPTER XXI.
1793-1794.
Southern Tour — Great Exposure — William McKendree —
Tour to the North — Southward Again — The College —
R. R. Roberts  153
CHAPTER XXII.
1795.
Episcopal Journeyings — Death of Judge White— The En-
nalls Family — Governor Van Cortlandt — Return South.. 160
CHAPTER XXIII.
1796.
South Carolina — Georgia — North Carolina — Tennessee —
Virginia — Views on Education — Bridal Party in the
Mountains — Methodism in Brooklyn — Southward Again
— Francis Acuff  166

Contents. xi
CHAPTER XXIV.
i7s7- PAGE
Charleston — Sickness — Northward Journey — Breaks Down
in Kentucky — Reaches Baltimore — Goes on His. Tour
Northward — Jesse Lee — Returns South — Gives Up at
Brunswick, Virginia, and Retires for the Winter.. ....... 170
CHAPTER XXV,
1798.
Asbury Out of His Sick Room — Recovery — Views on Slav
ery — On Local Preachers — Some of His Mistakes — Vir
ginia Conference — O'Kelly — Tour Northward — Death of
Dickins  177
CHAPTER XXVI.
1799.
Asbury in the Last Year of the Century — Charleston —
North Carolina —Advice of Physicians — Feebleness of
Whatcoat — Jesse Lee and Benjamin Blanton — Henry
Parks — Tait's, Pope's, and Grant's — Extensive Tour
Through Georgia — Charleston Again  183
CHAPTER XXVII.
1800.
Beginning of the New Century — Asbury Rests a Month — •
Washington's Death — Nicholas Snethen — General Con
ference — Great Revival — Whatcoat's Election as Bishop
— Journey Northward  188
CHAPTER XXVIII.
1801.
Troubles About Slavery — Death of Jarratt — Northern Tour
— Revival Days — Southern Tour — Charleston Again  198
CHAPTER XXIX.
1802.
Northward Again — A View of the Virginia Conference —
Baltimore — His Mother's Death — Meeting with O'Kelly
— Over the Alleghanies — Exposure in Tennessee — Sick
ness — McKendree — Reaches Camden and Rembert's..... 205

xii Contents.
CHAPTER XXX.
1803. Page
The South Carolina Conference — Scotch in North Carolina
— Mr. Meredith's Work in Wilmington — Cumberland
Street Church in Norfolk — Northward Journey — Mer
chandise of Priests in Boston — Southward Again— Trip to
Ohio — Kentucky — Dr. Hinde and His Blister — Journey
to Charleston — Conference at Augusta  209
CHAPTER XXXI.
1804.
Conference in Augusta — Reasons for Never Marrying —
Journey Northward — General Conference — Slavery Ques
tion Again — Confined by Sickness — Letter to Hitt — Jour
ney to the West, and Thence to Charleston  218
CHAPTER XXXII.
1805.
Journey Northward — Letter to Hitt — Conference in North
Carolina— Episcopal Trials — Journey to the North — Jour
ney to the West and the South  225
CHAPTER XXXIII.
1806.
Asbury Alone — Coke Offers to Come to America— Offer
Declined — Camp Meetings in the East— Whatcoat's
Death — Western Tour — Southern Tour  233
CHAPTER XXXIV.
1807.
Asbury Alone — Journey Northward — Western New York
— Visits Ohio, and Goes Through Kentucky to Georgia —
Views on Education  240
CHAPTER XXXV.
1808.
South Carolina Conference— George Dougherty— North
ward Journey Through New Virginia— Baltimore— Gen
eral Conference — Death of Harry Gough — Conference
Legislation— Election of McKendree— Tour of the Bish
ops—Meets William Capers— Capers's Recollections  246

Contents. xiii
CHAPTER XXXVI.
1809. Page
McKendree's New Departure — Northward Tour— Confer
ence at Harrisonburg — Journey to New England — West
ern New York — Western Conference in Cincinnati —
Journey to Charleston  257
CHAPTER XXXVII.
1810.
Asbury and McKendree on Their Second Tour — The Vir
ginia Conference — Mary Withey's Funeral — New York
Conference — New England — Jesse Lee's History — Lee
and Asbury — Genesee Conference — Western Conference
—Senator Taylor  266
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
1811.
Asbury in His Old Age — Sweetness of His Character — Crit
icism on Adam Clarke — Visits Canada— Returns to the
States — Goes to Ohio and Southward to Georgia  271
CHAPTER XXXIX.
1818.
Near the Close — General Conference — Presiding Eldership
—Benson's Life of Fletcher— Ohio— Nashville  277
CHAPTER XL.
1813.
Asbury's Last Effective Year — Northward Again — White
head's Life of Wesley — Things in New England — West
ern Journal — Epistle to McKendree — Charleston Again. 282
CHAPTER XLI.
1814-1815.
The Sun Going Down — Goes Northward — Long Attack of
Sickness in Pennsylvania — John Wesley Bond — Mc
Kendree Crippled — Reaches Nashville — Georgia for the
Last Time— Goes Northward— The West Again— Surren
ders All Control to McKendree  288

xiv Contents.
CHAPTER XLII.
1816. Page
Asbury's Last Journey — The Sun Goes Down — Granby,
South Carolina— Journey to Richmond — Last Sermon —
t Reaches Mr. Arnold's— Death Scene  295
CHAPTER XLIII.
Asbury's Religious Experience  301
CHAPTER XLTV.
The Character of Francis Asbury.   306

LIFE AND LABORS OF FRANCIS ASBURY. (XV)

FRANCIS ASBURY.

CHAPTER I.
1745-1771.
Asbury's Birth — Family of Joseph Asbury — Childhood — Con
version — Apprenticeship — The Local Preacher — On a Cir
cuit — The Missionary.
FiEAjSTCIS ASBURY was the son of Joseph As
bury and Elizabeth Rogers, his wife. He was
born on the 20th or 21st day of August, 1745, about
five miles from Birmingham, Staffordshire, England.
His father was a sturdy yeoman, a gardener for the
great folks, or perhaps a manager of the gentlemen's
estates. He had a home of his own, was industri
ous, sober, thrifty, and might have been wealthy,
Asbury said, if he had not been so liberal.
The family whose name he bears, and from whom
he probably sprang, were large landholders in Staf
fordshire, and John Evans, the father of "George
Eliot," was a tenant on their estate. If Joseph As
bury sprang from this stock, he was evidently one
of its poorer members; but what he lacked in vested
funds he made up in industry and capacity, and no
lord in England was more independent than the
good gardener of Staffordshire.
There were but two children in the little family,
one of whom, a girl, died in infancy. Joseph As
bury was able and willing to give his only son a
good education, and sent him to school earlv, and
(1)

2 Francis Asbury.
he was able to read at between six and seven years
of age. But the master of the school used to beat
the sensitive boy so cruelly that his distaste for the
school became fixed, and he was permitted to dis
continue attendance upon it before he was twelve
years old. He was then employed as a servant in
a wealthy and ungodly family; but when he was
near fourteen years old, he chose the trade of a
saddler, and was apprenticed to a kind master, with
whom he remained until he was nearly of age.
His parents were Church-of -England people of the
best type, and he was carefully brought up. "He
never," he says, "dared an oath or hazarded a lie,
and was always a prayerful, religious child, abhor
ring mischief and wickedness." His comrades called
him parson; and when the brutal schoolmaster so
cruelly flogged him, he found relief in prayer. The
good mother, always hospitable, and especially so
to preachers, invited a pious man — not a Methodist,
however — to her home. The young son was awak
ened by hearing him talk, and began to be more care
ful in attention to his religious duties. The parish
priest, at whose church the family worshiped, was
not a converted man, and so the young inquirer went
to another church, opened to Whitefield's preachers.
Here he heard the leading evangelical preachers of
that day, and into his hands came the sermons of
Whitefield and Cennick, which he read with great
interest. He became anxious to hear the Wesley-
ans, and sought them out, and joined their society;
and while praying with a young companion in his
father's barn, he wns consciously converted. He
now began to go among the laborers and farmers,

Francis As bur r. 8
and talk to them of religion, and at his father's
house he frequently held meetings. He met a class
regularly. He seems to have had no license to
preach, but he was really a local preacher before he
was seventeen. After some months, he exercised
his gifts in the Methodist chapel, and became, while
a saddler's apprentice, a regular local preacher. He
was a cheerful and ready helper of the traveling
preachers, and worked diligently in the shires about,
preaching three, four, and even five times a week.
After thus laboring for five years as a local preach
er, he entered the traveling connection.
He says little of his work in England, and we do
not know from him what were the circuits that he
traveled; nor does he mention any interviews he had
with Mr. Wesley, but he met him every year, doubt
less, and Mr. Wesley learned to value the honest,
sturdy young man, so faithful to the work put into
his hands.
Mr. Wesley had heard the call for more laborers
for America, and sent Boardman and Pilmoor; and
now, in 1771, he needed others to help them. Young
Asbury volunteered to go, and, with Richard Wright,
he was chosen for the distant field. It was his in
tention to remain six years, and then return to En
gland, but he never went back. The ten years which
had elapsed since he began his work as a preacher
had not been idle ones. He had studied hard, and
improved greatly. It is evident that he had become
a preacher of no mean parts and of no insignificant
attainments before he began his work in the new
world. It was a hard thing for him to leave the
good parents v/ho had done so much for him, and for

4 Francis Asbury.
them to surrender their only child, but they cheer
fully gave him up, and he went to Bristol by Mr.
Wesley's order to take his departure on his mis
sion work.
Of Joseph Asbury the son says little more than
has been written above. He lived to be quite an old
man, passing beyond his fourscore years. He was
evidently a good man of no remarkable parts. As
bury's mother was a woman of good mind, and good
culture for those times; a woman of deep piety, and
of great devotion to the Church. Asbury was an
affectionate son, and used a liberal part of his small
income to add to the comfort of the good people in
England as long as they lived.
His early life was spent in close contact with the
best English people, and in his boyhood he was an
inmate of a gentleman's family, and w$s thus trained
in the best school of manners, and acquired the most
refined tastes. His access to and welcome into the
best families of America after he became an Ameri
can itinerant were perhaps due in no small degree
to his early training.
While his early education was not advanced, it
was correct as far as it went, and very great dili
gence in after time made him a scholar of no mean
kind. When he began the study of the languages
he does not say, but not in all probability till after
he came to America; but before he took his depart
ure from England he had secured a very respectable
acquaintance with the best religious literature, and
especially with that excellent selection of books
from the old Puritans which Mr. Wesley had re
published.

Francis Asbury. 5
With this equipment he presented himself as a
candidate for what was really a foreign mission, and
with little idea of the great work he was to do,
bade England -a long and, as it proved, a last fare
well. He says but little of the circumstances at
tending his appointment, and no one perhaps of all
Mr. Wesley's preachers expected less what was to
be his future than he did. No man ever went to
a work with purer intent than this young circuit
preacher. He came, with a spirit of perfect conse
cration, to Bristol, which was the seaport from
which the American ships generally sailed to the
western shores, and, in company with Richard
Wright, took shipping in the fall of 1771 to come to
America and assist Boardman and Pilmoor.

CHAPTER II.
1771-1772.
The Young Missionary — Passage from Bristol — Incidents of the
Voyage — Arrives at Philadelphia — Goes to New York — View
of New York in 1771 — Journey to Maryland.
THE missionary to Japan or China in 1896 makes
an easier and a quicker passage than the two
young Englishmen made from Bristol to Philadel
phia in 1771.
Richard Wright, the companion of Asbury, seems
to have been unsuited to the work for which he vol
unteered, and his career in America was not cred
itable. Asbury was now in his twenty-sixth year, and
had been a preacher for ten years. He was intense
ly in earnest, and no man ever went on a mission
with greater purity of intention. His father and
mother were poor, and it was evident that he had
made little by his preaching or his saddle-making,
for when he reached Bristol, from which port he was
to take shipping to Philadelphia, he had not a shil
ling in his pocket.
The Bristol Methodists were, next to those of Lon
don, the wealthiest Methodists in England, and they
raised a purse of ten pounds to supply the needs of
Ihe missionaries. They forgot, however, that the
voyagers would need beds to sleep on, and when the
ship was under wav the voung preachers found that
(6)

Francis Asbury. 7
they must be content with two blankets as a couch
across the seas.
The voyage was more than eight weeks long, and
they had preaching every Sunday. Sometimes the
winds were fresh, but the young preacher stood
propped by the mizzenmast and preached to the
somewhat insensible sailors, and in the weary week
days gave himself to the reading of good books.
He does not seem to have had many. He read the
"Pilgrim's Progress;" Edwards's account of the
great revival in New England which took place
thirty-five years before, and of which the good man
found but few traces when, a score of years after
this, he entered New England himself; and the life
of M. de Renty, the Catholic ascetic, who had no
little to do with the austerities to which the early
preachers unwisely subjected themselves. These
books, with the Bible, gave him employment during
the weary days of a tedious voyage. At last, after
having been nearly two months on the way, Phila
delphia was reached. There was a society here and
a hundred members, and a meetinghouse; and Mr.
Francis Harris met the long-looked-for reenforce-
ments, and took them to his home. There was a
meeting that night, and Mr. Asbury and Mr. Wright
went to it and were introduced to the American
Methodists. Mr. Pilmoor was here as pastor and
Mr. Boardman was in New York, and after a few
days' stay, during which Mr. Asbury preached, he
then began his journey through the Jerseys to York,
as he called New York. The societies in those days
furnished a horse to the helpers, and on horseback
the journey was made.

8 Francis Asbury.
Some years before this an English captain who
had lost one eye at Louisburg was in Bath, England,
and heard Mr. Wesley preach. He was converted
and began to work as a lay preacher, and when he
was made barrack master in Albany, in America, an
office which seems to have demanded little atten
tion, he began to work as a lay preacher in New
York, and went thence into the Jerseys and to Phil
adelphia. He became a leading spirit among the
Methodists in both cities, and marked out a circuit
for himself between them.
Asbury met in Philadelphia a Mr. Van Pelt, a
farmer from Staten Island, who had heard him
preach, and consented, at his instance, to visit the
island on his way to New York. There were a few
small societies in New Jersey which had been organ
ized by Captain Webb, but there seems to have been
none in Staten Island. Mr. Van Pelt and Justice
Wright, however, gave him their houses as preach
ing places, and before he reached New York City
he preached in the island.
About five years before Asbury came, in the house
of Philip Embury, an Irish carpenter, the first Meth
odist sermon in New York had been preached by
Embury himself , and he had meetings there. Captain
Webb came to his help, and when the house proved
to be too small they went to a rigging loft, and then
a stone church was projected and built, and in it the
little society was now worshiping. When Asbury
came to the city he found the society already organ
ized and in working order. Captain Webb, Robert
Williams, and Mr. Boardman had all worked here.
New York was now quite a growing town, almost

Francis Asbury. 9
as large as Philadelphia. There were in it seven
teen churches. Of these the Episcopalians had
three; the High Dutch, or Reformed German, one;
the Low Dutch, or Dutch Reformed, two; the Lu
therans, two; the French Protestants, one; the Pres
byterians, two; the Seceders, one; the Baptists, one;
and the Methodists, one. The Methodists had gath
ered a small society, and some of its members were
men of substance. Among these was William Lup-
ton, who had married a rich widow and was a well-
to-do merchant. The clergymen of the Church of
England in the city were evidently friendly to the
new society, and each of them made a generous
contribution when the new church was built. Near
by the stone church a little parsonage had been
erected, and a colored woman was secured as house
keeper and maid of all work. Such supplies as the
preachers needed were furnished by Mr. Newton,
the steward. The barber was employed to shave
them, the physician to attend them, and the charge
for castor oil indicates a proper, if not pleasant, pro
vision for the cure of their ailments. Mr. Pilmoor,
Mr. Williams, and now Mr. Boardman, had pre
ceded Mr. Asbury. Mr. WTilliams and Mr. Pilmoor
had each been furnished by liberal stewards with a
beaver hat which cost £2 5s. apiece.*
When the young Englishman, full of missionary
ardor, came into the city he found Captain Webb
and Mr. Boardman both there. He began to feel
restless in a little while, and he expressed his dis
satisfaction to himself in his journal. The preachers,
he thought, ought to circulate; they were too fond
* Wakeley.

10 Francis Asbury.
of the city. And so, after a little while, he struck
out for himself to form his circuit in the country
around. He went to Staten Island, Long Island,
East Chester, and West Farms. He preached every
day in the week in the country, and then returned
to the city for his Sunday work.
If Mr. Asbury had been a vigorous man in En
gland, his health failed soon after he came to Amer
ica. It was a rare thing for him to be perfectly
well after that, if we may judge from his journal;
and, indeed, living as he did, he could scarcely have
hoped for health. He rose at four in the morning,
or soon after, preached when he could at five, trav
eled fifteen or twenty miles a day over wretched
roads, faced all kinds of severe weather, and ob
served an entire fast one day in the week and a par
tial fast on another. He did not find things to suit
him in New York. He was not well, and perhaps
he was a little exacting. Methodism was new in
America, and Mr. Newton and Mr. Lupton and the
other trustees had heads of their own, and did not
see things as he did; but as he was only to stay a little
while now, and as Mr. Boardman was in charge, he
said nothing about it save in his journal. After a
few months around New York and in it, he turned his
face toward Philadelphia, preaching in the villages
in Jersey along the way. New Jersey was thickly
peopled in that day, but it was not fruitful ground
for the Methodists. The Presbyterians had a strong
hold in the colony, and during the days of the Ten-
nents and Mr. Whitefield there had been a great re
vival among them, and twenty years before this the
college at Princeton had been established. The

Francis Asbury. 11
Quakers were numerous, but the Church people
among whom the early Methodists found their first
adherents were not many, yet in the towns Captain
Webb had founded a few societies.
Asbury now came to Philadelphia, where he took
charge. Philadelphia was at that time the most
important city in America. It had been settled now
a hundred years; all around it was a fertile land,
and it was the market and trading center of the new
ly-settled valleys of Maryland and Virginia, as well
as of Pennsylvania. The Quakers had now become
wealthy, respectable, and worldly. They had the
garb of George Fox, but the utilitarian spirit of
their townsman, the enterprising printer, Benjamin
Franklin, was more common than the heavenly
mind of the earnest reformer. There were fervent
souls among them, but the mass was absorbed in the
one idea of making gain. There was a very friendly
feeling toward the society on the part of the Church
people, and Captain Webb had organized a society
of a hundred souls, and they had bought an old
church and had services regularly. There were a
number of country appointments attached to the
city charge, and Mr. Asbury preached somewhere
every day. He was a born disciplinarian. He de
manded strict obedience to orders. He gave it him
self, and he expected it from everyone else. In his
endeavor to carry out these measures in Philadel
phia he met very stern opposition, but while he felt
it keenly, it did not cause him to swerve. He re
mained his three months in Philadelphia, and then
be went to New York again and relieved Mr. Wright.
This young man, he said, had nearly ruined every-

12 Francis Asbury.
thing by having a general love feast. It was ev
ident to him that Mr. Wright had been spoiled, and
he determined to be on his guard. He watched all
men closely, and (Mr. Rankin thought) somewhat
suspiciously; but he watched no one as he watched
himself, and demanded from no one what he did not
ask from himself. He was naturally genial and
cheerful, and could have been a bright companion,
but he thought it was wrong to be so, and reproached
himself for being too light. He was troubled on his
first visit to New York by certain things which need
ed to be mended, and now when he was in charge he
found himself where it was his duty to mend them.
His journal gives us an insight into the usages of
the strongest society in America. There was pub
lic preaching on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday
nights. On Sunday there were two sermons, evi
dently out of Episcopal Church hours. The society
was to have a private meeting on Sunday night.
The preacher was to meet the children and the stew
ards once a week.
There was evidently a good understanding be
tween the society and the Church, and the rector
of one of the churches seems to have had a sacra
mental service at the chapel, and at this communion
there were negro communicants, much to Asbury's
delight. Things, however, did not go to suit him.
He was sure that he was right, but the stewards
did not see it so, and at last he was constrained to
take the chief among them, Mr. Lupton, to task. He
told him plainly of how he avoided him, of how he did
not attend the leaders' meeting, how he appeared to
dissimulate, opposed the rules, and consulted peo-

Francis Asbury. 13
pie not in the society. Mr. Asbury was not twenty-
seven years old, and had been less than a year in
America, and Mr. Lupton was a portly merchant,
the Avealthiest man in his charge; and so the daring
young man was taken to task by Mr. Newton, as all
who have done the like are to this day. Mr. New
ton complained of the manner in which the worthy
Lupton had been treated, and told Mr. Asbury plain
ly that he preached the people away, and that the
whole work would be destroyed by him. This was
very painful, all of it; but just then he received a
letter from Mr. Wesley urging him to mind all
things, great and small, in the discipline; and so he
read the letter to the society, and went on his way
in spite of Mr. Lupton and Mr. Newton. The three
months of his time in New York, however, were
nearly over, and they soon ended, and he left for his
new work in Maryland.*
*The facts concerning the New York society are largely
drawn from that valuable book, "Wakeley's Lost Chapters."

CHAPTER III.
1772.
Journey to Maryland — Bohemia Manor — Strawbridge — Freder
ick County — View of Maryland — Asbury's First Round — •
r Goes to Baltimore — View of Baltimore — Into Kent County-
Conflict with the Parson — Sickness.
TO no man does Maryland owe a greater debt
than to Francis Asbury. He worked a part
of every year for nearly fifty years in her borders,
and in his palmy days gave to her his best labor.
He claimed Maryland as his home, his dearest friends
were -among her people, and near Baltimore his body
rests. He came to America in the fall of 1771, and
in the fall of 1772 he went to Maryland to aid Straw-
bridge, who had been at work for six years, and
who had laid out the circuit which Asbury was now
to travel. Strawbridge had joined him in Phila
delphia, and he and Asbury began their journey to
Maryland. They made their first stop at Bohemia
Manor. This was in Cecil county, Maryland, near
the Delaware line, and had been a favorite stopping
place of Whitefield's. The section was settled by
old English and Huguenot families; and as Mr.
Whitefield came southward he found warm sympa
thizers among these large planters. The Bayards,
Bouchelles, and Herseys lived here; and Mr. Wright,
Mr. Asbury's colleague, had been so delighted with
the people that he had spent his first three months
almost altogether among them. He was so much
attached to them that it was feared he would settle
(14)

Francis Asbury. 15
there. We find many allusions to this excellent
neighborhood in the journals of the earlier preach
ers. To reach Bohemia they came through New
castle and Chester, in Delaware, crossed the river
at a place he calls Susquehanna, and began their
first round in western Maryland.
Six years before, Strawbridge, a fervid young
Irishman, found himself in Frederick county, a pen
niless immigrant. Around him was a large and
comparatively new settlement of English people.
Some of them were Quakers ; many of them, like him
self, Church-of-England people, but, unlike himself,
they were merely nominal Christians. They were
many of them well-to-do tobacco planters, with quite
a number of slaves, comfortable in their circum
stances, easy in their lives, orthodox in their faith,
but entirely ignorant of anything like spiritual re
ligion. The gifted, earnest, pious young Irishman
began on his own motion to hold meetings among
them, and organized them into Methodist societies.
His preaching made a profound impression on the
community, and some of the best people in it joined
the society. They built a little log church, which
Asbury said was the first in America, and of which
we shall hear after awhile. When Boardman and
Pilmoor came, they found Strawbridge hard at
work; and now that a regular circuit had been laid
out, Asbury came to aid him. Asbury had been
only among the small farmers of New York and New
Jersey, but he now found himself in a colony where
there were large plantations and many slaves. The
interior part of this country had been settled for not
much more than fifty years; and as land was very

16 Francis Asbury.
cheap, and when first opened very fertile, and as
negro labor was easily secured, the wealth of the
country was already considerable.
Although Maryland had been settled by the Cath
olics, the Episcopal Church was now the established
one; but all classes of Christian people were tol
erated, and in this colony alone were the Roman
Catholics in any number. They were, however, con
fined to the western shore, and were not many in
proportion to the Protestant population. The Quak
ers were numerous, and there were a few Baptists.
The bulk of the population were Church-of-England
people in their affiliations. The journals of Asbury,
which were very full, reveal the religious destitu
tion of this part of Maryland. He mentions the
church in Baltimore, the church in which Parson
West preached in upper Harford, a church in Fred
erick City, and a church at Chestertown in Kent.
These were all the established churches he mentions.
There were in Baltimore (then a city of perhaps six
thousand people) churches of several denominations,
but, as far as we can see, few of any name outside
of it.
The preaching of Strawbridge had been in private
houses, and Asbury found these various stations
opened to him. A view of the condition of things
in Maryland at that time can be secured only by
looking with some care into the mention he makes
of the various homes which received him. He says
that before Strawbridge came the people had been
swearers, cock-fighters, horse-racers, and drunkards.
but had become greatly changed. William Watters
and Joshua Owings, two sterling young men, had

Francis Asbury. 17
been led by Strawbridge to give themselves to the
traveling ministry, while Nathan Perigau and Hen
ry Watters were lay preachers. Strawbridge had
preached extensively in Baltimore, Harford, Car
roll, and Howard counties, and had secured the con
version of a number of most excellent people. The
work of Strawbridge has not received its proper con- A
sideration. Mr. Asbury and the strong-willed Irish
man did not always agree, and, it may be, he did not
rate his work as highly as it should have been rated ;
but the journals of Asbury show at least something
of what had already been accomplished by his pred
ecessor. The two preachers had begun their round in Har
ford, and turned their course toward the northwest
ern part of the state. They were received into the
homes of the planters, and for the first time since
Asbury had been in America he found himself in
their houses. He was a stern young Englishman of
the straitest Wesleyan views, and when he visited
Dr. Warfield he was much shocked by the extrava
gant headdresses of the polite ladies he met there.
He went to Frederick City on this round. Here he
found a considerable town. It had in it now two
German churches (the Lutheran and the Reformed),
an Episcopal and a Roman Catholic church. He
went over into the Virginia Colony to Winchester,
where he preached in an unfinished house. On his
return to Maryland he stopped and preached at
Joshua Owings's,who had been one of Strawbridge's
first adherents. The widow Bond, whose husband
was a Quaker, and whose descendants have been so
distinguished as Methodists (for she was the grand-
2

18 Francis Asbury.
mother of Thomas E. Bond, Sr., and the great-grand
mother of Thomas E. Bond, Jr., the distinguished
editor), received him into her house, which was a
preaching place ; and Henry Watters, the brother of
William and Nicholas Watters, both of whom be
came distinguished as Methodist preachers, was an
other whom he met on his journey. Samuel Merry-
man, a pious Church-of-England man, who lived in
a beautiful valley some twenty miles from Balti
more, and John Emory, the father of Bishop Emory
and the grandfather of Robert Emory, were already
Methodists. From the home of one of the hos
pitable planters near Baltimore, he made his first
entry into Baltimore town on December 25, 1772.
An old map of Baltimore town, made some thirty
years before Asbury came, shows that where the
busy city is now there were at that time only the pos
sibilities of one; but in these thirty years it had
grown rapidly, and from Jones's Run on the east to
what is now Hanover street on the west, and from
Main (now Baltimore) street to the Bay, it was some
what thickly settled. M. de Warville, who visited
it in 1789, says the streets were unpaved and very
filthy, and there were about fourteen thousand peo
ple in it. The country through which he passed to
reach it was badly tilled, and the slaves were naked
and poorly fed; but the philosopher was in no hu
mor to see anything good in a slaveholding colony.
Where Asbury preached on this visit he does not
say, nor do we know who entertained him; but on
his return we know he preached in the house of the
widow Tribulet, a member of the German Reformed
Church, at the corner of Tribulet alley and Main

Francis Asbury. 19
(now Baltimore) street, and in the house of Captain
Paten, a clever and well-to-do Irishman, at the
Point. From Baltimore, in company with several
good women — the widow Huling, Mrs. Rogers, and
some others — he went to Nathaniel Perigau's, six
miles from the city. Nathaniel Perigau was con
verted under the preaching of Strawbridge, and be
gan at once to work, as did Owings and Watters.
He was the means of the conversion of Philip Gatch.
Baltimore county was a very large county, in
cluding what is now several counties. Baltimore,
which was at this time a small town, and Joppa, on
the Gunpowder River, which was at that time a de
clining port, were the only towns of any size in this
western part of Maryland. Most of the people were
poor, and lived in a plain way. Some families pos
sessed a large holding of land and a considerable
body of negroes. There were the Howards, Goughs,
Ridgeleys, Carrolls, Eagers, and others, who had
large estates near the new city; but the mass of the
people were like Strawbridge — if they owned their
land, they had little besides. They lived in log
houses, and in a very simple way. The country im
mediately around Baltimore was fertile, and the
country people came to the Point to hear this zeal
ous young Englishman. It is likely that at this time
he became the means of the conversion of Sarah
Gough, who, with her husband, was for so long a
time his most devoted friend. According to Dr. At
kinson, Mr. Pilmoor had organized a society in the
city some time before Asbury came; if so, Asbury
makes no mention of it, nor does he speak of organiz
ing one himself on this visit. He had a large circuit,

20 Francis Asbury.
which included all western Maryland. He belonged
to the race of circuit riders. He preached in the
city on Sunday, and went to the country, where he
preached every day. The roads were execrable; the
cold was very severe. In going to an appointment,
the very tears, as they fell, were frozen; but still he
went on.
The preachers met in quarterly meeting to divide
out the work, to receive their stipends, and to consult
about matters. Mr. Asbury, Mr. Strawbridge, Mr.
King, and Isaac Rollins were at the Conference.
The Conference met at James Presbury's, in what
was then Baltimore county, now Harford county,
Maryland, on the 23d of December, 1772. Although
this is the first Quarterly Conference of which we
have record, it is evident that others had been held
by Mr. Strawbridge, who had begun to work on his
own responsibility, and at these he administered
the sacrament. Mr. Boardman had quietly acqui
esced in that innovation, but Mr. Asbury did not
think it the thing to do. Mr. Wesley had not done
so, nor had he permitted his preachers to do so. Mr.
Boardman had not, Mr. Asbury had not, and he
could not consent to this young Irishman's course;
but for the sake of peace he withdrew his objec
tions, and Strawbridge administered the sacrament
to no one's hurt as far as we can see. On Sunday
Mr. Asbury took the sacrament from the regularly
ordained parson West. The funds were divided.
and for his three months' work Mr. Strawbridge re
ceived £8 and King and Asbury £6 each. He
preached at this quarterly meeting, and gives us in
his journal a skeleton of his sermon, which was suf-

Francis Asbury. 21
ficiently practical, and, like most of the sermons of
those days, covered all the ground. The text was,
"Take heed unto yourselves." "1. Take heed to
your spirits. 2. Take heed to your practices. 3.
Take heed to your doctrines. 4. Take heed to your
flocks: (1) Those under conviction; (2) Those that
are true believers; (3) Those that are sorely tempted;
(4) Those groaning for full redemption; (5) Those
who have backslidden." The appointments were
now made by a kind of mutual agreement, and Mr.
Asbury came to the Baltimore Circuit again. Be
fore this Conference he opened a new field.
On the eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay,
nearly opposite the counties of Baltimore and Har
ford, is and was the old county of Kent. It was the
first part of the state of Maryland which was set
tled, and was at this time thickly populated. The
settlers were almost entirely English people. The
large German element in western Maryland had no
place here. The people were generally well-to-do
planters, who lived in the easy way of those times,
and were connected with the Establishment. Meth
odism had not made any decided impression on them
up to this time, but they were not, perhaps, entirely
unacquainted with the Methodist preacher, and
some of them were quite friendly to the Methodist
movement. Strawbridge and King had probably
made a tour through Kent; but if so, they had or
ganized no societies.
The rector of the parish, however, was not dis
posed to welcome the intruder on his domain. Said
Mr. Asbury: "Mr. R. came to me, and desired to
know who I was and whether I was licensed. I

22 Francis Asbury.
told him who I was. He spoke great swelling words,
and told me he had authority over the people, as he
was charged with the care of their souls, and that 1
could not and should not preach; and if I did, he
would proceed against me according to the law.
I let him know that I came to preach, and preach I
would, and further asked him if he had authority
over the people and was charged with the care of
their souls, and if he was a justice of the peace, and
said I thought he had nothing to do with me. He
charged me with making a schism. 1 told him that
I did not draw the people from the church, and
asked him if his church was then open. He told me
I hindered the people from their work. But I asked
him if fairs and horse races did not hinder them.
I further told him that I came to help him. He
said he had not hired an assistant, and did not want
my help. I told him if there were no swearers or
other sinners, he was sufficient. But he said, 'What
did you come for?' I replied, 'To turn sinners to
God.' He said, 'Cannot I do that as well as you?'
I told him I had an 'authority from God.' He then
laughed at me, and said, 'You are a fine fellow in
deed.' I told him I did not do this to invalidate his
authority, and also gave him to understand that I
did not wish to dispute with him ; but he said he had
business with me, and came into the house in a great
rage. I began to preach, and urged the people to
repent and turn from their transgressions, that in
iquity should not be their ruin. After preaching,
the parson went out and told the people they did
wrong in coming to hear me; that I spoke against
learning."

Francis Asbury. 23
As the people had little use for the parson, and
little taste for paying the tobacco demanded for his
support, this encounter did the young circuit rider
no harm, but rather added to his popularity. He
found a good field for his work here, but he seems
to have tarried but a little while, and then he went
northward to the head of the Elk River and over
into Delaware. His work during this visit seems
to have been that of an explorer. He does not ap
pear to have organized societies, but preached, as
he went, to white and black.
His stay in Maryland was nearing its close. Mr.
Pilmoor was, perhaps, the ruling spirit among the
preachers, and he was not pleased with some things
his younger colleague did; and while Asbury was
on this visit he received a letter from him. He does
not tell us what was in it, but speaks of it as "such
a letter." The fact was doubtless that the younger
man had shown his independence, and Mr. Pilmoor
thought it was his duty to curb him. Asbury com
forted himself with saying and feeling that God
knew. Poor Francis, as he called himself, was
doomed all his life, and, as far as that is concerned,
for all the years since he passed away, to be misun
derstood, and his motives misread; and perhaps he
did no little of the same work when he made up
his verdict concerning other people.
The upper part of Maryland bordering on Penn
sylvania was in his circuit, and Mr. Strawbridge,
Abraham Whitworth, and Mr. King met him at the
quarterly meeting at Susquehanna. The sacrament
does not seem to have been administered at this
time, but strict inquiry was made into the state of

24 Francis Asbury.
the societies. It was thought there were no disor
derly members in the societies. The people paid
their debts, but the questions as to whether there
was no dram-drinking, whether band meetings were
kept up, and as to whether the preachers were blame
less, are not answered.
Mr. Asbury, after this Conference, went to Balti
more, but only to get ready for his journey to New
York. He had spent his first six months in Mary
land, and had gone over nearly all the western part
of the state, but did his main work in what are now
Baltimore and Harford counties, in the meantime
paying a visit to Kent and Delaware.
The families he met with give us a glimpse of
what kind of people the first Maryland Methodists
were. Henry Watters, the brother of William and
Nicholas Watters, was one of his first hearers. He
was already in the society. Charles Ridgeley, Dr.
Warfield, Mr. Giles, Joseph Dallam, and Joshua
Owings, Mrs. Huling, Mrs. Rogers, Nathan Peri-
gau, James Presbury, who was a relative of Free
born Garrettson, Mr. Merryman, and Mr. Emory.
were all of them among his hearers, and at many of
their houses he had a preaching place. The Quak
ers were particularly kind to the early Methodists,
and he mentions them very often. Over in Kent
Samuel Hinson, one of the old settlers, and a mem
ber of a distinguished family, entertained him, and
became a constant friend. There was in Kent a
Hinson's chapel named, doubtless, for him. He
preached very earnestly on his favorite theme, "Per
fect Love;" and while he did not profess it himself,
he was earnest in seeking it and urginsr all to seek it.

Francis Asbury. 25
Those who are familiar with Maryland and the
families of Maryland can see what impression had
even now been made. Mr. Asbury seems to have
made a greater impression upon Baltimore and the
Point than any who had preceded him. There were
now at work in that part of Maryland quite a num
ber of workers, and at the Conference which met in
June, 1773, there were four preachers sent to Balti
more, and five hundred members of the society were
reported. In New York and Philadelphia there
were one hundred and eighty each ; in Virginia, one
hundred ; in New Jersey, two hundred ; but in Mary
land, five hundred. They were chiefly found in Har
ford, Baltimore, and Frederick counties.
After this Conference he returned to Baltimore,
but only to get ready for his journey to New York,
to which place he went early in 1773.

CHAPTER IV.
1773-1774.
Asbnry in Maryland Again — Goe3 to New York — To Philadel
phia — Mr. Rankin's Arrival — The First General Conference —
Maryland Once More.
MR. WESLEY had appointed Asbury assist
ant in charge of the work, but he took be
sides a regular circuit, and was in New York in May.
He only remained one week, however, and then went
to Philadelphia, visiting Staten Island by the way.
He kept his journal with care, but says little of the
incidents of his outer life, and merely makes record
of his religious experience and of the sermons he
preached. He was not thirty years old, but his pi
ety was of the solidest sort, verging toward asceti
cism. Judging from his journal there seems never
to have been a single intermission in his religious
fervor, but he had seasons of great depression.
Reinforcements had been called for from En
gland and sent, and on June 1st Mr. Thomas Ran
kin, Mr. George Shadford, and Mr. Yearby reached
Philadelphia direct from England, and from Mr.
Wesley. Mr. Rankin superseded Mr. Asbury as general as
sistant, and immediately took charge of the socie
ties. He preached his first sermon in America in
Philadelphia, and Mr. Asbury thought he would not
be admired as a preacher, but he had good hope that
as a disciplinarian he would do well.
While he was in Philadelphia, like a good church-
(26)

Francis Asbury. 27
man as he was, he went to church to receive the sac
rament; and then the next week Mr. Rankin and
himself went to New York, where Mr. Richard
Wright was. Mr. WTright does not seem to have
done anything grievously wrong, but he did not
please his more serious brothers; and the sight of
him and other concurring circumstances "affected
Mr. Rankin so that he seemed to be cast down in
his mind," but after Mr. Asbury's sermon his spirits
revived, and in the afternoon Mr. Rankin, Captain
Webb, Mr. Wright, and Mr. Asbury all went to St.
Paul's and received the sacrament.
Mr. Asbury left his new superintendent in the city
and visited his old friend Justice Wright on Staten
Island. He here found at his house one who really
believed that we were regenerate before we repent
ed. He gave the obstinate Presbyterian Mr. Fletch
er's second Check, then just from the press, fully
persuaded, we doubt not, that if that failed to cure
his heresy, his case was hopeless. Mr. Asbury soon
returned to New York and went to work.
Mr. Lupton was still a little hard to please, and
charged the stern Asbury with winking at the fol
lies of the people, and said some other hard things
sufficiently painful to the sensitive young preacher;
but as he was no longer general assistant, and was
not likely to stay long in New York, he bore the in
dignity that the portly steward put upon him, and
went calmly on his way.
There had not been up to this time a Conference of
all the preachers. Some of them had met together in
their quarterly meetings, but it was now decided to
call a General Conference. The name given to the

28 Francis Asbury.
little assembly of Methodist preachers which met in
Philadelphia in June, 1773, is the only feature of re
semblance to the body of delegates who now meet un
der that name every four years. The minutes of this
Conference have been preserved. They cover about
half a page of octavo paper. There were ten preach
ers present and one thousand one hunderd and sixty
members reported as in the society, of which Mary
land had five hundred, and Virginia one hundred.
Thomas Rankin presided, and fixed the appoint
ments. Mr. Asbury, Mr. Whitworth, and Mr. Year-
by were sent to Maryland, to take up the work so
well begun.
Mr. Asbury went to his circuit and came again to
Baltimore; and Mrs. Tribulet's new house, on Main
street and Tribulet's alley, was freely lent for a
preaching place. When it was known that there
was to be preaching, he had a good congregation.
He made another visit to Kent, and to his friend
Mr. Hinson's. He had sent poor, rough, and, alas!
unreliable Isaac Rollins to work in Kent, but the
people would not bear with his rough address and
perhaps slack morals.
We may now get an outline of Asbury's circuit.
With Baltimore for a center, he went to Patapsco
Neck; then to Charles Harriman's; then to James
Presbury's, up the Bay; then over to Kent, on the
eastern shore; then, recrossing the Bay, he went to
Watters's and Dallam's, and to Pipe Creek. His
circuit took him into the midst of the most malari
ous section of Maryland and at the sickly season,
and he had a severe bilious attack which terminated
in a quartan ague. In studying his journal, which

Francis Asbury. 29
is an exceedingly dry detail of events, we are able
to make out only the bare outlines of the work.
There are evidences in it of a deep religious interest
among some of the people. The doctrine of a sound,
conscious conversion and the duty of a rigid adher
ence to the General Rules, and seeking with all ear
nestness for perfect love, were the burden of every
sermon. He made no compromises ; he was intense
ly in earnest, and so impressed himself on all who
heard him. A protracted meeting was then an un
known thing. The preacher preached and went on
his way.
He was now introduced by his good sister Hu-
ling into a family which did much for the struggling
society. This was the family of Philip Rogers. As
bury's prayer was that the wicked man might be
come a disciple of Jesus, which prayer was gracious
ly answered. The first revival in Baltimore began
now to cheer him. He remained in Baltimore for
a month, but no service like to the modern pro
tracted meeting was held. He preached on Sunday
three times, and on Wednesday night, and expected
results at the regular service. During all this time
he was really an invalid ; a most obstinate attack of
ague kept him in torture a large part of the time,
but no sooner was the fever gone than he was at
work again.
He was not a man to be trifled with. He knew
his rights, and asserted them. He had taken out a
regular license from the authorities under the tol
eration act, and demanded protection; and when
certain drunken fellows of the baser sort raised a
riot at the widow Tribulet's, which was promptly

30 Francis Asbury.
suppressed by Philip Rogers, who had been their
companion in sin, Mr. Asbury advised her to have
them prosecuted, and it was no fault of his that they
did not receive the punishment which they justly
deserved. The house of the good widow was not large
enough to hold the people, and Mr. Moore invited
them to his house. A church building was a neces
sity, but Asbury felt that it was too great a burden
for him to undertake to build it. He went out on
his country tour, and when he returned he found
that William Moore had raised £100 and Philip Rog
ers had taken up two lots. These lots were on Love
ly Lane. The November before this Jesse Hollings-
worth, George Wells, Richard Moale, George Rob
inson, and John Woodward purchased a lot on
Strawberry Alley on which to erect a church, and
"on the 30th of the month," Mr. Asbury said, "we
agreed with Mr. L. to begin the brick work of the
church," which, according to Stevens, was com
menced in November, 1774. On April 18, 1774, the
foundation of the house in Baltimore was laid, and
by the middle of October it was so far completed that
they were able to preach in it. Stevens says the
Strawberry Alley church was of brick, forty-one feet
in length and thirty in width; that its openingwas on
Fleet street; that its pulpit was very high, and over
it hung the sounding board. It was given to the ne
groes as early as 1S01.
There seems to have been a constant revival in
Baltimore, and Methodism made another inroad on
the ranks of the godless and wealthy planters about
the city. Mr. Gough and Mr. Charles Ridgeley and

Francis Asbury. 31
Mr. Carroll attended the preaching of Mr. Asbury;
and Captain Ridgeley was awakened, and Mr. Gough
after this was converted and joined the society.
Asbury had now two very plain brick chapels in
which to preach, one at the Point and one in the
city. Unornamented, uncomfortable houses they
were, but they were for his use. They were simply
brick, barn-like buildings, with rows of backless
benches, a high pulpit, and a sounding board. The
Methodists who attended the services here were
drilled according to the English model, for Asbury
was almost a Methodist ritualist. The lively song,
the fervent prayer, the noisy sermon, then the ear
nest song came in regular order. The last two
lines of the hymn sung, the congregation wheeled
right about face, and, after repeating them, they all
bowed on their knees for prayer. All were dressed
alike in sober stuff, cut in the Methodist pattern,
and all alike eschewed ruffles, rings, and feathers.
There was no stove in the chapel, but they made up
for the want of artificial heat by their zeal. These
noisy meetings and lively sermons drew quite a con
gregation to the chapel, and in the Strawberry Alley
and Lovely Lane chapels there was a decided inter
est all the time, and probably Mr. Asbury was the
most interesting preacher in Baltimore. He could,
however, stay only three months, and then he went
to Norfolk, and it was quite a twelvemonth before
he was in Maryland again.
Asbury's journal not only gives us an account of
his work for the Church, but is filled with personal
allusions, and we see what were his spiritual exer
cises and what his intellectual pursuits.

32 Francis Asbury.
The whole story of his religious life at this time
may be found in a few statements. All is presented
in them. He wa3 thoroughly consecrated to God,
and had but one aim, and that was to do his will
perfectly. He had a varying experience as far as
feeling was concerned; sometimes he was much de
pressed, sometimes he was full of peace, sometimes
severely tempted, but he was always triumphant.
It mattered not how he felt, his work was always
done. Mr. Rankin did not understand him. He under
rated him, and perhaps Mr. Asbury was a little sus
picious of Mr. Rankin, and thought his motives oth
er than they were. He had, however, no serious dis
agreement with him while he was in Maryland dur
ing this stay.
He was very diligent in reading, and his reading
was of the solidest kind — Neal's History of the Puri
tans, the Life of Calvin, the Reign of Christ, by
Guiso, and Church history. One can hardly see
how he could have found time for any reading or
study, but he was constantly at work.
His old friend Captain Webb came out to see
him, and remained in Baltimore for a little while.
The Conference was to meet at Philadelphia the
last of May, and after a year of useful work in Mary
land he went to its session. At this Conference the
young Englishman who had come over the year be
fore, Joseph Yearby, was admitted into the con
nection, and Philip Gatch, a young Marylander;
but Strawbridge was left out of the minutes, and
Asbury's old companion, Richard Wright, was sent
home. The stuff of which he was made was not

Francis Asbury. 33
stern enough for the Spartan demands of men like
Rankin and Asbury, and he was sent back to Mr.
Wesley to be used by him in England, and disappears
as far as we are concerned.
Poor, brave, conscientious Strawbridge was not
willing to submit to the demands made upon him.
He was willing to preach, and willing to suffer, and
willing to die; but he was not willing to refuse the
ordinances to people who otherwise could not have
them because these good churchmen said so. He
was not punished, but simply ignored; and now
there were only nine assistants, but seven young
helpers were admitted on trial.
3

CHAPTER V.
1774.
Mr. Asbury in New York and Baltimore — New York Again —
Discouragements — Mr. Rankin and Mr. Asbury — Richard
Wright Goes Home — Asbury's Discipline — Beligious Expe
rience — Feebleness of Body — Goes Southward — Maryland
Again.
THE Conference of 1774 closed, and Mr. Asbury
was appointed again to New York, and he was
soon at his place. He was sick and tired. Mr.
Rankin was overbearing and inconsiderate, and Mr.
Asbury said that but for the fact that he was con
scious of the truth and goodness of the cause he
would have gone back to England. He always
found preaching a great help for his depressed spir
its, and after preaching he went to see the incorri
gible Wright. Alas! Wright had little taste for
spiritual subjects, and his more pious associate says:
"Lord, keep me from all superfluity of dress and
from preaching empty stuff to please the ear. Thus
he has fulfilled as a hireling his day."
Asbury did not find all the congregation at the
stone church glad to see him; indeed, it was de
cidedly otherwise. "Mr. C. had written him an
abusive letter, and was still exerting his unfriendly
force." Nearly all, however, were pleased to have
him come again, and some were comforted with the
assurance he gave that the society should be purged.
He believed in drastic remedies, as one can see by
(34)

Francis Asbury. 35
reference to his memoranda of the medicines he
used on himself, and he was not inclined to spare
those committed to his care.
The most rigid Montanist was not more uncom
promising than Asbury was. The society was no
hospital to help the sick to convalescence, and if
the tares were in the field, up the tares must come.
The society was intended to help men and women to
be good who were anxious to be so, and its rules were
laid down for that purpose, and those rules "could
be observed, and ought to be observed, and must be
observed." He went to the St. Paul's Church as
usual, but clearly saw where the gospel ministry
was. Evidently it was in his view at the Methodist
meetinghouse on John street. He went out into
the meadows — where that was we do not know, but
long lines of buildings have doubtless covered those
meadows long ago — and there preached with plain
ness and power, and then preached in the city on
Tuesday evening, and on Wednesday felt his heart
glowing with divine love. "Blessed be God," he
says, "my soul is kept in peace and power and love."
His stay in New York was uneventful ; he spent the
larger part of his time in the city and made regular
preaching tours into the country round about. His
old adversary, Mr. Lupton, was entirely changed.
He was on the best of terms with Asbury now that
his old favorite, Wright, was gone.
The year in New York was one of great trial in
many ways. The society was not what he thought
it ought to be. There had been undue haste in re
ceiving people into it, and their hearts were not right.
Mr. Rankin was not agreeable, and wrote him un-

36 Francis Asbury.
pleasant letters; his health was not good, for he
had now been sick ten months and many days close
ly confined, but yet had preached three hundred
times and ridden nearly two thousand miles. In
all these trials and toils the heart of the pure young
man was moving heaven ward, and one day he says:
"My soul is not so intently devoted to God as I would
have it, though my desires for spirituality are very
strong." Then again: "My heart enjoys great free
dom and much peace, and love both toward God
and man. Lord, ever keep me from all sin and in
crease the graces of the Holy Spirit in my soul." "I
was much blessed," he says, "at intercession to-day,
but shut up in preaching to-night." He makes great
discoveries of defects and weaknesses. He rises
early, but is weak in body and mind. "Now his
mind is calm and comfortable, then he is assaulted
by heavy trials." "His soul is at peace, but longs
for to be more devoted to God." "He feels some
conviction for sleeping too long, and his mind is
troubled about a conversation between Mr.R.,Mr.S.,
and himself." Then his mind is free, and his soul
delights in God. "He taketh such possession of my
heart as to keep out all desire for created objects.
In due time I hope through Christ to enter into full
fruition." I have cited these extracts from his journal, not
that they are important as giving us a true insight
into the man, but to show how varying was the rec
ord he made — as varying as the record of any con
scientious man who morbidly chronicles all the phas
es of his changing sensations. In all this time his
faith never wavered, his love never abated, and his

Francis Asbury. 37
loyalty to God had not the slightest weakening;
and one cannot but regret that he evidently put such
great stress upon these phases of mere sensation,
and cannot but regret as well the morbidity with
which he looked upon the violation of some arbi
trary rules he had adopted as sins against God. Mr.
William Law thought people slept too much, and Mr.
John Wesley became his disciple, and he decided
that six hours were enough for any man to sleep;
and now poor Francis Asbury, sick and worn down,
instead of staying in bed till he used nature's sweet
restorer as physical health demanded, was dragging
himself out of bed at an untimely hour or reproach
ing himself for sleeping too late because he did not
do as Mr. Wesley said. One could only wish that
his good old mother could have had the sick, tired
preacher at her cottage for a few weeks, that she
might have given him the benefit of her matronly
counsel and care, and have put him to bed early in
the night, and kept all things still and dark until
the poor invalid had rested his fill. He, however,
gives himself and his feelings what seems to us to
be a little higher relative position than they were
entitled to, and these extracts taken from his jour
nal almost as they come show how varying were his
experiences. His pilgrim's progress had more than
seven stages: "My soul is in peace, but longs to be
more spiritual." "I do not sufficiently love God
nor live by faith." "Oh, what happiness did my
soul enjoy with God!" "My mind was much taken
up with God, but I must lament that I am not per
fectly crucified with Christ." "My body was weak
and my mind much tempted." "My soul is strength-

38 Francis Asbury.
ened with might and filled with peace." "My
heart is grieved and groaneth for want of more
holiness." "Unguarded and trivial conversation
has brought a degree of spiritual deadness." There
are in his journal many like entries, which we
might extract, but these are sufficient. The man
who never has a thrill of spiritual joy is sadly to be
pitied, but he is to be pitied also who longs to be
thrilling all the time. The man who has no sense of
sorrow for sin, and to whom a conscience never
wakes, is certainly to be pitied; but so is he who is
ever searching for some reason why God should
condemn him.
He gives us a little insight into the way in which
he prepared to preach, and his failure sometimes to
succeed in expressing himself satisfactorily. He
was diligent as a pastor, and mentions the case of a
poor lost girl who sent for him when she was dying,
and to whose bedside he went at the risk of cen
sure. He kept up his week-day appointments in the
country, and spent his time otherwise entirely in the
city. There were then in all New York city and
state only two hundred and twenty-two members,
and while care had been used to purge the societies,
there were still those whose want of consistency
greatly grieved the young pastor's heart. The im
prudence of some and the loose conduct of others,
he said, grieved him. He went regularly to hear
the Dr. E. who filled St. Paul's pulpit. As he does
not give his full name, and his remarks are by no
means complimentary, we need not try to discover
who he was. He went to church because he was a

Francis Asbury. 39
good Christian, and it was his duty to go there; but
the "doctor went on with his trumpery in his old
strain, or was on his old tedious subject of the Lord's
Supper. He cannot be at a loss in saying the same
thing over and over."
Mr. Asbury's friends wished him to return to
Baltimore, where his heart was, and where he was
much needed, but Mr. Rankin refused him permis
sion to go. There were now in New York Rankin,
Webb, and Asbury; and Asbury asks what need
can there be for two preachers to preach three times
a week to sixty people. " On Thursday night about
sixty people attended to hear Captain Webb. This
is indeed a gloomy prospect."
Mr. Asbury was sick, and things bore to him a
somewhat somber look, and he was much grieved
at Mr. Rankin's conversation. What the genial
Scotchman said which grieved him, we do not know.
In truth, like some other young invalids of real good
ness, he seems to have been somewhat easily grieved
by the shortcomings of other people as well as by his
own. The charge was too small for two men like
Rankin and Asbury, and matters did not go smooth
ly. Asbury wrote Wesley, and read* the letters to
Rankin on the matters of difference. Rankin, As
bury said, "drove the people away by telling them
how bad they were and what wonders he intended
to do." At this day it looks to us that honest Tom-
mie Rankin was a little arbitrary, and Mr. Asbury
certainly so regarded him.
One of Asbury's numerous ailments came early in
the new year, with more than usual severity. It
was an ulcerated throat, for which he kindly gives

4.0 Francis Asbury.
us a receipt for a gargle which is worth preserving :
"Sage tea, honey, vinegar, and mustard; and after
that another gargle of sage tea, alum, rose leaves,
and loaf sugar, to strengthen the parts." The ail
ing throat brought Mr. Rankin to his bedside, and
there was sweetness and love between them. At
last Mr. Asbury decided to follow his heart and go
southward, and so he took his journey to Baltimore.
Whether Mr. Rankin consented we do not know, but
there are intimations that Mr. Asbury acted on his
own judgment.
He rode on horseback, and preached as he went.
One of his happiest homes when he was first in
Maryland had been that of Joseph Dallam, where
the good old matron had treated him like a son ; and
as it was on his way, he called to spend an hour, and
mentions it in his journal. No man ever had a ten
derer love for his friends than Asbury had for those
who had dealt kindly with him, and in Maryland he
had made his attachments which lasted through his
life. The good Eliza Dallam is enshrined in the
hearts of Methodists because of her tenderness to
the young and often suffering missionary. Asbury
never forgot a kindness, and was never ungrateful
for one, and she had nursed him like a child when he
was ill; he, therefore, never fails to mention her.
He reached Baltimore, and found both at the Point
and in the city large congregations to attend the
ministry of their favorite preacher. It is evident
that Asbury at this time was a preacher of greater
power than he was in after years. After he became
a bishop he was burdened with so many cares, and
so constantly in motion and preached so frequently,

Francis Asbury. 41
that he did not impress men from the pulpit as he did
at this time. He still kept up his country appoint
ments, and mentions preaching at William Ijynch's,
where the wealthy Charles Ridgeley was present.
Charles Ridgeley was the planter who gave Straw-
bridge a home. Here at Lynch's he met Straw-
bridge, and they agreed fully in their estimate of Mr.
Rankin; but "all these matters," Mr. Asbury says,
"I can silently commit to God, who overrules both
in earth and heaven."
He went into the country, into the Neck, and
preached on the week days. Mr. Otterbein, the good
German pietist, who was Asbury's lifelong friend,
and Benedict Swope, his colleague, were living in
Baltimore and at the Point, and were ready to co
operate with him in his work.
Thus in labors abundant and successful he spent
his appointed time in Maryland.

CHAPTER VI.
1775.
Asbury's First Work in Virginia — Norfolk — Portsmouth — Isaac
Luke — County Work — Brunswick Circuit.
AT the Conference of 1775 Francis Asbury was
appointed to Norfolk, and in the last of May
he stepped from the deck of one of the Bay sailing
boats, and entered upon his new field. One hundred
and forty years before this the vestry of the Es
tablished Church in lower Norfolk had called Mr.
Thomas Harrison, at a salary of £100, to take charge
of Elizabeth River parish, and there was a preach
ing place in a private house; but now there was a
new town on the right bank of the Elizabeth River,
as well as the older on the other side. Norfolk, the
younger of the twin sisters, was quite a flourishing
little city. The tobacco which came from the then
western counties of Virginia and from North Caro
lina, much of it, found shipment to England here;
and into the port came the cargoes of rum, sugar,
and molasses from the West Indies. There were
two churches of the Church of England, one in Ports
mouth and one in Norfolk. A few years before this
Robert Williams had preached his first sermon in
Portsmouth on the courthouse steps, and Mr. Isaac
Luke had become his adherent. Mr. Luke secured
an old storeroom for him to preach in, and an old
playhouse had been utilized in Norfolk. Mr. Pil
moor and Mr. Wright had been there, and there had
(42)

Francis Asbury. 43
been at least a foothold secured, and Mr. Asbury
found the way laid out.
The people of the twin cities were noted for their
wickedness. Nothing else perhaps could have been
expected from their surroundings; but now, to add
to Mr. Asbury's difficulties, the war excitement ran
very high. The contrary winds which had tossed
the little bark for a week on the Bay were but typical
of the trials which were before him. There were
only thirty nominal members, and few of these were
willing to keep the rules; but yet he could gather
these early summer mornings fifty people for morn
ing service, and one hundred and fifty at night. The
change from the well-appointed charge in New York
and the hospitable counties around Baltimore to
the friendlessness of Norfolk was rather chilling,
but he consoles himself with the thought that much
ballast is necessary to keep the ship steady, and
that he needed humility. He went on with his work,
preaching in Norfolk and Portsmouth three times
on Sunday, and meeting the society besides. On
Tuesday he skirted the Dismal Swamp, and went
into St. Bride's parish and worked between Norfolk
and Portsmouth. Gloomy as was the prospect, they
tried to get a subscription for a church building, but
could raise only a little over §150. He had an ap
pointment six miles from Portsmouth toward Suf
folk, one at Mill Creek, one at Northwest Woods, one
at Mr. H.'s, and one at Craney Island. The people
came in from the country to Norfolk to hear him, and
he went as he could into the country during the
week, and in the cities on Sunday. He tried to en
force the rules, and as usual met with opposition.

44 Francis Asbury.
While he was in the midst of these troubles, Mr.
Rankin, Mr. Rodda, and Mr. Dromgoole wrote him
that they had decided to go back to England; but
he would not consent to leave these three thousand
souls, and so he wrote to Mr. Shadford. His letter
to them seems to have had its effect, for it was two
years after this before the Englishmen did return.
He worked faithfully and zealously, and in Septem
ber he had a three weeks' attack of fever. The
British marines landed soon after, and sacked the
printing office, and carried off the press of the rebel
lious printer, and altogether the times were out of
joint. He, however, remained his four months out,
and in November he began his journey southwest
to Brunswick. During these days of almost exile,
when his work seemed so fruitless, the devoted young
preacher was filled with one earnest yearning; it
was to be a holy man. He had peace and joy and
constant communion with God, but he longed for
perfect love.
In Brunswick there was a glorious revival fire
blazing. This section of Virginia at that time was
very populous and very prosperous. The Bruns
wick Circuit included in its boundaries Brunswick,
Sussex, Surry, Southampton. Isle of Wight, Din-
widdie, Lunenburg, and Mecklenburg, and George
Shadford had under his charge a corps of most ef
ficient assistants. There had been a most wonder
ful revival which began under the ministry of Dev-
ereux Jarratt, and which Robert Williams, who
died while Asbury was in Portsmouth, had done so
much to advance. The country was thickly settled,
and the well-to-do farmers, who peopled it and who

Francis Asbury. • 45
lived plainly, but in solid comfort, had been brought
up as Church-of-England people, but the Church
had secured no hold upon them. When the fervid
Jarratt, and the saintly Williams, and the gifted
Shadford had preached to these simple-hearted peo
ple the doctrines of the Methodists, they spoke in an
unknown tongue, but at last such a revival as had
not been known to this time in America began among
them. After passing Southampton Courthouse, As
bury entered the circuit, and met Shadford and
Francis Poythress, John Huey and James Hartley,
who had such a hard time in Delaware a few years
afterwards. Unhappily for us, Mr. Asbury adopted
the English custom in his journal of merely using
initials, and we are at a loss to mark out his line of
work. He went through Brunswick into Dinwiddie,
and met Mrs. Jarratt, who asked him to come into
their parish. He went on by Parham's to Peters
burg. On Sunday he preached twice in Petersburg,
where he said many of the people seemed to care for
none of these things. He went to see Jarratt, and
a friendship was thus begun which was never ended ;
and after the death of the good churchman, Asbury
preached his funeral sermon. After having gone
around this large circuit twice, which took him three
months, he left Virginia for Philadelphia.
It will be noticed that Shadford, Asbury, and Ran
kin seem to have made no allusions whatever to slav
ery in these their first visits. Their silence on this
subject, and their keeping themselves closely to their
legitimate work, was in decided contrast with the
course taken years afterwards. It is not likely that
slavery was more agreeable to the young preacher

46 Francis Asbury.
now than it was ten years afterwards, but he did
not then feel that his special mission was its over
throw. When he did yield to this pressure, he
found that the course he had at first adopted was the
only wise one.
He now began his journey to Philadelphia, and
calling on some Menus in Maryland, preaching as
he went, he at last reached his destination.

CHAPTER VII.
1776.
The War Time— Mr. Wesley's Mistake — Asbury's View — Asbury
Sick — Berkley Bath — Preaching — Conference at Deer Creek — ¦
Discussion on the Sacraments — Trouble with Mr. Rankin — .
Asbury Left Out of the Minutes — Goes to Annapolis — Test
Oath — Retires into Delaware.
THE good Mr. Wesley, not satisfied with the
troubles he had at home, and the paper battles
with the Calvinists, and not content with making
rules which his preachers were to keep and not to
mend, had taken the colonies in hand, and was try
ing to show the English people that the taxation of
the Americans was no tyranny, and that the rebels •
should disperse; but, alas! the rebels did not dis
perse; and little good did his honestly-written pam
phlets do, and much embarrassment did they cause
his preachers in America. It was thirty years after
the war before the 'Methodist could purge himself
from the charge of being a Tory. Mr. Rankin and
Mr. Rodda and Mr. Boardman fully indorsed Mr.
Wesley, but Mr. Asbury thought his course very un
wise. The Continental Congress met in Philadel
phia, and here Asbury was stationed, but it was to
him as though it had not been. He had still that
pertinacious ague, and was unable to get to Confer
ence. It met in May, and he was appointed to
Maryland again.
When he found that he was appointed to Balti
more, he began his journey southward; reached his
(47)

48 Francis Asbury.
old friend Dallam's, and thence came to the city.
He began his work with his accustomed earnest
ness. On the week days he went out into the coun
try to preach, and returned to the city for his Sun
day work. His child in the gospel, Philip Rogers,
and his good wife were still faithful, and the rich
Harry Gough and his lovely wife had been con
verted. Their elegant home at Perry Hall had now
been opened to the Methodist preachers, and re
mained so for forty years. Gough was of noble
family, and was the heir of a large estate in En
gland. He then was worth $300,000, and at this
time would be rated as worth largely over $1,000,-
000. He had been a frivolous, dissolute man, who
had been influenced by his desire for amusement to
go and hear Asbury. His wife had already been
awakened, and he had opposed her; but now, when
he heard Asbury, he was awakened and genuinely
conArerted. He became a warm friend of Asbury,
and we shall see him often in the course of his life.
These were stirring times. The battles around
Boston had been fought, and the Continental army
had been organized; the Declaration of Independ
ence had been made; but Asbury in his journal
makes no mention of these events as having taken
place. He went on oblivious of everything but his
work. The fact that Mr. Wesley had so unwisely
intermeddled with the American matter, and writ
ten so sharply against the course of the colonies,
and that so many of his preachers were Englishmen,
made it a very disagreeable thing for Mr. Asbury to
remain where he was exposed to suspicion, and at
Nathan Perigau's he was fined £5 for preaching with-

Francis Asbury. 49
out taking a license; but he went on his way, saying
nothing on the great political questions of the day.
He says that while riding along the highway, soaring
out of the regions of his duty, he became inattentive
to what immediately concerned him, and overset and
badly broke his chaise. He could not get entirely
well. The quartan ague that two years before had
fixed itself on him, and the terrible putrid sore
throat he had in New York, had so reduced him that
he resolved to take a little respite from toil, and
seek health; and as Mr. Gough and Mr. Merryman
Avere going to the springs in Berkley, he went also.
There were a number of people at the springs, and
at the cottages of Mr. Gough and Mr. Merryman
they had services every evening. His stay at the
springs was very profitable to him both in soul and
body. He preached nearly every day, visited the
sick, went to the German settlement nine miles
away and preached to the Germans ; read De Renty
and Haliburton and Walsh and Brainerd; prayed
a great deal, and found much comfort in his soli
tary musings ; and after a two weeks' stay left Bath
with the opinion that it was the worst and best
place in which he had been : the best for health, the
worst for religion.
He returned to his work in September. He
preached at Bush Forest, Deer Creek, Nathan Per-
igau's, the Forks, Merryman's, Greer's, and kept up
his weekly appointments at the Point and in the
city. His circuit was large, but he had two young
helpers. Appointments in the city were sometimes
filled by others, and the services seem to have been
kept up regularly. Watch-night services were not
4

50 Francis Asbury.
only held then, as they are now, at the going out of
the old year and the coming in of the new, but were
also held occasionally without reference to any par
ticular time.
The seat of war was somewhat remote from Mary
land, and while there was agitation there was little
of actual disturbance. Mr. Asbury's companions,
Mr. Rankin, Mr. Shadford, and Mr. Rodda, were pro
nounced Englishmen, and it is likely they sympa
thized with the mother country in the contest; at
any rate, they determined to go back to England.
Mr. Asbury had been longer in America than any of
them, and if he did not sympathize with America he
had no disposition to take sides against her nor to
desert his flock, and could not make up his mind to
go back, and so decided to remain. The Englishmen
did not go back for the present, and, as Mr. Shadford
was willing to take his place on the Baltimore Cir
cuit, Asbury decided to go to Annapolis and begin
a new work.
Annapolis was then, as it is now, the capital of Ma
ryland, and was the seat of much elegance, and, alas!
of much wickedness, and especially infidelity. He
went to the city, and preached his first sermon at the
widow D.'s, and then preached in an old playhouse
used as a church. In and around Annapolis he
preached with small success until the yearly Confer
ence, which met in Deer Creek the 20th of May.
This was the Conference at which the first note of
serious discord was struck. The American preach
ers were restless under the condition of things, and,
as they were largely in the majority, they were dis
posed to have the ordinances. Asbury and his Enjx-

Francis Asbury. 51
lish brethren recognized this as the beginning of di
vision from the English Wesleyans, and they sternly
opposed it. When the appointments were made,
Mr. Asbury's name did not appear as having an ap
pointment. Rodda and Shadford were appointed,
and Mr. Rankin was general assistant. Mr. Asbury
is mentioned as one of the assistants, but not other
wise. The Conference pledged itself to take no step
to separate itself from the English brethren.
Why his name was left out has not been explained,
but the fact was that Mr. Wesley had ordered Mr.
Asbury to return to England, and he would not go.
Mr. Rankin did not understand his colleague, and
Avrote freely, if not favorably, about him to Mr. Wes
ley, and Mr. Wesley said in a letter to Mr. Rankin:
"I doubt not that you and brother Asbury will part
friends. I shall hope to see him at the Conference.
He is quite an upright man. I apprehend he will
go through his Avork more cheerfully when he is
within a little distance from me." And again: "I
rejoice over honest Francis Asbury, and hope he
will no more enter into temptation." Mr. Asbury
could not take out a license1 to preach in Maryland
without taking the oath, and he was not willing to
do that; but the same thing was true of Shadford,
and he was sent to Baltimore. As Mr. Rankin made
the minute, it is likely that Mr. Asbury's name was
left off by his authority.
Asbury went from the Conference to the circuit
he had traveled before he went to Conference. He
spent a little while at Gough's, and mentions that he
had left off Ms wig. To us of this day the custom
of cutting off the natural hair and wearing an un-

52 Francis Asbury.
comfortable wig seems to rise to the height of ab
surdity ; but even Mr. Asbury, who had great fear of
the good women of society conforming to the world
in their headdresses, wore his wig for five years after
he came to America.
He had a rather unfruitful field around Annapolis.
He preached at the widow D.'s, at Mr. H.'s, Mr. J.
P.'s, the schoolhouse, South River, and Maggoty.
The congregation in Annapolis sometimes amounted
to fifty, chiefly women. He preached very earnestly,
if not very successfully. Mr. Rankin and himself had
their usual collisions about appointments, and at last,
in September, Mr. Rodda and Mr. Rankin went home.
Mr. Asbury, in a letter to Joseph Benson, says:
"Mr. Rankin was in favor of bringing the colonies
into subjection at once." Mr. Rodda distributed the
king's proclamation and ran away to the British
fleet. Mr. Shadford and Mr. Asbury found matters
getting too warm for their comfort. Mr. Shadford
decided to go to England, and Mr. Asbury crossed
the bay to the eastern shore early in January, 1778.
Here, in Kent, he found his old friend Hinson, and
saw that the seed he had sown when he came to Kent
four years before had been fruitful, and there were
flourishing societies now; but Maryland was not a
safe refuge for him, and he went on to Delaware,
where, near Dover, his old friend Thomas White
had a home, and there he was gladly wel corne'd.
He never returned to Maryland for pastoral work.
He next came as Mr. Wesley's assistant, and then as
the Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church in
America.

CHAPTER VIII.
1778.
Life in Delaware — Thomas White — Asbury's Studies — Stormy
Times — The Conference at Leesburg — Asbury's Called Con
ference^ — Troubles in the Conferences — Asbury's Hard Con
dition — A Truce Made.
THE oath which was prescribed in Maryland, and
which Asbury refused to take, was designed for
those ministers who were suspected of secret sym
pathy with the king. The fine of £5, to which he
alludes as collected three years before, was under
the colonial law, and was laid on all unlicensed
preachers. When he found, as he did early in 1778,
that he must take an oath that he could not con
scientiously take, he resolved quietly to withdraw
from Maryland. Not far from Dover, in Delaware,
lived a well-to-do farmer, Thomas Whife. He was
judge of the county court, and was known as Judge
White. He was a stanch Church-of-England man,
and while he was not an enemy to the American
cause he was not an active participant in the Rev
olution. He was a profoundly religious man, and
was deeply attached to Asbury, who sought his home
for seclusion. Here he remained for a part of three
years, and had more time for study than at any other
time in his life.
Mr. Asbury had found time to study Greek and
Hebrew, but his journal does not tell us when. For
several years after he came to America there is no
mention of this fact, but now in the quietude of his
(53)

54 Francis Asbury.
Delaware retreat he spends much time on the Greek
Testament. He read the Testaments in Latin and
Greek and the Old Testament Scriptures in Hebrew,
and at Thomas White's home, and at that of Edward
White, his brother, he now had his preaching places.
It was dangerous to move about in Delaware at that
time. J. Hartley had been arrested in Queen Anne
county, Maryland, and imprisoned. Gatch had been
assaulted and lost his eye, and Garrettson had been
knocked from his horse, and shortly after this Thom
as White himself was arrested and carried to pris
on; and these were Americans, not Englishmen.
Mr. Fletcher and Mr. Wesley had both rendered
themselves obnoxious to the Americans by their
course, and Mr. Asbury was Mr. Wesley's special
representative. Mr. Asbury was afraid of no man;
he seems never to have known what fear was; but
he was afraid of reckless daring, and of refusing to
heed the directions of Providence; and so he re
mained in seclusion, only preaching as he could get
an opportunity. He had a good preaching place in
the tobacco barn of Judge White, and while he did
not leave his retreat to go any considerable distance,
he preached somewhere nearly every day. He laid
a plan for himself to travel and preach nine days in
two weeks. He was constantly engaged in preach
ing or study, and especially in earnest spiritual ex
ercises. He did not think he had secured that high
est of earthly boons to him, perfect love, but he was
groaning after it.
The Conference met in Leesburg, Virginia, May 19,
and while it was in session Mr. Cox held a quar
terly meeting in Judge White's barn in DelaAvare,

Francis Asbury. 55
and Mr. Asbury preached. Mr. Asbury does not
mention the Annual Conference in Virginia at all in
his journal; but while he says nothing of it, it is
evident that he was greatly concerned on account
of the state of the Church. The young Americans
who were now in control of the Conference were
without a leader. Rankin was gone from Amer
ica with all the English preachers except Asbury.
Asbury had seen the temper of the young Amer
icans at Deer Creek the year before, when, as he
said in his letter to Shadford, he had been una
ble to resist the tide in favor of separation. Per
haps he had no special desire to go to Leesburg,
and as he did not go, the Conference entirely ig
nored him. He was not mentioned at all in the min
utes. It was evident to Asbury that matters were,
getting into a shape by no means pleasing to him,
and he feared all the hard labor of these past years
would come to naught. It was no time to discuss
theories, he had to face a condition. He Avas the
senior preacher on the continent. The Conference
was entirely cut off from Mr. Wesley, and he decided
as the senior to take an extraordinary step. He re
solved to call a Conference of such preachers as
were within his reach, and take control of it. The
regular Conference had assembled, and had made
provision for a separation. He believed that unless
something was done separation was inevitable, and
he determined, if possible, to prevent it. It is not
my province to express opinions, but to state facts,
yet one can do no less than say for Asbury that he
believed he was not usurping authority, and that he
was doing what Mr. Wesley wished; and in that be-

56 Francis Asbury.
lief he was sustained by after facts, and his course
had Mr. Wesley's full indorsement.
He wrote to his old friends Gatch, Dickins, and
Dromgoole, urging them to interpose; and he called
and took charge of a Conference in 1778. It is for
the historian to give a full account of the little Con
ference, as Jesse Lee calls it. It recognized Asbury
as chief pastor, and passed sundry resolutions, and
proceeded as if it was the only ecclesiastical body
among the Methodists.
The few brethren who met with him were willing
to cooperate with him, and he gave them their ap
pointments, took one for himself, and soon was hard
at work. Though the war was going on, the revival
in Delaware under Garrettson and others was truly
wonderful. Asbury began now to venture out at,
greater distances from Judge White's, but he was
still in seclusion and was diligent in the work of ad
vancing his spiritual welfare. One cannot but re
gret his attention to a certain class of books which
led him, always so distrustful of himself, to draw
such invidious comparisons between himself and
others. The lives of De Renty, Haliburton, and
Walsh he seems to have read more than any other
books but his Bible, and they had no little to do
"with the deep depression under which oftentimes
he sank. He was, however, no recluse. Philip
Cox, the preacher in charge, had quarterly meet
ings at which he was present that were much like
the camp meetings of an after day. People came
from Sussex, Somerset, Queen Anne, Kent, New
castle in Delaware, and Philadelphia in Pennsyl
vania. Mr. McGaw, an Episcopal rector, adminis-

Francis Asbury. 57
tered the sacraments, and there were six or seven
hundred present. Mr. Asbury was an Episcopalian
— he believed in bishops, and had no objection to
prayer books. He says, September 10, 1779: "I be
gan reading Camper on Ordination. Much pomp
was annexed to the clerical order. Though plausi
ble in its way, I believe the episcopal mode of ordi
nation to be more proper than that of presbyters."
To this view he always held. To get a view of his
untiring toils we take the record of a few days.
On Sunday he says: "I went to a people I tried
near two years ago in vain. Monday I read thirteen
chapters in Revelation, a hundred pages in Camper
on the Consecrating of Bishops, and fifty pages in
Salmon's Grammar." "It is plain to me the devil
will let us read always if we will not pray."
"Tuesday I read a few chapters in the New Testa
ment and seventy pages in Salmon's Grammar.
"Wednesday, I am going up to Kent, and thence
to Lewistown.
"Thursday, called at the widow Beauchamp's,
who was sick but happy in the Lord."
Rode to Lewistown: "I rode thirty miles, and on
my way called to hear an Episcopal minister. He
was legal to all intents and purposes."
"Sunday, went to Lewistown, preached in the
courthouse twice. Preached Monday at nine o'clock.
Preached on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Fri
day." Never wearying, never ceasing, he was al
ways at work.
These extracts are but samples of the entries in
his journal when he was in retirement. No wonder
he said he never did harder or better work at any

58 Francis Asbury.
time than in these days of exile. Hartley, who had
been licensed to preach when Asbury was in Vir
ginia, and who had been imprisoned in Maryland
for preaching, had yielded to the temptation to mar
ry, and was wedded. The somewhat cynical As
bury says: "I find the care of a wife begins to hum
ble my young friend, and makes him very teachable.
I have always thought he carried great sail, but he
will have ballast now." The part of Delaware where
he was at work was very populous, and perhaps few-
spots of earth have been blessed with a more able
ministry than this section of Maryland was at this
time. Freeborn Garrettson, Philip Cox, Francis As
bury, and Mr. McGaw, the Episcopal minister who
was the Devereux Jarratt of that state, were among
the workers, and their success was great.
The Conference of the year 1779, which Mr. As
bury had called, had adjourned to meet in Balti
more in 1780, and Mr. Asbury was in charge of it
when it met. Of no one thing was he more firmly
convinced than that he and those who were with him
were the only regular Methodists in America. He
had resolved at first to cut loose entirely from the
Virginia brethren, then he decided if they would com
ply with certain terms he would again affiliate with
them. They had sent a peace commission, Gatch
and Ellis, to Baltimore. Asbury offered them cer
tain conditions, which they promptly rejected. He
then proposed that the matter of administering be
deferred a twelvemonth. They thought that might
do, and Asbury, Garrettson, and Watters decided to
go to Fluvanna, which they did. Here, after all
hope of reconciliation seems to have been lost, while

Francis Asbury. 59
Garrettson and Watters were praying, the noble Vir
ginians decided to wait another year, and there was
harmony. Mr. Asbury was recognized as general
assistant, and began what was really his episcopal
work.

CHAPTER IX.
1781-1783.
General Assistant — Conference in Baltimore — Settlement of
Troubles — Through the Valley of Virginia — Allusion to
Strawbridge — Through Eastern Virginia — First Visit to North
Carolina — His Friends Among the Episcopal Clergy — Visits
New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey — Barratt's Chapel, 1784
— Letter from Asbury to Shadford.
ASBURY began his journal for the year 1781
with this entry : "January 1, 2, 3, 4. Pain, pain,
pain!" No wonder. He had been troubled again
with his ulcerated throat, and took physic, and ap
plied two blisters afterwards — put one on the back
of his neck and another behind the ear; had some
blood taken from his tongue and some from the arm.
This was on December 31, 1780; but he was soon
able, despite this medication, to go on his way, and
did most earnest work around his home in Delaware.
He now went into Pennsyhrania, where he met that
wonderful man, Benjamin Abbott, or, as he writes
it, Benjamin Abbitt. He visited the Philadelphia
society, and preached in PennsylATania and Dela
ware until April, when he crossed the Chesapeake
Bay, and rode to Mr. Gough's to meet the Baltimore
Conference. The Conference was to meet in Baltimore in May.
Mr. Asbury determined to recognize none but those
Avho stood with him on the old plan, as making the
Conference. During this vear, 1781, according to the minutes,
(60)

Francis Asbury. 61
there were two Conferences held — one at Choptank,
April 16, 1781; the other at Baltimore, April 24.
Mr. Asbury inserts the minute which recognizes the
smaller Conference as the true one. He says, May
16: "After meeting, we rode about twenty miles to
brother White's, where about twenty preachers met
to hold a Conference." On the 24th he says: "Our
Conference began at Baltimore, where se'veral of the
preachers attended from Virginia and North Caro
lina. All but one agreed to return to the old plan,
and give up the administration of the ordinances.
Our troubles seem to be over in that quarter. All
was conducted in peace and love."
When this Conference met, a pledge was asked for
from those who would preach old Methodist doctrine
and discountenance a separation. There were thir
ty-nine who signed this pledge. "Why was this
Conference begun at Choptank?" Say the minutes:
"To examine those who could not go to Baltimore."
"Is there any precedent for this in the economy of
Methodism?" "Yes; Mr. Wesley generally holds a
Conference in Ireland." As Choptank was only a
few days' ride from Baltimore, and as all the preach
ers who were there were in all likelihood in Balti
more afterwards, the answer does not seem quite
satisfactory. John Dickins would not submit, and
he desisted from traveling, to come back some years
afterwards and die in the work. This was the end
of the trouble about ordination.
Asbury visited Martinsburg now for the first time.
The beautiful section of Virginia known as the Val
ley of Virginia had been exposed to Indian forays
until a very few years before this time, and had been

62 Francis Asbury.
occupied by daring settlers of an entirely different
class from those with whom Mr. Asbury had been
associated in eastern Virginia and Maryland. Ger
mans and Scotch-Irish people, intermixed with east
ern Virginians who were willing to face perils, made
the population. Much of the country was very rug
ged, and the forests were wild; but he says: "Al
though alone, I have blessed company, and some
times think who so happy as myself." He found
Methodists and a Methodist preacher even here.
He says: "We had twelve miles to R.'s along a
bushy, hilly road. A poor woman, with a little
horse without a saddle, went with us up and down
the hills; and when she came to the place appointed,
the Lord met with and blessed her soul."
He now went southward along the south branch
of the Potomac. "Blessed be God," he says, "for
health and peace. We found some difficulty in cross
ing the Capon River. Three men very kindly car
ried us over in a canoe, and afterwards rode our
horses over the stream without fee or reward.
About five we reached W. R.'s. I laid me down to
rest on a chest, and, using my clothes for a covering,
slept pretty well. Here I found need of patience.
The scenery was grand, though the roads were
rough." He had, he says, about three hundred peo
ple to hear him, but there were many whisky-drink
ers who brought with them so much of the powers
of the devil that he had but little satisfaction in
preaching. He found even here a few who were striving to be
entirely sanctified, and says: "It is hard for those
to preach this doctrine who have not experimentally

Francis Asbury. 63
attained it or are not striving with all their hearts
to possess it." In these wilds he was reading Fletch
er's Checks, which had been greatly blessed to him.
In crossing the mountains Avith William Par
tridge, they were overtaken by night, so they secured
their horses to some trees and waited quietly till the
return of the day. They slept among the rocks,
though much annoyed by the gnats. In all this
tour, when he was in a house, he was compelled to
sleep on the floor every night, but was full of grati
tude to God that he fared so well.
He reached Leesburg July 31st, crossed over into
Maryland, and went to the quarterly meeting,
preaching as he went. He makes a somewhat pain
ful allusion, evidently to Strawbridge. He says:
"Monday, September 2d, I visited the Bush Chapel.
The people here once left us to follow another.
Time was when the labor of their leader was made
a blessing to them; but pride is a busy sin. He is
no more. Upon the whole, I am inclined to think
that the Lord took him away in judgment because
he was in the way to do hurt to the cause, and that
he saved him in mercy, because from his deathbed
conversation he appears to have hope in his end."
One could wish this paragraph had not been writ
ten, and a partial biographer would be glad to ex
punge it; but an honest one cannot. Mr. Asbury
was perhaps given to judging harshly those who did
not see things as he saw them, and to attributing
to them motives from which they were often free.
Those who knew Strawbridge best had the highest
confidence in him and respect for him, and his death
was, according to Garrettson, a very peaceful and

61 Francis Asbury.
happy one. Happy is he who can judge justly one
who he thinks is in grave error!
Mr. Asbury was very busy visiting his old friends
and the churches, and, under great weakness of body,
preaching every day. He made a short visit to Phil
adelphia, and came into Delaware again, and once
more came into Baltimore. While things in Virgin
ia were not so bad as he feared, yet there was need
for him, if he would stamp ont this spirit of separa
tion, to go there as speedily as possible; and so at
the close of this year he went into Virginia again.
In January, 1782, Mr. Asbury again entered Vir
ginia and worked with all ardor to suppress the
spirit which clamored for the ordinances. His in
domitable will had nearly crushed it out, but still
there was to be another Conference of the disaf
fected at Manakintown. He believed this would be
the last struggle of a yielding party, but the yield
ing party in two years' time was the victorious one
so far as the main issue was concerned. He rode
into King George county to Stedham's. Stedham
had been a famous racer in those days, but now he
was the servant of Jesus Christ, and had given up
his race horses. In October, 1781, the surrender at
Yorktown had taken place, and Mr. Asbury was
now in the midst of the desolations caused by the
war. He says: "We find the smalLpox and camp
fever raging, and heard of several poor creatures,
white and black, that had died on the road. Ah!
we little know what belongs to war, and with all its
train of evils, churches converted into hospitals and
barracks, homes pillaged or burned." He rode to
Mr. Jarratt's, below Petersburg, and met him again.

Francis Asbury. 65
The influence of Mr. Jarratt over Mr. Asbury was
manifestly very great, and it is quite evident that Mr.
Asbury had a hope that the evangelical party of
the Established Church and the Methodists would
in some way coalesce, and that all the Episcopalians
in the southern provinces would become Methodists
while all continued to be Episcopalians. The na
ture of the situation, for which the party that Mr.
Asbury was so sternly opposing was trying to pro
vide a remedy, is seen when he says in the entry:
"Mr. Jarratt baptized A. C.,one of our young preach
ers." He went on his way from Jarratt's through
Sussex and Nansemond, and preached at Ellis's;
Avent to Lane's and Mabry's; met his good friend
Dromgoole, in Mecklenburg, and passed again into
North Carolina and into the upper counties of that
state, and then recrossed the line into Virginia. He
says: "In that country I have to lodge half my nights
in lofts where light may be seen through a hundred
places, and it may be the cold wind at the same time
blowing through as many, but through mercy I am
kept from murmuring." He was at that time most
earnest in preaching on sanctification ; and while he
makes no positive statement with regard to his own
experience he says many things which would lead
one to suppose that he claimed, if he did not profess,
a grace he so constantly presaed upon others; and
yet after saying one day, "My soul restoth in God
from day to day and from moment to moment," a
week later he says: "I have been much tried in vari
ous ways. I feel myself greatly humbled. This
morning I poured out my soul to God in the granary,
and was refreshed in my spirit."
5

66 Francis Asbury.
He was hard at work trying to bring all the
preachers who had been disaffected to harmonize
with him in his vieAVS about the ordinances, and he
had succeeded most wonderfully up to this time,
and now Philip Bruce and James O'Kelly also were
reconciled to him. Mr. Jarratt was in full accord
with Asbury in all these measures, and was ready to
cooperate with him, and attended the Conference at
Ellis's meetinghouse and preached; and as soon as it
was over, Mr. Asbury preached at Mr. Jarratt's barn.
Asbury, with his determined will and admirable
management, had now checked, if he had not com
pletely crushed out, the movement toward inde
pendency in Virginia; but it is evident from his
after course that he knew the matter was merely in
suspense, and that the old plan was only to be ad
hered to until Mr. Wesley could be heard from; and
after results showed that even when Mr. Wesley was
heard from the preachers were not disposed to blind
ly follow his directions. The preachers at the Con
ference, however, all signed the agreement, both at
Ellis's and afterwards at Baltimore, agreeing to
wait, and there was now concord.
Asbury now made a visit to the western shore, to
Calvert county, Maryland. This is the first mention
of hisA'isitation to this part of Maryland, where Meth
odism won such conquests in after time. It was a
secluded peninsula on the western shore, inhabited
by English people of simple tastes and warm heart".
From the western shore he went to Leesburg, Va.,
and made another journey through the northern part
of what was then Virginia and what is now West
Virginia. He rode sixty miles over incrediblv bad

Francis Asbury. 67
roads in two days, and preached in Shepherdstowu
to about two hundred people. He returned to Mary
land, and then went to Pennsylvania; then to Dela
ware and into East Virginia, and down through the
war-desolated sections of the tide-water country,
where he ended the year 1782. He was in constant
motion, and in the first part of 1783 he made a very
extensive tour.through the upper part of North Car
olina. He passed through Salem and went doAvn
as far south as Guilford, then back to Caswell, and
then turned his face toward the eastern part of
North Carolina, where he made another A'isit to
Green Hill, "at whose house he preached," he said,
"to a proud and prayerless people;" and it was while
on this tour he heard the rumor of peace between
England and America.
The de facto bishop had established his lines, and
now extended them across the mountains into Hol
ston, and all over upper North Carolina and Vir
ginia, and Eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Whenever it was practicable he had made a circuit
and found a preacher for it, until now there were
thirty-seven circuits and nearly fourteen thousand
members. He now had his hands full, as he made
a yearly visitation to all parts of the work. His cir
cuit began at New York, and took in New Jersey,
the eastern parts of Pennsylvania, Delaware, the
eastern shore of Virginia and Maryland, and all of
the then settled parts of Virginia, and along the
northern part of North Carolina. He was still try
ing to keep on good terms with the Episcopal clergy,
and Mr. Jarratt, Dr. McGaw,and Mr. Pettigrew were
his special friends. But his hope that by making

68 Francis Asbury.
concessions he might secure something of the same
nature from the Established Church seems to have
been a baseless one. After the Conference he went
as usual to the western border, preaching in Shep-
herdstown and Winchester, and during the hot
weather of early August went into Pennsylvania.
Here he heard of the sad death of Isaac Rollins,
whom he had ten years before introduced into the
ministry which Rollins had so shamefully dis
graced. There is perhaps no comfort to us in these
latter days in finding out that the early preachers
were not all saints, and learning that of the four
earliest American preachers Abram Whitworth and
Isaac Rollins became apostates, and, alas! that the
gifted and zealous Joseph Cromwell, having done
most excellent work, fell into grievous drunkenness
and died and made no sign. The demands which
Asbury made upon those who were associated with
him were perhaps sometimes too great for weak men,
and perhaps he was sometimes mistaken in the mor
al stamina of those whose zeal was so ardent. He
visited Philadelphia, where after the war all things
were prosperous but religion, and came again to
New York. He had persuaded John Dickins to leave
North Carolina, and take charge of the church in
New York, which came out of the Revolution even
stronger than when it went into it. He now vis
ited him, and preached earnestly to the people, and
went again into the eastern shore of Maryland, and
into Virginia and along the old route he had trav
eled the year before and traveled so often after
wards. He went into North Carolina, where he re
ceived the Lord's Supper from Mr. Pettigrew, and

Francis Asbury. 69
received a letter from Mr. Wesley appointing him
to a work he had been doing for four years. Again
he pressed through the middle counties of North Car
olina, and was sadly disappointed because he could
not reach the Yadkin Circuit once more; but an in
flamed foot kept him from it, and it was by the aid
of a stick that he could limp to the barn and the sta
ble. The Tar River Circuit, in Granville and War
ren, was very populous and was then in a prosperous
state. He found the people numerous; the congre
gations in all the southern section of Virginia and
the northern counties of North Carolina largely at
tended. He attended the two Conferences, one at
Ellis's and one at Baltimore, and found that poor,
half -crazy William Glendenning was beginning a
fight against him, which he kept up for years.
The Conference of 1784 over, he turned his face
again toward the newly-settled Valley of Virginia
and the borders of northwestern Virginia, where
he says they were three thick on the floor. He went
into western Pennsylvania, and in July was in Phil
adelphia. He went as far north as New York, and
met his old friend William Lupton. This portly
merchant, who had given him some trouble, was
still alive, and despite the war the society was still
prosperous. He was in New York in August, and
possibly learned something of what was designed
in England by Mr. Wesley, but got only an inkling.
He came southward, preaching as he came, and after
passing through the eastern shore of Virginia he
made a circuit and reached Barratt's Chapel in
Maryland, where he met Dr. Coke, in November,
1784; and his next tour was as Bishop Asbury.

70 Francis Asbury.
Stevens gives a letter from him to Shadford which
throws some light on these times:"
" Long has been thy absence," he says, " and many,
many have been my thoughts about thee, and my tri
als and consolations in loving and gaining friends.
We have about fourteen thousand members, and be
tween seventy and eighty traveling preachers, and
between thirty and forty circuits. Four clergymen
have behaved themselves friendly in attending quar
terly meetings, and recommending us by word and
letter. They are Mr. Jarratt in Virginia, as you
know; Mr. Pettigrew, North Carolina; Dr. McGaw,
Philadelphia; and Mr. Ogden, of East Jersey. You
have heard of the divisions about that improper
question proposed at Deer Creek Conference : ' What
shall be done about the ordinances?' You know we
stood foot by foot to oppose it. I cannot tell you
what I suffered in this affair. However, God has
brought good out of evil, and it has so cured them
that I think there will never be anything formidable
in that way again. I hope if any preachers are to
come over here at any future day, you will be one.
I admire the simplicity of our preachers. I do not
think there has appeared another such company of
young, devoted men. The gospel has taken a uni
versal spread. You have heard what great things
God has done in the Peninsula since about these
eighteen months that I thought it most prudent to
stay in Delaware, and an exceeding great work we
have had there, and on the eastern shore of Mary
land, so that my labors were not in vain. Since 1
have been ranging through Virginia toward the Al-
* Stevens's History of the Methodist Episcopal Church.

Francis Asbury. 71
leghany and Maryland, Pennsylvania and East and
West Jerseys and the Peninsula,. I enjoy more healtli
than I have for twenty years back. I travel four
thousand miles in a year, all weathers, among rich
and poor, Dutch and English. O, my dear Shad
ford, it would take a month to write out and speak
what I want you to know. The most momentous
is my constant communion with God as my God."
He wrote to Wesley near the same time, and said
of North Carolina: "The present preachers suffer
much, being often obliged to dwell in dirty cabins,
to sleep in poor beds. My soul is daily fed, and I
have abundant sweetness in God. I see the neces
sity of preaching a full and present salvation from
all sin."

CHAPTER X.
1784.
Dr. Coke— Mr. Wesley's Will — Mr. Asbury Refuses to be Or
dained Till a Conference is Called — The Conference Meets —
Mr. Asbury and Dr. Coke Elected Bishops and Called Super
intendents.
~\\ 7~HEN Mr. Asbury rode up to Barratt's Chapel
VV on Sunday morning, November 14, 1784, he
found in this chapel in the forest a great crowd of
people assembled. When he entered the church he
saw in the pulpit a clergyman in his gOAvn. He was
a small man with feminine features, long hair, and
a hooked nose. He had never seen him before,
but he knew he was Thomas Coke, LL.D., Mr. Wes
ley's favorite lieutenant. The thin-visaged Thomas
Vasey and the doctor he had not known, but the se
rene-looking Whatcoat, who was with them, he had
known before in England. Dr. Coke came from the
pulpit as the sunburned, sturdy traveler came in
whom he rightly conjectured to be the man he had
come to find, and embraced him warmly. The serv
ice was concluded with the communion, and to
Mr, Asbury's astonishment his old friend What
coat assisted the clergyman in handing around
the elements. Mr. Asbury was not taken entire
ly by surprise, and the meeting was not acciden
tal. When he was in New York a short time be
fore he had learned from John Dickins something of
what was designed; but now in an interview with
(72)

Francis Asbury. 73
Dr. Coke the whole plan of Mr. Wesley was opened
before him.
I have with design confined myself as closely as
I could to my office as Mr. Asbury's biographer, and
have not allowed the temptation to turn to other
closely connected subjects to influence me; and I
shall not do so now, but will leave to those who write
the histories of Methodism, or who feel it incumbent
on them to defend Mr; Wesley's position, and to put
his theory of Church government in its true place,
to do so. I am simply to give Mr. Asbury's part in
the transaction. When they had now gone to the
home of their host, Dr. Coke laid before Mr. Asbury
the matter in hand. The facts brought out seem
to be that Mr. Wesley had decided that he had a
right to ordain not only deacons and elders, but su
perintendents or bishops for his societies; that he
had selected Dr. Coke to be one of the superintend
ents of the American societies, and ordained him to
the office; that he had selected Francis Asbury to be
joint superintendent with Dr. Coke, and Dr. Coke had
been commissioned to ordain him deacon, elder, and
superintendent ; and that he had sent Richard What-
coat and Thomas Vasey to act as elders and subordi
nate assistants to Mr. Asbury.
The doctor said he was now ready to go forward
and carry out Mr. Wesley's orders, and he presented
to Mr. Asbury Mr. Wesley's letter, with which letter
all the students of Methodist history are familiar.
Mr. Wesley gives in it the reason why he exercised
a right which he believed was legitimately his, and
why he did in America what he had not done in
England.

74 Francis Asbury.
In Dr. Tigert's Constitutional History of Ameri
can Episcopal Methodism, in Stevens's History of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, in Bangs, in Mc-
Tyeire, the whole story of this affair is given, and
there is an able defense of the propriety of Mr. Wes
ley's course, but with that we have little to do in this
biography. Mr. Asbury says when he heard why they had come
to America he was shocked; and well he might have
been, for a greater change of position was rarely
demanded of anyone than that he was required to
make. I think it is certain that the Church of En
gland did not have in it a more loyal member than
Mr. Asbury was. He was an Episcopalian of the
Wesleyan type, and not Charles Wesley himself was
more attached to the Establishment than he was.
With sacramentarianism, or high-churchism, he had
no sympathy, but he loved the Church of Burnet
and Tillotson. He had no liking for Presbyterians
or Congregationalists. He believed there were three
orders — bishops, elders, and deacons; and while he
was as evangelical in his theology as Bunyan or
Flavel, he was, as far as his views of Church govern
ment were concerned, thoroughly an Episcopalian.
When his young brethren in Virginia had broken
away from the old traditions and were determined
to exercise the right to administer the sacraments,
almost single-handed he had withstood them and
won the field; and now he was startled by a propo
sition that he who would not even administer the
sacrament of baptism, because he was not ordained
by a bishop, should consent to take ordination as a
bishop. He was not at all misled by the use of what

Francis Asbury. 75
seemed to be the less offensive term of superintend
ent, instead of bishop. He knew well that he was
to do in America all that a bishop did in England;
and while he might not have the name, he certainly
was to have the office, of a bishop.
Mr. Asbury had now the whole plan laid before
him. A Church was to be organized, orders were to
be given, sacraments were to be administered, a lit
urgy was to be used, and articles of faith were to be
accepted. It was only necessary for him to say aye,
and Dr. Coke would lay his hands upon him. Rich
ard Whatcoaf and Thomas Vasey would remain
with him as elders, and he would continue to do the
work he had been doing, and add to it the office of
ordaining. But lie did not say aye. He was willing
to do all asked of him, provided his brethren said so,
and nothing unless they did say so; and more than
this, with his consent Dr. Coke could not exercise
his Wesley-conferred function unless they said so,
and a Conference must be called.
Mr. Wesley had not designed this. He was not
accustomed to consult his helpers They were to
keep his rules, not to mend them; but there was no
time to consult Mr. Wesley, and Dr. Coke yielded,
and that saintly young man, Freeborn Garrettson,
who had done such wonderful work in Delaware,
was sent like an arrow from a bov/ through Virginia
to call the preachers to meet in Baltimore on Christ
mas day for consultation.
Mr. Asbury gave up his traveling companion,
Black Harry, to Dr. Coke; and while Dr. Coke went
one way he went another, and a week before the
time for the preachers to report he and Dr. Coke

76 Francis Asbury.
and sundry others met at Perry Hall. Here there
was a free consultation, and on Friday, the 24th day
of December, the preachers who could be gathered
together met in Lovely Lane meetinghouse in Bal
timore, in which the good stewards had had backs
put to the benches and placed a stove. The Con
ference was tenacious of its rights, but not umvilling
to regard, as far as possible, all Mr. Wesley's wishes.
They were not Avilling to accept bishops or liturgies
or declarations of faith at his dictation, but Avere
willing to adopt his suggestions; and so they settled
all things as he Avished by a majority vote, and unan
imously elected Mr. Asbury and Dr. Coke to the su-
perintendency, accepted the service-book provided,
and did sundry other things at Dr. Coke's suggestion.
William Philip Otterbein, of whom Ave have had men
tion, a German-Reformed preacher, joined with Dr.
Coke, Mr. Whatcoat, and Mr. Vasey . and Francis As
bury was set apart first as deacon, then as elder, and
then as superintendent, and for two years was Mr. Su
perintendent Asbury. For two years he was known
by the people as Bishop Asbury, and appeared in the -
minutes as superintendent; and then the silly trib
ute to high-church prejudice was paid no longer,
and Superintendent Asbury became Bishop Asbury
in name as he was in fact.
Note. — It has been impossible to verify all the statements
made in this important chapter by referring to the section of
the journal, page and paragraph ; but the facts as I have giA'en
them are so presented at length in the journal of 1784, which
can be consulted.

CHAPTER XI.
1784.
Mr. Asbury's Views on Episcopacy.
THIS is perhaps the proper place to give Mr.
Asbury's views concerning the episcopal office
with which he had been invested. In this chap
ter I shall aim rather to state his views than to de
fend them, and in doing this I shall make no effort
to fit them into any theory of Church government
whatsoever. Mr. Wesley said a bishop and an elder were the
same order. So said Dr. Coke, but Mr. Asbury held
to the three orders as decidedly as the judicious
Hooker. He writes explicitly on this subject in his
journal after he had been a bishop for some years.
In April, 1801, he writes: "I recollect having read
some years since Ostervald's Christian Theology, and
wishing to transcribe a few sentences, I met with
it and extracted from Chapter IL, page 317, what
follows: 'Yet it cannot be denied that in the prim
itive Church there was always a president who pre
sided over others who were in a state of equality
with himself. This is clearly proved by the cata
logue of bishops to be found in Eusebius and others.
In them we may see the names of the bishops be
longing to the principal Churches, many of whom
were ordained while the apostles, especially John,
were still living.' So far Mr. Ostervald was, I pre
sume, a Presbyterian. In Cave's Life of the Fa-
(77)

78 Francis Asbury.
thers and in the writings of the ancients it will ap
pear that the churches of Alexandria and eisewhere
had large congregations of many eiders, that the
apostles might appoint or ordain bishops. Mr. Os-
tervald, who it appears is a candid and well - in
formed man, has gone as far as could be expected
from a Presbyterian. For myself I see but a hair's
breadth difference between the sentiments of the
learned author of the Christian Theology and the
practice of the Methodist Episcopal Church. There
is not, nor indeed to my mind can there be, a perfect
equality between a constant president and those
over whom he always presides."
Bishop Asbury does not here enter into any dis
cussion as to the manner in which bishops are made,
but concerns himself with the position they occupy.
The question which interested him was not how
came he a bishop, but, as he was one, what were his
prerogatives; but a little later he says: "I will tell
the world what I rest my authority on: First, divine
authority; second, seniority in America; third, the
election of the General Conference; fourth, my ordi
nation by Thomas Coke, William Philip Otterbein
(German Presbyterian minister), Richard Whatcoat,
and Thomas Vasey; fifth, because the signs of an
apostle have been seen in me." He was no lord over
the heritage. He was not self-appointed, nor did
he, as he once had done, exercise rule because Mr.
Wesley had chosen him to do so. He was the serv
ant of his brethren, but the office they conferred on
him required him to command, and the authority
they gave him was almost absolute, limited only by
the conscience of the chosen commander. No pope

Francis Asbury. 79
ever claimed a more unlimited power than Bishop
Asbury claimed, but it was conferred for public
good, and could have been withheld. As the black
pope, the head of the Jesuits, has but to speak and
he is obeyed, so Asbury expected those who had
made him commanding general to heed his orders.
He claimed no superiority save that which was of
office, and an office given, and he would gladly have
resigned it at any time if it had been possible. While
he was bishop he realized the responsibility of his
position and tried to meet it. The Asburyan episco
pacy, as it is sometimes called, is more fully set
forth in his letter to Bishop McKendree, written at
a late period of his life, but is substantially the one
I have given. The letter is too long to be inserted
here. It was dictated to Thomas Mason, and was
written in 1813. It is somewhat rambling and in
coherent, and evidences the decay of his mental pow
ers. The reader can find it in full in Paine's Life of
McKendree, Vol. I., p. 310. It is made up largely of
extracts from Haweis's Church History. In it he
states the position which he held. There were three
orders — the bishop, the elder, the deacon. The bish
op was the successor of the apostles. The apostolic
order of things, which was that of a traveling super-
intendency, was lost in the first century. Mr. Wes
ley ordained Dr. Coke, and Dr. Coke ordained him.
Mr. Wesley was ordained by two bishops, deacon
and elder, and had an apostolic right to ordain also.
The apostolic order was lost in fifty years after the
death of the apostles, and we must restore it. The
regular order of succession was in John Wesley,
Thomas Coke, Francis Asbury, Richard Whatcoat,

80 Francis Asbury.
and William McKendree. It is needless to follow
this rambling letter to its close. He believed that
he was a legitimate successor of the apostles, and
his utterances rather indicate that he thought the
Methodist bishop alone Avas that successor. But he
held as decidedly to the opinion that he was only
a bishop or superintendent of his brethren, because
they, by their selection of him, conferred that office
on him. These are his views.
While he felt as fully as any pope ever did that he
was called of God to the office of bishop, he recog
nized the fact that he had been placed in this posi
tion by the suffrages of his brethren. "For myself,"
he says, "I pity those who cannot distinguish be
tween a pope of Rome and an old worn man of sixty
years who has the power given him of riding five
thousand miles a year, at a salary of eighty dollars,
through summer's heat and winter's cold; traveling
in all weathers, preaching in all places; his best
covering from rain often but a blanket; the surest
sharpener of his wit hunger, from fasts voluntary
and involuntary; his best fare for six months of the
twelve coarse kindness; and his reward from too.
many suspicion, envy, and murmurings all around.
He says he felt the great responsibility of his office,
and would have been glad to have surrendered it if
he could have done so. He was always very sensi
tive, and the intimation that he was partial to men
and sections in the discharge of his office gave him
great pain. The careful itinerary his journal gives
shows how he labored to meet the demand for the
oversight of every section of the land.

CHAPTEE XII.
Thomas Coke — The Welsh Gentleman — In Oxford — Coke's Cu
racy — His Conversion — Mr. Wesley's Favor — His Labors —
His Death.
THE President of the Christmas Conference
of 1784 was Thomas Coke, LL.D. He was
a Welshman by birth, and was born thirty-seven
years before this time, the only child of a family of
wealth and position in the province from which he
came. He began his university studies in Oxford
in his seventeenth year. John Wesley had founded
his first Methodist society in London, ten years be
fore Coke's birth, and Methodism was a strong and
healthy plant when he entered on his Oxford life.
He was a handsome boy, and, living in ease and
affluence, he became very frivolous and fond of
the ordinary amusements of those days, especially
of dancing. Oxford was the university to which
wealthy and titled Tories sent their sons; and the
pure though irreligious young Welshman found him
self in a hotbed of vice and, of course, of infidelity.
He soon became infected with the virus of unbelief,
and, boy as he was, gave up the faith. Although he
was the boon companion of the dissipated, he did
not fall into their grosser vices; and while he in
dulged in wine, he never ran into great excess, and
though fond of cards, he did not game deeply. He
was very unhappy in the midst of this gayety. At
this time he was visited by a clergyman from his
6 (81)

82 Francis Asbury.
native province. He heard him preach, and was
impressed. When he spoke to the clergyman of his
sermon, however, he was shocked, to hear from his
lips an avowal of entire disbelief in the Christianity
he was defending. This course so disgusted the
high-toned young Welshman that he began to ex
amine the evidences of the Christian religion, and so
became theoretically a Christian. In studying the
subject of regeneration he became satisfied that he
had not received the new nature. He resolved to
seek it, and in the meantime gave himself with great
assiduity to his studies, and improved rapidly. He
left Oxford before he was twenty-one, and was soon
elevated to an important position in his borough.
He resolved to enter into holy orders, and, naturally
ambitious, he expected a high place. He took or
ders, and, seeking for the worldly rewards of his of
fice, he lost sight of his religious needs; after being
disappointed in his expectations of rapid promo
tion, he took a curacy in the charming county of
Somersetshire, in the center of England. Here he
preached with great earnestness; and without com
punction, when he found a better sermon than his
own, following Sir Roger's advice, he used the one
he found; but now he became convicted under his
own preaching, and began to preach with real ear
nestness the great necessity of the new birth. His
church became crowded, and he built a gallery at
his own expense. He was at once accused of being
a Methodist, which was the one term of odium given
to anyone who preached as he did.
Thomas Maxfield, Mr. Wesley's first lay preacher,
who left him in the great excitement on the subject
of Perfection in London, in 1763, was now an or-

Francis Asbury. 83
dained clergyman. He was not far from Dr. Coke,
and he sought him out. His conversation aroused
Coke still more, and that stirring book, Alleine's
Alarm, fairly awakened him. He was yet unde
cided on the Calvinistic question, which was stirring
the evangelical world. A clergyman handed him Mr.
Fletcher's Checks. This settled his doubts on this
question. An interview with a friendly clergyman
among the dissenters brought him on his way; but
he was led to clear and correct views by a pious rus
tic and a class leader. He had now found the way
of life intellectually, and he began to preach as he
had never done before, and work with an ardor
which told how deeply he was in earnest for the
souls of his people. A few days after the interview
with the laborer, peace came to his soul. He told
others of it. He laid aside his manuscript and
preached with divine unction. Few things give
formalists of any name greater offense than pro
fessions of a deeper experience than they know, and
few things were more unendurable in such a parish
as the average one in England then was than re
ligion in the curate. They could tolerate a little
gaming, a little too much wine, and all such minor
matters; but for him to have religion, and to urge it
upon others, was another thing, and was unpardon
able: and so Dr. Coke was dismissed from the curacy,
and the bells rang him out of the parish.
He was educated, wealthy, and not yet thirty
years old, a stanch churchman and an earnest
Christian; he heard that Mr. Wesley was to be in
twenty miles of him, and he rode to meet him. Mr.
Wesley was now an old man (seventy-four years old),
and his heart warmed toward this brave young cler-

84 Francis Asbury.
gyman. He invited him to meet the preachers at
Bristol, and from this time to his death Thomas
Coke was Mr. Wesley's bosom friend. His expul
sion from his parish took place after the Methodist
societies had outlived their days of weakness and
persecution; and when Dr. Coke appeared in Lon
don, crowds came to hear him. Following Mr. Wes
ley's example, he preached in the fields, and great
success followed his ministry everywhere.
Mr. Wesley had long needed an assistant in his
episcopal work. His brother Charles had left him to
bear the burden alone. Mr. Fletcher, who he had
hoped would succeed him, was unwilling to take the
position. Here Mr. Wesley thought was the man
he had been seeking and praying for. So he re
ceived the zealous young doctor, and gave him the
warmest affection and confidence; and so Coke en
tered into the connection. He came to America, as
Ave have seen, and entered earnestly into the work
before him. He found simple-hearted Francis As
bury trying to build up a high school for Methodist
boys at Abingdon, Maryland. He decided at once
on a college to be called Cokesbury, after himself
and Asbury. The scheme was about as sensible as
Whitefield's college in Savannah; but at it he went
with all zeal. He made all the plans; he set to wTork
to raise the funds; raised enough to start the affair,
and then left poor Asbury to do the rest, and Avent
back to England. The rules of the school were
drawn up by him, and were about as practicable as
the constitution John Locke gave to the South Caro
lina colony, or the measures of James Oglethorpe in
Georgia's early settlement. Happily and merciful
ly, the schoolhouse was burned down, and Cokes-

Francis Asbury. 85
bury, Maryland, with its impracticable rules, passed
away from the earth, much to Mr. Asbury's relief.
Coke had been about a month in America when
he began a crusade against slavery. The preachers
were all agreed about the matter. It was an evil to
be put down. Asbury had been doing his best to
put it down, and so had the preachers; but now the
little doctor was going to beard the lion in his den.
He would have an act passed at Baltimore, and put
it into effect on his first tour, which would extirpate
the crying evil; and much good he did, to be sure.
He was going to kill or to cure; but the preachers
would not let him kill, and certain it is he did not
cure. The good doctor was now a bishop, and had as
sincere a desire to do the Church good service as ever
man had. He had spoken out in no uncertain tones
at Baltimore, and was imprudent enough to say
things which, while they pleased the Methodists and
the Republicans in America, were not at all pleas
ant to Church people and the Tories of England, sore
enough over the loss of the colonies. He now began
his tour through Virginia. The warm-hearted peo
ple received him as an angel ; but before he had been
among them many weeks he made the fiercest as
sault against slavery, and aroused no small amount
of displeasure. His biographer thinks that he was
in danger of bodily harm, and just escaped — well,
he escaped all bad treatment, and thus had better
fare than he had in his English parish. But the
Virginians were glad to see him go back to England.
He was a brave, unselfish man, and like a hero
faced the many dangers of the American traveler in
fording and swimming streams, and sometimes made

86 Francis Asbury.
very narrow escapes in this way. The Methodist
preachers in England were in no very good humor
with him; and even Mr. Wesley, who had a very
dim vision when the faults of his faArorites were to
be searched for, received him very coldly on his re
turn to England, and his name was left off the min
utes for the year. He now began his great missiona
ry work by securing some missionaries for Nova Sco
tia. He took his collections for these missionaries,
and even then opened a correspondence with refer
ence to a mission in Hindoostan; and this desire then
expressed, to reach India with the gospel, lingered
with him to the last. This was four years before
Carey. He now secured three missionaries for Nova
Scotia,and set sail from England; but there was nev
er smooth sailing for the good doctor, and there was
a stormy voyage this time. When a fierce storm
came on and continued, the superstitious sailors,
somewhat angered already, were about to throw
him overboard as a Jonah, and he barely escaped.
At last they landed in the West Indies, instead of
Nova Scotia.
Methodism had been introduced into these islands
by a slave owner, Mr. Nathaniel Gilbert, and Dr.
Coke found some societies and a missionary already
there. He did good work on the island on which
he landed; and, leaving Mr. Hammett behind him,
he took shipping for Charleston, in South Carolina.
He did not receive a very cordial greeting from his
American brethren, and when he reached Virginia
again he found the people much exasperated at his
plain dealing. He saw that he was doing neither
slaves nor masters any good by his course, and he
desisted from it. He could not be still nor remain

Francis Asbury. 87
in one place; so he returned to England and Ire
land. He swept over England; then preached in
the Isle of Jersey; then came again to the West In
dies; and was the next year once more in Charles
ton. The second Conference in the state of Georgia,
at that time the southern frontier of the United
States, was to be held in Wilkes county. It was to
be reached only on horseback; and so, leaving
Charleston, he began his journey through the wil
derness; and, after over a hundred miles through
pine woods and swamps, he reached the higher and
better lands of South Carolina, where great crowds
were gathered to hear a real bishop and a doctor
of laws. He found a vigorous, young Conference
in Georgia; and, as usual, enterprising some great
scheme, he set on foot the Wesley and Whitefield
College of Georgia, which never became an institu
tion. Tobacco was the Georgia staple then, and
twelve thousand five hundred pounds of tobacco,
worth £500, was subscribed for the school. The
doctor, now wise from experience, let social ques
tions alone. He remained in America this time
nearly six months, and then he crossed the sea again.
He was nominally a bishop of the Methodist Episco
pal Church in America, but he was really the mis
sionary bishop of all Methodism. This restless, de
voted, heroic man felt that there was no man for
whom Christ had not died, and no man Christ could
not save. Mr. Wesley said that the world was his
parish, yet England and Ireland gave him all he
could do ; but Dr. Coke found the British empire too
small a field for his enterprise. So, after a few
months in England, he returned again to America.
As a bishop he was not a very pleasant man to an

88 Francis Asbury.
American Conference. He had his views, and did
not expect others, especially the backwoods preach
ers of America, to have theirs; and as he did but lit
tle of the work in America, they insisted on holding
their way and holding their opinions. While really
valuing the good doctor, they refused to be ruled by
him ; and at last they told him that he might stay in
England if it suited him best.
, Mr. Wesley died while Coke was in America, and
he hurried back to England. The Wesleyan preach
ers there never felt very cordially toward him. They
thought his aim in returning was perhaps to take
Mr. Wesley's place. This is very doubtful; but if
it was, little he made of it.
Not satisfied with his great work in supervising
missions and being Bishop of America, the good
doctor now prepared a commentary. He did not
take time to make it short, and drew largely upon
Dr. Dodd's work. The Conference refused to print
the folios, but he published them on his own account.
After spending some fifty thousand dollars on it,
and having a world of trouble Out of it, he sold out
to the Conference on a long time for fifteen thousand
dollars, and retired from book printing. He was
rich, he married rich, and gave away all he had. He
enterprised a mission in Africa, which failed; and
at last, at his own expense, fitted out a mission to
Ceylon. On his way there he died. They buried
him in the sea, and its waves never sung their requi
em over a nobler soul.

CHAPTER XIIL
1785.
The New Bishop — Tour Southward — Henry Willis — Jesse Lee
— -Visits Charleston, S. C. — Edgar Wells — Journey North
ward— Cokesbury College — Visit to Mount Vernon — Corner
Stone of College Laid.
"T~T 7"HEN the Conference of 1784 ended, Bishop
VV Asbury at once began his journey to the
south. He rode through central Virginia, where he
found Henry Willis, who had not attended the
Christmas Conference. He ordained him a deacon
and an elder, and took him with him on his journey.
In two weeks he was in central North Carolina, and
mentions as stopping places Thompson's, Short's,
Fisher's River, Witherspoon's, Elsbury, and Salis
bury. Here at Salisbury he met Jesse Lee, who had
not been at the Christmas Conference. The new
bishop preached at Salisbury, and used the liturgy
and wore the gown and bands. Jesse Lee had had
enough of liturgies and gowns in his Virginia bring
ing up, and he gave the new bishop his mind on this
subject, and as far as we know the gown and bands
vanished forever, to the gratification of American
Methodists. Jesse Lee was to go with the bishop
to Charleston, and the big-bodied, big-brained, big-
hearted Virginian was just the companion the some
what gloomy bishop needed, and he says that he was
greatly comforted by brother Lee's company. As
bury, Willis, and Lee made their way to Georgetown,
where William Wayne, nephew of Mad Anthony
(89)

90 Francis Asbury.
Wayne, received them into his home and heartily
entertained them. They rode into Charleston a few
days afterwards, but not to find themselves entirely
among strangers. A Mr. Edgar Wells, who was a
merchant there, to whom Mr. Willis was commend
ed by Mr. Wayne, now welcomed the three evan
gelists to his home, and entertained them while
there. They found themselves in the largest city
south of Philadelphia. There were of Christian de
nominations: "The -Church" people, who had two
churches, St. Michael's and St. Philip's; the Inde
pendents, the Huguenots, the Baptists, one each.
In the lower part of the city, near the bay, there was
an old Baptist church, which had been perhaps one
of the first churches built in the city, and being aban
doned by the Baptists, it was secured by Mr. Wells
as a preaching place. Charleston was now nearly
one hundred years old. Peculiar advantages of
location made it a most important city. The back
country for hundreds of miles sent its products here
for sale, and the people bought here their supplies.
There was a large number of s!aAres on the Sea
Islands and rice plantations near by. These ne
groes do not seem to have had any special attention
religiously till Asbury began his work among them.
Among the white population there was much lax
ity of morals and much formality in religion. It
evinced the daring character of Asbury's ministry
that he should have fastened his eye on Charleston
with a determination to establish Methodism there,
and while its success in this city has not been re
markable as compared to some other places, it has
been won over perhaps greater difficulties than in

Francis Asbury. 91
any other city on the eastern coast. The new bish
op preached every day for a week. Jesse Lee re
mained with him and helped him both by preaching
and singing for a few days. The strangers attract
ed a considerable amount of attention, and at least
one person was converted, and he was worth the
journey. It was their host, Mr. Edgar Wells. A
society was formed and Methodism was established
in Charleston. After laying the foundation for the
future, he left Charleston and 'made his way along
the eastern border of South Carolina to Wilming
ton, in North Carolina. It was a somewhat impor
tant commercial town, and Asbury says: "We went
to  , but he was not prepared to receive us; after
wards to  , where we had a crowd of merry, sing
ing, drunken raftsmen. To this merriment I soon
put a stop. I felt the power of the devil here. The
bell went round to give notice of preaching, and I
preached to a large congregation. When I had
done, behold F. Hill came into the room powdered
off, with a number of ladies and gentlemen. As I
could not get my horse and bags, I heard him out. I
Aerily believe his sermon was his own, it was so much
like his conversation." He does not say who F. Hill
was, nor where he had met him before, but he was
probably a relative of Green Hill. He rode to meet
the Conference at Green Hill's.
We cannot get a very satisfactory view of this
Conference. We know it met at Green Hill's, in
eastern North Carolina, and that he entertained the
entire body. He was a large slaveholder, a wealthy
planter, and a local Methodist preacher. Dr. Coke
was with Asbury, and Asbury simply remarks:
"Here we held our Conference in great peace." Who

92 Francis Asbury.
were present we do not know, but at this Conference
new work was laid out. The saintly John Tunnell
was sent to Charleston. The distant settlements on
the Holston and on the Yadkin, as well as the thick
ly-settled counties of Halifax, Rowan, Caswell, and
Guilford, and the New River, Tar River, and Roan
oke River settlements, were provided with preach
ers. At this Conference we find the first mention
of presiding elders. Richard Ivey, Reuben Ellis,
and Henry Willis were made "president elders," as
Bishop Asbury called them. Asbury had a milita
ry mind, and his organization of forces was com
plete. The bishop first, then the elder, the preacher
in charge, the junior preacher, the local preacher,
the class leader; there was supervision from the top
to the bottom. The selection of certain men as sub-
bishops, which was begun now, was not done with
out a certain amount of opposition.
This Conference was merely the assembling of a
few preachers, called together by the bishop, at a
place chosen by him for the convenience of the
preachers. The Conference, as it was called, met
now in sections, but no section was authorized to do
anything of a general nature until the other sections
were consulted and had agreed to it. Dr. Coke was
with him at this Conference, and he and Asbury be
gan their journey together to Baltimore, but parted
company, and Asbury rode through eastern Vir
ginia. On the way he passed through Yorktown. He
says the inhabitants were dissolute and careless, but
he preached to a few serious women at one o'clock,
and by request to the ladies again at four. He
crossed the York and Rappahannock rivers and went
into the Northern Neck. The first settlements of a

Francis Asbury. 93
new country are naturally along the water ways,
and when land is cheap and easily secured it is nat
ural that large bodies should be taken up by the first
settlers and large fortunes should be the result;
and thus it was in this tide-water country. The
country between the Rappahannock and the Poto
mac was very fertile, and for over a hundred years
had been settled by Englishmen. Those who lived
in it were among the wealthiest and most aristocrat
ic in Virginia. From these people came the Lees,
the Washingtons, the Masons, and others who have
been distinguished in the councils of Virginia.
Across the Potomac from there was the western
shore of Maryland, where the first Catholic settle
ments had been made. Asbury says at Hoe's Ferry
he found the people wretchedly wicked. He paid a
dollar for ferriage, and left them and rode to Alex
andria. Here he joined Dr. Coke, and together they
called on General Washington at his home at Mount
Vernon, and asked him to sign a petition to the as
sembly of Virginia, which they were circulating, for
the immediate abolition of slavery. The general
received them very courteously, invited them to dine
with him, and gave them his views about slavery,
and then refused to sign their petition. They took
their departure that afternoon, and, as far as I can
find any record, that was the first and last and only
time Bishop Asbury was ever in Mount Vernon, Dr.
Strickland to the contrary notwithstanding.
When Mr. Asbury met John Dickins in North Car
olina, at Dickins's suggestion he resolved to attempt
a school like the Kingswood School in England,
which he felt was much needed; but when Dr. Coke
came and heard of the plan, he was taken with the

94 Francis Asbury.
idea of a college — a real Methodist college, the first
in the world. The history of this ill-fated Cokes
bury College belongs largely to annals of the Meth
odist historian; suffice it to say that after Dr. Coke,
who knew all about colleges, had made his plans on
a sufficiently extensive scale, he went back to En
gland to meet his astonished and indignant brethren
of the connection there, and left poor Asbury to bear
the burden of carrying them out. Asbury was not
Avell, but he rode up to Abingdon and preached the
foundation sermon of Cokesbury College. The only
biographer of Asbury, Strickland, evidently draws
upon his fancy for a picture which Stevens repro
duces in his history. If there is any proof that As
bury was attired in a long gown, with flowing bands,
I have not been able to find it. The incident is like
some of the other things, related by his biographer,
giA'en more to add picturesqueness to a somewhat
prosy story than because it was a fact known to be
true. We would fain hope that after the vestments
disappeared at Salisbury they never came forth
again. What the home of Ebenezer Blackwell was
to Wesley, so was the home of Gough to Asbury.
He always turned his footsteps thitherward after
his long journeys, and paused longer here in his
ceaseless travel than he did anywhere else. He
rested less than a week, however, and then went into
a German settlement in Maryland, near Sharpsburg.
He rode by his favorite watering place, Bath, in
Berkley, up the south branch of the Potomac, and
after a dreary ride came to Morgantown, Virginia,
and returned to the springs, where he spent nearly a
week nursing his sick throat.
Then through the broiling sun in August he came

Francis Asbury. 95
to Baltimore, where he had an attack of fever which
kept him two weeks in bed at Perry Hall. While
he was sick here his dear friend Mrs. Chamier died.
From Asbury's account of the attendance at her fu
neral service, and other allusions to her, she seems
to have been a gentlewoman of deep piety. He was
able to creep from his sick bed, and performed the
funeral rites and preached to about a thousand peo
ple, and two days afterwards set off to Philadelphia.
He made a flying trip to New York, where his old
friends supplied his needs, and then started south
ward again. He bought a light jersey wagon in
New Jersey, but after trying to use it a few weeks
he went back to his sulky again, and continued his
journey southward.

CHAPTEE XIY,
1786.
Asbury's Second Episcopal Tour — Hanover, Virginia — North
Carolina — Sinclair Capers — Charleston — Hope Hull — John
Dickins and the Revised Discipline — Central North Carolina
— The Baltimore Conference — The Valley of Virginia — Re
ligious Experience at Bath — Return Southward.
IN Virginia, on his way, Asbury's throat became in
flamed, and he had to lie by at the widow Cham-
berlayne's, in Hanover county. She was very kind,
and being a somewhat skillful leech, and withal a
motherly woman, she put him on his feet again in a
short time. He had a rheumatic affection of one of
his feet, and was led to reflect upon the dark provi
dence. To those who read the story of his exposure
and toils, his long fasts and exhausting labors, the
providence which called a halt by a severe twinge of
pain does not seem so dark.
He went now into North Carolina. He was on
the eastern shore, riding parallel with the coast.
The rains had been very heavy, and the whole coun
try was under water, but they floundered on. He
says they toiled over swampy routes and crazy
bridges until they arrived at New Berne, then the
capital of North Carolina, where the assembly was
in session. He sailed down to Beaufort, where the
people were very kind, but had little religion. The
journey overland was largely through a dreary
waste until they reached Georgetown. Here the
(96)

Francis Asbury. 97
faithful Willis met them, and these were cheered to
see on the way the frame for a preaching house go
ing up. On this journey he stopped at the home of
S. Gapers. This was Sinclair Capers, the uncle of
William Capers. He was a well-to-do rice-planter,
converted under the ministry of Henry Willis, and
was one of Asbury's earliest and warmest friends.
On the 13th of January he came again into
Charleston, where he rested a few days, then turned
his face to the northwest, and went with labor, but
without anything of special interest, into North Car
olina. At Salisbury he met the preachers and spent
three days in the Conference. One of these, Hope
Hull, he speaks of as "a smooth-tongued, pretty
speaker, that promises fair for future usefulness."
The promise was not belied, for he was in after time
a power for good. We shall see him often as As
bury's cherished helper, whether in the itinerant or
local ranks. He was from the eastern shore of Mary
land, and had spent his last years in Georgia, where
he was a leading man in Church and State. The
bishop rode through the central parts of North Car
olina, and was not at all pleased with the state of af
fairs. In Hillsboro he found things so discouraging
that he resolved to come no more till they were bet
tered. John Dickins, who was now married, and
had returned from New York to North Carolina,
had been aiding Asbury in getting the Discipline
ready for the press. Dickins, who had been at Eton,
was at that time the most scholarly man in the
connection. He had been so opposed to Asbury's
course, when he resisted the preachers who worked
to separate the societies from the Established
Church, that he desisted from traveling, and it was
7

98 Francis Asbury.
evident from his course then that the sturdy En
glishman had little use for the English establish
ment, and little disposition to keep on good terms
with it; and it is probable that the change of the
name of Asbury's office in the Discipline from su
perintendent to bishop was at his instance. He had
good literary taste, and was the first book agent in
the connection. The country along Asbury's route,
although perhaps the oldest part of central North
Carolina, was by no means prosperous, and it was
somewhat difficult to get good food or tolerable
lodgings, and the religious condition of things was
not flourishing; but when he crossed over into Vir
ginia he found things in a very lively state. The
Conference was held at Lane's, and there were some
spirits which were tried, he said, before it ended.
There were, however, ten new probationers added
to the preaching force. His journals, never full, are
exceedingly barren here, and we know but little of
what occurred. He went on northward, and at Al
exandria, where he preached in the courthouse, he
drew a plan. and set on foot a subscription for a
meetinghouse. The Baltimore Conference was to be held at Ab
ingdon, Maryland, where the new college was lo
cated. He found it now only ready for the roof, but
a debt of nine hundred dollars hung over it. It was
never free from debt, and he was never free from
worry as long as it stood. Money was scarce, and
yet he must beg. The good brethren in Baltimore
had built a new meetinghouse, and on Light street
the congregation, which had worshiped in LoA7ely
Lane, a few blocks away, were now in better qiiar-
ters. Asbury preached for them twice on Sunday,

Francis Asbury. 99
and Whatcoat held a watch-night with them on
Tuesday night.
In the west of Maryland there was a large settle
ment of Germans, and he preached at Antietam,
where, nearly a century afterwards, the Confederate
and Federal armies met in hostile combat. He then
crossed the Potomac, and entered into the northern
part of the Valley of Virginia. He preached in a
grove in Winchester, and went on to Newtown,
where he met Otterbein, with whom he consulted
about the formation of the Church of the United
Brethren. Asbury was lame and weary, and the
country was new and rough. The section of west
ern Maryland and west Virginia and Pennsylvania
was then being peopled by new settlers, and Asbury
was always with the advanced guard. He rode out
to Coxe's fort on the Ohio River and then into the
lower counties of Pennsylvania. He had ridden one
hundred and fifty miles on as bad roads as any he
had seen on the continent. He had now reached
the point from which he started southward on his
first tour, and in July he went to the waters at Bath,
in Berkley, and as he had no appointment for three
Aveeks he resolved to spend the time recruiting in
Bath; but he was not willing to be idle, and he
preached every other night and spent his days of
solitude in much prayer.
Several times in his life he hoped that wondrous
change for which he had sought and prayed, when
all sinful tendencies would be destroyed, had come;
but then he doubted, and gave up his confidence
and sought again, and now he says: "A pleasing
thought passed through my mind; it was this: that
I Avas saved from the remains of sin." He now

100 Francis Asbury.
went northward, and worn and weary he reached
New York. He was sick, and for eight days was in
bed, but as soon as he was able to travel he started
for the south, and made his usual tour through the
eastern shore, and then came again to the trouble
some college. It had now cost ten thousand dollars,
and was ready for a president. Mr. Wesley had rec
ommended a Mr. Heath, and he was put in charge,
and then Asbury began his journey southward. The
family from which Mary Washington came, the
Balls, lived in Lancaster countjr, and one of the
Avealthy and aristocratic Balls, a widow, had become
a Methodist. "A lady," said Asbury, "came by craft
and took her from her house, and with tears, threats,
and entreaties urged her to desist from receiA'ing the
preachers and Methodist preaching; and all in vain."
This most excellent woman was for a long time the
stanch friend and warm supporter of Asbury.
Coming through Gloucester, York, and preaching
as he went, he came to Portsmouth, joined Francis
Poythress, waded the Dismal Swamp and along the
eastern shore of North and South Carolina, and at
last, in March of 1787, reached Charleston, where he
joined Dr. Coke once more.

CHAPTER XV.
1787.
The Tour of the Two Bishops— Dr. Coke Again— The Blue
Meetinghouse in Charleston— Prosperity of the Work in
South Carolina and Georgia— Central South Carolina— Jour
ney Northward— Virginia Conference— Baltimore Confer
ence— Dr. Coke in Trouble— The New Discipline— Mr. Wes
ley's Displeasure— Effort to Appoint a Bishop— Failure.
THE journals of Asbury are for the most part
mere memoranda of comparatively uninterest
ing events. They show us the bishop flitting from
place to place, but say little of what he did, save
that he preached ; and we are dependent upon other
sources for a knowledge of times and places and
men. Dr. Coke had made a rapid tour through a part of
the country immediately after he was made a bishop,
in which he had done many unwise things in his anx
iety to abolish what he thought was the great evil of
slavery, and had gone back to England. After two
rather stormy years there he returned to America,
coming by the West Indies, where he had done some
valuable work. He was to meet Bishop Asbury in
Charleston. The plucky little congregation of white
Methodists there, assisted by the large body of negro
members, had built a commodious and unpretentious
wooden church in the lower part of Charleston,
known for a long time as the Blue Meetinghouse, and
afterwards as the Cumberland-street Church. This
was the largest church south of Baltimore ; and while
there were not twenty-five white members in the so-
(101)

102 Francis Asbury.
ciety, the church was self-sustaining, as all the
churches were of necessity forced to be in those
days. Asbury's plans for advancing the work in the sec
tion which was in the South Carolina Conference
had been very wise and successful. The states of
South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia were
included in this Conference. There was an arrange
ment of the entire work by which the great circuits
touched each other from Virginia to Georgia. The
historians of Methodism have had much to say of the
faithful companions of Asbury and of their doings,
and to them we must leave all else than an account
of those men and that work with which the good
bishop was immediately connected.
The eastern parts of North Carolina and South
Carolina near the ocean had been settled nearly a
hundred years, but the central and western parts of
both of these states, and much of the most desirable
portions, had only been settled some thirty or forty
years. They had been rapidly peopled by a motley
body of Protestants — Germans, Scotch, Scotch-Irish,
and pure Irish — and since the Revolutionary War
very many families had removed from Virginia and
Maryland into South Carolina, Georgia, and North
Carolina, and people from these states were now
moving continually to these newly-opened and fer
tile fields.
As soon as the South Carolina Conference was
over, Asbury and Coke began their journey to the
Virginia Conference. They went directly to Cam
den, and thence through the pine woods to North
Carolina, and without adventure rapidly rode across

Francis Asbury. 103
the state to Charlotte county, Virginia, where, at the
residence of William White, the preachers of middle
and lower Virginia were called to Conference.
Bishop Coke, who had his ideas of an episcopacy
drawn from his English training, could not divest
himself of the idea that he was a prelate, and while
he was in England he had of his own will changed
the time and place of the meeting of the Conferences
after they had been fixed. He was astonished at the
dissatisfaction which was manifested, and manifest
ed very decidedly in the Conferences he met. There
was a very large crowd present in this then new coun
try; three thousand were supposed to be assembled.
As soon as the Virginia Conference was over, the two
bishops hurried to the Baltimore Conference, Avhich
met in Baltimore the next week. They reached the
city on Monday, and on Tuesday the Conference met.
It was evident that there was a storm brewing. The
doctor was nettled at the prospect, and when Nelson
Reed was making his protest, Coke said: "You must
think you are my equals." "Yes, sir," said the in
trepid Marylander, "we do ; and we are not only the
equals of Dr. Coke, but of Dr. Coke's king."
The impetuous little doctor was as ready to yield
when he was wrong as he was to assert his authority,
and so he signed a very humble statement that while
he was out of America he would exercise no govern
ment over the American churches, and while he was
in it he would simply preside at Conferences, ordain
according to law, and travel at large.
Asbury simply says: "We had some warm and
close debates at Conference, but all ended in love
and peace."
The two bishops went together to New York, Bish-

104 Francis Asbury.
op Coke doing all the preaching, Asbury silent from
necessity, for his throat v/as in bad condition. When
he was able, he began to preach again, and now in the
city, now in the country, he was at work. In New
York he met the leaders and trustees, and after some
explanation, "settled matters" relative to singing in
public worship. If he settled them then, they have
become sadly unsettled since that time. He went to
New Rochelle, and found it as it was sixteen years
before, when he was on the New York Circuit. "If
there is no change," he says, "I will trouble them no
more." He says "his body was weak, his soul peaceful,
and he had power over all sin." For the first time in
his ministry he went up the Hudson as far as West
Point. He merely surveyed the field, and then
turned his face southward again through northern
New Jersey to Philadelphia, through northern Mary
land and to the springs at Bath.
The Discipline, upon which he and John Dickins
had been at work the year before, was now pub
lished. In the Discipline of 1784, adopted by the
Christmas Conference, the second question was as
follows: "What can be done in order to the future
union of the Methodists?" Answer: "During the
life of the Rev. Mr. Wesley we acknowledge our
selves his sons in the gospel, ready in all matters be
longing to Church government to obey his com
mands." This second question and answer were left
out of the Discipline in 1787, and to add to the of-
fensiveness of this act to Mr. Wesley the two super
intendents were called bishops.
The publication of the Discipline, with the changes
made in it, was not the only ground of offense which

Francis Asbury. 105
Mr. Asbury gave Mr. Wesley. He was known by
Mr. Wesley to be the ruling spirit in the connection.
Mr. Wesley had never been willing to surrender any
part of the power with which he honestly believed
he had been divinely invested, and he had no idea
of giving up his control of the American societies
to Mr. Asbury or anyone else. So he sent the Confer
ence, through Dr. Coke, peremptory orders to ordain
Mr. Whatcoat a bishop, which the Conference as
peremptorily refused to do. They had introduced
into the minutes the binding minute in 1784, by
which he understood that they bound themselves to
do what they now positively refused to do, and now
to prevent any further misunderstanding they sim
ply repealed the minute, and left off the name of
Mr. Wesley. Of course, Mr. Asbury incurred all the
blame for their action.*
Dr. Coke was silly enough to say in his funeral
sermon on Mr. Wesley that this act of discourtesy
from the Conference hastened Mr. Wesley's death.
The Conference did not intend to leave Mr. Wesley
in any doubt of where it stood, and while it may not
have been pleasant for him to know it, yet that it
had the effect which Dr. Coke intimated was not at
all probable.
Mr. Vasey, who came over with Dr. Coke, was so
offended that he obtained ordination from Bishop .
White, and said very bitter things of Bishop As
bury. He retracted them afterwards, but returned
to England, and by Mr. Wesley's consent obtained a
*Mr. Asbury said that it was James O'Kelly who defeated
Mr. Wesley's aim in appointing Whatcoat, and the Baltimore
Conference repealed the binding minute.

106 Francis Asbury.
curacy, and afterwards came back into the English
Wesleyan connection, in which he died. This act of
Mr. Asbury in changing the wording of the Disci
pline was concurred in by Dr. Coke, but was much to
the displeasure of Mr. Wesley, who some time after
wrote a very sharp and somewhat indignant letter
to Mr. Asbury, to which we will hereafter refer.
Asbury had so outlined the work that the filling
in was comparatively easy. A wonderful response
to the call for laborers enabled him to provide work
ers for these new fields. In every direction he was
establishing outposts, and by his admirable military
system he was having each detachment of the army
properly officered, and under his own eye.

CHAPTER XVI.
1788.
Charleston Again — Riot — Georgia — Holston — Greenbrier — Con
ference at Uniontown, Pennsylvania — College Troubles.
AFTER Dr. Coke returned to England, Asbury
came south, passing through the western shore
counties of Maryland, which he said was the only
part of the state unoccupied by the Methodists. He
then crossed the Potomac, rode through the North
ern Neck of Virginia and the tide-water counties of
North and South Carolina until he reached Charles
ton again. The Conference session was not a long
one, but long enough to arouse certain leAvd fellows
of the baser sort. Asbury says : " On Sunday morn
ing the house v/as crowded, and there were many at
the door. A man made a riot near it, and an alarm
at once took place. The ladies leaped out of the
windows, and a dreadful confusion ensued." Again
he says: "While I was speaking at night a stone was
thrown against the north side of the church, another
on the south, a third came through the pulpit win-
daw and struck near me inside the pulpit." But he
adds: "Upon the whole, I have had more liberty to
speak in Charleston on this visit than I ever did be
fore, and am of the opinion that God will work here,
but our friends are afraid of the cross." As he
came through Virginia he heard from Philip Cox of
the wonderful revival in Sussex county, Virginia,
in which Cox said he thought not less than fourteen
hundred people had been converted, and John Eas-
(107)

108 Francis Asbury.
ter wrote him that he thought there was a still
larger number in Brunswick. These statements
Avould appear incredible to us if we failed to remem
ber how thick was the rural population of those
counties at that time, and how destitute the people
had been of evangelical preaching before the itiner
ant evangelists had come among them. Methodism
was not now new in this section, and as the number
of preachers increased it had been able to enter
hitherto unentered fields, and had secured a large
body of clerical and lay workers to till them.
The effort to advance the work had led to the ap
pointment in 1786 of John Major and Thomas Hum
phreys to Georgia, and now Asbury went to the first
Conference in that state. It was held in the forks
of Broad River, probably near the home of James
Marks, one of Asbury's old Virginia friends who
had removed to Georgia.
After the session of the Conference Asbury passed
through the foothills and mountains of North Caro
lina. His aim was now to go into the Holston coun
try. He had held the Georgia Conference in the
early .part of April, and, crossing the Savannah
River into South Carolina, he came on into western
North Carolina and into the Yadkin country, and
there he and his companions had their horses shod,
preparatory to a hard ride across the mountains of
North Carolina into what is now Johnson county,
Tennessee. He crossed three ranges of mountains:
the first he called steel, the second stone, the third
iron. He and his companions were moving north
ward toward General Russell's, whose home was
where Saltville now is. The trail (for it was nothing
more) led across the head waters of the Watauga

Francis Asbury. 109
River. The country was almost entirely unsettled,
and there was a terrific thunder storm while they
were on their way. They found a dirty house, where
the filth might have been taken from the floor with a
spade, and sought shelter in it. They could not get
wood to kindle a fire, but managed to get through
the night, and the next day they reached the head
waters of the Watauga, and fed, and reached Ward's
that night. When they reached the river the next
day, the preachers crossed in a canoe, swimming
their horses beside it; and in order to avoid high
water they took an old trail through the mountains.
Night came on in the wild, and, with a severe head
ache, he pressed on toward Greer's. In answer to
prayer his head was eased and his fever abated, and
at nine o'clock he reached Greer's; and set out the
next day to find Cox's, on one of the branches of the
Holston River. The road was through a wood; he
had two horses, one to carry his baggage and one to
ride, and the weary packhorse, delighted with the
rich herbage along his way, would neither lead nor
drive. If he was prevented from grazing by tying
his head up, he ran back ; and if he was permitted to
graze, he would not follow. The good bishop was
not a little tried. He crossed the north fork of the
Holston and met Tunnell in Washington county,
and together they went to where Saltville now is.
In one of the most picturesque valleys of south
western Virginia is the village of Saltville, where
for over a hundred years a wonderful spring has
furnished its saline waters for the kettle. Here
General William Campbell had brought his bonnie
bride, the sister of Patrick Henry, and when he died
General Russell had wedded her. They lived here

110 Francis Asbury.
in great comfort. John Tunnell had found a home
at this hospitable house, and now Bishop Asbury
and his companion were welcomed to it. The bish
op preached on Sunday, and on Tuesday he went to
Easley's, on the Holston, thence to K.'s. He entered
East Tennessee, probably about where Bristol is,
and went on to Owens's, where the delegation from
Kentucky met him. He came to a place he calls
"Half Acres and Key Woods," and held his Confer
ence with the few preachers that were in the Hoist ou
country and that had come from Kentucky to meet
him. Tennessee was the rather rebellious daughter
of North Carolina, and was now trying to set up the
new state of Franklin, and there was civil war ; Iloav-
ever, Asbury did not allow this to disturb him, but
made this brief visit, and then returned to General
Russell's, where he again received his rested horse,
and began his journey through upper North Carolina
eastward. This was his first visit to the Holston
country. He made his way as far south as Greensboro,
North Carolina, and thence northward to Peters
burg, Virginia, where the Virginia Conference met.
After its adjournment he began his journey to a
hitherto unvisited section — the Greenbrier country,
in the present West Virginia.
General Assistant Asbury had some years before
sent missionaries, to the beautiful country which lies
beyond the Alleghany Mountains in Virginia. It
had been only a few years since the land had been
freed from the dangers of Indian invasion, and it had
now been settled by an enterprising, sturdy race of
Scotch-Irish and German people. The pure English
element was very small, but German and Scotch-

Francis Asbury. Ill
Irish Protestants — generally Presbyterians or Lu
therans — were in numbers. They found themselves
away from pastors and churches; living in remote
sections widely separated from each other, with
no churches built nor even schoolhouses estab
lished, they were without clerical care. The circuit
preacher had found them out, and began a work in
an apparently unfriendly soil, which brought forth
a large harvest. One of the first churches west of
the Alleghanies had been built in what was then
called Greenbrier county. It was called Rehoboth.
• This church still stands, as does another which bears
its name, in what is now Monroe county, West Vir
ginia, To this remote part of Greenbrier Bishop Asbury
and Richard Whatcoat now came. The bishop was
to hold a quarterly meeting there. His faithful co-
laborer, Le Roy Cole, was on the district, and John
Smith, a young preacher, was on the circuit. Bishop
Asbury and his companion left Lynchburg, and
passed westward through Buckingham, Bedford,
and Botetourt into Greenbrier. His journal merely
states the fact that the journey was made, but says
nothing of the toil of making it; and one must know
something of the old trail to the west through Fin-
castle, of the mountains which were to be climbed,
and the long rides through almost unpeopled wilds,
before he can appreciate the labors of the bishop in
making the journey a hundred years ago. He sim
ply says: "Heavy rains, bad roads, straying bewil
dered in the woods : through all these I worried. I
had a high fever, and was otherwise distressed in
body and ill at ease in mind." He preached as he
went, and was the first American bishop of any name

112 Francis Asbury.
who was ever seen in this remote section of Virginia.
At last he crossed the great Alleghany range, but by
no means passed out of the mountains; his entire
journey, after he entered them, was up and down
from one mountain to another. He makes little
complaint. He merely says the journey was made,
and that after preaching at Rehoboth he started
northward. His aim was to reach Clarksburg, which
was in northwestern Virginia, and to do this he had
to ride over the wildest mountains in the state.
The beautiful prairies, or savannas as they were
called, were covered with rich native grass, and
many cattle were fattened on these plains ; and while
the country was new, yet in these valleys there were
settlers whose humble homes were opened to As
bury and his companions. The travelers rode from
what is now Monroe county into the Great Levels, as
the rich Greenbrier valley is called, and crossed a
mountain range into the Little Levels, a fertile val
ley in what is now Pocahontas county. Here the
McNiels, a family of Scotch-Irish people who had be
come Methodists, had their comfortable homes, and
Asbury mentions them in his journal. The descend
ants of these people still live in their old homes, and
the home which sheltered Asbury and McKendree
was still standing a few years ago.
After leaving this valley, he started to Clarksburg,
entering Tigert's valley, which he calls "Tyger's Val
ley." He says: "We came to an old forsaken habita
tion. Here our horses grazed while we boiled our
meat; at midnight we brought up at Jones's. At four
in the morning we journeyed on through devious,
lonely wilds, where no food might be found, except
what grew in the woods or was carried with us. We

Francis Asbury. 113
met two women going to quarterly meeting at Clarks
burg. Near midnight we stopped at A.'s, who hissed
his dogs at us, but the women were determined to
get to the quarterly meeting, and so we went in.
Our supper was tea; brothers Phoebus and Cook
took to the woods. Old  gave up his bed to the
women; I lay along the floor, on a few deer skins,
with the fleas. That night our poor horses got no
corn, and the next morning they had to swim the
Monongahela. After a twenty miles' ride we came
to Clarksburg, but we were so outdone it took us ten
hours to accomplish it."
The journey he made led him through Pocahontas,
Webster, Braxton, Lewis, and Harrison counties.
At Clarksburg he lodged with Colonel Jackson.
This Colonel Jackson was the grandfather of " Stone
wall" Jackson, the great general.
The Baptists were in these mountains before the
Methodists came, and had a long, close room in
which the Methodists held their Conference. There
were seven hundred persons present to attend the
quarterly meeting.
The journey was resumed on Monday, and it was
still through the mountains. " Oh, how glad I should
be [he says] of plain, clean plank as preferable to
most of the beds! and where the beds are in a bad
state, the floors are worse." The gnats were as bad
as mosquitoes, and the wild frontiersmen were hard
ly acquainted with the decencies of life. "They had
been fighting Indians [Asbury said] till it made them
cruel, and then the only preaching they heard was
the hyper-Calvinism of Antinomians. Good moral
ists they are not, and good Christians they cannot
be till they are better taught."
8

114 Francis Asbury.
He preached in Morgantown, and after riding for
two days reached Uniontown, Pennsylvania, where
the Conference met.
The journey he had made from North Carolina to
Pennsylvania had led him almost entirely through
the frontier settlements, and much of it through
wild mountains, many of which at the present time
are as wild as they were when he passed through
them. The people were then as wild as the mount
ains, and the preachers he had sent out to evangelize
them were exposed to every trial; and he was will
ing, in order to save them from long journeys to Con
ference, to expose himself to the fatigue and priva
tion of this weary tour.
Richard Whatcoat was his traveling companion,
and the journey had made both ill. They, however,
returned to Virginia, and stopped a little while at
Bath. There he tried to preach a sermon on "The
Lame and Blind." "The discourse," he said, "was
lame, and the people were blind."
The college, so unwisely begun, had given him al
most as much care as Kingswood School gave Mr.
Wesley, and now at Bath he heard that both the
teachers were gone.
During this journey, rough as it was, he had been
busy reading Mosheim, a book which one would not
likely take for reading on the wing. He went from
Bath to Baltimore, where he met the Maryland
preachers in September, 1788. The view he gives
of the Conference is a pleasing one. The old Light-
street church was now completed, and Conference
met in it. The Dutch church of Mr. Otterbein was
also at the service of the Conference. There began
on Sunday a gracious revival, and sinners cried for

Francis Asbury. 115
mercy, and perhaps twenty souls were converted be
fore the meeting closed on Tuesday. The puzzling
college affairs were settled as best they could be, and
he began his northward journey again.
In three days he was in Philadelphia, and the Con
ference for the eastern part of Pennsylvania and
New Jersey was attended to, and he began his move
southward. On the eastern shore of Maryland and
Virginia, and through Delaware, he preached in
great feebleness and weariness, but with great
power and earnestness, finding a gracious revival in
fluence wherever he went. He was troubled about
college debts, but his friends helped him out, and,
visiting Cokesbury, he tried to put things in order in
the college, and then rode through the western
shore of Maryland into Virginia, and by his old
route to Charleston, South Carolina, once more.

CHAPTER XVII.
1789.
Mr. Wesley's Famous Letter and the Council — Georgia — Daniel
Grant— Wesley and Whitefield School— Mr. Wesley's Letter
— North Carolina — The Council.
BISHOP ASBURY had perhaps delayed his com
ing to the south in 1789 because he expected to
meet Dr. Coke in Charleston; but wllen he reached
there Coke had not arrived, and a few days after he
began his journey to Georgia. He had gone only a
short distance, however, before Coke joined him.
He had reached Charleston a few hours after Asbury
left. They crossed the Savannah River at Sand-bar
Ferry and rode on by the old road to Washington
and to Grant's, where the Conference was to be
held. Daniel Grant was the descendant of an old Scotch
family. He was a man of good culture for those
times, and of profound piety. He had at one time
been a Presbyterian elder in Hanover county, Vir
ginia, in the church of Samuel Davies, and after
wards lived in Granville county, North Carolina,
where he had been an elder in the Grassy Creek
church. Thence he had removed to Georgia. When
he heard the Methodists, he invited them to his
house to preach, and finally joined them and built a
church, the first Methodist church in Georgia. His
son, Thomas, had become a member of the Church
also, and lived near him. They carried on a large
mercantile business at Grant's Store, in Wilkes
(116)

Francis Asbury. 117
county, and being well off in the world's goods, they
were able to dispense a generous hospitality. The
Conference met at their house and held its sessions
in the church near by. Mr. Asbury approved the
scheme which some of the preachers had made for a
Methodist school in Georgia. This was to be called
the Wesley and Whitefield School, and the scheme
was to buy five hundred acres of land and establish
the school and get donations of land for its endow
ment. Bishop Coke, who was with Asbury, second
ed the idea with great heartiness, and a subscription
was started. The subscriptions, were to be paid in
cattle or land or tobacco or money. In the county
of Wilkes there were, besides Grant's, Meriwether's
and Scott's meetinghouses which Asbury mentions.
David Meriwether had become a Methodist. He be
longed to a distinguished and wealthy Virginia fam
ily who had been, as far as they were anything,
Church-of-England people; he was the first Metho
dist among them. The bishops had, however, no
time for a tour through Georgia, and pressed on to
South Carolina. They rode the two hundred miles
to Charleston in four days.
Here Asbury received a letter from Mr. Wesley, the
last he ever had from his pen. He says of it: "Here
I received a bitter pill from one of my greatest
friends. Praise the Lord for my trials also! May
they be sanctified." This letter has been often pa
raded by those who had little love for Mr. Wesley as
a means of rebuking the pretensions of those for
whom they had still less. It was written by an old
man eighty-six years old, and written to one whom
he regarded almost as his child. It can only be ex
cused because of this fact. The charge that As-

118 Francis Asbury.
bury was striving to make himself great, because
he strove to keep himself from being ridiculous, was
only to be passed by since a somewhat childish old
man made it. If Mr. Wesley had not designed to
make Mr. Asbury a bishop, what had he designed?
If he had not believed he was an episcopos himself,
why had he acted as one? Perhaps next to God,
Asbury venerated Mr. Wesley, and yet he had been
misread by him time and again. We, however, give
the letter just as it was : London, September 20, 1788.
There is, indeed, a wide difference between the relations
wherein you stand to the Americans and the relations where
in I stand to all Methodists. You are the elder brother of
the American Methodists: I am, under God, the father of the
whole family. Therefore, I naturally care for you all in a
manner no other person can do. Therefore, I, in a measure,
provide for you all; for the supplies which Dr. Coke provides
for you, he could not provide were it not for me — were it not
that I not only permit him to collect, but also support him in
so doing. But in one point, my dear brother, I am a little
afraid both the doctor and you differ from me. I study to be
little; you study to be great. I creep; you strut along. I
found a school; you a college! Nay, and call it after your own
names! O, beware! Do not seek to be something! Let me
be nothing, and "Christ be all in all!"
One instance of this, of your greatness, has given me great
concern. How can you, how dare you, suffer yourself to be
called bishop? I shudder, I start at the very thought! Men
may call me a knave or a fool, a rascal, a scoundrel, and I am
content; but they shall never, by my consent, call me a bishop.
For my sake, for God's sake, for Christ's sake, put a full end
to this! Let the Presbyterians do what they please, but let
the Methodists know their calling better. Thus, my dear
Franky, I have told you all that is in my heart. And let this,
when I am no more seen, bear witness how sincerely I am
Your affectionate friend and brother, John Wesltst.

Francis Asbury. 119
The letter pained him, but did not cause him to
abate his work, for as soon as the Conference ended
its session he was on his way again.
He went northward to North Carolina, where, at
McKnight's, in a month's time he was to have an
other Conference, and by the 3d of April he had rid
den three hundred miles, and the poor horses had
suffered because of it. They reached McKnight's on
the Yadkin, and the Holston brethren met with
them, and their next stop was in Petersburg Vir
ginia. Asbury allowed Bishop Coke to do all the
preaching. On one Sunday, having no appointment,
they pushed on until they reached Leesburg. They
found a lively religious state all along the way
through Virginia and Maryland, and when they
reached Baltimore " the meetings were very live
ly," he says, "and one night the people continued
together till three o'clock in the morning; many
have professed to be convicted, converted, sancti
fied." It would be monotonous to follow him in his wan
derings the remainder of this year. They covered
very much the same ground that he had been over
before, and were amid much the same scenes. His
heart was greatly cheered by the great revival
which he found everywhere, and much to his pleas
ure there was much noise in it. "Noble shouting"
delighted his heroic heart. He was now trying to
raise money to keep the needy at the schools and
raising the first educational collection.
It had been now nearly five years since the Christ
mas Conference which organized the Methodist
Episcopal Church had held its session and ad
journed, and there had been no general meeting of

120 Francis Asbury.
the preachers. In order to do anything it was neces
sary to pass the measure round among the Confer
ences, and the veto of one could defeat the will of the
rest. Bishop Asbury did not see the need of a Gen
eral Conference, nor possibly of any more legisla
tion, but he felt the need of a general body of advis
ers, and he proposed the formation of a council,
which should be composed of the men of his choice,
and they were to be invested with almost plenary
powers. He hoped the Conferences would accede to
his plan, and the council was selected and called to
gether. They were among the best men he had, and
he thought the plan would be eminently satisfactory
to his brethren; and he was now hurrying to Balti
more to be at the first session of this celebrated and
shortlived council.
Bishop Asbury says, December 6, 1789: "Our
council was seated, consisting of the following per
sons, namely: Richard Ivey, from Georgia; R. Ellis,
E. Morris, Phil Bruce, James O'Kelly, L. Green, Nel
son Reed, J. Everett, John Dickins, J. O. Cromwell,
Freeborn Garrettson. AU our business was done in
love and unanimity." He was highly pleased with
the result of his experiment, and he had certainly
shown good judgment in the selection of the con
clave. This was the beginning of the council. The legal
izing of this conclaA^e and defining its powers Avere
dependent upon what the Conferences would say.
There was little question in the mind of Bishop
Asbury that the plan he had devised would be ac
cepted, but he heard the mutterings of the storm be
fore the council had adjourned its session many
weeks. That dear man, James O'Kellv, who hnd ris-

Francis Asbury. 121
en from his bed at midnight to pray for Asbury when
they first met, and who had been made a member of
the council, did not like the trend of things; and As
bury says on the 12th of January, 1790 : " I received a
letter from the presiding elder of this district, James
O'Kelly. He makes heavy complaints of my power,
and bids me stop for one year or he must use his in
fluence against me. Power! power! there is not a
vote given in a Conference in which the presiding
elder has not greatly the advantage of me. All the
influence I am to gain over a company of young men
in a district must be done in three weeks. The
greater part of them are perhaps seen by me alone
at Conference, while the presiding elder has been
with them all the year and has the greatest opportu
nity of gaining influence. This advantage may be
abused. Let the bishops look to it. But who has
the power to lay an embargo on me and to make of
none effect the decision of all the Conferences of the
union?" The battle was now on. O'Kelly wrote
Coke and presented his side of the case, and in the
meantime Asbury used his personal influence to se
cure the indorsement of the Conferences. When the
council met in Philip Rogers's house it coolly re
solved that "it had the right to manage the temporal
concerns of the Church and college decisively, and
to recommend to the Conferences for ratification
whatever we judged might be advantageous to the
spiritual well-being of the whole body." This was
certainly a rather sweeping proposition from a body
whose hold on life was so frail, but at the Virginia
Conference it received its deathblow, and the Gen
eral Conference was called for, to meet in Balti
more in 1792.

122 Francis Asbury.
I have preferred to interrupt the current of the
story and give the whole history of this matter as
Asbury's journal gives it. He had conceived the
idea of the council and had selected the best men of
the Church to form it, but he says comparatively
little about it, and the general minutes make no men
tion at all of its origin, its beginning, or of its ending.
The various Church histories give its history in ex-
tenso. It no doubt originated with Bishop Asbury,
and was designed to supersede the necessity for the
calling of a General Conference. Mr. Asbury did
not have great confidence in the vox populi even
among the preachers. He thought he knew best
what ought to be done, and while he was not unwill
ing to take advice if he thought it good, he was anx
ious to select those whose duty it would be to give
it. The council was well designed, but it had in it
the seeds of death, and it had but two unsatisfactory
sessions. In order to meet the convenience of the
preachers, they had been acting by sections; but so
jealous were they of their rights that no act was
obligatory on any until all of them had had an op
portunity to vote and speak upon it, and the
negative of one Conference defeated the measure.
The council was composed of the best men in the
connection whom Mr. Asbury could select, but it
was after all Mr. Asbury's voice which was heard.
He himself was much pleased at the results of
its two sessions, and much disappointed Avhen it
failed. The council adjourned in the early part of Decem
ber, and with Richard Whatcoat as a companion As
bury began his journey to the south, and at the end
of the year 1789 he found himself in Gloucester, Vir-

Francis Asbury. 123
ginia. This part of the tide-water country was at
that time the wealthiest section of that then wealthy
state, and here Methodism had made an impression
upon the leading people, and he was accustomed to
pay them an annual visit.
He was now hurrying to the south, that he might
meet the South Carolina Conference, which was to
meet in Charleston in February.

CHAPTER XVIII.
1790.
Over the Continent — North Carolina — Charleston — Georgia —
Western North Carolina — Over the Mountains — General Rus
sell's — Kentucky — Virginia — Pennsylvania — Cokesbury.
THE beginning of 1790 found Asbury in the cen
ter of the tide-water country in Virginia, has
tening as rapidly as possible toward the south. The
rivers were crossed with great difficulty, and he had
the Potomac, the James, and the Ronoake to cross
near their mouths. The cost for ferriage alone, he
says, was £3. He passed through the section in
which James O'Kelly had long exerted great influ
ence, and it was on this journey that O'Kelly made
the complaint alluded to in our last chapter. Aft
er crossing the Roanoke River into North Carolina,
he rode westward through the then thickly-settled
counties of central North Carolina. The journey
was free from incident, and by the 10th of February
he was in Charleston once more, where he met the
South Carolina Conference.
This Conference, which did not at that time in
clude Georgia, was a small body, and after a short
session the good bishop rode on his way to Georgia,
and entering it near Augusta he preached at Old
Church in Burke county, which is still an appoint
ment in the Burke Circuit, and at a church near
Fenn's Bridge in Jefferson county. Hewas nowmak-
ing search for a section of land on which to locate the
Wesley and Whitefield school. The land he exam-
ri24)

Francis Asbury. 125
ined did not suit him, and the purchase was not
made. He met the Conference of Georgia preachers
again at Grant's, and after a short session he began
his journey northward. On his way he rested at a
brother Herbert's, in Elbert county, where the saint
ly Major had passed away. Asbury said that a poor
sinner was struck with conviction at the grave of
this weeping prophet, whose voice he heard calling
him to repentance. John Andrew, the father of
James O. Andrew, was on the circuit at this time,
and Asbury says he heard of a woman who sent for
him to preach her funeral sermon while she was liv
ing. The quaint preacher did so, and she was
blessed under the word and died in peace.
With a rapid ride he came into western North Car
olina. Here he was taken with a disorder that
proved fatal to his grandfather, and he was serious
and despondent. Death, he thought, was not far
away, and he says somewhat innocently: "I could
give up the Church, the colleges, and the schools;
nevertheless there is one drawback. What will my
enemies and mistaken friends say? Why, that 'he
hath offended the Lord, and he hath taken him
away.' " He was on his way to Kentucky, and the
journey was made by crossing the mountains into
Johnson county, Tennessee, across the head waters
of the Watauga and the Holston. The house iu
which they slept was without a cover; the wolves
howled, and rain fell in torrents. They crossed the
mountain in the rain, and while the good bishop
was looking for the guide he was carried with full
force against a tree, but with no serious damage. To
add to his misfortunes, when they reached the Hol
ston country they turned the horses out to graze,

126 Francis Asbury.
and they could not find them. They had either been
stolen by the Indians or strayed afar. At last the
estrays were recovered, and he pursued the same
course he had taken on his first journey to the Hol
ston country, going from North Carolina into Ten
nessee, and thence to his friend General Russell's,
where there was a little time to rest and prepare for
the dangerous journey to Kentucky. The Indians
had been on the war path, and there was constant
danger from them. The road was dreary and he
was sick, but the untiring man pressed on. Peter
Massie and John Clark, from Kentucky, met him,
and then the footsteps of the sick man were turned
toward Kentucky. They came into Kentucky from
Tennessee, traveling along the north branch of the
Holston and the Clinch, and through the wilds across
the Kentucky River, until at length they reached the
settlement at Lexington. When he returned he
came by the Crab Orchard and by Cumberland Gap,
and back again to General Russell's. He now made
his way as rapidly as possible to McKnight's, on the
Yadkin, where the Conference had been awaiting his
coming for two weeks. There was no rest for him.
The Conference here was no sooner over than he
pressed on to Petersburg, in Virginia, where he met
the Virginia Conference, and where he had the trou
ble he looked for about the council.
Although the year was only half gone, he had al
ready crossed the Alleghanies and the other ranges
of the great Appalachian chain four times, but was
to climb them again before the year ended; for after
leaving Petersburg he made the same journey
through Botetourt and Greenbrier to Uniontown,
Pennsylvania, by the route of which we have given

Francis Asbury. 127
account in our last chapter. Then the weary man
turned his face toward the east, where the comforts
of an old civilization were to be found. To one who
had been for long months among the rocks, mount
ains, rattlesnakes, fleas, and cabins, the change to a
land of comfortable and often elegant homes must
have been a relief as much as a pleasure. He had
but little time to tarry anywhere, and he made a hur
ried journey through Maryland, during which time
he visited Cokesbury.
The college was now fairly under way, and there
were forty-six students. There were some public ex
ercises, evidently for his benefit, some philosophical
lectures by the faculty, and in the afternoon the boys
declaimed. Some parts of this exercise were very ex
ceptionable to the stern bishop who took note of them.
The rules adopted were revised. Impracticable be
fore, they were doubtless more so afterwards.
Asbury presided over the Philadelphia Conference
in September and the New York Conference in Octo
ber. Then he journeyed through Chester, where he
found that the good widow Withey, who kept the
best inn on the continent and always entertained the
preachers, was feeble in body and depressed in mind;
from which depression, one is glad to know, the good
Mary made a happy recovery. He came through the
eastern shore of Delaware and Maryland, the bright
est spot to him in all the land, and finally reached
Baltimore in December, where the council met at his
friend Philip Rogers's, and had its second and last
session. He ended the year of immense labor in the
heart of Virginia, having made a circuit that extend
ed from New York and the Atlantic on the north and
east to the remotest points on the western frontier.

CHAPTER XIX.
1791.
Arminian Magazine — Coke's Arrival in Charleston — William
Hammett — Georgia Conference — Virginia) — Wesley's Death
— Coke's Return to England— Jesse Lee — New England — As
bury's Visit.
DURING the year 1790 the second volume of the
Arminian Magazine had been issued. It was
almost an exact reproduction of the Arminian Maga
zine in England, and seems to us of this day a some
what dull and dreary volume, filled with the inter
minable discussions of Calvinistic errors. Asbury
says he finished reading the second volume, and not
withstanding its defects it was one of the best and
cheapest books in America. He says the poetry
might be better, and no one will be likely to contro
vert him.
The route that Asbury took to reach Charleston
was the same he had traveled before. He found,
however, much to his gratification, that Methodism
was securing a stronger foothold in all this tide
water country. The journey, always a disagreeable
one in winter, at last ended in Charleston.
An entry in the journal shows that Asbury still
used the Church service provided by Wesley in 1784.
He says: "I read prayers, after which brother Ellis
preached." The young preachers in Georgia were now engaged
in a controversy. History does not say with whom,
but likolv with the Baptists, then beginning a very
(128)

Francis Asbury. 129
aggressive campaign under Silas Mercer, and the
Calvinistic Presbyterians. Asbury objected serious
ly to it, and said we had better work to do.
The indefatigable Dr. Coke, at Mr. Wesley's in
stance, had come by the West Indies to South Caro
lina. Near Charleston he had been wrecked on
Edisto Island, but he made his way to Charleston,
and brought with him William Hammett, a young
Irishman, who afterwards gave Asbury a world of
trouble. The people were anxious to have the gifted
Irishman appointed as their preacher; but it was a
thing unheard of among the Methodists that the peo
ple should choose their own preacher, and so Mr. As
bury sent Ellis and Parks instead, much to the dis
satisfaction of the people, and as much to the dissat
isfaction of Mr. Hammett. After the Conference in
Charleston was over, Bishop Coke took one route
and Bishop Asbury another to unite at Scott's, in
Wilkes county, where the Conference was to be held.
It is evident that the meeting between the two bish
ops was not very cordial, and that their relations were
somewhat strained. Dr. Coke had evidently been in
correspondence with O'Kelly, and he had come to
America, possibly after consultation with Mr. Wes
ley, to put a speedy end to the council. The good
bishops came to an understanding, however, and de
cided that the council was to be among the things of
the past, and that a General Conference was to be
called. Asbury made his way to Georgia by going through
Beaufort and Barnwell, S. C, and into Burke county
in Georgia. When in Waynesboro he spent a night
with an intelligent Jew, Henry by name, who joined
with him in reading the Hebrew Bible till late in the
9

130 Francis Asbury.
night.. The people in the very insignificant village
of Waynesboro, as it was then, paid little heed to the
earnest bishop when he tried to gather them into the
courthouse for service, and he says: "Catch me here
again till things are changed and mended."
The Conference met at Scott's, a church in Wilkes
county, and Asbury and Coke were both present.
Matters in Georgia were not prosperous as far as re
ligion was concerned. Everything was in a bustle,
the new lands were being settled, emigrants were
crowding into the new state, negroes were now being
hurried into the newly-settled country by the Old
and New England slave dealers, since the slave trade
was to end in a few years, and nothing was favorable
to religion. Decline had begun, and decline contin
ued for several weary, gloomy years. As the two
bishops passed on their way northward through
South Carolina, they preached to the Catawba In
dians who were still there. They made their way to
McKnight's on the Yadkin, and thence through the
middle of Virginia to Petersburg, where the Virginia
Conference was to meet. Here a crumb of comfort
was given to those who were so displeased with the
condition of things, and they were now assured that
the council should meet no more, and the General
Conference should meet during the next year.
It was on this tour that the tidings reached them
that the good Wesley was dead. It was high time
that his trusted lieutenant, Dr. Coke, should set off
for England, and so the two bishops hurried to the
first seaport where shipping . could be secured.
While they were in Baltimore, Dr. Coke was re
quested to preach a memorial sermon. The little
doctor was never discreet, and he wounded his breth-

Francis Asbury. 131
ren deeply by telling them that the good Wesley's
death was no doubt hastened by their leaving his
name off the minutes and repealing the celebrated
resolution. As Mr. Wesley was eighty-eight years
old, and had outlived all the male members of his
family, it is hardly likely that the conjecture of the
good doctor was correct.
Coke was needed in England, where things were
in much of a chaos, despite the chancery bill with its
legal hundred, and so he left Mr. Asbury alone and
hurried home.
The Charleston people had been much charmed by
the fervid Irishman Dr. Coke had brought with him,
and wanted him as their preacher ; and not satisfied
with Mr. Asbury's first refusal, they sent Mr. Ham
mett himself with a petition all the way to Philadel
phia only to have their labor for their trouble, for
Mr. Asbury refused them again. Mr. Hammett was,
however, put up to preach in New York and Philadel
phia, which preaching was less acceptable to the
people than it had been to those in Charleston.
The bishop now presided over the New York Con
ference, which then included New England, and
made ready for his first trip to New England.
When Asbury was on his first southern tour,
in company with Jesse Lee and Henry Willis, he
passed through Cheraw, South Carolina, and Lee
was thrown in company with a young New Eu-
glander. The New Englander told the companion
able Virginian what was to him a doleful story of
the religious destitution in New England. A land
where the people were all Calvinists — where there
were no class meetings and love feasts, where no
body ever shouted in meeting — was a land demand-

132 Francis Asbury.
ing missionary care, and the young man was anxious
to go there at once, but Asbury had other work for
him, and he did not go until five years had passed;
then he went. He had far from a cordial reception,
but he went on his way hammering, as he said, on
the Saybrook platform, and running a tilt against al
most everything the good New Englanders held dear.
He roamed over Connecticut, Rhode Island, and
Massachusetts, and at last secured a foothold in sev
eral places. He was now a member of the New York
Conference, and was appointed to the New England
Circuit. The time had now come for Asbury to visit New
England, and after the close of the New York Con
ference he, in company with Jesse Lee, turned his
face toward the land of the Presbyterians, as he
called the Congregationalists. New England had
been settled for nearly one hundred and seventy-five
years, and certainly did seem to need missionaries
as little as any part of America. It was the land of
steady habits and stalwart theology. As yet the
Unitarian had not dared to promulgate his views,
and was not bold enough to attack the orthodox
faith. Arminianism, which had been so dreaded in
the days of Jonathan Edwards fifty years before
that a great revival had resulted from prayers to
avert the heresy, had only now come with the
stalwart, unceremonious, irreverent Lee. The New
England legislatures still levied a tax to support the
standing order. The morals of the people were un
exceptionable, and their customs were in strict accord
with the best puritanic models.
Mr. Asbury had been twenty years in America be
fore he put foot in N6W England, and now he began

Francis Asbury. 133
his tour by entering Connecticut. It is not probable
that he expected a cordial reception, and he certain
ly did not have it. It was, however, not likely that
Avhen the strong, portly Lee and his delicate com
panion came into a quiet New England town and be
gan a service they would fail to draw attention to
themselves; and if they did not please the people,
they certainly interested them. Sometimes they
found a church open, and sometimes the selectmen
allowed them a house to preach in, but often they
were homeless.
The larger part of the country in which Asbury
had been at work for all these years, and especially
since he had been bishop, was a country of broad
acres and scattered people. Much of it was new,
and the houses were uncomely cabins, but now
he found himself where he was never out of sight
of a neat house, and rarely out of sight of a church.
The country reminded him of Derbyshire in En
gland. The people to whom he had been preach
ing were generally sinners outright. They did not
claim to be Christians, and were not formalists;
but now he found himself where Church mem
bership was expected from all respectable people.
He came to his conclusion as to the religious condi
tion of the states, one would think, somewhat pre
cipitately, since he made up his verdict in less than
forty-eight hours after he reached Connecticut. He
thought "there had been religion there once, but
doubted if there was much left. There had doubt
less been a praying ministry and membership, but he
thought now both were dead." Perhaps the good
bishop saw through brother Lee's spectacles. The
churches were, of course, generally closed against

134 Francis Asbury.
him; but the barns were open, and he preached his
first sermon in a barn. The effect of his preaching
was very decided. Some smiled, some wept; some
laughed outright, and some swore. He and his com
panion came to New Haven, where Yale College,
with President Stiles, was. It was a somewhat ven
turesome step, and they found no church to receive
them. Asbury preached what he evidently thought
was a poor sermon, with the sun shining in his face.
The next day they visited Yale College, but the
visitors received scant courtesy. Little did Presi
dent Stiles and his faculty know that one of his vis
itors controlled a college himself, or he might have
been more courteous. Asbury was not unmindful of
the rudeness, and promised himself that if they came
to Cokesbury he would treat them in a more gen
tlemanly way. Well, perhaps there was much to be
said on the other side. If ever men appeared to be
impudent intruders on the domain of others, Asbury
and Lee so appeared to President Stiles and his asso
ciates. To intimate that anything more was needed
than Yale was doing might have come with some
grace from some people, but from these unlearned,
fanatical men it was the height of absurdity; and
then, too, that Arminians and prelatists should come
on a mission to New England was both impudent and
presumptuous. The bishop and his companion went on a tour
through Rhode Island. They found sundry churches
at Providence and Newport, but met a chilling re
ception in both cities; and after a hasty ride through
the country, they reached Boston. It then had in its
borders nine Congregational churches, one Quaker
meetinghouse, one Sandemanian, one Roman Catho-

Francis Asbury. 135
lie, one Universalist,and two Episcopal. The church
of Mr. Murray was opened to them, but the hospital
ity the visitors received was limited. Asbury said
even in wicked Charleston he was invited to sundry
homes, but now no one opened his door to him. His
congregations, too, were very small ; at first not more
than twenty-six in a large church came to hear him.
He decided that he had done with Boston until he
could get a house to preach in and some one to enter
tain him, and made his way to Lynn. Here Meth
odism had made an impression and secured a foot
hold. Here there was a home at least, and here he
was able to hold sundry profitable services. He
went to Salem, "where the witches were burned, and
sought the graves of those whom the Puritans had
put to death for their religion." There was no place
here for this weary evangelist ; although there were
five churches, none was open to him, and he decided
to put Salem in the same catalogue with Boston.
At Manchester Mr. Foster, of honored memory, re
ceived him with great kindness, and the selectmen
gave him the courthouse to preach in. There was a
place where provision was made to entertain minis
ters, and an amount of money offered for their serv
ices. The high-spirited bishop refused their hospi
tality and their compensation. He made quite a
tour in Massachusetts, and was much struck with
the earnest wish of those with whom he dined in a
certain place, who said that the people were now
united and did not wish to divide the parish. "Their
fathers, the Puritans, divided the kingdom and
Church, too," Asbury said. After a little longer stay
in Massachusetts and Connecticut, he reentered New
York and came southward.

CHAPTER XX.
1792.
Returns Southward — Cokesbury Troubles — Virginia Conference
— North Carolina Conference — Troubles in Charleston —
Georgia Conference — Beverly Allen's Expulsion — Tour to
Kentucky — Northward Again.
IN the early fall Asbury returned from New En
gland, and, preaching as he went, made his way
through New York, New Jersey, and Delaware to
Baltimore. He was still burdened with Cokesbury,
and when he reached Baltimore he trudged through
the snow begging money to board and educate the
orphans who came there. He was anxious to found
a female school, and made some plans looking in that
direction. With Thomas Morrill he began his jour
ney to the farther south, and along his accustomed
route he made his way to Green Hill's in North Car
olina. The journey was an uneventful one, but was
fatiguing. The plan of holding the Conference in
small sections was still adhered to, and did not un
dergo any change till the next year. The Virginia
Conference met at Dickinson's, in Caroline county,
and the North Carolina Conference at that excellent
local preacher's Green Hill's, where it held several
of its sessions.
During this tour he thought at one time he had se
cured the blessing of perfect love, and cautiously so
expressed himself; but a few months afterwards he
speaks in another strain. In October he says : " I am
afraid of losing the peace I feel ; for months past I
have seemed to be in the possession of perfect love."
(136)

Francis Asbury. 137
But he says on the 21st of the same month: "Tempta
tions oppressed my soul and disease my body ; I fear
I am not so constant in prayer as I should be."
He did not reach Charleston as soon as usual,
and January, 1792, found him in Norfolk, where his
heart was gladdened by the evidences of a revival.
The North Carolina Conference was to meet early
the next week at Green Hill's; and though the
weather was very cold, and his exposure very great,
he and his companion, Thomas Morrill, pressed on.
His chief cordial, he says, was to preach at night;
and despite his weary ride, he was always ready for
his pulpit. Except in Georgetown and Charleston,
he says his congregations were generally good. It
was in February before he reached Charleston.
His companion in this journey was Thomas Mor
rill, who had been an officer in the Revolutionary
army, and who was long one of his most trusted help
ers as well as one of his most intimate friends. As
bury's custom was always to have a traveling com
panion, and his companion generally found that
pleasant as it was to be in the bishop's company the
price paid for the pleasure was not a small one.
We noted in the last chapter the arrival in Charles
ton of the young Irishman, William Hammett, and
his vain effort to get the appointment of Parks and
Ellis changed to secure the position for himself.
Although Dr. Coke had brought him from the West
Indies, he seems to have turned from him, much to
Hammett's vexation. After failing in Philadelphia
to get Asbury to change his decision, he came back
to Charleston and established an independent
church. This was the first schism in the societies
Hammett was very popular with many of the Meth-

138 Francis Asbury.
odists in Charleston, and with many who were
friends, although not members, of society; and after
he had preached in a hall for some time, they rallied
to his help, and built him a neat, and, for the Meth
odists of that time, a handsome church, which he
called Trinity.
The disaffection reached the country round about,
and in Georgetown he had another congregation.
He was very popular for a short time, but only lived
a few years. He was very bitter in his denunciation
of Coke and Asbury, and never was reconciled to
them or the connection. Lorenzo Dow, on a visit to
Charleston some years after this, made an entry in
his journal which was published, in which he said
Hammett died drunk. Hammett's son sued Lorenzo
for libel, and he was convicted and mildly punished
for slandering the dead man. Some years after
Hammett's death the church fell into the hands of
the Asburyan Methodists, among whom it still re
mains. Asbury said Hammett charged the Amer
ican preachers with having insulted him, and said
his name had been left off the minutes, and that the
cautioning minute was against him. Asbury not
only had trouble with Mr. Hammett, but some one
else, who he thinks was Mr. S., wrote him an abu
sive, anonymous letter containing several charges;
and Mr. Philip Matthews sent in his resignation as
a traveling preacher and withdrew from the connec
tion. The year opened as the last had, in a storm,
but the determined Asbury never turned aside for a
moment. Immediately after the Conference closed
he turned his face toward Georgia. There was trou
ble here, as there had been in Charleston. Beverly
Allen had been a prominent figure in the history of

Francis Asbury. 139
the early Church. He was energetic, gifted, and a
man of good lineage, who had married into an excel
lent family in South Carolina. He had not worked
in good accord with Asbury, who always distrusted
him. He had become involved in serious trouble,
and when Asbury, after a fatiguing journey, met the
Conference at Washington, he had the painful task
of pronouncing his expulsion. There was quite a
sifting and searching, and others were involved in
censure. When the Conference closed he took Har
dy Herbert and Hope Hull and began his journey
toward the distant west. He aimed to reach Ken
tucky, and with his companions went through west
ern North Carolina directly to General Russell's in
southwestern Virginia. The gateway to Kentucky
was by the route traveled before through Cumber
land Gap. It was a wild trail till he reached the first
settlements at the Crab Orchard. The huts in which
these first settlers lived were small and filthy, and a
severe dysentery fastened upon him ; but he found in
these wilds a little good claret wine, which set him
up again, and he pressed on to their thicker settle
ments. Kentucky was rapidly filling up, and the
question of its status after its admission into the Un
ion was now being settled. Should it be a slave or a
free state? Ten years before this, David Rice, a Vir
ginia Presbyterian, had come from Virginia with the
first Virginian immigrants and established the first
Presbyterian Church in Kentucky. He had also es
tablished a high school, and was a leading man in the
territory. He was bitterly opposed to slavery, and
had written a letter to the convention protesting
against allowing it in Kentucky. This letter Asbury
read with great pleasure, and while in Kentucky he

140 Francis Asbury.
wrote a letter to Rice encouraging him and applaud
ing his course. Francis Poythress, who belonged to
one of the oldest families in Virginia, who had been
licensed to preach by Asbury, and who had been one
of his trusted helpers, was now in charge of the Ken
tucky District. He had planned a high school, and
five hundred acres of land had been given for its en
dowment. He was now trying to raise money for the
buildings, and Asbury made the school a visit. No
one at the present day can have any true idea of the
difficulties encountered by those who projected and
attempted to build houses for schools in these last
days of the last century, and it is not to be wondered
at that the effort of Poythress was not fully success
ful. The times were greatly disordered. The con
vention to form a constitution was to be called. The
Indian tribes were in revolt. The Cherokees on the
south and the Wyandots on the north were both on
the warpath, and between all these excitements the
little band that composed the Conference had a rath
er uneasy session.
The session, however, was held: and new as the
country was, Asbury preached to large croAvds. De
spite all the hardships of the wilderness and the dan
gers from the Indians, the spirit of matrimony, he
says, was very prevalent. In one circuit the preach
ers were all settled. This was a serious matter to
one who wanted men on horseback. The land, he
said, was good, the country new, there were all the
facilities for family maintenance, and so the suscep
tible preachers were drawn into the marriage net.
He finished his work in Kentucky and started on
the same route back toward Virginia. In passing
through the mountains he came near the hostile sav-

Francis Asbury. 141
ages; guards were posted, and he stood guard all
night. He met the Holston Conference, and thence
Avent back again to his old friend General Russell's.
Although parts of eastern Virginia had been set
tled nearly two hundred years and the country was
aged and worn, the western slope had only been oc
cupied by white people since just before the Revolu
tion. The beautiful valleys of Kentucky and of the
Holston country, and even of what is now Middle
Tennessee, were being rapidly populated, but the
mountains of Virginia, in whose bosoms were hid the
great treasures of coal and iron, were as they had
stood for all the centuries. There was, however, a
rich and narrow valley along the Kanawha, which
was even then being occupied. The adventurous sur
veyor, George Washington, had explored these lands
while he was a young man, and had preempted a
large part of this almost matchless valley.
Asbury left General Russell's and made his way
northward through this valley, and thence rode the
one hundred weary miles through almost unbroken
forests to meet his few western preachers in the older
settlements among the grass-clad hills of Greenbrier.
With him labor and exposure were so common that
his scant records give but a faint idea of the sacrifice
their toils demanded; but let one acquainted with
the topography of this western section follow him in
his journeyings, and he will see something of the la
bor he must have undergone. His trip to Union-
town, in Pennsylvania, where he met the western
section of the Pennsylvania, Maryland, and western
Virginia preachers, was by the same wearisome
route of which we have already given account. He
turned eastward, and now for the first time in weary

142 Francis Asbury.
months found himself in the midst of comfort and re
finement. He paused but a little while, and pressed
on to New England to make his second visit. Here
in Lynn, in a half-finished house, he held the second
New England Conference. The contrast between the
old civilization and the new Church was as marked
in New England as the new settlements and the new
Church in the far west. Old England had over one
hundred and fifty years before almost transferred
a part of herself to the section in which this little
Conference now met. It might be said that this
country was never new, and it was especially true
that its religious features were fixed, and yet all the
hardships of the frontier were found here in the
midst of this old civilization. The visit to Lynn and
the effort to provide preachers for the old east, while
far less exciting than the journey to Kentucky, was
scarcely less trying.
The western part of New York was being rapidly
peopled. New Englanders and those from the older
parts of the state were pressing their way toward
the lakes. Freeborn Garrettson had for six years
been laboring in this section and had established
Methodism permanently in it, and he and his sturdy
corps of evangelists met Asbury in Albany. During
this year Garrettson, the elegant Maryland gentle
man, married into the distinguished Livingston fam
ily; and this marriage introducedAsburyinto the old
families of the Hudson, among whom he found kindly
friends for many years after this. Although Meth
odism worked largely among the poor and unedu
cated both in England and America, she numbered
among her truest friends and warmest supporters
some from the most distinguished of its noble and

Francis Asbury. 143
aristocratic families; and the Livingstons, Van Cort-
lands, Carrolls, Bidgleys, Balls, Eemberts, Grants,
Meriwethers, Goughs, and others, were not inferior
in social position to any families in the land.
During this tour Asbury was accompanied by Hope
Hull, of whom we have spoken before, and he left the
young Marylander in Hartford, where he spent a
year. During this time he was the instrument in the
conversion of a youth who became one of the most
striking personages in the early part of the century.
This was Lorenzo Dow. He was an ill-balanced but
remarkably gifted Connecticut boy, who tried to be a
traveling preacher in the regular connection, but who
found the restraints of its discipline too great for
him and became a free lance in theology, who
preached from Maine to Mississippi, then the western
frontier, and who for the first ten years of this centu
ry had perhaps a stronger hold on public attention
than any other Methodist preacher on the continent.
When the bishop reached New York City on his
return, the warm-hearted Methodists of the society
replenished his empty purse and provided him with a
new wardrobe. This supplied his needs, and he com
placently says that this was better than £500 a year.
It is evident that the good bishop, contrasting the
position of the comfortably placed pastor of one of
the rich churches of the east with the Methodist
bishop and his $80 a year, traveling from Maine to
Georgia, was not disposed to discount the Methodist.
Going from New York he stopped in Philadelphia
where he found things in the Ebenezer church in a
lively state. His description of the meeting gives us
an insight into many of the meetings of those days:
"The mobility then came in like the roaring of the

144 Francis Asbury.
sea. They had been alarmed the night before by
a shout, which probably was one cause why the
congregation was so large. Brother A. went to
prayer; a person cried out; brother C. joined in; the
wicked were collected to oppose. I felt the power of
darkness was very strong. . . . This is a wick
ed, a horribly wicked city; for their unfaithfulness
they will be smitten in anger for their sleepy silence
in the house of God, which ought to resound with the
voice of praise and frequent prayer; the Lord will
visit their streets with the silence of desolation."
He left Philadelphia for the eastern shore and
made his annual tour, and then went with a heavy
heart to Baltimore. His heart was heavy because
the General Conference was to meet. It is useless
to deny the fact, Bishop Asbury did not wish the
General Conference to assemble. He did not wish
to be hampered. He thought he knew the necessity
of the times and that he was master of the situation.
While he cared not a jot for power, except as a means
to do good, he believed every restriction put upon
him would be to the injury of the work; but the An
nual Conferences had called the Conference, and
now he went to meet it.
The General Conference met November 1, 1792. It
was simply a mass meeting of the traveling preach
ers. The Christmas Conference of 1784 had done
little more than to legalize the suggestions of Dr.
Coke, who brought over the service-book, and the
regulations suggested by Mr. Wesley, and any
legislation since that time had been done by the
preachers acting through their District or Annual
Conferences. Bishop Asbury, as we have said, did
not wish a General Conference called; but Dr. Coke

Francis Asbury. 145
did, and he expressed the wish of the preachers.
Bishop Asbury expected what was the fact, that
there would be a complete revision of the Discipline,
and feared that there would be sundry very unpleas
ant alterations. He says, October 31st: "Came to
Baltimore in a storm of rain. Whilst we were sit
ting in the room at Mr. Ross's in came Dr. Coke, of
Avhose arrival I had not heard and whom we em
braced with great love. I felt awful at the General
Conference which began November 1, 1792. At my
desire they appointed a moderator and preparatory
committee to keep order and bring forward the busi
ness with regularity. We had heavy debates on the
first, second, and third sections of our form of dis
cipline. My power to station the preachers without
an appeal was much debated, but finally carried by a
large majority. Perhaps a new bishop, new Confer
ence, and new laws would have better pleased some."
The bishop was not well, and after sitting with
the Conference a week he went to bed, and wrote to
the body the letter which is found below. The real
ground of conflict was as to the power to be allowed
him. Should the American preachers have the lib
erty of the English connection, and should one dis
satisfied with his appointment be allowed to appeal
to the Conference and ask for a change? James
O'Kelly led those who asked for this privilege.
He was seconded by strong men who had been
closely connected with Asbury, and were much at
tached to him personally. Among them were Rich
ard Ivey, Hope Hull, and Freeborn Garrettson.
Their devotion to the Church could not be ques
tioned, and their ability was conceded ; but opposed
to them were men of equal ability, and some of these
10 ----- -

146 Francis Asbury.
were not favorites with Asbury, nor was he in high
favor with them. Jesse Lee, who in after years was
a leader of the liberals, stood by Asbury in this con
test, and did as much to defeat O'Kelly as any one of
the body. While the matter was being discussed,
Asbury withdrew and wrote the following letter:
My Dear Brethren: Let my absence give you no pain. Dr.
Coke presides. I am happily excused from assisti~g to make
laws by which I myself am to be governed. I have only to
obey and execute. I am happy in the consideration that I
have never stationed a preacher through enmity or as a pun
ishment. I have acted for the glory of God, the good of the
people, and to promote the usefulness of the preachers. Are
you sure that if you please yourselves the people will be as
fully satisfied? They often say, "Let us have such a preach
er;" and sometimes, "We will not have such a preacher;
we will sooner pay him to stay at home." Perhaps, I must
say, his appeal forced him upon you. I am one, you are
many; I am as willing to serve you as ever. I want not to
sit in any man's way; I scorn to solicit your votes; I am a
very trembling poor creature to hear praise or dispraise.
Speak your minds freely, but remember you are only making
laws for the present time. It may be that, as in some other
things, so in this, a future day may give you further light.
The Conference refused to make the change asked
for, and O'Kelly, disappointed and angered, gath
ered up his saddlebags and, with some of those as
sociated with him, withdrew from the Conference
room and returned to his home in Virginia. The
Conference was anxious to conciliate him, but ho
was not willing to be reconciled, and after a feAV
months of silence he withdrew entirely from the con<
nectibn and formed the Republican Methodists. He
was in after times very bitter toward his old asso
ciate; but they met when O'Kelly was on his death
bed, and Asbury prayed for him and with him, and

Francis Asbury. 147
they parted to meet no more on earth. The positive
old Irishman had been too long in control of things
in his section to submit to another's dictation, and a
separation between the two was inevitable. There
was, however, nothing in O'Kelly's motives which
seems to have been censurable. He really thought
the arbitrary course which a bishop might take ought
to be anticipated and provided against, but Asbury
could not see any danger from that direction.
As Asbury came southward after the General Con
ference adjourned, he found the leaven at work, and
Rice Haggard and William McKendree both with
drew from the connection. McKendree afterwards
returned, and when he was a bishop stood as firmly
for the episcopal prerogative as he had opposed it in
Baltimore; and no man was ever nearer to Asbury
than he was in after days.
Bishop Asbury rode through central North Caro
lina to Rembert Hall, in South Carolina. Col. James
Rembert, a wealthy slave owner who lived on Black
River, was one of the wealthiest and most pious men
of his section. Rembert Hall was on Asbury's route
to Charleston, and once a year he found shelter there.
After a brief stay the bishop went on to Charleston,
and found that the eloquent Hammett had raised a
grand house and written an appeal to the British
Conference, in which he said some very hard things
of Dr. Coke, and doubtless of Asbury. As soon as
Conference was over, he made his journey to Geor
gia. He found a resting place at Thomas Haynes's.
Haynes was one of those sturdy Virginians who set
tled in Georgia, and whose life was devoted to the
building up of the Methodist Church, and whose dis
tinguished family has done so much for it.

148 Francis Asbury.
The Conference met at Grant's, and it was decided
to unite the South Carolina and Georgia Confer
ences, or districts as they were then called, and
thenceforth they were known as the South Carolina
Conference, until the division again nearly forty
years afterwards.
Mr. Asbury now resolved to take a tour through
' the older settled parts of Georgia and South Caro
lina. He rode through the pine woods, and OATer the
sand beds through Warren, Burke, Screven, and Ef
fingham counties, to Savannah. The settlers along
the way were few, and he says the time between
meals was long. He stopped with an old friend who
had received a letter from Mr. Philip Matthews, in
which the charge was made by Mr. Hammett "that
Mr. Wesley's absolute authority over the societies
was not established in America because of Bishop
Asbury's opposition." Bishop Asbury admits this,
but says the "Americans were too jealous to bind
themselves to yield to him in all things relative to
Church government."
The travelers reached Savannah, to which Hope
Hull had been sent, but where no society had yet
been formed. Bishop Asbury saw Whitefield's Or
phan House in ruins, and came by Ebenezer where
the Salzburghers were then established. The court
house in Savannah Avas offered him, but he preached
at Mr. M.'s. This was doubtless at Mr. Milieu's, a
good Presbyterian who always befriended the strug
gling Methodists. Mr. Asbury supposed Savannah
had then two thousand people in it. There was an
Independent, an Episcopal, a Baptist, and a Luther
an church there. He crossed the Savannah River
at Sister's ferry, in Effingham county, preached at

Francis Asbury. 149
Black Swamp, and rode to Purysburg, and from
thence, along what is now the Charleston and Sa
vannah railroad, to Charleston. Much of the coun
try was an unbroken pine wood, though along the
rivers there were occasional rice plantations. This
journey took him over much the same country which
Mr. Wesley had traveled, on foot, when he left Sa
vannah the last time. After a wearisome travel he
reached Charleston. At this time the congregation
there consisted of five hundred, of whom two hun
dred were whites. In no city in the United States
has the Methodist Church suffered so much from in
testine troubles as in Charleston, and the progress
made in spite of Mr. Hammett's division was really
remarkable. The bishop expected to remain in
Charleston a little while, but a sick friend came from
the north who needed the country air, and he hurried
away. For nearly a hundred miles from Charleston, in ev
ery direction, there are swamps and rivers, and his
journal of travel is little more than a wearisome ac
count of rivers ferried or creeks swum. He reached
the newly-established capital of South Carolina, Co
lumbia, and then through the high waters made his
way toward North Carolina.
His rule was to have appointments to preach at ev
ery place where he stopped. He rose in the morning
at four o'clock, read his Bible and prayed till six, and
as soon as breakfast could be had he began his trav
el again. The country was comparatively new and
was being rapidly peopled, chiefly by emigrants from
Virginia and Maryland. He kept the question of
where a new preacher should be sent continually be
fore him, and kept watch for the preacher. He

150 Francis Asbury.
went into the question of where the preachers should
be stationed with a perfect acquaintance with the
work. He was untiring, and though feeble, worn, and
often really sick, he did not spare himself, but
pressed on his way. His life story is almost a mo
notonous one, for days but repeat themselves, and
they all tell the same story. Despite the fatigue of
travel, he was not neglectful of his books. He car
ried a few with him, and during his long rides he
read and studied. His Hebrew Bible was his con
stant companion, and while he was making his jour
ney through the hills of upper South Carolina he was
studying Hebrew points and planning a new school.
He was making his way to the Holston country,
and traveled through the mountains of North Caro
lina, going his most direct route to General Russell's,
in southwest Virginia. The western part of North
Carolina was then a comparatively new country, and
was largely peopled by settlers from Germany and
Ireland, or their immediate descendants. There
were few comforts to be found on any line of travel,
and very few indeed on the rough mountain trail he
and his companions pursued. They were glad to
get a few Irish potatoes, some flax for bedding, and
a few boards to shelter them. The bishop, however,
made the journey safely, preaching as he went, and
after crossing the Watauga River and climbing the
Stone and Iron mountains, and descending that steep
side where it was impossible to ride, and where his
rheumatism made it very painful to go on foot, he
finally reached the hospitable home of his good old
friend Madam Russell. This excellent woman was
a second time a widow.

Francis Asbury. 151
General Russell, the brave old soldier, who had
become in later life a happy, useful Christian, had
gone to his reward. Asbury preached at the home
of the widow, and there followed several exhorta
tions. They were five hours in the exercise, and
there was shouting and weeping among the people.
No wonder he adds: "I have little rest by day or
night; Lord, help thy poor dust." "I feel unexpect
ed storms from various quarters. Perhaps it is de
signed for my humiliation. It is sin in thought 1
am afraid of; none but Jesus can supply us, by his
merit, his spirit, his righteousness, his intercession."
He made his way again to Rehoboth, in Monroe
county, Virginia, where he met the preachers of
southwest Virginia, and then through the wild Al-
leghanies one hundred miles to the then small but
lively village of Staunton. There was an Episcopal
church, a courthouse, a tavern, and some good
stores. Then down the valley to Winchester, where
"we had an excellent new house," and then to his
rest at wicked Bath.
After recruiting, he crossed the mountains of east
ern Pennsylvania and upper New Jersey and went
up the Hudson to Albany. The people of Albany, he
says, "roll in wealth, but they had no heart to ask
the poor preachers to their homes."
Although it was but the middle of the year, this
indefatigable man had gone from Charleston, South
Carolina, through the wildest mountains of the Al
leghany range, to Connecticut.
Methodism had come to New England to stay, and
the Conference was to meet at Tolland. With a blis
ter behind his ear for a sore throat and a poultice on
his foot for rheumatism, he consented to rest a little

152 Francis Asbury.
while, but only for two days. He was again at
tacked by the rheumatism, and was not able to walk
from his horse to the house, and had to be lifted
down from the saddle and up again.
On his way back, when he came near Whitehall,
in New York, his horse started and threw him into
a mill race, and his shoulder was hurt by the fall.
He stopped at a house, changed his wet clothes, and
prayed with the people. "If any of these people are
awakened by my stopping here," says he, "all will
be well."
The calamity he had predicted the year before had
fallen on Philadelphia — the yellow fever was there,
and there was silence in the streets. It was almost
recklessness that would lead one to go into the
plague-stricken town, but he never turned his horse's
head. He rode at once into the midst of the pesti
lence, delivered his message, and then went on his
way. He had spent nearly three weeks in the midst
of the sickness, and then made his annual visit to the
eastern shore. He attended the last Conference of
the year, at Baltimore. Here he raised a collection
for the distressed preachers which amounted to £43.

CHAPTEE XXI.
1793-1794.
Southern Tour — Great Exposure — William McKendree— Tour
to the North — Southward Again — The College — R. li.
Roberts.
THE Conference sessions began with the later
fall months, so after leaving Baltimore the
bishop made his way into Virginia and passed rap
idly through the center of the state, going as far west
as Prince Edward, returning eastward, and leaving
the state from Brunswick county. He found that
the O'Kelly trouble had not been so serious as he
feared. McKendree, finding he had been misled, re
turned to the old fold, and was going on with him
to the south. He again passed through the eastern
part of North Carolina, met the Conference again at
Green Hill's, and feeble and worn he came to Broad
River in South Carolina, where the South Carolina
Conference was to have its session. Philip Bruce,
presiding elder, was very sick, and so was the bishop,
but he managed to go through with the work, and on
the 20th of January reached Charleston, where he
had time to rest. It is a positive relief to the reader
to know that for thirty days the earnest and afflicted
man was as still as he could be. Dr. Ramsay, the
first of our historians, whose histories of South Car
olina and of the Revolution are so eagerly sought for,
attended him; but though Asbury was willing to be
blistered and to take nauseous doses,he was not will
ing to do the most important thing he could do — to
rest. He read, he visited, he preached, while he was
(153)

154 Francis Asbury.
here. Poor Beverly Allen, who had gone from bad
to worse, killed the United States marshal in Au
gusta and fled to the wilderness of Kentucky. Allen
had done the bishop much harm by his misrepresen
tations, and Asbury had always distrusted him, but
now his sad fate affected him painfully. The bish
op's stay in Charleston at this time was the longest
stop he had made in many months; but he was eager
to get to work again, and as soon as he could safely
do so he was on his way to Rembert's. The country
through which he rode was a peculiar one — along
the river affected by the tide sufficiently to make the
water available for flooding the fields were magnifi
cent rice plantations, worked by large gangs of
slaves, and then came wide stretches of uncultivated
pine forests. He says, after riding twenty -seven
miles without eating: "How good were the potatoes
and fried gammon! We then had only two miles
to brother Rembert's, where we arrived at seven
o'clock. What blanks are in this country, and how
much worse are the rice plantations! If a man-of-
war is a floating hell, these are standing ones: wick
ed masters, overseers, and negroes, cursing, drink
ing, no Sabbath, no sermons."
He had said little on the subject of slavery for
some time. He had found that the greatest success
won by Methodists had been among slave owners;
so that one might have thought that he was satisfied
that his views were too extreme, or that other mat
ters seemed to him to be more important than eman
cipation. He, however, says now: "Some are afraid
that if we retain among us none who trade in slaves,
the preachers will not be supported; but my fear is,
we shall not be able to supply the state with preach-

Francis Asbury. 155
ers." He left the hospitable home of Colonel Rem
bert for a journey northward. Passing through the
Waxhaws, where Andrew Jackson was born, he
made his way into North Carolina, as he says,
through discouraging prospects. He came through
Charlotte, in Mecklenburg, where the Scotch-Irish
had their large settlement, and with Tobias Gibson
for a companion went into the Dutch settlement on
the Catawba. This he found a barren place for re
ligion. In attempting to cross the Catawba he near
ly lost his life by getting into the wrong ford. There
was rain, rain, and only when he reached dear old
father Harper's after midnight, having been wet for
six or seven hours, did he find shelter. The next day
he was off again.
"It has been a heavy campaign," he said, "but my
soul enjoys peace; but oh, for men of God! This
campaign has made me groan, being burdened. I
have provided brother Gibson, for the westward. I
wrote a plan for stationing. I desired the dear
preachers to be as I am in the work. I have no in
terest, no passions in the appointments ; my only aim
is to care for the flock of Christ. I feel resolved to
be wholly for the Lord, weak as I am. I have done
nothing, I am nothing, only for Christ, or I had been
long since cut off as an unfaithful servant. Christ
is all and in all I do, or it had not been done, or when
done had by no means been acceptable." He did not
spare himself; he did not spare anyone else, and
complains that McKendree had not visited this ob
scure part of North Carolina in which he was, and
adds: "If I could think myself of any account, I
might say with Mr. Wesley, 'If it be so while I am
alive, what will it be after my death?' "

156 Francis Asbury.
No man ever lived who did not make a real merit
of self-sacrifice, who had less disposition to spare
himself hardships than Bishop Asbury. Living
stone inspired by his dream of mapping out Africa
and destroying the slave trade, Francis Xavier in
his zeal for the conversion of India to the Catholic
faith, or Las Casas in his devotion to the Indians,
were not more untiring in toil nor daring in exposure
than was this heroic man.
One sometimes pauses to ask, "Was this martyr
dom?" for martyrdom it was — a needless sacrifice;
or, "Was it a demand that had to be met?" When
one studies the history of those times, the rapid
movement of population westward, the influence of
the wild environments upon character, the need for
quick, energetic, discreet action, and sees how the
heroic spirit of this man made the heroes that the
day demanded, he cannot but feel that there was
nothing morbid in the anxiety of Asbury to make
every sacrifice that the work might be pushed for
ward. That he might have overestimated his per
sonal importance was but natural; and that he
should have exacted too much of others, would likely
have followed from his owu entire disregard of ev
erything like personal ease, when he thought duty
to the work was involved.
William McKendree, to whom Asbury evidently
refers under the initials, W. M., and who was after
wards to be his trusted lieutenant, and to do more
for Methodism than any other man of his day, save
Asbury himself, was now on the Union Circuit, in
South Carolina. In those days circuits had no defi
nite boundaries, and McKendree's parish stretched
from middle South Carolina awav toward the Hoi-

Francis Asbury. 157
ston country. McKendree had been a preacher now
for seven years. He stood by O'Kelly in his contest
with Asbury, and when O'Kelly withdrew he with
drew also; but he afterwards changed his opinion,
and accepted the decision of the Conference as a wise
one, and thirty years afterwards the same question,
in another form, found him occupying the place that
Asbury occupied in 1792.
The side lights which Asbury in his journal cast
on times which many have looked upon as the golden
days of Methodism are important. He was very
happy, he says, while riding along toward Dr. BroAV-
er's; on his way he saw Babel, the Baptist-Methodist
house, "about which there had been so much quarrel
ing. It was made of logs, and is no great matter."
And again he says: "I am astonished at professors
neglecting family and private prayer. Lord, help;
for there is little genuine religion in the world."
On his way, in Surrey county, North Carolina, he
found some old disciples from Maryland, Virginia,
and Delaware. He found also a schoolhouse twenty
feet square, two stories high, well set out with doors
and windows, on a beautiful eminence overlooking
the Yadkin, and known as Cokesbury School. This
school was located in the bounds of what is now the
Farmington Circuit, in the Western North Carolina
Conference. He rode now to Salem, where the Mo
ravians had a village, and thence through Guilford
into Pittsylvania county, Virginia, and north by his
old route through central Virginia. Going along
the foothills of the Blue Ridge, he preached in the
courthouse at Liberty, the county site of Bedford;
but he did not find freedom to eat bread and drink
water in the little village where there is now the

153 Francis Asbury.
magnificent Randolph - Macon Academy. His soul
was in peace and perfect love, he says, and he pro
posed to preach present conviction, conversion, and
sanctification. "I might do many things better than
I do," he says, "but this I do not discover till after
wards." He went over the hills into Rockbridge, Virginia,
preached at Lexington, and at length reached Win
chester, where, sick and weary, he found a resting
place at R. Harrison's, and gargled his poor throat
with rose-leaf water and spirits of vitriol. Perhaps
if the gargle had been substituted by rest, and he had
felt it less a duty to make a loud noise in preaching,
his throat might have recruited sooner. Though
his throat was sore and his ear inflamed, and he had
a chill and high fever, he attended Conference and
preached, and then went on his way to brother
Phelps's, in northern Virginia. The people came
from every side to hear him; and though sick and
weary, he took his staff and climbed the hill, and
did his best.
He came again to Baltimore, where, as the people
would have it, he consented to have his likeness
taken. This is the portrait of him so commonly seen,
and was taken when he was forty-nine years old.
He made his northward trip, and in Philadelphia he
had a talk with Mr. Pilmoor about Mr. G., in which
there was some question about his administration
of affairs. Bishop Asbury stated his position: (1)
He did not make rules, but had to execute them.
(2) That anjrone who desired him to act in disregard
of these laws either insulted him as an individual or
the Conference as a body of men. These two prin
ciples controlled him. Believing fully that he was

Francis Asbury. 159
divinely called to the office and work of a bishop,
yet unlike Mr. Wesley, who made the rules others
were not to mend, he made no rules, but left his
brethren to do that, and merely kept those made for
him. He came as far north as Providence, Rhode Island,
but had no freedom to eat bread and drink water in
that place. He found a good prospect at New Lon
don, and passed from thence through the Valley
of the Connecticut. R, R. Roberts, afterwards the
bishop, traveled with him on this tour and assisted
him in his work. He could find but little of what
he thought religion in this section. The Conference
met on September 5th, and they went through with
the business. On Sunday they spent from eight
to nine in prayer; a sermon, three exhortations, and
the sacrament followed. They were engaged in the
service till three o'clock in the afternoon, and he
broke his fast at seven. Then he came southward,
attending Conference in New York and Philadel
phia, and rode to Cokesbury. The college was in
debt £1,200, and £300 ought to be paid at once.
Thence he came to the Virginia Conference, which
met at Mabry's, in Brunswick. The Conference had
decided that extreme measures against slavehold-
ing, as far as the laity was concerned, were not now
wise; but that as far as the preachers were con
cerned, they should not remain in the traveling con
nection and hold slaves. After the Conference was
over he began his usual journey southward. When
he left Mrs. Mabry's, where he held Conference, he
continued his journey, through rain and snow and
cold, to Charleston once more.

CHAPTER XXII.
1795.
Episcopal Journeyings — Death of Judge White — The Ennalls
Family — Governor Van Cortlandt — Return South.
THE bishop remained in Charleston several weeks
trying to recruit his strength. He preached,
visited the people, and met the classes. The mob
was Arery violent, breaking the church windows, dis
turbing the congregation while at service, and sneer
ing at the preacher on the streets. He read diligent
ly, and read Wesley's Journal, Flavel on Keeping the
Heart, and the History of the French Revolution,
but he was impatient to be gone. He, however,
spent two months in the city, and labored as best he
could. He says he "was very much dejected the
Avhile, and worldly people are intolerably ignorant
of God. Playing, dancing, swearing, racing— these
are their common practices and pursuits. Our feAV
male members do not attend preaching, and I fear
there is hardly one who walks with God. Oh, how
I should prize a quiet retreat in the woods!"
He now went to the northwestern part of South
Carolina, where he was trying to collect one hundred
pounds to finish Bethel school. He says that on
this journey he met the negroes apart from the
whites, and said "for obvious reasons it was the only
Avay in which to meet them." He ordained a deacon
and married the deacon's daughter to a husband,
and it was all he could do, he said, to keep the
wedding company serious. Then he rode northward
(160)

Francis Asbury. 161
through western North Carolina, to Ernest's, on the
Nolachucky, in Tennessee, where he met the Holston
Conference, thence through the mountains of west
ern Virginia to Charlestown, and through Freder
ick, in Maryland, to his old friends, the Warfields,
and on to Baltimore, and to Perry Hall. Then came
to him the sad news of the death of one who had been
dearer to him than any other friend he had made in
America, Thomas White, whose house had been his
place of refuge when he was driven from Maryland.
Judge White had lived a pure life, and died a happy
death. Asbury was now fifty years old, and was as
dead to the world as though he had not been in it.
He says: "I feel happy in speaking to all I find,
whether parents, children, or servants, and I see no
other way; common means will not do." While on
this visit he made arrangements to build in Balti
more the first church for negroes in that city, and, I
think, the first in the United States,
He was very low in health and still, he says, under
awful depression. "I am not conscious," he says,
"of any sin, even in thought, but the imprudence and
unfaithfulness of some bear heavily on my heart."
He made a visit to the eastern shore to his friends,
the Ennalls, in Dorchester, and then passed through
Delaware to Philadelphia. On his way he called on
the good sister Withey, "who kept the best inn on the
continent, and who had entertained him when he
made his first journey southward;" and one is sorry
to hear that the good old sister was not well, and in
trouble. These little personal allusions show the tender na
ture of the fearless, strong-headed, and strong-willed
man who bore all the burden of the connection on his
11

162 Francis Asbury.
heart. One of his entries is especially amusing in
the light of the full information he has given us of
his use of the many and various remedies for his
often infirmities. He says: "I came to Elizabeth-
town and found brother Morrel, who had been Med
and physicked almost to death, on the road to re
covery." He now went through New York and into
New England. Roberts was still with him, but part
ed from him when he entered Vermont, which he
now for the first time visited. He preached at Ben
nington and went to Ash Grove, in New York, to
which place the good Embury had removed from
New York City, and in which he died. He was now
in northern New York, and at Plattsburg he had a
high day. As he descended the Hudson, he came
to his brother Garrettson's at Rhinebeck. Garrett
son, by his marriage with Miss Livingston, had come
into possession of a large property. He used it well,
and never relaxed his ministerial efforts to the end
of his useful life, twenty years after this.
Governor Van Cortlandt, Asbury's early friend,
lived near Garrettson, and he dined with him. On
his return southward he passed through New Jersey,
and when he heard of a fight in which the one party
had his eye gouged out, and another had his nose and
ear cut off, he concluded that Jersey was worse than
New England, for at least they were civil there.
The Conference met in Philadelphia, and remained
in session a week. Asbury then came by Chester,
where we are glad to find that his old friend, Mary
Withey, had made an advantageous sale of her inn,
and in three weeks was to give place to the pur
chaser. The Baltimore Conference, with its fifty - five

Francis Asbury. 163
preachers, met on Tuesday and remained in session
till Friday night.
The Africans in whom he had taken such an inter
est, and whose new church he had helped forward,
now asked greater privileges than white stewards or
trustees ever had a right to ask.
In his journal of this year he mentions, as far as I
can find, the first bequest made to the Church by
anyone in America. It was made by Stephen Da-
vies, of Virginia, and Asbury was made his trustee.
At Salem, in Brunswick, the Virginia Conference
was held. After its close he made his way through
North Carolina. On his journey, he says of one day's
travel: "My feet were wet, my body cold, and my
stomach empty, having had no dinner. I found a
good fire, a warm bed, and a little medicine, each
necessary in its place." "No people," he says of the
good North Carolinians, "make you more welcome to
thur homes." "After riding twenty miles, I preached
at father V.'s. I felt strangely set at liberty, and
was uncommonly happy."
He says of Georgetown, South Carolina, that after
ten years of circuit preaching they had done but lit
tle, but that if we could station a preacher there he
still hoped for success. Brother Cannon had not la
bored in vain. There was now less dancing, and the
playhouse was closed. He had brought with him
from Virginia Benjamin Blanton, and he had him to
preach, and "we had," he says, "a number of very
modest and attentive hearers." He now reached
Charleston, to be ready for the South Carolina Con
ference, which was to meet there.
As he was traveling through Virginia where there
was quite a number of Quakers, he found time to ad-

164 Francis Asbury.
dress one of them in a plain, outspoken letter, which
Strickland has given us in his "Pioneer Bishop."
It very strikingly illustrates the character of the
good bishop, and casts some light upon the histo
ry of the times. It was written, says Strickland,
to a friend in Delaware :
Newton, Va., Seventh Month, 1795.
My Very Dear Friend: If I have a partiality for any people
in the world except the Methodists, it is for the Quakers, so
called. Their plainness of dress, their love of justice and
truth, their friendship to each other, and the care they take
of one another, render them worthy of praise. Would it not
be of use for that society that makes it a point not to come
near any others, whether good or bad, to try all means within
themselves — would it not be well, thinkest thou, for them
to sit every night and morning, and, if they find liberty, to go
to prayer after reading a portion of God's word? As epistles
are read from the Friends, would it not be well to introduce
the reading of some portion of the Scriptures at public
meetings? Would it not be well to have a congregation and
a society, an outer and an inner court? In the former, let
children and servants and unawakened people come; in the
inAvard, let mourners in Zion come.
The Presbyterians have reformed; the Episcopalians and
the Methodists. Why should not the Friends?
It was a dark time one hundred and fifty years back. We
are near the edge of the wilderness. If this inward court or
society were divided into small bands or classes, and to be
called together weekly by men and women of the deepest ex
perience and appointed for that work, and asked about their
souls and the dealings of God with them, and to join in
prayer one or two or all of them that have freedom, I think
the Lord would come upon them. I give this advice as the
real friend of your souls, as there are hundreds and thousands
that never have nor will come near others. These might get
more religion if your people were to hear others; they might
get properly awakened; and if you bad close meetings for
speaking, they would not leave you. You must not think
that G. Fox and R. Barclay were the only men in the world.

Francis Asbury. 165
I am sure there must be a reform if you could move it in
quarterly and yearly meetings for family and society meet
ings, and adopt rules for these meetings.
Would It be well, thinkest thou, to preach against covet-
ousness? God has blessed Friends. They are a temperate,
industrious, and frugal people. Tell them to feed the hun
gry, clothe the naked, visit the sick, and always feel the spir
it of prayer at such times. Would it not be well to deliver a
testimony at other places if Friends felt freedom, and allow
others to come into their meetings without forbidding them?
Our houses are open to any that come in a Christian spirit.
I wish Methodists and Friends would be a stronger testi
mony against races, fairs, plays, and balls. I wish they
would reprove swearing, lying, and foolish talking; watch
their young people in their companies, instruct them in the
doctrines of the Church, call upon them to feel after the
spirit of prayer morning and evening, and strive to bring
them to God. If I know my own heart, I write from love to
souls; and although it is the general cry, "You can do noth
ing with these people," I wish to lay before you these things,
which I think are contrary to the ancient principles of
Friends, and I am sure that we are taught them in the word
of God. Think upon them. My soul pities and loves you.
You may fight against God in not inculcating these,things.
I am, with real friendship to thee and thy people,
Francis Asbtjrt.

CHAPTER XXIII.
1796.
South Carolina — Georgia — North Carolina — Tennessee — Vir
ginia — Views of Education — Bridal Party in the Mountains
— Methodism in Brooklyn — Southward Again — Francis Acuff.
THE Conference met in Charleston in January,
1796, and Asbury rested here longer than any
time in his journeyings. He was virtually a pastor
of the little flock, and paid great attention to the
blacks, who composed so large a part of it. He met
the slaves in the kitchen of Mr. Wells and in the
church, where he had often two hundred and fifty in
love feast. He had few social qualities, and what
time he did not spend in regular pastoral work he
spent in reading. All well acquainted with Ameri
can history know that Washington at this time was
not popular with many of the American people,
who thought he leaned too much to the English and
the aristocracy. This incensed the sturdy bishop,
who expressed a somewhat burning indignation at
those who detracted from one he so highly esteemed.
As usual, when he was sedentary and spent much
time in retrospection, he was despondent, as he says :
"For my unholiness and unfaithfulness my soul is
humbled. Were I to stand on my own merit, where
should I go but to hell?"
After a month in Charleston, he started to Augus
ta. The country through which he rode was very
flat, and it had been a season of heavy rains. The
creeks and rivers were full, and his feet were contin-
(166)

Francis Asbury. 167
ually wet. But despite his wet feet, and despite the
severity of the weather, he preached in an open house
as he was on his way, and administered the sacra
ment. He reached Augusta, and found that one of
those occasional floods which mark the Savannah
had inundated the streets. He said if they would
know his just view they would mob him, for he be
lieved it an "African flood, sent on them because of
slavery." He rode through a few of the upper east
ern counties of Georgia and reentered South Caro
lina. Here he was concerned about a free school,
called Bethel, out of which Cokesbury came, and
afterwards Wofford College. Dr. Bangs, who was a
great admirer of Asbury, says that one of the errors
of his life was his failure to value education. I can
not think this stricture is just. He planned schools
over the whole connection. There were Ebenezer in
Virginia, Cokesbury in Maryland, Bethel in Ken
tucky, Bethel in South Carolina, Cokesbury in North
Carolina, and Wesley and Whitefield in Georgia. If
these enterprises failed, as they .did, largely, it was
not for his want of interest, but experience taught
him that there were some things he could not do,
and he wisely left the local Conferences to provide
for their own needs. Passing out of South Carolina,
he entered the mountains of western North Carolina.
The rides were long, and homes were few, and he
mentions a dinner of dried peach pies that he and his
companions made in the woods. The society in that
section was rude, and he writes of a jolly bridal party
he met, with their flag, a white handkerchief, flying
as they dashed by him and paused at a distillery to
fill up with new-made apple brandy. He was soon in
Tennessee, at Acuff's Chapel, built by Francis Acuff,

1G8 Francis Asbury.
who was first a fiddler, then a Christian, then a
preacher, and then, he trusts, a glorified saint. The
journey was much the same as he had made several
times before, leading him through the mountains
of northeast Tennessee and southwest Virginia.
Sometimes he rode for forty miles without finding a
place to break his fast. A very fatiguing journey
was made through Greenbrier and northwest Vir
ginia into Pennsylvania; the Conference met at
Uniontown, and then through western Maryland he
came to Cokesbury, where he beheld the ruins of
the building which had cost him so much anxiety
and toil. For nearly twelve years it had been an un
ceasing care to him, and it is not likely that he wejit
scalding tears over the death of the feeble invalid.
It was now the midst of summer, and he hurried
through the heat northward.
When he reached New York, he spent some days
in visiting chapels, and preached in the village of
Brooklyn, where the Methodists were trying to get
a foothold. The General Conference of 179G met in
October. The presiding elder matter was not any
more agreeable than it had been at the first, and
there was a stroke at it as there was afterwards for
many years, but it came to naught. The deter
mined man had his will in this matter as in most
others, but not without a contest. He came from
Baltimore southward through the coast counties of
Virginia, North and South Carolina, and held a meet
ing at New Berne, North Carolina, on his way to
Charleston. He predicted future greatness for the
young seaport, and was much pleased at the kind
ness he received from the people. There was little
of incident in his journey to Charleston, but when

Francis Asbury. 163
he reached the city he heard the stunning news that
the neAV church in Baltimore and the new college
just built near by were burned, and a loss of twenty
thousand dollars had fallen on the society and the
Church. No wonder, with the burning of two col
leges and the failure of another, the good bishop
should have felt that he was not called to build them,
and retired forever from the business of doing so.
He had met every appointment during the year, and
had traA^eled from Charleston to Boston and from
the Atlantic coast to the mountains of Kentucky.
It had been a year of excessive exposure and toil.
The story of his journeys is, after all, the chief story
of his laborious life, and one must refer to his homely
but invaluable journal to get a true insight into the
social and religious history of America at that time.
No man of his day traveled so much, or so minutely
tells what he saw of the people, but one who looks
for startling or even striking incident in his story
will be disappointed.

CHAPTER XXIV.
1797.
Charleston — Sickness — Northward Journey — Breaks Down in
Kentucky — Reaches Baltimore — Goes on His Tour North
ward — Jesse Lee — Returns South — Gives Up at Brunswick,
Virginia, and Retires for the Winter.
SINCE Mr. Asbury's election to the bishopric,
while never very well, he had been able to do
all the heavy work demanded of him; but he was now
(in 1797) attacked by a long-protracted and severe
intermittent fever, which came near ending his life.
He had reached Charleston, January, 1797, in com
pany with Dr. Coke, in his usual health." The winter
Avas very severe, and he was much exposed. His old
friend Edgar Wells, who had done so much for the
church in Charleston, was very ill, and died not long
after Asbury reached the city. Asbury attended his
funeral service and paid his tribute to the good man's
memory, and then was himself attacked, as he had
been in Maryland years before, with a severe and
persistent intermittent fever. He was kindly attend
ed by Dr. David Ramsay, the famous historian,
and as skillfully treated as the science of that day
permitted. He would take the nauseous remedies
prescribed, and get out of bed and work till his chill
came on and the fever followed. He tried to meet
the negroes every morning at six o'clock for morning
prayer, and preached as often as he could. He
planned the erection of another house in another
part of the city, and put the matter in such shape
(170)

Francis Asbury. 171
that Bethel church was the outcome. He was anx
ious to get away from Charleston. The Holston and
Kentucky work seemed to demand his presence, and
he was impatient at confinement in the city. Late in
February, somewhat better in health, he turned his
face toward the northwest. He was delighted to be
in the woods once more. The southern spring was
in its glory. The white dogwood, the golden jas
mine, the red bud, the earliest of the flowering forest,
were in bloom. He hailed them with the delight of
an escaped captive. He said he came to a gentle
man's house and found them playing cards. He
asked for dinner, but said blunt Frank Asbury could
not dine on cards; whereupon they politely put them
aside. On his way to Rembert's his feet were
steeped as he swam the creeks, but he seems not then
to have experienced the ill effects of his exposure.
Leaving Camden, he turned his course northwest
wardly, aiming at the part of East Tennessee in
which the Holston Conference was to meet. After
he left Iredell Courthouse (now Statesville), in west
ern North Carolina, he found himself in the rugged
mountains, in the severe weather of early March.
The exposure was very great. The weather was
stormy, the streams were dangerous, the ascent of
the mountains was made with great difficulty and
the descent with greater. He had an inflamed limb ;
he was crippled with rheumatism ; it was impossible
for him to walk, and dangerous to ride. There were
very poor accommodations for man or beast, and he
was really a very sick man. He pressed on, how
ever, to the seat of the Holston Conference and held
the session. He intended to go on to Kentucky, but
his brethren insisted that he should not attempt it;

172 Francis Asbury.
and reluctantly, after sending Kobler to take his
place there, he decided to try to reach Baltimore.
He and his companions began their weary journey
eastward. The fever returned and held him thirty
hours. After a ride of forty miles, he reached the
hospitable home of his lifelong friend, Madam Rus
sell. One could not but hope that the sick and
weary man would have rested here; but he preached
the day after he came, and only remained two days,
and then began his journey again. He found good
homes along the way, and although he could make
but slow progress, yet by riding ten and fifteen miles
a day he managed to make the journey. His diet, he
said, was tea, potatoes, gruel, and chicken broth;
but in two months' time he had gone over the moun
tains and through the valleys to Baltimore. At the
home of brother Hawkins, a mile from the city, he
found a resting place.
His old friends in Maryland, rich and poor, crowded
around him ministering to his comfort in every way
in their power. He rode out every day, led a prayer
meeting when he could, preached a few short ser
mons, and visited his old friends. The Goughs sent
their chariot for him to come to Perry Hall, and he
went and spoke freely about his soul to his old friend,
who seems to have backslidden. He talked to the
negro servants, wrote a few letters, and was able
on Sunday to preach at Gough's. Mr. Gough now
detailed a negro servant to go with him to Mr. Sher
idan's in Cecil county, and he sent another with him
to Wilmington, and from thence he went in his sulky
to Philadelphia. He could not be idle, but all ex
ertion threw him back. He, however, managed to
get to the widow Sherwood's in New York ; and find-

Francis Asbury. 173
ing himself swelling in the face, bowels, and feet, he
applied leaves of burdock and drew a desperate blis
ter with a mustard plaster. He had such very sore
feet that only after two weeks was he able to set
them on the ground. He was confined for two weeks,
when he made the effort to reach Wilbraham, Massa
chusetts; but he was not able to make the journey,
and Joshua Wells went on for him while he recruited
at the widow Sherwood's. He said he could write a
little, but for two months he had not preached. He
grew despondent, and complains gently that he is
left too much alone. "Lord,help me," he says; "I am
poor and needy. The hand of God hath touched me."
A few days after this season of depression his sky
was brighter. "The clouds," he says "are dispelled
from my mind. Oh, that my future life may be holi
ness to the Lord! I wished to speak to a poor Af
rican whom I saw in the field. I went out, and as I
came along on my return he was at a stone wall,
eight or ten feet of me. Poor creature ! He seemed
struck at my counsel, and gave me thanks. Oh, it
was going down into the Egypt of South Carolina
after these poor souls of Africans, and I have lost my
health, if not my life, in the end. The will of the
Lord be done." The members of this good family
were especially kind to him, and he mentions them
by name. Mamma, Betsey, Jonathan, and Bishop
deserve to be held in lasting memory for their great
kindness to the suffering apostle.
He detailed Jesse Lee to travel with him, and to
gether they began their journey southward. He was
very unwell, and made no effort to preside at the
Conference, leaving this office, as he says, to the pre
siding elders. He made the appointments, and man-

174 Francis Asbury.
aged to preach a few times. After he had presided
over the Baltimore Conference, he began his weary
journey to the south; and sick as he was, he man
aged to keep in motion until after he had made half
the journey to Charleston. He had reached Bruns
wick county, Virginia, when it became evident that
if he attempted to go on he would likely forfeit his
life, and reluctantly he yielded to the inevitable.
For nearly twelve months he had been seriously ill,
and yet he had persisted in working. But it was ev
ident to all that if he ever did any more work he must
now seek a shelter. So he prepared his plan of ap
pointments for the South Carolina Conference and
sent it by Jesse Lee to Jonathan Jackson, and re
solved to lie by in Brunswick for the winter. He
could not have found a better place for 'resting.
Brunswick was the home of the Methodists. Here
they had won their greatest A'ictories. The people
were all known to him, and were all his friends. He
fixed his retreat at the home of Edward Dromgoole.
Edward Dromgoole was ah Irishman; a local
preacher who had traveled for some years and noAV
was living on a plantation of his own. His circum
stances were easy, and he was glad to give his old
friend a home during these weary days of invalid
life. Dr. Sims kindly attended him, and the local
preachers, Lane, Moore, Smith, and Phillips, came
to see him and cheer him up. He was in confine
ment here for three months. He was not confined
to his bed, but was unable to go far from the house.
The weather was very severe, and he was very fee
ble. He took fearful quantities of medicine. Tar
tar emetic in large doses was his favorite remedy,
and the exhausted, feeble man was well bled by his

Francis Asbury. 175
kind physician; and at last he took a diet, as he
calls it, which was so remarkable that it deserves
mention. It was one quart of hard cider; one hun
dred nails; a handful of snakeroot; a handful of
pennell seed; a handful of wormwood. Boiled from
one quart to a pint, one wine glassful was taken
every morning for nine or ten days, the patient using
no butter or milk or meat. He says, what one may
well believe : "It will make the stomach very sick."
Confined to a quiet country home, he had much
time for reflection, and he tried to solve some very
hard questions. "How could God have condoned
polygamy, slavery, and such like, under the earlier
dispensation, and condemned them noAV?" He an
swered these questions perhaps as well as any oth
ers have been able to answer them. He drew the
conclusion that while men may of two evils choose
the least, Christians should of two evils choose nei
ther. He was especially puzzled on the question of
slave-owning. No man was ever more bitterly op
posed to slavery; no man was on better terms with
slave owners. They were his dearest friends, and
in their piety he had the greatest confidence. They
knew his views and respected them, but did not
emancipate their slaves. Despite all his efforts, the
sentiment in favor of immediate emancipation did
not grow. He says: "I am brought to conclude that
slavery will exist in Virginia perhaps for ages.
There is not sufficient sense of religion nor of liberty
to destroy it. Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians,
in the highest flights of rapturous piety, still main
tain and defend it." He realized the character of
his peculiar situation — denouncing slavery, yet
friendly with slave owners, and supported by the

176 Francis Asbury.
proceeds of slave labor. And sometimes he frets
under it, feeling that it almost made a slave of him,
when he was free born.
He could do little. He wrote a few letters, read
his Bible, and wrote up his journal. The class met
at his home, and he ventured to give a short exhor
tation and a prayer. Despite his diet and his heroic
doses of tartar, he did not recover his strength; and
as he was confined to the house, he assisted the good
dame in winding broaches and picking cotton. In
those days there were no cotton gins, and the cotton
which made the clothing was prepared by hand for
the loom, and to the little children was committed
the tedious task of winding broaches. The sick
bishop spent his time in helping them in this work,
and spent a little time in revising his journal. His
brethren sent him loving letters, which cheered him
up. His feebleness and his confinement depressed
him; but while he was with the women and children,
winding cotton and hearing them read Alleine and
Doddridge, his soul was much blessed. The snow fell
and he was low-spirited; but good Betsey and Nancy
Pelham, young Virginia maids, helped him by read
ing to him Doddridge's Sermons to Young People.
Thus matters went on in Brunswick, where, in
the homes of Pelham and Dromgoole, he spent the
whole winter of 1797. He scorned to be idle, and
spent his days in teaching the children grammar
and in little tasks around the home until the last
of March, when he began to venture out again. He
was now so far recruited as to enter upon his work;
and while he did not fully recover his strength, he
was able to do efficient work for over ten years after
this trvinsr attack.

CHAPTER XXV.
1798.
Asbury Out of His Sick Room — Recovery — Views on Slavery—
On Local Preachers — Some of His Mistakes — Virginia Con- /
ference — O'Kelly — Tour Northward — Death of Dickins.
THE early spring of 1789 found Asbury able to
stir out again. He was in the midst of slave
owners, and these were his kind friends ; but, as we
have seen, he was by no means reconciled to slavery,
and was as decided as ever that it should, if possible,
be abolished; and when Philip Sands visited him, he
consulted with him about taking some measures to
drive it at least from the local ministry. There
were few, perhaps none, of the traveling preachers
who owned slaves or were likely to own any ; but the
local preachers, who were more numerous, and who
were men of families, were, many of them, owners
of plantations worked by slaves.
Asbury never seemed to think that a slave under
the guardianship of a pious local preacher might
have been better off than if he were free. He came
to that conclusion in after years, but now he was for
rooting the evil out by stern measures, and succeed
ed not in getting rid of slavery, but in driving from
the Church some excellent people. "Some of our
local preachers," he says, "complain that they have
not a seat in the general Annual Conference. We
answer, if they will do the duty of a member of the
Annual Conference, they may have the seat and
privilege of the traveling line. The local preachers
12 (177)

178 Francis Asbury.
go where and when they please; can preach any
where, or nowhere; can keep plantations and slaves;
can receive fifty or a hundred dollars per year for
marriages, and all the fees we receive we must re
turn at the Conference." He was confident that the
law for traveling preachers and that for lay preach
ers should be different.
Mr. Asbury was not very much given to look on
two sides of a question at the same time. Indeed,
to him moral questions had but two sides; one was
the right, the other the wrong side, and he did not
care to see any but the side he thought was right.
He knew it was wrong for the ministry to be covet
ous or self-indulgent, or eager for human praise;
and it never seemed to occur to him that in his effort
to provide a ministry, who knew nothing but seif-
abnegation, he might educate a membership to grasp
and hold and develop in themselves a selfishness
which demanded everything and gave nothing.
Some of his members in Maryland and Virginia
could have paid the entire salary or quarterage of
his preacher with a week's income, but that member
would content himself with his quarterly contribu
tion of a contemptible sum, and rejoice in the hero
ism of the self-sacrificing itinerant. Sixty-four dol
lars, and no more, was the allowance to pastor, bish
op, or elder. If the people gave either of them any
thing, he must report that .to the Conference, and it
should be deducted from his stipend. If he was un
fortunately married, his wife should have the same
allowance, and his children not fourteen years old
should have sixteen dollars. If over that, they must
take care of themselves. He knew sixty-four dol
lars was enough for a single man with tastes as sim-

Francis Asbury. 179
pie as his own; with that he could buy books and
clothing and a horse uoav and then. If one had
slaves he must free them, a farm he must leave it.
In all this the good bishop saw only the noble spirit
of self-sacrifice on the part of his guild, and by such
demands he did develop a nobility of soul and an he
roic unselfishness unsurpassed since the days of the
early apostles. The effect vfpon the Church, howev
er, was so harmful that it was a long time before a
proper reaction came. Whether that reaction has
not gone too far is a question still unsettled. The
Baptists and the Quakers, in their opposition to a
hireling ministry, were seconded by the early Meth
odists in their cheap gospel. The compulsory tax
to support priests, levied over the entire country by
the Established Church, aroused the spirit of oppo
sition to a salaried ministry, which gave great ex
cuse in after time for men to cover their avarice un
der the guise of religious simplicity. A fair biog
raphy must exhibit the weaknesses of the subject,
if they exist, as well as the excellences, but Asbury's
failings leaned to virtue's side. He had been a sad
dler—it was certainly not to his discredit that he
had been; and poor, deranged William Glendening,
who had an insane hostility to him, told it as if it
was something to be ashamed of. Asbury says : "A
friend of mine was inquisitive of my trade and ap
prenticeship, as William Glendening had reported.
As he asked me so plainly, I told him that I counted
it no reproach to have been taught to get my own
living." He was able to get to Salem in Brunswick, where
the Virginia Conference met, and then rode slowly
toward Baltimore, trying to preach as he went.

180 Francis Asbury.
There was yet no Methodist church in the city of
Richmond, but he preached in the courthouse. He
reached Baltimore on the 25th of April. The Con
ference began May 2. He says: "It was half-yearly,
to bring on an equality by the change from fall to
spring. We had to correct the many offenses giv
en at many Conferences to one particular man. I
pleased myself with the idea that I was out of the
quarrel ; but no, I was in deeper than ever, and never
was wounded in so deep a manner. It was as much
as I could bear. I cannot stand such strokes."
I confess my inability to understand some of these
allusions. Some one had wounded the sensitive
sick man. Who that one was I do not know, but it
is evident from other parts of his journal that As
bury was not able to separate the personal from the
official, and counted all opposition to his measures
as opposition to himself. He left Baltimore in his
sulky, and without meeting with anything of special
interest he reached Philadelphia and presided over
his Conferences there and at New York, and visited
New England. The cities gave him trouble; they
wished, he said, to have the connection drafted, and
some of the most acceptable preachers detailed to
serve them. In New York he heard of his father's
death. The good man was eighty-five years old;
had lived well, and died happy. O'Kelly, after some
years of persistent agitation, now attacked Asbury
in a severe pamphlet. He had, Asbury said, taken
the butt end of his whip to him, and among other
charges he made was that Asbury wished to be
called a bishop. The journal says: "James O'Kelly
hnth told a tale of me, which I think it is my duty to
tell better. He writes, 'Francis ordered the preach-

Francis Asbury. 181
ers to entitle him bishop in directing their letters.'
The secret truth of the matter was this : The preach
ers having had great difficulties about the appella
tion of Mr. and Rev., it was talked over in the yearly
Conference, for then we had no General Confer
ence established. So we concluded that it would be
by far the best to give each man his official title,
as deacon, elder, and bishop. To this the majority
agreed. James O'Kelly giveth all the good, the bad,
and middling of all the order of our Church to me.
Wliat can be the cause of all this ill treatment,
which I receive from him? Was it because I could
not settle him for life in the South District of Vir
ginia? Is this his gratitude? He was in this dis
trict for ten years as presiding elder, and there was
no peace with James, until Dr. Coke took the matter
out of my hands. After we had agreed to hold a
General Conference to settle the dispute, and be
hold when the General Conference by a majority
went against him, -he treated the General Confer
ence with as much contempt almost as he had treat
ed me, only I am the butt of all his spleen."
He made quite an extensive tour through New
England. He received small hospitality, and says:
"We frequently spend a dollar a day to feed our
selves and horses. I never received as I recollect,
any personal beneficence, no, not a farthing, in New
England, and perhaps never shall, unless I shall be
totally out of cash."
He now went to New Hampshire and Maine, and
attended the first Conference ever held in Maine.
Despite his fatigue, he improved in health. He met
the New England Conference at Granville, and then
returned southward.

182 Francis Asbury.
His dear old friend, John Dickins, who passed
safely through one epidemic of yellow fever in Phil
adelphia, had fallen a victim to another. "For pi
ety, probity, profitable teaching, holy living, Chris
tian education of his children, secret closet prayer,"
he says, "I doubt whether his superior is to be found
in America."
His horse was worn down, but his friend Philip
Rogers, converted under his ministry in Baltimore
twenty years before, lent him another; and with
Richard Whatcoat as a companion, he made his way
by his usual route to Rembert's in South Carolina,
where he spent a week; and after calling at Robert
Bowman's, he came to Charleston, where he received
a cooling letter from the north.

CHAPTER XXVI.
1799.
Asbury in the Last Year of the Century— Charleston— North
Carolina— Advice of Physicians — Feebleness of Whatcoat —
Jesse Lee and Benjamin Blanton — Henry Parks — Tait's,
Pope's, and Grant's — Extensive Tour Through Georgia —
Charleston Again.
BISHOP ASBURY remained in Charleston a
month, and then returned northward. To fol
low him every day would be a somewhat wearisome
task to the general reader, but there is an interest
attached to the names of persons and places along
the route which makes the otherwise dull journal
interesting. He went by Ragin's and Hawkins's,
in South Carolina, into Bladen, in North Carolina,
where he preached at Shallott Church; then by Town
Creek, where his dear friends, Stephen Daniel and
his good wife, used to entertain him; to Nixon and
Stone Bay, and friend Johnson's; to William Bryan's
and Colonel Bryan's ; to Trenton, then to New Berne,
and then twenty-four miles to Cox's, on Neuse Riv
er. I have given this extract from his journal merely
to show how close was his attention to little things,
as well as to present names which are still promi
nent in Southern Methodism. The people among
whom he found his chief friends in South Carolina
and North Carolina were nearly all of the same
class — plain, independent, well-to-do farmers, with
a few slaves, and a sufficient quantity of arable land
on which to make a good living. They knew little
(183)

184 Francis Asbury.
of luxury, but lived in comfort. They were inde
pendent yeomanry, who were generally of English
descent, and most of whom had made what they had
by hard toil. A few of the wealthy were Metho
dists, but the most of them had little use for Meth
odism, and Methodism less use for them and their
ways. There was, however, a boundless hospital
ity, and from Charleston to Baltimore he had free
entertainment. He presided over the Conference in Baltimore, and
then went to the eastern shore, going doAvn to the
lowest county in Maryland, and then through Del
aware northward. He called a consultation of phy
sicians in Delaware, and they advised that he should
discontinue preaching entirely, because they feared a
consumption or dropsy in the chest. He, however,
pressed on through Philadelphia into eastern Ncav
York, and then back down the Hudson, stopping
at Kinderhook, Rhinebeck, Albany, and Coeyman's
landing, through rain and damp into New Jersey,
and then through southern Pennsylvania into Mary
land. He came through Loudoun, Berkley, Fred
erick, Shenandoah, Culpepper, Madison, Orange,
Louisa, and Hanover, and thence to Richmond. He
says: "I need much faith and good water." He
found a pleasant retreat at John Ellis's, within two
miles of Richmond, and would have preached in the
walls of the new house at Richmond, but the heavy
rain prevented.
He put a blister on his breast, and went on his way
through Chesterfield, Powhatan, Cumberland, and
Buckingham, into Prince Edward. The Aveather was
hot, the blister was running, he had no rest night or
day — no wonder he says, "I would not live always."

Francis Asbury. 185
Poor, aged Whatcoat v/as with him. He had a
sore on his leg, and Asbury a sore breast inside and
out. John Spencer, however, gave them a good home,
and he rested two days; then he rode into Halifax
county, and had a large congregation on the Ban
ister, and thence into Pittsylvania, and into North
Carolina. He was now in Rockingham county, and
through Rockingham, Stokes, and Guilford, sick and
tired, he came into Rowan, and thence through Ire
dell, Wilkes, and Lincoln into York county, South
Carolina. Benjamin Blanton met him there. His
famous horse was dead of the staggers, and in four
years the hard-working young elder had received
two hundred and fifty dollars.
Bishop Asbury preached at Golden Grove, on the
Saluda, where the land was rich, and at Cox's meet
inghouse, where there was the best society in South
Carolina, and went thence into Pendleton, "where
Mr. James Nash and his family, though not in so
ciety, were our kindest friends."
He crossed the Savannah River at Cherokee ford,
and came safe to William Tait's, in Elbert county,
Georgia. He was attended, by Jesse Lee, who was
with him in all this journey, and by Benjamin
Blanton. He rode in a covered gig, which was called
"The Felicity," and kept dry, while Blanton and Lee
took the rain. There was now at the forks, near Pe
tersburg, a chapel, built by William Tait, who had
moved from Cokesbury, in Maryland, and who was
the father of Judge Tait; and here he was made ex
ceedingly comfortable for a little time, and then, on
a raw day, rode twenty miles, where he preached in
a cold meetinghouse to a warm-hearted people, and
where his friend Ralph Banks entertained him, and

186 Francis Asbury.
his wife, the hearty young mother of thirteen chil
dren, gave him a Virginia welcome. Ralph Banks
was one of the leading men of that country, and As
bury often afterwards found lodging at his home.
Henry Parks, the father of William J. Parks, fa
mous in Georgia, had been converted and built his
cabin chapel in the woods of Franklin, and Asbury
found it. He was now in a new country, just be
ing settled by a body of sturdy immigrants from
North Carolina and Virginia. The preachers came
to Charles Wakefield's, in the new county of Ogle
thorpe, when poor Blanton broke down and went to
bed with a high fever, and Asbury sent the hearty,
happy, healthy Lee on to the head waters of the
Oconee, while he stayed behind to nurse his sick
companion, whom he housed in his carriage, and
rode Blanton's stiff-jointed horse, that he would only
ride, he said, "to save souls or the health of a broth
er." He went now to the hospitable home of Bur-
rell Pope. These Popes, Henry and Burrell, had
come from Virginia, and had a meetinghouse, iu
which the congregation, the journal says, "seemed
more wealthy than religious."
He Avent on his tour, stopping at the widow Stew
art's, and reaching the village of Greensboro, then
quite a sprightly county town. Then to Burke's and
to John Crutchfield's, and to Mark's meetinghouse,
in the forks of Broad River, and to Hope Hull's and
David Meriwether's, and to his old friend Thomas
Grant's. They now turned their faces eastward, and
passed the wagons laden with rum; and stopping at
Thomas Haynes's and James Allen's, they rode once
more into Augusta. The little city had much im
proved in every respect but religion. There was as

Francis Asbury. 187
yet no organized religious body in it, though there
was sometimes preaching. He heard a sermon in
the morning and preached one in the afternoon, and
over wretched roads he traveled on till he reached
Charleston. The itinerary I have given will perhaps only in
terest those who will take the map and mark the
course he and his companion took. Journeys such
as this will never be made again, and if made now
would be vain labor. But Lee and Asbury planted
seed as they went along which is ripening yet.
The Conference was soon held. There was really
but little to do. The recital of religious experiences,
the careful examination of character, the preaching,
then the appointments, and all was over. There
were now twenty-three members present in the Con
ference, whose work extended into three states,
where, on his first visit, Lee and Willis and himself
had begun the work only fifteen years before.

CHAPTER XXVII.
1800.
Beginning of the New Century— Asbury Rests a Month— Wash
ington's Death — Nicholas Snethen — General Conference—
Great Revival — Whatcoat's Election as Bishop — Journey
Northward.
AFTER a year of immense labor, during which
he had traveled incessantly, Asbury now de
cided to rest for a month in the balmy air of Charles
ton. The South Carolina Conference convened on
the first of January. The work was all hard and
there was little choice in appointments, and so they
were easily made. In no Conference was Asbury's
administration recognized as wise to a greater de
gree than here. Jesse Lee was with him, to relieve
him of much of the fatigue of preaching and of
presiding, and in three days the Conference session
closed. While the Conference was in session the tidings
came that Washington was dead. Asbury had met
him twice. In company with Dr. Coke, he called on
him once at Mount Vernon to get his signature to a
petition to the Virginia legislature for the abolition
of slavery, and dined with him; and a second time,
in New York, after he was elected to the presidency,
Coke and Asbury called to present him the address
of the Conference. Other than this he had no com
munication with him, but he had for him the high
est admiration. He calls him "the intrepid chief,
the disinterested friend, the temporal savior of his
(188)

Francis Asbury. 189
country, the matchless man." He paid a tribute to
him in his Sunday sermon.
Asbury now decided to take a little needed rest,
and Jesse Lee, who was strong and active, though
he weighed two hundred and fifty pounds, took John
Garvin with him and rode to St. Mary on Asbury's
old gray. St. Mary was then the remotest English
settlement in the United States. The weather was
exceedingly severe, snow falling to the depth of eight
een inches in South Carolina. Nicholas Snethen,
a gifted young Jerseyman, was with Asbury, and
during the snowy weather read to the bishop from
the sermons of Saurin. Asbury was not at all well,
but kept up with his correspondence, preached oc
casionally, visited the Orphan House, which was
then superior to any institution in America, and on
Jesse Lee's return, after a rest of six weeks, he left
Charleston. The roads were bad, the weather cold,
and it was a week before he reached Rembert's, and
went thence into North Carolina. Appointments
had been sent ahead, and there was preaching every
day. The journey was through the central part of
North Carolina, and the travelers came by the rough
roads to the university, to Raleigh, and through the
upper counties into Virginia.
A friend asked him for the loan of fifty pounds.
"He might as well have asked," he said, "for Peru.
I showed him all the money I had in the world —
twelve dollars — and gave him five." It was the
same oft-told story of Virginia travel: wretched
roads, bad weather, but hospitable homes and com
fortable lodgings. He presided at the Virginia Con
ference, which met at Norfolk and remained in ses-

190 Francis Asbury.
sion three days; he then pressed on 'toward Balti
more, where the General Conference v/as to meet.
There was now quite a company of preachers, for
Lemuel Andrews and William McKendree, as well
as Snethen and Lee, were with him.
They made their way to Baltimore. There the
fourth General Conference of the Methodists opened
its work on the 6th of May, and continued in ses
sion two weeks. Dr. Coke was there and presided.
Asbury had fully made up his mind to resign his of
fice as bishop, and so expressed himself to his breth
ren, but they insisted so earnestly on his remaining
a bishop that he consented to do so. It was evident
that the American preachers did not wish to have Dr.
Coke in Asbury's place, or even as his associate, and
yet it was as evident that some one must be chosen
for the place. Perhaps before the Conference met
there had been little question as to who that associ
ate should be, and that one was Jesse Lee. For two
years he had been in training for this office, for
which he had every qualification. He no doubt ex
pected it, and Asbury was perhaps as confident as
his traveling companion that he would be chosen;
but the vote was cast, and there was a tie between
Whatcoat and Lee. Another Arote came later, and
by a majority of four votes the feeble and aged
Whatcoat, whom the Conference had refused to re
ceive as bishop by Mr. Wesley's appointment, was
elected. Mr. Asbury was Whatcoat's bosom friend.
He believed, and truly, that there was no better
man. He did not, it may be, do anything to elect
him, or to defeat the strong and somewhat angular
Lee, but he was neutral. A word from him would

Francis Asbury. 191
probably have secured the result which Lee's friends
expected. I think it unquestionable that Lee and
his friends were seriously hurt with him, and while
Bishop Asbury disclaimed saying anything to Lee's
disparagement, Lee's defeat was largely attributed
to his indifference. If he made a mistake, as many
think he did, he suffered severely for it. Whatcoat
was a good man, the country had in it no better; but
save that he was a good man, and a good preacher,
he seems to have had no other qualification for the
episcopacy. He was sixty-four years old, in feeble
health, and a man of such quiet, mystical spirit that
he was utterly unsuited to taking the important com
mand now devolving on him; and instead of reliev
ing Asbury, he burdened him. The Conference did
little more than make this election. It decided,
however, that hereafter the preachers might have
eighty dollars instead of sixty-four, and need not ac
count for all their presents.
Asbury visited his old friend Rogers, at Green
wood, and then went to Gough's, and with Whatcoat
began his northward journey.
The General Conference which had just adjourned
was perhaps the most remarkable for the religious
effect on the community of any which ever assem
bled in America. In Old Town — Baltimore — a great
revival began, which continued during the entire
session, and over one hundred professed conversion
during the sitting of the Conference. This was the
beginning in the east of that wonderful revival ep
och which continued for nearly ten years, and which
swept over the whole country. The revival fire was
burning in Delaware, whither the two bishops went

192 Francis Asbury.
to Conference; and at Dover the love feast began
at eight and continued until four, and some people
never left the house till midnight. At Duck Creek,
a little country hamlet, where the preachers of the
Philadelphia Conference assembled, a revival began,
and over a hundred were converted. Asbury and his
companion, however, hastened on to Wilmington,
and then on to Chester, where the good Mary Withey
still lived ; and happily raised above her doubts, and
rejoicing in God, she gladly received them, as she
had the Lord's prophets for twenty-eight or twenty-
nine years. Asbury was gladdened by the news
Avhich reached him from all sections. There were
great revivals everywhere. He thought our Pente
cost had come. In Edisto (South Carolina), Guilford
(North Carolina), Franklin, Amelia, Gloucester (Vir
ginia), Baltimore, Cecil (Maryland), Dover, Duck
Creek, and Milford (Delaware), the work was glori
ous ; and to add to his joy, to the astonishment of his
friends as well as his own, his health was restored.
In New York City, where the next Conference was
held, there was a gracious revival. One evening the
services continued till after midnight, and twenty
souls found the Lord. He made his annual visit to
the Sherwood farm, and found that his dear old
nurse, Betsy Sherwood, was gone to glory. He made
his usual tour through New England. It is very ev
ident that the land of the Puritans was not to his
taste, but there were many things among the people
he thought very praiseworthy. The roads were built
for ages, and the simplicity and frugality of the New
England matron were admirable. "She, as a moth
er, mistress, maid, or wife, is a worthy woman. Here

Francis Asbury. 193
are no noisy negroes running and laughing. If you
wish breakfast at six or seven, there is no setting the
table an hour before the breakfast can be produced."
He made his way to the place of Conference session
in Massachusetts and congratulated himself that
after riding thirteen hundred miles he had finished
the six Conferences in seven months. He did not
relish the compulsory church tax, and when he rode
through Weston and saw the grand steeple and
porches, and even the stalls for the horses, he says :
"It is well if they do not make the Methodists pay to
support their pomp. Oh, religion in NeAV England!"
The tour was a long one, leading the two bishops
through New England during the hot days of the
summer. Poor WThatcoat found it hard work to
keep up with his senior colleague, and came so near
fainting that Asbury had to give up his carriage to
him. He now returned through Connecticut, and
joined Garrettson. The saintly lady of Livingston
Manor, who had been the first to invite the Meth
odist preachers to Rhinebeck and receive them into
her home, was dead. She gave her daughter, Cath
erine, to a Methodist preacher, but never herself left
the Reformed Church, in which she had been con
verted. The two bishops returned to New York
City, and, preaching on the way, went through New
Jersey into Pennsylvania, and reached Baltimore
again by the first of September. On every breeze
Asbury heard news of victory, and he shouts, "Glo
ry! glory! glory!" Perhaps six hundred souls had
been converted in Maryland alone since the General
Conference. After traveling through Maryland he came into
13

194 Francis Asbury.
Loudoun, Virginia, and here mentions for the first
time his visit to the widow Roszel. She was the
saintly mother of that great man Stephen George
Roszel, who in obedience to his mandate began to
travel a circuit. He came to Rectortown, and the
hospitable gentry did the best thing for the two
bishops they knew. They gave them a barbecue, or,
as Asbury calls it, a green-corn feast, with a roasted
animal, cooked and eaten out of doors under a booth.
The next barbecue he came to was not intended for
the bishops, since there was a horse race attached
to it. His journey was through the midst of Virgin
ia, and he mentions a visit to Lynchburg, then a
sprightly young town on the James, where he
preached in a town hall. Through the hills they
rode to Liberty, now Bedford City, where he found
the people so anxious to see a live bishop that they
gathered around his carriage as if he had a cake-and-
cider cart. He preached in the courthouse, and went
to brother Paterson's and to Blackwell's. \
He then climbed the mountains of Botetourt and
went to Fincastle. He was on his way to the Hol
ston country, and rode to Christians, now Christians-
burg, and down the line of the present Norfolk and
Western railway through Wytheville, Abingdon, and
what is now Bristol, and rested at his old friend Van
Pelt's in East Tennessee. Here he left his tired
horse and, with another furnished by his host, began
his journey to Kentucky. It had been several years
since he had made a visitation to this then remote
section. McKendree was now with the bishops, and
together they crossed the mountains, and riding one
hundred and forty miles, they reached the new school

Francis Asbury. 195
projected by Francis Poythress and known as Bethel.
Asbury was much dejected at the prospect. Here in
an obscure place, surrounded by the Kentucky Riv
er in part, was a large, expensive building, only part
ly finished. The lowest sum which could keep the
school designed at work would be £300, without
which it would be useless, and there was in sight nei
ther funds nor principal nor pupils. Poythress had
worn himself out, and was to be relieved. The work
in Kentucky had grown much in interest, and de
manded a careful supervision. Settlers by thou
sands had poured into the new state, and while there
were not many Methodists among them, so few that
in traveling two or three hundred miles he had only
been entertained in six homes, yet there was an im
perative call to provide for the surging immigration.
After a few days at Bethel, the bishops and their
companion, McKendree, struck out through the new
ly-opened country for the settlements on the banks
of the Cumberland. They made their way through
the prairies, then known as the barrens, and soaked
by rain and exhausted by fatigue they at last reached
Nashville, the new town on the Cumberland River.
The pioneers had been here before them, and a new
church was projected. It was to be of stone; it
would hold when completed a thousand people; it
was as yet neither floored, ceiled, nor glazed. He
now came in contact with the celebrated coalition
between Presbyterians and Methodists, which cre
ated such a sensation and brought about such re
sults, in which the McGees, Craig, Hodge, Rankin,
and Adair took part with the Methodist McGee and
others of the early Methodist preachers. The camp

196 Francis Asbury.
meeting was now begun by these people, and Asbury,
Whatcoat, and McKendree were at the close of one
held at Drake's meetinghouse. There were a thou
sand present on the week-day and two thousand on
Sunday. The stand was in the open air, in a grove
of beech trees. At night fires were blazing here and
there, and the religious excitement rose high, and
the services were protracted into the midnight. As
bury was delighted that God was visiting the sons of
the Puritans, who, he says somewhat complacently,
were candid enough to acknowledge their obliga
tions to the Methodists. The travelers were now
compelled to return to the east, going by a route
which led them through the Indian nation. They
entered the white settlements, and finally reached
Knoxville. As yet there was no Methodist church
there, and Asbury preached to about seAren hundred
persons in the statehouse. Two days' riding on
horseback brought him to Van Pelt's, where he had
left his horse and chaise. His host, who had come
to these wilds from New York, kindly took care of
him until he and his companions had recruited, and
then they made their way by what is now the rail
way route by Paint Rock and Asheville toward the
east. He was walking over the mountain at Paint
Rock, and his horse, which was led by another, reeled
and fell over, taking the chaise with him. The horse
turned a complete somersault, and the carriage was
as completely turned over, but by a heavy lift they
were both righted, and, strange to say, neither horse
nor carriage had received any serious damage.
Without further accident they reached Asheville.
He had now pretty well made the entire circuit, and

Francis Asbury. 197
found himself in November near the same point he
had passed in January.
He had wonderfully recovered his strength, and
his religious life had a sereneness which was not
usual to him, but he was not as strong as he thought
he was, and these labors told upon him. The jour
ney through the mountains, however, was not yet
over, and the travelers pressed on into what is now
Pickens, South Carolina; then into Georgia, where
they made a circuit of almost half the then settled
part of the state; and then into South Carolina again,
bringing up at Camden, where the South Carolina
Conference was to hold its session.

CHAPTEE XXVIII.
1801.
Troubles About Slavery — Death of Jarratt — Northern Tour —
Revival Days — Southern Tour — Charleston Again.
THE bishop had made the entire circuit of the
Conferences without any failure to meet each
on time, and the new year of 1S01 found him at Cam
den. Isaac Smith, his old friend at whose home he
made an annual halt, had settled in this little village,
and had established a Methodist society and built a
church, and now with two others he proposed to en
tertain the South Carolina Conference. The Con
ference remained in session for five days and then
adjourned. The bishops decided to rest a feAV days,
but on January 9th started on their northward jour
ney. They entered into North Carolina, and then re
turned into South Carolina and made quite a tour
through that state. The General Conference had
made a very decided utterance on the question of
negro slavery, and it had aroused great hostility to
the Methodists in South Carolina. Asbury indorsed
the utterance fully, but felt the embarrassment under
which it placed him and his brethren. He advised
that by increasing effort and faithful preaching they
should live down the prejudice against them. He
said nothing could so effectually alarm some of the
citizens of South Carolina against the Methodists as
the address of the General Conference. "The rich
among the people never thought us worthy to preach
(198)

Francis Asbury. 199
to them; they did indeed give their slaves liberty to
hear, and join our Church, and now it appears that
the poor African will no longer have this privilege."
No wonder that Asbury afterwards doubted the wis
dom of a course which had produced such a result.
Bishop Whatcoat had been with him since his elec
tion in May; indeed, it is evident that Asbury was
not willing to give into any other hands the work or
any part of it which he had so long directed. He
was willing enough to have Whatcoat with him to
relieve him of the labor of preaching, but he had lit
tle confidence in his ability to plan and arrange the
work. Generally there were two sermons a day.
Whatcoat followed Asbury, or Asbury followed
Whatcoat, and three hours were often taken up by
the service. They made their way through loAver
North Carolina, and at Wilmington Asbury was in
vited to preach in the St. James Episcopal Church,
which he did to a large congregation. The route
pursued by the bishops was the one so often taken
by Asbury in going to and from Charleston, and the
journey was void of any special interest. The Vir
ginia Conference was to meet at Dromgoole's April 1,
and the two bishops were engaged in preaching in
eastern North Carolina and eastern Virginia until the
session commenced. The congregations at the Con
ference were very large. While the preachers were
holding their indoor session the people were being
preached to out of doors; and on Sunday, while As
bury was preaching in the house, William Ormond
was preaching outside.
His old friend Devereaux Jarratt was dead. This
Episcopal minister was the first man to preach the

200 Francis Asbury.
doctrines of Methodism in Virginia. He had been
alienated from the Methodists in latter years, but
was never in good accord with, his own Episcopal
brethren. He loved Asbury, and between them
there was never any discord or even coolness. The
good old clergyman had been cruelly wounded by
Dr. Coke, and especially by some things in Coke's
journal; but as the time came for him to go to the
Avorld beyond, his affection for Asbury grew strong
er, and when he died his wife requested Asbury to
preach his funeral sermon, which he did. He hur
ried northward to the Conference in Maryland,which
met at Pipe Creek. Here, Asbury says, Mr. Straw-
bridge formed the first society in Maryland and in
America. The effort to give any other meaning to
this expression than it bears has not been successful ;
and while the argument in favor of the first society
in America having been formed in New York is not to
be despised, it cannot very well stand against this
positive statement of Asbury's, made after that in
the Discipline by himself, and Dr. Coke, in which he
gave to the New York society the priority.
The Baltimore Conference remained in session
four days, and the bishops spent the interval be
tween the adjournment and the beginning of the
Philadelphia Conference in visiting the churches on
the eastern shore. One day Asbury preached and
Whatcoat exhorted, and the next day Whatcoat
preached and Asbury exhorted; and thus they went
on toward Philadelphia. He mentions a little inci
dent, illustrating the character of those primitive
days, that is worth reciting. A Mr. Hughes, an Irish
Methodist, had conducted a school, and the bishop

Francis Asbury. 201
was urged to go to the examination. He went, and
was greatly pleased at the pedagogue's success. The
master had provided a medal, but the committee
thought it proper to keep it for a future examina
tion, and a subscription in money was taken to fur
nish the children each with a small silver piece, and
so make them equal in a "free country." The bish
op's foot was seriously inflamed, but Dr. Physick
applied caustic; and while he was crippled for two
months, the treatment was effective for his final cure.
The Philadelphia society was sadly divided. As
bury had been harassed by the condition of things
there even while in South Carolina; but here, con
fined to his room and forced to contend with the sons
of Belial who had so wretchedly divided the Church,
it was specially trying. After two months' stay in
Sodom, as he calls Philadelphia, he began his tour
among the churches, and went direct to Baltimore.
Here he found things in a very cheering condition,
for at Perry Hall, where Mr. Gough had a chapel, he
found a revival going on.
He was to join Bishop Whatcoat in Frederick.
He made his journey among his old friends and met
Whatcoat at Fredericktown, and they mapped out
the work. Bishop Whatcoat was to go eastward
and Asbury, with Nicholas Snethen, was to go west
ward. He went up the valley, preaching at Win
chester, Woodstock, Harrisburg, Staunton, Fairfield,
and Lexington. This beautiful section was popu
lated largely by Presbyterians, but the Methodists
had established themselves all through the country,
even then. The travelers came again to Madam Rus
sell's. Snethen, his young companion, who after-

202 Francis Asbury.
wards was one of the great men of the Methodist
Protestant Church, was a preacher of great power,
and as he was a vigorous man, he relieved the feeble
bishop of much labor. While Asbury hoped the year
before that he had fully recovered, he was painfully
reminded of his weakness by a return of the same
trouble; but his will kept him in motion, and in spite
of mountains and execrable roads he made his way
to Ebenezer in the Holston country, where the Con
ference met. In reaching this place he passed
through the beautiful Elk Garden, and Snethen
preached in the church. Here, in this remote part
of southern Virginia, shut in by the mountains, there
were valleys of matchless fertility, and hills clad in
richest robes of native blue grass. A class of ex
cellent people had settled here and built a church.
Asbury sought them out. The route to East Tennes
see was through the rugged Alleghanies, and it was
only after a week of hard riding that they reached
the seat of the Conference. At that time the Ken
tucky country and the Holston were in the same
Conference, but such was the revival in Kentucky
that the preachers in that section were not able to
leave the work. McKendree was now in charge of
this Kentucky District, as it is written in the min
utes, and had a diocese extending from the banks of
the Scioto to the Holston and from the Alleghanies
to the Mississippi. Snethen did most of the preach
ing, but Asbury was able to fill the appointment on
Sunday, when there Avas much praise and shouting.
The circuit of the Conferences was now over, and,
with his eloquent young brother, Asbury came south
ward on an evangelistic tour through the connection.

Francis Asbury. 203
Asbury was in his own view a Pauline bishop, and
certainly no bishop of the primitive Church was ever
more abundant in labors. Crossing the mountains
of North Carolina, he came through the western
counties of the state into the upper part of South
Carolina; and preaching every day, they made their
way through Greenville, Laurens, Spartanburg, New
berry, and Edgefield to Augusta, Georgia. After
years of fruitful and fitful work on the part of oth
ers, Stith Mead, a young Virginian, whose family
resided in Augusta, had by his earnest ministry or
ganized a society in Augusta, and by giving five hun
dred dollars of his own money for a lot he had suc
ceeded in securing a subscription sufficient to build
in the city what Asbury thought a very large and
most elegant house.' It was a plain, barn-like wood
en building which is now owned by the negroes of
the Springfield Baptist Church. There was earnest
preaching by Snethen, who excited considerable at
tention, but there were no conversions. They left
the city and went on through Columbia and Wilkes
counties. Bishop Whatcoat had joined them, and
while he went on to the southern part of the state,
Asbury and Snethen went northward. This part of
Georgia was now thickly settled with excellent peo
ple from Virginia and Maryland, and churches had
been built all over the country. They were homely
houses of logs, almost universally, but as good as
the residences of the people. Asbury said: "The
people, however, are extremely kind. I have ex
perienced great sensible enjoyment of God ; our cab
ins are courts when Jesus is there."
The two bishops now agreed to divide out the ter-

204 Francis Asbury.
ritory, one going east, the other west, and Asbury
struck out for the frontier, the more westerly coun
ties in Georgia. Stith Mead was a great revivalisc,
and in the rural districts of Georgia religious ex
citement ran very high. At Little River the meeting
held for eight hours. In Warren they held a meet
ing from nine in the morning till three o'clock in the
afternoon. These new central counties of Georgia
were then bordering on the Indian nation. They
were very fertile, and many settlers from Virginia
and Maryland were crowding into them. Asbury
went to the very border of the Indian country, and
then turned his face eastward and made his way by
the oft-traveled route to Charleston. There are now
(1896) in lower South Carolina churches still stand
ing in the pine forests and swamps which Asbury
visited on this journey.

CHAPTEE XXIX.

Northward Again — A View of the Virginia Conference — Balti
more — His Mother's Death — Meeting with O'Kelly — Over
the Alleghanies — Exposure in Tennessee — Sickness — Mc
Kendree — Reaches Camden and Rembert's.
THE Conference convened at Camden again, and
when it adjourned, with Nicholas Snethen the
good bishop turned his face northward, and preach
ing as they went, Snethen and himself came to Sa
lem in Brunswick county, Virginia, where "the close
Conference was held for four days. There was great
strictness observed in the examination of the preach
ers' characters. Some were reproved before the
Conference for their lightness and other follies."
This extract from his journal gives us a glimpse into
the usages of those times which have long since
passed away. There was no open session. There
was but little to do except to examine character,
and it was done with rigid strictness. The name of
the preacher was called, and if there was anything
against him that was the time to speak. The inci
dents related by the old preachers show how strict
they were in their examination of each other. One
young man was complained of because he had jmt
on a girl's bonnet, and asked if he was not a pretty
girl; one had shaved on Sunday, and one had not
shaved off all his beard; one wore a dress coat; one
was too light in his conversation, and one was too
dressy in apparel — these as well as more serious
(205)

206 Francis Asbury.
things were brought out in these secret sessions;
but as a general thing there was commendation,
rather than censure. Philip Bruce, Jesse Lee, Jon
athan Jackson, and Nicholas Snethen, a thundering
legion, were preaching from the pulpit to the great
crowds that came to Conference "while this secret
session" was being held, and there was, the bishop
said, "a great shaking." As soon as this Conference
Avas over the bishop and his companions were on
their way to the next Conference which met in Bal
timore. This was Asbury's favorite Conference, the
strongest and best of them all. All the quarterage
this year was paid, three thousand souls had been
added to the society, money was raised to buy horses
for poor preachers, and donations made to those who
had long distances to go.
It was while he was in Baltimore that he received
the account of his dear mother's death. He had left
her thirty-one years before, and he had never gone
back to see her again. She had fully surrendered
him to his work, nor asked him to leave it. He had
not neglected his old parents, but had ministered to
them. His letters had been regular and his remit
tances as generous as he had been able to make
them. She died January 8, 1802, aged eighty-seven
or eighty-eight years.
The Philadelphia Conference had been in some
trouble. The golden days when Churches will be
always at peace are to come yet; they had not come
in 1802. Asbury was delighted, however, when the
difficulty, of which we know nothing, was settled.
His tour northward led him into New England again,
and he went as far north as New Hampshire. He

Francis Asbury. 207
was not a little indignant that Methodists had to
pay tax for the support of the standing order, not
perhaps considering the fact that this compulsory
support of the Congregational clergy was doing not
a little to drive men into the Methodist fold. He
came by his old friend Garrettson's on the Hudson,
who had the most elegant home of any Methodist
preacher on the continent, and returning to the south
he took Nicholas Snethen, whom he had had as a
traveling companion the year before, as his associ
ate again, and made his way to the Valley of Vir
ginia. In passing through Winchester, as he was
going southward, he heard that James O'Kelly was
in the village and was sick. Asbury sent him word
that he would call and see him if it was agreeable,
and the two old men met once more. They made no
allusion to differences. Asbury prayed for his old
friend, and they parted to meet no more on earth.
He now moved up the valley, preaching as he
went. It was a time of revival, and nothing so de
lighted him as lively, noisy meetings, and they were
to be found all along the route. He went on through
Botetourt to the Salt Works, where, he said, there
was a little salt, but when sister Russell was gone
he thought there would be a deficiency. Then he
entered the Holston country, preaching every day.
Near Jonesboro, Tennessee, he attended a canip
meeting. William McKendree, who was the presid
ing elder of the Western District, now joined him
and accompanied him toward the Conference, which
was to meet at Station Camp, in Roane county. They
had to camp out in the woods, and lying too far from
the camp fire, he caught cold, and as a result his

208 Francis Asbury.
throat became involved. He was soon a very sick
man, but McKendree nursed him tenderly. He grew
worse, rheumatism followed, and sick as he was they
were forced to camp in the mountains. McKendree
made a tent for him out of his blankets, where he
caught a little sleep. By an unfortunate accident
he was hurt severely in his feet, and was unable to
get on or off his horse without help. McKendree
lifted him like a sick child in his arms and bore him
into the houses at which they stopped, but despite
it all the unconquerable man preached at a meeting
appointed for him. At Justice Huffaker's he heard
that Snethen had gone to fill his appointments in
Georgia, and he then consented to rest a week. Then
he clambered over the mountains, and with incredi
ble difficulty reached South Carolina and came to
Rembert's, where he remained for ten days, and here
spent the closing days of the year 1802. McKen
dree, who accompanied him on this tour a consider
able part of the way, was his trusted corps command
er; and a few years before when Francis Poythress
lost his mental balance, Asbury had ordered him to
Kentucky. He went just in time. That wonderful
revival which marks the close of the last century
and the beginning of this had just begun when he
reached the field. Never was there a greater de
mand for a cool head and a strong arm, and McKen
dree had them in a high degree. We shall see him
often in the future.

CHAPTER XXX.
1803.
The South Carolina Conference— Scotch in North Carolina —
Mr. Meredith's Work in Wilmington — Cumberland Street '
Church in Norfolk— Northward Journey— Merchandise of
Priests in Boston— Southward Again— Trip to Ohio— Ken
tucky— Dr. Hinde and His Blister— Journey to Charleston-
Conference at Augusta.
THE South Carolina Conference met at Camden
in January, 1803. It met on Saturday, and re
mained in session till Wednesday. This had been a
year of great revivals, and over three thousand had
united with the Church in the bounds of this Confer
ence. Asbury read the appointments, as was his cus
tom, and then mounted his horse and rode immedi
ately away. He went at once to Charleston, and
after a few days there, with his companions took the
oft-traveled road through Georgetown and through
the pines of South Carolina into North Carolina.
Snethen, young, vigorous, and eloquent, did most of
the preaching; but the bishop preached now and
then, and generally on "Christian Perfection," which
he was still striving to attain. He says : " I feel it my
duty to speak chiefly on perfection, and above all to
strive to attain that which I preach." Through mud
and cold, preaching in houses open as a sieve, they
made their way in the pine forests of North Carolina.
After the battle of Culloden, in Scotland, many of
the malcontented Highlanders who were on that ill-
fated field were exiled to the colony of North Caro-
14 (209)

210 Francis Asbury.
Una, and in Bladen, Robinson, and Cumberland coun
ties they had their homes. They had ministers of
the Kirk, from Scotland, to preach to them. They
read their Gaelic Bibles and sang their Gaelic hymns.
They were a thrifty, religious people, and prospered.
In Fayetteville they had a strong hold. Here,
through the agency of Henry Evans, a colored man,
the Methodists had not only gathered a society of
blacks and a few whites, but they had built a small
chapel. In Wilmington, also, Mr. Meredith had
gathered a society of seven hundred blacks and a
few whites, and a little two-room parsonage was
built on the church lot. The negroes here hired
their time of their masters, and were growing in
wealth. At this time (1896), nearly a hundred years
since Asbury preached there, not only have the
whites several handsome churches, but the descend
ants of these negroes have some of the largest and
handsomest churches in the city.
They rode for miles through slashes, or through
wild pine forests with now and then a cabin, and at
night lodged in the humble home of some poor set
tler. The bishop evidently found the people of 0Q-
slow county, through which he passed, rather hard
to move, for he says: "I conclude I shall have no
more appointments between Wilmington and New
Berne. There is a description of people we must not
preach to. The people of Onslow seem to resemble
the ancient Jews, 'they please not God, and are con
trary to all men.' "
In New Berne they rested for a few days, theu
went northward. "In Williamston there were twen
ty families, in Tarborough there were thirty-three,

Francis Asbury. 211
and the people had more trade than religion. In
Halifax there was a decent and respectable congre
gation from the forty families there." The Confer
ence met at Dromgoole's, in Virginia, and after a
session of five days closed in great peace. There
was preaching out of doors, although it was in
March. Whatcoat, then quite a feeble man, was
with him on this tour.
Then eastward they rode to Norfolk and Ports
mouth. He says: "The new church in Cumberland
street, Norfolk, is the best in Virginia belonging to
our society. The pulpit is high, with a witness, like
that awkward thing in Baltimore, calculated for the
gallery, and high at that." In Petersburg he found
them building a new church, sixty by forty, and two
stories high. He went now to Baltimore, stopping
as usual on the way to preach as often as possible.
The Conference met in Baltimore April 1; there was
preaching three times every day. After the ses
sion he went to Perry Hall, and then made a short
visit to his old friends in Harford, and through
storms of wind and snow on through northern Mary
land to the eastern shore. He stops long enough to
say: "My mind is in a great calm. I have felt much
self-possession ; indeed, age, grace, and the weight of
responsibility of one of the greatest charges upon
earth, ought to make me serious. In addition to this
charge of superintendence, I strive to feel and live
perfect love."
As he went through the eastern shore on his way
to the meeting of the Philadelphia Conference, which
met at Duck Creek, he could not but rejoice in the
changes which had passed over that section since

212 Francis Asbury.
he had first entered it. He loved the eastern shore
of Maryland, and as long as he lived paid it an an
nual visit, and now he saw everywhere the fruits
of his early labors. The Conference met at Duck
Creek town, and in a Quaker meetinghouse. He
seems to have had an unusual rest from bodily af
fliction for some time, but when he reached Duck
Creek town he had to submit to tooth-drawing, ca
thartics, and bleeding; but despite it all he sat in
the Conference for the four days of its session. Ear
ly in May he left for New York, and preached in his
old church home at John Street, and took legal steps
to secure a legacy made by Miss De Peyster.
Without any special adventure he reached Con
necticut. If the Methodists were now disposed to
fret at the legal support given to the clergy of the
standing order, the Baptists were not so submissive,
and supposing the Methodists would join with them,
they sent a request to Asbury and Whatcoat to pe
tition the legislature for relief. But Asbury said:
"We are neither popes nor politicians; let our breth
ren assert their own liberties."
At length he reached Boston, where, with eighteen
members present, the New England Conference met
in the solitary little chapel. Joshua Soule was or
dained an elder at this Conference. The great want
of Boston, Asbury said, was "good religion and good
water; but how can this city and Massachusetts be
in any other than a melancholy state — worse, per
haps, for true piety than any other part of the Un
ion? What! reading priests and alive! no; dead,
by nature, by formality, by sin." "I will not men
tion names, but I could tell of a congregation which

Francis Asbury. 213
sold their priest to another in Boston for one thou
sand dollars and hired the money out at the unlaAV-
ful interest of twenty-five or thirty per cent. Lord,
have mercy upon the priest and people who can
think of buying the kingdom of heaven with money !
How would it tell in the south that priests were
among the notions of Yankee traffic?" This priest
thus disposed of was the father of Ralph Waldo Em
erson. It is evident that Mr. Asbury did not have a
high estimate of New England piety; and between
the contempt of the standing order for the fanatical
Methodists, and the want of faith which the Metho
dists had in the standing order, there was but little
room to choose. Jesse Lee began fifteen years be
fore the work of hammering away on the Saybrook
platform, and there had now followed him a body of
sterling young men who were doing the same work ;
and despite the fact of the establishment and its
taxes, the societies grew and the preachers multi
plied. There were among them Sylvester Hutchin
son, Martin Ruter, Joshua Soule, Daniel Ostrander,
and Elijah Hedding. They had been distributed in
all parts of the New England states, and were win
ning their way more and more each year. At this
time New Hampshire, Vermont, and Connecticut had
not been drawn upon by the richer fields of Ohio and
the farther west, and Asbury found the rural sections
full of sturdy people who lived in solid comfort. It
must be said in justice to New England that the good
bishop was a little given to somewhat harsh judg
ments upon Calvinists and a well-paid clergy, and
that he had little use for read sermons, and was a
very Quaker in his dislike of steeples and bells.

214 Francis Asbury.
From New England he came through New York back
to Philadelphia, where he made ready for his jour
ney to the far west. He turned his face to the west
and passed through the lower tier of counties in
Pennsylvania. Henry Boehm, a German, whose fa
ther, Martin Boehm, had been driven from the Men-
nonites because of his pietist views, and who had
joined the Methodists, went with him as a traveling
companion, preaching in German to his countrymen,
of whom there were many. The bishop says of this
part of Pennsylvania in which they were now trav
eling: "I feel and have felt for thirty-two years for
Pennsylvania, the most wealthy, and the most care
less of God and the things of God, but I hope God
will shake the state and the churches. There are
now upward of twenty German preachers ; some have
connected with Mr. Otterbein and Martin Boehm,
but they want authority and the Church wants disci
pline." In Pittsburg the Methodists had no church,
and he preached in the courthouse.
Poor Whatcoat, who had been with him, was not
able to go farther, and the saintly and useful Wil
son Lee was compelled also to leave him ; but Asbury
went on his way with young Boehm, crossing
through Ohio county, Virginia, into the new state
of Ohio. He was himself suffering with dysentery,
and the journey was a trying one, but he kept on his
way. In Ohio the Church was making rapid prog
ress. Governor Edward Tiffin was a Methodist and
a local preacher. Asbury visited him, and on the
2Sth of September crossed the Ohio River into Ken
tucky. He passed rapidly to Mount Gerizim, where
the Kentucky Conference was to hold its session.

Francis Asbury. 215
Here the Western Conference, which embraced the
Holston, the Middle Tennessee, and the Kentucky
and Ohio country, held its session. McKendree was
in charge of the Kentucky District, and men like
William Burke, Thomas Wilkerson, Lewis Garrett,
James Gwin, Tobias Gibson, Jesse Walker, and Hen
ry Smith were among the workers. It was a time
of revival, and there was preaching every day, and
twenty souls were converted. Asbury was quite un
well, but he pressed on, passing through Paris, Ken
tucky, which had in it even then about four hundred
houses and a stone preaching house of the Presby
terians. He visited Dr. Hinde, the grandfather of
Bishop Kavanaugh, once a surgeon under General
Wolfe, and an infidel. The doctor had married into
a Virginia family, and when his wife was awakened
among the Methodists, he had blistered her head to
cure her of her madness; but he was converted, and
was now a Methodist. The highways were crowded
with travelers, and while they may have broken the
spell of loneliness they by no means improved the
character of the roads, and as he returned Asbury
found the way through the Gap into Tennessee but
little better than when he came over it the first time
fifteen years before. He could endure a great deal
of discomfort without complaint ; indeed, one has to
know much of the times and of the topography of
the country in order to realize what he did endure,
but the story of his hardships will sometimes come
out in his narrative. Stopping now at a house un
finished and filled with brutal travelers, and then in
a little house ten by twelve feet in size, where there
were within a man and his wife and six children —

216 Francis Asbury.
one of them always in motion — and without there
were rain and wind; sleeping in beds from which he
contracted a royal but rather nameless disorder,
against which a brimstone shirt was his only protec
tion, and then pushing across the mountains, over
the worst road in America, he at last reached a rest
ing place ; but he says, " My soul is tranquil, the air
is pure, and the house of God is near." The remain
der of the trying journey was through the moun
tains of Tennessee and North Carolina until he final
ly reached father John Douthat's, in South Carolina,
where he bade farewell for awhile, as he said, to the
"filth, fleas, rattlesnakes, hills, mountains, rocks,
and rivers." He now went across the western part
of South Carolina, and going through Greenville,
Laurens, and Richland counties, he came into Colum
bia, like an Indian chief, with his blanket around
him to protect him from rain, and went to John Har
per's, in whose house he held a family union, preach
ing to a respectable body of hearers. The South
Carolina Conference was to meet in Augusta, but,
as always, he visited Charleston, and now took pos
session of the parsonage, the first in the South Caro
lina Conference; or, as he calls it, "the new house
built for the preacher, near the new chapel." This
little parsonage is described by Bishop Andrew in
his "Reminiscences": "The old, odd-shaped house de
fying all sorts of architectural style, was a house of
shreds and patches, and stood almost touching Beth
el church. Below stairs was the dining-room stuck
up in one corner ; at the other you went into the yard,
from a little cuddy in which was the water pail; but
the grand room of the lower story was the Confer-

Francis Asbury. 217
ence room. In this was transacted all the business
of the session. Here you met every week either
stewards or leaders, white or black; and here the
preachers had to have all cases of complaints or tri
al, especially among the blacks; and to this room
also came, at stated intervals, all who wished to join
on trial. Here Asbury had prayer at sunrise for all
who came."
After a two weeks' rest in Charleston, he made
his way by the old route to Augusta, where the South
Carolina Conference was to hold its session, which
it did in the January following. Among the exiles
from Hayti was a Frenchman, Peter Cantalou. He
became a Protestant and a Methodist, and at his
home the Conference was held. As there was a
month between the Conferences, Asbury went up
the country and made an extensive tour through all
the settled portions of the state. He was enter
tained in Louisville by Mr. Flournoy. He speaks of
Flournoy as a new convert. Alas! his conversion
was not of long duration ; but his wife, to whom the
bishop alludes as one of "the respectables," and who
was one of the famous Cobb family, long continued
to bless the Church by a beautiful and saintly life.
She was the aunt of Howell Cobb, and the grand
mother of Rev. H. J. Adams, and a kinswoman of
Chief Justice Jackson. Bishop Coke had joined As
bury in Augusta, and they were together for the ses
sion of the Conference, which began on January 4,
1804.

CHAPTEE XXXI.
1804.
Conference in Augusta — Reasons for Never Marrying — Journey
Northward — General Conference — Slavery Question Again —
Confined by Sickness — Letter to Hitt — Journey to the West,
and Thence to Charleston.
THE new year began with the meeting of the
South Carolina Conference in the home of Pe
ter Cantalou, on Ellis street in Augusta. It opened
its session on Monday and closed on Thursday, and
the next Monday Asbury reached Camden, where, at
the house of one of his brethren (probably Isaac
Smith's), he parted with Dr. Coke, giving him a plan
for a journey as far as Boston before the General
Conference met in May. After a week in Camden
he began his tour to the east by riding to James
Rembert's, where he rested for a week, and then
went as far south as Georgetown. After years of
hard work in Georgetown, there were only twenty
whites in the society, but there were four hundred
blacks. Mr. Hammett had built a church there
which now fell into the hands of Asbury, as had the
churches in Charleston and Wilmington. With
Alex. McCaine as a traveling companion, he went
northward. He was now sixty years old. He had decided never
to marry, and when he was in Georgetown he wrote
in his journal the reason for this final decision. He
was twenty-six vears old when he came to America,
(218)

Francis Asbury. 219
and it had not been a proper thing to marry up to
that time. He expected to return to England in five
years, but it was ten years before his return could be
considered, because of the war. Then he was chosen
bishop. His duties demanded constant travel, and
he could not think it was just or kind for him to mar
ry one whom he must leave for so much of the time.
His salary was small; his mother needed all the help
he could give her, and he was an old man when she
died. He hoped God and the sex would forgive him
if he had done wrong in thus remaining unmarried.
His journey into South and North Carolina was
through the counties on the coast. He visited Wil
mington, New Berne, Washington, Edenton, and
Elizabeth City — where there was as yet no home for
the Methodists — and through Norfolk and Suffolk
back into the circuit he had traveled thirty years be
fore to Salem, in Mecklenburg, where the Virginia
Conference held its session. The Baltimore Confer
ence was to meet in Alexandria, and he rode direct
ly through the midland counties of Virginia to its
place of session. The new church was then built,
and he preached in it, and after a short session the
.Conference adjourned. The General Conference
was to meet in May. Asbury had little taste for
changes of any kind, and he did not relish these
quadrennial sessions when the Discipline was to be
revised from beginning to end. He was sorry when
the Conference assembled and relieved when it ad-
. journed. The presiding eldership had not given perfect sat
isfaction, and there were attempts made, he said,
"upon the ruling eldership." He says, "We had

220 Francis Asbury.
great talk." It is the province of the historian to
tell of the doings of this Conference, which was one
of the last general conventions which was held. This
Conference consisted of one hundred and twelve
members, and the inequality of the representation
is seen by the figures: The Boston Conference, four;
Virginia Conference, seventeen; Baltimore Confer
ence, twenty-nine; Philadelphia Conference, forty-
one ; New York Conference, twelve.
Dr. Coke was present. Asbury, according to the
journals, made several motions : first, that the doors
should be kept closed ; second, that an assistant book
agent should be chosen; and third, that the Annual
Conferences shpuld be advised to restrict the preach
ers from preaching improper matter.
The Conference desired that he should assist in
forming a chapter on slavery to suit northern and
southern sections. Asbury knew the absurdity of
the proposition, and decided to have no part in it.
A committee attempted it, and egregiously failed.
Up to this time there had been no limit to the bish
op's authority to appoint preachers for as long a
time as he chose, but George Dougherty moved that
a time limit be fixed, and it was decided that it should
be at two years. The General Conference of 1800
had been the revival Conference, and Asbury hoped
for the same gracious results at this one, but was
sadly disappointed.
As soon as the Conference was over he left for
the Philadelphia Conference. It sat five days and a
half, and the bishop then started on his journey to
New York. For years the faithful animal who bore
him was a mare whom he called "Little Jane," and

Francis Asbury. 221
to whom he was tenderly attached. On this journey-
he says : " Here my little Jane was horned by a cow
and was lamed. She is done, perhaps, forever for
me, but it may be all for the best. I am unwell, the
weather is bad, but except my feelings for the poor
beast I am peaceful and resigned. I was able to
write but not to preach on the Sabbath." Poor lit
tle Jane ! How many weary miles had she borne the
faithful apostle, and how tender was his love for her!
We cannot but hope that the ignominious wound was
not fatal; that Jane had greener pastures and an
easier life than she had had in days gone by.
Procuring another Jane, he went on his way to
New York and into New England. The constant
travel on horseback and the very hot weather of June
were trying to him, but not so much so as the trials
of his office. He was very sensitive, and felt keenly
the misjudgments and censures of some of those with
whom he had to do. He could not give satisfaction
to many, and they poured upon his head their vials of
wrath. "O man! thou hidest thy face and changest
thy voice," he says, "and I must be troubled forsooth.
But I am just as serene as ever as to what man can
say or do. Whom shall I trust? Why, who but a
good and true and never-failing God." His journey
through New England was by much the same route ;
through Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts,
and over the rough hills of New Hampshire and Ver
mont back into New York. It was a very fatiguing
journey, and he says, "I suffered from hunger and
was skinned several times." He had spent fifteen
dollars in traveling from the 20th of June to the 27th
of July. This was to him a very heavy outlay, and

222 Francis Asbury.
seemed extravagant. He rarely had a bill to pay in
the south, and but few in the west, and this outlay
for food for man and beast seemed to him to be very
extraordinary. He came on rapidly through Penn
sylvania and upper Delaware, and by September was
in the west of Pennsylvania, riding over the steep
hills of Wayne county; but it was not in the power
of his feeble frame to bear up under all, and he was
forced to yield. For thirty days he was in a sick
room. In the kind family of Harry Stevens he was
attended by two doctors, who at last happily left him
to himself. They were seldom right in their treat
ment, he said, and medicines were not to be had.
He was not able to travel, but travel he must, and he
began his farther journey to the west. Riding
brought on a fever and cough. Whatcoat, feeble too,
was with him, and the self-sacrificing Asbury gave
him his easier riding horse and took Whatcoat's
jolting steed. They could not hope to reach the
Kentucky Conference, and barely hoped to get to
the South Carolina in time. Whatcoat persisted in
going into the west, and Asbury wrote Daniel Hitt,
who was on a district in Ohio :
Phelps's, November 7, 1804.
My Dear Daniel: You will be surprised to hear of my pass
ing this way. I have been sick upon Monongahela and Ohio
about sixty days. I must needs preach at Union and Jacob
Murphey's; ride twelve miles through the hot sun, and some
rain. This brought on a chill and burning fever every day,
with a most inveterate cough. I used emetics, two; the sec
ond cleared me. I was bled four times, and blistered four.
I was part of my time at Harry Stevens's, and two weeks at
Beck's. I had no intermission, but only a remission, for
fifty days. I gave up my visit to the eastern. Brother What-

Francis Asbury. 223
coat came up with me, and stayed till two days of my recov
ery. I came off as soon as the Indian summer came on. I
came from Beck's (from Sabbath to Sabbath) to Cresap's.
I am now on my way to Charleston. I must make the best
of good weather. I have written to appoint a president; I
believe it will come to that in time. I am in no doubt or
fear but the connection will do as well or better without me
as with me. The president elders have more local knowl
edge; they have more personal information of the preachers
and circuits. I only go because it is my appointment from
the Conference, and to cast in my mite; and I cannot be idle.
I am happy to find the work of God is reviving to the west
ward. I shall be pleased to haA'e a narrative of the work in
this district. God certainly has a controversy with this land.
Many that will not be mended will be ended, or mended and
ended both. America is the infant of Divine Providence.
He must begin to correct — he will correct us himself; he will
not let others do it. I make no doubt there is not a single
spot but will feel in time (arid turn) the rod of God. The
sinners in the cities are not sinners above all the Galileans.
I anticipated the pleasure of seeing you; but time is short:
I must improve every hour of fair weather and sun.
I am, as ever, thine, F. Asbtjbt.
He received constant kindness from everybody,
for, go whither he would, he was never among stran
gers. He was now, perhaps, the best known and
the most beloved man in America. While he was at
Cokesbury he had to punish a refractory student.
Thirty years had gone, and as he passed near him he
called to see him. He says: "We rode to James
Cresap's. Notwithstanding what passed at Cokes
bury, he received me as a father. That matter might
have been better managed. We were to have all
the boys to become angels. John Hesselins sent me
a note of invitation to see him. I did so. He re
minded me of his respectable father who took me to

224 Francis Asbury.
his house thirty years ago, in the time I was exposed
to daily reproach and contempt."
The bishop made the journey by the most direct
route to Charleston, and without incident reached
there better, despite his fatigue and exposure, thau
when he started from Pennsylvania, the 10th of Oc
tober. When one takes into consideration the char
acter of the roads, and the feebleness of the man, and
the greatness of the distance, he is amazed at the
fact that the journey was made.

CHAPTER XXXII.
1805.
Journey Northward — Letter to Hitt — Conference in North Car
olina—Episcopal Trials — Journey to the North — Journey to
the West and the South.
THE Conference at Charleston, which was the
beginning of the series, met January 1, 1805.
The bishop was feeble, but was able to preach, and
after resting a week and preparing the minutes for
publication, he began his tour. In a month's time
he was to meet with the Virginia brethren at Tay
lor's, in Granville county, North Carolina. He and
his companions nearly always chose a different route
for each return northward, and he now made his way
through the high waters and over the wretched
causeways through eastern South Carolina and into
eastern North Carolina. The ferries were numerous
and the boats were very poor. Sometimes the trav
elers had to swim their horses, and in doing so wet
their own limbs; sometimes they crossed in a canoe
with their horses swimming beside them. The ferry
boats were shackling, and more than once they were
in great danger. Poor, aged, feeble Whatcoat suf
fered much, and the chronic trouble which torment
ed him was fearfully aggravated by this exposure.
Asbury himself was bleeding at the lungs, but, de
spite all this, he kept in motion and kept the work
going. Wherever there was a place which needed a
preacher, and a preacher could be had, Asbury or-
15 (225)

226 Francis Asbury.
dered him there. The battle was at its height. Re
vivals were everywhere, and never had such success
attended the evangelical labors of the itinerants. At
that time the pastoral relation, as it at present ex
ists, was hardly known. Every preacher was an
evangelist, and every nerve was strained to keep up
with the demand for aggressive work. The leading
spirit who directed all these movements, the general
commanding this army, was this feeble old man of
sixty years, breaking down with fatigue, but still
clear-headed and untiring. When he reached Fay-
etteville, North Carolina, where the Presbyterians
were strong and the Methodists weak, Dr. Flinn, the
Presbyterian minister, politely asked the good bish
op to take his pulpit, which he as politely declined.
He was offered the statehouse, but refused it. Hen
ry Evans, a most remarkable negro, had built a plain,
homely church, which was known as the African
meetinghouse, and in it A sbury preached. While in
the low lands near Wilmington he was riding
through a rice plantation when he came to an un-
bridged canal. The negro overseer came and made
a way for them to cross, and Asbury found, to his
delight, that he was one of the Methodist sheep.
The housekeeper gladly received the bishop into the
hospitable home of the absent planter. The poor
people, black and white, who formed the Wilming
ton congregation had built, Asbury said, an elegant
meetinghouse, sixty-six by thirty-six feet in dimen
sion. At New Berne he wrote to Daniel Hitt :
New Berne, N. C, Jan. 26th, 1805.
My Dear Daniel: May the spirit of holy Daniel and a holy
God fill thy soul! I received thy two letters at too late a
period to be answered from Charleston. I found it proper

Francis Asbury. 227
to move as soon as Conference expired. God is good to me.
I found, as I proceeded southward, my health increased. To
my joy, I found brother Whatcoat had returned from the
Avestern states in good health — all things in good order, al
most everything done my letter anticipated; but my letter
not received till after the Conference; increase of eighteen
preachers in the Kentucky Conference; two thousand mem
bers: South Conference, eleven preachers, few located; in
crease of members, fifteen hundred, notwithstanding the
deaths and great removals to the west, whose membership
must be suspended for a time. We had great love and union,
but little money. I believe the Conference in the south was
near one thousand dollars insolvent. Our married men
sweep us off in the circuits, and share a great part of the
bounty of two hundred and sixty dollars, Charter, and Book
Concern. Yet such is the consequence of the work: we em
ploy all we judge worthy. I calculate upon twenty thousand
added to the societies, and twenty thousand dollars insol
vency. We must not have gold and grace. God will give
us souls for wages. We overseers find this the very nick of
time, in the winter season, to visit the seaports: these give us
an opportunity of preaching to hundreds of the inhabitants
of the sea. Our town stands are of great magnitude: by be
ing present, I feel their importance, especially when we can
get the Jews and Gentiles to work it right. I find it matter
of very great heartfelt concern to settle the frontiers of the
sea, as well as the frontiers of the east, west, and north. We
have the following towns which call for stationed preachers:
Augusta, Columbia, Camden, Georgetown — yes, oh that I
could command Savannah also! In the North State, Pay-
etteville, Raleigh, Wilmington, New Berne, Washington,
Edenton, poor Halifax, then Portsmouth, Norfolk, Peters
burg, Richmond, and some others; for when we can come
at a square of two miles, and two thousand souls, it is an
object that we shall not perhaps find in a circuit; besides
comers and goers, as we generally say. We gain in this
town, upon Trent, a dark place. A poor old local preacher
labored and preached till he was called home: now God has
visited his children and neighbors; one hundred souls have
been brought in. The work grows in Georgia and the Car-

228 Francis Asbury.
olinas. I can see a surprising difference everywhere sinee
the year 1785. Oh, what prospects open in 1805! I am
lengthy; I am loving; you are liberal in writing to me. You
have my letter that was lost by this time. I have a letter
from Joshua Taylor informing me of the success of our Con
ference in the Maine — of a camp meeting and several happy
seasons in the Maine. Glory! I thank you for the printed
account. I have a written one from Billy Thacher.
The famous Abner Wood is turned Baptist from stem to
stern. He was going on till they suspended him preaching
Baptist-like upon the New London Circuit: now our Dis
cipline is a human invention: Jocelin is rebaptized. See our
great Conference men. We must have some drawbacks.
They judged the camp meeting near Suffolk was the great
est ever known. Four hundred professed in four days. Bal
timore and the Point look up. The fire of God is broken
out in the city of Brotherly Love (Philadelphia) : near one
hundred souls converted. God's thoughts are not as ours, nor
his ways as our ways. I received a long letter from brother
Willis. I have only to add, he and myself have served the
Church, the one above forty years, local and traveling, the
other between twenty and thirty. We must leave the gov
ernment to younger men now. You know my thoughts on
the local eldership; they are yours. As to any valuable ends
he contemplates, I can see none in his letter that might not
be answered, as to their usefulness; but a judicious presiding
elder might secure. The South Conference wrote a letter to
the trustees of the Charter Fund, applauding gratitude for
their attention. By brother Cooper a letter is sent that they
are well under way in York, and much work on hand. At
least I am happily disappointed, he is gone to York to stay.
I am always pleased to be disappointed for the best. B.
Jones, Gibson, N. Watters, and W. Lee, all I have heard of
the deaths. Now, brother, perfect love; live it, preach it.
I have marked the kindling of a fire in the Latin and Greek
Churches, so called, the French and Russians, the British
at the bottom. I saw it some time, but it is likely to break
out: it will probably involve the whole world. What can
we say? Let us make haste to promote the work of God. It
shall be well with the righteous. I am thine, F. Asbtjby.

Francis Asbury. 229
From New Berne he went on his northern journey,
in company with poor Whatcoat, who was suffering
agony at times with that physical ill that at last took
him off. There had been a great deal of rain and
there were heavy floods, but they managed to reach
Norfolk and Portsmouth; and then, through the
counties in which Methodism had won her first tri
umphs, and where Asbury and Whatcoat had both
traveled for many years, they made their way to
Granville county, North Carolina.
While that class of Americans, known in these
days as gentry, had little to do as a common thing
with the Methodists, there were in every state repre
sentatives of the leading families among her ad
herents, and Edmond Taylor was one of the best of
these people. He lived in Granville, and around
him were other Methodist families of the same char
acter, and no doubt at his instance the Virginia Con
ference held its session at his home. When the Con
ference concluded, Asbury and Whatcoat began their
journey to Win Chester, Virginia, where the Baltimore
Conference was to meet. The weather was severe,
the roads were bad, and the route led them directly
over the Blue Ridge Mountains, but they made the
journey in time, and Asbury presided over the Con
ference. He had the usual trials of a Methodist bishop.
Lawrence McCombs, one of his leading preachers, re
fused positively to take his appointment, and had to
be changed; and at the Philadelphia Conference one
of the five days of the session was taken up in hear
ing an appeal case.
As he passed through Baltimore on his way to the

230 Francis Asbury.
east, the bishop preached for the Light-street peo
ple, but they were dull of hearing. "He feared the
people were preached to death." As he did every
year, he visited Perry Hall. "It had been repainted
and newly furnished, and the grandchildren were
gay and playful, but he and his host felt that the
evening had come to them." Two years after he fol
lowed his friend of thirty years to the grave. The
Philadelphia Conference met at Chestertown, and
he presided over it, and came on to Philadelphia.
His lifelong friend, Dr. McGaw, one of the few evan
gelicals among the Episcopal clergy, was dying. His
mind was affected, but his heart was full of joy, and
Asbury prayed at his bedside. So perfectly dead
was Asbury to the world that he was sometimes un
duly depressed because others did not regard his
somewhat arbitrary dictates. One of these was that
there should be vocal prayer after each meal in every
Methodist home; and he feared, he said, such was his
poor success, after eighteen years of faithful labor,
that some Methodists did not do so. "God be gra
cious to us and to such families and unfaithful
souls!" The New York Conference met at Ashgrove, New
York, where Embury died, and after its close the
bishop went into New England. They went the usu
al round, and Asbury made his usual comments, and
then, with Joseph Crawford as a companion, he
started to the west. A jersey wagon was purchased
in Philadelphia, and by the usual difficult route he
went to Ohio. Ohio was being rapidly peopled, and
great numbers were crowding the highways. He
had but entered the state when his traveling com-

Francis Asbury. 231
panion was taken seriously ill. Governor Tiffin was
a local preacher and physician, as well as governor
of the state, and ministered to the sick preacher, who
was soon able to go on his journey. Philip Gatch,
his old associate and his stern antagonist in the sac
ramental controversy, had now removed to Ohio, and
was a leading man in the state. He was still a de
voted Methodist and doing much to build up the
Church, and the two old companions met in these
wilds. Many of his old Maryland friends had re
moved to Ohio, many of his Virginia friends to Ken
tucky, and he found himself now in the homes of
those whose grandfathers he had received into the
societies in the east. The journey through Ohio was
made with difficulty, but it was at last made, and he
reached the Conference at Mount Gerizim, in Ken
tucky. He had not been able to meet these frontier
preachers the year before, but in the hands of the
matchless McKendree the work had not suffered.
The heroic band of twenty-five received their ap
pointments, and then by a new, but by no means an
improved, route they came southward. There was
but little that was unusual in their journey to South
Carolina and into Georgia, and despite this constant
journeying, Asbury found time to read Judge Mar
shall's Life of Washington, which he greatly en
joyed. When he reached Charleston, many colored
people came to see him, and he had prayer with all
who came. The Conference was to meet at Camden,
and on the 30th of December the two bishops came
into Camden. Asbury had met every appointment
and had traveled the entire circuit, going from the
frontiers of Georgia to the borders of Maine, and

232 Francis Asbury.
from the Atlantic to the Mississippi. He had been
wonderfully strong and cheerful. For some time
his spiritual conflicts and his conflicts with depres
sion seem to have ceased. Doubting Castle had
been left far behind. There was no question now
that he was filled with pure love, and his soul was
flooded with constant peace.
The work had been so wonderful and was going
forward with such great rapidity that his heart
was cheered with the good news of victory. The
preachers were true and heroic, the people respon
sive, and he was now strangely well, and while all
the burden of the bishopric rested on him he had
been able to bear up under it; but it was evidently
impossible that this heavy labor could be long con
tinued, and it became evident to him, as to others,
that the episcopacy must be strengthened. Dr.
Coke was nominally a bishop, but his relationship
was merely nominal. Whatcoat was an invalid, and
on the shoulders of Asbury rested the whole burden.
He felt the weight, but bravely bent himself to the
work before him.

CHAPTER XXXIII.
1806.
Asbury Alone — Coke Offers to Come to America — Offer De^
clined — Camp Meetings in the East — Whatcoat's Death —
Western Tour — Southern Tour.
THE Conferences of the year 1806 began with
South Carolina, which the bishop called the
South Conference. The condition of things was
anomalous. There were apparently three bishops —
Coke, Asbury, and Whatcoat — and there was in fact
but one. Whatcoat was superannuated, Coke was
in England, and on Asbury alone all the labor ex
cept that of travel rested. Coke had married a rich
wife of deep piety, and was willing now to return
to America to stay all the time. At least he thought
he was, but the fact was he could not have remained
in any one place long. He would not have been con
tent had he come to America, but he wrote to the
preachers that he was willing under certain condi
tions to come and remain.
As there was no General Conference in session,
this letter was presented to the Annual Conferences
for their consideration. Asbury said of the way in
which it was received at Baltimore : "An answer was
given to Dr. Coke's letter, I fear in a manner that
will not please him. An order was passed that the
answer should be presented to all the Annual Con
ferences. It was also recommended to the Annual
Conferences to consider on the propriety of having
(233)

234 Francis Asbury.
a select delegated Conference. The eastern, western,
and southern Conferences were counseled to take
such measures as theyin theirwisdom might see best,
to produce a more equal representation from their
several bodies to the General Conference." The
Conference did not recall Dr. Coke then, and never
did; and while his name remained on the minutes
they recited the fact that he was permitted to remain
in England. It will be remembered, however, that
this was done by the preachers as a body, and not by
a delegated General Conference. The effort of As
bury to have a delegated General Conference pro
vided for at this time was defeated, as well as his
plan to have a select number who should elect an
other bishop before the regular General Conference
of 1808.
After the Baltimore Conference, Asbury left for
the Philadelphia Conference, which met in Phila
delphia. He made his usual detour through the
eastern shore country, separated from Whatcoat,
but met him again in Delaware, and took him in
his carriage. On the journey the saintly old man
was taken with a severe illness, and Asbury was
forced to leave him. The attack ended fatally;
Whatcoat died near Dover.
The Conference at Philadelphia answered Dr.
Coke's letter in much the way in which it had been
answered from Baltimore, and so did the Conference
in New York. This no doubt was very much to As
bury's mind. He had little disposition to surrender
the entire control of any part of the work, which
had cost him so much, into the hands of anyone; and
while he loved Dr. Coke very tenderly, he knew him

Francis Asbury. 235
too well to be willing voluntarily to step aside, and
yield place to one in whose judgment he had so little
confidence. He went from New York to the NeAV
England Conference. These New England preach
ers had two defects, in his eye; they would get mar
ried, and they would stay in town. He says the Con
ference sat seven hours a day. The address con
cerning a new bishop was concurred in, but he adds :
"We did not, to my grief, tell our experiences, nor
make observations as to Avhat we had known of the
work of God; the members were impatient to be
gone, particularly the married town-men." "Why
did I not visit this country sooner?" he says again.
"Ah! what is the toil of beating over rocks, hills.
mountains, and deserts five thousand miles a year?
Nothing, when we reflect it is done for God, for
Christ, for the Holy Spirit, the Church of God, the
souls of poor sinners, the preachers of the gospel in
the seven Conferences, one hundred and thirty thou
sand members, and one or two millions who congre
gate with us in the solemn worship of God. Oh, it
is nothing."In order to attend the Conferences the preachers,
we learn from his journal, were absent from their
work for two or three months. This is only to be
accounted for by considering the vast distances the
preachers had to travel on horseback, and even then
the time taken in the journey seems excessive.
Camp meetings had now made their way from
Kentucky to this far east. It is impossible proper
ly to estimate the ultimate effect of this accidental
assemblage in the barrens of Kentucky, and As
bury's journals are full of allusions to the great work

236 Francis Asbury.
wrought at them. He made it his special aim to
reach as many of them as he possibly could, and he
visited a number on this tour. As he feared, What
coat was dead, and he pays this beautiful tribute to
the good man's memory: "My faithful friend for
forty years, who ever heard him speak an idle word?
when was guile found in his mouth? A man so uni
formly good, I have not known in Europe or Amer
ica." He turned now to the west. The route he
took this time was up the Valley of Virginia, through
Salem and Wytheville, to the widow Russell's, at
Saltville, where he found the dear old saint as happy
and cheerful as ever. The route he took to the Hol
ston Conference, which met at Ebenezer, on the Nol-
achucky, was a rough one, and he was not well ; but
he reached the place where the Conference was to
be held in good time.
The work of these noble pioneers was still the
hardest on the continent. He found the poor preach
ers ragged, so he parted with his watch, his coat and
shirt. There were not far from two thousand people
present on Sunday, and he says: "If good were done,
which I trust and hope, it is some compensation for
my sufferings. Thirteen hundred miles in heat and
sickness on the road, and in the house restless hours,
the noise of barking dogs, impatient children and
people trotting about, and opening and shutting
doors at all hours."
He was lost on his way through the mountains of
North Carolina, and had to spend a night in an old
schoolhouse. He had no fire, and no bed save a bare
bench. Moses Lawrence, who traveled with him,
had a bear skin on the floor.

Francis Asbury. 237
In descending the mountains into Rutherford
county, North Carolina, "one of the descents," he
says, " is like the roof of a house for nearly a mile. I
rode, I walked, I sweat, I trembled; my old knees
failed. Here are gullies and rocks and precipices."
He attended a camp meeting in Rutherford, theu
passed on through Lincoln to South Carolina, and
rested a week at his old home at Rembert Hall. He
had long since ceased to antagonize slaveholding, as
much as he disliked it, and realizing the fact that it
might be an evil for which the proposed remedy of
immediate emancipation was no cure, he contented
himself with preaching the gospel to master and
slave. The idea that Dr. Coke had so pressed — the
sinfulness of slaveholding under all circumstances —
he never entertained ; and as he grew older, and re
alized more and more the difficulties in the way of
emancipation, he was still less disposed to speak pos
itively as to what should be done. Gough, Rembert,
Grant, Tait, and many others of his most valued
friends, were large slave owners. In their homes he
rested, and in their piety he had perfect confidence,
but he never became reconciled to slavery, and had It
been in his power he would have ended it speedily.
On Sunday, November 4, he was in Charleston
once more. Here he remained over a week, and then
when to Augusta. The good old bishop was a little
worried with one of the young preachers. He was
not exactly pleased when any one differed with him,
but when that one was a young man he had to be
looked after. He says: "Hugh Porter had written
to this town about a station ; and added to the mis
chief he had formerly done. And behold, here is a

238 Francis Asbury.
bell over the gallery ! and cracked too ; may it break.
It is the first I ever saw in a house of ours in America.
I hope it will be the last."
He made his usual tour through Georgia, calling
on his old friends Thomas Grant and Ralph Banks,
and thence to Judge Charles Tait's. He "did not
present himself," he said, "in the character of a gen
tleman, but as a Christian, and a Christian minister.
I won't visit the President of the United States in
any other character. As to Presbyterian ministers,
and all ministers of the gospel, I will treat them with
great respect, and ask no favors of them. To hum
ble ourselves before those who think themselves so
much above the Methodist preachers by worldly hon
ors, by learning, and especially by salary, will do
them no good." The man who was the welcome
guest of Ridgley, Van Cortlandt, Bassett, Living
ston, and Gough, and the friend of Otterbein and
Jarratt, need scarcely to have feared the charge of
toadyism because he visited a Georgia judge, and
treated respectfully Messrs. Cummings and Doak;
but he was a little sensitive to the lowly estimate in
which his people were held, as he thought, by the
Presbyterians. His letters told Lim that the camp
meetings in Maryland and Delaware were having
amazing results. Five hundred and twenty-eight
persons converted at one in Maryland and hundreds
in Delaware. "But what a rumpus was raised!
Grand juries in Virginia and Delaware have prose
cuted the noisy preachers. Lawyers and doctors
are in arms. The lives, blood, and livers of the poor
Methodists are threatened. Poor, crazy sinners, see
ye not that the Lord is with us?"

Francis Asbury. 239
The Conference in Georgia met in the village of
Sparta, and Asbury's favorite scheme of a called
General Conference went through without serious
objection, only two opposing.
The close of this year found him in the heart of
Georgia. He seems to have been in firmer health
than at any other period of his life in America. He
was the sole bishop, and at no time has the episco
pacy of the American Church had so precarious a
tenure. Coke was in Europe, Whatcoat was dead,
and there was no General Conference for a year
ahead. Upon his life depended more perhaps than
he himself knew. He was, however, sufficient for
the work demanded, and as soon as the Conference
closed he made ready for his northward flitting.

CHAPTER XXXIV.
1807.
Asbury Alone — Journey Northward — Western New York — Vis
its Ohio, and Goes Through Kentucky to Georgia — Views on
Education.
~\\ 7"HATCOAT was dead, Coke was in Europe,
VV Asbury was alone, and the first day of Jan
uary, 1807, found him on the road from Augusta mov-
ing toward Rembert Hall. The weather was very
cold and the exposure very great, but he made the
journey in a few days, and found shelter at his old
friend's house, where he took time to answer his
letters. The Virginia Conference was to meet early
in February, in New Berne, North Carolina, and he
pressed on to meet it. He had now the whole work
to visit, and he took the easiest and quickest route —
his oft-traveled way along the tide-water counties
of North Carolina and Virginia — to Norfolk, where
he turned westward. He says little of the Virginia
Conference, and makes no mention of the fact that
it defeated his plans for a called Conference.
After its adjournment, through the cold March
winds, by Petersburg and Fredericksburg, he pushed
on to Baltimore, where he met the Conference. It
began its session on Monday, and remained in ses
sion till Saturday evening. As soon as it was over
he visited his friends at Perry Hall, and then made
his usual visitation to the eastern shore, going as far
down as Accomac, and thence through Delaware to
(240)

Francis Asbury. 241
Philadelphia, where he held the Philadelphia Con
ference. The New York Conference met at Coeyman's Pat
ent, near Albany, beginning on Saturday and clos
ing in seven days, and then Asbury crossed into Ver
mont. He entered the state in Rutland county and
struck the Green Mountains, and, though it was the
1 1th of May, snow was in the mountains still, and the
roads across the mountains were fearful. "We were
obliged," he says, "to lead the horses as they dragged
the carriage up the heights, over rocks, logs, and
caving in of the earth; when we arrived at the Nar
rows we found that the bank had given way and
slidden down. I proposed to work the carriage
along the road by hand while Daniel Hitt led the
horses. He preferred my leading them, so on we
went; but I was weak and not attentive enough,
perhaps, and the mare ran me on a rock. Up went
the wheel hanging balanced OA'er a precipice forty
feet, rocks, trees, and the river beneath us. I felt
lame by the mare's treading on my foot; we un
hitched the beast, and righted the carriage after un
loading the baggage, and so we got over the danger
and the difficulty; but never in my life have I been in
such apparent danger."
It was his custom, whenever he stopped, to have
prayer, whether in taverns or private houses, among
saints or sinners, friends or strangers, and to speak
to everyone about his soul. The traA^elers went
across Vermont to New Hampshire, into the Dis
trict of Maine, through Berwick, Kennebeck, Saco,
and Scarboro to Portland, and then back into New
Hampshire. On June 1 he was in Boston, where the
16

242 Francis Asbury.
Conference was to assemble. The Conference held
an agreeable session, and he started west.
He entered New York on the 15th of June, "faint,
sick, and lame." The old rheumatic trouble in his
feet had so lamed him that he had to walk on crutch
es, but despite his lameness he now decided on a visit
to the newly-settled country in the western part of
New York, among the lakes. Methodism had made
quite a conquest there, and was growing rapidly.
The camp meeting had been introduced, and had
come to stay for a long time, and to haA'e great in
fluence on its future. The country was wild, and
there was trouble with drunken men on the camp
grounds, which he notes.
He now came through the mountains of eastern
Pennsylvania, following along the course of the Sus
quehanna. On his way south he passed through
Nazareth and Bethlehem, where nearly a century be
fore the Moravians had made their settlement. He
was as little pleased with the Moravians as he had
been with the Congregationalists. He could not but
note, however, their good arrangement, their ele
gant buildings, and their delightful surroundings,
and he was of the opinion that Bethlehem and Naz
areth were good places for the men of the world
who did not want their children spoiled by religion.
"They could send them here with safety."
Across the Lehigh road, on down through Lan
caster, he came to York, where for some days he re
mained, writing up his correspondence and prepar
ing for his western tour. He had ridden twenty-five
hundred miles since he left Baltimore.
He had rheumatism in both feet, and now his old

Francis Asbury. 243
throat trouble returned; but he did not pause on his
journey to Ohio, where the first Conference ever held
in the state was to convene at Chillicothe, on the
14th of September. He reached the seat of the Con
ference while there was a camp meeting, and pre
sided. He had made this long, hard journey in his
jersey wagon, but as he now wished to visit the fron
tier settlements on the Miami, he sold his wagon and
resolved to make the visitation on horseback. He
was in poor health for such an attempt, but he never
allowed anything to thwart him in what he thought
was his duty; so he pushed forward, visited his old
friends in Ohio, and crossed the river into Kentucky.
There was little of note in the weary journey which
he made through Kentucky, Tennessee, and Georgia.
He was very happy in his experience, and preached
as often as he could, pressing upon the people ev
erywhere the necessity for, and the possibility of,
perfect love. He says of Georgia: "Oh, what a ne
cessity to urge the doctrine of sanctification ! a doc
trine almost forgotten here." He entered South
Carolina and visited Rembert Hall, and on January
1 opened the South Carolina Conference in Charles
ton. He had made the circuit of the continent again.
This is a somewhat brief and uninteresting story
of a tour which cost him great labor, and which he
made in great pain, and it is substantially the story
so often told in his life. There was generally some
thing new in his travels, for nearly every year he vis
ited some new field; but the necessity for reaching
certain places at certain times led him often over the
same routes of travel, and at that time the pathways
across the mountains were so few that each year

244 Francis Asbury.
he traveled the same road, and his journal, upou
which one must depend largely for authentic ac
counts, is rather a dry detail of similar accounts very
hastily made, and often very unsatisfactory. He
gives nothing but a very short statement of the
places he reached and how he reached them, and
says little at any time of those who were with him,
and of the incidents of travel. We could, with the
assistance of other books, fill in the vacant places by
historic details; but a life of Asbury thus Avritten
Avould be a history of early Methodism, and not a
simple biography of the primitive bishop.
The work which he had so largely laid out was
wonderfully successful. He was a man of remarka
ble common sense. He knew what ought to be done,
and generally who was the best man to do it. He
neA'er hesitated to do any work himself, and allowed
no hardships to discourage him, and no danger to
daunt him. He had explored the whole territory,
he knew the conditions, and his plans were always
wisely conceived. The corps of assistant bishops
whom he had chosen were men admirably selected;
and when he was unable to direct the campaign per
sonally, he had a lieutenant on whom he could fully
rely. It has been charged against him that he was
not concerned enough about schools, colleges, an ed
ucated ministry, and a comfortable maintenance of
these in the work. This may have been to some ex
tent true, but the immense issues at stake, the de
mand for the most earnest evangelistic work, in his
mind, outranked everything else. The camp meet
ing had come. He saw the opportunity. The field
preaching of John Wesley and George Whitefield,

Francis Asbury. 245
which made Methodism in England and Ireland, was
now fairly begun in America, and by a strange prov
idence begun in the ranks of another denomination.
The experiment born of necessity had resulted in
an institution. There was a class of camp-meeting
preachers who were admirably fitted to conduct
these meetings, and they were used in every section.
The excitements and the extravagances which were
in these meetings were not offensive to him. The
deadness, the formality, the lifeless prayer meeting
were far more obnoxious to him than the noise and
confusion of the battlefield. As he went on his way,
he received tidings by every mail of the glorious vic
tories that were being won in these fields.
He was a bright, happy old man — older, in fact,
than his years. He saw the fruits of his untiring
toil on every side, and while he realized the slender
thread on which the superintendency hung, and the
serious nature of the situation, he did not allow it to
distress him. He had done all he could to have mat
ters bettered, and had failed; and now he patiently
went on, not knowing whence relief would come.
One thing was plain, the American preachers were
not willing to be ruled by Dr. Coke as they had been
by Asbury, and were not willing to have any man in
Asbury's place whom they had not chosen and upon
whom they could not rely. Who that one was, per
haps none knew. The General Conference was to
convene in May, 1808, and there were certain changes
that would be made then ; and at last, after twenty-
four years of trying labor, there was a prospect of
some relief to the weary old bishop. That relief
came when McKendree was chosen.

CHAPTEPt XXXV.
1808.
South Carolina Conference — George Dougherty — Northward
Journey Through New Virginia — Baltimore — General Con
ference — Death of Hairy Gough — Conference Legislation —
Election of McKendree — Tour of the Bishops — Meets William
Capers — Capers's Recollections.
THE beginning of 1808 found the South Carolina
Conference in session in Camden, only twenty
miles away from Rembert Hall. In the twenty years
during which this Conference had been in existence
it had grown wonderfully, and had already produced
some of those remarkable men of whom it has had so
many. One of the most wonderful men it ever had
produced had now passed away, and Asbury paid a
tribute to him in his sermon. This was George
Dougherty, an Irishman by descent. He had
worked with great success in South Carolina and
Georgia. He was a man of unusual cultivation for
those days, a fine Greek and Hebrew scholar, who
had studied the advanced books on mental and moral
science, and was a fearless and eloquent preacher.
To him the Church owes the important law limiting
the pastoral term. Up to the time that he suggested
the law to limit it to two years, the bishops had been
at their own will as to how long a preacher should
remain in a charge. He had been the means of es
tablishing a rule in the South Carolina Conference
by which if a preacher left his circuit in times of
(248)

Francis Asbury. 2A7
pestilence he should travel no more amongst us.
His courage in rebuking sin in Charleston had so
angered the mob that they had dragged him to the
town pump, and would have murdered him but for
the intrepidity of a good woman, who stuffed her
apron in the mouth of the pump. He had died a
comparatively young man, and now Asbury preached
his funeral sermon.
This South Conference, as Asbury called it, had a
supply of preachers brought up within it. He was
no longer compelled to go to Virginia for his preach
ers, but promising boys, as he called them, were com
ing forward to take the charges, much to his grati
fication. James Russell, Lovick Pierce, Reddick
Pierce, William Arnold, W. M. Kennedy, John Col-
linsworth, Samuel Dunwody, men who were to act
the yeomen's part in the future, were now receiA'ing
appointments from his hand. He still was as indif
ferent to any rules of order as he had been when the
Conferences were composed of less than a dozen
men, but his will was regarded as law by those who
were under his charge. He gave all his thought to
arranging the work and advancing it. He kept ev
ery part of it under his eye, and was on the watch
continually for some devoted man to go to a new
field. Everything in these frontier Conferences was
formative, but he saw to it that no large section of
the country was left unsupplied. The Conferences
were not then business meetings, and every day at
noon at this Conference there was preaching. As
soon as the Conference was over he returned to Rem
bert's, and after a week's rest he began his journey
northward.

248 Francis Asbury.
Through the forest, over bad roads, on a lame
horse, cold, hungry, he journeyed. This, he says,
was one side; but then he had prayer, patience, peace,
and love, and he says he had the odds greatly in his
favor. He was sixty-three years old, and all the
burden of superintendency rested on his shoulders,
but he preached as regularly as the humblest circuit
preacher in the connection; and riding his lame mare
and preaching every day, he says his soul was very
happy in the Lord. He passed through the western
part of North Carolina, skirting the foothills, and
thence into Henry county — New Virginia, as it was
called. This was a comparatively new country, and
quite a rugged one. The frequent changes of weath
er and the wretched road made traveling disagree
able, but it was much worse in the cabins, crowded
with men, women, and children; no quiet place
for reading, writing, or meditation, and the woods
too cold for solitude. "We are weather-bound. I
employ my time in writing, reading, praying, and
planning." He was moving toward Lynchburg,
Avhich he reached in good time, and on Sunday
preached to about six hundred hearers, when he was
paid for all his toil. The Conference session began
on Tuesday. The Virginia Conference was a very
large, strong Conference, extending from New Berne,
North Carolina, to the Peaks of Otter. It had a
strong corps of preachers, and they were led by Jesse
Lee. They had more than once thwarted Asbury in
his aims, and had not only defeated his plan for a
council, but his plan for a called General Conference
which should be a delegated bodv; but now the Con
ference consented to do what he wished — to accept

Francis Asbury. 249
the New York proposition for a delegated General
Conference. Leaving Lynchburg, and traveling along through
the Virginia midland counties, he made his way to
Loudoun, where at the widow Roszel's he made a
short stay. He preached at Leesburg, and arrived
in Alexandria on the Sunday before the Conference
began. The Conference convened in session for a
week, and after traveling without fire, food, or wa
ter, on Wednesday afternoon he reached the city.
He was not able to tarry long anywhere. He was
anxious to complete his round, so that the Confer
ences should act before the General Conference in
May, and he hurried northward, where he held the
Philadelphia, then the New York, and then the New
England Conference; and after having made his
round, he reached Perry Hall again on May 2.
It was a sad coming. His dearest friend, after
Judge White and James Rembert, Harry Gough, was
dying. We have often had occasion to refer to him.
He was perhaps the wealthiest Methodist in Amer
ica. He belonged to the English nobility, and had
inherited a large estate from England, married into
the Ridgley family, and had begun life a rollicking
gentleman of those wild days. His wife, as we have
seen, had been converted through Asbury's influ
ence ; he had been converted also, and was for a time
very zealous. Then there was a time of backsliding
and an alienation from Asbury, but his spiritual fa
ther had been the means of his recovery again, and
for many years his country seat, Perry Hall, had been
Asbury's home. It was an elegant old colonial man
sion with a chapel in which his many slaA^es assem-

250 Francis Asbury.
bled for family worship, and where the circuit
preachers had service. Gough had been very dear
to Asbury and a true friend to the Church, and the
General Conference paid him no higher honors than
he deserved when many of the members walked in
procession to his grave. Asbury had long hoped for
a General Conference such as would give the west
and far south a fair place in the councils of the
Church, and the delegated Conference, he hoped,
would do that. In the histories of Methodism there
is a full account of this Conference. With it Asbury
individually had little to do. The idea which As
bury had of discipline led him to interfere whenever
he thought there was any danger of weakening au
thority. His favorite expression was that men who
did not know how to obey would not know how to
rule, but during this Conference he seems to have
taken even a less part than in those which went be
fore. This was the last general convention of Meth
odist preachers; the last General Conference of un
restricted powers. From this time forth the dele
gated Conference had to act in a limited sphere, and
the bishops were less under its control. The Con
ference elected William McKendree an associate
bishop. It is somewhat amusing that Bishop As
bury should refer to this election as he does in his
journal. "Dear brother McKendree," he says, "was
elected assistant bkhop." As McKendree was' not
elected assistant but associate bishop, with coordi
nate powers, the manner in which the old man re
garded it was characteristic. He had been from
1784 to 1808, for twenty-four years, unrestrained
and with undivided powers, and he had little idea of

Francis Asbury. 251
being now superseded or hampered. McKendree
was in the prime of his mature manhood, strong-
minded, strong-bodied, strong-willed ; a man of won
derful self -poise, of the most heroic moid, and withal
of the deepest piety. He had been in fact if not in
law a bishop for eight years, presiding over a dio
cese of immense area, and one which demanded the
highest qualities in its superintendent, and he had
met all its demands. If Asbury could have chosen
from the whole body the man he would have pre
ferred as his associate, it is likely that McKendree
would have been that man. And now for the first
time in the fourth of a century Asbury felt that he
could take a little rest ; but he did not do so. There
was a respite from imperious calls, but he spent this
month going on visiting and preaching among old
friends and old scenes.
When Asbury first came to Maryland in 1773, he
was a guest at Dr. Warfield's, where the elaborate
headdresses of the ladies distressed the strict young
bachelor. The doctor was living still, and he came
quite a distance to meet his old acquaintance. The
good bishop speaks as if the dear old doctor was still
out of the fold, for he says: "I should not regret
coming so many miles if I could be the means of
converting this dear man to God." He saw his old
friends the Willises, went to the parts of western
Maryland that he had visited years before, and with
his associate, Henry Boehm, went into southwestern
Pennsylvania. Some of his old friends rode sixty
miles to see him. Again the Western Conference
was to meet in Tennessee in October, and he had
planned a long itinerary to cover the land till the

252 Francis Asbury.
time came. He was in Wheeling August 1, but the
hot days and long hills almost made him cry out.
He reached Ohio, and went to a camp ground, and
then to the home of General Worthington, who had
married the daughter of his old friend Governor Tif
fin. Mary Tiffin, the governor's wife, had been very
dear to the bishop, and speaking of her loss, he says:
" The world little knows how dear to me are my many
friends, and how deeply I feel this loss."
He was now riding through Ohio. It was August.
He was feeble and worn, the heat was great, and the
flies wretchedly annoying, but his heart was glad
dened by the promise of great results from the camp
meetings. There was only one district in Ohio, and the coun
try was only now being settled. The discomforts
of the journey would have been great to a well man,
but to him they must have been distressing. At
brother Gatchell's he saw an unfeeling man about
to take away a poor widow's horse, and it so trou
bled him that brother Gatchell, to relieve him, paid
the debt and gave the animal to the widow for her
lifetime. During this trip he went into Indiana, where there
were already twenty thousand people, and crossing
the Ohio was again in Kentucky, and then made his
way through Kentucky — passing from its extreme
northern county through the entire state into Ten
nessee. On his way he met Benedict Swope, his old
German friend of thirty years before. McKendree
and Thompson came miles to meet him, and together
they made the journey to the camp meeting at which
the Western Conference was held. It was the first

Francis Asbury. 253
Conference McKendree had attended since he was
made bishop. Asbury, following his old habit, says :
"I began Conference, and preached twice on Sab
bath day and again on Tuesday." As soon as this
Conference, which was largely cared for by his old
friend Green Hill, had concluded its session he start
ed for the South Carolina Conference, which was to
meet in the heart of middle Georgia, December 26.
The Conference which ended its session was held in
Williamson county, Tennessee, a little south of Nash
ville. There was no direct route to Georgia, and
the two bishops, with their companions, started into
the wilderness. They had to journey over the moun
tains almost all the way. They crossed the Cumber
land range and then the Alleghanies. Asbury was
on a stumbling horse that would not only stumble
but run away. They had rain and high rivers, he had
several severe ailments, the houses were crowded,
the roads were rough, and the men were bad, but
despite it all, he says, he kept on his way. They
crossed the mountains into North Carolina, and then
along the foothills in South Carolina, and then to
Camden, where he lodged with the good old Sammy
Matthews. They had a camp meeting at Rembert's, late as the
season was. The weather was cold, and the super
intendents had a hut with a chimney to it. At this
camp meeting Asbury met his old friend Major Wil
liam Capers and his gifted son, whose after history
is so well known. Major Capers was converted years
before under the ministry of Henry Willis, and under
the influence of William Hammett had been alien
ated from Asbury, and gradually backslid. He had

254 Francis Asbury.
now been reclaimed, and his young son William, a law
student, had been converted. They were at camp
meeting, and Major Capers and Asbury met for the
first time in eighteen years. Asbury had not seen
William since he was an infant. He took him ten
derly in his arms, as he did his aged father. A year
after this, when the young lawyer had become a cir
cuit preacher, as Asbury and Boehm passed through
the young man's circuit, the incident occurred which,
told in the inimitable way of Bishop Capers, casts
such a mellow light on the lovely character of the old
bishop. Bishop Capers says :
I met him when a heavy snow had just fallen, and the
northwest wind blowing hard made it extremely cold. The
snow had not been expected, and our host was out of wood,
so that what we had to use had been picked up from under
the snow and was damp and incombustible. Our bedroom
was a loft with a fireplace to it and a plenty of wood, but how
to make the wood burn was the question. I had been at
work blowing and blowing long before bedtime till to my
mortification the aged bishop came up, and there was still
no fire to warm him. "0, Billy Sugar," said he as he ap
proached the fireplace, "never mind, give it up, we will get
warm in bed;" and then stepping to his bed as if to ascertain
the certainty of it, and lifting the bedclothes, he continued:
"Yes, give it up, Sugar; blankets a plenty." So I gave it up,
thinking that the play of my pretty strong lungs might dis
turb his devotions, for he was instantly on his knees.
But then how might I be sure of waking early enough to
kindle a fire at four o'clock? My usual hour had been six,
and to meet the difficulty I concluded to wrap myself in my
overcoat and lie on the bed without using the bedclothes.
In this predicament I was not likely to oversleep myself on
so cold a night. But there might be danger of my not know
ing what hour it was when I happened to wake. Nap after
nap was dreamed away, as I lay shivering in the cold, till I

Francis Asbury. 255
thought it must be four o'clock; and then, creeping to the fire
and applying the breath of my live bellows as I held the
watch to the reluctant coals, to see the hour, I had just made
it out when the soft accents saluted me: "Go to bed, Sugar.
It is hardly three o'clock yet."
Another night he says:
It was past four o'clock, and the bishop was up, but Billy
Sugar lay fast asleep. So he whispered to brother Boehm
not to disturb him, and the fire was made. They were
dressed, had had their devotions, and were at their books
before I was awake. This seemed shockingly out of order;
and my confusion was complete, as, waking and springing
out of bed, I saw them sitting before a blazing fire. I could
scarcely say good-morning, and the bishop, as if he might
have been offended at my neglect, affected not to hear it.
Boehm, who knew him better, smiled pleasantly, and I whis
pered in his ear: "Why didn't you wake me?" The bishop
seemed to hear this, and closing his book, and turning to me
with a look of downright mischief, had an anecdote for me.
"I was traveling," said he, "quite lately, and came to a cir
cuit where Ave had one of our good boys. Oh, he was so
good, and the weather was as cold as it was this night at
brother Hancock's, and, as I was Bishop Asbury, he got up
in the cold at three o'clock to make a fire for me. And what
do you think? He slept last night till six." And he tickled
at it as if he might have been a boy himself. And this was
Bishop Asbury, whom I have heard called austere; a man,
confessedly, who never shed tears, and who seldom laughed,
but whose sympathies were nevertheless as soft as a sancti
fied spirit might possess.
After the camp meeting was over the travelers
went on to Charleston, and from thence to the South
Carolina Conference, which met at a camp ground in
Green county, in Georgia. This was the first and
only Annual Conference in this section held in con
nection with a camp meeting or near a country
church. At this Conference William Capers was ad-

256 Francis Asbury.
mitted into the traveling connection. Asbury intro
duced McKendree, the new bishop, to the Confer
ence, and one by one they came forward and took
him by the hand.
At the General Conference of 1800 a resolution
was passed allowing an elder to travel constantly
with Bishop Asbury. He had had Hull, Lee, and
Whatcoat to accompany him as companions before
the resolution was adopted, and after that Crawford,
Snethen, and Daniel Hitt; and now he selected Hen
ry Boehm, the son of his old friend Martin Boehm,
the German pietist. Henry Boehm was now a
steady young German, thirty-three years old, who
had been a Methodist preacher for eight years. He
was Asbury's traveling companion for six years, and
assisted him greatly in his arduous work. Boehm
could preach in German and English, and as there
were scattered through the land a large number of
native Germans who did not speak English, Boehm's
services were of great value. Boehm lived to be over
a hundred years old, and during his hundredth year
a volume of his Reminiscences was issued. His
journal runs parallel to that of Asbury, and he says
little in it which Asbury does not say in his record.
During the year he traveled with the bishop from
the first of May. He was to meet him at Perry Hall
on a certain day, but he stopped at a camp meeting
and was detained a day beyond his time. When he
reached Perry Hall, Asbury was gone. By hard rid
ing he caught up with him, and accompanied him on
this long tour which left them at the end of the year
in the heart of middle Georgia.

CHAPTER XXXVI.
1809.
McKendreo's New Departure — Northward Tour — Conference at
Harrisonburg — Journey to New England — Western New
York — Western Conference in Cincinnati — Journey to
Charleston.
SINCE Asbury had taken the control of the Meth
odist societies in Delaware in 1780 until now he
had been the virtual dictator in the connection, at
least so far as directing the work was concerned.
Although Coke was legally his colleague, practically
he had no more to do with the work than if his name
had not been on the minutes. Whatcoat had been a
legal bishop, but he had yielded the entire control
to Asbury, and for all these years no will save As
bury's own had been considered in making appoint
ments. In making laws and regulations, and in
executing discipline, the Conferences had never been
at all interfered with by him, but in arranging the
work and appointing the men to do it he had con
sulted no one. He appointed presiding elders, and
when he was out of the way they acted as Aricar-gen-
erals, and ruled things as arbitrarily as he did, but
when he was on the ground, they were not his cab
inet to counsel, but his lieutenants to execute. He
felt the weight upon him, and longed for relief. He
had once determined to resign, but had been per
suaded not to do so. The time had now come when
there was some possibility of securing relief. Mc
Kendree, who had been elected in May, 1808, had
17 (257)

258 Francis Asbury.
been Asbury's trusted helper in the superintend-
ency for over ten years. He had been presiding
over districts in the east which covered half a state,
and in the west over a district which swept from the
Alleghany Mountains to the Mississippi River. He
had been in sole charge of this work for the years
that Asbury was an invalid, and in all the excite
ment and confusion resulting from the great awak
ening in the west out of which came such deplorable
results to other Churches, McKendree, by his strong
nerve and wonderful common sense, protected the
Methodist charges from greater harm. He had been
unknown in the east, but when he preached his first
sermon in Baltimore he was at once chosen as a bish
op. He had not accepted the office expecting anoth
er to do the work, and Asbury soon found he had a
colleague, and not an assistant. When McKendree
took the presidency of the Conference he made some
striking changes in the manner of conducting bus
iness. It had been conducted by Asbury in an in
formal and somewhat disorderly way. After Mc
Kendree had read his address in the General Con
ference of 1812, the old man rose and said, turning
to McKendree: "I have something to say to you be
fore all the brethren. You have done to-day what I
neArer did. I want to know why." McKendree calm
ly said: "You are our father, and do not need these
rules. I am a son, and do." "So, so!" said the old
bishop with a smile, as he sat down.
It would have been greatly to the relief of As
bury's brethren, as well as to his own, if he had con
sented to take a season of rest, and if he had left
to his younger and stronger companions the harder

Francis Asbury. 259
part of the work at least, but this he could not do.
He had been so unceasingly on the wing for nearly
fifty years that rest Avas not relief, and although
it was not really necessary for him to travel, he
thought it was, and did not abate his labors at all.
The beginning of the new year of 1809 found him
with McKendree, in a thirty-dollar chaise, riding
through middle Georgia on his way to Tarborough,
North Carolina, where the Virginia Conference was
to meet. He and his companion reached it in good
time and presided. This Conference included a
large part of North Carolina and all of Virginia
east of the Blue Ridge. There was one thing about
it which pleased Asbury greatly: there were but
three married men in it. He thought the opposition
of these high-toned southerners to the marriage of
their daughters to Methodist preachers was, after
all, a blessing, in that it kept the preachers single.
Asbury was not opposed to the marriage of laymen,
nor was he in favor of a coerced celibacy among the
preachers, but he found it so much easier to use
single men in the hard work demanded, and so much
easier to support them, that he looked upon the mar
riage of the preacher as a calamity, expecting that
soon after marriage there would come location.
I have already intimated that Asbury's view with
reference to the immediate abolition of slavery had
undergone a modification. He had ceased to write
in favor of emancipation in his journal, or to urge it
in the Conferences and from the pulpit. His hatred
of slavery as a system had not changed, his love for
the negro race was not at all diminished, but he was
satisfied that immediate emancipation was neither

260 Francis Asbury.
practicable nor judicious. He says in his journal,
February, 1809 : " Would not the amelioration of the
condition and treatment of slaves have produced
more practical good than any attempt at emancipa
tion? The state of society unhappily does not admit
this; besides, the blacks are thus deprived of the
means of instruction."
The Conference ended, the bishops rode by Suffolk
and Portsmouth, and on through central Virginia
across the mountains into the valley, where, at Har
risonburg, the Baltimore Conference was to have its
session. A large body of German pietists, Mennon-
ites, Dunkards, and Lutherans had settled in this
rich Valley of Virginia, as had quite a number of
families from eastern Virginia. Among the eastern
Virginians was a young physician named Harrison.
He was the father of the distinguished Gessner Har
rison, so famous as the Professor of Greek at the
University of Virginia, and the grandfather of the
distinguished authoress, Mrs. Mary Stuart Smith,
wife of Professor F. H. Smith, of the University of
Virginia. As soon as the Conference had conclud
ed its session the bishop went northward, and pass
ing through the Valley of Virginia entered Maryland
by Frederick City, and on to Baltimore. He spent
only a few days in the city of his early love. Al
though' it was March, a camp meeting was held near
Perry Hall, and the heart of the bishop was sad as he
passed near the home of his friend Henry Gough.
The Conference that met in Philadelphia, as well as
that which met in New York, gave him trouble ; and
he said that while he was not conscious of wrong tem
pers, he was not willing to hold a Conference again

Francis Asbury. 261
in Philadelphia, and that he should hold his peace
about some things which occurred in New York.
He had received much kindness from the Quakers
in his early days in Maryland, New Jersey, and Del
aware, but he felt it his duty now to rebuke them,
much to their annoyance, and to say that he feared
the reproach of Christ had been wiped away from
them. The reader has of course seen that the good
old bishop had a high standard of religious excel
lence, and perhaps in his opinion none but Metho
dists reached that, and very few of them. He went
on his way to New England. He had not been very
well pleased with matters on his first visit, and on
each succeeding one he had seen things in no better
light, and it was not very likely that as he grew old
er and more exacting he would find less to censure.
As they came into Newport he was horrified when
he saw a grand house, with a high steeple and pews,
built by a lottery. But when he came to Bristol
"the Methodists here had a house with pews and a
preacher who had not half enough to do. Poor work !
I have as much as I can bear," he said, "in body and
mind. I see what has been doing for nine years past
to make Presbyterian Methodists." If the piety of
the New Englanders had not improved, their hospi
tality had, for the bishop called at but one tavern.
When he reached Lynn, and had an interview
with the official brethren, they gave him a doleful
account of the condition of things: "the preachers
did not preach evangelically, did not visit the fam
ilies, and neglected the classes." The old bishop
listened respectfully enough, but said: "One story
was good till another was told." The New England

262 Francis Asbury.
Conference was to meet in Maine on the 15th of
June, and at New Gloucester it was held, and then
the travelers returned through New Hampshire into
Vermont, and across into upper New York, and then
into western New York, where they preached in
barns and slept on the floor, and now and then
preached in the courthouses. The Congregational-
ists, whom Asbury always calls Presbyterians, were
laboring to preempt the country by building churches
and establishing congregations. Asbury says some
what complacently: "They will flourish awhile, but
a despised people will possess the land. Oh, the
terrors of a camp meeting to these men of pay and
show!" The country was quite new, and accommo
dations were very poor. He says: "In the evening
we mounted our horses in the rain and came six
miles, dripping wet, to Asa Cummings's cabin,
twelve feet square. On Tuesday morning we were
well soaked before we reached David Eddy's. We
had an awful time on Thursday in the woods,
amongst rocks and trees, and behold the backwater
had covered the causeway. One finds it hard to re
alize that less than a hundred years ago, in so old
a state as New York, there was such a new and un
settled state of things. In upper Pennsylvania mat
ters were worse. "Such roads, such rains, and such
lodgings!" he says. "Why should I wish to stay in
this land? I have no possessions or babes to bind
me to the soil. What are called the comforts of life
I rarely enjoy. The wish to live an hour such a life
would be strange to so suffering, so toil-worn a
wretch. But God is with me, and souls are my re
ward. I may yet rejoice; yea, I will rejoice."

Francis Asbury. 263
The sensitive eld man generally, indeed almost
universally, received great kindness, but sometimes
it was not his good portion. "I called at a certain
house," he says. "It would not do. I was com
pelled to turn out again to the pelting of the wind
and rain. Though old I have eyes. The hand of
God will come upon them. As for the young lady,
shame and contempt will fall on her. Mark the
event." Asbury nearly always preached on Sunday,
and rarely traveled on that day; but sometimes he
did, and on this journey he says: "Sunday 23. — We
must needs ride to-day; our route lay through Wal
nut Bottom, but we missed our way and the preach
ing of George Lane. A twenty - four mile ride
brought us to breakfast at Otis's. Brother Boehm
upset the sulky and broke the shaft. Night closed
upon us at Osterout's tavern." They made their
way through the mountains, and although the roads
were so rough, he says he was simple enough to put
plasters on his knees, and they drew huge blisters,
so he neither stood to preach nor kneeled to pray.
Two days afterwards he preached in the courthouse,
and while he was preaching the presiding elder put
his feet on the banister of his pulpit; "it was like
thorns in his flesh till they were taken down." He
had supplied himself with tracts in German and
English, which he gave away. Cold and chilly as he
was, he went to camp meeting and preached; and
the two bishops made their way to Pittsburg, where
the "Rev. Mr. Steel offered, unsolicited, in the name
of the Presbyterian eldership, their elegant house
for my Sunday exercises."
The bishops were moving toward Ohio to meet

264 Francis Asbury.
the Western Conference, which was to meet in Cin
cinnati on the 30th of September; and passing
through Wheeling, in which Colonel Zane had given
ground for a chapel, he preached in the courthouse,
and went into Ohio. He said he was weak and weary,
but had great consolation in God and a witness of
holiness in his soul. Why he said it then I cannot
conjecture, but he adds to this: "We have our diffi
culties with married preachers, their wives and chil
dren, but while God is with us these difficulties must
be borne." The camp meeting was now spreading
all over the west. It was a very primitive affair.
A grove was chosen near a stream, logs were cut
down for seats, a simple stand was made for the
preacher, and the people literally camped out for
days. These meetings Asbury so heartily indorsed
that he wished there might be twenty in a week in
the various parts of the work. His old friend Gov
ernor Tiffin was now plain Dr. Tiffin, and he called to
see him. While the talk of others was of politics,
and of land, he had little taste for these topics.
"O Lord, give me souls," he says, "and keep me
holy." McKendree had gone in one direction, and
he was going in another. Ohio was being peopled
with marvelous rapidity, and there had been but lit
tle time for comforts to be provided. Asbury says :
"I slept about five hours last night. I had excessive
labor, a crowd of company and hogs, dogs, and other
annoyances to weary me." At last the bishops met
at Cincinnati, which Asbury calls "fair Cincinnati,"
where they had the Western Conference, and after
its close he went into Kentucky.
The Conference was to meet in South Carolina in

a
Francis Asbury. 265
two months' time, but Asbury and McKendree were
in Kentucky, and there was a ride of several hun
dred miles to Charleston where the Conference was
to meet. Eight times, he says, within nine years
had he crossed these Alps, and was under the neces
sity of putting up at the wretched inns where there
were drinking and carousing. He made the journey
safely, and at last on the 10th of December was
again in Charleston. Here for two weeks he re
mained and recruited, and the first day of 1810 found
the untiring man again on the highway.
Henry Boehm, who was Asbury's traveling com
panion, kept a journal, from which, fifty years after
Asbury's death, he published extracts, which add
something to the information given by the bishop
himself. The journey through the mountains of
eastern Pennsylvania, when Boehm was thrown
from the sulky and badly hurt, though not disabled,
was specially memorable. The roads were awful,
and the rain poured in torrents. The mountain
streams were dangerously high, and they were in a
wilderness. On the banks of the Elk, where it was
too high to cross, they met an eccentric Englishman
who was living alone in the wilds, four miles from
any other person, and in a homely cabin. He re
ceived the strangers and kept them with him for
several days. Boehm said as he held the purse and
knew that they had but two dollars between them,
th3 hospitality of the hermit was for more than
one reason grateful to them. The sturdy young
German was required to put out his full strength to
keep up with the untiring old man, who never knew
the meaning of the word rest.

CHAPTER XXXVII.
1810.
Asbury and McKendree on Their Second Tour — The Virginia
Conference — Mary Witney's Funeral — New York Conference
— New England— Jesse Lee's History — Lee and Asbury —
Genesee Conference— Western Conference— Senator Taylor.
THE Virginia Conference was to meet early in
February in Petersburg, and to meet it the
bishops were compelled to push forward very rapid
ly. The winter was very severe, and they had rain
and snow in abundance. Pressing on through up
per South Carolina, they passed through Fayette-
ville in North Carolina, on to Wilmington, where
Asbury was gratified to find things greatly bettered,
and on through New Berne and Edenton into east
ern Virginia. Rising at four, they were often on
the road at five, and rode fifty miles a day. Poor
Henry Boehm, the youngest of the company, with
an awful cough and fevers, suffered more than his
older associates. The ride was made, however, in
time to meet the Conference on the 9th of February,
and on the 25th he was in Baltimore. After the
Conference he made his usual visit to the eastern
shore. It was McKendree's first visit, but here As
bury had labored for over thirty years, and those
who in infancy were dandled on his knee received
him into their homes. The Philadelphia Confer
ence met at Easton, in Maryland, and after its ad
journment he went northward. At Chester he
(266)

Francis Asbury. 267
preached the funeral of a good woman whom he
often mentions. Mary Withey, "who kept the best
inn on the continent, and always received the preach
ers," entertained the young English missionary in
1772. Under his prayer in family worship she was
convicted, and afterAvards happily converted. She
formed a society in Chester, and for all these years
her house had been his home. Asbury said "she
had Martha's anxieties and Mary's humility." Thus
his old friends were leaving him: Eliza Dalham,
Sarah Gough, Mary Tiffin, Mary Rembert — all sis
ters to the tender-hearted, homeless exile, who de
serve to be mentioned in the story of Methodism.
He was now passing over ground he had often trav
eled, and preaching in churches in which he had
ministered for twoscore years.
The New York Conference met at Pittsfield, Mas
sachusetts, and the New England Conference at
Winchester, New Hampshire. After the Conference
closed he came into Massachusetts again. He says :
"Our preachers get wives and a home and run to
their dears almost every night. How can they by
personal observation know the state of the families
it is a part of their duty to watch over for good?"
In Rhode Island he says: "Oh, the death — the for
mality in religion! Surely the zealous, noisy Meth
odists cannot but do good here." At Bristol where
they had the church with pews and a steeple, he
spoke with power to their consciences, "but their
favorite preacher was removed, and saints and sin
ners were displeased." "We are on our lees here —
no riding of circuits, local preaching and stations
filled in the to\vns."

268 Francis asbury.
Jesse Lee had written his History ; the General Con-:
ference refused to publish it, and Lee had published
it on his own account. Asbury says of it: "I have
seen Jesse Lee's History for the first time; it is bet
ter than I expected. He has not always presented
me under the most favorable aspects. We are all
liable to mistakes, and I am unmoved by his. I cor
rect him in one fact : my compelled seclusion at the
beginning of the war was in nowise a season of in
activity. On the contrary, except about two months
of retirement, it was the most active, most useful,
and most afflictive part of my life. If I spent a few
dumb Sabbaths, if I did not, for a short time, steal
after dark, or through the gloom of the woods, as
was my wont, from house to house, to enforce the
truth, I (an only child) had left father and mother
to proclaim, I shall not be blamed, I hope, when it is
known that my patron, Thomas White, was taken
into custody by the light-horse patrol ; if such things
happened to him, what might I expect, a fugitive
and an Englishman?" Those who have read the
journal of these years can see the justice of this de
fense. The fact was that the burly Virginian and
the delicate, sensitive Englishman were not likely
to understand each other. They were equally good
men, and each filled well the place in which a good
Providence had placed him, but they were as little
likely to understand each other as Luther was to
understand Calvin. They could each work and
work well, but they could not work together. Those
who have studied Mr. Wesley's life have seen how
impossible it was for him to see eye to eye with any
of his equals. No one had a gentler and less selfish

Fsancis Asbury. 269
spirit than Asbury, but it was with him "Caesar or
no one." The two men who did the most for Meth
odism in the east were Lee and Asbury, but the two
were as different as Paul and Peter, and agreed no
better. The bishops had, by their volition, set off a part
of western New York and Pennsylvania into a Con
ference, to be called the Genesee, and its first ses
sion was to be held at Lyons, in western New York;
and after the tour in New England, they made their
way toward the village in which it was to be held.
After a hard and rapid ride they reached Lyons and
held the Conference, July 20, 1810. It included a
part of New York, Pennsylvania, and Canada. As
bury spent the rest of the summer visiting camp
meetings and preaching in the villages and country
places of western Pennsylvania. He was not well,
and he said: "Lord, prepare me by thy grace for the
patient endurance of hunger, heat, labor, the clown-
ishness of ignorant piety, the impudence of the im
pious, unreasonable preachers, and more unreason
able heretics and heresy."
The Western Conference was to meet the 1st of
November, and the two bishops made a visitation,
such as they had made the year before, to the rapid
ly groAving churches of Ohio, and into Kentucky.
Bishop Asbury at this time was, perhaps, better ac
quainted with all parts of the United States than
any one man in its boundary. He was known and
honored everywhere. The people whom he met, as
he trudged along over the hills and mountains of
western Pennsylvania, knew him by name. He was
no longer what he had once been in the pulpit. His

270 Francis Asbury.
sermons were disconnected, but earnest — often pa
thetic — talks. He was sometimes severe, and, he said,
he feared too strong in his censures; but all knew
the warm, tender heart which lay back of it all. He
was sometimes petulant and childish in his inter
course with the preachers, but all who knew him,
and by this time nearly all did know him, knew how
warmly he loved those he chided. His travels were
much over the same routes, and his journals are
monotonous accounts of the same hardships. He
ought not at his age to have attempted what he did
attempt, but on he went untiring and undaunted.
The journey through Kentucky was without adven
ture. He passed through Frankfort, where as yet
the Methodists had no house of worship. He
preached in Nicholasville and Winchester, and here
he saw his old friend Francis Poythress, whose mind
had given way, and who was being cared for by his
sister, Mrs. Lyons. He says: "If thou be'st he, oh
how fallen!"
With much difficulty they made their way to
Columbia, where the South Carolina Conference
had its session. Senator Taylor, of the United
States Congress, was a Methodist, and he lent the
Conference his home for its session. As soon as the
Conference adjourned Asbury started on his annual
visit to Charleston, and in a few days he was in his
old quarters in the Bethel parsonage.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.
1811.
Asbury in His Old Age— Sweetness of His Character— Criticism
on Adam Clarke— Visits Canada —Returns to the States-
Goes to Ohio and Southward to Georgia.
ASBURY was now sixty-six years old, and had
been forty years in America. He was not
really an old man, but hard labor, great exposure,
and needless austerity had taxed a naturally frail
constitution too heavily; and while he was not old
in years, he was in fact. He ought to have rested,
but he could not. He had been traveling constantly
for forty-six years, and he could not be still. So he
left South Carolina immediately after the Confer
ence closed, and went to the Virginia Conference at
Raleigh, North Carolina, and to the Baltimore Con
ference at Pipe Creek. He saw the widow of his old
friend Henry Willis, and says: "Henry Willis! ah,
when shall I look on his like again?" ,He trembled
for these Baltimore preachers, who had such ease
and comfort, and wondered how they could retain
the spirit of religion amid such pleasant surround
ings ; and he was much distressed over the marriage
of four young preachers, which would take $800
from the funds.
It was a pleasing thing to him now to meet the
children of his old parishioners, and find a shelter
in their homes. There was no place so dear to him
as Maryland. The Howards, the Warfields, the Hig-
'271)

272 Francis Asbury.
ginses, the Owings, the Dallams, the Goughs, the
Rogerses, and others, had been his friends for forty
years. The good old man, always gentle and tender, had
become more so in his later years, and in his anxiety
to do good, so far as we can. see, he taxed himself
needlessly, and inflicted upon himself such suffer
ings by his persistence in doing what he believed to
be his duty that reading his journal becomes posi
tively painful; but his religious comfort was now
continuous. He says: "Sometimes I am ready to
cry out, 'Lord, take me home to rest;' courage, my
soul!" "At Benjamin Sherwood's I stopped a mo
ment and called the family to prayer." "Came to:
night to Major Taylor's. Monday my kind enter
tainer and family made me a promise to be hence
forth for God." "I feel great consolation and per
fect love." "I rode sixteen miles to see brother
Wilson in his affliction." "Oh, the clover of Balti
more Circuit! Ease, ease, not for me — toil, suffer
ing, coarse food, hard lodging, bugs, fleas, and cer
tain etceteras besides."
He went over the same ground he had traversed
in 1772, and found a few of his old friends living.
The seed he had then sown had brought forth abun
dantly, and the Methodists were now numerous, and
Methodist churches were all along his route. The
old homes which received him then were here still,
and he sought them out. The Dallam and Bennett
and Garrettson homes were still here, and, while the
old people were gone, the children welcomed the
patriarchal bishop whom they had loved from their
infancy.

Francis Asbury. 273
It was his rule to speak to all who came into his
presence on their soul's interest, which sometimes,
he says, he was not ready to do. "I covenanted
with General Burleson to pray for him every day."
"A poor afflicted widow called on me; for what do
I live but to do good and teach others so to do by
precept and example?"
New Jersey had not been fruitful ground for the
Methodists, and he says: "I am unknown in Jersey,
and ever shall be, I presume ; after forty years' labor
we have not ten thousand in membership." "I read
Adam Clarke, and am amused as well as instructed.
He indirectly unchristianizes all old bachelors. Woe
is me ! It was not good for Adam to be alone for bet
ter reasons than any Adam Clarke has given."
"We came to Middleburg (Vermont); here is col
lege craft and priestcraft." The heat was great,
the roads were wretched, and he was suffering much
with his feet; but he pressed on into Canada, where
there were quite a number of Methodists, and made
his first and only visit to that province. Along the
banks of the St. Lawrence and the shores of Lake
Ontario a considerable body of settlers, most of them
Americans, had fixed their homes; and to them mis
sionaries from the states had been sent, and now
there were several circuits supplied with preachers
from the Genesee Conference. Bishop Asbury part
ed from McKendree in Vermont, and with Bela
Smith as his guide and Boehm as a companion, he
struck out for the new settlements. He crossed
Lake Champlain, and preached in a barroom at
Plattsburg, and then began his journey to the settle
ments by entering the wilderness. He came out of
18

274 Francis Asbury.
it at the village of the Indians where the St. Regis
River enters the St. Lawrence. The Indians put the
travelers across the wide and rapid river by lashing
their canoes together and putting the horses and
men in them. Safely over the river, the mission
aries made their way from settlement to settlement,
preaching as they went, until they reached Lake
Ontario. Here they took a scow as a ferryboat to
go across the lake to Sackett's Harbor. It was a
fearful voyage, for a storm burst on the rickety old
boat; and after being in great peril of wreck, the*
captain anchored the scow near an island, where
Asbury, lying on a pile of hay, and covered with the
saddle blankets, passed the night. The next day
the weary man, tortured with rheumatism, was in
the wilds of western New York. He was too ill to
travel, and Boehm, who tells of this journey, left
him and went himself to fill an appointment forty
miles away, and then by an all-night ride returned
and accompanied him to the Genesee Conference,
which met in Oneida. This section of western New
York was comparatively new, and the rides were
hard at the best, but his feet were in a wretched
condition; and poor "Spark," his faithful beast, was
lame. He was forced to sell him; and as the bish
op rode off on his new mare, poor "Spark" nickered
his "good-by," and it went to his heart. "Jane,"
"Fox," and "Spark," the three beasts who bore him,
do much to make one hope that Mr. Wesley's theory
of the second life of good quadrupeds may be true.
The eight Conferences had furnished twenty-five dol
lars each for traveling expenses, of which the bishop
had expended one hundred and thirty dollars.

Francis Asbury. 275
He says he was unspeakably happy in God, and
when he reached father Boehm' s he wished to rest,
but they would have him away to the camp meeting;
and with inflamed feet, and a high fever, and a wast
ing dysentery, he went and preached. Good father
Boehm had some old Rhenish wine of his own make
which refreshed him; and could the weary old bishop
have rested long enough he might have sooner re
covered, but he could only rest a little while, and
then he was on his way again.
Through southern Pennsylvania he went again
into Ohio. He crossed the center of the state, and
was among old friends, some of whom he had known
in Virginia and Maryland. He searched for his old
friends, and among them found John Death, whom
he had known in the Monongahela. He had been
spiritually dead, the bishop said, but his old friend
dug him up.
The Western Conference met at Cincinnati, and at
this Conference in 1811 James B. Finley was or
dained a deacon. Mr. Finley wrote in an after time
some very interesting reminiscences of these times,
and gives an incident of this Conference which was
characteristic. "Bishop Asbury said to the preach
ers: 'Brethren, if any of you shall have anything
peculiar in your circumstances that should be
known to the superintendent in making your ap
pointment, if you will drop me a note, I will, as far
as will be compatible with the great interests of
the Church, endeavor to accommodate you.' I had
a great desire to go west, because I had relatives,
which called me in that direction, and it would be
more pleasant to be with them; so I sat down and

276 Francis Asbury.
addressed a polite note to the bishop, requesting him
to send me west. My request was not granted. I
was sent a hundred miles east. I said to him: 'If
that's the way you answer prayers, you will get no
more prayers from me.' 'Well,' he said, 'be a good
son, James, and all things will work together for
good.' "
He then came into Kentucky, and here there is a
break in his journal, for the next entry puts him in
the center of Georgia at Littleberry Bostwick's, in
Louisville. He went to Burke, Scriven, Effingham,
and reached Savannah, where the new church was
just begun, and back again to Camden, South Caro
lina, where the Conference was held, and to Charles
ton, where he ended the year 1811.

CHAPTER XXXIX.
1812.
Near the Close — General Conference — Presiding Eldership-
Benson's Life of Fletcher — Ohio — Nashville.
THE Virginia Conference was to meet in Rich
mond, February 20, and Asbury made his way
directly to it. It was the first session of a Methodist
Conference in Richmond. The old parts of Virginia
where Methodism had won such triumphs were now
being largely drawn upon for emigrants to the south
and west, but the newer parts of the state were rap
idly filling up. He says little of the Conference ses
sion, save that the number of preachers stationed
was smaller than usual. The Conference began on
Thursday, the 20th. Among the preachers who at
tended the Conference was Dr. Samuel K. Jennings,
who was selected afterwards as Asbury's biogra
pher, and who, he says, was much followed. Leaving
Richmond as soon as Conference adjourned, he rode
down the James and visited again Williamsburg and
Yorktown. He found this ancient city declining in
numbers and in wealth because of the decrease of
trade and the prevalence of strong drink.
He was on his way to the Baltimore Conference,
which was to meet at Leesburg on the 20th of March.
Here in this good old city there was a happy Confer
ence, as there was in Phildelphia. The General
Conference of 1812, the first delegated General Con
ference, was to meet in New York, and on May 1st
(277)

278 Francis Asbury.
it convened. The General Convention of 1808 had
restricted the powers of the General Conference,
and Asbury, who was very jealous of any limit upon
the powers of the bishops to appoint, had hoped that
after the decisive action of the General Conference
of 1808 the agitation about the eldership would
cease, but he found himself greatly deceived. His
old colleagues, Lee and Snethen, were on the side of
the progressives, who desired to make the presiding
elders elective. These, as Asbury said, were great
men, but they were defeated. While Asbury was
traveling through Georgia, twenty years before, he
had met Colonel Few, who wTas a Marylander and
one of the first senators from Georgia. He had re
moved to New York, and here Asbury met him and
breakfasted with him. The wife of brother Seney,
whose descendant, George I. Seney, has made his
name and memory so precious, had been a leader in
the good work of raising a handsome contribution
for the poor preachers of the New England Confer
ence, which Asbury carried with him. One of his
striking characteristics was his attachment to old
friends and to the homes in which he had stayed.
For years together he never changed his stopping
places, and what Perry Hall in Maryland, and Lott
Ballard's in North Carolina, and Rembert's in South
Carolina, and Grant's in Georgia were, was mother
Sherwood's, twenty-four miles from New York. At
Albany the New York Conference was to convene.
It met at the same time with the Synod of the Re
formed Dutch Church. In Lynn, where the first
Methodist chapel was built, he was disturbed by the
proposition to place a steeple on the new meeting-

Francis Asbury. 279
house, and he said if it was done it must not be
by Methodist order or by Methodist money. After
leaving Lynn, they went without adventure to west
ern New York, where, in Lyons again, the Genesee
Conference was to be held. He found his old
friends scattered all over this new country, and
reached Lyons in good time, where he had a pleasant
session of the Conference, and then through the
excessive heat of July he pressed over these wild
hills into Pennsylvania. In those days there was a
general laxity in the matter of drinking alcoholic
liquors, and among these bibulous Germans drinking
was all but universal. Asbury was always an un
compromising foe of drink of all kinds. He says:
"The Germans are decent in their behavior in this
neighborhood, and it would be more so were it not
for vile whisky — this is the prime curse of the Unit
ed States."
On his way southward he passed through Middle-
town, Maryland, where he had at last a small chapel,
and to Hagerstown, where he preached in the new
church. He rode on through Cumberland, and vis
ited the camp ground near by. He made it a rule to
speak to all he met on the subject of their soul's in
terest, and his gray hairs and saintly aspect always
secured to him a hearing. While he was on this
trip he read, as he rested, Benson's Life of Fletcher,
and says: "Comparing myself with Fletcher, what
am I in piety, wisdom, labor, or usefulness? God
be gracious unto me." The recluse of Madeley and
the working bishop of America could not well be
compared ; but if they were to be, the American bish
op is not the one who would stand lowest in the

280 Francis Asbury.
popular verdict. The old man's heart was glad
dened by seeing the immense crowds who flocked
to the camp grounds which he visited on his way to
the growing west. He passed through Ohio, and
attended the first session of the Ohio Conference,
which met in Chillicothe, October 1. His rest at
night had been broken. A severe neuralgia had
kept him awake, and yet he preached three times
at this Conference. On the last day he says his
strength failed. "I want sleep, sleep, sleep." On
Wednesday, exhausted, he stole away and slept for
three hours, and then they called him up to read the
stations. The Tennessee Conference was to meet near Nash
ville on the 1st of November, and he must try to
reach it; and though feverish and worn as he was,
he began the journey. Through Ohio they came into
Kentucky, and then through Kentucky into Middle
Tennessee. On this tour he made his first visit to
Louisville, Kentucky, which he says was "a growing
town, where we had a neat brick house, thirty by
thirty-eight;" and then directly to Nashville, where
the kind jailer took them in charge and entertained
them. There was now in Nashville a new neat brick
house, thirty-four feet square, with galleries. Green
Hill, his old North Carolina friend, was living not
far from Nashville, and he visited him and went on
to the camp ground at Fountain Head, where the
Conference was held; and then over rocks, hills,
roots, and stumps he made his way to East Tennes
see, across the Cumberland mountains; and then
through North Carolina into South Carolina; and
exposed to the intense cold of December, he reached

Francis Asbury. 281
Charleston, where the Conference was to meet, De
cember 19.
He made the long circuit without resting a week.
Mile by mile he kept up with his more vigorous com
panions. He had virtually given the bishop's work
into the hands of his colleague. He ordained and
preached and advised about appointments, but he
realized the fact that he was no longer able to do the
work of a bishop. He had now but one work, and it
was to do as much good as he could. He carried
Bibles with him to give away. He scattered tracts.
He visited the sick and dying. He spoke to all about
their souls, and prayed wherever he stopped, either
at inn or private house. He had reached a period of
perfect rest in his religious experience. The revival
fire was burning wherever he went, the burdens of
the superintendency were no longer resting heavily
upon him, and his health, though by no means good,
was as strong as it had been for some years. He was
greatly beloved, and he was very happy in knowing
that he was. Of no man could it be said more truly
than of him that his walk was in heaven and that
his life was hid with Christ in God. He had now
neared the end of his labors, and was to have only
one more year of really efficient work. Henceforth
the shadows deepened, and the time when no man
can work drew on rapidly, but as yet he did not real
ize the fact that the time for rest was near at hand,
and worked on as aforetime.

CHAPTER XL.
1813.
Asbury's Last Effective Year — Northward Again — Whitehead's
Life of Wesley— Things in New England — Western Journal
— Epistle to McKendree — Charleston Again.
IN 1813 the good old bishop was steadily declining.
He had now been forty-two years in America and
nearly fifty years in the regular ministry. Expos
ure, and perhaps injudicious medication, had done
much to break him down, but his indomitable will
kept him on his feet. The first of January, 1813,
found him in Georgetown, South Carolina. After
twenty-nine years of labor they had a church and
a preacher's home in Georgetown, and they had one
thousand black and one hundred white members —
most of them women — in the society. He spent a
few days catching up with his correspondence, and
then; lame and with high fever, through the rain he
came to Fayetteville, North Carolina. With a blis
tered foot, too feeble to walk to church, he was car
ried into it, where he preached sitting, and ordained
two deacons and one elder. He came back to his
lodgings with a high fever and applied four blisters,
and for two days was closely confined to his bed. At
Wilmington he was carried into the church and
preached morning and evening, and then with swoll
en feet he made his way by his usual route, stemming
the cold wind, to his friend Ballard's. He was sadly
lame, and could not wear his leather shoe, but he
(282)

Francis Asbury. 283
pressed on, preaching and working. At Thomas
Lee's he preached and gained a fever and a clear con
science by his labors. On his way he got an insight
into Whitehead's Life of Wesley. His only com
ment on this book, so offensive to the early Meth
odists, is: "I have looked into Whitehead's Life of
Wesley. He is vilified. Oh, shame!" Through south
eastern Virginia and eastern Virginia he made his
way by the usual route into Maryland, preaching as
he went, though he could not stand. At last he
reached Baltimore. His old friend Otterbein came
to see him. Asbury was remarkable for the strength
and duration of his friendships. He never seems
to have lost a friend to whom he had given his heart
Avithout reserve, and this good old German was es
pecially dear to him. Conference was in session, and
Asbury ordained the deacons and McKendree the
elders. If the good old bishop had any weakness
which was apparently pronounced, it was his failure
to recognize in his journal the labors of others be
sides himself; and unless one knew it to be a fact, he
would not learn from the journal that McKendree
was with him at this or at other Conferences. The
war was on the land, and there were confusion and
danger, but he pressed on ; his friends would gladly
have sheltered him and relieved him from toil and
exposure, but he felt that he must work on, and, fee
ble as he was, he says he "preached nearly two hours
and had gracious access to God." And on the next
day he says : "I was weary and faint, and returned to
my sick bed to take medicine." The dear old bishop
needed some protection from his friends as well as
from himself, for he says : "After a ride of twenty-five

284 Francis Asbury.
miles I was requested to preach at a moment's warn
ing, and I found an assembly ready. It would seem
as if the preachers think they are committing a sin if
they do not appoint preaching for me every day, and
often twice a day. Lord, support us in our labor,
and we will not murmur." The New York Confer
ence was held, and he went into New England and to
New Hampshire, where he stopped to dine with the
"nice Websters, in Greenfield." "My knee," he said,
"is swelled again." He was not pleased with Win
chester, where the Conference met, nor, for all that,
with the state of religion in the country. "Like
priest, like people, in these parts, both judicially
blind. This town is not reformed by Methodist Con
ference or Methodist preaching." He made his an
nual tour through the New England states, preach
ing as he went. He was never quite able to get rec
onciled to New England ways, and says : "I have diffi
culties to encounter, but I must be silent; my mind is
in God. In New England we sing, we build houses,
we eat, and stand at prayer. Here preachers locate
and people support them, and have traveling preach
ers also. Were I to labor forty-two years more, I
suppose I should not succeed in getting things right.
Preachers have been sent away from Newport by an
apostate. Oh, vain steeple houses, bells (organs by
and by)! these things are against me and contrary to
the simplicity of Christ. We have made a stand in
the New England Conferences against steeples and
pews, and shall probably give up the houses unless
the pews are taken out."
The old bishop's favorite remedy for his many
physical ills seemed to be tartar emetic. No Thomp-

Francis Asbury. 285
sonian of later day ever relied more on the tincture
of lobelia than he did on tartar, and when he was
very unwell he had recourse to this remedy. He
said: "My dinner and supper to-day have been tartar
emetic." He was an intense Methodist, there could be no
question of that; and it could not be said that he had
a lofty opinion of the piety of other Churches, and
especially of Congregationalists, or, as he called
them, Presbyterians; but he despised narrow bigot
ry, and says: "I never knew the state of the Metho
dist chapel in New Durham until now. It was
bought of the Presbyterians, carried five miles and
rebuilt within hearing of the Independents' church.
There is surely little of the mind of Christ in all this,
and I will preach no more in it. Should the Meth
odists have imitated the low Dutch who treated
them exactly thus in Albany?"
The travelers pressed on to New York to the Gene
see Conference, which met in Oneida county. The
dear old man says pathetically: "I have suffered
much from hunger, heat, and sickness in the last two
hundred and seventy miles. If we were disposed to
stop at taverns, which we are not, our funds would not
allow it always when we need refreshment and food.
We have not brethren in every place, and the east is
not hospitable Maryland, or the south." The journey
southward, through the rough country of southern
New York and northern Pennsylvania, was one of
usual difficulty those rude days. At all the houses
at which he stopped, either to spend the night or to
dine, he had religious service; and generally his
services were respectfully received, but not always

286 Francis Asbury.
so. He says: "We put into a house at the Great
Bend, in Pennsylvania, and stopped to dine. Here 1
lectured, sung, and prayed with the infidels of the
house; some stared, some smiled, and some wept.
The lady asked me to call again as I passed. 'Yes,
madam; on condition you will do two things: read
your Bible, and betake yourself to prayer.' " On his
way he stopped at Daniel Montgomery's. His wife,
he said, was his old friend Mollie Wallis; "but oh,
how changed in forty-two years! Time has been
eighty years at work on her wrinkled face." At Ja
cob Gerhart's the company went to bed and "I," he
says, "sat up hulling peas, and I am to preach at six
o'clock." On the next day, as they traveled, "we
asked for food, and were told a tavern was near.
Our money was scarce. We had borrowed five dol
lars, which will barely be enough, perhaps, to bring
us through this inhospitable district."
It was during this tour that he wrote that long,
rambling epistle to McKendree, which is published
in full in Paine's Life of McKendree, giving his
views of the episcopacy. Feeble as he was, he went
to camp meetings, and pressed on his way to the Ohio
Conference, which met at Chillicothe on September
1; and then to Kentucky to the Tennessee Confer
ence, which met at Reese Chapel. He realized that
his sun was setting, and as he stopped to rest he
wrote his valedictory address to the presiding elders.
He says little in his journal of the toils of this weary
journey. He came through North Carolina and
South Carolina into Georgia. He rode through
Georgia as far as Savannah, and into South Carolina
again; spent a little while in Charleston, and closed

Francis Asbury. 287
the last year of unbroken toil at Rembert's. This
was Asbury's last year of continuous toil. The next
two years of his life were broken into by repeated
attacks which confined him to his bed. He realized
that the end was not far off, and very grandly he
prepared for his departure. He surrendered to his
colleague the entire charge of the work, wrote his
farewell to the presiding elders, made his will, and
then went on doing all he could. The work he had
done during the year had been at great cost of suffer
ing, and all could see, save the man himself, that he
ought to have sought some quiet home and waited
for his change; but the feebler he grew the harder he
worked.

CHAPTER XLI.
1814-1815.
The Sun Going Down— Goes Northward — Long Attack of Sick
le ness in Pennsylvania — John Wesley Bond — McKendree
Crippled — Reaches Nashville — Georgia for the Last Time —
Goes Northward — The West Again — Surrenders All Control
to McKendree.
ASBURY spent ten days in Charleston and re
cruited his strength someAvhat, and if he could
have been persuaded to remain longer in its bracing
and balmy air his life might have been prolonged;
but he had suffered so much and was so accustomed
to the invalid life he had led that while he could
ride he felt that he could not rest. Time was so
short, he said, he must go. On January 1, 1814, he
preached at Rembert's, and in company with some
of his South Carolina brethren he began his journey.
He visited and prayed with his old friends along the
route, and reached Fayetteville in five days.
He now had but one topic in every sermon. "He
was divinely impressed," he said, "to preach sancti
fication in every sermon." The South Carolina Con
ference met in Fayetteville, and was a heavenly,
spiritual, and united Conference. After its adjourn
ment he remained a week, and then, enjoying great
peace of mind, he came away. On this journey he
met William Glendening. The old Scotchman had
once been his warm friend, and afterwards his stern
opponent; but as was the case with O'Kelly, so now
with Glendening, the old veterans met and embraced
(288)

.Francis Asbury. 289
each other, and parted in peace. Preaching and vis
iting his brethren, he made his way to Norfolk, Avhere
the Virginia Conference was to meet; but the exx>os-
ure had been too great for him, and when he reached
Norfolk he had a severe attack of pleurisy, which
confined him for two weeks; but he got out of his
sick bed, and through excessive cold made his way
to Baltimore. During the whole session he was sick,
but he preached the funeral sermon of his dear friend
Otterbein. He says of him: "Forty years have I
known the retiring modesty of this man of God, tow
ering, majestic, above his fellows in learning, wis
dom, and grace, and yet seeking to be known only of
God and the people of God. He had been sixty years
a minister, fifty years a converted one." The friend
ship between Otterbein and Asbury was very beauti
ful. "The quiet, self-poised, cultivated German was
worthy of the love the sturdy, self-taught English
man felt for him.
Feeble as Asbury was, he still pressed on, but it
was evident to all that he could not long continue
this course. He left Baltimore oh his northern tour,
and big journal says: "On the 25th of April I
preached at Bethel. We had a rainy day, and my
flesh failed. I rested at Bales's, greatly spent with
labor. We should have failed in our march through
Jersey, but we have great kindness and attentions,
and have great accommodations." The next entry
is in July: "I return to my journal after an interval
of twelve weeks. I have been ill indeed.'' The at
tention the dear old bishop received was all that
could be rendered, but as soon as he could be lifted
into his little covered wagon he began his journey.
19

290 Francis Asbury.
The kind people of Philadelphia sent him a neat car
riage, and the Baltimore Conference detailed John
Wesley Bond to attend him on his journey. This
young man, who was so dear to Asbury, was the
brother of the distinguished Thomas E. Bond, who
was the famous editor of the Christian Advocate and
Journal, and the uncle of the not less distinguished
Thomas E. Bond, Jr., editor of the Baltimore Chris-
Han Advocate. John Wesley Bond was a very pious,
very earnest young man, and devoted to Asbury. He
did much for the relief of the poor invalid, and per
haps shortened his own life by his devotion to him.
Despite his feebleness, Asbury started with his com
panion westward. He was very happy in his reli
gious life. He says: "I groan one minute with pain
and shout glory the next." In their comfortable
two-horse carriage they made their way over horri
ble roads toward Ohio, and then through the state to
Cincinnati. He was riding over bad roads, sick and
weary, trying to preach and exhort at every stopping
place. To add to his distress, McKendree had been
thrown from his horse and badly crippled, and was
unable to get to Cincinnati to the Conference. As
neither bishop could preside, John Sale did so. The
old bishop made out a plan of appointments and then
hurried away through Kentucky to the seat of the
Tennessee Conference, which included a considera
ble part of Kentucky.
Sick as he was, he had intended to make an effort
to reach the Natchez country; but Bishop McKen
dree was so lame that Bishop Asbury said it was
doubtful as to whether he could reach the South Car
olina Conference in time, and for that reason alone

Francis Asbury. 291
he gave up the attempt. With his colleague he
braved the oft-crossed Cumberland and Alleghany
mountains again, passed through South Carolina,
and went into Georgia, and reached Milledgeville.
He was so feeble that he could not be heard, but he
attempted to preach at the ordination, and after the
adjournment of Conference he and his assistants
moved toward Charleston. In Augusta, in the house
of Asaph Waterman, he preached his last sermon in
Georgia, and left the state the next day to return
to it no more. He did not go, as was his custom, to
Charleston, but made his way through South Caro
lina and North Carolina and by his oft-traveled route
to Maryland. There is nothing in the account he
gives save the same story of travel and suffering
until the reader feels the pain, and longs for some
one to lay his hand on him and stay him in his prog
ress. He was dying with senile consumption, but he
would not pause. Through the eastern shore,
through Delaware, through Pennsylvania and NeAV
Jersey, the weary man moved to New York. "Poor,
wheezing, groaning, coughing Francis," as he called
himself, came into the New York Conference and
spent a few hours. Although he could not preach or
talk long, he could plan ; and he did that, and went on
toward New England, to go on to the seat of the
New England Conference. He was unable to pre
side, but George Pickering did that for him, and he
did the ordaining and the planning. Although it
was the 10th of June, they had rain and snow. Mc-
Kendree had gone to western New York to meet the
Genesee Conference, and they were to meet again at

292 Francis, Asbury.
the Ohio Conference in September. It was with the
usual difficulty that he made this journey, but he
reached Lebanon in good time. On the way he dis
tributed hundreds of Testaments, visited many of
his old friends, and preached at the camp meetings.
Of course he was too feeble to be heard, but the peo
ple were anxious to get only a sight of the aged and
venerated apostle. He and Bishop McKendree had
now an earnest talk. "I told Bishop McKendree the
western part of the empire would be the glory of
America for the poor and pious; that it ought to
have five Conferences, and as far as I could I traced
out the lines and boundaries. I told my colleague
that having passed the flrst allotted period — seventy
years — and being, as he knew, out of health, it could
not be expected that I could visit the extremities,
every year, sitting in eight, and it might be twelve,
Conferences, and traveling six thousand miles in
eight months. If I was able to keep up with the
Conferences I could not be expected to preside at
more than every other one. As to the stations, I
should never exhibit a plan unfinished, but still get
all the information in my power. The plau I might
be laboring on would always be submitted to such
eyes as ought to see it, and the measure I meted to
others I should expect to receive." This was a char
acteristic utterance, and there is a pathos in the
statement that he would not expect to preside over
more than half of the Conferences, and his appoint
ments should be made by himself. He attempted to
preach the memorial sermon for Dr. Coke, and then
went into Tennessee to meet the Tennessee Confer-
ence in Wilson county. ^Although he had spoken so

Francis Asbury. 233
decidedly to Bishop McKendree at the Ohio Confer
ence, when he reached the Tennessee Conference he
said: "My eyes fail; I will resign the stations to
Bishop McKendree; I will take away my feet. It is
my fifty-fifth year of ministry and forty-fifth of labor
in America.. My mind enjoys great peace and divine
consolation; my health is better, but whether health,
life, or death, good is, the will of the. Lord. I will
trust him and will praise him. He is the strength of
my heart and my portion forever. - Glory! glory!
glory!" And thus he surrendered his commission. He had
been in sole command of the army for all these years,
and had allowed none to interfere with his mandate;
but now he lays it down, and henceforth leaves to an
other to do the duty so long resting upon him. He
turned his face eastward, and by the 5th of Decem
ber he stopped at the home of Wesley Harrison, the
son of Thomas Harrison, who had been the first to
receive him in his visit to Harrisonburg, Virginia;
and from his house he turned his face southward on
his way to Charleston. By December 20th, finding
that he would not be able to make the journey, he
turned back at Granby, South Carolina, and the last
entry in his journal was made, according to the print
ed page, on the 7th of December. The journal says
he was in Virginia November 1. This was an error.
He was in Middle Tennessee the first of November,
and could not possibly have reached Virginia in five
days. The editor has evidently been misled by the
names of Wesley and Thomas Harrison, and the fact
stated that their father received him at Harrison
burg, Virginia. He evidently took the nearest route

294 Francis Asbury.
to South Carolina, and passed again over the mount
ains into Buncombe county and then into the upper
part of South Carolina. The entry was no doubt
made by the editor, who, careful as he was, made a
number of small mistakes. Asbury says he came to
Wesley Harrison's, then to Thomas Harrison's. He
was in Sumner county, Tennessee, when he started
to Charleston. He says: "We came upon the turn
pike — a disgrace to the state." He came to father
Holt's, and in a few days was at Wesley Harrison's,
then by Robert Harrison's, Boling's, Barnett's,
Mills's, Glover's, Arlington's, Means's. These names
indicate the route he pursued, which was through
East Tennessee, western North Carolina, and upper
South Carolina to Columbia. He had taken a month
for the tour, and now turned his course from Colum
bia toward Charleston; but at Granby he found it
would be useless to attempt to make the journey, and
he turned his face northward. The last entry he
ever made in his journal was made here, and is
Thursday, 7th of December: "We met a storm and
stopped at William Baker's, Granby." He was dy
ing with consumption, and the disease was aggra
vated by a severe influenza. He knew it would be
useless to go -farther, and he turned his way toward
Maryland.

CHAPTER XLII.
1816.
Asbury's Last Journey — The Sun Goes Down — Granby, South
Carolina — Journey to Richmond — Last Sermon — Reaches Mr.
Arnold's — Death Scene.
GRANBY was a small village in the central part
of South Carolina, and when the invalid bishop
realized the fact that he could not reach Charleston
for the Conference he decided to return to Maryland,
so as to be at the session of the General Conference
in May. We have no record of this journey, the last
he made. It is likely that he went by Camden and
Fayetteville and Wilmington, and along the eastern
shore of North Carolina and Virginia to Norfolk, and
then turned toward Richmond. Along this route he
had many friends and many homes, and the journey
could be made in easy stages. He preached, or at
tempted to preach, to the last. He was wasted to a
skeleton, and could not do more than speak while sit
ting, in tones too low for any but a very few to hear,
but he would not allow himself any repose. It was
nearly three months after he left Granby before
he reached Richmond, Virginia. He wished, he said,
once more to preach here, and he was borne in the
arms of his brethren to the church and seated upon
a table, and with feeble voice, after pausing to re
cover his breath, he preached for nearly an hour with
much feeling from Romans ix. 28: "For he will finish
the work, and cut it short in righteousness : because
(295)

296 Francis Asbury.
a short work will the Lord make upon the earth."
The audience were much affected. It was to them as
a voice from another world. He felt that he was
speaking to them for the last time, and he spoke with
the earnestness and tenderness of a dying man.
When the rambling, tender talk was finished they
bore the attenuated form of the dying man to the car
riage, and he left the pulpit which he had entered at
sixteen years old to return to it no more. He had
probably preached more sermons at the time he
ceased his work than any other man then in the
world. Mr. Wesley, who went to crowded cities and
populous villages by easy riding, may have preached
oftener Avhen he lived, but it is, I think, a fact
that Asbury, up to the time he died, had preached
more sermons than any other man then living in
the world. - From Maine to Tennessee, from Ohio to
the borders of Florida, his voice had been heard.
His zeal never knew any abatement, and he never
stayed on his way, unless he was too ill to ride. But
now his work was done. In October, 1771, he
preached his first sermon in America in Philadel
phia ; in March, 1816, forty-five years afterwards, he
preached for the last time in Richmond, Virginia.
He rested on Monday, and started on his journey
on Tuesday. He went by slow stages until Friday,
when he reached the home of his old friend George
Arnold, in Spottsylvania,Virginia,twenty miles from
Fredericksburg, which he was trying to reach by
the Sabbath. Finding it impossible to go forward,
he did not make the attempt. He grew worse, and
his friends wished to send for a physician, but he
would not consent, saying that before he could reach

Francis Asbury. 297
him he would be gone. He was asked if, in view of
death, he had anything to communicate. He said he
had fully expressed his mind in relation to the
Church in his address to the bishop and to the Gen
eral Conference. He had nothing more to add.
Sunday morning came, and he asked if it was not
time for service, and, recollecting himself, he re
quested the family to be called together. This was
done, and his young companion, at his request, chose
the twenty-first chapter of Revelation, which he read
and expounded. During these exercises he appeared
calm and much engaged in devotion. He grew fee
bler, and his speech began to fail. Seeing the dis
tress of his son John, as he called young Bond, he
raised his hand and looked upon him with a smile of
joy, and then, raising both hands, he bent his head
on the hand of his dear son and breathed his life out.
He was in his seventy-first year. His death took
place on the 21st day of March, 1816. He was buried
by those who were with him in the family burying
ground of Mr. Arnold, but at the session of the Gen
eral Conference the remains were brought to Balti
more and deposited in a vault under the pulpit of the
Eutaw-street Church.
The insignificant town he had entered forty years
before, and in which he had begun a meeting that
seemed to promise so little, was now a large and
wealthy city. He was known to all its people and
honored by them all. A vast concourse of citizens
and several clergymen of other denominations fol
lowed the corpse from Light street to the burial
place on Eutaw, and the General Conference, with
McKendree and the English representative, Black,

298 Francis Asbury.
at its head, walked in sad procession to the church,
and he was laid to rest. The Methodists of the city
afterwards purchased a handsome body of land near
the city and opened Mount Olivet cemetery, to which
his remains were removed, and in which they now
lie; and not far from these remains lie those of his
old associate and companion Jesse Lee, Avho died the
latter part of the same year in which Asbury died.
With the death of Asbury passed away the man
who had exerted a mightier influence OArer America
than any other who had ever lived in it. He had
entered upon the work of the ministry in America
when the Methodists were but a mere handful. He
had become the most influential man among the
Methodist preachers before he was appointed to
the superintendency, and that influence continued
unlimited for forty years after he was elected a
bishop. His voice was the most potent in the land.
Neither Ignatius Loyola nor John Wesley had a
greater power over those associated with them than
this saddler apprentice of Birmingham, and neither
of them had so mighty a personal influence upon
so many people. His place in the history of Amer
ican civilization has not been accorded, and even
many of those who have entered into the fruit
of his labor have not properly rated this man who
planned so well and did so much. He was not like
Luther, or Wesley, or Calvin, a man of many sides.
He was remarkable in that he had but one aim and
but one way to advance it. His aim was simply to
save men from sin, and his way to advance that was
by the simple preaching of the gospel. He had full
faith in the gospel, and he believed if it was preached

Francis Asbury. 299
anu accepted that all other things would follow in its
wake. He had no faith in government or education
or in anything human apart from the gospel, and he
believed that he had but one work to do, and that
was to preach it; and from the time he left his place
on the saddler's bench for his circuit till the end, this
was his work.
The story written in these pages has been a story
of most heroic encounter with difficulties and of un
ceasing toil. The opening of the western country,
the subjugation of the Indian tribes, the impetus
given to emigration from the older to the newer
states, demanded action quick and sharp. The over
throw of the state churches in the south, the wonder
ful interest which had been aroused in religious mat
ters all over the land, had called for some great lead
er who knew what to do and how to do it. Asbury
was eminently adapted to that place, and filled it as
perhaps no other man could have done. He began
his work when there was not a turnpike nor a stage
line in America, and when the paths to the wilder
ness were Indian trails. He had gone into the wil
derness while the war whoop of the savage was still
in the ears of those to whom he preached. The hard
ships he was compelled to endure were never inter
mitted, and to add to it all he was an invalid a large
part of the time. He saw, however, the labor of his
hands as no other man perhaps has ever seen it. The
year he began his work there were less than five hun
dred Methodists in America; when he died there
were two hundred and fourteen thousand. The
Church had been organized and was in working or
der in every part of the field. He had breathed his

300 Francis Asbury.
spirit into hundreds of itinerant and local preachers,
and Avhen he ceased at once to work and live the
Church to which he gave his life was established
over all the United States.
Realizing a few years before his death that he was
near his end, he made his vdll. He had never made
or tried to make a dollar. His small income, the
same as that allowed every traveling preacher, suf
ficed for his moderate wants, and from that he was
able to assist his aged parents. After they died he
gave what he could save to the widows of itinerant
preachers and to the needy preachers he met on his
tours. Some friends made him sundry bequests,
and he had two thousand dollars of his own in his
old age. He bequeathed that to the widows of his
old associates, providing that every child who bore
his name should have a Bible furnished to him by
his executors.

CHAPTER XLIII.
Asbukt's Religious Experience.
NO honest biography of Asbury can be written
which does not give prominence to his account
of his personal religious experience. In no private
diary is there a fuller exhibit given of all the phases
of one's inner life than Asbury gives in the pages of
his honest and homely journal. He was a good
child — prayerful, obedient, and truthful. When
quite a child he was awakened to the need of conver
sion, and at twelve years of age was converted. He
knew it and rejoiced in it, and, though through a
child's ignorance he afterwards lost the evidence, he
never lost the character of a Christian, and when he
was sixteen he began to preach. His religious life
was serious, self-denying, and emotional. All Meth
odists in that day, after a conscious conversion, be
gan to seek for what they called the removal of the
least and last remains of the carnal mind, and As
bury began to seek for it with all his heart, and in the
ardor of boyhood and in his early and happy experi
ence he thought he had attained it, but he afterwards
decided that he was mistaken. He had almost an
uninterrupted witness of acceptance with God, and
had a constant dominion over sin and the witness of
his own spirit that he was pure in his intentions ; but
he was confident that that lofty experience Mr. Wes
ley pictured as Christian perfection he had not
reached when he came to America, nor for many,
years after-wards. . , . >

302 Frajscis Asbury.
During his first years in America, while he records
a story of great comforts, he wrote bitter things
against himself oftentimes, and censures himself for
sundry failings. Thus in 1772: "Found an inatten
tion to study, an unsettled frame of mind, and much
backwardness in prayer. Lord, help me with active
warmth to move." "Visited an old man who was
sick, but came away without prayer, and was justly
blamed, both by my friends and myself. Lord, for
give my secret and open faults." "My heart is still
distressed for want of more religion. I long to be
wholly given up, and to seek no favor but what com-
eth from God alone." "A cloud rested on my mind,
which was occasioned by talking and jesting. I also
feel at times tempted to impatience and pride of
heart." "In this journey I have my soul comforta
ble and alive to God." "On Saturday all my soul
was love. No desire for anything, but God had
place in my heart. Keep me, O Lord, in this de
lightful, blessed frame!" On Tuesday he says: "My
foolish heart felt rather disposed to murmuring,
pride, and discontent. Lord, pardon me, and grant
me grace." The next day he says: "My conscience
reproves me for the appearance of levity."
These are but specimen extracts from his early
journal. Sometimes he is very happy after being
very much depressed, condemning himself for what
appears to us to have been neither errors nor sins;
but, despite his changing moods, he was always
faithful. He had one desire: to live entirely for
God. Resigned, submissive, untiring, he pressed on
the way.
On June 14, 1774, he says : "My heart seems wholly

Francis Asbury. 303
devoted to God, and he favors me with power over
all outward and inward sin. Some people, if they
felt as I feel at present, would, perhaps, conclude
they were saved from all indwelling sin." The next
day he says: "My soul was under heavy exercises
and much troubled by manifold temptations. I feel
it hurtful to lay too much on myself. Lord, make
thy face to shine upon me, and make me always joy
ful in thy salvation."
These extracts from his journal are merely sam
ples of numerous entries, and they tell the same
story; a constant reaching forward after the high
est attainments and varying sensations — sometimes
very happy, sometimes very much depressed.
On Sunday, August 6, 1786, he says: "A pleasing
thought passed through my mind. It was this : that
I was saved from the remains of sin. As yet, I haAre
felt no returns thereof." But on October 5, of the
same year, he says : " My soul is under deep exercise
on account of the deadness of the people and my own
want of fervor and holiness of heart."
The effort to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion
about the extent of the good work wrought in his
soul had been so unsatisfactory that for some years
he seems to have almost given over any effort to
make an exact record of it. His affections never
varied; his devotion to duty knew no intermission;
his prayerfulness and his attention to his religious
duties never slackened: but his introspection was
to a large degree interfered with by the demands
of his work upon him. His sky grew brighter as the
years passed on, and during the days of his long in
valid life there was a constant serenity. He had re-

304 Francis Asbury.
ceived, as all the Methodists had, the teachings of
Mr. Wesley on the possibility of Christian perfection
secured instantly by faith, and was patiently wait
ing, as he was earnestly groaning, for the hour when
the consciousness would be given him that his soul
was filled with pure love.
In 1803 he said: "My general experience is: close
communion with God, holy fellowship with the Fa
ther and his Son Jesus Christ, a will resigned, fre
quent addresses to the throne of grace." And Jan
uary 9 he says: "I feel it my duty to speak chiefly
upon perfection, and, above all, to strive to attain
unto that which I preach." March 7 : "I find the way
of holiness very narrow to walk in or to preach." In
April, 1803, he says: "My mind is in a great calm
after the tumult of the Baltimore Conference — in ad
dition to the charge of the superintendency to feel
and to live perfect love."
This was thirty-two years after he came to Amer
ica, when he was fifty-eight years old; and, as far as
I can find it, this is the first positive statement that
what he sought for he had found. As in the case of
Mr. Wesley and Mr. Fletcher, there is nowhere a
marked line when he, by a wonderful transition,
passed into the land of perfect peace. It was, as far
as his journal tells the story, a constant progress,
leading him at last into the land of Beulah.
The study of a life like his, where all the throb-
bings of an earnest heart are seen, cannot but be a
profitable exercise. When we note the experiences
through which he passed, and when his life in its
external features is looked at, we find that an ex
ample of advanced holiness is presented which has

Francis Asbury. 305
rarely been equaled in this world. Perhaps he
erred, I may say confidently he did err, in following
his ideas of self-denial to the extent he did. Not
Loyola, with his scourge, had less pity on his poor,
feeble frame than Asbury on himself. He pitied
every being but himself. The poorest slave, who
was so much the object of his pity, was better treat
ed by the cruelest master than Asbury treated his
poor, frail, emaciated body. Fasting when he was
barely able to walk, facing bleak winter when God's
laws called him to shelter, riding in hot suns when he
needed shade, rising from a bed when exhausted na
ture bade him stay, he suffered when God would
have spared him. His austerity toward himself
made him not sour, but did make him exacting to
ward others, and he had less love for the things God
had made lovely than was his privilege and, perhaps,
his duty. God honored him greatly, and for years
he walked in the secret place of the Almighty. His
life was hid with Christ in God.
Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Knox, Wesley, were
good men all ; but in the holiness of his life and in the
extent of his usefulness, Francis Asbury was behind
none of them.
20

CHAPTER XLIV.
The Character of Francis Asbury.
IN my opinion Francis Asbury has been, the worst
misread man in the history of the first men of
American Methodism. When fair and well-informed
historians give an estimate of him so different from
that I entertain, I may hesitate in giving utterance
to my conclusions ; but a long and very careful study
of a very transparent life has, I think, qualified me
for making a verdict.
By the older class of Methodists he was looked
upon almost with awe. He was the ideal Christian.
Mr. Wesley had no more the confidence of the Eng
lish Wesleyans, Calvin's followers were not blinder
in their attachment to the great reformer, than the
preachers brought into the work in America were to
Asbury. Many of the latter-day Methodists do not
place him on this high pedestal. They know little of
him, and judging him from the allusions to him in
history they have failed by a great deal to recognize
his true worth.
I do not think, rating men as they are rated by men,
that Asbury was intellectually a great man. Many
of the leaders of the Methodist movement were be
yond him in extraordinary endowments, but in prac
tical common sense he was behind none of them.
Mr. Wesley's wondrous power to rule men, and his
correct idea of what was to be done, was not beyond
(306)

Francis Asbury. 307
that of Asbury. In directing the work of the Church
as a pastor he made few mistakes, and when he was
invested with the bishopric his judgment was nearly
always to be relied on. Sometimes he overrated a
man, sometimes he undervalued him, but generally
his estimate was a correct one. He saw the field, he
realized the need of the times, and he had at once a
man to supply the need. He was a general com
manding, and his campaign was always well planned
and wide-sweeping.
He was a diligent student. He knew enough of
Greek, Latin, and Hebrew to read the Bible in them.
He was well read in the theology of the Wesleyans,
was acquainted with the best of the old Puritan di
vines, and he read much history, both profane and
sacred, and was very fond of religious biography.
With polite literature he had no acquaintance at all,
and perhaps he regarded its study as something
rather to be avoided than to be pursued. He was a
very decided and unswerving man. The sturdiness
of his race found its best example in him. He was
absolutely fearless, and was as immovable as granite
when principle was involved. There have been a
few points at which I was compelled to admit that
the adhering to what he believed to be right led him
to do some violence to what I thought were the rights
of others, but he never did anything he could not de
fend, nor ever asked one to do anything when he did
not believe he ought to do it.
I would not be perfectly fair if I did not admit that
in some respects Mr. Asbury seems to have been a
narrow man. His ideas of ministerial support, of
the obligations of a people to their pastor, and of a

308 Francis Asbury.
pastor to his family, were exceedingly contracted.
He unwittingly encouraged good men to be shame
fully penurious in their gifts to good causes, and laid
such stress upon plainness that he encouraged covet-
ousness. The gold on a schoolgirl's person seemed
more offensive to him than the gold hid in her fa
ther's coffers, if that father was a plain man of
steady ways. He could not recognize the fact that
the Methodists were growing rich. They were poor
when he first knew them, and he wanted them to stay
so. He cared comparatively little for advanced ed
ucation among ministers. He wanted piety, zeal,
and heroism in his preachers, and then he was con
tent if they knew how to use the English tongue. He
was more concerned about the circuit in the wilder
ness than the cathedral in the city. He was not al
ways tolerant. What he said as true he thought was
true, and he had no disposition to reopen the ques
tion. When men differed with him they were wrong,
and that was the end of it.
His idea of the piety of other preachers but the
Methodists was not high. Especially did he dispar
age the New Englanders. That he was prepared to
do them justice one will not be likely to admit who
takes into consideration his very rapid transit
through the states, and the little intercourse he had
with Calvinists.
The story of his life is the story of heroic self-sac
rifice, and the magnificent campaigns which he
planned and which he so successfully carried out are
without a parallel in the history of the world.
He was imperious, a very autocrat in the domain
in which he had been made dictator, but he was a die-

Francis Asbury. 309
tator for the good of others alone. He required in
stant obedience to his commands, even when he or
dered difficult and sometimes apparently impossible
things to be done, but he was as willing to share the
danger as he was to ask another to face it.
That he was sometimes petulant, and sometimes
said things which were unduly severe, was doubtless
true. He did not admire Rankin, nor Jesse Lee, nor
O'Kelly, nor Glendening, nor sundry others who op
posed him; they thought he was overbearing, and he
thought they were untrustworthy, and to his inti
mate friends he spoke his mind freely of these men,
and in no mild terms. We of this day clearly see
that he misread some of them. Once he turned his
back on Jesse Lee, when he was speaking, and Lee
said "one of his brethren had said no man of com
mon sense would speak as he did, and he supposed he
was a man of uncommon sense." "Yes," said As
bury, "yes, yes, brother Lee, you are a man of un
common sense." "Then," said Lee, "I beg that un
common attention be paid to what I am about to
say." Once Asbury said petulantly that he would not
give one single preacher for three married ones. "I
ask a location, sir," said one ; "And so do I," said an
other; "And so do I," said another of the married
men. "Why, brethren, what do you mean?" said
the alarmed bishop. "Why, sir, you said you had
rather have one single preacher than three of us."
"Did I say that?" "Yes, sir, you did." "Then I'll
take it back ; I'll take it back."
He did not like opposition, nor any movement that
lessened his episcopal power, and when the men of

310 Francis Asbury. .
the presbyterial party, as he called it, persisted in
their effort to make the presiding eldership electoral,
he avowed his determination to use his position to
prevent it, as far as possible, saying to T. L. Douglas
in a letter quoted by Bennett (Memorials, p. 584) : "In
former times I have been impartial, indifferent, and
have appointed good men, that I knew were for a
presbyterial party; but since they have made such
an unwarrantable attack upon the constitution, in
the very first General Conference after its adoption,
I will only trust such men as far as I can see them,
and let such men know that I know their principles
and disapprove them."
He was sternly opposed to innovations, and as he
grew older was always on the alert lest there should
be any made. Young Nathan Bangs had been sent
to New York as one of the preachers. He found a
state of things which he thought ought to be correct
ed. There was a wild excitement in the meetings,
which was very offensive to the young preacher, and
at considerable cost to himself he sternly suppressed
these excesses. It was reported to Asbury that he
was making a concession to the demands of the fas
tidious, and the old bishop mildly alluded to it in a
letter to the young pastor. Bangs asked for an ex
planation, but showed that he was hurt. The dear
old man replied, saying among other things: "I am
sorry I am not more prudent, but when I am called
upon so often to speak and write I am not sufficiently
on my guard. I hope you will bear with me. You
will pardon me, and pray that I may say, do, preach,
and write better."
He had no children of his own, and he looked on

Francis Asbury. 311
the young preachers as his family. He wa i as gen
tle and tender toward them as a grandfather could
have been toward the members of a son's household.
Ee was in the habit of tenderly embracing them, and
kissed them affectionately on the cheek. He called
them by the most endearing names — but he allowed
none to oppose him. He was sure he was right, and
if any opposed him they were to be resisted and
sternly stood against. He made no compromises, no
concessions, and was not always just in his censures.
While these features of his character must be rec
ognized, one has not to search far before he finds that
there was no malevolence in the good man's heart.
He had never come in contact with a strong man
without a contest, but it was the brave tilt of a stain
less knight, and always in defense of what he be
lieved to be the right. He was as devoid of selfish
ness as he was of fear, and as ready to forgive as he
was quick to strike; and while his course was un
swerving in the prosecution of duty, personal rancor
had no place in his heart. Rankin,Wesley, Coke, Lee,
O'Kelly, had all found him a sturdy antagonist, but
he always contended for a principle. He called no
man rabbi, and he asked from others nothing more
than he gave.
No man ever did so much for Methodism inAmeri-
ca as Francis Asbury, and no man ever had an eye
more single to God's glory in the work he did, and
no man ever labored more unselfishly for those
among whom his lot was cast.
THE END.

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