USA > Missouri > Annals of Methodism in Missouri : containing an outline of the ministerial life of more than one thousand preachers, and sketches of more than three hundred ; also sketches of charges, churches and laymen from the beginning in 1806 to the centennial year, 1884, containing seventy-eight years of history > Part 6
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If I am correctly informed F. A. Briggs is the only person licensed to preach by the church there, and he was there only transiently.
The first church, which was the first erected in the town. was begun in 1832, and dedicated by Bishop Soule in IS38. This was torn down in 18S2 and the present house, erected on the same lot, under the pastorate of C. H. Briggs, was dedicated by C. C. Woods. The annual Conference has held six sessions there.
But we must go back to ISIS. This year John Scripps was sent to Cape Girardeau circuit and John McFarland to .St. Francois. These two circuits were united and both men wwrought on each, going around every six weeks. Mr.
32
CAPE GIRARDEAU CIRCUIT.
Scripps has left the following outline of this united charge : "Our field of operations this year was bounded on the east by the Mississippi river, from the Grand Tower to the Big Swamp, four miles south of Cape Girardeau ; south, by the Big Swamp to Current river ; west, by that river to Vernon's Mills, twenty miles north of the road to Batesville ; north and west crossing Black river, then St. Francis at Frederick- town, cross Castor to Apple Creek and Grand Tower."
Within that outline there are now fifteen pastoral charges, and in the bounds of the Boonslick, which he trav- eled the year before, there are now about twenty-five. Those were days of "magnificent distances" and of grand men to compass them.
1819.
This year is of special note as the one in which the annual Conference first met on Missouri soil. The place was McKendree Chapel, in Cape Girardeau county. I quote again from John Scripps : 6
"It was this year that McKendree Chapel was built, a good hewed-log house, with a shingle roof, good plank floor, windows, etc. It was the first substantial and finished meet- ing house built for us in Missouri, by the hands of regular workmen, and was commenced and completed this year, with special reference to the first annual Conference ever held on the west side of the Mississippi river. It stands two miles east of Jackson and eight miles west of Cape Girardeau, in a camp ground hallowed by the recollections of happy hun- dreds, who have there been born again to sing redeeming love."
The chapel is still standing, the oldest meeting house in the state, and is an appointment on the Jackson
33
IS20.
circuit. The annual Conference held four sessions there, . in 1819, IS21, 1826 and IS31. Nine per cent. increase the past year.
1820.
This year the Cape Girardeau district was organized. Also two new circuits,-Gasconade and Cedar Creek. The former was taken from Cold Water and the latter from Boonslick and Missouri.
The work in Missouri, the result of fourteen years of labor, and to which forty-six preachers had contributed, was now divided into two districts and eleven circuits-four north and seven south of the river-with about the following out- line : Beginning at New Madrid, thence up the Mississippi river to Palmyra ; thence west to Brunswick and Sedalia ; thence south, via Versailles and Rolla to the Merrimac ; thence to its source; thence down Current river to the Arkansas line ; thence east to New Madrid. Every charge is named for a river, creek or settlement, except Cape Girardeau and New Madrid. So far as known, no class had yet been organized in any town, except in Cape Girardeau in ISog and in Boonville in ISIS. Probably classes had been organized in New Madrid, Potosi and Franklin. "And the seventy returned with joy, saying, Lord, even the devils are subject to us through thy name."
34
WM. W. REDMAN.
CHAPTER III.
SECTION 1.
"Lo! I am with you always, even to the end of the world." 1821.
We begin this chapter with a sketch of one worthy to walk in the steps of Wm. McKendree.
WM. W. REDMAN was admitted on trial in IS20, and sent to White River circuit in Arkansas, after which his labors were confined exclusively to Missouri. His appoint- ments, beginning in IS21, were: Gasconade, Boonslick, and Cedar Creek ; Cedar Creek and Boonslick as supernumerary. He located in 1826, but was readmitted in IS28, and served on La Mine circuit ; 1829, Cedar Creek ; 1830, located again. Readmitted again in 1832, and appointed again to La Mine circuit ; 1833, Cedar Creek ; 1834, Boonslick ; 1835, Boon- ville district, two years ; IS37, agent for St. Charles College, two years; 1839, Richmond district, four years ; 1843, Weston district ; IS44, St. Louis district, two years ; 1846, St. Charles district, four years; but soon after his last appointment "fell on sleep" at his home in Danville, Mo., October 31, IS.19.
Mr. Redman was born in what is now Clark county, Indiana, December 14, 1799 ; converted at a camp meeting in Jefferson county, Kentucky, September 12, IS17, and five days afterwards joined the church; licensed to exhort December 17, 1819; licensed to preach June 10, IS20; and received on trial into the Missouri Conference September 14, IS20. The above dates reveal the man. He was particular, exact, correct. Some years ago the writer of this found by
35
IS21.
examining an old Quarterly Conference Journal that Mr. Redman was the most painstaking presiding elder that ever traveled Springfield district. . Because of this it is not strange that he was elected secretary of his Conference fourteen times ; three times to represent it in the General Conference, and was appointed thirteen times as presiding elder of districts, serving half of his itinerant life on districts. Ile gave Missouri twenty-nine years of faithful service, four of which were spent in the local ranks, albeit he was employed by Andrew Monroe one of those years to travel Cedar Creek circuit, which he traveled frequently, and on which he was always popular and useful.
In addition to his business capacity and habits, Mr. Redman was a good preacher and of commanding presence. He was among the first preachers whom the writer remem- bers. The secret of his successful life may be traced to the fact that his parents were Methodists and religious.
JOHN BLASDELL, admitted in IS21, traveled La Mine, Buffalo and Missouri circuits in Missouri; Cash River in Illinois, and Hot Springs in Arkansas. He located in 1826.
A. W. CASSAD, of the same class, served Buffalo in Missouri and Kaskaskia in Illinois, and was admitted into full connection and located in IS23.
JAMES KEYTE, of the same class, traveled Boonslick, and discontinued. He settled where Keytesville now is, made fortune and fame by a useful life, then "fell on sleep."
WASHINGTON ORR, admitted in ISIS, served Hot Springs, Arkansas, and Pecan Point in Arkansas; New Madrid, Missouri, two years ; and located in IS23.
36
JAMES BANKSON.
1822.
JAMES BANKSON, another member of the class of 1821, was first appointed to White River; 1822, Gasconade ; IS23, Cape Girardeau ; 1824, Saline and St. Francois; 1825, Belleview ; 1826, Boonslick; 1827, Cedar Creek; IS2S, Arkansas; IS29, transferred to Illinois Conference ; 1830, Spoon River. He died September 4, 1831, in St. Louis, whither he had gone for medical treatment. Mr. Bankson had a vigorous mind, and, though destitute of early culture, so assiduously did he apply himself to study that he rose to eminence and position in his Conference, and served it the two years before his transfer in the important office of secretary. He made an able preacher of the Word and a useful servant of the church.
DAVID SHARP was admitted on trial by the Ohio Con- ference in 1813, and served five years in the bounds of the Miami district, transferred to the Missouri Conference in ISIS, and appointed to Silver Creek circuit; 1819, Illinois district, three years; 1822, Missouri district, two years ; 1824, transferred to Pittsburg Conference and appointed to Grand River circuit; 1825, Uniontown circuit; 1826, Beaver ; 1827, Connelsville ; 1828, Pittsburg district, four years ; 1832, Smithfield circuit, two years ; 1834, Connelsville, two years ; 1836, Lisbon ; 1837, Redstone, two years ; 1839, Bealsville, two years ; 1841, Chariton, two years. Mr. Sharp was elected president of the Missouri Conference in IS22, and a delegate to the General Conference in 1823.
WILLIAM ROBERTS, admitted in 1822, and appointed to Buffalo circuit; was expelled from the church during the year.
37
$22.
JOHN WOOD, of the same class, served Fishing River, and discontinued.
FREDERICK B. LEACH, another member of the class of 1S22, wrought five years in Missouri and one in Illinois, as follows : La Mine, Kaskaskia, Spring River, Cape Girardeau, Buffalo, New Madrid, and located in IS28.
Mr. Leach "was gifted, pious, devoted to his work, and emi- nently useful. Though quite popular in the pulpit, he did not become vain or proud of this, but by an humble and consistent life, and a chaste conversation, seasoned by grace, he made one of the most consistent and effective traveling preachers" of his day.
DAVID CHAMBERLAND entered the itinerancy in 1820, and located in 1826. He served three years in Missouri. His appointments were: Bloomington, Honey Creek, Cedar Creek, Buffalo, Missouri and Belleview. Superannuated in IS25.
THOS. RANDLE, of the class of IS22, wrought on Missouri, Buffalo and Missouri, Kaskaskia, St. Louis and Gasconade, Mississippi and Shoal Creek, and located in IS2S. He was readmitted in 1834, and traveled Greenville, and located in 1836.
WILLIAM SUBLET, who was this year appointed to St. Louis circuit, seems to have been a veritable Melchizedeck. Whence he came and whither he went, this scribe cannot tell.
WM. BEAUCHAMP entered the itinerancy in 1794, and traveled Alleghany circuit two years, the Pittsburg one, and was stationed in New York, Boston, Provincetown and Nantucket each one year, and located, because of ill health, in ISO1. He was readmitted into the Missouri Conference in IS22, and stationed in St. Louis ; IS23, elected delegate to
35
JOHN GLANVILLE.
the General Conference, and appointed presiding elder of Indiana district, and died October 7, 1824.
Mr. Beauchamp was born in Kent county, Delaware, April 26, 1772; was converted when sixteen years old ; licensed to preach when twenty, and soon took rank with the leading men of the church. He was a born genius ; had a brilliant mind ; was deeply pious, and was a constant, life-long student, and an incessant worker. He edited and published one year a religious magazine ; wrote and published a defense of the Christian Religion, which I read with much profit in the early years of my ministry. He is also author of the "Letters on Itinerancy. "He was the first preacher stationed in St. Louis, and none of his successors have been more popular. He was called "the Demosthenes of the Church in the West." Six months before he died, he came within three votes of being elected bishop.
JOHN GLANVILLE, of the class of IS21, was appointed that year to Sangamon circuit in Illinois ; 1822, Belleview, Mo., two years ; 1824, Missouri circuit ; 1825, St. Louis and Gascon- ade ; IS26, Belleview ; 1827, Cape Girardeau district ; 1828, St. Louis circuit; 1829, located. Readmitted in 1830, and appointed to Union circuit ; 1831, Belleview ; IS22, Union ; 1833, St. Louis circuit, two years ; 1835, superannuated ; 1836, St. Charles circuit ; 1837, Union ; 1838, St. Louis circuit ; 1839, Boonville ; 1840, Hannibal, two years ; 1842, Paris ; 1843, Brunswick district, two years; 1845, superannuated ; and the minutes for 1847 announce his death, but do not state when it occurred, nor is there any memoir of him; nor is there any of Jesse Green ; nor of S. W. McConnell, both of whom died this year. Often the minutes say the least about those who were most useful.
39
IS23.
Mr. Glanville was an Englishman. Of his early life I have not been able to learn anything. He ranked well as a preacher, was presiding elder three years, served his Con- ference as secretary one, and was a member of the Louisville Convention which organized the M. E. Church, South. He died in St. Louis county.
WILLIAM RYAN, of the class of IS22, served that year as junior preacher, under John Glanville, on Belleview circuit ; the next year he was the junior on Gasconade and St. Louis circuits. He discontinued in 1824.
LORENZO EDWARDS and THOS. DAVIS, both of the same class, served but one year each, and discontinued in IS23 ; the first on St. Francois and the other on Cape Girardeau. 1823.
JOSEPH EDMONDSON was admitted on trial in IS23 and located in IS33.
He wrought in the following fields: 1823, Boonslick and Cedar Creek ; IS24, Gasconade and St. Louis ; IS25, New Madrid ; IS26, Cape Girardeau ; 1827, Belleview ; 182S, St. Louis circuit ; 1829, Boonslick ; 1830, St. Louis station ; 1831, Missouri district ; IS32, St. Louis station.
In IS40 his name reappears on the Lebanon circuit in the Illinois Conference, which he served two years ; 1842, Edwardsville, two years. While local he supplied Waterloo circuit, Springfield station, and Belleville station. 1823.
Mr. Edmondson was born in Virginia, May, 1798; hence, was twenty-five years old when he entered the minis- try in Missouri.
He was a good man, and full of faith and the Holy Ghost. He was not only a good, but he was a great man. He possessed a mind of
40
STEPHEN R. BEGGS.
the highest order. It is rare that so powerful an intellect is accompanied with feelings so strong, a fancy so delicate, and an imagination so exuberant, and yet so chaste. His preaching was systematic and argumentative. It was rich and sublime in imagery; strong, clear chaste, and beautiful in language; and eloquent, forcibly eloquent in delivery. His matter was scriptural, and was breathed out under the mighty influence of the Spirit of God. He died on Sunday, Sep- tember, 1, IS44.
Mr. Edmondson was a member of the General Con- ference of IS32.
STEPHEN R. BEGGS was admitted on trial in IS22 and appointed to Mt. Sterling circuit in the Indiana district. He spent the next two years in Missouri serving the La Mine and Fishing River circuits. In IS25 he was transferred to the Illinois Conference and appointed to Rushville circuit. In this state he continued to serve the church, filling important charges as long as we can trace him, which is IS45. Judg- ing by his appointments, Mr. Beggs was a good, strong, acceptable preacher, and a successful laborer in the Lord's vineyard. He is still living and a member of the Rock River Conference.
EBENEZER T. WEBSTER was admitted on trial in IS2 1 and served two years in Indiana, traveling Mt. Sterling and Patoka circuits. IS23 we find him in Missouri in charge of Gasconade and St. Louis circuits ; 1824, Shoal Creek, in Illinois ; 1825, Illinois circuit ; 1826, located.
WILLIAM SHORES Was admitted on trial in IS23, ordained deacon in 1825; elder in 1827, and located in IS29: He wrought in the following fields: Saline and St. Francois, Spring and White River, Saline and St. Francois. Fishing River, Arkansas circuit, and Boonslick. Four years in Missouri and two in Arkansas. While on the Boonslick circuit
41
IS23.
in 1828, he married in the neighborhood of Fayette, Miss Susan Johnson, a sister of the three preachers of that name. At the next Conference he located and settled eight miles north of Fayette, where he served the church for many years in the capacity of a local preacher. He has a son, J. F. Shores, in the Missouri Conference. He died in 1872 and sleeps in the cemetery at Washington church.
WILLIAM MOORE, of the same class, wrought with Wil- liam Shores on the Saline and St. Francois circuits, one year and discontinued.
BENJAMIN S. ASHBY was a member of the class of 1823. Of him the minutes say: "Benjamin S. Ashby was a native of Kentucky. We know nothing of his early history, except that he came to Missouri in ISIS, being then about twenty- one years of age. At that time he was a licensed local preacher, and came to Missouri with the intention of enter- ing at once the traveling connection, but his aged, widowed mother coming soon after, he deferred entering the itinerant work till he had provided for her comfort. In IS23 he received his first appointment to New Madrid circuit ; 1824, La Mine ; 1825, Cedar Creek; 1826, St. Louis circuit ; IS27 and IS28, Buffalo ; 1829, Fishing River ; 1830, superannuated and located in 1834. In 1845 was readmitted and appointed to Brunswick district. In 1846 and 1847 he traveled the Keytes- ville circuit ; 1848, Palmyra station ; 1849, Portland circuit ; 1850 and 1851, Richmond district ; 1852 and 1853, Savannah district ; 1854, Clarksville and Paynesville ; 1855, Canton ; 1856, supernumerary on Brunswick station ; 1857, his strength having failed he took a superannuated relation, in which he continued till his death. He was a delegate to the General Con- ference of 1854, and was noted for the soundness of his judg-
43
BENJAMIN S. ASHBY.
ment, and the practical character of his views upon all matters upon which he was called to deliberate. Brother Ashby was a zealous, faithful preacher ; in the pulpit he was always sound, instructive, and sometimes powerful. He was a man of prayer, being much on his knees in private as well as in public. On Wednesday, August 29, 1860, he preached twice, delivering his last sermon from the text, 'Come unto me, all ye that labor,' etc. Near the close of the sermon he was greatly blessed ; related his experience, regretting all unfaithfulness ; he affirmed that, if he had a thousand lives, he would give them all to the ministry, and that he would like to die at the altar of God. The following day he was in the enjoyment, apparently, of his usual health ; attended church morning and night. After sermon in the evening, he talked with penitents for nearly an hour. It was intimated to him that it was time to close ; he answered that it was, but that he wanted to pray first. The hymn being concluded, he called on the congregation to join in prayer. He led the prayer to near its close, when he was observed to pause for a moment and then to attempt to speak, but his voice was . faint as one going to sleep. He fell to the floor. The attack was thought to be epilepsy. In twenty minutes he so far revived as to be able to swallow a little water, and, with much effort, speak a few words, but was soon taken with another spasm, in which he was, for a few minutes, in great distress. But this soon passed off, and at fifteen minntes past twelve o'clock, on the morning of the 31st, he slept in Jesus without a struggle or a groan. His remains were
interred at Keytesville." Worthy notice of a worthy man.
Mr. Ashby preached the Gospel forty-two years in Mis- souri, thirty-nine of which were given to the north side of the
43
IS24.
river. He was one of the fathers of the Missouri Confer- ence, and his labors, influence and memory are as "precious ointment poured forth" on his sons in the Gospel. Ilis death, occurring as it did, at God's altar, in accordance with a wish, publicly expressed a few hours before, while engaged in prayer, was a fitting close to a truly consecrated life, and produced a profound and wide-spread sensation at the time, the waves of which have not yet ceased to roll.
1824.
SHADRICK CASTEEL and CASSEL HARRISON were admitted on trial in '24. The first served on Boonslick circuit, with Urial Haw, one year, and discontinued. The second traveled four years in Missouri and one in Arkansas, and in '30 his name disappears from the minutes. The fol- lowing were his fields of labor; Missouri circuit, Spring and White River, Belleview, La Mine, Boonslick, St. Louis circuit. The last appointment he did not fill. So his col- league, John Hogan, writes me.
Four extraordinary men were received this year, '24, by transfer. They were Urial Haw, R. J. Dungan, Andrew Monroe, and Jesse Green.
Urial Haw was the son of Rev. James Haw, the first Methodist preacher ever appointed to bear the tidings of sal- vation to the "dark and bloody ground" of Kentucky. He was born May 13, 1799, was received on trial into the Ken- tucky Conference in '22, and sent with Milton Jamison to Cumberland circuit ; in '23 both were sent to Danville. In '24 he was ordained deacon, transferred to Missouri and appointed to Boonslick; '25, Boonslick and La Mine ; '26, St. Louis circuit ; '27, Cape Girardeau, two years ; '29, Arkansas district ; '30, Cape Girardeau district; '31, name
44
RICHARD J. DUNGAN.
not on the minutes ; '32, superannuated ; '33, Cape Girar- deau circuit ; '34, located ; readmitted in '43, and appointed to Charleston circuit, where he died, most triumphantly, September 7, '44.
In person he was tall, but slenderly built, and carried himself erect, with quick, elastic step. His features were not handsome, but very expressive; in particular, he had the most sparkling eyes that were ever set in a man's head; not large, but sparkling with an unusual fire of intellect and heart. His literary attainments were respectable, though not scholastic; but his knowledge of divine things made him one of God's "mighty men. * He acted as * one whohad adopted as the rule of his life, "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might."
RICHARD J. DUNGAN began his itinerant career in Ken- tucky in '23, came to Missouri in '24, and served as third preacher on Gasconade and St. Louis circuits ; in '25, he was junior on Missouri and Buffalo. He returned to Kentucky in '26, located in '35, was readmitted in '39, and located again in '46. Re-entered the third time in '55, and died February 9, '56, having traveled two years in Missouri, and sixteen in Kentucky.
ANDREW MONROE. Next to the name of Jesse Walker, that of Andrew Monroe ranks probably highest, and deserv- edly so, in the Annals of Missouri Methodism. He was the seventy-fifth preacher in the State, and the eleventh presiding elder, in which office he served twenty-six years. He was fifty-six years an effective itinerant preacher, forty-six of which were given to the Missouri Conference. Rev. T. M. Finney, D.D., who bears his honored name, and who was at the time of his death, November, '71, editor of the St. Louis Christian Advocate, has forwarded to me the following memoir of this once heroic, but now sainted man :
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IS24.
ANDREW MONROE was a native of Virginia, born in Hampshire county, October 29, 1792. He was the youngest of eleven children. By the death of his father, when only a small boy, he was reared by a widowed mother. The family of sons furnished the church four preachers of the gospel. The oldest was in the ranks of the local ministry, and died only a few years since at the extra ordinary age of one hundred years. His brother, William Monroe, survived until June last, dying in the eighty-eighth year of his age and the sixty-second of his ministry. Another brother, Joshua, asuper- annuated member of the Baltimore Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, as was also his brother William, still lives in Maryland, now at the age of eighty-six years, and having been in the ministry sixty-four years. This record, with his own added, is remarkable-the history of the four brothers making three hundred and fifty-four years of life, and one hundred and eighty-three years of labor in the Methodist itinerant ministry, and many years-how many we have not been informed-in the work of the local ministry. His family were among the early emigrants to the West, settling first in Ohio. There, in '12, he was converted under the ministry of the Rev. William Lamden. In '15 he was licensed to preach by a quarterly Conference in Zanesville district, David Young being presiding elder. By his appointment he traveled as junior preacher on Fairfield cir- cuit till the session of the Ohio Conference at Lebanon in the fall of the year, Bishop Asbury presiding, when he was admitted on trial in the traveling connection, and received his first regular appointment to Cumberland circuit, in the state of Kentucky, and one of the charges of Salt River district, Charles Holliday being presiding elder.
At the following Conference this district was attached to the Tennessee Conference, and he became and remained a member of that Conference till its session at Hopkinsville October 14, '20, when the Kentucky Conference was organized, and to which he attached himself. Atits session in the fall of '24 he was transferred to the Mis- souri Conference, which theretofore had embraced Illinois and Arkansas. Its session was held at Padsfield's, Looking Glass Prairie, Illinois, October 23, '24, and was attended by Bishops McKendree, Roberts and Soule. The Illinois district was at that session separated from the Conference, and he was assigned to work in Missouri at the
46
ANDREW MONROE.
station in St. Louis. He was present at the Conference. On his journey thither he traveled several days in company with Bishop Rob- erts, who told him that his purpose was to send him either to St. Louis or New Orleans, giving him his option. His personal prefer- ence and family circumstances determined his choice of the West. Since then his ministerial life has been continuously spent in this state and in connection with the Missouri Conference, with the ex- ception of one year, when he became connected with the St. Louis Conference as superintendent of the Kansas mission district.
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