THE APOSTLES OF FYLDE METHODISM published in 1885
This book provides a highly readable account of the penetration of Methodism into the region north and west of Preston known as The Fylde, including Blackpool as it grew in importance in the first half of the 19th century.
Several chapters are of great interest with respect
to the Garstang Circuit, in particular:
Michael Emmett's missionary visit to the Garstang and
the area beyond (Chapter 5), the story of the great missionary William Threlfall,
of Woodplumpton (Chapter 8), Richard Mason, the first Methodist in Pilling (Chapter
9), the role of George Fishwick in establishing the churches in Hollins Lane
and Scorton (Chapter 11), and much more.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
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THE APOSTLES
OF
FYLDE METHODISM
BY
JOHN TAYLOR
AUTHOR OF
“REMINISCENCES OF ISAAC MARSDEN,” “PICTURE TRUTHS,”
“GREAT LESSONS FROM LITTLE THINGS,” ETC.
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 1885 BY
T. WOOLMER, 2 CASTLE STREET, CITY ROAD, LONDON E.C.
PREFACE
While preparing a lecture for our young people on the “Introduction of Methodism to Blackpool,” I was astonished to find how little the Fylde people knew of their own history. Lives of self-denial, and deeds of heroism, had laid the foundations of the Church as it is today, and the noble men and women who had toiled, and suffered, and died for the truth, were in danger of being forgotten.
What is true of the Fylde country is true of every Circuit and Church in the land. The Gospel lifts men and women from obscurity and weakness, and makes them powerful for good. It transforms some of them into the grandest heroes the world has ever seen; and if half the time and talent spent in writing works of fiction were devoted to the facts of Church history, it would soon be acknowledged that “fact is stranger than fiction.”
This book is not a history of Fylde Methodism. It is a series of biographical
sketches of the men and women who made the Church what it is, and who were themselves
transformed and sanctified by the Gospel they believed and taught. I have gathered
my facts from official documents and Circuit records, and from the lips of old
people who knew the parties I have named. So far as I could, I have verified
every state-ment I have made, and the reader may rely on its absolute truthfulness.
And so long as the bright succession of holy men and women runs, the “Acts of
the Apostles” will have to be written. We need to realise that the power of
the Gospel is the same in every age and place, and that wherever it is faithfully
preached and consistently lived, it must and will bring forth fruit.
If the reading of this book strengthens any man’s faith in God, or intensifies his love and devotion to the cause, it will have served its purpose nobly.
JOHN TAYLOR
29, BANK STREET, BLACKPOOL
Click on its number to go forward to a selected chapter
CHAPTER
1
The Fylde Country
CHAPTER
2
Martha Thompson
The First
Methodist in Preston
CHAPTER
3
Roger Crane
The Founder
of Fylde Methodism
CHAPTER
4
William Bramwell
The Chief
of the Apostles
CHAPTER
5
Michael Emmett
CHAPTER
6
Moses Holden
The Organiser
of Fylde Methodism
CHAPTER
7
Devout and Honourable
Women
CHAPTER
8
William Threlfall
The Missionary
Martyr of Namaqualand
CHAPTER
9
Richard Mason
The First
Methodist in Pilling
CHAPTER
10
James Roskell
The Converted
Soldier
CHAPTER
11
George Fishwick
of Scorton
CHAPTER 12
Mrs. Dorothy Hincksman of Lytham
CHAPTER
13
Francis Parnell of South Shore
CHAPTER
14
Sheaves from the Harvest Field
THE FYLDE COUNTRY
The “Fylde,” or “Garden,” is the name given to that tract of country which lies between the rivers Ribble and Wyre, in North-West Lancashire. The name is sometimes applied to the district beyond the Wyre as far as the mouth of the Lune. It is a level, fertile country, about twenty-four miles long by eighteen broad, extending from Lytham and Freckleton on the south to Scorton and Pilling on the north, and from Preston on the east to BIackpool and Fleetwood on the west.
In the summer season excursion steamers sail from Preston occasionally on a coasting trip, and this is a very enjoyable method of surveying the Fylde country. We leave “Proud Preston” for a sail down the Ribble early in the morning, as the tide serves us only at that hour. The tall smoky chimneys cause a dark cloud to hang over the town, but the sky is clear and the prospect bright as we leave the town behind. For a few miles we sail along the edge of Preston Marsh, that was once a bog and morass, but is now drained and rendered fertile. Soon we approach a bluff overlooking the river, on which stands Freckleton, the most southerly village in the Fylde. Through an intricate channel and over shifting sands we plough our way to Lytham, twelve miles from Preston.
Lytham is a clean, quiet, respectable town, of about 5000 inhabitants, that for years has been under a paternal government. The Clifton family, of Lytham Hall, being land-owners of the entire parish, and spending most of their time in the town, have preserved a form of local government closely approaching to the feudal system of the olden time. The town has thus acquired a reputation for order and quietness and respectability, and this reputation has attracted to the place visitors and residents who desire to escape from the bustle and strife of our large towns. It has an extensive promenade and pier, and during the summer steamers run daily to Southport, which is only eight miles distant across the sands.
Resuming our journey from Lytham, we sail through a narrow, intricate channel, near the lighthouse at the mouth of the Ribble, and steering northward, we are soon at St. Annes, about two and a half miles from Lytham. St. Annes is the youngest of the Fylde towns. It was only born about ten or a dozen years ago. A number of enterprising capitalists leased the land from J. T. Clifton, Esq., of Lytham Hall, and transformed a lonely rabbit warren into a town. It has now all the attractions of a watering-place, and is largely patronised by visitors seeking repose and quietness. It affords a fine view of Southport, and the distant hills of North Wales, from its promenade and pier.
Steaming again north-west through the channel known on the charts as “North
Hollow,” we soon come abreast of South Shore and Blackpool, and land at one
of the piers. We find ourselves on a magnificent promenade nearly three miles
long, and in a town that out of season has a population of about 15,000, while
during the season it is crowded with visitors from every part of the country.
The charm of the place is its magnificent sweep of sea. Like St. Annes,
it is a modern town. It has no history. It takes its name from a
“black pool” of stagnant, bog-stained water that used to lodge among its primitive
sand-hills.
We spend a day or two in Blackpool for rest and recreation, till one day we
find another steamer sailing for Glasson Dock, and we join her. For eight or
ten miles we are hugging the coast, past Bispham and Cleveleys, till in half
an hour we are abreast Rossall College, a large public school, where many of
the doctors and lawyers of the next generation are polishing their wits and
keeping themselves in training for the great conflict of life.
Soon we pass Rossall Point, a huge landmark built of immense beams of timber, and now we may consider ourselves on the shores of Morecambe Bay. Away to the right is Fleetwood, on the banks of the Wyre. You can see its immense grain-elevator and the shipping in its dock. The town is largely interested in the shipping trade, and it has a fine fleet of fishing-boats. Like St. Annes and Blackpool, it is a modern town. Compared with Lancaster, York, and Chester, these large Fylde towns are mushroom growths of yesterday. They all owe their development to the line of railway opened in 1846 from Preston to Fleetwood, and known to this day as the Preston and Wyre Railway.
Passing Fleetwood Lighthouse, we steer away to the right, through Lune Deeps, skirting the coast of Pilling and Cockerham, and catching distant glimpses of Lancaster, Morecambe, Grange, Ulverston, and Barrow. Soon we arrive at Glasson, the oldest dock in the kingdom. It is five miles from Lancaster, and depends for its support mainly on the timber trade. It has immense timber ponds and dock accommodation; but there is a quiet, sleepy, old-world air about it that must be experienced to be understood.
A smart walk of five or six miles across well-cultivated fields will bring us to Scorton, whence we take train on the London and North-Western Railway to Preston again.
So that in imagination we have travelled round the Fylde as it is today. It is bounded on the east by a range of hills stretching from Lancaster to Preston, and known by various names, such as Scorton Fells and Wyresdale, but they are all parts of the great central mountain chain of Lancashire. From these hills the district stretches away in level or undulating plains to the shores of Morecambe Bay and the Irish Sea on the west.
It now requires an effort of the imagination to realise the Fylde country as it was a century ago. By one stroke of the pen we must obliterate all the watering-places on the coast, and sweep away their thoughtless, giddy multitudes. By another stroke of the pen we must wipe out all the lines of railway, and all the steam-engines and steamboats and telegraphs, and modern discoveries and inventions. We must put back the clock of time for a hundred years, and undo all the good that has been done by the spread of knowledge and the progress of truth during that period.
If our great-grandfathers had been anxious to visit and explore the Fylde at that period, they would have found it a very formidable task indeed. They would have found Preston the key of the Fylde then as now. Preston at that time was a place of strong passions, and lasting antipathies, and bitter controversies. She was known throughout the land for her passionate love and violent hatred. If she loved a cause, it was a love that could brook no rival and could bear no contradiction. If she hated a cause, it was a hatred so intense that only blood could pacify it. The Preston men of those days never did things by halves. If they had a contested election, they spent a fortune over it in bribery and corruption, and they were not content to outvote their opponents and leave them in a numerical minority; they generally contrived to beat and mutilate and kill some of them before the strife was over. Civil war often raged in the town between the Catholics and Orangemen with such fury that the Riot Act had to be read and the military cleared the streets at the point of the sword. It was only by the strong arm of civil authority that men’s passions were curbed and their violence restrained in those good old times.
And what was true of Preston men was true to a less degree of the men and women in the villages and hamlets of the Fylde. They imbibed their religious and political opinions with their mothers’ milk, and from the cradle to the grave they were of the same opinion still. In religious matters they were intensely conservative and averse to change. Many of them were the descendants of ancient Roman Catholic families, who cherished the old faith, and were true to their principles all through the stormy times of the Reformation; and when kingdoms were overthrown and dynasties perished before the advancing waves of Protestantism, they were unwavering in their allegiance to the Church of Rome. The sons inherited their religious opinions, as they inherited their broad acres, from their sires, and outside influences had no effect upon them.
Others, again, were staunch English Protestants, belonging to the yeomanry, farming, and trading classes, who had been brought up under the influence of the Established Church. These were numerous, comparatively wealthy, and very decided in their religious and political opinions. Many of them were Orangemen, who bore no love to their Catholic neighbours, and who at election times raised the cry of “Church and King,” and invariably voted “true blue.”
A third section of the community represented the Independents and Baptists. These men were the sturdy sons of those sires from whom Cromwell recruited his Ironsides. They were Puritans and Nonconformists, who prided themselves on their church history, and who were prepared to fight and die for liberty of conscience. They studded the Fylde with little white-washed conventicles, in which they sang and prayed and heard sermons after their own tastes, from men who cared for neither priest nor bishop nor pope. They were high Calvinists, as bigoted and exclusive in their teachings as any of the other denominations. At election times they were generally in a minority; but they were a body of men who had to be reckoned with in every great movement. They were powerful and demonstrative and uncompromising, as their fathers had been in the times of the great civil war.
These three denominations held sway throughout the Fylde. They had no love for each other, but they all agreed in their aversion to change and in their demonstrative attachment to the faith of their fathers.
Outside the Christian Churches were hundreds of families who never thought
about religion, and had no love for Christianity. They vegetated and existed
without mental effort or spiritual life. Intellectually and morally they were
only a few degrees above their own sheep and cattle. And like the cattle,
when their passions were roused, they were full of blind undiscriminating fury.
It is not difficult to account for the mental peculiarities and idiosyncrasies
of the Fylde people at that time, if we consider their position and circumstances.
They were shut up to a little world of their own. Seed-time and harvest,
summer and winter, found them performing the same dull round of duties.
They ploughed and dug, and planted and sowed, and reaped, and tended their cattle,
month by month and year by year, from childhood and youth to hoary hairs. So
they became human machines, and life was one stupendous effort to solve the
problem: “What shall we eat? What shall we drink? Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
They seldom saw a strange face or heard a strange voice. An occasional tramp
would beg at their door by day and plunder their hen-roost by night. So
they came to regard every stranger as a foe, and earned for themselves a reputation
for want of hospitality.
They were far removed from the great highways of the world’s thought and
activity. The roads in the Fylde led nowhere. They were simply country lanes
and occupation roads from farm to field, that had been used as highways.
They were very narrow and crooked, and disgracefully dirty and uneven. It was
safest to ride on horseback in wet weather, for if your horse sank to his knees
in mud, he would generally contrive to pitch you over his head into a soft bed
of mud, and scramble out with the empty saddle. If you drove, the chances
were you would either lose the wheels or the whole conveyance, or you would
stick fast in a bog for an indefinite period. The London and Scotch coaches
passed through Preston, and the ostlers and stable-boys heard the latest news
from the great world outside. And when the Fylde farmers went to Preston market,
they gathered their news second-hand from these veracious ostlers and stable-boys.
So that battles might be fought and victories won, and they would hear nothing
about them for weeks or months. There were no newspapers except the London
Newsletter, that was sent to the Vicarage every week, and usually formed the
chief item in the parson’s sermon on the following Sunday.
They were very superstitious. The bulk of the people were lamentably ignorant,
and a few shrewd, clever knaves imposed on their ignorance for their own private
greed and gain. Every village and hamlet had its wizard and fortune-teller,
who consulted the oracle, and ruled the planets, and foretold coming events.
I have been compelled to listen to ghost stories that ought to have frozen my
blood, and made each particular hair to stand on end, but I am not a good subject
for ghosts and ghouls and fiends to operate upon.
All these considerations must be weighed and valued if we would try to estimate
the task our forefathers undertook when they introduced Methodism to the Fylde.
They had to carry the Gospel to a hostile, unfriendly, and superstitious people.
They never troubled their heads about the difficulties in their way, or the
reception they were likely to have. They believed that the Gospel is “the
power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth,” and it was their business
to proclaim it, and God Almighty’s business to protect and foster his own truth.
MARTHA THOMPSON
THE FIRST METHODIST IN PRESTON
About the year 1750 a respectable young woman named Martha Thompson resolved to leave her native town in consequence of domestic trouble, and take a situation as servant in a gentleman’s family in London. She was then nineteen years of age, fair and attractive in appearance, of amiable disposition, and fairly well educated for her position in life.
Her mother had died some years before, and as her father had married a second time the old home had lost its charms for her. So she wrote to a lady in London who had lived in Preston, and obtained a situation in her family.
She started from home with her box of clothing and a few books, and travelled by the carrier’s cart to Manchester. It was a formidable journey for one so young and inexperienced. The roads were full of holes and ruts that in dry weather nearly shook the cart to pieces. In wet weather the horses toiled through pools of water two or three feet deep, and bespattered the cart with slime and mud. The lonely lanes and wide moors were haunted by footpads and thieves ever ready to plunder the defenceless, while at almost every cross road the grinning skeleton of some malefactor swung in chains from the gibbet where he had been executed.
On through Chorley and Bolton the carrier’s horses plodded in safety to Manchester. Martha met the coach there and drove in safety to London.
She found her new home a very happy and comfortable place. She had a generous
master, a considerate mistress, and four or five fellow-servants. For some time
her life in London was quiet and uneventful, but very peaceful and happy. She
was a diligent, faithful servant, who lived on good terms with her comrades,
and won the confidence and esteem of her employers.
One day her mistress sent her into the City on an errand. She had to pass through
Moorfields, which was then an open space that had escaped the builders’ hands.
Passing through the fields she saw an enormous crowd of people gathered in a
compact mass round a preacher. As she paused to gratify her curiosity with such
a strange sight, she heard the whole multitude break forth into song. It was
such singing as she had never heard before. It came from thousands of human
voices united in hearty and cheerful songs of praise.
Martha stood spell-bound and charmed by the singing of the multitude. Step by step she pushed her way into the crowd, forgetting all about her errand in the City. She could hear nothing but the melody of ten thousand voices united in song, and she could see nothing but the preacher and his extraordinary congregation.
The preacher was a small man, rather thin, with fine, sharply-cut features and closely-shaved chin. He wore a neat wig and a clergyman’s gown and bands. He was mounted on a table in the centre of the crowd, and by his air of calm authority he arrested universal attention. He had a bright steady eye that seemed to command the multitude, and a mouth and lips indicative of firmness and decision of character.
His congregation was a motley crowd, gathered from the streets and slums of the city. Merchants and tradesmen had stolen away from business for half an hour to hear this famous preacher in Moorfields. Godly men and women who were seeking spiritual light and power in those dark degenerate days had crowded round the table for that light and truth which they could not find elsewhere. Outcasts and thieves, who had not a home or a friend in the world, had returned like prodigals to the home of mercy they had so long neglected and despised. Bitter and persecuting opponents of the preacher were in the crowd also, but for once they were cowed and overawed by the multitude. In their anxiety to hear the preacher, they were crowded round the table in serried ranks as closely as they could stand. Some of them were very ragged and dirty, but they listened as attentively as their more favoured brethren.
After the first hymn had been sung the preacher offered a short prayer, full of earnestness and pathos, but without using a prayer-book. Then taking out his pocket Bible, he announced his text, and for about twenty minutes preached with great plainness and power. During the sermon many of his hearers wept; some sobbed as if their hearts would break; while others seemed afraid to weep or stir or breathe, lest they should lose a word.
Martha Thompson was riveted to the spot. That sermon had been all for her. It had shown her what she ought to be, and how far she was living below her privileges. It had destroyed her self-righteousness, and shown her the need of the new birth. Her conscience was awakened, and in her heart there rose the cry, “What must I do to be saved?
The vast multitude had melted away before she remembered her errand to the
City. She ran to complete her purchases, and hurried home as quickly as she
could, with her mind full of the great truths she had heard and her spirit disturbed
and anxious.
Her mistress reprimanded her for being so long away, and demanded an explanation.
Martha frankly told her all. She described the preacher and the congregation
and the sermon, and told what a powerful impression it had made on her mind.
Her mistress was a good Churchwoman of the old school. She believed in baptism
and confirmation and communion, and attendance at church, but she did not believe
in repentance and regeneration and sanctification. From Martha’s description
of the preacher she knew it was John Wesley, who at that time was building up
his Societies called Methodists. So as a good Churchwoman she took Martha aside
and solemnly admonished her of the error of her ways. She warned her never again
to listen to those Methodists, for they would drive her mad and ruin her soul.
Poor Martha was “mad” already, for she was under deep conviction of her guilt and need of salvation. She was “sore wounded by the Spirit’s sword,” and she must be healed. That first sermon had done all the mischief. It had opened her eyes, and aroused her conscience, and impelled her to ask and knock and seek for mercy.
In a few days she contrived to go again to Moorfields to hear Mr. Wesley once more. Under his second sermon her sense of guilt was taken away, and she was filled with joy and gladness. Her burden was removed, her soul was set at liberty, and she became a new creature in Christ Jesus.
She was so happy she could scarcely control her feelings. She wept for joy,
and when the congregation sang the last hymn she was almost beside herself with
gladness. That hymn is now the 650th in the Wesleyan Hymn Book:
“The Lord Jehovah reigns,
His throne is built on high;
The garments He assumes
Are light and majesty.
His glories shine with beams so bright,
No mortal eye can bear the sight.”
The vast congregation sang this noble hymn to a popular tune that made the
welkin ring on Moorfields, and when they came to the last verse Martha was in
a transport of joy:
“And will this sovereign King
Of glory condescend?
And will He write His name
My Father and my Friend?
I love His name, I love His word;
Join all my powers to praise the Lord!”
How Martha found her way home she hardly knew. Whether in the body or out
of the body she could not tell. She had lost all thought or concern about everything
for a season but her own conversion. She went about her domestic duties with
a countenance beaming with joy and gladness. She was so full of peace and joy
that she told everybody that came in her way the good news of her salvation.
Early in the morning and late at night and all the day through she was singing:
“And will this sovereign King
Of glory condescend?
And will He write His name
My Father and my Friend?
I love His name, I love His word;
Join all my powers to praise the Lord!”
Her fellow-servants endured this for a day or two, but they soon complained
that Martha was mad and ought to be removed. Her master and mistress were sorely
perplexed, and they sent for a doctor, who examined her and declared she was
stark mad. So the following morning her master’s carriage drove to the door
and she was ordered to step in and accompany her mistress. They drove her to
a lunatic asylum, and poor Martha soon found herself a prisoner for Christ’s
sake, and literally buried alive. Still her confidence in God remained, for
she sang:
“I love His name, I love His word;
Join all my powers to praise the Lord!”
Her keepers were sorely puzzled with her. They cut off her hair and shaved
her head, but she showed no resentment and bore them no malice. They had no
need of strait jackets or dark cells or cruel restraints, for she was as gentle
and harmless as a child. When she had not a friend in the world, and was shut
up in that living tomb with no prospect of escape and no means of communicating
with the outside world, she still sang her old song:
“I love His name, I love His word;
Join all my powers to praise the Lord!”
God heard her cry and touched the hearts of her keepers. They listened to
her story and relaxed the severity of her imprisonment. One day the master came
into the room with a torn coat, and she begged him to let her mend the coat
to find her employment. The matron supplied her with needle and thread, and
Martha did the work so neatly that henceforth she was permitted to darn stockings
and make herself generally useful with her needle in the asylum. Then she was
permitted to come into the kitchen to help the servants. Thus she had an opportunity
of securing a piece of paper and pen and ink. With these she wrote a letter
to Mr. Wesley, stating her case and soliciting his help in regaining her freedom.
For weeks she carried that letter in her pocket seeking an opportunity of posting
it. One day a gentleman whose wife was an inmate of the asylum heard Martha’s
story and undertook to deliver her letter to Mr. Wesley. With characteristic
energy he caused an inquiry to be made into Martha’s condition, and in a few
days she was set at liberty, when she sang her old song once more:
“I love His name, I love His word;
Join all my powers to praise the Lord!”
She was free, but she was alone in London, and friendless. Mr. Wesley, with
his usual good sense and prudence, asked her what plans she had in life, and
how she intended to earn her living. She told him that if she could only find
her way to Preston again she would commence business on her own account as a
mantle-maker and milliner, and she had no doubt of her ability to earn her own
living comfortably and honourably. He was travelling northwards himself at that
time, so he mounted Martha on a pillion behind him, and rode with her on horseback
till they found a carrier’s cart that would convey her to her native town.
She commenced business at once, and the Lord prospered her. All she touched
turned to gold, and all her efforts were crowned with success.
She was the only Methodist in Preston, and her love for the communion of saints prompted her to seek the country round for some kindred spirits. There was a poor weaver at Cockshott House in the Ribble Valley, named William Livsey, who joined the Methodists about this time, and who became a spiritual magnet of considerable power. He attracted fifteen other persons to himself, and became leader of a Society class at Brimicroft. It was six miles from Preston, but Martha Thompson counted it a privilege to walk twelve miles every Sunday for spiritual counsel and help.
She had a neighbour named Mrs. Walmsley, who kept an inn in Church Street, and who went with her one Sunday and joined the little band of Methodists. Shortly afterwards Mrs. Walmsley’s son, William, was converted and joined them. There were now three Methodists in Preston, and they earnestly desired a visit from one of the travelling preachers. The Haworth Circuit at that time extended from Otley, near Leeds, to Whitehaven, and included the whole of North and North-East Lancashire, Westmoreland, and Cumberland. The two travelling preachers had a Circuit 120 miles long by 60 miles broad, so that they were only able to visit the Societies occasionally. At first they came to Preston once in six weeks, and preached in Mrs. Walmsley’s alehouse. She entertained them, and her son William became the first leader of the little Society, which numbered five members—two other females having joined them.
When Colne became the head of the Circuit, Preston had the preachers once a fortnight, and later service was held on Sunday at noon.
So the little Society at Preston grew and flourished. Meanwhile Martha Thompson had married Mr. J. B. Whitehead, a brassfounder and button manufacturer from Birmingham. Her new home was one of comfort and affluence, and she used her opportunities to promote the interests of Methodism in her native town. She was hospitable to the preachers, devoted to the cause, and did her utmost to promote the work of God in the place.
A very remarkable story is told of one of her efforts to win her friends to Christ. Mr. Wesley was announced to preach at Chorley one week-day, and she thought it would be a good opportunity for making Methodism known among her friends. So she hired a horse and conveyance at one of the inns in Preston, and invited her friends to go with her to Chorley. She packed up a hamper of provisions, with some of Mrs. Walmsley’s good ale, and prayed that God would save her unconverted friends at Chorley.
The innkeeper who owned the horse and carriage had a young man named Christopher Briggs, who was ordered to drive the party that day. Now Briggs had a fierce hatred of Methodism, common to all the Fylde people at that time, and when he heard they were a party of Methodists going to hear John Wesley, he positively refused to drive them. The innkeeper told him that one man’s money was as good as another man’s money to him, and as Mrs. Whitehead was a neighbour of his and a good customer, he must either drive her to Chorley or he must quit his service at once. After a long parley, Briggs promised to go as his master ordered him, but he secretly swore he would upset the coach and break their necks.
The party filled the conveyance, stowed away the provisions under the seats, and drove away merrily out of Preston. They were soon in the country, and Briggs began to look out for his opportunity of upsetting them all. One would have thought he could have managed to work any mischief upon them he pleased, for it was a wretched road - full of holes and ruts and stone-heaps. On he drove at a fearful pace, rattling their bones over the stones, and jerking and jolting them fearfully. He expected every moment to be overturned, and was prepared to jump for his life and leave them to their fate.
But the coach had a charmed life that day. It would not upset, and it did not break down; but it drove triumphantly into Chorley, and set them down in safety. Briggs could not understand it. He did not know that Mrs. Whitehead had been praying for him, and that God’s providence had been watching over him.
The hamper was unpacked, the ale was broached, and Mrs. Whitehead entertained her friends to a good dinner. Briggs was persuaded to join them, and under the influence of the good things provided he began to think these Methodists were not such bad people after all. He went with them to the service, and under Mr. Wesley’s sermon he was led to seek and find mercy. He joined himself to the Methodists, and became a very devout and sincere Christian. For some years he lived in Preston and rendered valuable service to the cause.
Years afterwards he was travelling by coach from Staffordshire to Manchester, when he was upset and thrown violently to the ground. His leg was badly crushed, and had to be amputated. After the surgeons had finished their work, he turned to them with the greatest composure and said, “I thank you, gentlemen, for all the pains and trouble you have taken.” Then turning to the Rev. Thomas Taylor, who stood by his side, he said, “Glory be to God, Who has gathered me unto Himself!” Then he was seized with convulsions and died.
It would be easy to multiply examples of this good woman’s devotion to the cause of Christ. Through a long life she did what she could to bring sinners to Christ and build up her beloved Church. She was born in the year 1731, converted about the year 1755, and commenced business in Preston about 1757. She was a member of the little Society at Brimicroft in 1759 and continued to be a faithful and devoted Christian to the end of her days. She was tried in the fire of persecution, but she endured hardness as a good soldier of the Lord Jesus Christ. She bought her religion at a great cost, and she valued and treasured it accordingly.
Her children grew up to occupy positions of honour and usefulness. One of her grandsons has been Mayor of “Proud Preston,” and some of her descendants occupy honourable places in the Methodist Church to this day.
The evening of her life was spent in preparation for the life of heaven. With her lantern in her hand, and a child to lead her, she found her way to the early morning prayer meetings, and the services on winter nights. To the last she retained her love to Christ and her attachment to the people of her early choice.
She lived to be nearly eighty-nine years old, and I have spoken to old men and women who remember her at the beginning of the present century in a green and happy old age. Her declining years were passed away in great peace. She visited the sick, and ministered to the poor, and occupied her place in the sanctuary till the Master called her to the better land. She died at Preston in 1820.
And when, in age and feebleness extreme, she was waiting for the end, she
gathered her children and her grandchildren round her bed, and begged them to
sing her old song:
“And will this sovereign King
Of glory condescend?
And will He write His name
My Father and my Friend?
I love His name, I love His word;
Join all my powers to praise the Lord!”
ROGER CRANE
THE FOUNDER OF FYLDE METHODISM
The great wave of Methodist revival that swept through the land towards the close of the last century was a long time in finding its way to Preston and the Fylde country.
As early as 1749, London, Bristol, Leeds, and Newcastle became circuit towns,
and the centres of religious activity and progress. From these centres devoted
men went forth in all directions scattering the seeds of Divine truth, and as
soon as it germinated into bud and leaf and fruit, other circuits were formed,
and new schemes of aggression were planned and executed.
In 1753 Lincoln lighted a fire that was destined to illuminate the wide Vale
of Trent, and penetrate the fens and plains of the East Coast.
In 1758 York set up the standard of Methodism in the East Riding, and carried the Gospel far and wide.
In 1765 quite a number of circuits were formed, including Barnard Castle, Bedford, Birmingham, Bristol, Manchester, Norwich, and Sheffield.
In 1768 Liverpool became the head of a circuit, and Bradford followed its example in 1769.
In 1773 a circuit was formed, whose centre was Haworth, in the West Riding of Yorkshire. Haworth was the home of Grimshaw, the friend of Wesley, and though he was Vicar of Haworth, and had to preach in his own church, he was also a travelling preacher of more than ordinary ability and success.
In 1776 Colne became the circuit town, instead of Haworth. The preachers crossed the moors, and gave their attention to North and North-East Lancashire. They travelled through Burnley, Accrington, Bacup, Blackburn, Preston, Lancaster, Ulverston, Kendal, Settle, and Skipton, a tract of country now represented by about twenty-five circuits.
Thus, for more than a quarter of a century, Preston was outside the influences of Methodism, and had no regular services from John Wesley’s preachers. Its position on the plan dates from the formation of the Colne Circuit in 1776.
The first preachers appointed were Samuel Bardsley and William Brammah. “Sammy” Bardsley was a man of one idea - a singularly good and simple-minded man - whose only mission was to preach the Gospel, and be the means of saving his fellow-men. He had a slight impediment in his speech, and but a limited acquaintance with English grammar and logic, but he was mighty in the Scriptures, and full of the Holy Ghost and of power.
Many good stories are told of Sammy’s wit and wisdom, that should not be buried in oblivion. In one of his circuits the members imagined that he was scarcely good enough for their pulpits. They carped at his sermons, and criticised his style of preaching, and told him he must leave them at the end of the year. Sammy listened very meekly to all they had to say, and then, with a merry twinkle in his eye, he replied: “Brethren, the misfortune is - not that I am a poor preacher - but that you are poor hearers, and I intend to stay till you are better.” And he did stay till they were not only hearers of the Word, but doers of it, and a gracious revival followed.
When he first came to Preston the town was a seething caldron of controversy and agitation. The various sects and denominations were spending all their time and energies in trying to demolish each other. The Protestants were having a bitter war with the Catholics. The Churchmen were fighting the Dissenters, and among the Dissenters themselves a fierce and angry controversy raged on doctrinal questions.
It seemed as if the devil of discord had been let loose to ravage and destroy whatever of spiritual life and power had existed in the Churches. There was no charity to be found among them, and men who followed after peace, and desired to live in love and charity with their neighbours, were abused as traitors to their principles, and cowards in the cause.
Sammy preached in the streets, and gathered round him a crowd of angry, fiery zealots, who were ready to fly at each other’s throats. The young bloods of the town laughed at his peculiarities, and bantered him about his learning. Every time he made a slip in his pronunciation they interrupted him, even during prayer, to ask: “Is that grammar?” “Is that logic?”
When he came to the sermon he apologised for his lack of knowledge, and regretted that he was only a student of one book. He understood there was a great battle being fought in the town on the nature and extent of the Atonement, and he wanted to throw a little light on the subject. If they would excuse him, he would stand aside and call witnesses of undoubted veracity and ability to speak for themselves.
“Isaiah,” said he, “come and tell this people all thou knowest about the
nature and extent of the Atonement.”
Then in a tone of deep solemnity he repeated aloud passage after passage from
the Book of Isaiah: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every
one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” “He
was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement
of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed.” So he went on,
quoting passage after passage, till the truth evidently touched the more thoughtful
and serious of his hearers, and then with a smile he turned to the conscience-stricken
ones and asked, “Is that grammar? Is that logic?”
After Isaiah he called David, and Peter, and Paul, and John, and James, and
quoted their teachings on the subject, till it dawned upon his hearers that
his business was to preach the Gospel while other men were quarrelling and fighting
about it.
Among those who came to hear him was a young gentleman named Roger Crane. He
was then a stripling of nineteen, and when Sammy met the little Society, he
presented himself among them and asked to be admitted into fellowship with them.
He “desired to flee from the wrath to come, and to be saved from his sins;”
so his name was entered on the class-book, and he received his ticket of membership.
This occurred in 1777, probably at Mrs. Walmsley’s house, and it proved to be the most important event in the local history of Methodism.
Roger Crane, the only son of Thomas Crane, was born in Preston in 1758. His ancestors for more than two centuries had lived in the neighbourhood of Chorley and Preston, and had been highly esteemed for their public and private virtues. They were staunch Nonconformists and orthodox Presbyterians. In the great Civil War their sympathies were on the side of the Parliament, and in every effort to promote civil and religious liberty they nobly played their part. Like all the Nonconformists of their time they were terribly in earnest. When they drew the sword for conscience’ sake, they grudged no sacrifice, they feared no foe, they asked no quarter, and they gave none.
Unlike many of their comrades in the fight for liberty, they were a race of educated men. They could always give a reason for the opinions they held, and they could generally hold their own in argument.
When Roger Crane was but a youth, the Presbyterian Church in Preston had been cursed with a spirit of controversy that was agitating the town. Its minister seems to have lost his spirituality, and to have wandered away into the mazes of Humanitarianism and Unitarianism. Instead of proclaiming the great truths of the Gospel, and allowing them to have their due influence on men’s minds and hearts, he went hither and thither hunting Will-o’-the-wisps of idle theories and foolish speculations, till he landed his Church in quagmire and bog. Eventually, he cast off all pretence of spirituality, and boldly proclaimed himself a high and dry Unitarian of the old school. By the weight of his personal influence he carried away some of the leading members of his Church and the trustees of the building in which they worshipped. Having the trustees on his side, he was enabled to defy his opponents, and continue in office long after he had ceased to preach the doctrines to which he was solemnly pledged. In the end the trustees betrayed their trust, and the chapel was handed over to the Unitarians.
Roger Crane and his father were the leading opponents of the men who betrayed the Church. They resisted both by argument and personal influence every effort to rob the Church of its spirituality, and so long as there was any hope of saving the sinking ship they stood by it. But when they found all their efforts were vain, they deserted it, and left it to its fate, and the building is to this day used as the Unitarian church in Preston.
Thus Roger Crane was cast adrift in an angry sea of controversy and unrest. He went hither and thither among the Churches of Preston, seeking spiritual food and nourishment, and settling nowhere. He knew the great truths of the Gospel as he knew history, or geography, or mathematics, but he was a stranger to its saving power. He remembered how his grandmother took him aside and prayed with him when he was but a child of six years old, and how she stored his mind with Divine truth. He called to mind how he and his two sisters had been the subjects of powerful religious impressions even in childhood, and he mourned that now on the dawn of manhood those hallowed influences had departed from him. Where could he find the light and truth for which his soul earnestly longed?
He felt he must be converted. What was the use of contending for a creed
unless the truths he believed touched and hallowed his life? What must be the
fearful responsibilities of those blind leaders of the blind who had landed
him into the ditch?
Full of these thoughts he found his way among the Methodists. It was while on
a visit to Leeds that he first heard Methodist teaching, and when he knew that
occasional preaching services would be held in Preston, he resolved to cast
in his lot among them.
It was a fortunate thing for himself, because it saved him from drifting away into error and sin; and it was a fortunate thing for Methodism, because it introduced a wise, and able, and willing apostle.
For some months he walked in darkness, and lived in bondage. He had travelled many miles to hear the truth, and one day he had an opportunity of stating his case to one of the preachers he heard in Yorkshire. The preacher saw that his mind was well stored with Divine truth, and if he could only start him on the right track he would soon be saved. After a lengthy conversation he said to Mr. Crane: “Brother, you are inverting the order of God. Remember it is, believe, love, obey; and you are trying to obey, love, and believe.” That afternoon, while travelling alone, he saw the way of salvation in its simplicity, and consciously laid hold on the living Saviour.
Those who knew Roger Crane predicted that his would be no ordinary conversion.
He had not cast in his lot with the poor despised Methodists in a passing fit
of enthusiasm, of which he would repent on the morrow. He had enlisted for life,
and he was destined ere long to take the foremost place in directing the energies
and supplying the needs of the Church.
His father fully approved the choice he had made, and his two sisters shortly
afterwards joined the little Society.
Their house from that time became the home of the Methodist preachers. “Sammy”
Bardsley was succeeded by Alexander Mather, and two years later he was succeeded
by Christopher Hopper. It was during the ministry of Mr. Hopper that William
Bramwell joined the Society in Preston.
Roger Crane was a year older than William Bramwell, and had the advantages of superior mental culture and logical acumen. He was comparatively wealthy, and occupied a good social position in the district. He was also a man of sterling piety, undaunted courage, and firm in his integrity. What he accepted and believed had been well weighed, and measured, and valued, before he accepted it. There was nothing in Roger’s creed that would not bear the light of reason and of revelation. He would have nothing short of “Thus saith the Lord” as the authority and warrant for any truth he accepted. He had seen one Church scattered by the heresy and falsehood of its minister, and he did not mean to see another scattered in the same way. So that he became an authority in matters of doctrine, and a watchman to guard and defend the walls of his Zion.
William Bramwell was a simple-minded country lad, who had heard little and
read less of those burning controversies of his time. He knew nothing about
predestination and election, or Antinomianism and Socinianism. He only knew
that once he was blind, and now he could see; and in the warmth and fervour
of his first love he threw himself into the arms of Roger Crane.
These two young men, so different in learning and experience and worldly position,
were drawn together by a common love to Christ, and a common zeal for His glory.
They became as David and Jonathan. They formed a friendship that lasted all
through their lives, and that was of incalculable value to each of them.
Roger Crane was made a class-leader very early in his career, and he introduced
some of the most respectable of the early converts to the Church. His two sisters
and several of their friends met with him in Christian fellowship, and their
number increased till it was no longer possible to meet for public worship in
private dwelling-houses. About 1781 a room was hired over a packer’s warehouse
in St. John Street, Preston, and in this “upper room” the services were held
for six or seven years.
Roger Crane and William Bramwell became local preachers about this time, and
entered together on their evangelistic work. They found a kindred spirit in
Michael Emmett, a young convert who assisted them “in introducing the doctrines
and discipline of Methodism into many of the uncivilised districts around Preston,”
especially throughout the Fylde.
These three young men travelled to every village and hamlet of the Fylde, preaching
the Gospel, enduring persecution, and laying the foundations of the Churches
of today.
Mr. Crane took his stand on the fish stones in Poulton market-place one day to preach, when he was suddenly attacked by a mob and dragged to the ground. A score of rough strong men seized him and carried him out of the market-place, swearing they would drown him in a neighbouring pond. On their way they encountered a big brawny pugilist who demanded with an air of authority what all the row was about? Being informed that it was a “mad preacher” they were going to drown, he joined the sport with as little concern as if they were drowning a few hapless kittens. But suddenly remembering that Roger Crane was an occasional preacher, and a Methodist whose name was held in esteem in Preston for his kindness to the poor, he elbowed his way through the crowd, and demanded to have a look at him. The mob fell back under the influence of his ponderous blows on their heads and shoulders, and gave him an opportunity of recognising Mr. Crane. As soon as he saw it was his friend and benefactor, he bared his ponderous arms and fists, and with a fearful oath exclaimed: “I will knock the first man down that touches him.” It speaks volumes for the discretion of a Poulton mob that they fell back like lambs, and permitted the pugilist to lead him to a place of safety.
From about the year 1780, the biography of Roger Crane is the history of Fylde Methodism. He devoted his time and talents and fortune to the cause.
His sister Mary married the Rev. Michael Emmett in 1786, and travelled with him in various circuits.
Miss Elizabeth Crane married the Rev. Charles Atmore in 1785. She was the twin sister of Mrs. Emmett, and won for herself a good name in the Churches, though she only lived seven years after her marriage.
Roger Crane was honoured with the personal friendship of Mr. Wesley. He entertained him in 1781, and again in 1784, when he visited Preston, and tradition tells to this day how the people lined Fishergate to see him pass, leaning on the arm of Mr. Crane and one of his preachers.
In 1787 the first permanent Wesleyan Chapel was erected in Back Lane, Preston. Mr. Crane had recently received from his father his allotted portion of this world’s wealth, and was just about beginning business for himself. He generously devoted towards the building of this place one-fourth of his property, and spent much time and labour in begging for it and in superintending the workmen.
He commenced business in the iron trade, and prospered so wonderfully that in fifteen or twenty years he was able to retire from business and devote his whole life to works of mercy and the extension of Christ’s kingdom. His early retirement from business surprised many of his wealthy neighbours in Preston. One of them stopped him in the street and asked him how much money he had saved. With characteristic shrewdness he replied, “I am richer than you.” “How can that be?” eagerly inquired his friend. “Because I have enough, and you have not,” was the reply. He was twice married, first to Miss Annet of Alnwick, who died within two years of her marriage, and afterwards to Mrs. Aspden, the widow of Dr. Nathaniel Aspden of Blackburn. Both his wives were pious, devoted women, who shared his enthusiasm and self-denial in the cause of Christ.
He had one daughter, the issue of his first marriage, Miss Eliza Ann Crane, who married George Fishwick, Esq., of Springfield, near Garstang.
In 1790 Mr. Wesley paid his last visit to Preston and preached in Back Lane Chapel. Mrs. Michael Emmett had the honour of entertaining him. He was then in age and feebleness extreme, and had scarcely strength to preach.
In 1799 Preston became the head of a circuit, and for more than thirty years it had the benefits of Mr. Crane’s generosity and experience and practical help. Those who knew him in his later years describe him as a fine type of an English Christian gentleman. He had a pale intellectual face, with aquiline nose, and snow-white hair, thrown back over a rather prominent forehead. His dress was the pattern of neatness and order, and his manners strikingly impressive. In the pulpit he spoke with great clearness and force. His style of preaching was expository, but he had a fund of anecdote and a wealth of illustration always at his command. He gave to Methodism a stamp of respectability and social position that it would not otherwise have obtained in Preston and the Fylde.
Roger Crane lived to see the fruit of all his early labours and persecutions.
He kept up an intimate correspondence with Bramwell and Michael Emmett, the
friends of his youth, but he survived them both. He died on the 15th of October,
1836, in the seventy-ninth year of his age. He was a man of cultivated mind,
great energy of character, and an able expositor of the Scriptures. He was loyal
to Christ and faithful to duty through a long and eventful life, and when he
died, men began to realise the force and power of the truth: “The memory of
the just is blessed.”
WILLIAM BRAMWELL
THE CHIEF OF THE APOSTLES
We take an early train from Blackpool to Poulton some fine summer’s morning,
and walk by Skippool, on Wyre, to Singleton, one of the prettiest villages in
the North of England. As we stroll through the village, its neat white-washed
cottages glisten in the sunlight, and its trim, well-cultivated gardens are
fragrant with the perfume of flowers. We linger awhile to admire its stately
mansion and park, with its handsome church and schools, set in a background
of forest-trees crowned with luxuriant foliage.
Our four miles walk has been through shady lanes, skirting and occasionally
overlooking the Wyre; but we resume our journey through corn-fields and pastures
rich with all the wealth of approaching harvest. On, through straggling villages
and sleepy hamlets, we pursue our way for three miles more, till we reach the
village of Elswick.
We are now in the very centre of the Fylde country - six or seven miles from any railway station. Let us call on the Congregational minister here, and tell him we are on a pilgrimage to a Methodist shrine. He will invite us to sit and rest awhile, and he will entertain us with stories of his own church in the village.
Elswick has long been the headquarters of Nonconformity in the Fylde. It has a very handsome modern church, erected as a memorial of those good clergymen who were ejected in 1662, in consequence of the passing of the Act of Uniformity. More than two centuries ago a pious clergyman was deprived of his living, and suffered imprisonment, for refusing to assent and subscribe to everything contained in the Book of Common Prayer. After his release from prison he was ordered to attend service at Kirkham Parish Church. To comply with the law, and save himself from further persecution, he attended service as an ordinary member of the congregation; but the vicar recognised him, and ordered him out of church. Gathering up his hat and Bible he marched out of the church, exclaiming as he went: “It is fiddle, and be hanged - and be hanged, if you don’t fiddle.” So he went over to the Non-conformists at Elswick, and troubled the Churchmen at Kirkham no more.
For more than two centuries the Elswick Nonconformist Church has been letting its light shine over the Fylde, and lighting successive generations to the better land. The venerable minister who feeds the flock today is widely known and deservedly esteemed. He is firm and unflinching in his attachment to the principles of Nonconformity, but he loves “all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity.”
With a hearty grip of the hand, and a fervent “God bless you,” he sets us on our way out of the village. Three quarters of a mile from Elswick, on the road to Garstang, we reach Copp Church. It is a plain brick building, white-washed within and without, standing on an eminence that overlooks nearly the whole of the Fylde.
Let us call at the Vicarage and tell the worthy vicar that we are Methodist
pilgrims. He will gladly have a chat with us, and take us to look at his church,
for he is a spiritually-minded man who can recognise goodness and love it anywhere.
We are now at the birthplace of William Bramwell, the famous Methodist preacher.
He was born in a thatched cottage that stood in the lane leading from Elswick village to Copp Church, in February, 1759. That humble cottage was pulled down some years ago to save it from falling, and all trace of it is now lost. It was from that cottage that he rushed out mad with pain when suffering from smallpox, and flung himself into a horse pond on the other side of the lane. Along this lane he came every Sunday to the service at Copp Church, and took his place in the choir. It was in that gallery he used to stand on a footstool when six years of age, that his sweet voice might be heard by the congregation below. It was from that pulpit he first heard of God and heaven, and learned something about Jesus and His love. It was from this home of solitude that he went forth to be one of the most successful evangelists of modern times, and to lay broad and deep the foundations of Fylde Methodism.
Leaving Elswick and Copp Church behind, let us return by Great Eccleston to Poulton, and beguile our seven miles walk by talking about William Bramwell’s life and work.
The Spirit strove with Bramwell when he was but a child. He had a very tender conscience, and was lamentably ignorant of Divine truth. He was fond of music, and flowers, and good books. He earnestly desired to love and serve God, but he had nobody to teach him, so he groped in the dark for very many years.
When he removed to Preston, he fell in with a number of Roman Catholics, and he tried their plans of finding Christ by penance, and self-denial, and self-mortification. He knelt on the sanded stone floor with his bare knees in an agony of pain while he prayed. He cut his flesh and kept the wound open, that the pain might remind him of his sin. He nearly starved himself to death by abstaining from food when fasting, but he failed to find peace by these methods.
Afterwards he returned to the Church of England and was prepared for confirmation
by the Rev. Mr. Wilson of Preston, It was while he was receiving the Sacrament,
and “feeding on Christ by faith,” that he first realised a sense of God’s forgiving
love.
But his joy was only short-lived. His musical ability was the snare that entangled
him again in bondage. He was soon singing in public-houses, and bringing himself
once more into condemnation and distress.
One evening in the winter of 1779, when he was nearly twenty-one years of
age, he joined a company of less than a dozen Methodists who were assembled
in a small house in Preston, to hear a travelling preacher. He was so impressed
with what he heard that he went a second time and heard that grand old son of
thunder - Christopher Hopper. He was mightily pleased with Mr. Hopper’s trenchant,
vigorous style of preaching, and on his third visit he said to Roger Crane,
“Oh, this is the kind of preaching I have long wanted to hear; these are the
people with whom I am resolved to live and die.” He joined the little Society,
and received his ticket of membership from the Rev. Andrew Inglis, the junior
preacher in the Colne Circuit.
He did not at once find peace and rest. For some months he walked in darkness,
but he diligently read his Bible and prayed without ceasing. About the latter
end of April, 1780, Mr. Wesley visited Preston and met the little Society. Turning
to Bramwell he said, “ Well, brother, can you praise God?” Bramwell replied,
“No, sir.” He lifted up his hands and said with a smile, “Well, but perhaps
you will tonight.” These words were prophetic, for that night William Bramwell
was made a new creature in Christ Jesus.
This was the turning-point in Bramwell’s history. From that moment he cast
in his lot unreservedly with the Methodists, and being baptized with the Holy
Ghost, he became a living flame of fire.
The change wrought in him was marvellous. By nature he was of a gloomy, desponding
temperament. He had passed through years of spiritual conflict and mental anguish,
and at one time it seemed as if he never could rise and live above the troubles
that oppressed him. But a shrewd old Methodist in Preston taught him a lesson
he never forgot. Finding him one day depressed and gloomy with looking on the
dark side of things, he said, “I’ll tell thee what’ll cure thee, Billy. Go home,
and lock thyself up in thy closet, and look back on all thy past life. If thou
can find that the Lord has blessed thee with only one mercy, praise Him for
it.” Bramwell took the old man’s advice, and when he looked back on all the
past he found not one, or ten, or a hundred, but ten thousand mercies to be
thankful for, and he was soon singing with the Psalmist, “Bless the Lord, O
my soul, and forget not all His benefits.”
From that time he was not merely pardoned, but sanctified. He was lifted above the clouds, and mists, and darkness that had enshrouded him for years, and he went on his way a burning and shining light.
He soon became remarkable for his sterling piety. He literally “prayed without
ceasing, and in everything gave thanks.” All his evenings and the whole of his
Sabbaths were devoted to evangelistic work. He became a class-leader, and soon
gathered round him a devoted band of godly men and women who were ready to go
anywhere and do anything in the Master’s service.
Shortly afterwards he became a local preacher. His first sermon was a solemn
and powerful appeal to the unconverted, based on the text, “Prepare to meet
thy God.” Publicly and privately, he never ceased to warn sinners of the error
of their ways, and exhort them to flee from the wrath to come.
He had many opportunities of exercising his talents, and for the next five or six years his labours were incessant. That period of his life, from 1780 to 1786, was the time in which he did so much for Fylde Methodism.
His apprenticeship had only just expired when he joined the Methodists, so that he had only the wages of a journey-man currier and fellmonger with which to maintain himself and support the Lord’s cause. And yet out of his modest earnings he contrived to hire a horse very frequently to carry him on his preaching expeditions. He visited Grimsargh, Longridge, Ribchester, and every village and hamlet as far as Clitheroe and Blackburn. He preached at Salwick, Woodplumpton, Garstang, Kirkham, Poulton, and most of the villages of the Fylde. Often when his scanty purse would not afford the hire of a horse, he would walk twenty or thirty miles, and preach four or five times in the course of one journey.
It was in one of these journeys to Longridge and Ribchester in 1785 that
he met with Ann Cutler, a poor hand-loom weaver, who was converted under his
preaching, and became one of the holiest women of her times. She was known all
over the Fylde as “Praying Nanny”, and herself conducted services at Poulton,
Thornton, Kirkham, and many other parts of this district.
A band of godly earnest men and women were raised up by Bramwell, and carried
on the work after his removal from the Fylde. We must remember that many of
the self-denying local preachers and leaders who succeeded Bramwell were his
own spiritual children, who had caught his enthusiastic and devoted spirit.
So that he not merely toiled five or six years for the people among whom he
had spent his childhood and youth, but he trained and sent out his spiritual
children likewise.
In estimating the magnitude and value of this work, we must try to realise the opposition and persecution he had to encounter. His own parents were bitterly opposed to him. His father fumed and stamped, and shook his fist in his face, and denounced him for joining the Methodists. His mother wept and sobbed as if her heart would break. His old friends jeered and derided him, and declared he was mad. But he bore it all with meekness, for he remembered that men said of his Master, “ He hath a devil and is mad.”
If they do these things in a green tree, what will they do in a dry? If his
own familiar friends assail him, what about those outside?
Bull-baiting, bear-baiting, dog-fighting, and cock-fighting were the Sunday
amusements of those days. Big brutal bulldogs and mastiffs were kept chained
up all week to make them more savage on the Sunday, and when they were not fighting
each other they were deliberately set on the preacher. He wore knee-breeches
and low shoes with buckles, and it is said he scarcely ever had a pair of stockings
that were not torn by the dogs’ teeth. His legs were bitten and torn by bulldogs
till he was compelled to take a long staff spiked with sharp iron to defend
himself. Long after his death that spiked staff was preserved as an heirloom
in his family, and he was so terribly persecuted in the Fylde that to his dying
day he could scarcely bear the sight of a dog.
Sometimes he was mobbed and pelted with mud and filth, and the poor defenceless
women and children were hurled to the ground and trampled upon by a gang of
roughs while they were listening to his sermon.
Still, in spite of brutal persecution and the vilest slanders, he toiled on with unwearying devotion and gratifying success. Here and there in lonely farm-houses and isolated cottages candles were lighted that gave light to all that were in the house. Men and women were converted who became centres of spiritual light and power in succeeding years.
Bramwell’s success as an evangelist marked him out as a preacher. Roger Crane, who was a shrewd, sensible business man, and a good judge of character, was the first to tell him he ought to be a travelling preacher, and this view of his call to the ministry was confirmed and endorsed by the little Church at Preston.
But there was a second call more imperative and authoritative still. The great Head of the Church honoured his ministry and crowned it with gratifying success. His spiritual children were springing up on every hand, and almost every service was signalised by the conversion of sinners.
Thus there were two voices calling him to devote his life to the ministry, and yet he shrank from it as if he were unworthy and unfit. For months a fearful struggle raged in his soul between inclination and duty.
God had prospered him in business, and there was a fair prospect of success in life. He was engaged to be married to Miss E. Byrom, a young lady who had been converted under his ministry, and who was deservedly esteemed in Preston. He was now firmly established as an apostle in the district, and he questioned the wisdom of severing his connection with Preston and the Fylde. He consulted his friends about it, and Roger Crane told him that there could be no doubt he was called and qualified by the great Head of the Church to be a preacher; he was also called and approved by the Church in which he laboured; and he was sure that God by His providence would make a way for him.
Bramwell prayed about it. Tradition points to an old stone quarry near Preston in which he spent thirty-six hours in agonising continuous prayer, without meat, or drink, or rest, till God by His Spirit made known His will and purpose. And when he knew that the Lord had called him to forsake all and follow Him, he disposed of his business, sold all he had, and bought a horse and saddle-bags for his journey.
He was appointed to Canterbury at the Conference of 1786, and after many prayers and farewell greetings from his Preston friends, he mounted his horse and started on a journey of three hundred miles.
He found the glorious Gospel had the same power in the sunny South as in the sturdy North. He laboured a year in Kent with gratifying success, and then returned to Preston and married Miss Byrom.
Owing to domestic responsibilities and family cares, he could not accept his next Conference appointment to Lynn; so he spent a year in business, and returned to the scenes of his early triumphs as a local preacher.
In 1788 he was appointed to the Blackburn Circuit, and from that time his labours in the Fylde terminated. He travelled successively in Colne, Dewsbury, Birstal, Sheffield, Nottingham, Leeds, Wetherby, Hull, Sunderland, Liverpool, London, Newcastle, and Salford, where he finished his work in 1818.
We may not follow him to every field of toil and conflict. With untiring
devotion, and ceaseless prayer, he went into the great spiritual field to sow,
and he came again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him. His labours
were signally owned of God to the conversion of sinners, and the building up
of His Church. He used to spend whole nights in prayer. He prayed for the conversion
of men and women by name, for opportunities of evangelising certain villages
and hamlets, for God’s gracious help to be afforded to persons he knew to be
in special danger and need, and for friends in distant lands beyond his reach.
For many years he kept a ledger account with heaven, in which he recorded side
by side the many mighty blessings he had prayed for, and the strange and providential
answers he had received. His record was not so much a journal, or diary, as
a debtor and creditor account with heaven. It was a most remarkable document,
showing that for years he had asked of God great and precious and specific blessings,
and he had always received them. “There failed not aught of any good thing which
the Lord had spoken unto the house of Israel ; all came to pass.”
Shortly before his death, in reviewing this record, he resolved to burn it,
lest it should ever fall into the hands of men who should doubt his word, and
ridicule his statements, and thus make God Almighty a liar. So he committed
it to the flames, and thus deprived the Christian Church of one of the most
remarkable documents that a good man ever wrote.
At the Sheffield Conference in 1811, under the presidency of the Rev. Charles
Atmore, Bramwell publicly pleaded for his native Fylde. He told his love for
the home of his childhood, pointed out the extensive fields that needed cultivation,
and begged hard that the Rev. John Wright, who had done so much for Scorton
during his ministry in Preston, might be appointed missionary to the Fylde.
He pleaded long and earnestly, and in the end he was allowed to have his own
way. The Rev. John Wright thus became the first minister in the Fylde, and commenced
his labours at Garstang in 1811.
Three or four biographies of Bramwell have appeared, but they are all unworthy records of such a singularly holy and devoted life.
“ ‘ Twas all his business here below
To cry, ‘Behold the Lamb!’ ”
Men misunderstood his character, and misrepresented his opinions. Even his colleagues were sometimes jealous of his success. But he toiled, and prayed, and denied himself, and lived every moment on the threshold of heaven. The storms of passion, and the strifes and controversies of his day, are hushed, and we can now see the man as he was - a simple-minded Methodist preacher, of immense popularity and amazing spiritual power and unvarying and remarkable success.
It is one of the most gratifying signs of the times that the story of such
a life should be so widely and eagerly read. In the Methodist Churches of America
his name is still fragrant and his memory green. And in our own land he is just
beginning to be thoroughly understood and appreciated. He had no wealth or social
position or learning to commend him. He gained and kept his position by the
power of goodness alone. Ho was a striking illustration of the truth of the
proverb, “Goodness is power.”
Bramwell died as he had lived ? in intimate communion with heaven. On
his way from the Conference at Leeds to meet the coach that should carry him
to his circuit in Salford, the Master called him. Two watchmen found him early
in the morning, in the lane, and carried him to a friend’s house, but the chariot
of Israel had borne him to the better land on the 13th of August 1818, in the
sixtieth year of his age, and the thirty-second of his ministry.
MICHAEL EMMETT
A century ago there stood an extensive block of old property on the
site of the present free library in Preston. It covered the whole of the space
between the New Town Hall and Lancaster Road, and was at that time the best
business part of the town.
The houses and shops were irregularly built, and clustered together in hopeless
confusion. Innumerable “wynds”, and “alleys”, and “entries”, and “yards” intersected
this old block of property, and made it as difficult to penetrate as a rabbit-warren.
If a thief stole a valuable prize, and darted into one of these entries with
a constable at his heels, he would turn and double upon his pursuers, and dodge
about these wynds and courts till they had lost scent of him, and he could possess
his plunder in peace.
Within this area were the shambles, and slaughter-houses, and stables of the
butchers, and the rickety, tumble-down warehouses of the grocers. Many of the
houses were only one or two stories high, lighted with small, leaden-framed,
diamond-shaped window panes. Some of them were built of lath and plaster, with
framework of wood, and foundations of stone.
The march of improvement has swept them all away, and instead of dark, dingy, stuffy shops, in which men could scarcely see or breathe, we have palatial establishments with plate glass windows and irresistible attractions.
Right in the centre of this bit of old Preston was a well known hostelry
at that time with the sign of the “Ram’s Head.” It had a swinging signboard,
with a rude painting of the head of a ram, and that there might be no mistake
about it, the horns were not only painted, but decorated with gold. It was necessary
to have an attractive sign in those days. For the people could not read, and
their only chance of finding a particular inn was not in the name of the 1andlord,
but in the sign above his door.
The “Ram’s Head” was approached from the market-place by “Gin Bow Entry,” a
narrow passage through which a cart might be driven with great difficulty.
Mine host at that time was Michael Emmett, a thrifty, sober, steady man, who conducted his house in the old-fashioned style. He provided for “man and beast,” and his “accommodation for travellers” was among the best in the town.
The half-famished traveller, who had driven on a biting day in winter from Lancaster or Kendal, would find a blazing fire, and a clean hearth, and a comfortable chair. One of Michael’s sons would take the horse to the stable, and feed him and groom him, while Mrs. Emmett prepared a dish of ham and eggs and a cup of tea for her guest. The beds were clean and well aired, the provisions were abundant, and the prices were reasonable. So Michael Emmett did a roaring trade during those old coaching days by entertaining travellers.
The “Ram’s Head” had a reputation for order and good government. Michael Emmett was a sturdy fellow, and very determined when he was on his mettle. He would serve no drink to those who began to show signs of having already had enough. He would harbour no persons of loose habits and bad character. If he refused to serve them, and ordered them about their business, they made off as quietly as they could to avoid further unpleasantness.
By good management, and strict attention to his house, he made a considerable
fortune, and retired from business many years before his death. He belonged
to an old Preston family, who for generations had been partial to the name of
Michael. His customers would sometimes chaff him about the name, and they used
to annoy him with a coarse doggerel that ran thus:
“Old Mike, and young Mike,
And young Mike’s son;
Mike’s son will be Mike,
When old Mike’s done.”
Young Michael Emmett, the eldest son of the landlord of the “Ram’s Head,” was born somewhere in Preston in 1759. He spent his childhood and youth in his father’s service at the inn, for he had nine or ten brothers and sisters younger than himself, and there was work enough to do in that busy hive of industry. When he was thirteen years of age he was apprenticed to a cabinetmaker and upholsterer in the town, and became an efficient workman at his trade.
Towards the close of his apprenticeship he became intimate with William Walmsley, the Methodist innkeeper in Church Street, and through his influence was induced to attend preaching services and class-meetings at their house. He was interested and pleased with these services, and began to read his Bible and all the Methodist tracts and publications that came in his way. He was a thoughtful, intelligent youth, with a retentive memory and keen perceptive faculties, and he soon made himself acquainted with the leading doctrines of Methodism.
But he shrunk from openly identifying himself with the cause for various reasons. His father was intensely conservative and averse to change. There had been a succession of Michaels in the family, who had all been steady, sober, thrifty men; who had invariably been Churchmen and upholders of the king and constitution; and if he were to take a new departure, there would be trouble at home.
He thought, too, of what it wou1d cost to be a Methodist in the workshop. He would have to bear persecution, scorn, derision, and insult for Christ’s sake, and perhaps be cast adrift in the world when his time of apprenticeship expired.
Still the Spirit strove with him, and the voice of conscience urged him to decision. He knew the path of duty, but he hesitated to follow so he had an anxious troubled life for some months. He found the way of transgressors very hard.
At length he could hold out no more. He surrendered unconditional1y, and made his peace with God. He joined the little Society towards the latter end of the year 1776, when he was in his twentieth year.
His father was greatly annoyed about it, and turned him out of doors. He vowed he would never own him or speak to him again, and he kept his vow for many years. It was not till towards the close of his life that he so far relented as to allow Michael £500 in his will, the amount he left to each of his children.
Young Michael Emmett was now an outcast and a stranger for Christ’s sake. He was able to earn his own living at his trade, so he manfully reso1ved to labour with his own hands, and fight his own way through the world. He was a good-looking young man, of medium height, with a frank, handsome countenance, and a pleasing voice and manner. He spent most of his spare time in reading good books, and in the study of his Bible. He meditated and prayed much, till he became remarkable for his intelligence and piety.
Shortly after his conversion he formed a close and lasting friendship with Roger Crane, who was at that time seeking spiritual light and comfort. Having found the way of peace himself, and being full of zeal and devotion, he was a fitting companion for the thoughtful and intellectual young seeker after truth. These two young men were soon linked together in esteem and affection, and yet they were strangely unlike in character and habits.
They were about the same age, and were converted about the same time, but they differed in all other respects. Roger was tall and thin. Michael was of medium height and inclined to corpulence. Roger had received a superior education, and had lived the life of a gentleman. Michael had but learned to read, and all he knew besides had been gained by self-denial and labour, for his had been a life of toil. Roger was slow to accept any man’s teaching, and would believe no statement that was not warranted by the teachings of the Bible. Michael was quick to apprehend and apply truth to his own case without suspicion or distrust. Roger was cool, and calculating, and prudent. Michael was fervent, and demonstrative, and aggressive.
So they agreed well together. Each esteemed the other more highly than himself, and found in his friend the very qualities he lacked. As Michael lived in lodgings, and had no home of his own, he was a frequent visitor at Roger’s house, and was treated almost as one of the family.
Just as this friendship was becoming close and intimate, another young man
joined them. It was in 1779 that they welcomed William Bramwell into their band.
He was of the same age as Michael Emmett, and nearly a year younger than Roger
Crane. His peculiarity was his piety. He had little learning, and no social
position, but he lived in intimate communion with heaven.
These three young men formed “a band.” In the language of the old Methodists,
a band was a kind of secret society within the Church into which certain parties
voluntarily entered. They were always in close and intimate friendship with
every member of the band. They told each other their hopes and fears, their
joys and sorrows, their plans and purposes. They watched over each other in
things temporal as well as in things spiritual. They prayed for each other by
name so many times a day. They exhorted each other to diligence and self-denial
and patience. They warned each other of lurking temptation or impending danger.
They advised each other in times of perplexity, and they consulted each other
in every difficulty. They relieved each other’s necessities, and made willing
sacrifices for the good of the brethren. If any brother became wayward, and
wilful, and seemed inclined to rush into sin, they never lost sight of him.
Morning, noon, and night some of them would grasp his hand in holy freemasonry,
and utter some word of warning or encouragement as the case might demand. So
that when once a young man was soundly converted and joined a band, it was no
easy matter to fall away again into sin. The fold was so carefully guarded,
and the watchers were so vigilant, that the slightest signs of restlessness
would be noted and checked.
One of the subjects talked about in the band was aggressive work for Christ.
Methodism had now three earnest, self denying, pious young men in Preston, and they agreed that the three of them might do something for the Master. They talked about a mission to the unconverted around them. They prayed about it, and finally began the stupendous task of missioning the Fylde country. They had no organisation to help them. They had no funds to sustain them. They had no friends to countenance them.
They had twenty or thirty villages, and hamlets, and towns, without a Methodist, or a spiritually-minded man of any kind, so far as they knew. And they had the Master’s command: “Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature”. And they had the Master’s promise “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world”.
Small and feeble was the work at first, for they were untrained and imperfect workmen. But they gathered experience and confidence after a few years of preparation.
Michael Emmett became a local preacher about the time that his comrades were accepted, and he shared with them the honour of missioning the villages around Preston.
On one occasion he had a week’s mission in the Fylde country as a holiday excursion. He obtained leave of absence from his employment, and through the kindness of a wealthy friend he was supplied with a horse for his journey. Starting on the Thursday morning early from Preston, he rode in the direction of Lancaster, till he came to Garstang. It was market-day, and the farmers were assembled from every part of the district.
He rode up to the obelisk in the market-place, and while men were selling their potatoes, and grain, and produce, he preached Christ with great plainness and power. Many consciences were aroused, and many hearts were touched, and tidings of that sermon were carried to Pilling and Poulton, and every part of the Fylde.
At the close of the sermon a gentleman, well known at the time as “Quaker
Jackson”, spoke kindly to the preacher, thanked him for his sermon, and gave
him half a guinea.
Michael Emmett said, “Friend, I do not preach for money”.
The kind-hearted Quaker smiled and replied, “No, but thou cannot pay thy toll
bars and keep thy horse without money. Keep it, lad, and go on with the work
thou hast so well begun.”
Thus encouraged and helped, Michael Emmett turned his horse’s head in the
direction of Scorton and Upper Wyresdale.
Among the hill sides and fells he gathered the shepherds and rustics, and preached
to them in the evening. Some hospitable farmer took him in for the night and
stabled his horse, and gave him the use of a bedroom on the ground floor, and
the kitchen for preaching services.
For half an hour before the service was held the rustics gathered round the bedroom window in awe-stricken silence to hear the good man pray. He prayed that God’s truth might visit in saving power the hills and fells of Wyresdale; that it might come like a mighty river and water Scorton; that it might linger in pools and floods of blessing at Garstang, and then find its way to every nook and hamlet in the Fylde. So the good man talked with God alone, and the ignorant shepherds outside wanted to know who was in the room with him, and why he was talking so earnestly.
They had not long to wait, for soon he came into the kitchen to preach to
them fresh from his communion with the Master. He quickly arrested their attention,
and enlisted their sympathies, as he told them the strange sweet story of the
Redemption.
They were deeply interested as he told them of the sheep that had gone astray,
and how the Good Shepherd had laid down His life for the sheep. He preached
to them so lovingly, so tenderly, and yet so earnestly, that they were melted
to tears. Strong men wept like little children, and some of them were converted,
and their descendants are with us to this day.
Next day Michael Emmett went on his way in the direction of Lancaster, kindling fires that through God’s mercy can never be put out.
This missionary journey, that still lives in tradition and story, must have occurred somewhere about the year 1784, when Michael Emmett was a promising young man of five-and-twenty. It was the first attempt to introduce the Gospel to the byways and hamlets of the Fylde country to the north of Garstang.
In 1786 Michael Emmett married Miss Mary Crane, the sister of his intimate friend Roger Crane. She was a gifted and amiable lady; sprightly, vivacious, and kindly. She had all the strength of mind, and keenness of perception, that distinguished the Crane family, with their devout and reverent spirit. She was about three years older than her husband, but she out-lived him ten years, and retained much of her graciousness and sprightliness even to hoary hairs. She entertained Mr. Wesley at her house in 1790, on the occasion of his last journey through Lancashire, and was the friend of all the leading Methodists who visited Preston during her residence in the town. Her ready wit, and lively repartee, and pleasing anecdote, and kind hospitality are matters of tradition and history to the present time.
Mr. Wesley desired to employ Michael Emmett as a travelling preacher, and after some correspondence he and his devoted wife consented to leave Preston, and spend their lives in proclaiming the Gospel. His first circuit was Alnwick, where he laboured with great acceptance and success. He afterwards travelled at Bolton, Bradford, Wakefield, Sheffield, York, Wetherby, Birstal, Manchester, Lancaster, Dumfries, Brough, Carlisle, Glasgow, and Paisley, Norwich, and Prescot. His ministerial career lasted twenty-four years, and was cut short by failing health, induced by the hardship, exposure, and incessant labour to which he was exposed.
He became a supernumerary at Liverpool in 1815, and lingered in delicate health for upwards of thirteen years. During his ministerial career he laboured with great zeal and usefulness. His style of preaching was peculiarly fitted to arouse the careless, and impress the thoughtless. He was one of those born preachers who compel their hearers to listen attentively, and then lead them to thought and decision. He was called and qualified for the rough pioneer work of the Church, and for nearly a quarter of a century the Master signally owned and blessed his labours.
He died in Liverpool, March 2nd, 1829, in the seventieth year of his age. During his last moments, and when he was suffering great pain, a friend whispered in his ear: “The Lord liveth, Who hath so long been your Rock.” “Yes,” he replied with emphasis, “and I shall soon be with Him for ever”.
In a few moments more his heart ceased to beat and without a sigh or a moan
he passed away, to be “for ever with the Lord”.
MOSES HOLDEN
THE ORGANISER OF FYLDE METHODISM
Moses Holden was born at Bolton, Nov. 21st, 1777, but his family shortly afterwards removed to Preston, where he spent the greater part of his life.
His father was a hard, stern disciplinarian, and ruled his children more by fear than love. He was in comfortable circumstances in life, but he was parsimonious and niggardly towards his children.
And yet he was very much concerned about their welfare, and took some pains to bring them up according to his own ideas and tastes.
On the long wintry evenings, to save candles, he would sit crooning over
the fire, talking to his two boys, and telling them stories of heroism and devotion
to duty. He had a rare stock of these stories, and the boys were never tired
of hearing them.
One of these stories was about Jeremiah Horrocks, who in 1639 came to live at
Hoole, a village five miles from Preston. He was a young man of twenty years
of age, who had just finished his career at Cambridge, where he had distinguished
himself by his knowledge of mathematics and astronomy. He had just been appointed
village schoolmaster and curate of the parish, and he was content to toil six
days a week for forty pounds a year. He fitted up his bedroom in the farmhouse
at Hoole as an observatory, and every night for many hours when the sky was
clear he studied astronomy. In the course of his studies he learned that Kepler
had predicted a transit of Venus in 1631, but did not live to observe it. Pursuing
this subject, he predicted another transit of Venus about the 24th of November,
1639, and he resolved that he would see what human eyes had never seen before.
Accordingly, he darkened his room and arranged his telescope some days beforehand,
lest he should have made some mistake in his calculations. He wrote several
letters to a young friend in Manchester, Mr. William Crabtree, who was also
an astronomer of some ability. He pledged his friend to secrecy, as he might
possibly have been mistaken, but he made all arrangements for the approaching
visit of Venus to the sun. As the time drew near, he became nervous and excited,
and his excitement increased when he found that the day predicted was Sunday,
and he would have to preach in church. He spent every available moment at his
telescope till the bell summoned him to service. Then quitting his post of observation
he hurried away and conducted the service with reverence and devotion, for he
was as good as he was clever. As soon as the service was over he hurried back
to his telescope, and was just in time to see “a spot of unusual magnitude and
of a perfectly circular shape upon the sun’s disc”. Thus he was the first
to observe the transit of Venus, and in that darkened room at Hoole he saw what
human eyes had never seen before and would not have an opportunity of seeing
again for more than one hundred and twenty-one years.
About a year after this wonderful event Jeremiah Horrocks found an early grave, and science has mourned for him ever since. In his short life he did more for astronomy than any Englishman had ever done before, and through all coming time his name will be held in reverence and esteem.
This plain unvarnished story had a wonderful effect on the mind of Moses Holden. Just as a fallen rock or mass of earth may divert a mountain stream from its course and change the whole direction of its career, so this story, coupled with another adventure, changed the whole life of Moses Holden.
Moses and his brother had been playing some boyish pranks with their companions one day, and bringing themselves into disgrace and trouble. Their father, forgetting that he had ever been a boy himself, and had got into scrapes in his time, treated them with great severity. He sentenced them to several days’ imprisonment in the attic.
The two prisoners were marched to the top of the house with their slates, and pencils, and school-books. They had tasks allotted to them to occupy their time, and they were supplied regularly with their meals, but on no account were they to leave their prison.
It was dull work up in the attic solving problems and writing lessons. The skylight was opened, but they could see nothing but the clouds by day and the stars by night. As they sat in silence star-gazing, and wishing themselves back again among their companions, Moses said to his brother, “John, if we only knew the stars, we might be as happy with them for our companions as we used to be when we had our playfellows”.
“Our father never gave us much chance of being happy with anybody”, was John’s reply, and then he relapsed into railings and murmurings at his father’s tyranny.
Moses resolved there and then that he would distinguish himself in the study
of astronomy. So, when his term of imprisonment expired, he ransacked Preston
for books to aid him in his studies, and for lenses, reflectors, and instruments
for observations. He spent all his pocket-money on text-books and materials,
and in a little while he became tolerably proficient in his studies.
He made for himself a large and powerful telescope. He constructed an orrery
with which he travelled through the district as a lecturer on astronomy. He
also made a solar microscope of unusual power, and invented a number of ingenious
instruments for observation. His lectures on optics and astronomy were able
and popular expositions of these branches of science, and he rose to such distinction
that he became a member of several learned societies and received their thanks
for his services to science. The people of Preston were so proud of him, that
on the 3rd of May, 1834, the freedom of the borough was presented to him amid
the congratulations of the most influential burgesses.
While Moses was a young man of eighteen or nineteen, he fell in with Roger
Crane, and, having been converted, he joined the Methodists in Preston. He soon
became a local preacher, and was received with great favour and cordiality by
the people. He was a man of striking originality and power, and in the villages
and hamlets of the Fylde he preached with great success.
Moses was a remarkable man in many respects. He is described as a short, broad-set
man, of strong physique, and stronger will. Whatever he undertook he would drive
to a successful issue, or he would know the reason why. He had unbounded faith
in God and indomitable courage. Once at Rawcliffe his persecutors let loose
a vicious bull-dog to worry him in the street; but Moses stood perfectly still
in the middle of the road, whistling the “ Old Hundred”, and staring the brute
out of countenance. It came close to the good man’s feet and then slunk away
without touching him. In his days superstition had a mighty hold of the people.
Every village had its ghost or its witch, and things uncanny were seen or heard
by everybody. Astrology was professed and believed to an extent that we can
scarcely realise today. When our present Queen was born, the astrologers consulted
the planets and pronounced them so unfavourable that thousands of loyal people
went about in tears for many a day, prophesying a short and terrible career
for the infant princess. And if Moses had been a knave, he might have made a
fortune by fortune-telling and ruling the planets. But he had a genuine love
for learning and a passion for the study of astronomy, and, better than all,
he had a large-hearted philanthropy that impelled him to seek and save his fellow
men. By the kindness of Major Hincksman of Lytham, I have picked up a few extracts
from a journal written by Moses in 1811. And let me here say that Moses expresses
his opinions pretty freely about everybody he meets with, and gives us some
curious glimpses of the condition of things three-quarters of a century ago.
He says: -
“From the time of the Conference of 1810, the Rev. Thomas Jackson, superintendent
of the Preston Circuit, never let me rest till I consented to go and try to
open the Fylde country. Poulton was the only place where Methodism had made
any way, and here there were ten members. These were given me to begin with
and I went down from Preston on the 19th of January, 1811. I got to Poulton
about seven o’clock in the evening and was kindly received. Next day I preached
at Thornton Marsh, morning and afternoon, and at Poulton in the evening. I had
good times, and a large number to hear me. On the 21st of January I preached
at Little Marton, and then in every little town and village through the Fylde
I preached and formed classes.
“When I got to Lytham I found a house licensed for preaching (Mr. Mercer’s,
in Bath Street). I understood a Mr. Lyon had got it licensed, and preached in
it a long time before, but it had been given up. However, I opened it again,
and had good congregations, but a deal of persecution. The clergyman of the
parish came to the house and kicked up a great stir, demanding the licence.
They showed it to him, but he puffed at it, and talked of stopping them. Mercer’s
daughter told him he could not stop them, for the licence would stand good for
that house as long as there was one stone upon another. Then he went to Squire
Clifton, and asked him to put a stop to this Methodism, and get Holden sent
out of Lytham. But Mr. Clifton said, ‘I shall do no such thing. Let them alone,
or I may put Holden into your place.’ He troubled us no more after that.
“I was often sorely tried with the people at Thornton Marsh. They took it into
their heads that I must be proud, because I had always a good coat on my back;
and so they would try to humble me. One wet day they said, ‘Will you put on
James’s smock-frock to preach in? ‘ And I had to put it on. Another time an
old woman in a red cloak said, ‘Will you have my cloak?’ I said, ‘Ay, and bonnet
too, if you like.’ After that they came and said, ‘You must preach from such
a text tonight.’ I did as they wished for many a time, and they told me afterwards
they had done it to try me.
“At Bispham I was persecuted by the clergyman. One day when I had to preach there, some of the people begged I would not go, for Mr. Elston said he would have me put in prison. I said that would be an honour. I went and preached without any disturbance. Another Sunday, Mr. Morrow, the Calvinist minister at Poulton, sent word that I had better not go to Bispham, for he was well assured that the clergyman had engaged several men to kill me, and they were to have ale and rum mixed to fit them for their work. Many came to me to persuade me not to go, but I said, ‘I will go. I shall not be the first by many to suffer for the sake of Christ.’ Two or three stout men refused to go with me, for the clergyman had threatened to law every one who either lent me a chair or allowed me to stand on their horse-block. So John Tomlinson took me in his shandray, and I had it for my pulpit. I gave out the hymn:-
‘Shall I, for fear of feeble man,
The Spirit’s course in me restrain?
Or, undismayed in deed and word,
Be a true witness for my Lord?’
When I gave out the second verse:-
‘Awed by a mortal’s frown, shall I
Conceal the truth of God Most High?’
a number of men made their appearance from behind some bushes. The people about me were alarmed, but the men made a halt as though they would go away. So I called out to them and said, ‘You had better come nearer. I am not very well, and may not be able to make you hear at that distance. Perhaps you are afraid of a disturbance, but there will not be any. The laws of the land and God will protect us.’ They stood there all the time, and I went through the service in peace, and had a large congregation.
“From the time I went down into the Fylde, in January, until the following
Conference, I had opened the whole of the Fylde country from Lytham to Pilling,
and formed classes in the different villages. The following is a list of places
and members in Society:— Poulton, 11; Preesall, 16; Rawcliffe, 2; St. Michaels,
7; Kirkham, 8; Marton, 7; Thornton, 17; Freckleton, 12.
I never could prevail on the Lytham people to join the Society. They received
me kindly, and heard me gladly, but that was all. At the Conference of 1811,
I gave up my work to the Rev. John Wright, the Fylde missionary appointed to
Garstang”.
The first member of Society at Poulton was Betty Tomlinson, wife of John Tomlinson,
butcher of Poulton. She had some conversation with a few devout and honourable
women that first directed her thoughts to religious matters. One day while she
was in a “gad house,” or place for shelter for cattle in the field, praying,
she was converted. She found two or three pious women in the neighbourhood,
and met with them for private prayer. Her husband was bitterly opposed to the
Methodists, and used to lock her out of the house every time she went to pray,
but that did not cure her. Then his suspicions were aroused, and he began to
think these good women met for something worse than prayer and fellowship. But
he would find it out; so he managed to con-ceal himself in the house where they
met, and spent an even-ing watching them in secret. On the principle that “listeners
never hear any good of themselves,” he had a bad time of it. These holy women
prayed for him by name, and asked God to change his heart, and make him a new
creature in Christ Jesus. He began to cry for mercy, and came out of his hiding-place
a conscience-stricken penitent. He soon found mercy, and joined his wife in
faithful and devoted service for the Master.
He entertained Moses Holden at the time of his visit in 1811, and drove him to various villages on his preaching expeditions. He was the first leader at Poulton, and the little class consisted of John and Betty Tomlinson, Margaret Campbell, Mr. and Mrs. Carter, and their daughter. They were not long permitted to worship in peace in the small room they used as a chapel. The mob smashed all the windows with stones. They broke into the chapel and dragged the pulpit into the market-place, as a delicate hint that the Methodists did not need a chapel when they preached so often in the market-place. They heaped every form of contumely and insult they could devise on the heads of these poor Metho-dists; but the more they persecuted them, the more they multiplied and grew.
When Moses Holden was among them, they required him to preach from Acts xxviii. 22: “But we desire to hear of thee what thou thinkest: for as concerning this sect, we know that everywhere it is spoken against.” And yet there were some noble men and women raised up from Poulton.
John Stirzaker, the son of a labourer at Poulton, was con-verted during the great revival. His mother, to keep him away from prayer-meetings and class-meetings, locked him up in the bedroom. But love laughs at locks and bars, and the lad let himself down from the chamber window, while his mother was abusing him and pelting him with turf from the turf-stack. He bolted like a greyhound across the field and into the Methodist chapel. She followed him, and dragged him out of the service by the hair of his head, and beat him till he was black and blue, but she could not cure him of his madness. He became a Methodist preacher, and years afterwards, when he came to preach special sermons at Poulton, her matronly instincts so far overcame her bigotry as to permit her to go and hear him preach. She was a fair sample of the average matrons of the Fylde. They would rather their sons enlisted for soldiers, or their daughters lived in shame, than they should join the Methodists.
Modern readers of Moses Holden’s diary are puzzled with the name of Thornton Marsh. There is no marsh at Thornton in these days. It is now a quiet, clean, well-cultivated village, covered with cottages and gardens, and thousands of excursionists to Blackpool drive to Thornton to admire its pretty church and rustic surroundings. But three-quarters of a century ago, there was a marsh occupying the centre of the village. The land lies only a few feet above the level of the sea, and as the sea fence was very imperfect at that time, and the Wyre occasionally overflowed its banks, the village was badly drained. On the edge of the marsh lived Nanny Greenwood, the mother of Mrs. Tomlinson of Poulton. The thatched cottage still stands near Thornton Mill, and it was the scene of the first Methodist class-meetings and prayer-meetings. Nanny was one of the first members of the Society in Thornton, and she entertained Moses Holden during his visits to the village. One night as they were having a prayer-meeting in her cottage, the rough young fellows climbed to the top of the roof, and dropped a goose down the chimney. It beat its wings and swept the chimney effectually in its descent, filling the room with soot and smoke; but as soon as it landed on the hearthstone and found itself among some pious Methodists, it made itself at home, and squatted peacefully at their feet till the meeting concluded.
The first members of Society were Rebecca Croft, Bradshaw Croft, John Charnley, Richard Charnley, Betty Charnley, Ben Wilding, Nanny Greenwood, and John Bleasdale. Nanny Greenwood’s son, William, was converted at home, and carried Methodism to Darwen in Lancashire.
In 1812 a chapel was built at Thornton. It was a plain barn-like structure,
whitewashed within and without; but it stands today the oldest Wesleyan Chapel
in the Black-pool Circuit. At that time the members scattered over a wide area
of the Fylde had no other place of worship, and many a long, wet, dirty walk
they had to prayer-meetings, class-meetings, and preaching services.
In 1819 a chapel was built at Poulton, and was used instead of the small room
behind the King’s Arms Hotel. For a few years the Society was small and poor,
but a very gracious revival visited the place, and scores of young men and women
were converted. John Stirzaker, Richard Crookall, John Smith, Edward Smith,
James Smith, George Singleton, Richard Seed, James Thornton, William Seed, and
many others, were the fruits of that revival.
Moses Holden lived long enough to see the churches he had organised in a vigorous and flourishing condition.
In his later years he became self-willed and opinionated to such a degree that few people could manage him. He was a personal friend of Joseph Livesey, of Preston, when he first took up the Temperance cause. So long as they preached and advocated moderation only, he was chairman of the Temperance Society, and one of its most ardent supporters. But as soon as they introduced the pledge of total abstinence, he would have no more to do with them. He followed his own opinions and convictions, and left them to do as they pleased.
This incident is a fair sample of the man. In temperance, religion, politics, and social questions of every kind he had the same contempt for other people’s opinions, and the same regard for his own. So that he alienated many of his old friends, and said and did things that were widely regretted.
Still, justice and charity demand our meed of praise and our tribute of respect for the work he did. According to his views of truth and righteousness, he was faithful and devoted in his service to his day and generation.
He lived to a good old age, and died in great peace; and in the preparation
of these sketches I have been surprised to find what a warm place he has in
the affections of his spiritual children.
DEVOUT AND
HONOURABLE WOMEN
Shortly after the old Back Lane Chapel was opened at Preston, in 1787, Mary Barrett and Ann Cutler conducted special services there that became memorable in the history of Fylde Methodism.
Mary Barrett was a native of Colne, the circuit town. Her father was comparatively wealthy, and occupied a good social position in the town; but he was a very bigoted, intolerant Churchman. He regarded John Wesley as a renegade Churchman, who had sold himself to the devil, and solemnly warned his children to turn a deaf ear to all Methodist teachings. But, when Mary became a young woman of two or three-and-twenty, she was powerfully impressed with her need of spiritual light and power. She read diligently, she attended faithfully to all the ritual and ceremonies of the Church, and led a life of strict self-denial and self-mortification. But she failed to find peace or rest till she heard John Wesley preach and expound the simple plan of salvation by “repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ”. She soon found the way of peace, and cast in her lot with the poor despised Methodists. Her father was almost beside himself. He tried all the arts, and blandishments, and temptations of wealth and pleasure, to draw her away from their Society. Then he solemnly warned, and exhorted, and threatened her with his anger and displeasure, if she did not return to the Church of England. But, finding that his promises would not draw her away from Methodism, and that his threatenings would not drive her away, he finally lost his temper with her, and turned her out of house and home for ever. He utterly disowned her, and drove her from the parental roof into the cold world a pilgrim and a stranger. She was young and inexperienced. She had considerable personal attractions, and had received a liberal education; so her father hoped that his rigorous severity would soon bring her in submission to his feet, with a promise that she would abandon those “mad people” for ever. But she had learned to count it all joy when she was called to suffer persecution for righteousness’ sake. She packed up her clothes and a few books in her box, and left the home of her childhood like Abraham of old, not knowing whither she went.
For years she never had a home. First one kind-hearted Methodist and then another took her in and lodged her for awhile, and she used to sing:-
“How happy is my pilgrim’s lot!
How free from every anxious thought,
From worldly hope or fear!
Confined to neither court nor cell,
My soul disdains on earth to dwell,
I only sojourn here.
Yonder’s my house and portion fair:
My treasure and my heart are there,
And my abiding home;
- - - - - - - - - -
I lodge awhile in tents below;
Or gladly wander to and fro,
Till I my Canaan gain.”
So completely did she enter into this pilgrim spirit that for years her life seemed a race for heaven. She refused to listen to any offers of marriage, or to entertain any suggestions that would link her to this life. So fully was she prepared to leave this world, that she packed up her shroud in her box, and carried it from place to place, to be in readiness for her departure whenever the Master should call her. But He had other work for her to do. Her talents and her piety eminently fitted her for usefulness among her lost and neglected sisters. She began to work as an evangelist, and so popular did she become, that multitudes flocked to hear her, and hundreds and thousands were converted through her instrumentality. In later years she married Dr. Taft, and rendered valuable services to Methodism till the end of her life.
Her services as an evangelist led to her employment as a preacher, and she occupied many of the most important Methodist pulpits in the land with great acceptance and success. The employment of female preachers gave offence to many members of the early Societies, and a fierce controversy raged round Mary Barrett’s name and mission for some years. When the controversy was agitating the preachers, she preached, by request, before the Conference, and Dr. Adam Clarke was so pleased with her sermon that he patted her on the back, after she came out of the pulpit, and said, “Well done, Mary; go on with your preaching, and the Lord will own and bless your efforts”.
Ann Cutler was a poor hand-loom weaver, born at Thornley, near Longridge, in 1759. She received but a scanty education, and had little natural ability. She was converted under the powerful preaching of William Bramwell, and by strict self denial and self-discipline she became a woman of strong faith and mighty power in Methodism. The hand-loom weavers of a century ago were poor toilers, who knew little of life’s pleasures and possessions. Seated at the loom from early morning till late at night, toiling with unwearying monotony the week through, for a miserable pittance that would scarcely keep them from actual starvation, they had more than their share of life’s toil and drudgery. Ann Cutler lived on the meanest fare, and dressed in the plainest garb; but, like her more favoured sister, Mary Barrett, she “looked for a city which hath foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God”. She was a pilgrim and a stranger on earth, as all her fathers were. She had but one talent, and she used it wisely and well. She could pray with such faith and power that people were strangely moved; stout hearts yielded, and sinners were saved, wherever she went. The Fylde people nicknamed her “Praying Nanny,” and said she was mad. It was to them a mystery how she escaped the rough horse-play and brutal persecution that was the common lot of the Fylde Methodists; and they never could understand the secret of her success as an evangelist. Their ringleaders were converted before they had time to play the pranks they had carefully rehearsed for the occasion, and “fools who came to scoff remained to pray”. Physically she was a young woman of medium height and build, of comely appearance, plain and neat in her dress, and of a very modest, retiring disposition. Her prayers were pithy, pointed, and practical. She seldom prayed for more than two or three minutes, always in a distinct and rather loud voice, and with great definiteness and precision. She knew exactly what she wanted, and she never rested till the Master said to her, “O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt”.
William Bramwell made use of her services in several of his circuits; and she visited almost every village and hamlet of the Fylde. As her fame increased, she was invited to all the leading chapels in the North of England; and in spite of bitter persecution and the vilest slanders, she laboured with unvarying success for some years. While on a visit to Macclesfield, she was seized with her mortal illness. When she realised that her end was approaching, she said, “It is enough. Well done! Welcome life, or death, or sickness, just as seemeth good in the sight of the Lord”. Her life’s breath had been prayer; and it seemed fitting that her dying breath should be praise, for her last words were, “Glory be to God and the Lamb for ever!” She literally wore herself out in ceaseless activity and unflinching self-denial, and escaped to the better land at the early age of thirty-five.
The vicar of Christ Church, Macclesfield (Rev. David Simpson), placed a brass memorial over her grave, with the following inscription:- “Underneath lie the remains of Ann Cutler, whose simple manners, solid piety, and extra-ordinary power in prayer, distinguished and rendered her eminently useful in promoting a religious revival wherever she came. She was born near Preston, in Lancashire, and died here, December 29th, 1794. Aged 35”.
These two remarkable women were eminently successful in their evangelistic work at Preston; and many strange stories are told of extraordinary conversions