Part 7 (2/2)
Thomas the Martyr at Oxford; then Vicar of Wendron, Cornwall, and afterwards of Newbold Pacey, near Leamington, in 1868. After leaving Horncastle he was invited by the Governors, as an able scholar, to examine the Horncastle Grammar School, then a considerably larger school than it has been in later years, with a large number of day boys, and also boarders from London, many distant parts of the country, and even from Jersey and the continent.
As this is the last chapter in which we shall deal with church matters, we may here say that a Clerical Club, with valuable library and news room, was established in the town in the year 1823. At that time there was a numerous community of country clergymen living in the town; a dozen, or more, villages in the neighbourhood having no official residence in their parishes; thus a Clerical Club became a convenient inst.i.tution for social intercourse, and valuable papers were often read at their meetings. This ceased to exist at the close of the 19th century, when the books were transferred to the Diocesan Library at Lincoln. In order to enable these country inc.u.mbents to maintain a town residence, they, in several cases, held a plurality of benefices, which would hardly be allowed in the present day. Even the Vicar of Horncastle, Dr. Madely, also held the Vicarage of Stickford, distant more than a dozen miles; another clergyman was Rector of Martin, Vicar of Baumber, and Rector of Sotby, several miles apart; while a third held the Perpetual Curacy of Wood Enderby, 4 or 5 miles to the south-east of the town, with the Curacy of Wilksby adjoining, and the Chapelry of Kirkstead, 5 or 6 miles to the west. Further, to eke out the family income, his daughter found employment of a somewhat novel kind in the service of the late Queen Victoria. Being in figure the exact size of the Queen, her Majesty's dresses were all tried on this lady by the royal dressmaker; and, as a portion of her remuneration, the cast-off clothing of the Queen became her perquisite. On the occasion of the wedding of one of her friends at Horncastle, the bride and her bridesmaids were all attired in Queen's dresses.
In connection with the church is the ”Young Churchmen's Union,” of which the Vicar is President. They have fortnightly meetings, in the Boys'
National School, at 8.15 p.m. There is also a Church Lads' Brigade, No.
1951, attached to the 1st Battalion, Lincoln Regiment, B 51. This was enrolled Oct. 1st, 1901. The members are youths between the ages of 13 and 19; the present Lieutenant being H. W. Sharpe; Chaplain, the Vicar; a.s.sistant Chaplain and Correspondent, the Senior Curate. Entrance fee 1/6, subscription 1d. per week.
The Church National Schools are good substantial buildings, erected at various periods, the Girls' School in 1812, the Infants' in 1860, and the Boys' (at a cost of 1,000) in 1872; the total accommodation is for 300 children, the average attendance being about 250. The schools were taken over by the Lindsey County Council, on April 1st, 1903.
CHAPTER V.
NONCONFORMIST PLACES OF WORs.h.i.+P.
There are in Horncastle five Nonconformist religious communities, the Wesleyan, Congregational, Primitive Methodist, Baptist, and New Church or Swedenborgian, each now having substantially built chapels, resident ministers, with Sunday, and, in one case, Day Schools. Through the courtesy of the Rev. John Percy, late Head Minister of the Wesleyan Society, we are enabled to give a fairly full account of its origin and growth, down to the present 20th century. As this is the most important religious body in the town, next to the Church of England, although it is not the oldest, we take the Wesleyans first. As will be seen in the following account, this Society arose from a very small beginning, but at the present time, with perhaps the exception of the Baptists, it is the most numerous and influential body among Nonconformists. Although, locally, rather fewer in numbers in recent years, than formerly, it is generally growing, and in the year 1904, as published statistics show, it acquired in the United Kingdom an addition of 10,705 full members, with 11,874 members on trial, and junior members 4,367; a total increase of 26,946.
THE WESLEYANS.
The founder of this Society was, as its name implies, John Wesley, probably of the same stock as the great Duke of Wellington, whose family name was variously written Wellesley, or Wesley. {64} We take the immediately following particulars mainly from the _History of England_, by Henry Walter, B.D. and F.R.S., Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, Professor in the East India College, Hertford, Chaplain to the Duke of Northumberland, &c., &c., himself a Lincolns.h.i.+re man.
John and Charles Wesley were the second and third sons of Samuel Wesley, Rector of Epworth, near Gainsborough; {65} John being born in 1703 (June 17), and Charles in 1708 (Dec. 18). John was educated at the Charterhouse, and Charles at Westminster School. In due course they both entered at Oxford University; John eventually being elected to a Fellows.h.i.+p at Lincoln College, and Charles to a Students.h.i.+p at Christchurch. In 1725 John was ordained deacon of the Church of England.
He left Oxford for a time to act as his father's curate, Charles remained as Tutor to his college. He, with some of his undergraduate pupils, formed a custom of meeting on certain evenings every week for scripture study and devotion, they carefully observed the Church's fasts and festivals, and partook of the Holy Communion every Sunday. From the strict regularity of their lives the name was given to them, by those who were laxer in conduct, of ”Methodists.”
[Picture: Wesleyan Chapel]
In 1729 the Rector of Lincoln College summoned John Wesley to resume residence at Oxford, and he became Tutor of the College. In this capacity he was careful to look after the souls, as well as the intellectual training, of those under his influence. The brothers began missionary work in Oxford, about the year 1730, in which they were a.s.sisted by a few other kindred spirits. They visited the sick and needy, with the permission of the parish clergy, as well as offenders confined in the gaol. This continued for some time, but gradually John began to long for a wider field for his spiritual energies. He had gathered about him a small band of equally earnest a.s.sociates, and they went out to Georgia, North America, in 1735, to work among the English settlers and North American Indians. After two years John returned to England, in 1737, and then began the work of his life.
It is said that he was a good deal influenced by the _De Imitatione Christi_ of Thomas a Kempis (of which he published an abridged edition in 1777), {66a} also by Jeremy Taylor's _Holy Living and Dying_; and he imputed his own conversion to his study of Law's _Serious Call_. His ”first impression of genuine Christianity,” as he called it, was from the Moravian sect, with whom he came in contact at Hirnuth in Saxony, which he visited in 1738, after his return from America; but his complete ”conversion,” he was wont to say, occurred at a meeting of friends, in Aldersgate Street, London, where one of them was reading Luther's _Preface to St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans_, the exact time being 8.45 p.m., May 24, 1738.
Though taking an independent course, and appointing only lay workers as his agents, he regarded himself to the end of his days as an ordained minister of the Church of England, and his society as still being a part of it, and he urged all faithful Wesleyans to attend church service once on Sunday, and to receive the Holy Communion at church, it being only after his death that the society's secession became complete. {66b}
The first Wesleyan congregation of about 50 members, some of them Moravians, was formed in London, where they met in Fetter Lane, once a week; the first meeting being on May 1st, 1738, and from that day the society of ”Methodists” may be regarded as having begun. {66c} The birth of the sect in Lincolns.h.i.+re may be said to date from his visit to Epworth, in 1742.
In 1743 he divided the whole county into two sections, or circuits, the eastern and western. Of the eastern Grimsby was the head; this included Horncastle, and gradually comprised some 15 other subsidiary centres, extending from Grimsby and Caistor in the north, to Holbeach in the south.
His earliest recorded visit to Horncastle was in 1759, when he addressed a large concourse of people in a yard, supposed to be that of the Queen's Head Inn, near the Market Place, on April 4th and 5th. On July 18th, 1761, he again preached here, and on July 18th, 1774, he addressed, as his journal states, ”a wild unbroken herd.” On July 6th, 1779, he says ”I took my usual stand in the Market Place, Horncastle, the wild men were more quiet than usual, Mr. Brackenbury, J.P., of Raithby Hall, standing near me.” This Mr. Robert Carr Brackenbury remained his firm friend through life; and we may here add that he granted to Wesley the use of his hay loft at Raithby for religious services, further securing the use of it in perpetuity, by his will, to the Wesleyan body, so that the curious anomaly has occurred that, when the hall was bought in 1848, by the Rev. Edward Rawnsley, the house became the residence of an Anglican clergyman, yet bound to allow the loft over his stable to be used for nonconformist wors.h.i.+p. In recent years the stable has been unused as such and the loft made more comfortable, being furnished with seats, pulpit, &c
Wesley, throughout his life, generally visited Horncastle every two years, his death occurring on March 2nd, 1791. There is in Westminster Abbey a mural memorial of John and Charles Wesley, having within a medallion, the bust-sized effigies of the two brothers, beneath which is inscribed the saying of Wesley, ”The best of all is G.o.d with us.” Below this, within a panel, is a representation of John Wesley, preaching from his father's tomb in Epworth churchyard. Beneath are two more quotations from his own words, ”I look upon all the world as my parish,” and ”G.o.d buries His workmen, but carries on His work.” At the head of the slab is the inscription ”John Wesley, M.A., born June 17th, 1703, died March 2nd, 1791. Charles Wesley, M.A., born December 18th, 1708, died March 29th, 1788.”
The growth of the society was not rapid, and for some years was subject to fluctuations. In 1769 Grimsby had 56 members and Horncastle 42, including such well-known local names as Rayson and Goe. In 1774 Grimsby had fallen to 32 members and Horncastle to about the same. In 1780 Horncastle had only 31 members, but the numbers had increased in the neighbourhood; Kirkby-on-Bain having nearly as many as Horncastle, viz.
29, Wood Enderby 10, Hemingby 7, and Thimbleby 18; there being evidently a greater readiness to accept the new teaching among the simpler rural population.
In 1786 Horncastle was made the head of a circuit to itself, and in that year the first chapel in the town was built, the whole circuit then numbering 620 members. This chapel was near the site of the present Baptist place of wors.h.i.+p. A few years later the opposing barrier among the upper cla.s.s seems in some degree to have given way, as, in 1792, we find the name of Joseph Ba.s.s, a ”physician,” as ”leader.” In 1800 there was further growth in the country, Greetham having 21 and Fulletby 26; among the latter occurring the still well-known names of Winn (Richard and Elizabeth), 5 Riggalls, and 5 Braders. By this time there were 6 circuits formed in Lincolns.h.i.+re, and congregations at Newark and Doncaster.
Although there was a chapel at Horncastle there was no minister's residence until after 1786. At that date John Barritt rode over from Lincoln to preach, and finding no Wesleyan minister's house, he was taken in and hospitably entertained by a Mr. p.e.n.i.stoun, who was ”a great Culamite.” After staying the night with him he rode on next day to Alford, for Sabbath duty. On the death of John Wesley (1791) his mantle fell, and indeed, had already fallen, in several cases, on shoulders worthy of the commission which he conferred upon them. The first resident ministers were the Rev. Thomas Longley, Superintendent; the above John Barritt was the second, and Richard Th.o.r.esby the third.
Hitherto it had not been a service free from difficulty, or even danger.
Itinerary ministers had to make their journeys on duty, often long and wearying, on horseback, over bad country roads, even occasionally incurring hards.h.i.+p and peril. In 1743 Mr. John Nelson was sent by Wesley to Grimsby, and his journals describe severe labour and even persecution.
Another pioneer, Thomas Mitch.e.l.l, was thrown by a mob into a pool of water, and, when drenched, was painted white from head to foot. He was afterwards thrown into a pond more than 12 feet deep, rescued and carried to bed by friends, he was thrice dragged out of his bed because he would not promise not to visit the place (Wrangle) again. Wesley himself, in his journal (May 10, 1757) says ”I preached to a mixed congregation, some serious, others drunk;” but on the other hand, in 1764, he preached, when the chapel ”though having its galleries, was too small.”
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