WESLEYAN HERITAGE LIBRARY Reference THE JOURNAL AND LETTERS OF FRANCIS ASBURY VOL. I “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” Heb 12:14 Spreading Scriptural Holiness to the World © 1998 Wesleyan Heritage Publications The Journal and Letters of FRANCIS ASBURY EDITORIAL BOARD Elmer T. Clark J. Manning Potts Jacob S. Payton Illustrator Erie Prior Maps by Lewis Akin Thoburn Lyon FRANCIS ASBURY Portrait by John Paradise at New York, 1812. From the steel engraving by B. Tanner, 1814. Frontispiece The Journal and Letters of FRANCIS ASBURY In Three Volumes VOLUME I The Journal 1771 to 1793 ELMER T. CLARK Editor-in-Chief J. MANNING POTTS JACOB S. PAYTON Published Jointly By EPWORTH PRESS ABINGDON PRESS London Nashville FIRST PUBLISHED IN 1958 PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY HAZELL WATSON AND VINEY LTD AYLESBURY AND SLOUGH EDITORIAL STAFF EDITORS ELMER T. CLARK, A.B., M.A., B.D., S.T.D., Litt.D., LL.D. Secretary of the World Methodist Council; Secretary of the International Methodist Historical Society; Executive Secretary of the American Association of Methodist Historical Societies; Author of The Warm Heart of Wesley, An Album of Methodist History, etc.; Editor of What Happened at Aldersgate, etc. J. MANNING POTTS, A.B., M.A., Th.M., D.D. Editor of The Upper Room; Member of the Executive Committee of the World Methodist Council and American Association of Methodist Historical Societies; Vice-President of the International Methodist Historical Society; President of the Southeastern Jurisdictional Methodist Historical Society; Collector of Asbury's Letters. JACOB S. PAYTON, A.B., B.D., D.D. Sometime Washington Correspondent for The Christian Advocate; President of the Northeastern Jurisdictional Methodist Historical Society; Member of the Executive Committee of the International Methodist Historical Society and American Association of Methodist Historical Societies; Author of Our Fathers Have Told Us, The History of Methodism in Western Pennsylvania. REGIONAL RESEARCH EDITORS FRANK BAKER, A.B., M.A., Ph.D. Executive Secretary of the Wesley Historical Society of Great Britain; Secretary of the International Methodist Historical Society; Author of A Charge to Keep, The Methodist Pilgrim in England, An Introduction to the People Called Methodists, Charles Wesley as Revealed by His Letters, etc. ALBERT DEEMS BETTS, A.B., M.A., B.D. Author of History of South Carolina Methodism. CULLEN T. CARTER President and Member of Commission on Historic Places and Relics of the Tennessee Conference Methodist Historical Society; Secretary of the Southeastern Jurisdictional Methodist Historical Society; Author of Methodist Doctrinal Beliefs, History of the Tennessee Conference of The Methodist Church. JOHN OWEN GROSS, D.D., L.H.D., Litt.D., LL.D., S.T.D., D.Sc.Ed. Executive Secretary of the Department of Educational Institutions of the Board of Education of The Methodist Church. VERNON BOYCE HAMPTON, Ph.D., Litt.D. President, Newark Conference Methodist Historical Society; Author of Francis Asbury on Staten Island, etc. WALLACE H. HARRIS, A.B., B.D., S.T.M. Vice-President of the Northeastern Jurisdictional Methodist Historical Society; Biographical Secretary of the Philadelphia Conference Methodist Historical Society. LEWIS O. HARTMAN, Ph.D., D.D., Litt.D., L.H.D. Bishop of the Methodist Church; Librarian of the New England Methodist Historical Society. (Deceased.) BROOKS B. LITTLE, A.B., M.A., B.D. Editorial Associate and Librarian of The Upper Room; Associate Research Director and Collector of the Letters of Francis Asbury. ISAAC P. MARTIN, D.D. Librarian-Historian of the Holston Conference Methodist Historical Society; Author of Elijah Embree Hoss, History of Methodism in Holston Conference, Church Street Methodists, A Minister in the Tennessee Valley. ARTHUR BRUCE MOSS, A.B., M.A., B.D. Pastor of Old John Street Methodist Church, New York City; Secretary of the New York City Methodist Historical Society. LOUIS D. PALMER, B.A. Author of Heroism and Romance: Early Methodism in Northeastern Pennsylvania. LAWRENCE SHERWOOD, B.A., B.D. Research Historian, West Virginia Conference Methodist Historical Society. WALLACE GUY SMELTZER, B.S., S.T.B., D.D. Historian of the Pittsburgh Conference Methodist Historical Society; Vice-President of the Northeastern Jurisdictional Methodist Historical Society; Author of Methodism on the Headwaters of the Ohio. WILLIAM WARREN SWEET, Ph.D., Litt.D., D.D. Sometime Professor of American Church History at the University of Chicago and Southern Methodist University; Author of The Methodist Episcopal Church in the Civil War, Circuit Rider Days in Indiana, The Rise of Methodism in the West, The Story of Religion in America, Religion on the American Frontier, Methodism in American History, Virginia Methodism, A History, etc. LESTER A. WELLIVER, A.B., M.A., B.D., D.D., LL.D. Sometime President of Westminster Theological Seminary; President of the Northeastern Jurisdictional Methodist Historical Society. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ATTENTION is called to the authorities cited in the footnotes and to the bibliography. The whole range of early Methodist literature, including periodicals, has been carefully searched. Contemporary maps have been studied to trace the routes of Asbury's travels. For local details scores of histories of states, counties, cities, and churches have been ransacked. The archives of most of the states through which Asbury passed have been investigated, and archivists and librarians have been uniformly helpful. County historians and genealogists have been contacted; and these have searched the old public records for deeds, wills, and other documents that might throw light on passages in the Journal. The Editors have traveled widely in all the states to trace the exact movements of the great Circuit Rider. It would be impossible to mention by name the hundreds of persons who provided local data and co-operated with unfailing kindness in the vast volume of research which has gone into the production of the work. Without their help thousands of local facts would not have been secured. High credit is due to Mrs. Louise Stahl, my own secretary, who was responsible for a considerable part of the research and for drafting the whole Journal in its final form. She read numerous microfilms and photostats, accurately interpreted difficult handwritten documents, transcribed all the annotations, and with her helpers carried on the voluminous correspondence with the many persons who contributed much or little to the project. Similar credit must be accorded to the Misses Annie and Clarice Winstead, secretaries to Dr. J. Manning Potts, for indefatigable work on the Letters. They co-operated in deciphering a large number of documents and transcribed all the Letters and the notes thereon. In Washington the secretary to Dr. Jacob S. Payton, Miss Margery E. Rohman, rendered highly important service on large sections of the Journal. Proximity to the Library of Congress greatly enhanced her usefulness during the whole period of research. Mr. Thoburn C. Lyon and Mr. Lewis Akin were responsible for making the maps used in this work. Each of Asbury's trips in each state was traced on an outline map of the state involved, and the hundreds of maps thus resulting were furnished to Mr. Lyon for guidance. Our indebtedness to Mr. Erie Prior of Washington, the illustrator, is evident throughout the book. To express suitable gratitude to all the persons who have co-operated in the present work would involve listing the ministers in nearly all the areas through which Asbury moved for nearly half a century. Among the hundreds who deserve the thanks of the Editors the following must be mentioned: GEORGIA: Mrs. Z.W. Copeland, Professor E. Merton Coulter, Dean S. Walter Martin, The Rev. Dr. A.M. Pearce, North Georgia Conference Historical Society, Professor Robert C. Wilson. DELAWARE AND MARYLAND: Dr. William H. Best, Miss Annie P. Dalton, Mrs. S.J.L. DuLaney, Carlyle R. Earp, Dr. William M. Hoffman, Dr. Arthur J. Jackson, Ralph F. Martz, Dr. Walter M. Michael, Miss Hannah S. Parker, The Rev. Kenneth Ray Rose, The Rev. Edwin Schell, The Rev. Melvin Lee Steadman, The Rev. R.T. Thawley, Library of Congress, The Library of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Historical Society of the Peninsula Conference, Maryland Historical Society, Methodist Historical Society of the Baltimore Conference, The Rev. William O. Hackett. KENTUCKY: The Rev. O.B. Crockett, Russell Dyche, Sr., C.H. Greer, W.S. Hudson, E.C. Watts. NEW ENGLAND: Mrs. William Kirk Kaynor, The Rev. Dwight H. McMahon, Mr. E. Farley Sharp, The Librarians of the Kent Memorial Library, The Public Library at Providence, R.I. NEW JERSEY: Dr. Lynn H. Corson, Dr. B. Harrison Decker, The Rev. Frank D. Dennis, The Rev. John L. Ewing, Dr. William R. Guffick, The Rev. Albert E. Hartman, The Rev. George T. Hillman, Walter W. Hoover, Dr. Roland L. Luerich, Loring McMillen, The Rev. Raymond E. Neff, Dr. John B. Oman, The Rev. Frank Ostertag, Dr. Olin Y. Shute, Dr. Harold N. Smith, Dr. Frank B. Stanger, Miss Laura Yetman, William H. Zelley. NEW YORK: The Rev. C.W. Christman, The Rev. Robert H. Dolliver, Dr. Robert C. Hunsicker, Mrs. Elizabeth D. Meier, The Trustees of John Street Methodist Church, Bishop Frederick B. Newell, Miss Dorothy Woodruff. NORTH CAROLINA: Miss Alma Browning, Mrs. Mary L. Browning, The Rev. G.W. Bumgarner, W. Frank Burton, D.L. Corbitt, Department of Archives and History, Leon M. McDonald, Society of County Historians, Miss Amy Muse, S.T. Peace, William S. Powell, University of North Carolina Library, J.F. Pugh, Mrs. G.D.B. Reynolds, Stanley County Historical Society, Colonel Jeffrey F. Stanback, William S. Tarlton, Mrs. Stanley Whitaker, Mrs. Laura S. Worth, Randolph County Historical Society. PENNSYLVANIA: Dr. Raymond Martin Bell, Ellsworth H. Bringinger, The Rev. Charles C. Chayer, The Rev. A.L. Cliffe, Mrs. Gladys DuPuis, William H. Irelan, Miss Ernestine M.