The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1874-04-18
Sniscelloneoms.
Father HerSeU.


A METHODIST MISSIONARY OF THE oLDEN TINE
ONE OF The ITINERANT LIGHTS OF MARYLAND.
A communication in the Washington .Sta1
gives the following interesting sketch:
No books possess more value to the student
of local and neighborng history than the better
classes of religious biographies. In the Libra
ry OF Congress one of the most useful books on
Delaware State history is Foote'S history OF
| Drawers Church and congregation. In like
manner the best books on the Eastern Shore oil
Maryland are Foote'S History of the Presbyte
rian Church, Freeborn Garretson's Life by DR.
Bangs, Asbury's Journals, end the Biography
of Thomas. the parson of the islands. These
men and others have left their record upon the
history and growth of Washington city other
itnerants who found biographers, could
have supplied sterling books on our topogra ply
and character. Amongst the pilgrims who
were well known in their day as visitors and
preachers in Washington none was more eff
cient than Father Hersey.
| This man was born on the Delaware bounda-
ry line between New Castle and Elkton. He
was Of positive character and strong pera
ment, and although mparatively uneduca ted, i,
| he had q native mind which never failed to put
| weaker, if more cultured, men in objection to
| his will. He was TALL gaunt, with keen eye,
a long nose, and way OF mounting men, as an
eagle might fasten on sheep overcoming the
until like the Ancient Mariner he had satisfied
his forte and told his story. His sterling con-
fidence, never at fault, made him equally eff
cient over large, miscellaneous audiences, and
| as pulpit orator, he approached Whitfield
When he leaned over the pulpit, he looked
down as if into the boiling furnace of hell, and
his auditor could feel the heat of the place, as
well as hear the groans ascending therefrom,
which Hersey could initiate with shrill die
tion that brought old and young to their feet,
and made all nature uneasy.
This man, according to tradition, had been
in early life sort OF Jim Fisk--a travelling
peddler with snowy team, glded wagon,
and that kind of personal bounce which attrac-
ted crowd, or bore down a merchant to whom
he desired to make sale. He was a proud
man, as we'll as confident one, and held his
peregrinating reputation and success at q high
standard. There are persons who remember
him riding into Washington city on the box, as
lean and keen as John Randolph, a perfect re-
publican, admitting no man to be his superior,
and the boys and negroes, the dogs and babies,
looked at his caravan as if it were some sort of
national property. The President may have
envied him showmen always did.
At certain time in Hersey's life, extrava-
gance, profigacy, or error in business brought
him in debt. He suddenly found himself
mortgaged for many years, and the iron OF obl-
cation entered into his flesh. The natural eff
feet of such grief upon a bold, yet sensitive
and provincial man, was to make him serious,
and then religious. Conversion affected him
with the whole force Of fanaticism. He was
converted from the crown of his head to the
sole of his feet. Every fibre of his being ap-
peared to cry out in praise and fear to God.-
He conceived himself to be the most awful sin
ner. His past life arose in hideous outlines,
and the slightest error of thought and conduct
resolved that henceforth, until he paid his
debts and cleared up his character, he would
accept no comforts, and punish himself as he
thought heaven might have punished him.
He became a Methodist, of course, because
that denomination was at the head of spiritual
life in the region Of country which he had
traversed yet with his native boldness Char
acter he refused to accept some leading tenets
of the Methodist church as to organization and
discipline. He believed that laymen ought to
be admitted to church government; he doubt
ed the episcopacy as proper thing IN a chris
tian sect all license, such wearing jewelry,
eating rich food, and love of creature comfort,
he eschewed. Since the day of George Whit
field, no revivalst entered upon work with
such terrible earnestness. He tourlshed at his
best between 1880 and 1850.
His system OF paying off his debts was the
same which Parson Weems, the biographer of
Washington, pursued, viz: the writing of books,
issuing them himself, and being their colpor
teurer. Like Freeborn Garretson and John
Wesley, he addressed one of the earliest of these
books to the slavery question, and it was called,
if remember correctly, "Thoughts Cd Slavery"
Hersey's books were always to be found at the
booksellers stands. One of them was called
"Small Things" and the slavery book was al
ways indispensibly placed among his more Or
thodox publications. 1t was for many years
the only anti-slavery book available to the pub
lie in Maryland and Virginia. 1t was the first
book that the present writer ever read address
ed to the instinct Of the STAKEHOLDER, and per-
haps it insensibly paved the way for that polit-
ical fermentation on the subject which at last
threw down slavery and all connected with it,
The helplessness and individuality of this cru
sade made him so independent and inglorious
that the rich Shareholders could no more than
back-bite, calling him diseased man, repro
bate and what not On one occasion, when he
was guest at my fathers house, some super
serviceable postmaster tampered with his mail, !,
and found therein an abolition newspaper
whether Benjamin Lundy's or W. L. Garrison s
do not know. The charge was so heinous
that there was rumor that tar and feathers
would be applied to this abolition emssary.
AS revival preacher, do not believe Whit
field was more effective. His stock of ideas
and information was limited, but everything
he knew was made available. His writings
were quaint and exceptional. He had some
how fallen across a translation of Madam
Gulon's hymns, which he committed to memo
ry, and recited to country congregations
| ''Some of you may not like Madam Gulon be-
cause she was a Catholic, but that makes no
difference to me-" l we'll remember that one
| of these poems used to raise the house with its
sweetness, beginning something like the follow
ing:
| "a little bird am /,