The Morning herald., 1878-05-03
A MUCH MARRIED MINISTER.

Ahe LWteS uds poeu lnlormeu Oh tne af"
rest at Bangor, Me-, of the Rev. J. M. |
Wells, alias Chenoweth, on a charge of
bigamy. He was brought to this city, and
is now in Jail here awaiting the action of
the Grand Jury of the Sangamon Circuit
Court. He was born in small town in
Ohio in 1921, and learned the trade of a
tailor. When he was % years old he mar
ried and lived with his wife seven years.
One day he left his house and did not re-
turn. He then went, so it appears, to
Iowa, where he joined the Methodist
Church and became class leader. He
married there, and lived with his second
wife about two years, when he left her and
went to Kaskkaskia, in this State. 1t does
not appear that he got married while at
Kaskaskia, but in 1858 he married in
Manchester, Scott county, and began busi-
ness as tailor. He had good business
and made little money, but is described
as being 'of a lively, sporting turn" and
he drank freely, gambled little, and
made his shop the headquarters. for fast
men and youth of the neighborhood. Af-
ter seven months of this sort of life he told
the boys that he was going to quit his bad
habits and join the church, and this he
proceeded to do with great celebrity. He
professed great admiration for the teach
ing of the Rev. G.. W. S. Beer. the Bap-
tist clergyman of the place, and was very
attentive to his ministrations. He was soon
converted and baptized, and was after
ward licensed to preach. He married Miss
Ruth Clement, and devoted himself to the
work of the ministry, being in succession
the pastor of the Baptist Churches at
waverly, Applebrook Manchester, Mount
Sterling, Clayton, Girard, Whitehall, and
Auburn.
In the fall of 1865, his Manchester wife
died, and on July IA, 1866, he married Miss
| Anna Wrightsman of Auburn. In the fall
of 1874 he was in great financial trouble,
and left Auburn. For three years the peo-
pie of Auburn heard nothing of him, but
in the fall of 1877 the Standard, the Bap-
tist organ of Chicago, published a letter
from the ehnrch at Aurora, Ind, detailing
the misdeeds of the Rev. M. Chenoweth.
The people of Auburn wrote to the Aurora
church and an exchange of photographs
revealed the fact that the Auburn fugitive
and the ex-pastor of Aurora, Ind, was the
same person. He had got married at Au-
rora, and after his exposure there bolted
from that place, When he left Auburn he
went back to bis old home in Ohio, and
there found that his first wife had got a
divorce and married man who afterward
died, leaving her well fixed in the way OF
property. He professed the utmost penl-
tence for his desertion of her, swore that
the story of his marrying in Iowa was not
true. and was remarked to her. After
time he took charge of the Baptist Church
at Dunkirk, Ind. He had steadily urged
his wife to sell the property left her by
her late husband but she refused, and at
last, as his treatment was brutal, size left
him and went back to her home in Ohio.
Then Chenoweth went to the church at
Aurora, and there, it is reported, forged
the name of one of the deacons of his
church to note or check, got the money
ond fed The friends of the Auburn lady
spent the time and money required to trace
him up, and he is now in jail. The of
spring of his many marriages are one chile
at Manchester, two at Auburn, five in Ohio
and one in Iowa. Chicago Times