John Morgan Walden John Morgan Walden ( February 11 , 1831 – January 21 , 1914 ) was an American Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church . He also gained notability as a newspaper editor and journalist , as a State Superintendent of Education in Kansas , as an officer in the Union Army , and as an Official in his Christian denomination . Birth and family . John Morgan Walden was born in Lebanon , Ohio , the son of Jesse and Matilda ( née Morgan ) Walden . The family moved to Hamilton County , Ohio in 1832 . John was of Virginian ancestry , his great - grandfather Walden having moved from Culpepper County , Virginia to Kentucky in 1770 , and his grandfather Benjamin to Ohio in 1802 . After the death of his mother in 1833 . John went to live with relatives near Cincinnati . John married Martha Young of Cheviot , Ohio July 3 , 1859 . They had five children . Education and early life . Walden attended a local school in Cincinnati until 1844 , when he went to work . Becoming a wandering laborer , he found employment as a carpenter . He became interested in the writings of Thomas Paine , whereby Walden became a skeptic . He read Sir Walter Scott and Oliver Goldsmith . His own early romantic stories were published under the pen name " Ned Law " in the " Hamilton , Ohio Telegraph " from 1849 until 1853 . After attending Farmers ' College in College Hill , Ohio in 1849 , Walden taught school for a year in Miami County , Ohio . It was there that he was converted by a Methodist Circuit Rider . Returning to Farmers ' College , Walden graduated in 1852 . He then continued to teach there for two years . Journalism career and Kansas . In 1854 John went to Fairfield , Illinois , where he published the " Independent Press . " In his editorials he opposed the liquor traffic and so - called " squatter sovereignty . " Illinoisans starved him out by refusing to support his paper , and in 1855 he returned to Ohio , where he became a reporter with the " Cincinnati Commercial " . John became deeply interested in the Kansas troubles while reporting from the Democratic National Convention of 1856 . Indeed , he went to Kansas , where he established the " Quindaro Chindowan , " a Free - Soil paper in the Free State port - of - entry town of Quindaro . He was a delegate to five Free - State conventions , including the Leavenworth Constitutional Convention of 1858 . That same year he campaigned over half the Territory , opposing the Lecompton Constitution . John Morgan Walden served in the Kansas State Legislature in 1857 . He also was the State Superintendent of Education for a time . Ordained ministry . John returned again to Ohio , where on September 8 , 1858 he was admitted on trial to the Cincinnati Annual Conference of the M . E . Church . His first two years of ministry were spent on various circuits . In 1860 he was admitted to the Conference in full connection and sent to the York Street Church in Cincinnati . While he was there the American Civil War began . Rev . Walden became very active in the war effort , raising two regiments to defend the city against threatening attacks . He joined the Union Army , where he achieved the rank of lieutenant colonel . Rev . Walden served with the Ladies ' Home Mission in Cincinnati ( 1862 – 64 ) . In the post - war years , he helped many African Americans through his work as corresponding secretary of the Western Freedman ' s Aid Commission and also with the Methodist Freedman ' s Aid Society . In 1867 Walden was appointed Presiding Elder of the East Cincinnati District . In 1868 he was elected Publishing Agent of the Western Methodist Book Concern , also in Cincinnati . His penchant for statistics and organization , his business ability , and his sympathetic cooperation with the preachers made the Concern a financial success under his stewardship . Episcopal ministry . John Morgan Walden was elected a Bishop by the 1884 General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church . During his service he presided at some time or other over every Conference in the U . S . A . He also inspected missions in Mexico , South America , Europe , China and Japan . He did much to shape the missionary policy of his Church . Walden was a delegate to the Ecumenical Conferences in London in 1881 , in Washington in 1891 and in Toronto in 1911 . With respect to church organization , he insisted on strict adherence to the written law of the church . Otherwise , he was more liberal in his views . Death and burial . Walden died on January 21 , 1914 at Daytona Beach , Florida , and is buried in Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati , Ohio . He was survived by his wife and three of their five children .