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biography
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Williams, Rev. Samuel, was born August 5, 1802, in Connellsville, Fayette County,
in southwestern Pennsylvania, and died September 8, 1887, in Brooklyn, New York.
Sam was a well known Baptist preacher, an abolitionist and Temperance worker.
From 1827 to 1856 he was pastor of the First Baptist Church of Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania.
He was the fourth of the 11 children of Charles and Mary (McLain) Williams.
Charles was born in Goshen, New York. When he was a small child during the
Revolutionary War his parents, John and Hannah (Finch) Williams, moved the
family to near Martinsburg, now in West Virginia, before settling in the wilds
of Bedford County, Pennsylvania. Charles told his children of the dangers he
faced when the settlements were young, and how they had been subject to Indian
raids.
One old, oft repeated story that Sam remembered in particular was of a small
girl in a peach tree who had been taken and scalped by Indians, survived, and
spent several years in captivity. When she and other captives were finally
released by a treaty with the Indians, they were brought before their parents
to be claimed. Standing there, all dressed as Indians and having forgotten
their native tongue, some were unrecognizable. The girl's mother couldn't pick
her daughter out of the group of unclaimed girls, and the girl couldn't
recognize her mother. As the story went, the two were reunited when the
mother started to sing an old German hymn the girl had been fond of as a child.
Charles Williams was a blacksmith and bell maker and had his log dwelling and
shop at the corner of Spring Street and Mountain Alley in Connellsville. He
was eight times elected to the town council. In 1818 he moved the family to
Bracken County, Kentucky, and shortly thereafter to Brown County, Ohio, just
across the Ohio River. From there they moved to Middletown, Henry County,
Indiana, where Charles died in 1848 and his wife, Mary, in 1857. An entry in
their family bible states "We were baptized and joined the church 1801." The
denomination they joined is not mentioned.
In 1820 Sam was studying at an academy in Zanesville, Ohio, and presumably
living in the home of his mother's parents, Jacob and Elizabeth (Wilson)
McLain. They had married very young. Both were from old Maryland families and
had come up to Bedford County, Pennsylvania, from Frederick County, Maryland,
around 1783. From Bedford County they moved to Zanesville by 1812.
Jacob reportedly was a Revolutionary War veteran and had fought at Bunker
Hill. Into his later years he still wore velvet knee breeches and silk
stockings.
Sam's grandmother, Elizabeth, while a young girl living on Pipe Creek in
Frederick County, had been converted to Methodism through hearing John Wesley
during his tour of America. Wesley's close friend and fellow pioneer Methodist
evangelist, Robert Strawbridge, lived and preached not far from Elizabeth's
home.
Sam was baptized in 1822 at Zanesville, and decided to preach the Gospel. He
wrote: "at Zanesville I was converted under the preaching of George C.
Sedwick, who had been a student of Dr. Staughton of Philadelphia and soon after
began to speak in public. He put Gill's 'Divinity' and Mosheim's 'Church
History' in my hands, directing my studies for two years. By too close
application I came near death with typhoid fever. When partially recovered,
our doctor deacon sent me off to Bedford Springs, Pennsylvania. I soon began
to improve, and a Presbyterian church there had lately lost their pastor and
urged me to preach for them, where I received the first little salary for 18
months."
Bedford Springs had long been known for the healing effects of its mineral
waters, and it attracted people from near and far. A favorite vacation spot
for politicians and Presidents, it was located in the county where Sam's
parents' had grown up and he had many cousins in the area.
After recuperating, Sam was called by the Redstone Association to be a
traveling evangelist. Later he spent 1826 and part of 1827 caring for two
churches, one in Schellsburg, Bedford County, and one in neighboring Somerset
County, where he and other preachers boarded with "Aunty" Mary Graft. It was
in Somerset County that he had been ordained. Sources give 1824 or 1826 as his
year of ordination.
One day in 1826 he was asked by a Mr. Schell to perform the funeral of his aged
mother-in-law, Mrs. Rebecca Statler. The funeral was to be held at the home of
another son-in-law, a Mr. Lambert, in the Allegheny Mountains near Stoystown.
Once there, Schell helped Sam prepare his eulogy by giving him some details
about Mrs. Statler's life. He took Sam into the room where her body was laid,
and, pulling back her cap, showed that long ago she had been scalped. Schell
told him that Indians had taken her when she was a small child, healed her
wound, and did not release her for seven years. After being released, the way
the girl recognized her mother was through her mother's singing her favorite
childhood hymn. It was obvious to Sam that he was looking into the face of
the heroine of that story he had so often heard years before.
In 1827, at the age of 25, Rev. Samuel Williams became pastor of the First
Baptist Church of Pittsburgh. That year was probably the year of his first
marriage, to Sarah, "one of the (church) members, a young widow of my age"
Sarah was born Sarah Wendt in 1802 and died in 1851. About two years after her
death, Sam, "having one small daughter, married a Methodist lady and gave her
the New Testament to study." The second wife was Louisa Johnson. She was
born in 1822 and died in 1905. Sam had four children with Sarah and three with
Louisa.
Sam was pastor at Pittsburgh for 28 years. During this time he resumed studies
and in 1830 graduated from the Western Theological Seminary at Pittsburgh.
Six other churches were established in the area while Sam was here. One of
these was the First Baptist Church of Wheeling, (now West) Virginia.
In 1834 he edited a hymnal "The Lyrica: a Collection of Psalms, Hymns and
Spiritual Songs, adapted to general use".
The abolition of slavery was a cause that claimed much of Sam's time and
effort. He helped found the Anti-Slavery Society of Western Pennsylvania, and
in 1836 began publication of an abolitionist newspaper, the "Christian
Witness". It ran for sixteen years.
In 1837 Sam and other well-known Pittsburgh anti-slavery men organized a
memorial service for Elijah P. Lovejoy, publisher of an abolitionist newspaper
at Alton, Illinois, who, after a long period of harassment, had been gunned
down by a mob.
Sam brought abolitionist speakers, including the renowned Frederick Douglass,
to the church. Years later, in 1880, in response to a letter inquiring about
his speaking in Pittsburgh, Douglass wrote:
"I have the honor to acknowledge your favor of yesterday, informing me that
Rev. Samuel Williams lately mentioned that I lectured in the First Baptist
Church in Pittsburgh, and his belief that that was my first public address I
well remember speaking in that church a little less than 40 years ago It was
esteemed by me at the time a high mark of courage and liberality of the First
Baptist Church that its doors were thrown open to the cause of my then despised
and enslaved people, and I rejoice that I have lived to be able to see my
people free, and to acknowledge the benevolent spirit of the church that gave
me leave to plead for emancipation within its walls, when to do so was to make
itself odious in the eyes of the general public, and even of surrounding
churches"
Sam is reported to have been "one of the most effective workers with the
Underground Railroad" and to have numbered among his intimate friends Henry
Clay, William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips.
Signey Rigdon had been pastor of the Pittsburgh First Baptist Church some years
before Sam. After he left he helped Joseph Smith establish the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints. Sam made a study of Rigdon's life and activities
at Pittsburgh and the founding of that church. In 1842 he published a pamphlet
on his findings and lectured on the subject.
In the 1850's, when some members of his congregation were experimenting with
Spiritualism, Sam attended a few of their meetings to gain an understanding of
that new movement. At his first meeting, the director of the session claimed
to be relaying words from one of Sam's deceased friends.
Sam was well known among his fellow ministers as an ardent opponent of infant
baptism and denounced it in the strongest terms. In 1852 the Association his
church belonged to held a meeting at McKeesport, Pennsylvania. The meeting was
to be held on a Sunday, and many of the visiting ministers were invited to be
guest speakers at churches in the area. Sam accepted an invitation from the
First Methodist Episcopal Church. Members of the Association were amused to
hear later that, after Sam was introduced and seated in the pulpit, the church
pastor announced that, before hearing the guest speaker, a special service was
to be performed. At that point, 23 babies, in their mothers' arms, were
brought in before the pulpit and the rite of sprinkling was administered.
In 1856, saying goodby to Pittsburgh after 28 years, Sam's new assignment was
at Akron, in northern Ohio. Here he stayed from 1856 to 1862. During this
period, in 1858, he engaged in two public debates, each with a Universalist
minister. They were held two weeks apart, at Centerville and Casstown, toward
Ohio's southwestern corner.
The Civil War had begun in 1861, and through the American Tract Society Sam was
able to expand his preaching to the troops. He wrote at least two tracts for
them: "The Social Glass", an exhortation to temperance, and "The Eloquent
Senator".
After Akron, home for Sam and Louisa for at least the next eight years was
Springfield, Ohio. Here again, as at Akron, they conducted a school for young
women.
After Springfield came a couple of years at New Castle, Pennsylvania. By 1874
they were back in the Pittsburgh area, in the borough of Castle Shannon. Sam
was building a new church and school there, and preaching in churches in the
area around Pittsburgh.
By 1884 at least two of Sam's children had moved to New York City. Sam and
Louisa followed them there and found a home at 188 Tompkins Avenue in Brooklyn.
In a letter to a grandson in November of 1884, he wrote: "Give my respects to
Mr. Phillips when you see him and tell him I am abolitionist against rum now as
I used to be against slavery." "
When he no longer had Slavery to fight, Sam took up the cause of Temperance, or
national Prohibition. In 1874 at Pittsburgh he had joined the National
Christian Temperance Alliance and was appointed to their Business Committee.
Now at New York ten years later he was leading the opening prayer of a meeting
of the Executive Committee of the Kings County Prohibitionists. Before long he
became dissatisfied with the direction that group was taking, so in 1886 he and
his son Allen, who worked with his father in the Movement, helped organize the
new Liberty Hall Temperance Union. Allen became the first secretary of this
union and Sam the first chaplain.
Allen Samuel Williams, in addition to sharing his father's desire to see
Prohibition the law of the land, also worked against the evils of the drug
trade. He had just made a study of hashish and opium addiction and published
the results in "The Demon of the Orient". This book was to be instrumental in
getting new drug laws enacted in New York State.
In April 1887 the new church building of Emmanual Baptist Church was formally
dedicated. Rev. Sam read the Scripture lesson from Isaiah 11, and closed the
service with the benediction.
Rev. Adolph Gumbart was pastor of the Noble Street Baptist Church in the
Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. In early 1887 he became ill and needed several
months' rest. Sam was one of a dozen or so prominent ministers who volunteered
to substitute for him during his absence. Being now in his 85th year, Sam was
in declining health himself, and the sermon he preached for Rev. Gumbart was to
be his last.
Sam died suddenly at his home in Brooklyn on September 8, 1887. He had
suffered for several years with kidney disease, but heart disease was the
immediate cause of death. On the afternoon of September 9 a brief and simple
service was held at the home, and in the evening the body was taken to
Pittsburgh for burial. On September 10 he was laid to rest in Allegheny
Cemetery alongside his first wife and three children.
The following month the 21st annual meeting of the Long Island Baptist
Association was held at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Brooklyn. On October 20 the
Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported: "The Rev. Dr. Middleditch read the report of
the Committee on Obituaries. The report noted the death during the year of the
Rev. Samuel Williams, at the time of his death connected with Emmanuel Church
On motion of the Rev. Mr. Gumbart of Greenpoint the report was adopted. In
making the motion he referred especially to the late Rev. Samuel Williams. His
last action, the speaker said, was preached before the Greenpoint church while
the pastor (the speaker) was very ill. At the suggestion of the moderator the
audience joined in singing the hymn, 'Oh, for the death of those who slumber in
the Lord'". Sam had served in the ministry for over 60 years.
Rev. Samuel Williams was survived by his second wife, Louisa; son John H.
Williams of New Brighton PA; daughter Mary Eliza, wife of Henry E. "Harry"
Marshall of Independence MO; daughter Emma, wife of Charles T. Dunwell, of
Brooklyn NY; son Allen Samuel Williams, Brooklyn; five grandchildren and two
great-grandchildren. He was predeceased by son Charles F. Williams and
daughters Ann E. and Sarah Louisa Williams.
BIOGRAPHY OF REV. SAMUEL WILLIAMS (1802-1887)
Author: Merrill F. Anderson; self-published.
Contributed by Andy Anderson.
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