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Research

Days 12-14: Cardiff and London – Michael Faraday

evansmfrHello all:

I am behind again. I have been traveling almost non-stop the last several days, and haven’t had a lot of opportunities to publish to the blog.

On Day 12, I took the train from Edinburgh to Cardiff, Wales. It was a very long trip, and by the time I arrived, I was quite exhausted. I spent the evening reading about Sandemanians in Wales.

Christmas Evans was a one-eyed Baptist minister who served the poor congregants throughout Wales for 49 years. For about 10 of those years, Christmas Evans was a Sandemanian. He was converted to the Sandemanians on the Island of Anglesey off the coast of Wales, where he had been assigned to minister to all of the Baptists on the island. He and many other Baptists became Sandemanians, in part, it seems, in defense of their strict Calvinist beliefs. When Methodists arrived on the island, Evans attacked them, attempting to defend Calvinist soteriology against Wesleyan Arminianism. Evans became one of the most well known free church ministers in the history of Wales non-conformity.

Day 13 was my birthday. I spent it touring the Cardiff area, visiting the Cardiff Castle, and enjoying this beautiful city. Later in the day, I took the train to London, and promptly went to bed.

faradaymichael3Day 14 I spent in London, discovering the city.  London is the place where the most famous of Sandemanians, Michael Faraday, was a member.  Faraday was an important enough person in the social and political circles in London that he has his own memorial in Westminster Abbey.  However, because of his supposedly unorthodox Sandemanian beliefs, he was denied burial in the Abbey and was instead buried in the Highgate Cemetery in London.  I did not have time to visit Highgate on this day, but I hope to do so before I leave the UK.

 

 

I found the following poem about the Sandemanians in London:

THE SANDEMANIAN MEETING-HOUSE IN HIGHBURY QUADRANT

On roaring iron down the Holloway Road
The red trams and the brown trams pour,
And little each yellow-faced jolted load
Knows of the fast-shut grained oak door.

From Canonbury, Dalston and Mildmay Park
The old North London shoots in a train
To the long black platform, gaslit and dark,
Oh Highbury Station once and again.

Steam or electric, little they care,
Yellow brick terrace or terra-cotta hall,
White-wood sweet shop or silent square,
That the LORD OF THE SCRIPTURES IS LORD OF ALL.

Away from the barks and the shouts and the greetings,
Psalm-singing over and love-lunch done,
Listening to the Bible in their room for meetings,
Old Sandemanians are hidden from the sun.

John Betjeman

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Research

Day 11: Visiting the Glasite Meeting House and the grave of James Alexander Haldane

Hello all:

After getting up and changing accommodations (I had the very unfortunate luck of staying somewhere that was hosting multiple bachelor parties and hardly slept) , I set off in search of the old Glasite Meeting House of Barony Street in Edinburgh.  Once I arrived, I found it locked up.  I called the number to the property manager and got no answer, so I was unfortunately not able to go inside and take a look, which was a major disappointment.

Photos of the Glasite Meeting House

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I then set off to locate the graves of James Alexander Haldane and Archibald McLean.  While James Haldane needs no introduction on this blog, Archibald McLean might.  He is not the same Archibald McLean that was a leader of the Stone-Campbell Movement in Upper Canada, President of Bethany College and the chief executive of the Ameican Christian Missionary Society.  The Scottish Archibald McLean was a Sandemanian.  However, McLean left the Sandemanians after a while after becoming convinced that believer’s baptis by immersion for the remission of sins was the intent of the New Testament.  McLean started a new sect, very similar to the Sandemanians, called the Scotch Baptists.  The Scotch Baptists practiced adult immersion, celebrated the ord’s Supper weekly, and generally closely resembled modern day Stone-Campbell Churches.  That said, I was unable to find McLean’s grave.  He is buried in the same cemetery as James Haldane, but after over an hour of looking, I was unable to locate his grave.

James Haldane’s grave, however, I was able to find with the help of Scott Harp’s website.  James is buried in a family plot with multiple family members.  His own grave itself was unmarked, but the entire family pot was marked as “the burying ground of James Alex. Haldane”.

Josh

Photos of the gravesite of James Haldane:

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Research

Day 10: Wrapping up Work in the Archive, and Visiting the Dundee Glasite Church Building

IMG_7549Hello all:

This is my last day in the archive.  I photographed over 700 documents today alone.  It was a busy and interesting day.

Right after I started working this morning, I heard someone ask for me by name.  Carol Kinghorn, who had commented on my itinerary, saw my posts that I was in Dundee and came down to the University to meet me, and also to do some of her own genealogical research on her Father’s side of the family, the Sandemans.  She showed me her family tree, with the connection to Robert Sandeman and John Glas, and we had a lovely conversation about the impact and legacy of the Glasites on Protestantism.  While I was talking to Carol, she asked me if I had been to the former Glasite Church in Dundee.  I had not know that it existed!  I had done some research to see if I could find other old Glasite buildings in existence besides the Glasite Hall in Edinburgh, but had had no luck.  Carol gave me directions to it, and I walked down to it over my lunch break.

The Former Glasite Builidng here in Dundee,  is now, ironically, owned by the Church of Scotland.  The building itself was built right next door to a Church of Scotland perish, and I must wonder if the Glasites didn’t have a sense of humor in selecting the site for their building. I was able to go inside and look around a little bit.  It is a two story structure, somewhat round.  A staff member of the church guided me upstairs to see the actual church meeting room, but when we arrived we found a meeting in progress so we weren’t able to go in.  I took a few photos of the outside however, and was happy to be able to see this historic building at all

This evening I take the train to Edinburgh, where I will locate the grave of James Haldane, and visit the Glasite Meeting Hall.

Josh

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Research

Days 7 – 9: Research in the Dundee Archive, and Visiting the grave of John Glas.

IMG_7002Hello Everyone:

I’ve spent the last three days working 8 hours days in the archive at the University of Dundee.  In the three days that I have been there, I have photographed well over 2,000 pages of documents relating to the Glasite/Sandemanian Churches.  It has been in many ways exhausting work, standing up, then sitting down,  bending over documents, strategically placing leather and cloth weights on pages to keep them down while trying to obstruct as little of the text as possible.

Almost all of the documents in the Dundee archives are handwritten, and many are hard to decipher.  Additionally, almost all of the documents are unpublished, which means that under U.K. copyright laws, I can make a copy for research, but I cannot provide these copies to others.  That means that the documents that I am obtaining at Dundee will not be available via the Glasite Digital Archive.  This is a shame, but a legal necessity. However, since I am able to make copies of the documents and bring them with me, it means that I can do research in the more comfortable confines of my own home or the library using digital copies of the text.  I already see the potential for several articles from the data that I have collected.  I am also spending tomorrow in the archive, continuing to take photos and document texts and artifacts.

There are so many different items related to the Glasites in the archive that it is utterly impossible for me to capture them all in the short time I have here in Dundee. I am categorically skipping items from the mid to late 20th Century, and focusing on the 1700 – 1800’s.  I had to make the decision early as well to skip many of the sermon and exhortation books, in favor of actual records, letter collections, and written manuscript collections.  There remains a large treasure trove of sermon and exhortation texts that were meticulously recorded by members of the congregations using shorthand, and then written out in long hand.  The theological content of these documents is rich, but I just don’t have the time.  They will have to wait until I can return, or until another researcher comes to comb them for content.

One insight that I have gained from this is that the Glasites were sticklers for record keeping.  The archive has, I believe, about 100 service books, recording the bible verses read, members missing from services, and visitors from other congregations for every week of a given year.  I’ve photographed a couple of books that consistently note visitors from other congregations, because, as a case of disfellowship against the famous Glasite scientist Michael Faraday shows, the Glasites did not tolerate members missing worship.

John Glas002Also, today, I visited the grave of John Glas.  Glas is buried in the Howff Cemetery, which is the middle of downtown Dundee.  I have read about Glas since I was 15 years old, which makes twenty years of reading about, wondering about, and being curious John Glas this year.  It was surreal to finally be able to visit his grave and walk in the areas that he trod.

Stay tuned for some discoveries from the archive that I’ll post later.

Josh

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Research

Day Six: Finding the Grave of Robert Haldane, and Exploring the Glasgow Necropolis

GlasgowCathHello all:

I visited the grave of Robert Haldane, who is buried, quite interestingly, inside the building of the Glasgow Cathedral. I say interestingly, because as independent congregationalists, both of the Haldanes rejected the state Presbyterian Church. Why would Robert Haldane be buried in the largest symbol of Scottish Presbyterianism in Glasgow, right under the shadow of a huge monument to John Knox, the man who brought the reformation—and Presbyterianism—to Scotland?

I don’t have an answer yet, but there is some evidence to start hypothesizing (or really, just jumping to some conclusions). Robert is buried in the tomb of his wife’s parents. According to a narrative I have read, he died in Edinburgh, where he and his brother were collaborating in church building, and he was buried the very next day in the Glasgow Cathedral. Robert’s in-laws were wealthy town-folk in Glasgow. His father-in-law was an attorney and merchant in the city, living in a fine estate. In contrast, Robert and his brother James had been wealthy. The brothers sold their Castle, called Gleneagles, used some of the money to fund their ministry, and gave the rest to the poor. Robert’s father-in-law, by contrast, kept his estate, his money, and had enough status, prestige, and money to purchase his entire family tombs in the Glasgow Cathedral. So, when Robert died, the family did what was easily and immediately available: they buried Robert in a place he would have never wished to be…..let alone en tombed.

Robert is buried in the floor of the Cathedral, near the stairs that take the viewer down to Saint Mungo’s tomb. Some of the family graves are marked G.O. with a number next to it. Robert’s tomb, however, is walked upon so frequently that the letters and numbering have completely warn off. Nothing is left to mark his tomb. To find his grave, you must locate the graves of family members and then count the stones to determine where he lies.

After visiting the Cathedral, I took a trip up to the Glasgow Necropolis – The Glasgow City of the Dead. The first monument in the Necropolis was a statue at the top of a large hill commemorating the death of John Knox, the reformer of Scotland. Ironically, Knox is buried in Edinburgh, not Glasgow. After Knox, others started placing their graves, along with their gaudy headstones and mausoleums, near by. In the Victorian era, the Necropolis took off as the “in” place to be buried. The architecture of the area is amazing. I had to think about the Necropolis eschatologically, however. The City of the Dead is beautiful, if not a big creepy, in its own way. I had to wonder what the Earth will look like without all of these huge monuments to human beings. What will Earth be like when the only monument that exists is one to the Living God, the New Jerusalem come down from heaven so that God may dwell with God’s people? I long to know, and so does Robert Haldane and John Knox.

Josh

 

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Inside Glasgow Cathedral, looking at the tomb of Robert Haldane:

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The Necropolis and Scenes of the Outside of the Glasgow Cathedral:

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Research

Day Five: Visiting Greville Ewing’s Grave, and the University of Glasgow.

Hello Everyone,

I arrived in Glasgow this afternoon after taking the ferry and the train from Belfast.  After arriving in the city, I made two visits, one to the grave of Greville Ewing, a Haldanite preacher in Glasgow that had a major impact on the thought of Alexander Campbell, and the University of Glasgow, where both Thomas and Alexander Campbell attending University. I found the masoleum to be in disrepair, with graffiti on it and trees growing up around it.  In addition, the general cemetery, which is owned by the City of Glasgow, is in general disrepair. Greville Ewing was a Haldanite minister who preached and ran a seminary in Glasgow.  When Alexander Campbell was shipwrecked off the coast of Ireland in 1808 and then crossed the channel into Scotlqand, it was Ewing who helped Campbell get enrolled at the University of Glasgow.  Campbell spent quite a bit of time in Ewing’s home, and visited his church often, experiencing weekly communion.  Additionally, Ewing created an immediate link between the Glasites and Campbell.  Ewing required all of his students to read the works of John Glas and Robert Sandeman, and we know that Campbell read their works and were familiar with their theology. Ewing broke away from the Haldanes, however, over baptism by immersion.  The Haldanes eventually embraced believers baptism by immersion, but Ewing, who had come out of the Presbyterian Church, could not agree to give up infant baptism, and eventually he broke ranks with the Haldanes. Between 1808 and 1809, Alexander Campbell attended the University of Glasgow, like his father.  Alexander was heavily influenced by the Scottish Philosophy that he learned at Glasgow, that included heavy doses of Scottish Common Sense Realism, the school of which was founded by Thomas Reid.  Common Sense Realism heavily influenced how Campbell, and later, his followers in the faith, read the bible. Later, many other conservative, evangelical Christians, were influenced by Common Sense Realism, to the point that Mark Noll has declared a knowledge of Common Sense Realism as a requirement for fully understanding evangelicals.  However, among the rest of the world that is not evangelical, Common Sense Realism has largely been rejected.  The discipline of Anthropology, for instance, has termed Common Sense Realism as “Naive Realism,” and lays the phenomenon of ethnocentrism directly at the feet of Common Sense Realism. Pictures from the mausoleum of Greville Ewing: Mausoleum 18 Mausoleum 17 Mausoleum 16 Mausoleum 15 Mausoleum 14 Mausoleum 13 Mausoleum 12 Mausoleum 11 Mausoleum 10 Mausoleum 9 Mausoleum 8 Mausoleum 7 Mausoleum 6 Wilson Wislon Mausoleum 5 Mausoleum 4 Mausoleum 3 Mausoleum 2 Mausoleum 1 Glasgow City Council Land Services Sign Eastwood Old Cemetery Rule Sign                                         Photos from Glasgow University:   IMG_3804 IMG_3803 IMG_3802 IMG_3800 IMG_3799 IMG_3797 IMG_3796         IMG_3793 IMG_3792 IMG_3791 IMG_3784 IMG_3777

 

 

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Research

Days Three and Four: Exploring Dublin and Belfast, and thinking about the Campbell’s and Glasites as Colonizers

View of Belfast 1789, Lawson's MapHello all: Days three and four have been slow ones on the research front.  Since I am traveling by train, there are Glasite and Stone-Campbell sites that I could visit that are outside the cities that I just can’t reach without a car.  So, I’ve been unable to check those areas.  Instead, I spent some time exploring Dublin, and yesterday, Saturday, I transited between Dublin and Belfast on the train.  I’ve also taken some time to read and think about Thomas and Alexander Campbell and the role they played as Scotch-Irish settlers in Ulster. Ireland was a colonized area, and it required military force to keep the island a British possession.  The area of Ulster, particularly, was taken over by the British as a settlement.  Starting with the Irish Rebellion of 1798, there were four sustained uprising against British rule by the Irish between then and when Alexander Campbell left Ireland in October of 1808.  Thomas, Alexander, and their family then, as Scotsmen, were foreign colonizers, and Thomas, as a Protestant Presbyterian clergyman in a predominately Catholic nation, was an important part of the dominating English establishment.  As far as I am aware, no research has focused upon Thomas and Alexander as colonizers.  The same could be said of those Glasites who spread the faith from Scotland to Ireland as well.  Of course, the Campbell’s and those Scottish Glasites who went to Ireland did not see themselves as colonizers, but as missionaries, or as simple ministers of the Gospel traveling to Ireland to feed the flocks that were already there.  I wonder, however, what we can learn about both our own movement, and the lives and work of those who transplanted their faith and work from one area to another, in part, as a way to defend and expand an empire.

Josh

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Research

Day Two: Dublin, Searching for John Walker

TrinityCollegeHello all:

I arrived in Dublin around 11am GMT this morning.   I visited Trinity College today, there the Reverend John Walker had been a fellow.  Walker had been a member and minister of the established Church of Ireland, but then converted to Sandemanianism.  Upon his conversion, he was expelled by Trinity College.  Walker founded several Sandemanian congregations in Ireland, which often went by the name of Walkerites or Separatists.

I’ve been attempting to locate Walkerite meeting houses in the Dublin area, but unfortunately they all appear to have been torn down.

The collected works of Walker were published shortly after his death in 1838. Volume 1 and Volume 2, along with a separate index, can be found at the Glasite Digital Archive.

Josh

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Research

Day One: Flying from Nashville to Dublin via Toronto

dublinHello Everyone:

I am flying from Nashville to Toronto today on Air Canada Flight 8032, departing at 6:50pm Central Time.  I will arrive in Toronto, Canada, at 9:40pm Eastern.

I then depart from Toronto to Dublin at 11:10pm Eastern, and will arrive in Dublin at 10:40am GMT.

I will be updating this blog post throughout the day.  Stay tuned.

Josh

 

 

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Travel Preperation

Preparing to Leave

christadelphian-largeHello Everyone:

Finals are done and over with here at Vanderbilt, and I am working on getting ready to leave for the trip.  As the time grows closer and closer to departing, I am finding more and more things that I could research while I’m in Ireland and the United Kingdom.  A colleague from the U.K. recently emailed me a short reading list on the Churches of Christ in the U.K.  I am not surprised that there is some literature, but even the short list that he sent me was substantially more than I had assumed existed.

I wrote a paper this term on the prison experiences of conscientious objectors during World War I.  During my research for this paper, I came across the memoirs of a British C.O. who was a member of the Old Paths Churches of Christ, as well as the memoirs of a Canadian C.O. who was a Christadelphian. Using that source, I was able to locate a book full of primary sources on pacifism within the Christadelphians during World War I. Whats more, while researching a paper for Sociology of Religion, I came across an ethnography of the Christadelphians in the United Kingdom, where the author analyzed the group in terms of Church-Sect typology.  While I have had an interest in the Christadelphians for some time, these resources are sparking a greater interest.

Unfortunately, I only have a short period of time in the country to do research.  After learning more about the rich history of the Stone-Campbell Movement and its off-shoots in the U.K. and Ireland, I am realizing that this will simply need to be the first of several research trips to the area.

Please stay tuned to the blog as we draw closer to May 7.  Once the trip starts, I will be posting updates at least once a day, and hopefully more often. I encourage you to follow me on my journey!  I would love to hear your thoughts about what you read, the pictures I take, and the finds that I come across while I am in the U.K.

Josh