CHAPTER XIV. DOVER CIRCUIT, 1806—SICKNESS AND DEATH OF BISHOP WHATCOAT.

On Saturday, August 12, I went with Bishop Asbury to Philadelphia. He preached twice on Sabbath. In the morning at St. George’s, from 2 Peter i, 12-14. If the reader will turn to the passage he will see how touching and how appropriate it was. The bishop had just left his dying colleague, Bishop Whatcoat. He was himself pressed down with many infirmities; his tabernacle was shaken, some of the pins were being taken out. He preached also at the Academy from James v, 7, 8, on patiently waiting for results, like the husbandman. The conference commenced on Monday the 14th. There were sixty-three preachers present, and the session was one of great peace and harmony. Bishop Asbury preached on Wednesday from 1 Tim. iv, 12, 13: “Let no man despise thy youth;” after which he ordained seven elders.

On Thursday I heard Ezekiel Cooper preach in the Bethel from Haggai ii, 9: “The glory of the latter house shall be greater than the former,” etc. This was a sermon of superior excellence. Ezekiel Cooper was then in his palmy days, powerful in the pulpit, powerful on the conference floor. The influence he wielded in the Philadelphia Conference was wonderful. He was the master-mind, the leading spirit.

On Monday the 21st this pleasant and profitable conference adjourned. The bishop in his journal says, “I hope many souls will be converted in consequence of the coming together of this conference, having had great peace in the societies, and sound, sure preaching three times a day.”

I was appointed to Dover Circuit with James Bateman. It was a pleasant circuit, and he was a pleasant colleague. He was a young man, belonging to one of the first families on the Peninsula, and this was his first circuit. William P. Chandler was the presiding elder. On my arrival I was heartily welcomed in the name of my Master. My home was the house of the Hon. Richard Bassett. On the 26th I wrote: “Here in this hospitable mansion the venerated Richard Whatcoat is confined with dangerous illness; but I rejoice to find him better, and that there is hope of his recovery.” Alas, it was a false hope, raised only to settle in despair.

On Sunday morning, with the assistance of several class-leaders, I met two hundred colored members. Their black faces shone with holy joy, and their songs were fervent and exhilarating. Religion does wonders for the children of Ham.

On Tuesday I went with Dr. Chandler to James Purnell’s, where our quarterly meeting was to be held in a grove. This was the custom in that day. They were miniature camp-meetings. The people came in crowds, so the churches could not hold them. We spent a day or two in clearing the ground and removing the underbrush, and prepared seats for twelve hundred persons. On Friday there were several tents on the ground, and a number of people.

Dr. Chandler preached the opening sermon from Hab. iii, 2: “O Lord, revive thy work,” etc. Great success attended the word. Brother Richard Lyon exhorted. I closed with prayer, and then Brother Lyon invited the mourners to the front of the preachers’ stand. I preached in the afternoon, from 1 Peter iii, 9; and at night James Bateman, from Acts iii, 19, on the times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord. We had not only the gentle dew, but the refreshing shower; a number of mourners came to the altar; sinners were pricked to the heart, and some who came to mock, remained to pray.

Sunday was a day of mighty power; we had three sermons. I never witnessed a more melting time. The work of justifying and sanctifying grace went on with sweetness and power.

During the meeting one hundred and sixty were converted, and thirty-four professed to be sanctified, and were witnesses that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin.

I do not wish to make any invidious comparisons, and all my brethren know that I never belonged to the family of croakers; but I will ask this question: What would we think if we could witness such a scene at a modern quarterly meeting? There was a power among the fathers, both in the ministry and laity, that we do not possess. The ministers moved the masses as the wind does a field of wheat, and they mowed them down as the scythe does the grass.

After spending several days in attending the different appointments, I returned to Dover on Monday the 12th. I wrote in my journal thus: “Father Whatcoat is still very dangerous.” Tuesday, “To-day I shaved the dear saint of God. I also had great satisfaction in conversing with him; he is much resigned to the will of God.” Never shall I forget the days and hours I spent with the dying bishop. The place was hallowed, and the room seemed filled with the glory of God.

I took another tour, and then returned and spent more time with the excellent bishop, whose days were closing, and the shadows of a long evening were gathering around him.

On the 18th I preached at Barratt’s Chapel. I also preached at Frederica and at Banning’s Chapel. Much of the power of God was felt in many of these meetings; several lay speechless and helpless.

On May 26 I made this record: “This evening I had the pleasure of conversing with dear Father Whatcoat, who is in a very low state of bodily health; but what is infinitely superior, he has peace of mind, which the world, together with health, cannot give.” The next day I had another conversation with the aged pilgrim. “O! may the loving wholesome advice he gave me never be erased from my mind. May I, agreeably to his wish, continue in the field of battle should I live fifty years from now and have health and strength. Lord, thou knowest I want to be wholly thine while I live, thine in the article of death, thine in Paradise, thine in the morning of the resurrection.”

Such is the record I made fifty-nine years ago, after an interview with one of the holiest men earth ever saw. He was exceedingly happy; he shouted aloud the praises of Jesus, and gave a glorious testimony to the power of religion to sustain in adversity. He talked sweetly of heaven, and of the numerous friends in America and in England that he expected to meet in heaven.

I have ever esteemed it one of the most exalted privileges of my life to enjoy the interviews I did with the dying bishop, and to be favored with his benediction.

On the 5th of July, 1806, the good bishop gave his soul to God and his body to the dust. Seldom has the Church lost a brighter ornament, seldom heaven received a purer spirit.

Dr. Chandler delivered an address at his funeral to an immense crowd, and the remains were deposited under the altar of the church, in Dover, Delaware.

PORTRAITURE OF BISHOP WHATCOAT.

With Bishop Whatcoat I was personally acquainted for sixteen years. I had seen him at my father’s house long before he was elected bishop. I was present at his election and ordination, and I was myself ordained by him a deacon. I have heard him preach often; have traveled with him hundreds of miles; have been with him in many families; enjoyed his friendship, and had the benefit of his wise counsels. I presume there is no one living that has as many personal recollections of Bishop Whatcoat as I have.

In regard to his personal appearance, Bishop Whatcoat was not very tall; he was stout, though not corpulent. He had a fine intellectual face; his mouth was small; his eyes not very dark, but expressive. His dress was very plain, in Methodist minister style: the shad-belly coat, and vest buttoned snug up to his neck. A few years before his death he lost all his hair, so he was entirely bald. Some time after, to his great astonishment, it began to grow, and his hair came out thick and beautiful, so that when he died he had a fine head of dark hair, not even sprinkled with gray. He combed it down straight over his forehead, the Methodist fashion in those days. It would have been considered out of order to have worn it so as to exhibit a noble forehead. His face, like that of Bishop Asbury, was bronzed or tanned by exposure to many summer’s suns and winter winds and storms. His likeness in the “Arminian Magazine” resembles him, though it is younger than when I saw him.

As a man he was most remarkable, for in him was blended a dignity that commanded reverence, and a humility and sweetness that inspired affection. The benignity that shone in his countenance revealed the character of the inner man. He loved everybody, and all loved him in return. As a bishop he was a safe counselor, for he was wise in judgment. He was a good presiding officer. He governed by the law of kindness, and the preachers all venerated him. In the pulpit he excelled. He could melt and mould an audience as few men ever did. The holy anointing rested on him, and a peculiar unction attended his words. Several of his sermons I can never forget. One I heard from him in 1790, seventy-five years ago, I distinctly remember: “The handful of corn,” and “the fruit shaking like Lebanon.” Also the one at Duck Creek Cross Roads, in 1803, on “suffering a while,” etc. He professed purity of heart, and no one that knew him doubted his being in possession of it. A holier man has not lived since the days of the seraphic Fletcher, whom in some respects he strikingly resembled. He walked in the light as God was in the light. He was a man of one book, the Bible; and such was his knowledge of the Scriptures that he was called “a concordance.” He was peculiarly solemn. He always appeared to act as if he heard a voice saying, “Occupy till I come,” or as if the judgment trump was sounding in his ears summoning him to “give an account of his stewardship.”

It was my privilege on September 23 to hear Dr. Chandler in Dover preach the funeral sermon of Bishop Whatcoat from John i, 47: “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile.” Was there ever a more appropriate text? No man was ever more free from guile than Bishop Whatcoat. Dr. Chandler did justice to the subject. He had known the bishop intimately for years, and was a great admirer of his many virtues. I wrote thus in my journal: “This was truly a solemn and profitable discourse. My heart was affected on reflecting on what wholesome instructions I have heard from the lips of our father in the Lord both in private and public. I am encouraged to be more faithful, that I may not become a castaway, and be separated from those who have gone before.”

Bishop Asbury hastened back after his New England tour to see his friend and “true yoke-fellow,” but he was too late. “At Kingston,” he says, “I found a letter from Dr. Chandler declaring the death of Bishop Whatcoat, that father in Israel, and my faithful friend for forty years; a man of solid parts; a self-denying man of God. Who ever heard him speak an idle word? When was guile found in his mouth? He had been thirty-eight years in the ministry: sixteen years in England, Wales, and Ireland, and twenty-two in America; twelve years as presiding elder; four of this time he was stationed in the cities, or traveling with me, and six years in the superintendency. A man so uniformly good I have not known in Europe or America.... At his taking leave of the South Carolina Conference I thought his time was short. I changed my route to visit him, but only reached within a hundred and thirty miles; death was too quick for me.”

The next spring, when Bishop Asbury was returning from his annual southern tour, he came to Dover. On April 27, 1807, in Wesley Chapel, standing over the remains of Bishop Whatcoat, he preached the funeral sermon of his late colleague from 2 Tim. iii, 10: “But thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, charity, patience.”⁠[11] Governor Bassett was present, and many others who loved Bishop Whatcoat in life, and mourned the loss they sustained in his death. It was a portraiture of Bishop Whatcoat sketched and painted by a master workman who was well acquainted with his subject; and so accurate was the likeness, with its lights and shades, that there was no difficulty in recognizing the original.

On the walls of the church in Dover was placed a neat marble slab, on which the following was inscribed:

“In memory of the Rev. Richard Whatcoat, one of the bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church, who was born March, 1736, in Gloucestershire, England, and died in Dover July 5, 1806, aged seventy years.”