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United States of America
American Methodism Centenary
1866 Bronze Medal 29mm (11.60 grams)
CENTENARY OF AMERI CAN METHODISM FRANCIS ASBURY. 1866, Francis facing 1/4 right.
SUFFER THE LITTLE CHIL DREN TO COME UNTO ME CHILDREN’S MEDAL, Wreath.
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 Francis Asbury (August 20 or 21, 1745 – March 31, 1816) was one of the first two bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States. During his 45 years in the colonies and the newly independent United States, he devoted his life to ministry, traveling on horseback and by carriage thousands of miles to those living on the frontier.
Asbury spread Methodism in British colonial America as part of the Second Great Awakening. He also founded several schools during his lifetime, although his own formal education was limited. His journal is valuable to scholars for its account of frontier society, with references to many towns and villages in Colonial America.
At the age of 22, Asbury’s ordination by John Wesley as a traveling preacher became official. Typically such positions were held by young, unmarried men, known as exhorters. In 1771 Asbury volunteered to travel to British North America. His first sermon in the Colonies took place with the Methodist congregation in Woodrow, Staten Island. Within the first 17 days of being in the colonies, Asbury preached in both Philadelphia and New York. During the first year, he served as Wesley’s assistant and preached in 25 different settlements. When the American Revolutionary War broke out in 1776, he and James Dempster were the only British Methodist ministers to remain in America.
“During his early years in North America, Asbury devoted his attention mainly to followers living on the eastern shore between the Delaware River and the Chesapeake Bay. Bishop Asbury was a good friend of the Melsons and was their guest many times on his rounds. When the American revolution severed the traditional ties between the American Thirteen Colonies and Great Britain, Bishop Asbury, in the interest of his religious tenets and principles and in an attempt to remain aloof from the political and military fervor that swept the country, announced he would, to keep the embryonic Methodist congregations neutral, refrain from endorsing either Great Britain or the newly formed United States of America government and urged all his followers to do the same. This request placed almost all of his followers, especially those living in Maryland, in an untenable position. The State of Maryland had enacted a law requiring all citizens to take an Oath of Allegiance to the newly formed American Congress. It addition to this, it stipulated all non-residents within its boundaries also had to take and sign an Oath of Allegiance. Those refusing were summarily incarcerated for treason. Asbury, after proclaiming his neutrality, fled to Delaware, where taking an oath of allegiance was not a requirement. His adherents in Maryland suffered the rancor of the proponents of the Oath.”
Asbury remained hidden during the war and ventured occasionally back into Maryland. Sometimes this had the effect of compromising his parishioners.
In 1780, Asbury met the freedman Henry “Black Harry” Hosier, a meeting the minister believed “providentially arranged”. Hosier served as his driver and guide and, though illiterate, memorized long passages of the Bible as Asbury read them aloud during their travels. Hosier eventually became a famous preacher in his own right, the first African American to preach directly to a white congregation in the United States.
In 1784, John Wesley named Asbury and Thomas Coke as co-superintendents of the work in the United States. The Christmas Conference that year marked the beginning of the Methodist Episcopal Church of the United States. It was during this Conference that Asbury was ordained by Coke.
For the next 32 years, Asbury led all the Methodists in America. However, his leadership did not go unchallenged. His idea for a ruling council was opposed by such notables as William McKendree, Jesse Lee, and James O’Kelly. Eventually, based on advice by Coke, he established in 1792 a General Conference, to which delegates could be sent, as a way of building broader support.
His journeys
Like Wesley, Asbury preached in a myriad of places: courthouses, public houses, tobacco houses, fields, public squares, wherever a crowd assembled to hear him. For the remainder of his life, he rode an average of 6,000 miles each year, preaching virtually every day and conducting meetings and conferences. Under his direction, the church grew from 1,200 to 214,000 members and 700 ordained preachers. Among the men he ordained was Richard Allen in Philadelphia, the first black Methodist minister in the United States who later founded the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first independent black denomination in the country. Another African American was Daniel Coker, who emigrated to Sierra Leone in 1820 and became the first Methodist minister there from the West. Bishop Asbury also ordained Peter Cartwright in the fall of 1806.
A camp meeting
In the fall of 1800, Asbury attended one of the events of the Revival of 1800 as he travelled from Kentucky into Tennessee. The combined Presbyterian and Methodist communion observance made a deep impression on Asbury; it was as an early experience for him of multi-day meetings, which included attendees camping on the grounds or sleeping in their wagons around the meeting house. He recorded the events in his journal: it showed the relation between religious revivalism and camp meetings, later a staple of nineteenth-century frontier Methodism.
Failing health and death
In 1813, Asbury wrote his will. This was a time when “the greatest membership gain in the history of the church” was achieved. In 1814 his health started to fail and he became ill. In 1816 he started to regain strength and continued his preaching journey. He “preached his last Sermon in Richmond, Virginia” on March 24, “and died at the home of George Arnold near Fredericksburg” on March 31.
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