Nathanael Rawlings

This memoir of Nathaniel Rawlin(g)s is from The Baptist Magazine 1810, pp 27, 28

REV. NATHANAEL RAWLINGS

Your fathers where are they? And the Prophets, do they live forever? No, these men of like passions with otliers, like other men, like all sinners, die. Yet the memory of the just is blessecl; their journey through life is marked by a progress, which in its moral splendour resembles the shining light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day. This beautiful illustration very happily characterised the pious subject of this slight memoir; the days of whose pilgrimage, amounting to more than threescore years and ten, were nearly all spent in this state of blessed prgression. The late Rev N Rawlings was born in Morton-in-theMmarsh, Gloucestershire, 1733. His mother and father were long members of the Baptist church in Bourton-on-the-Water. On his maternal side genuine piety is to be traced through preceding generations. His ancestors were among those of whom the world is not worthy and who avoided its fury during persecuting times by assembling in solitary places. Mr R was serious from a child and was baptised at Bourton in 1750 at 18 years of age. The church soon requested him to preach and when after long solicitation his diffidence yielded to this trial of his abilities, he was sent to Bristol Academy, then under the care of the Rev H Evans and the Rev B Foskett. Here he remained four years; during this period he supplied the church at Trowbridge and was so far approved as to be called at the termination of it to the pastoral charge. It was nevertheless a season of adversity; the number was scanty, the brethren were at variance, and symptoms of disaffection to the ministry of Mr. R. began to discover themselves, so that his ordination, which occurred, October l0th, 1765, was succeeded by his resignation and removal in 1771, when he settled at Bronghton, in Hampshire.

A few days preivious to his departure he married Miss Mary Webb, an emineutly pious woman, who was baptised at the uge of twelve; with her he enjoyed the sacred interests of eonjugal life for thirty years; she died in November 1801 without children, and he remained a widower.

At Broughton he resided six years, when a visit to his friends at Trowbridge renewing all their former attachments produced the united and successful application for his return. He resumed his charge in November 1777. The first settlement was short and troublesome, the last durable and happy. A long series of uninterrupted rosperity in this part of Zion signalised with peculiar favour his subsequent ministry; and his declining life, cheered by the affection of his people and the success of his labours did not present that sort of gloomy pause which has marked alas so frequently the fainting energies of extended age; producing a melancholy interval between the business of both worlds.

A remarkable integrity of character united with great plainness of manners sometimes failed to introduce Mr R advantageously to the attention of a stranger but gave him an honourable seat in the circle of friendship. There it was known how much the law of kindness governed his heart and there breaking through his natural reserve it was expressed by the appropriate communications of the tongue ministering grace to the hearers.

To the popularity of his address or the brilliancy of his talent none of the friends of Mr R will attribute his permanent success as a preacher; but they will remember with veneration how well his holy life and deep personal experience enabled him to enforce those doctrinal subjects in which he especially delighted. They will recollect the usefulness of discourses which finding entrance at the heart abundantly compensated for the want of elegancies which had they distinguished the preacher could not have survived him. They will look round on the late converts of his ministry and see how this aged shepherd brought home the wanderers to his Master's fold when it was eventide with himself and nature might have languished for repose. More than 40 members have been added to the church during the last five years and the place of worship has been crowded.

He was taken ill while attending the funeral of the late Reverend Mr Clarke of Trowbridge and never preached afterwards. He said to a friend who called on him the next day "My work is done. I have nothing more to do here". His tedious illness was admirably sustained, his consolations were not expressed by ecstasies but by the peaceful triumph of an abiding hop; of which he often spoke to those about him. He died October 7th, 1809. His funeral sermon by the Reverend J Barnard of Bradford was delivered to an overflowing house from whence indeed hundreds departed unable to obtain admission. It was founded on a passage selected by himself; at once describing the blessedness of his past experience and the emphasis of his present joy Christ is all and in all.

1768

We know from Brooks that although 1767 had been a good year, there were no baptisms in Bourton in 1768 (although we know from elsewhere that William and Henry Collett were baptised in Upper Slaughter). Other things went on, however, including a mild earthquake on Wednesday, December 21! The British Geological Survey describes it as “little-known”. It was felt fairly strongly in the Gloucester-Droitwich area and in Oxfordshire and as far east as Reading. The western limit was Stoke Edith, near Hereford; the north-south extent is obscure. In Gloucester many people ran from their houses, but in some parts of the city it was less noticeable.

January 1, 1768, was a Friday. Preparation day meetings should have taken place but there was snow so that did not happen. In fact, on the Sunday, a communion Sunday, it was so cold that the evening meeting was cancelled. The snow continued into the second Sunday of the year when, although both services in Bourton took place, the scheduled afternoon meeting at Stow was cancelled (twice a month an afternoon meeting was held at Stow).

As the weather improved various church members put on new year's entertainments at their homes (Richard Boswell, Beddome's father-in-law; Mr (Henry) Collett, Dr Paxford, Mr (Samuel) Palmer*). Which ones Beddome attended we do not know nor do we know how he celebrated turning 51 on January 23.

We do know, however, that Mrs Beddome had given birth to Joseph on December 9, 1767. Snooke, Boswell and Palmer paid her a visit on February 3, 1768. She had been unable to be at the first tea party for two months at Snooke's, where Beddome, Collett and Polly Palmer had come together the day before.

February was a better month weather-wise and on Sunday 14, Mrs B was able to borrow the Snooke sedan chair and go out for the first time in weeks. She remained at home when tea was served at the Snookes again the next day, though Beddome went. The same thing happened the next Monday too and on the last Monday of the month of that leap year they all gathered at the home of Mrs B's father, Richard Boswell.

On Sunday, February 19, Farmer Penny died. Beddome preached from Isaiah 40:8 at the funeral the following Wednesday. From February 27-March 1, a Thomas Skinner (d 1782) was around. He had tea with Beddome on Saturday, 27 and breakfast with him on Tuesday, March 1. Beddome and Skinner were also at Snooke's for tea on Sunday, when Skinner preached (2 John 5:4, John 10:27). This is not the Devonshire Skinner (1752-1795) who eventually ministered in Clipstone, Towcester (1783-93) and Newcastle and who first studied in Bristol but the minister of Alcester, 1766-1782. He was not actually ordained until September 7 of this year, 1768.

The rest of March was unremarkable, then Snooke was in London, Monday, March 28 – Wednesday, May 17.** (This was the day, apparently when Richard Haynes, over at Bradford on Avon suddenly died. Summing up his ministry many years later William Hawkins wrote that "He was ordained on the 25th April, 1750. He appears to have been sound in the faith and consistent in discipline. His ministry was greatly honoured for eighteen years, when he suddenly died, having been called from earth to heaven while at his dinner on the 17th May, 1768.") Snooke was back in time for the preparation day and the funeral of “Dame Collett” on the Sunday. Beddome preached from 2 Chronicles 24:15, 16.

The next day Beddome himself set out for the Association meetings in Bromsgrove. The distance is around 40 miles and he probably stopped overnight somewhere – perhaps in Alcester but not with Skinner who preached again at Bourton, Sunday May 29 (Rom 8:28, Luke 11:13). That day a Mr Cresser died, probably Jeremiah, a deacon and the father of a later deacon, Thomas Cresser (d February 25, 1808). Skinner set off back to Alcester early the next morning and Beddome was back by the evening. On June 2 Cresser was buried, Beddome preaching on Job 42:17. Four days later (June 6) there was a wedding. Ann Collett (1741-1811), twin of John, married James Beale of Stow. (They eventually had seven children altogether).

At the Association Beddome would have heard Benjamin Whitmore (pastor of Hook Norton 1754-1786) and John Poynting (1719-1791) of Worcester preach. He shared their sermons at the subsequent Friday meetings (Ephesians 2:5 and Psalm 102:16 respectively). The minister of Chipping Campden, the predecessor to Elisha Smith, was present on the latter occasion. (This would be David Davis),

July was difficult for Beddome. Although he preached on the first Sunday and part of the second, by the second service on July 10 he was very poorly with rheumatism and could not preach. Unusually he had not been able to write his own hymn on Matthew 25:31 that week either. By the following week he was well again for a communion Sunday. On Thursday July 21 he and Mrs B had tea at her father's with Snooke and others. That day Beddome Senior's successor at the Pithay church, John Tommas (1724-1800) arrived at the Beddomes (Snooke stabled his horse) and the next day the Beddomes were with Snooke for tea when Tommas preached on Psalm 73:25, leaving for Bristol early the next day. Beddome preached on the communion Sunday (July 24) but was again ill the next day when Snooke and others came for tea.

On Friday August 3 most of the Beddomes were at the Snookes with the Palmer family enjoying fresh fruit and on Monday August 22 and Thursday September 22 the Snookes visited Mrs B. At this time the Beddome children were 18, 12, 10, 5, 3 and nearly 8 months. Ten year old Foskett was not there on this occasion.

From Monday, September 26-Monday, October 13, Beddome went up to London. We do not know any details but, presumably, he preached on October 2 and 9, somewhere. In Bourton, either John Butterworth (1727-1808) from Coventry or, more likely, his brother Lawrence Butterworth (1741-1828) from Evesham and former member John Reynolds (1731-1792), then in London, stood in. Nathanael Rawlings (1733-1809), another former member, came up from Trowbridge for the meeting on Friday, October 7. Reynolds and Rawlings both arrived in Bourton on Tuesday October 4.

On Sunday October 17, Beddome shared his pulpit with John Martin (1741-1820), who had fairly recently gone to Sheepshead in Leicestershire.

The rest of the month and into November was more routine with more Monday teas at the Snookes. On Wednesday, November 16, John Poynting preached (Hosea 12:3,4a). Snooke says that on Sunday 27 he acted as clerk as Mr (Jasper) Bailey (d 4 July 1782) was ill. Clerk was apparently the term used for the precentor. December 25 fell on a Sunday in this year. Beddome preached in the morning on Mark 3:27 (No man can enter into a strong man's house, and spoil his goods, except he will first bind the strong man; and then he will spoil his house) and in the second service carried on with his series in Acts 16.

*The names Paxford and Palmer are illustrious as (according to Ivimey) Dr Paxford was the son of Thomas Paxford of nearby Clapton, of whom Calamy wrote "Though he was not bred a scholar, yet he had good natural parts, and preached and prayed well, and sometimes officiated for Mr (Anthony?) Palmer at Bourton-upon-the-water. After his ejectment, he became an Anabaptist and fell under some censures as to his morals; which I the rather take notice of, because of an intimation of Dr Walker's, as if some of the ejected were therefore passed by, because they were such as partiality itself could not speak well of." Mr Palmer, after mentioning the above adds, "Crosby has nothing more than this quotation from Calamy, except abuse of the Author for relating this last circumstance, which he does not attempt to disprove". Ivimey defends Paxford who was obviously held in high esteem in Bourton. Presumably the Palmers were connected to Anthony Palmer. Henry Collett was also of good nonconformist stock no doubt.
** In April Samuel Burford c 1726-1768, Pastor of Little Prescott Street, died. He was succeeded that same summer by Abraham Booth who had published his Reign of grace the April before.

Hayden 07a

On pages 89-92 Hayden looks at who went into the ministry through Beddome. We have a post on this here. He does add a little information.

1. Richard Haines - Hayden says his death was on May 17, 1767. He was baptised May 15, 1741. He gives the 1747 note about calling him. Haines pastored in Bradford-on-Avon 1750-1767. Hayden gives the note from the Bourton church book on his death mentioning a work started by him in Bath in 1755.

2. John Ryland Senior is only mentioned in passing.

3. Richard Strange (Stratton, Wiltshire). Not mentioned by Hayden.

4. John Reynolds (1730-1792). There is quite a bit on him. Hayden quotes the Bourton church book but can cast no light on the period before the call to Cripplegate 1766 and ordination, which involved Gill and Stennett, with Benjamin Wallin the preacher (no Bristol men involved). Hayden mentions the unfortunate accidental swallowing of his shirt studs that impaired his voice forever after. He mentions a friendship with former Bristol student John MacGowan and says that Reynolds one published sermon was a 1782 address to the annual meeting of the Bristol Education Society.

5. Nathanael Rawlings (1733-1809) was baptised March 24, 1750. Hayden gives some further background on this man who ministered in Trowbridge and Broughton (Broughton Gifford near Melksham or Borughton in Hampshire?).

6. William Wilkins. Hayden mentions Beddome's Bristol trained assistant from Horsely here.

7. Alexander Paine. Not mentioned by Hayden.

8. Thomas Coles, Beddome’s eventual successor. Not mentioned by Hayden.

Character and influence

There appears to be no portrait of Beddome in existence and no physical description of the man. We get some idea of his character from the description given by the scholarly and eloquent Robert Hall Junior (1764-1831) in his preface to the collected hymns. We should bear in mind, however, that this is a young man’s description of an eminent man of an older generation.
Hall speaks of his personal acquaintance with Beddome but he was only 31 when the latter died, there being an age gap of nearly 50 years. No doubt the input of Hall’s father, Robert Hall Senior (1728-1791) is significant. The Preface is simply signed R Hall, Leicester and it could possibly be the work of Richard Hall but the former suggestion seems far more likely. Hall was pastor at Harvey Lane, Leicester, 1806-1826. The frontispiece includes ‘Rev R Hall AM’ the same form used in his collected works. Hall gained his MA from King’s College, Aberdeen. The memoir with the works is by Olinthus Gregory, [see pic] mathematician and father-in-law to Samuel Beddome, Benjamin Beddome’s grandson.
'Mr Beddome was on many accounts an extraordinary person. His mind was cast in an original mould; his conceptions on every subject were eminently his own; and where the stamina were the same as other men’s, (as must often be the case with the most original thinkers) a peculiarity marked the mode of their exhibition .… Though he spent the principal part of his long life in a village retirement, he was eminent for his colloquial powers, in which he displayed the urbanity of the gentleman, and the erudition of the scholar, combined with a more copious vein of attic salt than any person it has been my lot to know.'
(Robert Hall, Recommendatory preface, Hymns adapted to public worship or family devotion, London, Burton & Briggs and Button & Son, 1818)
As for Beddome’s abiding influence, besides his later published hymns and sermons and his immediate influence on the Bourton congregation (Brooks, 63, ‘As a pastor Mr Beddome seems to have been no less excellent than as a preacher’) and beyond, there was that which came in the shape of men converted under his ministry who later became ministers themselves. As Derrick Holmes remarks (42) the extent of Beddome’s influence on each individual we are about to mention cannot be properly ascertained without more information than we presently have but he must have had some influence on each of the following.
Richard Haines from Burford was converted, shortly before Ryland, who we mentioned in an earlier post, in the 1741 awakening. He began to preach in 1747 and went on to pastor at Bradford-on-Avon from 1750. (The letter of dismissal is in the Bourton old church book, 43. See Appendix 12 in Holmes. Haines ministered at Bradford until his sudden but not wholly unexpected death, 1768. The final year was particularly blessed with some 24 being converted.)
John Ryland Senior became ‘a master preacher’ and ‘a giant in the land’. He was set apart to the ministry in 1746. Following studies in Bristol, he pastored the Castle Hill church, Warwick, where Beddome had once been a frequent visitor. In 1750 he moved to Northampton where he ministered with much success until retirement to Enfield, 1785, where he had a school originally begun in Warwick and carried on in Northampton. (Peter Naylor, John Collett Ryland (1723-1792), BPB 1, 200, 201)
There were several others. Richard Strange became pastor at Stratton, Wiltshire in 1752. Little is known of him. (Presumably he was son to deacon Joseph Strange, mentioned by Holmes, 60, 61. Was Nanny his sister? Cf fn 43).
John Reynolds (1730-1792) from Farmington, baptised in 1743 aged 14, studied in Bristol and for several years often deputised for Beddome. In this period his more settled ministry appears to have been at Cirencester, Cheltenham and Oxford. (Holmes, 46). In 1766 he became minister at Cripplegate, London. He succeeded High Calvinist John Brine (1703-1765) and is buried next to him in Bunhll Fields. Of Reynolds’ ministry The Baptist Register 1794-1797 says ‘Nothing very remarkable attended’ it but he had a marked ‘solicitude for the conversion of souls’, 44. Like Beddome and Ryland he was awarded an MA by the college in Providence, Rhode Island. His father, John Reynolds Senior, who died in 1758 was ‘the oracle of the town’. (Cf Holmes, 60, 61n).
We have mentioned Nathanael Rawlings, from Moreton-in-the-Marsh, baptised in 1750. Another Bristol student, he became pastor in Trowbridge in 1765. His call seems to have been a rather drawn out affair lasting from 1763-1766. He also seems to have had financial difficulties getting through college. See Holmes, 47-49. Rawlings ministered in Trowbridge, 1765-1771, when there was a disruption, and again from 1778 until his death, 1809.
Alexander Paine was a former Methodist preacher who joined the Bourton church in the Autumn of 1775, the same year that he was baptised at Fairford by Mr Davis. His name first came before the Bourton church in 1778 but there was no call until 1780, there clearly being some doubts over his suitability. The church at Bewdley considered calling him for some while but he eventually became minister at Bengeworth from November 1780. (One wonders if the Bengeworth congregation were better able to cope with the remaining Methodist traits in Paine).
Thomas Coles, Beddome’s eventual successor, was baptised and joined the church at the age of 15 or 16. He headed off to study at Bristol 10 days before Beddome died. He went on to gain an MA from the Marischal College, Aberdeen, in 1800. He eventually succeeded Beddome the following year and pastored the church until 1840. (In the intervening period he turned down a call to Cannon Street, Birmingham and worked with Abraham Booth 1734-1806 at Prescott Street, London). His youth does not rule out Beddome’s influence. Even at the age of 11 he was taking extended notes of Beddome’s sermons and at 13 was reading them back at the midweek meeting (Cf Brooks, 82).