History of the M.E. Church, Vol. IV - Media Sabda Org

Ten new preachers were received at this session. "Praise the Lord, O my soul!" exclaims Lee, as
he records the fact. Among these young men were Epaphras Kibby, Daniel Webb, Asa Heath, and
also those two remarkable men, so generally known alike for their great labors and great
eccentricities, Billy Hibbard and Lorenzo Dow, the latter after no little opposition, as we have seen.
Twelve were ordained. The public services were impressive; Lee speaks of "a blessed time in
preaching," when preachers and people were melted into tears. The Conference closed on Friday, 21;
the next day Asbury and Lee "began their flight," as the latter calls it. They were accompanied by
twelve of the preachers, who had been designated to the neighboring Circuits of New York. By
Sunday afternoon they had crossed the boundary, and the bishop was preaching the same evening
at Dover.
William Beauchamp was a man of genuine greatness, one of nature's noblemen and God's elect.
He was born in the County of Kent, Del., April 26, 1772. His father, a respectable Methodist
preacher, removed in the year 1788 or '89 to the western part of the state of Virginia, settled on the
Monongahela River, and after residing there six or eight years, again emigrated to little Kanhawa
River, in Wood County, Va., where he and Rees Wolfe, another preacher, formed societies. At all
early period of his life Beauchamp had religious impressions. When about fifteen or sixteen years
old he became a member of the Church. Some time after he began to exhort. He was sent to a
seminary of learning, and acquired a knowledge of English and Latin grammar. In 1790 he taught
school in Monongahela. At the age of nineteen he began to preach. In 1793, the twenty-first year of
his age, he left his father's house on the Monongahela, and traveled under the presiding elder. In
1794 he was stationed on the Allegheny Circuit, which he traveled two years. The next year, 1796,
he was appointed to Pittsburgh Circuit. In 1797 he was stationed in New York, and in 1798 in
Boston. From thence, in 1799, he was removed to Provincetown, Mass. In 1800 he was stationed on
Nantucket. George Cannon, then a located preacher, had preached there with considerable success.
As the prospect appeared flattering, he solicited the aid of the traveling ministry, and Beauchamp
was sent to his help. He had not been in this station more than six months when a society of between
seventy and eighty members was raised up, and, before he left it, a large and commodious
meeting-house was built. [8]
In the following year, 1801, he located, having married. In 1807 he removed from Nantucket, and
settled near his father, in Wood County, (Va.,) on the little Kanhawa. He continued there, preaching
with great popularity and usefulness, till 1815, when he removed to Chilicothe, Ohio, to take the
editorial charge of the "Western Christian Monitor," the only periodical publication at that time in
the Church. He had previously published his "Essays on the Truth of the Christian Religion," a work
of decided merit in the estimation of good critics. He edited the Monitor with conspicuous ability,
and preached meanwhile at and about Chilicothe with eminent success. The whole community paid
him the homage due to his great talents and exalted character, and a remarkable revival of religion,
which occurred soon after his removal, is attributed to his previous instrumentality. He was called
the "Demosthenes of the West."
In 1817 he removed to Mount Carmel, Ill., where he was employed in founding a settlement. He
showed himself the truly great man in all the details of this new business, planning public measures
and economical arrangements; devising mechanical improvements, for which he had a rare genius;
directing the instructions of the youth, and simplifying its modes; ministering as pastor to the