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

meeting-house. The first camp-meeting I ever attended was in the Foster settlement, Adams County,
and the preachers whom I remember are, Randall Gibson, Miles Harper, Thomas Griffin, and
William Winans. The latter was then recently from Indiana; a tall, thin, raw-boned and awkward
young man, arrayed in home spun pants, with a long, brown, straight-breasted coat, no neckerchief;
and a coarse pair of boots. There was nothing prepossessing about him but his small, burning eyes,
that glowed like coals of fire. His manner was slow, deliberative, self-possessed; but the first
sentence he uttered arrested the attention of the audience, and told that he was no ordinary man.
Miles Harper and Thomas Griffin were brothers-in-law, having married daughters of one of the
patriarchs of the Church. They were both then young men, and used to 'hunt in couples,' as often as
circuit duties permitted, and it was seldom they failed to 'tree their game.' I often heard them during
a period of twenty years, and as camp-meeting and revival preachers I have never met their superiors.
They were both men of striking physiognomy, of rough manners and severe aspect, and full of
pungent, and sometimes very bitter satire. They had clear, powerful, stentorian voices, whose loudest
tones would ring through the forest with terrible distinctness, and whose lowest notes were perfectly
audible. Harper's voice was peculiarly remarkable, full of volume and melody. He had a sparkling
eye; a smile, when he chose to smile, particularly persuasive; and a fund of anecdote at command,
which he brought to bear with great effect. Griffin was rather harsh and sardonic. He would make
the congregation quail, and shriek, and hide their heads with fear and shame, and then Harper would
solace and comfort them; and between the two, whenever they preached, a revival was sure to
follow. Both these good men began life with no advantages of education; they were pioneer
Methodists, saddle-bag preachers, the great instruments of civilization and Christianity. In the
wilderness, by the torch of the camp-fire, on the circuit exposed to toil, privation, and personal peril,
they studied the Bible; and I doubt if any ever understood it better, or preached it with more effect.
Harper died, not many years since, in the parish of Tensas, Louisiana, leaving there several sons, who
inherit his talents and virtues."
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