A History Of The Rise Of Methodism In America - Media Sabda Org

Barratt's Chapel is memorable on account of this account which has echoed through the length
and breadth of Methodism, of the gentleman who wished to know the use that was to be made of it.
Being informed that it was to be a place of worship for the Methodists, his reply was, "It is
unnecessary to build such a house, for by the time that the war is over a corn crib will hold them all."
Also, as being ,the place where Dr. Coke and Mr. Asbury had their first interview, and where the
preliminaries of forming the Methodists into a church began in this country -- the seat on which they
sat in the pulpit on that occasion, is still preserved in the same place as a memento. Mr. Philip
Barratt, after whom the chapel was called, went to his reward in 1784, just before Dr. Coke came
to the neighborhood.
Mr. Asbury settled the rules of the chapel, appointed towards, and made arrangements for the
preachers to meet and instruct the children. As it was a custom for the preachers to change at the fall
quarterly meeting, he stationed the preachers on the Peninsula, for the remainder of this year, thus:
-- "Kent, in Maryland -- William Glendenning, Stephen Black, and Joseph Wyatt. Kent -- in
Delaware, Thomas S. Chew, Joseph and James Cromwell, and Brother Law. Sussex -- Samuel
Rowe, James Martin, and James White. Dorchester -- Caleb B. Pedicord, and Joseph Everett." Some
of these were more properly local than traveling preachers, as Mr. Law, who probably belonged to
that Law family that gave name to Laws' Chapel, four miles from Milford; and Joseph Wyatt was
not yet fully received as a traveling preacher.
Besides Barratt's Chapel, in 1780, the Methodists were engaged in building Moore's, Brown's,
White's, and Cloud's Chapels, all in the state of Delaware. Brown's Chapel, in North West Fork,
though begun this year, was not finished until 1806.
White's Chapel was opened for worship in 1782. It was about 30 by 40 feet, with a vestry room
attached to it; and by Mr. Asbury pronounced the neatest country chapel owned by the Methodists
then. It has been moved from the site on which it was built, and called Lee's Chapel. Its old name
should be restored to it. Much of the original material is still in it.
Mr. Asbury records some solemn events that took place in Kent county this year. One was the
awful death of a backslider near Blackiston's Cross Roads, one B. S____, who was deeply awakened
about 1774, and became a Methodist. He afterwards sinned away his convictions. During the
Christmas of 1780 he was sitting up with a sick person. Two women that had lately been awakened
under the preaching of Lewis Alfree were present. They asked him what he thought of the
Methodists. He answered, contrary to his better knowledge, "they are all hypocrites." They asked him
for his opinion of L. Alfree and J. Dudley. He condemned them also. They then asked him how they
could pray and exhort as they did, if they were such men as he represented them to be. He replied
that he, too, could pray like a minister when he was in society. The next day he started for home, was
taken sick on the road, bereft of his reason, and died without reaching home.
Equally awful was the end of Mr. F. near Barratt's Chapel, who, though he was a hearer of the
Methodists, constantly resisted the truth that he heard, and could not bear the chapel so near him. He
sickened, and became delirious, and in this state he frequently called to a son of his, that he was
passionately fond of; to go with him. It appears that the boy complied with his father's request; for
about the time that the father died, this son hung himself; and father and son lay corpses together,