Susanna Wesley
This is the story of Susanna Wesley, 1669-1742 Mother of Charles and John Wesley, who were founders of the Methodist Church. Susanna and her husband, Samuel, had nineteen children, ten of whom survived to adulthood. Her son Charles became a well-known hymn writer and her son John became the found of Methodism. Susanna was brought up in a Puritan home as the youngest of twenty-five children. As a teenager, she became a member of the Church of England. She became the wife of a chronically debt-ridden parish rector in an English village. She said, "I have had a large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune." Nonetheless, Susanna managed to pass down to her children Christian principles that stayed with them.
This is the story of Susanna Wesley, 1669-1742 Mother of Charles and John Wesley, who were founders of the Methodist Church. Susanna and her husband, Samuel, had nineteen children, ten of whom survived to adulthood. Her son Charles became a well-known hymn writer and her son John became the found of Methodism.
Susanna was brought up in a Puritan home as the youngest of twenty-five children. As a teenager, she became a member of the Church of England. She became the wife of a chronically debt-ridden parish rector in an English village. She said, "I have had a large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune." Nonetheless, Susanna managed to pass down to her children Christian principles that stayed with them.
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SURVIVORS AND DESCENDANTS. 215<br />
in his power to get her to return, but she would<br />
neither see him nor reply to his letters. At last he<br />
caused a report of his death to be circulated, and she<br />
straightway went down into Lincolnshire to attend<br />
his funeral. Finding that it was only a ruse to get<br />
her back again, she immediately returned to London,<br />
and no one could persuade her to be reconciled to her<br />
husband. Misfortune overtook Mr. Ellison in his later<br />
years. It was the business of the Commissioners of<br />
Sewers in the Fen Country to keep the great drains<br />
open, and, as this was neglected, the water flowed all<br />
over and submerged his land for a couple of years.<br />
His cattle and horses died, he could raise no crops,<br />
and obtain no compensation, and was consequently<br />
reduced to such poverty, that he went to the Foundry<br />
and threw himself on the charity of his brother-inlaw,<br />
John <strong>Wesley</strong>, who recommended him to a rich<br />
banker, having the distribution of some trust-moneys,<br />
saying that " the smallest relief could never be more<br />
seasonable." Although the unhappy man's wife kept<br />
aloof, John and Charles were very kind to him, and<br />
considered him quite a reformed character. He died<br />
in London early in April 1760, and Charles <strong>Wesley</strong><br />
read the burial service over his remains.<br />
The children of this ill-matched pair were John,<br />
Ann, Deborah, and Richard Annesley Ellison. The<br />
eldest lived and died at Bristol, and some of his descendants<br />
still reside in that city.<br />
Ann married<br />
Pierre le Lievre, a French refugee, who died leaving<br />
her with one son; she afterwards married a Mr.<br />
Gaunt. She was a vivacious, clever, handsome little<br />
woman, and Mrs. Ellison resided principally with her,<br />
and died in her house, at the age of sixty-nine, early<br />
in December 1764. John <strong>Wesley</strong> wrote to Charles
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