Since I started this writing journey, I've been fascinated with time travel because of my need to fill in the missing parts of my research. I'm not a science fiction reader, for sure, much less a sci-fi writer, but when I sit before a screen filled with news articles or journal entries from the distant past, I know I am in a time warp zone. It's the closest I will ever come to time travel, and it will have to do until someone comes up with an actual time machine. Sign me up. I'd love to talk to those who penned what I read and ask them for more details.
Like this past Saturday, when I time traveled to the beginnings of our nation through the journal of Methodist Bishop Francis Asbury. I am thankful for the various groups that went ahead of me and transcribed his writings from pen to type and then posted online. My research was on an obscure fact, but I needed an element of proof to back up a statement in my current project, so I dove into the journals of this devout Christian, like I was looking for a needle in a haystack.
This circuit rider spent years and years riding throughout America, first in the colonies and then the early states, writing his thoughts and opinions almost daily. He did have opinions, I must say.
He looks so peaceful and serene in this picture, but his life was far from it. He suffered greatly from years in the saddle and from diseases that we have long since conquered. He was distressed those times he returned on his circuit after a year away and found rampant sins among his people, yet he journeyed on. He encouraged the local ministers under his charge. He preached to the masses in courtyards and to the individuals under a tree.
One of his circuits brought him near where I now live. His trials are evident as shown in his 1786 journal entry:
Not only did I find that nugget, I found where he mentioned the church of my childhood, Love's, where he preached in 1799. The sentence about his visit was printed on the front of the bulletin at the church the many years I attended there, so I knew it existed. I just never uncovered it in the actual journals.
If only those he met had listened to him. He was totally against slavery, and this was in the very beginnings of our nation. He preached to blacks and to whites, usually in the same congregation, and saw no differences in the children of God. I found most interesting his comment on the death of George Washington. He was in Charleston, South Carolina when he heard the news a month afterward:
Imagine the streets of Charleston that day with muffled bells tolling in the background. Only through time travel journal reading am I able to comprehend the reaction to the death of a great leader. In this excerpt from his journal he talked about the manumission of slaves, which I had to look up. It's the release of slaves into freedom.
His was a front seat to history, and he didn't realize it. He talked about the French Revolution. He talked about the Moravian village in Salem and the Baptist missionaries throughout the mountains.
I did find what I was looking for, despite my being distracted in so many ways. I am writing a second book with Jasper Reese about Madison County in western North Carolina. One section explains the early town of Hot Springs and the settlers there. I needed to make sure the Bishop was there also, and bang, Southern Methodist University produced a map of his stops in North Carolina. Here are the western counties and there, near the words Hot Springs, are two locations named for men in my book, Hoodenpile and Barnard.
The Bishop mentioned the dangerous road in the area. He even talked about a buggy wreck from cliffs high above the French Broad River and about his own wreck that same day.
I'm back in real time now, mission accomplished. But I'm looking forward to the next time travel journey I might have in the days to come. It will be a joy.
Catch of the day,
Gretchen
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