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Index to Methodist Ministers

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The Methodist Church in Ireland spread rapidly after separating from the Church of Ireland in 1817-18. Methodists called for the individual to experience Jesus personally. This radical message in essence bypassed the professional clergy in the Anglican parishes throughout the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Tracing Ministers

Pivotal to spreading the Methodist message were ministers who would preach to all classes in societies making no distinction. For this reason, the common people would find the message appealing, as it provided hope in often desperate circumstances.

If you have a Methodist minister in your family, you will be interested in the “Index to Methodist Ministers” database hosted by The University of Manchester library. The database covers 1819-1968. The source is “Ministers and Probationers who Have Died in the Work” which appeared in the back of the 1968 edition of Ministers and Probationers of the Methodist Church, printed by the Methodist Publishing House in London. A link from Ancestry.com under the database “UK, Methodist Ministers Death Index, 1800-1963” sends you to the Manchester database.

This serial was published periodically with updated ministerial lists in each edition. The periodical ran from 1819 to 1968. The database acts as a finding aid to Methodist clergy in the United Kingdom and Ireland.  

The Codes Used in the Ministerial Database

The index is alphabetical and although it provides only basic information, it is enough to allow research to continue. The names in the index are coded as follows:  P (Primitive); U (United) and W (Wesleyan). Other codes include:  Est. (Clergymen of the Established Church); I (Ministers in the late Primitive Wesleyan Methodist Conference in Ireland before the Amalgamation in 1878); W1 (Died in the 1914-18 War); and WW2 (Died in the 1939-45 War).

This list is similar to the “Index of Methodist Ministers Who Served in Ireland” being compiled online by the Methodist Historical Society of Ireland. Their codes include: M (Methodist); MNC (Methodist New Connexion); P (English – Primitive); PW (Primitive Wesleyan); W (Wesleyan); WMA (Wesleyan Methodist Association); Est. (Clergymen of the Established Church); WW1 (Died in the 1914-18 War); and WW2 (Died in the 1939-45 War).

Using the Information from the Database

Once you have identified a minster contact the Methodist Historical Society of Ireland or The University of Manchester for more biographical information.

If you would like help with your genealogy please call 385-214-0925.

 

 

Methodist Church in Ireland

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The Methodist Church in Ireland: www.irishmethodist.org should not be ignored in your research. By the early nineteenth century, it had spread like wildfire throughout Ireland. Today it is the fourth largest denomination in all of Ireland.

Methodist beliefs arrived from England to Ireland. The chief founder and theologian was John Wesley (1703-91). However, he would remain within the Church of England. It’s easiest to think of the Methodists as reformers within the Anglican tradition, even if they were only tolerated.

The contributions of Methodism to world Protestantism is often underestimated. The chief contribution of Wesley was his doctrine on “Christian Perfection,” also termed “entire sanctification.” This was a process wherein Christians could obtain a perfection of love, through God sanctifying and transforming the believer. Where Methodists may have seen this as a life-long process, later movements such as the Holiness and Pentecostals, would see this as a second instantaneous religious experience.

The first separate Irish Methodist churches were not in Ireland but in the North American colonies as early as the 1780s. They would begin to emerge in 1817-18 as their own denomination in Ireland.

Many Methodist records can be found at the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland in Belfast. Another resource is the Wesley Historical Society located at Edgehill College in Belfast.

An excellent primer to research is Steven C. ffeary-Smyrl’s Irish Methodists – Where Do I Start? (2000). Another important work is the chapter “Methodist Records in Ireland,” in James Ryan’s Irish Church Records (1992). For historical research, Charles H. Crookshank’s three-volume History of Methodism in Ireland (1885-1888) is a classic. The impact of Irish Methodism in world Protestantism can be found in Taggart, Norman W. Taggart’s The Irish in World Methodism 1760-1900 (1986). 

The Methodist Church would suffer membership losses due to immigration. Canada and America were prime areas. However, they literally went everywhere the Irish would settle.

American Frontier Religion

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The frontier population was un-churched, with few ministers and priests. Do not automatically assume your Kentucky Catholic ancestors remained with the church, or your Tennessee Scots-Irish ancestors were ever baptized Presbyterian. The “Second Great Awakening” (1790-1830) began to change the un-churched frontier. Congregations were organized, ministers ordained, schools and seminaries established. From these fires were birthed an American Christianity, such as the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement (Disciples/Christians), and the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. Both had a heavy Scots-Irish membership. In Upstate New York, the revival fires lingered birthing Mormonism (1830), Adventism (1844) and Spiritualism (1848).

Record keeping was affected by the education of the ministers. Among Baptists, the only qualification to preach may have been a “called of God,” and the minister may have been barely literate. Church organization affected records. Some were not organized outside the local congregation, as with Disciples/Christians. Others were home-based such as Spiritualism, where the medium, was often the woman of the house. All of this may or may not have created a paper trail.

Some solutions were brilliantly devised to address frontier life. The Methodists pioneered the circuit rider who would have a set route on horseback. Various communities knew where they fell on the schedule, at which time everybody would turn out. This concept was mimicked by the Swedenborgians and Catholic priests. Circuit riders kept scattered records.

Theology also influenced records. Baptists, Disciples/Christians, Mormons and Adventists, baptized believers eliminating the need for an infant christening. Separate births may or may not have been kept. Membership was counted at the time of the baptism.

In frontier research, tax and land records are usually consulted prior to church registers. This does not mean you don’t look at them, they may be just a little further down on the research list.

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