The life and sayings of Sam P. Jones

Front matter

■ IIP 1

mI

■■ra

Foreword

While in the last meeting Mr. Jones conducted, which was in Oklahoma City, in conversation with me, he suggested that we set apart the month o<f December for the purpose of getting together the material for a book containing the story of his life and work. It was Mr. Jones's wish that we write the book, and he requested Rev. Walt Holcomb, who was associated with him in evangelistic work, to spend December in our home and assist us. Our plans were made to do as he suggested.

But in the Providence of God, Mr. Jones was called to his reward ; and Mr. Holcomb and I are left to carry out his plans. Acting upon the advice of friends, we began the manuscript as early as my strength would permit, and we have followed the best we knew how what we believe would have been his wishes could he have spoken to us.

For nearly thirty-five years I have preserved newspaper and magazine accounts of his great meetings throughout the United States. In order to get our bearings, and map out the best plan for the book, it was necessary to get the material chronologically arranged, and do much careful and discriminating reading.

We have not tried to give a critical study of Mr. Jones and his labors, but to present them in the simplest way, that those who knew and loved him might have a true record of his long, useful career. The book, however, will be suggestive to those who wish to know the secret of his wonderful life. We have made free use of illustrations, anecdotes and stories related by Mr. Jones to

23 (17)

18 Foreword.

make the work characteristic of himself. As there is such a demand for his "Sayings/' we have included many of them. The reader may follow his development, his crowning ministry, and study him in the many capacities in which he served.

Some of the tributes given at the funeral and the memorial services have been used. We regret that we could not use all of them. Other tributes prepared by friends appear in the volume.

Rumors of unauthorized books coming into the field made it necessary for this one to be given to the public as early as possible.

Many friends have been very generous in supplying us with valuable material for the manuscript, which we gratefully acknowledge.

The Life and Sayings of Sam P. Jones.

INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.

As I Knew Him.

The saddest task my love could perform is this tribute to my husband, in writing the story of his life, and when I attempt to write of him as I knew him my heart is filled with sadness, and my eyes with tears, for I knew him: in the most sacred relations of life, first as his sweetheart, his wife, his helpmeet, the companion of his youth, the mother of his children, whom he loved more than his own life, and then when the frost began to fall as a mantle upon his head, and the weight of care and the burden of years to bend the precious shoulders that bore so many burdens for the careworn and overburdened fellow man, whom he tried to help, and labored and wore himself out in a life of service to save — we were all the more to each other, and our love instead of diminishing grew and. grew until it seems to me since he has gone from me so suddenly, slipped away from me, leaving me the sacred charge of following him, leading our children to the foot of the Cross — and finally reuniting on the morn of the Resurrection — that until that day my life must remain incomplete. I could not tell of him as I knew him; no words, no language could describe him.

I have often heard him say in public life, as well as at home, "The highest ambition I have on earth is to have those who survive me say of me when I am dead and gone, 'Sam Jones lived up to and died by his convictions.' That I was a true man, a good husband, a good father to my children and a good neighbor and citizen, without reproach." I believe the supreme wish of his life has been granted. The people of Cartersville will testify that he was a neighbor and a citizen without reproach. His audiences all over the United States and Canada will testify that he lived up to his convictions and was willing to suffer for them, and all his children will unite in declaring that he was the most patient, gentle and the tenderest of fathers, and I feel sure that I will not weary the readers of this book when I declare to them that he was an ideal husband. I have reason to know, for I have been his cherished companion, not only in the privacy of our home, but in public life during all these years of his noble career.

It was in the home of Mr. Austin Dupuy, whose father owned the adjoining farm to my father's, that this young man was a visitor during the eight months of his stay in Kentucky. He was taken in as a son of the household and soon became the mosttalkedof personage in the neighborhood, for most of that part of the country during the Civil War was in sympathy with the North, and this young man was the son of a Confederate captain, and he created a good deal of interest among the people.

This family being such intimate friends of my father's it was perfectly natural that my brothers should very soon know this young man, and he was invited to our home ; in fact, was a constant visitor there during his entire stay in Kentucky.

It was on a Friday afternoon in January, 1864, that, in company with one of my young girl friends, it was my privilege to come home and spend the Sabbath, from the boarding-school in Newcastle, Ky., that I met this young man. When I g-ot home my mother was full of praises for Sam Jones, the Georgia boy, who had come home with Lieutenant Dupuy, and when my brother came we were all delighted that he had brought him with him to spend the night. And my first introduction to him was by my mother, who said, "Laura, this is Sam Jones from Georgia.'' I looked at him and saw a bright-faced boy with large brown eyes, and my heart went out to him in sympathy, for I had heard something of his history and separation from his family from my mother. This was the first sight of the boy who was, in after years, to become my cherished companion, and whose name was to become a household word all over the land.

Sam P. Jonbs. 21

In the latter part of the year of 1864, it was made possible for him to return South and join his mother in Lumpkin, Ga. I often met him during the remainder of his stay in the community and grew to like him. After he left us he corresponded regularly with my younger brother, but it was quite a surprise when I received my first letter from him, after he had been away several months, From this time we corresponded regularly.

In 1867 Capt. John Jones, Mr. Jones's father, was commissioned to go into the Middle States and solicit supplies for the people of the desolated South, and traveling through Kentucky, he made it convenient to visit the friends of his son in Henry county. He came to our home and made me very happy by chance allusions to his son Sam, whose image at this time was deeply graven on my girlish heart, and from whom I received frequent letters. In this time of struggling poverty in the South Mr. Jones was unable to return to Kentucky to see me, and for four years we corresponded, but were not engaged until the spring of 1868. At this time he was studying law, and expecting to be admitted to the Bar the first of November of the same year. And we had decided on this time for our marriage. After being admitted to the Bar in the courts of Georgia, he took the first train for my home, and on November 24, 1868, we were married very quietly, the marriage being witnessed only by my mother, brothers and a few relatives and friends. My father refused to witness the ceremony, because he had learned since Mr. Jones's return to Kentucky that he had become dissipated — but, thank God, long before my father's death he saw God's hand in my choice, and learned to love Mr. Jones as his own son. My brothers were not entirely willing to entrust the care of their only sister, then a young girl of eighteen, to this young man of whom they knew so little — but my mother, the high-bred, spirited woman that she was, said, "Now, Laura, you've promised to marry Sam Jones, he has come for you, and you are going to redeem your promise." She never regretted this advice, and through the long years of her widowhood he was a son in every respect, and she often said she knew no difference in her love for me and her love for Mr. Jones.

In after-years the homestead came into my possession, but my mother made it her home as long as she lived, spending her winters with us and her summers in Kentucky, and so it was made possible for me to go and spend a portion of the time with her. And here Mr. Jones would snatch a day or two frequently from his many engagements, coming to the home of my girlhood to live over the old scenes of happiness of our youthful days, when no thought of the future, with its cares, responsibilities, perplexities, and, above all, its increasing, abiding love, growing stronger each day, came to us. When I was called to my home one day in August, 1895, to see my mother before she passed away, Mr. Jones was in Baltimore engaged in a camp-meeting at Emory Grove, and our eldest daughter, Mrs. Turner, was in the Johns Hopkins hospital very ill ; he joined me to pay the last tribute to her whom he had loved as a mother, and to whom he had shown every respect. And when she left us, we went to the little church where she worshipped and Mr. Jones made such a beautiful talk, thrilling those who gathered to pay their last tribute of love; how my mother loved him, and stood by him and had indeed been his mother since the day he came to Kentucky in 1868 to claim her only daughter as his wife.

After our marriage we left at once for Mr. Jones's home in Georgia. In those days traveling facilities were greatly inferior to those of the present day, and it took us three days to make the trip from Kentucky to Carters ville, which was to be our home for a time. We were welcomed by Mr. Jones's family and were entertained for some weeks in his father's home. Never will I forget those days. I was a proud, high-spirited Kentucky girl, who had been raised in affluence, and these new surroundings were so different to any I had been accustomed to. On the first Sunday after our marriage Mr. Jones and I went to church with his father and mother, and when we got to the door of the church a sudden shyness seemed to come over him, and he left me, after starting up the aisle with me, to walk alone and sit with his parents, and he went back and sat near the door during the service. But, I am glad to say, in all the thirty-eight years of our married life this was the first and only time he deserted me. He said I taught him better when I got home that memorable day.

Mr. Jones had been admitted to the Bar before our marriage and his prospects seemed bright for the future, but for the South the times were very straightened, and professional men of experience often suffered from lack of employment and poor pay for service they rendered; so a young man necessarily had little advantage. Thinking he would be more successful elsewhere, we decided to go to Dallas, and go into a little home of our own and live in a very modest way, and there our first little girl, Beulah, was born October 31, 1869. We remained in Dallas only a few months, going from there to Alabama, staying in Alabama until Mr. Jones's father expressed a desire that we should return to Cartersville, as he needed his son's assistance in caring for him in his sickness, he having been an invalid for many months, having contracted lung trouble during the terrible exposure of the war.

It was in August, 187 1, that God in His wisdom, saw fit to take unto Himself our little Beulah, then twenty-one months old, and it seemed to us in our young lives that the sunshine of life had surely gone out, leaving all so dark and desolate. Never will I forget Mr. Jones's grief. He loved this beautiful little girl so tenderly, and I have never seen any man so fond of little babies as he. Each one that came into our home brought joy and gladness to his heart from the first to the last. A few weeks after the death of our little girl, Beulah, our second daughter, Mary, now Mrs, Turner, came into our life.

At this time we lived in a little cabin in Cartersville, which is only a short distance from our present home, and it was in one of the last sermons that he preached at the tabernacle meeting that Mr. Jones gave a few pages of his life, dwelling upon the fact how God would bless a man if he lived right and walked humbly before Him, and spoke of the fact that when he was converted and started out in the ministry that we were living in this humble home, and how through the years of his faithfulness, as he believed he had been faithful to God, how God had blessed him not only in a spiritual, but in a material way. How God had, through friends, given us this beautiful home wherein we now dwell, and how we had dedicated it to God, and had tried through the years to be faithful to our vows.

Mr. Jones at this time was not so dissipated as he had been for the first two years of our married life, but he had abandoned his law practice altogether, and it was by his daily labor that we were enabled to live. He worked for many months, firing a furnace, three miles from Carters ville, having his dinner at n a, m., and returning home at i a. m. Often in after-years he would say to me, "Wife, I never look up at the stars at night that I don't think of the months I fired that old Bartow furnace. It seemed to me that I counted hundreds of times each star in the heavens and thought of the Great Beyond." Did any whisper of his future greatness come to him ? Did he realize the undeveloped power which lay dormant in him? The power which would sway the multitudes as no other man had swayed them since our Divine Christ lived among men? No man ever mounted the pinnacle of fame more rapidly, and yet no man ever seemed so unconscious of his greatness.

Through these years of trial and poverty we found that our friends were not so numerous, but there was one of whom he always loved to speak, who was ever faithful, and that was an old colored woman, Aunt Ann Mickens, who lived near by (we having only one or two near neighbors) . She was a woman who had given her heart to God and was a faithful Christian. She and her husband lived on the hill, and had known Mr. Jones all the years of his life that he lived in Cartersville, and loved him devotedly,. She would come night and morning during my sickness and minister unto me and give me all the help possible, praying constantly for us that God might lead us out into better and more useful lives. It was our privilege in after-years, when God had blessed us, to minister in turn to her and her husband, who was helpless for many years. In Mr. .Jones's visits home she was among the number that he always visited, and contributed to her support, trying to make her latter years as comfortable as possible. It was during one of his visits home that he went to see her before leaving, and she said to him, "God bless you, Marse Sammy. When you gits back from this trip I will be gone, but I will be sitting right inside the gates of heaven when you come, waiting to welcome you, and will tell the Lord Jesus how good you was to an old nigger down 1 here."

GRANDFATHER JONES.

GRANDMOTHER JONES.

I have spoken at length of Mr. Jones as I knew him before his conversion. His conversion, his call to the ministry, and his work as a pastor in the North Georgia Conference are spoken of fully in chapters to follow. His work as an evangelist is also taken up and covered completely.

I shall now speak briefly of him as a husband and father, and his social life, and in the hours of sorrow and bereavement.

Frequently his work while the Agent of the Orphans' Home took him away from us, and perhaps a letter written February 10, 1881, will show his great solicitude for his home, wife and children while necessarily separated from them; also his faithfulness to God and duty :

"My Dear Wife : I received your postal yesterday. I do wish you would quit these postals. Are you out of envelopes, paper and stamps? I want you to write me all about how you feel. Maybe you say if I am so much interested in how you feel, I would go home and see. Well, Laura., I had rather be with you this moment than to be anywhere in the known world, yet I am here, and why I came here and why I am still here, I can only feel is by the direction of the Lord. It is only in the path of duty that I can walk safely. You know, dear wife, that the Lord has done wonderful things for us, whereof we ought to be glad, and whatever the demands of duty are let us comply gladly and freely. I think often of you all at home, 'Be it ever so humble there's no place like home.' After preaching here last night some of the brethren came to me and said, 'You must send for Sister Jones.' I really think you would enjoy being here a few days. You never met a kinder people, and it would be so nice for me to* have you come. I think Mary and Annie, for papa's sake, would stay at home with Miss Kate, and be good girls. After all I have written, wife, I want you to do as will be the most pleasure and comfort to you. Let me hear from you by return mail. Love to all.

"Your husband,

"Sam P. Jones."

While on the Van Wert Circuit, May 11, 1873, Annie, our

2o Sam P. Jones.

daughter, now Mrs. Rouhs Pyrcn, was bom. Our oldest son, Sam Paul, was born on May 31, 1875. Our second son, Robert W. Jones, was born on Christmas Eve, 1876, while on the Desoto Circuit. Our fourth daughter, Laura, now Mrs. B. C. Sloan, was bom in October, 1881, at Social Circle.

With our five living children, and the added cares and responsibilities which had been multiplied, and which were necessarily heavy upon me, Mr. Jones felt that we must locate permanently, and buy a little home where he could leave us in comfort. We considered both Marietta and Cartersville, but Mr. Jones was specially drawn to the home of his boyhood, where so many of his people live. In our Cartersville home our youngest daughter, Julia Baxter, was bom in April, 1885. No father ever loved little children more than he, and the coming of our last child brought special delight to his heart, as there had not been a child born in our home in the last four and a half years. Our grandchildren, of whom five are living, Laura and Eva Mays, Samuel Paul Jones, Robert Porter Jones, and Sam Jones Sloan, were a constant source of love and pleasure to him. When the last little one came just one year ago, we hesitated when he arrived to name him Sam Jones, as the other boys had been given his name in part. Mr. Jones was away from home at the time, and when he returned after a few days the subject was mentioned, and we saw that he was delighted with the idea of calling this sturdy little fellow Sam Jones Sloan, and he was particularly devoted to this boy all the days that followed. He wrote the Atlanta Journal, saying, "With the advent of another grandson in our home comes great joy and rejoicing, and I am pleased beyond measure with the fact that he is named plain, flat-footed Sam Jones." Somehow he seemed to be endeared to this little fellow more and more as the days went by. On the eve of our leaving home for Oklahoma City he took the dear little boy in his arms and said to me, "I would love to live to see the day when this dear child will be grown, and will take up the work that I am doing."

The people of Nashville, where he had held a great meeting, generously offered to give him a beautiful home, but after considering and praying over it, he decided to remain at Cartersville. Then the citizens of Nashville made a generous donation for the purpose of improving our Cartersville home, and through their generous gift our home was completed. Mr. Jones was so* grateful to God and friends for the home that he decided to dedicate it to the Lord, and on Christmas Day, in 1885, the house was formally dedicated at 2 130 p.m., Dr. T. R. Kendall, of Louisville, Ky., conducting the service. After an appropriate hymn and prayer by Dr. Kendall, Mr. Jones arose and, in a most touching and earnest manner, presented the home to Dr. Kendall, as a minister of God for dedication to His service. The official minister then read several appropriate passages of Scripture, and after commending the action, expressing the hope that many others must follow the example, he accepted the home in the name of the Lord. He then called upon Rev. W. A. Dodge, who offered a fervent prayer for God's blessings upon the home and family.

Four generations of Mr. Jones's family were present, including his venerable grandfather, uncles, brothers, sisters, mother and my mother.

His beautiful thoughts concerning home and home-life, and the blessings of God in the home, were so sacred and sublime that every one present saw him in an entirely different light to what the world had known him 1 . Some one who was present, in writing of the rearrangement of the home, said, "I was struck with something about Sam Jones's home which is typical of his life. When he built his present home he had the old home, which was a one-story frame building, raised and a new portion built under it. The old homestead is there, but it is elevated and made beautiful by the new part, which is a handsome foundation. So it is with the life of the owner. The old Sam Jones has been lifted up, with a new man and a firm foundation, the maker and builder of which is God. While the entire new structure is beautiful to behold, yet the old Sam Jones is still there, with the humor and the boyishness and the love for all mankind."

In his social life, Mr. Jones was always a marvel, and a source of untold delight to the friends that gathered in our home. We celebrated several occasions of note; among the first, was our twenty-fifth anniversary, thirteen years ago, the twenty-fourth day of November. This was a notable occasion in our lives, and we had begun to look forward to the fiftieth milepost, hoping to God, if it was His will, to let us journey together these few more years. Ke so often spoke of what a God-given privilege it was for a man and his wife to journey together for fifty years, and at the end of that time celebrate their golden wedding. It was on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of our friend and neighbor, "Bill Arp" that he said, "How glad I would be if God would let me live to celebrate with you, my beloved wife, the fiftieth anniversary of our marriage/'

Another, and the greatest occasion of the gathering together of our friends, was on the occasion of Mr. Jone's fiftieth birthday, just nine years before he celebrated his fifty-ninth birthday in the glorious City where many of those who were with him on the occasion of this celebration had gone on before, and I imagine it was a reunion of great gladness and joy. Mr. Jones's happiness on the dawn of his birthday knew no bounds. He was like a schoolboy come home to spend a holiday. The day dawned clear and beautiful. Forty-nine of his friends gathered with him and we were happy indeed. We give in his own words a few thoughts on this occasion. (Copied on separate page.)

We also had a. Christmas dinner for the boys of Cartersville, that he might bring them in closer touch with himself, and also a dinner for railroad men from many places. He loved these men tenderly and wanted to help them, because of their great kindness to him. And although Mr. Jones was a. very busy man, having only a few weeks in the year oftentimes to spend with his home people, he enjoyed beyond measure these memorable occasions. He loved his home and his home people and his association with them.

While the past seems dim' before my tear-filled eyes, and present great sorrow, it is still sweet to remember the gladsome look on his face and to feel that he appreciated the efforts made in his home to add this pleasure in various anniversaries.

But it was in the time of sickness and bereavement that his real heart was seen. I was taken violently ill on the twelfth day of

November, 1887, in Rochester, New York, as I was traveling with Mr. Jones on one of his extended lecture-trips, and I remained in New York five weeks. At the expiration of this time the doctor who was in attendance upon me told Mr. Jones that I would die, and as my anxiety was so great to see my children he advised him, if possible, to bring me home. The friend with whom we were staying was the President of the Delaware and Hudson River Railroad, and he offered Mr. Jones his private car for the journey. His wife, the physician and four other friends attended me. When we arrived in Atlanta, having telegraphed ahead for Dr. Bizell to meet us, he accompanied us home. Immediately upon our arrival here he performed an operation which was of a very serious nature, and my life hung in the balance for many weeks. The physicians held out little hope for my recovery. Mr. Jones was well-nigh prostrated, and his tender solicitude, as he watched by my bedside, touched deeply the hearts of those who were near him. It was the most sorrowful experience, as he often expressed it, in his whole life, for no man, I think I may truly say, ever loved more beautifully, more tenderly or sweetly than he did. He not only loved me with all the affection of his nature but he depended on me. Outside of his love for God, I think his love for me was the greatest tiling in the world. While my life was swinging uncertainly in the balance he divided his time between watching by my bedside, and praying to God to spare my life.

His suspense and sorrow was terrible. Calling his children together one day, he told them that he had given up hope, and they must be prepared for the greatest sorrow of their lives, although he was still praying to God to save me, and he said, "I have promised God that if He will give her back to us, I will never while I live give her a moment's pain or speak a cross or impatient word to her." Soon after this an improvement was noted in my condition, as though God had accepted the promise of my beloved husband, and I believe He did. While Mr. Jones was always tender and thoughtful before, it was literally true from that day to the last day of his life he kept his promise to God. He was never heard to utter an impatient word to his wife and his faithfulness to God has been known to the people throughout the land.

There was another period in his life when his faith in God was tested. That was when our daughter Mary was so ill for many weeks at the birth of her oldest daughter, and he saw that all human help was powerless. He went to God in prayer and called upon some of his friends whom he knew lived close to the throne to pray with him. Among them were Brother L. P. Brown., of Meridian, Miss,, who gives a very beautiful experience in his own life, when he took this girl to God in prayer, and how he had the assurance from God Himself that her life would be spared. Although many people came to Mr. Brown and told him they had seen in the papers that Mary was dead, he said he knew it was not true, for God had assured him that she would live; and it was in answer to these prayers that she lives to-day.