[This chapter has been compiled principally from Baxter’s Life and Times; Calamy’s Nonconformist Memorials; Calamy’s Life and Times; Macaulay’s History; Knight’s Pictorial History of England; Stoughton’s Church and State Two Hundred Years Ago; Alleine’s Memorial, by Stanford; Gauden’s Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ Suspiria, 1659; Walker’s Sufferings of the Clergy, 1714; History of Modern Enthusiasm, 1757; Rees’ Encyclopædia; Encyclopædia Britannica; and from tracts and pamphlets too numerous to mention.]
CHAPTER II.
PARENTAGE—1600–1670.
Samuel Wesley was the grandson of Bartholomew Wesley, rector of Catherston, in Dorsetshire. Bartholomew Wesley was born about the year 1600; but the place of his nativity is not known. He received a university education, a fact indicating, to some extent, the circumstances and the religious opinions of his parents. Calamy informs us, that, while at the university, Bartholomew Wesley applied himself to the study of physic, as well as of divinity; and the knowledge which he acquired was of great advantage to him in the dark days of his after life. In 1640 he was inducted to the rectory of Charmouth, and in 1650 to that of Catherston; both of which he held until his ejectment in 1662.
Catherston and Charmouth are villages in the south-western extremity of Dorsetshire; the former about a mile distant from the latter. Catherston stands on an eminence, and Charmouth in the valley adjoining it.
Like many others, Bartholomew Wesley was driven from his rectories by the Act of Uniformity. After this, though he preached occasionally, he had to support himself and his family by the practice of physic. Calamy says he used a peculiar plainness of speech, which hindered his being an acceptable, popular preacher.
Nothing more is known of Bartholomew Wesley, except a story related by Lord Clarendon, embellished by Anthony á Wood, and retailed by Rapin and others. Wood calls him “the fanatical minister, sometime of Charmouth, in Dorsetshire,” who, in 1651, had like to have “betrayed Lord Wilmot and King Charles II., when they continued incognito in that county,” but Wood was a man so bitter and intolerant that all he says ought to be received with caution.
The substance of the story, as given by Clarendon and others, is as follows:—After the battle of Worcester, in 1651, Charles II. wished to escape to France, and it was privately arranged that the vessel, in which he was to cross the channel, was to be near Charmouth on the night of September 22d. A man was sent to engage for that night the best rooms at the inn, at Charmouth, for a pretended wedding party, who wished to stop to refresh themselves and horses. All this being arranged, the party arrived at the inn, and were secretly assured that about midnight the long boat, to take them to the vessel, would be at the place appointed. The King and Lord Wilmot waited at the inn; and Colonel Wyndam and his man Peters went to the sea-side to look for the boat; but looked all night in vain. At break of day, they urged the king and Lord Wilmot quickly to escape from Charmouth for fear of treachery. The reason why the boat had not come, as was agreed, was, because the wife of the man who had charge of it suspected what was transpiring, and locked her husband in his chamber, and would on no account permit him egress. While Lord Wilmot was obtaining this information, a blacksmith of the name of Hammet[[6]] was requested to shoe his lordship’s horse. The smith, from the fashion of the shoes, declared they had been made, not in the west, but in the north. Henry Hull,[[7]] the hostler, hearing this, stated that the company, of whom Wilmot was one, had sat up all night, and kept their horses saddled. It was at once inferred, that the party who had departed from Charmouth that morning, was either the king and his friends, or some of the king’s distinguished adherents. The hostler ran to Wesley, the minister, to ask his counsel. Wesley was at his morning exercise, and being somewhat long-winded, he wearied the hostler’s patience, who returned to the blacksmith’s shop without telling his suspicions. In the meantime, Lord Wilmot had mounted and was gone. The blacksmith then told Wesley what had happened. Wesley went to the inn to make further inquiries, and then went with the blacksmith to a magistrate, to give him information, that warrants might be issued for the apprehension of the suspected fugitives. No warrants, however, were obtained; but a party pursued the king and his friends as far as Dorchester, where the pursuit was ended.
Such is the story in brief; but Clarendon adds that the day when Charles and his friends were waiting at Charmouth was a day appointed by the Parliament for a solemn fast, and that a fanatical weaver, who had been a soldier in the parliamentary army, was preaching against the king in a little chapel fronting the obscure inn where his Majesty was stopping; that, to avoid suspicion, Charles was among the weaver’s audience; and that this was the man who hastened to make inquiries at the inn, and that applied to a magistrate for a warrant.
John Wesley’s account of this affair is short. Like Clarendon, he states, that the minister was a weaver, but omits to state that he was his own great-grandfather. He writes:—“Pursuing his journey to the sea-side, Charles once more had a very providential escape from a little inn, where he set up for the night. The day had been appointed by parliament a solemn fast; and a weaver, who had been a soldier in the parliament army, was preaching against the king in a little chapel fronting the house. Charles, to avoid suspicion, was himself among the audience. It happened that a smith, of the same principles with the weaver, had been examining the horses belonging to the passengers, and came to assure the preacher that he knew by the fashion of the shoes, that one of the strangers’ horses came from the north. The preacher immediately affirmed that this horse could belong to no other than Charles Stuart, and instantly went with a constable to search the inn. But Charles had left before the constable’s arrival.”[[8]]
In a book entitled “Miraculum Basilicon,” by A. J., (Abraham Jennings,) and published in 1664, there are a few other particulars, in reference to this occurrence, possessed of some interest. The author calls Wesley “the puny parson of the place, and a most devoted friend to the parricides;” and designates the “morning exercise” in which he was engaged, when the hostler went to him, “his long breathed devotions, and bloody prayers.” Wesley having heard the rumour about the travellers at the inn, went to the innkeeper to make inquiries. The writer says, “Wesley, this pitiful dwindling pastor, posted to the innkeeper, and with most eager blusterations, catechised him concerning what travellers he had lodged that night; from whence they came, and whither they would, and what they did there? His suspicions being increased by the answers he received, he went to Dr Butler, the next justice of the peace, requiring a warrant, by which he would stir up the people and the soldiers to endeavour the apprehending of the king. The justice having refused to grant the warrant, Captain Massey, who was in the neighbourhood, at once gathered as many soldiers as he was able, and followed after the fugitives in the way towards London, until he came to Dorchester; but, by a most divine instinct, the king turned another way, crossing the country a little beyond Bridport, and so escaped from his pursuer Captain Massey!”