“In February, 1863, a meeting was appointed in one of those destitute neighborhoods, which he attended. The ‘fire was shut up in his bones,’ and in company with a friend he waited on the Captain then in command in that vicinity and requested permission to resume his duties as a minister. To his great joy he received a written permission, and the next night he preached a sermon full of joy and comfort.
“In July or August following three men called at his gate one dark night and ordered him to leave the country on pain of death. A few days after he remarked to the writer that he would love to live to see peace restored to the country, and he hoped he would, and then added, ‘Those fellows may kill me, but I think not. Of one thing I am certain, they can’t harm me; death has no terrors for me, and has not had for fifteen years.’
“He was a bold and fearless man. ‘Conscious innocence knows no fear;’ but through the entreaties of friends he left home for a month or more; and it is to be regretted that he made up his mind to return, and did so, saying that he would ‘risk the consequences.’
“He published an appointment for preaching, and a few hours before the time came, two militia soldiers waited on him and informed him that he would not be permitted to hold the service. He remained at home that Sabbath, and remarked to a neighbor, ‘Those fellows will kill me, I believe; but they shall never have it to say that they shot me in the back.’ That holy Sabbath was his last on earth.
“When night came on and good men laid them down to peaceful slumbers, his murderers approached his quiet dwelling. A ball discharged from a revolver passed through his window, entered his face and he fell to the floor. To make sure of his victim the murderer raised the window and reaching in shot him through the chest. They then went round, forced the door and three men entered. After a few words with Bro. Glanville’s son, one of them remarked that he had better finish the old man, and so saying shot him again. Thus died the Rev. Thomas Glanville, in the fifty-third year of his age.
“After threatening to burn the house and ordering the family to leave on short time, they rode two miles to the residence of Bro. Glanville’s eldest son, Mr. A. C. Glanville, a man of fine mind and respectable literary attainments, with a meek and quiet spirit, and a member of the M. E. Church, South. They called him up, and, all unconscious of his father’s fate and his own danger, he made a light. No sooner was the light made than a ball passed through his window, entered his head and he fell lifeless on the hearth. Thus perished father and son in one night.
“Since their death little has been said in reference to them; but they still live in the hearts of many friends, and it is well known that they bore the highest type of manhood.
“Bro. Glanville had for many years been an ordained elder in the M. E. Church, South, and while as a preacher he was neither profound nor brilliant, yet he possessed a sound mind, a good understanding in the things of God, was a good sermonizer and improved every year, so that his last days were his best. Peace to his memory.
“John H. Ross.”
The Rev. John Monroe, of the St. Louis Conference, one of the oldest ministers in Missouri, furnishes the following sketch of the lamented Glanville: