EVANGELICAL WOMEN IN THE SECOND HALF OF 1800; ELIZA WITHERSPOON P/21

                                                                  Read Part One HERE

In this story I will focus on a woman named Eliza Whitherspoon. She lived from 1855 - 1932. Her parents were W.A. Whiterspoon and Caroline Whitherspoon from Bates, Missoutri, USA. They were members of the Free Methodist Church. 

In the July 8, 1895, issue of "The Free Methodist," Eliza sends a ministry report from Virginia, Missouri noting that she, her mother and her sister had been "advocating the principles of Free Methodism" in that part of the country for seventeen years. She tells her readers her family is the lone Free Methodist family in the area where "God sent us help and souls were converted to God - more than twenty souls."

 Far from being a single report, Eliza begins appearing regularly in "The Free Methodist" over the next few decades as she writes ministry reports on her work as a Free Methodist Evangelist in Arkansas, Southern Missouri, and eventually Kansas.

In 1895, Eliza begins to appear in conference minutes, but not as an evangelist. That year she was a delegate to the Arkansas and Southern Missouri Annual Conference, and served on conference committees discussing education and raising money to publish the minutes.

In 1900, she again appears as a delegate to the Southern Missouri and Arkansas Conference. By 1901, the Arkansas and Southern Missouri minutes list her as a "conference evangelist" meaning she travelled and preached and was not assigned to a specific church. She was appointed to the Phelps County Missouri Circuit in 1904 and in 1905 she was appointed to the Neosho Circuit.

Read Part Twenty-Two HERE