Historical Writings

Death in Italy of Roman Catholic composer Giovanni di Palestrina. He had sustained high quality and originality in writing one hundred and five masses and two hundred and fifty motets (settings of biblical texts).

Beheading of Jordan of Trebizond in Constantinople by Muslims after he had mocked their prophet and refused to convert to Islam when brought to trial.

Young George Whitefield departs for Georgia, intending to become a permanent missionary to the American colony.

Pioneer American Methodist bishop Francis Asbury reflected in his journal: 'God is gracious beyond the power of language to describe.'

Death in New Hampshire of Henry Alline, an American Free Will Baptist evangelist who had fostered growth of the "New Light" movement Canadian and New England churches.

York Minster burns all day, set on fire by Jonathan Martin, a Methodist who had escaped from a lunatic asylum and hidden in the Cathedral when it was closed the night before. York Minster has caught fire at least four times.

Death of hymnwriter Adelaide Anne Procter in London, England. Charles Dickens had published many of her verses and she had been a favorite of Queen Victoria.

The first formal church youth organization was established in the Williston Congregational Church in Portland, Maine, by the Rev. Francis E. Clark, 29. Originally called "Christian Endeavor," it became the prototype of the modern denominational "youth fellowship."

Death in Pennsylvania of temperance leader Annie Wittenmeyer. She had been active in home missions, founded orphanages, edited Christian periodicals, written hymns, and authored several books. Among her significant roles was as the first president of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union which grew to 1,000 chapters under her leadership.

Macedonian rebels release Ellen Stone, an American missionary to Turkey from the Congregational Church. They had held her and an associate for five months demanding a large ransom. Friends and the American public raised the money.

In a letter written to American statesman William Jennings Bryan, Christian Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy counseled: 'The most important thing is to know the will of God concerning one's life, i.e., to know what he wishes us to do and fulfill it.'

College teacher Eliza George of Texas has a vision of Africans passing before the judgment seat of Christ, weeping and moaning, "But no one ever told us You died for us." Two years later she will leave her teaching position and establish a mission in Liberia.

German theologian and Nazi martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in a letter from prison: 'There is a kind of weakness that Christianity does not hold with, but which people insist on claiming as Christian, and then sling mud at it.'

English apologist C.S. Lewis wrote in a letter: 'It is right...that we should be much concerned about the salvation of those we love. But we must be careful not to...demand that their salvation should conform to some ready-made pattern of our own.'