Historical Writings

Bishop John Hooper (deprived of his see at Gloucester), and Dr. Rowland Taylor are burned at the stake as Protestant heretics in the reign of Mary Tudor.

Authorites in Toulouse, France, cut out Lucilio “Giulio Cesare” Vanini’s tongue, then strangle and burn him as an atheist and libertine. He had promulgated pantheistic views and addressed nature as a goddess.

Pioneer missionary Samuel Newell married fellow Congregationalist Harriet Atwood. They afterward sailed for India with Adoniram and Ann Hasseltine Judson. (Harriet Newell and Ann Judson thereby became the first American women commissioned for missionary work abroad.)

Death of Claudius Buchanan, in England. He had been a chaplain and educator in India where he had done much to advance the gospel and free missionaries from the control of the East India Company.

Birth of William True Sleeper, New England Congregational clergyman and author of the hymns "Jesus, I Come" and "Ye Must Be Born Again."

Scottish clergyman Robert Murray McCheyne wrote in a letter: 'In spiritual things, this world is all wintertime so long as the Savior is away.'

After the success of Mazzini and his followers and the flight of Pius IX from Rome, an Italian assembly declares the temporal power of the pope abolished.

Death of Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky, who often included Christian characters and themes in his writing.

Mary Stone, a Chinese missionary doctor, sails from Shanghai bound for the United States to receive medical care she desperately needs.

American pioneer linguist and missionary Frank Laubach wrote in a letter: 'The sense of being led by an unseen hand which takes mine, while another hand reaches ahead and prepares the way, grows upon me daily.'

Alexander Solzhenitsyn is arrested at the German front and charged with conspiracy to overthrow Stalin's government because of a letter he had written a friend criticizing the Communist leader's actions. He will be sent to the Gulag where he will find faith.

U.S. Senate Chaplain Peter Marshall prayed: 'We are tempted to despair of our world. Remind us, O Lord, that Thou hast been facing the same thing in all the world since time began.'

Cardinal József Mindszenty is sentenced in Hungary. Hungary's Communist government had accused him of treason because he refused to permit the secularization of Catholic schools. He had scribbled a note to his mother, saying, "I have taken no part in any conspiracy of any kind....if despite what I now say you should read that I have confessed or resigned, and even see it authenticated by my signature, bear in mind that it will have been only the result of human frailty. In advance, I declare all such actions null and void."

Dave Wilkerson, a pastor in Pennsylvania, decides to sell his TV and pray two hours a night. He goes on to do a notable work among the gangs of New York City.