Wrexham - Salvation Army

We are going ahead here and truly we can say the Lord still makes bare his arm. Sunday was a grand day to our souls. Knee drill at seven; the people came up well, one man having walked 10 miles and many more from long distances. Good open-air and inside at 11. We had a real Salvation Army meeting, the whole throng were in tears and at the close a man who said he had been an infidel for 20 years came weeping to the feet of Jesus, crying out he was too bad to be saved; but these are the sort Christ died for and even this man found that He could still save. Good meetings inside and out In the afternoon; but night was the crowning time when 20 precious souls came home to their Father's House. To God be all the glory.

From, 'The War Cry', November 1881.

I never expected to see the "Death and Glory Boys" (144th) surpassed; but really the 228th, who have only been six weeks in the field delighted me with an enthusiasm I had never before seen equalled.

My train arrived too late for the last grand march of 1881 but I found them in the crowded Temperance Hall.

"Marching to Zion"

at a break-throat pace, 101 gun's saluted the King in a very short space of time, and then quite a number of sinners surrendered.

In less than an hour we were at it again, and again the Hall filled up, and the deepest attention, and the most intense earnestness seemed to fall even upon carelees galleryites, Instead of a rush out at midnight, almost everybody stayed till about one o'clock, and both saints and sinners came forward to secure a real New Year. One hundred of them wore at it again at seven o'clock: but, not having been in bed on the friday night, I, to my great sorrow, overslept and missed it.

Capture of Twenty-two Guns.

The forenoon was rainy, but a goodly force turned out, and marched all round the town. We had a good time inside, and came out much stronger in the afternoon, getting the Public Hall tolerably full upstairs and down. At night the place was crowded to excess, and this crowd stopped, with but few exceptions, till the end of the prayer-meeting at ten o'clook. And oh, that was a prayer-meeting! How the "Boys" prayed on, and on, and on; now in plain language, now in song, Whilst the sinners one by one cave in, till twenty-two were ready to stand up and testify to what they had got. It was worth waiting till the end to see that!

For the Monday morning and afternoon, a Congregation Church had been secured. In the forenoon a goodly number came for a "Baptism of Fire." Many of them walking boldly out to seek it, and two surrendering their chains without previons mention of any such matter. But in the afternoon after a glorious open-air meeting, and some terrible stories of the War from Officers, who knew what it was really to

fight for the Lord everywhere, the whole available space was crowded with young men and women, who came to give up their bodies, their all, their lives to just such labours, and suffering as they had heard of, if needs were to gain souls, I told them that I could hold out no immediate hope to anyone of being taken into the work, but that in order to make the transaction with God a real one, they might give their names in to the Secretary. By six o'clock there were 46 Living Sacrifices duly recorded on earth, and doubtless most of them in Heaven, where they read hearts too.

What it all meant was at the same time wonderfully made clear by other demonstrations. We had a couple of hours between afternoon and evening meetings, and both before and after tea, the great anxiety of everybody was to speak out of doors, and no matter how often. It was most difficult to keep anything like a ring, not from pressure from without, but from pressure from within. Half-a-dozen at a time would rush into the middle, and as soon as one set had fired, another set would rush in to follow. We had scarcely had a woman speaker on Sunday morning, but now the sisters seemed as eager as anybody, and any rather backward ones were actually pulled in by their sisters.

Little Soldiers, too, were there in gangs, joining with the rest in one glowing, trusting testimony.

The grand march though the town to the Zion Chapel-one of the finest-which had been kindly lent for the evening, was the most like the charge of a conquering host that I ever remember seeing-Wrexham has some very hilly

streets, which made me pity some of the poor lasses. But as I saw that grand procession, well nigh two hundred strong, And mostly strong young colliers, striding down the hill, keeping step to their music, waving hats and going into it generally with all their might. I thought, “Well, what does all this mean?" It simply means that all the strength and energy of a lot of the heartiest and healthiest young men and women have been turned into followers of Jesus Christ.

In the splendid chapel, whose isles, upstairs and down, were as crowded as its seats, the Soldiers made themselves perfectly at home and there were shouts of praise and no mistake. I thought it an excellent combination of forces as three ministers of the town came into the singer’s pew to join their voices with those of our three tin whistlers, three concertina players and a flutist, all admirably accompanied by Capt Hockey with a tambourine and Lieut Spensley with a fiddle.

Upstairs and downstairs, front, back and sides, praised the name of the Lord and expressed in unmistakable tones their determination to serve Him to the death, till everybody present out to have been convinced, if they never were before, of the truth of the chorus – 

“Oh! There’s lots of joys

And there’s plenty of noise”

“When we see the King in His glory there” 

“Shouting Hallelujah! As we rise through the air.”

“We shall conquer all!”

I believe it.

I had delightful evidence of the wonderful way in which this work is spreading all over the countryside. Many of the Wrexham, “Praying Boys” come from villages around, some walking sixteen miles every Sunday to be there. The minister in whose chapel we were met conveyed to us a most cordial invitation to Holywell and strangers from Oswestry, Ruabon and Cefn, all crowded in with urgent entreaties to attack their own neighbourhoods Oh yes, we must seize on North Wales yet. God help us!

.From, "The War Cry," page 2, 12th January 1882.

I do not know where the meetings were held.