More Good News from Chatham
Another of Peter Wood’s excerpts from the ‘Christian Mission Magazine’ of July 1874
Peter Wood
GOSPEL PREFERABLE TO LAW
While I have been away on several occasions lately, preaching at Rochester, our friends have been so terribly annoyed with the dreadfully wretched people who live around the People’s Hall, that one of them licensed the place and declared he would summon the transgressors if these annoyances continued. I thought one day, however, that we would see if the Gospel could not do something more for them, bad and provoking as they were, before we had recourse to the law.
So we hit upon the plan of a free tea for the bitterest persecutors we had. I laid my plan before Captain Tinmouth, our treasurer, and Mr. Wheeler, of the Society of Friends, who at once entered heartily into the scheme, and promised their help in the undertaking.
We therefore made our arrangements and issued our invitations; and as the result, 160 of the worst people I could find in Chatham, sat down to tea. What a picture did that gathering present! There were men and women emaciated and blotched with drunkenness, and every form of vice and crime that could be named. But there they sat and listened through the night to earnest, solemn addresses.
Many wept, and twelve came out at the close of the meeting pleading for mercy at the feet of Jesus.
Oh, it was one of the most precious meetings I ever was in.
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