Marshall, Anne (1827-1852)

Transcription of obituary published in the Primitive Methodist Magazine by John Marshall

ANNE, the beloved wife of J. MARSHALL, Primitive Methodist minister, of Barton branch, was born at Tetney, in the Grimsby circuit, June 27th, 1827, and died at Barrow-on-Humber, September 12th 1852. She was the daughter of John and Alice Hewson, of Tetney; names dear to many of our ministers, who have shared their hospitality for more than thirty years. But notwithstanding the privileges of her birth and training, she remained a stranger to the saving grace of God till December 16th, 1848. During the afternoon of that day, conviction seized her breast; in the evening she went to the chapel, and knelt at the penitents’ form, but did not there find peace. The following morning she pleaded with God, believed on the Lord Jesus Christ as her Saviour, and was enabled to rejoice in a sense of pardon. Before she rose from her knees, she began to pray earnestly for the conversion of her sister Eliza. Her prayer was answered immediately; her sister, then deeply concerned for her soul, bowed before the throne of mercy, and they rejoiced together in the God of their salvation, and are now singing together in heaven, to Him that loved them and washed them in His own blood.

Before her conversion to God, her deportment was strictly moral. She was also amiable, and ever ready to administer to the necessities of the ministers of the cross, for whose comfort she was deeply solicitous; but after her conversion the change was nevertheless evident. She now manifested the meek, lowly, and loving religion of the Lord Jesus. Believing that she would be a suitable partner for me as a minister of the gospel, at a convenient time a correspondence was cominenced, and we were married July 10th, 1851.

High as my expectations had been of her as a wife, she far exceeded them. She was industrious in her habits, even in temper, kind in disposition, intelligent in mind, and holy in life. Notwithstanding the sacrifices a preacher’s wife has to make, and the troubles she has to encounter, I always found her cheerful and happy. She did not trouble others with her trials, but carried them at once to the Lord. The loss of such a companion I most keenly feel.

For the last two months of her life she was very weakly; and in the morning of September 10th, 1852, she was delivered of a son, and in the afternoon she called me to to her bed-side, and asked me to allow her mother to bring up her dear babe; expecting soon to leave it. In reply to the question, “Are you fully ready to die?” she said, “Oh yes! oh yes! I have prepared for this.” She then asked for her baby to be brought, in order that she might give it her parting blessing; when brought, she pressed it to her bosom, and, with solemn emphasis, said, “The Lord be with you! the Lord be with you!” then gave it her first and last kiss. After this she seemed to recover; but it was only to meet death with greater triumph, and to show more clearly the power of religion. 

On Sunday morning, the 12th, it was very apparent that she was worse. In the afternoon she spoke much about her future prospects. Then looking at me as I wept, she said, “We shall not be parted

long; we shall soon meet again on the blest shores of immortality.” Then she pronounced her blessings upon me, in a pathetic strain:— “The Lord be with thee, and bless thee, and make thee a blessing through life.” Having done this, she calmly said, “I am in Jordan; but Christ is with me’? She next addressed her sisters on religious things; and this done, she said,

“ ‘If this be death, I soon shall be,
From every sin and sorrow free,
I shall the King of glory see,
All is well,’ ”

And then she slept in Jesus. Reader! may you and I triumph so, when all our warfare’s past.

Family

Anne was born on 27 June 1827 at Tetney, Lincolnshire, to parents John, a grocer and draper (1851), and Alice. She was baptised on 28 June 1827 at Tetney.

She married John Marshall (b1825) on 10 July 1851 in the Louth Registration District, Lincolnshire. Census returns identify one child.

• Henry John (b1852)   

Anne died on 12 September 1852 at Barton on Humber, Lincolnshire.               

References

Primitive Methodist Magazine 1853/58

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers