It is January and a small fire is burning in the grate. A clock can be heard ticking out the seconds. The man is not tall. He is rather thick set with dark lively eyes, a full head of hair and a full beard that disappears on either side near the ears. He is in his thirties. It is the great C H Spurgeon, President of the Pastors College where we find ourselves.
At this moment there is a knock on the door of the room and in steps a tall African-American gentleman. His skin is dark, though not ebony black. He has the broad nose and the thick lips we associate with Africans. His black hair is quite abundant with a vague parting in the middle. It has been brushed as straight as its fairly tight curls will allow. He sports what is often called a ‘goatee’ beard and moustache, quite whispy in appearance. He is just 40 but looks perhaps a little older.
‘Ah, Mr Johnson’ says Spurgeon in his ringing tones, rising to take him by the hand, ‘how good to have a few moments to speak with you’. For the next 15 minutes the older man speaks to Spurgeon in a slow, precise Virginian accent, peppered with distinct African-American pronunciation and occasionally odd grammatical constructions. He tells his story and of how he longs to take the gospel to Africa. Spurgeon is a busy man and there is little time but he listens well and does not allow his black brother to depart without definite assurances that he will do all in his power to help him in his endeavours to bring the gospel to Africa. They bow their heads for a moment of prayer before parting and Spurgeon briefly but boldly commends his ‘black but comely’ brother to the Lord.
The story of Thomas Lewis Johnson is the story of a man who knew many changes, who served God on three continents, who was born into slavery but became a preacher and missionary and whose story is one of extraordinary struggle and great sacrifice.
Thomas Johnson’s name appears, no doubt, in many a church minute book. One reports a visit of his in the 1890s when, unlike now, his black skin was considered to be rather exotic.
His story gives us a window on God’s providence in the life of just one African-American hero, one that people of colour and of other cultures too can look to as a great example of the life of God in the soul of man. Johnson used to speak about his life in terms of three birthdays. That is how he referred to
- His natural birth as a slave in Virginia, America - August 7, 1836
- The day he was born again at the age of 18 - June, 1857
- The day he knew of his emancipation from the yoke of slavery when Richmond, Virginia was taken in the Civil War or War Between the States, April 3, 1865
More comprehensively, the first part of his life can be neatly divided in three - an early period of double slavery - to man and the devil; from the time he was emancipated in Christ to his escape from slavery and his official emancipation.
We can go on to speak further, of a later period when.
- He worked as a preacher in the northern USA
- Then came to study here in Britain
- Went as a missionary to West Africa
- Finally, ministering here in England and sometimes in America
His first birth and the life of double slavery that followed
As far as Johnson was able to discover, he was born August 7, 1836, in Rock-Rayman in the State of Virginia, USA. All he knew of his ancestry was that his maternal grandfather was of the Guinea tribe in Africa and that he and his wife had died still relatively young.
Johnson’s mother had been born into slavery and was separated from her brothers and sisters at the age of 13. Johnson’s father was an octoroon, ie only an eighth African and a freeman, but the law of the time said that if either parent was a slave, you were too, so he was born a slave.
When he was three years old, his owner, a Mr Brent, moved to Alexandria, a suburb of Washington DC. Johnson’s father wanted to buy his family out of slavery but Brent refused. Six years later Johnson Senior died. Though he apparently left money for his son to redeem himself from slavery, it fell into the wrong hands.
Reminiscing on younger days, Johnson could remember a time when he did not realise he was a slave and happily played, unaware of his sorry situation. However, from time to time companions would disappear. Virginia, in economic decline at this point, had a surplus of slaves. One of its more profitable enterprises was selling them to slaveholders from the Deep South, where there was a cotton boom. Cotton plantations used large numbers of slaves. Thomas soon learned about ‘Georgia traders’ and other slave dealers. Whenever he and other slave children saw a white man look over the fence they would instinctively run and hide. The little African-American children soon learned how different their lot was to that of the white children growing up in the same houses.
When 7 or 8 years old, Johnson’s owner moved to Washington DC itself to work for the government. Thomas’s job was to keep flies away at meals and bring his young master’s slippers to him at night. We get an idea of the ignorance in which such slaves lived when Johnson tells how impossible he found it to understand the difference between right and left, despite several slaps on the head for what his young master believed was wilful ignorance.
His mother seems to have been a loving, God-fearing woman to the degree she was able. Her education consisted of being able to recite the alphabet and count to a hundred. She taught Thomas the Lord’s Prayer and described heaven as a place where everyone was free. ‘Oh, I used to think’ writes Johnson, ‘how nice it must be in heaven, no slaves, all free, and God would think as much of the black as he did of the white.’ She told him how their ancestors had once been free in Africa but that white men had stolen them away. She explained to him that the way to freedom was to learn to read and write. However, he would have to do this secretly as draconian laws were in place forbidding the education of slaves. In many places slaves were not even allowed to attend Sunday Schools.
Mrs Johnson had no access to a Bible and spoke often of fortune and luck but she did urge her son to pray and seek religion. In his old age Johnson fondly remembered her. ‘I do thank my blessed Jesus that she knew so much; it was the germ of all I know today. My mother’s advice and my mother’s teaching will ever remain fresh in my memory. I cannot forget her tears as she looked upon me with a mother’s love ... and told me what little she knew. ... I remember her tenderness, and the deep security I felt when, in the evenings of my childhood, nestling in her arms, I listened as she told me how she loved me, not knowing what was passing through that loving mother’s breast as her tearful eyes looked upon me.’
Following a change in circumstances Johnson’s mother paid for him to have reading lessons in secret. However, when it was discovered, he was sent further south to work on a farm in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Following his master’s death, he was moved north again to Fairfax County under the young master who by this stage was trained as a medical doctor. Still only aged 12, Johnson missed his mother greatly. He was often beaten for the slightest things and continued efforts were made to prevent him from gaining any sort of education.
At the time, most slaves were treated in appalling ways. Not a day went by without one or other being whipped. They were pledged, leased, exchanged, taken for debt, even gambled away sometimes. Families were regularly split up at auction. It may give us some idea just how badly African-Americans were treated by the majority white population when we realise that it was generally thought by them that Queen Victoria was black. This idea gained currency because it was known that there was freedom for slaves in the north of the continent, in the British Dominion of Canada. By 1840 as many as 15,000 slaves had escaped there by ‘Underground Railroad’ a system of safe houses that secretly provided help for runaways on the journey north. The idea of a kind white queen was inconceivable!
His second birth or regeneration
From the age of about 16, Johnson tells us, he began to ‘seek religion’. Like many in Virginia, Johnson’s master was episcopalian. He taught his slave to pray and to recite the Apostles’ Creed and would read parts of Scripture to him emphasising the subservience of slaves. Then for good measure he would give his slave a good lashing.
Despite his resolve to ‘get religion’ what held Johnson back most was not such hypocrisy but his own superstition. One day he was picking blackberries and repeating the Lord’s Prayer when a rabbit suddenly jumped out in front of him. Remembering the story of the Garden of Eden he thought it was really the devil. He was very frightened. His fear of the attention the devil might pay him often stopped him praying at night.
Around 1852 his master married and Johnson was sold to the man’s brother who lived in the state capital, Richmond. Johnson was thus re-united with his dear mother. This brother also proved to be more benign in his attitude to slaves. However, he was no more ready to see slaves educated than others. On one occasion he warned young Johnson of the troubles that came upon slaves who learned to write. Johnson remembered him referring to the case of Anthony Burns, a cause célèbre at the time. In 1854 Burns had used his writing skills to forge a pass and so escape from southern slavery to Boston. Abolitionist resistance there was strong and 2,000 soldiers were needed to escort Burns to the ship that returned him to the South. Johnson’s master took the opportunity to point out that Burns was found and punished severely. Far from warning Johnson off, however, the story served as a stimulus to him to learn to read and write.
By means of various surreptitious acts he was able to make some progress with his education. He would say to his new master’s eldest son ‘I bet you can’t spell so and so’. The unsuspecting young boy would then prove he could by spelling it out. This sort of thing went on for some time. When the boy grew suspicious, Johnson would say he just wanted to see how the boy was getting on. So eventually he learned to read and to write to a certain standard. Freedom, however, seemed as far off as ever. A large map of the USA hung on the dining room wall and Johnson, who clearly had a good memory, memorised the names of all the railway stations from Richmond to Boston, dreaming of freedom. Understandably, in the minds of many slaves thoughts of earthly and heavenly
freedom mingled. Johnson wanted both. Nevertheless, at that time the freedom of both earth and heaven
seemed equally far off.
In 1857 and 1858 there was an extensive revival in America. Iain Murray (Revival and Revivalism 331) says that, 'In its extent the new work appeared to exceed all that had gone before.’ Practically the whole country was affected. J Edwin Orr called it ‘the most thorough and most wholesome movement ever known in the Christian church.’ There were many conversions among the slaves who worked in the Richmond tobacco factories and many of Johnson’s friends began to ‘seek religion’. He too started with fresh earnestness but was dogged by his old superstition concerning the devil. All sorts of innocent little things filled him with fear. He changed from being lively and cheerful to become gloomy and nervous. His master was concerned and threatened to send him away to Georgia. Johnson prayed that God would prevent it but he began to deteriorate further as he came under deep conviction. Not only was he losing sleep but he often fasted, which also made him weak.
Then one day he met a fellow African-American called Stephney Brown. He was quite an intelligent man and a true believer. He very simply explained the gospel, stressing the need for faith in Christ. He told Johnson he would go to hell if he was not a Christian but, he said, ‘You must ask pardon for Jesus’ sake’. That for Jesus’ sake went home and as soon as he finished work that night Johnson set to praying to the Lord. Trusting only in the finished work of Christ he soon came to that joyful point where he became convinced that all his sins had been laid on Jesus. How he rejoiced! He says that whereas he found it hard up until that time to imagine that any white people would be in heaven he now saw that if only his master and others trusted in Jesus all their sins would be forgiven. He began to pray for such people and others that they would find what he had. The first person to believe through his testimony was his dear mother.
In order to join a church, a slave had to get his owner’s permission. When Johnson announced his intention to be baptised, his master refused to countenance it at first, but after some months of praying Johnson asked again and this time was allowed. He and his mother were baptised at the same time. There were several Baptist churches in Richmond, all segregated into black and white congregations. Many of the black churches had white pastors who were sure to give undue emphasis to the duties of slaves. Johnson did not want to join a church like that so went to one with a black pastor and black members.
Soon after conversion he felt called to preach. As a semi-illiterate slave there were many difficulties in pursuing this. However, he took what opportunities he could to increase his learning. With other slaves he would often gather to pray and worship. Meetings for more than five slaves at a time were illegal and he often received as many as 30 lashes the morning after such gatherings. By means of persecution and praise he thus grew in grace.
His third birth, his emancipation
Despite severe penalties awaiting any slave trying to escape, Johnson attempted it at least twice. He had found freedom in Christ and now longed for freedom from human slavery too. In 1860 Lincoln became president, and, like other slaves, Johnson saw this as an answer to prayer. Civil war soon broke out and Johnson went with his master’s eldest son, as a personal servant, when he volunteered for service. They saw much of the activity that centred on Yorktown. Technically Johnson’s freedom can be dated from August, 1861. In that month an act was passed freeing any slave used by his master for military purposes hostile to the Union. In June, 1862, a law was passed emancipating all slaves in federal territory and on January 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation decreed perpetual freedom for all slaves in the rebel states.
During the second year of the war Johnson’s master died, leaving his property and slaves to his kind-hearted widow. From then Johnson remained at home, though at one point he was hired out to a cigar factory. In 1863 he married Henrietta Thompson, a maid to a Mrs Cooper, the wife of a Confederate General and the sister of famous Confederate General Robert E Lee. The couple met in Richmond. By this time Johnson was more literate and took on a class of six pupils.
For many months the sound of guns became commonplace in Richmond and great excitement stirred the slaves who sensed their freedom approaching. Each twist and turn was endlessly debated. Every scrap of information was eagerly seized on and discussed. Some slaves saw Daniel 11 as a prophecy of what was happening, though none were quite sure of the details. On April 2, 1865, General Grant took Petersburg, 20 miles from Richmond, and the southern leaders began to leave the capital. The following morning 40 US Cavalry rode in near to where Johnson was. He grabbed on to one and earnestly explained the case of an African-American he knew who had been forced to join the Confederate army, but the officer just laughed.
There was a measure of self-inflicted damage to property but little bloodshed when Richmond was finally taken. One can only imagine the salves’ delight now they knew they were free at last. Unbelievers strummed banjos loudly and climbed trees to shout out the news. Believers thronged to churches to praise God for this great answer to their prayers. There were tears of joy on all sides. The thirteenth amendment to the American Constitution proclaiming freedom for all slaves throughout the US was passed by two thirds majority on January 31, 1865. For some 250 years or so slavery had been an accepted part of the culture in North America. Between 1526 and 1810 some 400,000 men, women and children had been snatched from their native soil, transported across the ocean in inhuman conditions and forced to be slaves on a foreign shore. Many had not survived the journey. Those that did were treated in many, many cases, worse than animals. It is a huge blot on the history of mankind that such a traffic was allowed to go on virtually unchecked for so long.
Johnson was now a freeman. He describes his amazement at the wages he received after completing his first job. Having experience in hotel work he was put in charge of providing a grand dinner given by a Mr Sterns. He was could not believe it when, very satisfied, the man gave him 20 times what he was expecting.
Thoughts soon turned to moving north. By this time Johnson’s mind was filled with the idea of going to Africa to share the gospel with his ancient people. To do that he needed to be properly educated. Where the idea of going to Africa came from Johnson never states but the idea was ‘in the air’ at the time. No doubt he had heard of Virginia Baptist and former slave, Lott Carey, who had gone as a missionary to Liberia.
Sadly, before the Johnsons could head north their little son Albert, not yet one, died. Three days later Johnson’s mother also died, bringing a double blow. Shortly after, he sailed to New York on a troopship. He describes his experiences on first coming to the bustling city. Much is typical of a Virginian in the big city for the first time. He had a paralysing fear of pickpockets and scrapes with those ready to take advantage of him. Above it all, however, there was a tremendous sense of joy at being free.
He found work as a waiter, first in a hotel, then, thanks to his strong Christian integrity, in a private home, where his wife joined him. What education Johnson had gained was rather piecemeal and haphazard. He cut a comic figure in some ways. He tells of his love of impressive words and phrases. Until his wife pointed out what it meant, he delighted to tell people he had left Virginia under ‘peculiar’ or ‘very peculiar’ circumstances! He also describes a meeting he attended where plans were being laid to send former slave and outspoken black orator and writer, Frederick Douglass, as a delegate to Washington. There were many speeches about suffrage and the ballot-box. Johnson could not understand a great deal of what was said. What the ballot-box was he did not know and as for ‘suffrage’, he thought that was an allusion to the suffering they had endured. Somehow he was able to make a speech pledging support that was well received but he realised again how greatly in need of further education he was.
There were many movements around in this period of change and Johnson was nearly caught up in one or two. His employer’s offers of help to make money in business could have been another distraction. However, in God’s providence, he stuck determinedly to his desire to prepare for work in Africa. The story of how emancipated African-American slaves turned round their unenviable situation with such great toil and energy is a remarkable one. This was true not just in business and industry and the arts but also in the churches. Johnson is an example to us of such zeal and hard work.
In 1866 he decided to move 800 miles west to Chicago where prospects appeared better. Although he was disappointed in his initial expectations he joined Olivet Baptist Church, a church made up of former slaves, where he soon felt at home. He reconsecrated himself to study in preparation for Christian ministry. After some set backs he eventually found work supervising washing up and doing odd jobs and then waiting on tables again. Finally, he was able to get early morning work preparing offices for the day, as well as waitering at lunch time. This paid better and left him with more free time to study. His wife had gone to Washington meanwhile, successfully seeking to locate members of her family from whom she had been taken some years before. Johnson used to live very frugally to have money to send her. Chicago winters can he very cold and he felt unable to go on at times but kept looking to the Lord. As time went on he was able to gain better work as a waiter with H M Kinsley, the man for whom he had originally come to Chicago to work. He also worked as a steward for the Union Pacific Railroad. By this means he came to be acquainted with George Pullman, of railroad fame, his brother Albert, Lincoln’s son Robert and many other influential people who were very kind to him. ‘Thomas’ was well known as the best waiter for miles around.
Preacher in North America
As time went by opportunities arose to preach in the church he attended. The pastor, Dr R de Baptiste, was a great help. Convinced of a call to preach and finding his work left little time for study Johnson felt convinced he must leave Kinsley’s employment. Shortly after, his pastor received a request from former members who had gone west to Denver, then in Colorado Territory asking for someone to come and lead the little mission. De Baptiste immediately thought of Johnson. Johnson had only recently been offered an opportunity to set up in business but this clear call saved him from what he later saw could have been a temptation and a snare. De Baptiste fairly pointed out that if Johnson went into business he would be ready in four or five years to begin on an easier pastorate. The Denver congregation could only pay $25 a month. Johnson, however, cast himself on the Lord and wrote to the nine members agreeing to come.
At this point he was unordained. At a church meeting it was proposed that something be done about this. This put him in fresh consternation in view of his poor education. A council, involving representatives from various Chicago Baptist churches, was fixed for April 15, 1869. Johnson reflects, 50 years on, on how ‘in those days there were thousands of our people who preferred an illiterate man of their own race, who was known to be true to the Evangelical faith, to a white man.’ When we look for men for the ministry adherence to the faith must be the priority.
For 15 days before the council Johnson was able to give himself to prayer and study of God’s Word, walking by the banks of Lake Michigan. What wonderful times he had. Ten ministers (eight white, two black) examined him, hearing his testimony and testing his knowledge of fundamental truths. Several times he had to ask for questions to be clarified. When they asked him what he would do if they refused to ordain him he politely said he would continue to prepare himself for examination until he was found acceptable. He was sure the Lord wanted him to preach. After an hour he was asked to withdraw for a short while and spent an anxious 10 minutes waiting until Dr Taylor of Union Park Baptist Church recalled him. The ordination was held that evening when Dr Taylor preached on He that winneth souls is wise. After several farewell services and many kindnesses, the Johnsons took the Union Pacific Railroad to Cheyenne, then in Wyoming Territory. From there they headed south by stage coach, reaching Denver 24 hours later. They had travelled across miles and miles of open prairie. Apart from occasional sightings of antelope or buffalo and little ‘towns’ of prairie dogs there was nothing to see from one town to the next.
In Denver they were warmly welcomed and were glad to be greeted by familiar faces from Chicago days. Denver was very much a frontier town, just over 10 years old, founded in a gold rush. Twenty miles from the Rocky Mountain range, still today the range’s snow capped peaks rise abruptly from the low foothills to provide a spectacular backdrop to the modern city. At that time lynch law prevailed. Frontier settlements often lacked established law enforcement agencies and so exercised summary justice through vigilantes. Shortly before the Johnsons’ arrival a man had been taken down to a creek and hanged for stealing.
Johnson concentrated at first on his little flock. His lack of confidence providentially forced him to stick close to the Bible. When his stock of subjects from Chicago days began to get low he learned to pray earnestly too. He was greatly helped by a sermon of Spurgeon’s ‘The preachers’ prayer’ (Lecture 3, Lectures to my students). It was in one of a number of good books provided by The Bible Publication Society before he left Chicago. He had a book of Spurgeon sermons too. Having been warned not to plagiarise he found himself often saying, as many have, ‘Mr Spurgeon says’. Eventually he gave it away as he was becoming obsessed with it. As for his sermons he comments that if they produced no light then they certainly did some years later when he used them for a bonfire!
There were only 75 African-Americans in Denver at this time and it was not unusual for them all to be present on a Sunday. They were poor, so collections were small but the nine members did what they could to make the Johnsons comfortable. The first to be baptised was Mrs Johnson herself. She was a great help to him in his ministry in many ways. He also had help from more educated members of the congregation. One Sunday three white people came, which made him especially nervous. As he read from Acts 26:28 he read Almost thou per-su-ad-est me to be a Christian. He noticed a friend jot something down to tell him after but continued to pronounce the word in this way until corrected the next day.
Receiving only $25 a month it was necessary to find other work. He selflessly turned down the opportunity of becoming school teacher for the African-American children on the grounds that he was so poorly educated himself He was able to find a young man acceptable to the board. He felt very much his need of further education and began gathering information on Colorado Territory with the aim of raising money for a college course through a popular lecture back east. He eventually began his lecture course when it was made possible, through George Pullman, to travel back to New York free of charge. (By 1870 two railroads had reached Denver). He remembered going to see the great D L Moody and seeking his help to hire the Farwell Hall, Chicago. This happened but it was a snowy night and Johnson was very disappointed at the turn out.
He reluctantly decided that the sooner he returned to Denver the better. Back there he was taken seriously ill but made a good recovery. His burning desire was still to go to Africa to preach the God’s Word but for now he stuck to his task even though his health declined and, as ever, there was no shortage of get-rich-quick schemes to steer away from. As he plodded to the goal of obtaining a proper theological education and as Denver itself grew, so the little mission grew in numbers too.
In May 1872, after three years in Denver, Johnson returned to Chicago. Before going to Africa he hoped study in Washington but at this time calls came from two churches, one west of Chicago, in Elgin, the other further south in Springfield, Illinois. It was the latter he took up. After only a year there a unanimous call came to Providence Baptist Church, Chicago. This was an altogether more affluent and well-educated congregation and Johnson was embarrassed at his lack of schooling. Someone gave him an English Grammar but it made no sense. He found most help from the regular Sunday School notes he was provided with to teach a Sunday School class, alongside his preaching duties.
Student in England
Among the willing workers in the Providence Sunday School and at the church’s weekday adult literacy classes were the Stroud Smith family. Edward Stroud Smith was a help to Johnson with preparing Sunday School. The parents and two daughters were English and members at Western Avenue Baptist Church. They had great sympathy for their poor neighbours. The family were to become lifelong friends. Through them Johnson came to know their pastor, J J Irving, who had trained in England at Spurgeon’s Pastors College. After a while the Smiths returned to England. It was a sad farewell. Johnson had no real expectation of seeing them again, his heart set on Africa not England.
Meanwhile he discovered that the American Baptist Missionary Union had no work in Africa and no organisations were then sending African-Americans to Africa. Adding to his troubles his health was deteriorating and he again became seriously ill. He was nearly 40 now and still lacking the theological education necessary for work in Africa. Despite these disadvantages he was, however, able to secure the agreement of a Dr Murdock of the American Baptist Union to finance the journey from New York to Liberia, the American settlement for freed slaves in West Africa, though he could offer no other financial help.
Then early in 1876 Johnson received two important letters from England. One, from Stroud Smith, told of a conversation with W Hind Smith of the YMCA, Manchester about missionary work in Africa. The other was from Hind Smith himself and said that if Johnson could get to England he would arrange for his enrolment on a suitable course of study in readiness for Africa. Johnson was still gravely ill at the time but mustered the strength to write at once to say he would come. He also informed Dr Murdock of his intention to take up the offer of passage to Liberia. Remarkably he began to recover and arrangements were made for him to leave for England. Friends and members at the mission in Chicago were very kind and on August 19 that same year Thomas and Henrietta set sail for England on the SS Spain.
They arrived in Liverpool on September 1, 1876, and were taken to Manchester by rail, where they were met by the two Smiths. They stayed with the Hind Smiths and on their first Sunday morning went to hear eminent Baptist preacher and commentator Alexander Maclaren at Union Chapel, Oxford Road. By this time Maclaren had been pastor 18 years. A modest, unassuming Scot his expository sermons were very popular at one time. In the afternoon Johnson visited a ‘Ragged School’ where he spoke. Two things struck him on that occasion. The first was a picture he saw of Queen Victoria presenting a Bible to an African Prince. The story behind the picture is that the African had come to England to find the secret of her greatness. The Queen gave him a Bible and told him ‘this is the secret’. The other thing was the singing of some words by the children that Johnson was not able to join in with.
I was not born a little slave to labour in the sun,
Wishing I were but in my grave and all my labour done;
The Johnsons stayed in Manchester with the Hind Smiths whose young boys, Willie and Martin, had met the Jubilee Singers from America and loved to sing some of the negro spirituals with Thomas, including Steal away to Jesus, Mary and Martha just gone along and When he cometh, to make up his jewels. Sadly, just over a year after the Johnsons’ arrival in England, young Martin died. Meanwhile Johnson met various Christian leaders and businessmen, including the Bishop of Manchester and Dr Maclaren, mentioned earlier. A young student from Owen’s College was engaged to help him with his English grammar.
Maclaren gave Johnson’s name to the Baptist Missionary Society in London who invited him to meet them. The trip to the big city was an enjoyable one, especially the visit to the zoo in Regent’s Park. One mishap was being lost on Clapham Common. Johnson’s eagerness to meet Spurgeon led him to ask a bus driver where the great man lived. The man told him which bus to catch to get to Nightingale Lane, the other side of Clapham Common, but when he reached there, alas, Spurgeon was out. By then it was dark and the journey back was not easy or pleasant.
Back in Manchester Hind Smith noticed the damp weather was not agreeing with Johnson so he enquired of Spurgeon whether he might sit in on some lectures at the Pastor’s College. ‘Yes, let the man come’ was Spurgeon’s postcard reply. One can imagine Johnson’s amazement at this privilege. When he had first heard Spurgeon’s name he was, according to law, a ‘thing’, a mere ‘chattel’. Now he was going to study in the great man’s own college.
In accord with college policy the Johnson’s boarded with a family, the Wigneys. Mr Wigney was an elder at the Tabernacle. The college was then meeting in purpose-built premises at the rear of the Tabernacle and had been going for some 20 years. It endeavoured to teach not only theology but other basic subjects too. Tutors then included Archibald Ferguson, David Gracey and George Rogers. Johnson particularly mentions Ferguson, who would invite him to his home in West Ealing, where he was minister of the Baptist Church he had planted. Ferguson had been converted in Dundee in 1839, the year revival came to M’Cheyne’s church under W C Burns, who went on to serve in China.
Spurgeon would give one of his famous ‘Lectures to my students’ on a Friday afternoon and so Johnson soon came to meet his hero. His love and respect for the man were enhanced rather than diminished by this close encounter. ‘I at once fell in love with dear Mr Spurgeon’ he says of their first meeting. Many things about Spurgeon impressed him. ‘In the late Mr Spurgeon’ he writes ‘we had one in whom faith and courage and faithfulness in preaching God’s Word were predominant features of his ministry.’ It was in January, 1877, that the meeting mentioned in a previous post took place. He took great encouragement from Spurgeon’s assurances of help.
After a little while Johnson was accepted formally as a student. He found both tutors and students kind and welcoming. Gaps in his knowledge were sometimes a cause of mirth. He gives an example - his assumption that the world is flat! To be fair to Johnson at least one African-American preacher of the time claimed to teach similar ‘facts’ from the Bible. The most famous sermon of the otherwise reliable John Jasper (1812-1901) of Virginia was ‘The sun do move’. It appealed to Joshua 10 and 2 Kings 20 to disprove Copernicus and Revelation 7:1 to prove the earth flat! There was a great deal for Johnson to learn and quite a few things to unlearn. Ever after he was very grateful for his time there. In his first sermon before the students and faculty he turned to Acts 16:31, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, and leaned very heavily on the work of eighteenth century Baptist Andrew Fuller, hoping to go undetected. As students can be, they were merciless with poor Johnson. Professor Rogers defended him, however, but with the cutting remark that he saw in Johnson another Andrew Fuller! Johnson took it all in good part.
Missionary in West Africa
In August 1877 the Johnsons were joined by Mrs Johnson’s younger sister and her husband, Rev C H Richardson, another African-American eager to go to Africa to preach the gospel. Richardson also became a student at the Pastors’ College and accompanied Johnson on various deputation meetings arranged by the Baptist Union. The Union was only committed to sending Johnson to Africa but he in turn was committed to sharing all he received with Richardson. The two families began language study with retired pioneer missionary, Alfred Saker (1814-1880). Saker [see pic], then in his sixties, was nearing his life’s end. He had laboured for 32 years in the Cameroon, translating the Bible into Douala and advancing the gospel on many fronts.
From the Autumn of 1878 they began a round of farewell meetings culminating in a large gathering at the Tabernacle itself with C H Spurgeon in the chair. In Ten years of my Life in the service of the book fund Mrs Spurgeon refers to a visit from the missionaries to Nightingale Lane. She particularly remembered them singing. A semi-invalid, in her weak physical state she especially appreciated the quaint negro spiritual
Keep inching along, keep inching along, Like a poor inch worm
Jesus Christ will come by and by.
She even had them sing it in the quiet whispers that were used in days of slavery when meetings for worship were prohibited. Mrs Spurgeon’s book fund had started three years before and the song was a great help to her as she personally parcelled up books for sending out to needy pastors. ‘Though prevented by my weakness from taking giant strides’ she says, ‘how gracious is the Lord to allow his unworthy child to creep even inch by inch along the pleasant road of service for him’.
On November 6, 1878, the missionaries bade farewell to London and headed for Liverpool, where they sailed three days later. On November 22 they sighted Cape Verde (Cap Vert), Western Senegal, Africa’s westernmost point. What a moment for Johnson to see Africa for the very first time, the land he had dreamed of since boyhood and where he so longed to bring the gospel. ‘My feelings of joy were indescribable. I could not leave the state room without falling upon my knees and thanking my heavenly Father for permitting me to see the poor suffering land of Africa’. He was so excited he could hardly sleep that night. The next day they sailed up the Gambia river and disembarked at Bathurst (now Banjul, capital of Gambia but then part of Sierra Leone). The town then was a mixture of fine colonial buildings, churches, hospital, barracks, administrative buildings — and native huts of bamboo with grass thatched roofs.
After a short stay the SS Kinsembo sailed down the coast to Sierra Leone capital Freetown. It had been established as a British Colony in 1787 for slaves repatriated from Britain and the US or rescued from shipwrecks. The land was purchased from local chiefs. The Sierra Leone Company administered the settlement until 1808, when it became a crown colony. Freetown lies on sloping ground at the foot of a range of hills and faces one of the best natural harbours on Africa’s west coast. Its fine buildings and many large gardens where banana, orange, coconut and pineapple grew abundantly all impressed Johnson. Again the people were hospitable and several were lively Christians. Several Africans there spoke English.
Next stop was Grand Bassa, in what came to be known as Liberia. Liberia was established by the American Colonisation Society, founded in 1816 to resettle freed American slaves in Africa. The first article in its original code of laws was ‘Christianity is the foundation of all true laws’. As their steamship moved along the coast Johnson was struck by its great beauty. By November 30 they had passed the Cape Mesurado colony, later named Monrovia for President James Monroe, and reached Nifou then Grand Cess. Johnson mentions the fine looking and industrious Kroo people going out in canoes to fish from these places. He also mentions Elmina, Cape Coast and Accra on the Gold Coast (Ghana) and Lagos and Bonny, Nigeria, the next places reached as the ship continued to hug the coast. In Bonny he saw human skulls hanging in the native huts, reminders of the fact that only 15 years before these people had been cannibals though the coming of the gospel was transforming lives.
After a brief stop on the island of Fernando Póo (now Bioko Island, part of Equatorial Guinea) they finally reached their destination on December 14, 1878. This was Victoria, Cameroon. Now known as Limbe, it lies on the Ambas Bay on the Gulf of Guinea, at the southern foot of West Africa’s highest mountain Mount Cameroon (over 14,000 feet), an active volcano. Limbe, now Cameroon’s second port (after Douala) was founded as Victoria in 1858 by Saker and other Baptist missionaries, when the Spanish expelled them from Fernando Póo. They purchased a coastal strip 10 miles by 5 miles that became a haven from slavery, witchcraft and polygamy. One ministry was rescuing people accused of witchcraft and forced to drink poisonous casswood juice as a means of trial by ordeal.
The missionary in charge was Rev Q W Thomson. At this time Victoria’s population was only 500. The people were literate, English speaking native Africans. Most were believers. At 7 am the day after his arrival Johnson heard the bell ring to summon the populace to church, where he preached for the first time on African soil using his sermon on Acts 16:31. ‘I cannot remember ever preaching to a more attentive audience’ he recalled. A day or two later he went down with a fever so was unable to join Richardson and Thomson who, on January 20, 1879, set off 80 miles into the interior to select a new missionary station.
On February 4, Thomson returned without Richardson, whom he had left with two native Christians, in Bakundu, the selected new station, also sick with fever. Two days later Johnson, his wife, Mrs Richardson and another missionary, George Grenfell (1849-1906) later to distinguish himself in the Congo, set off in an open boat up river, rowed by Kroomen. They were followed by a large canoe containing provisions and other men. They had hoped to pass the hostile towns of Mungo and Mbungo by night but were soon behind schedule and unsure of their bearings. On the Friday night they were spotted by a man with a ‘talking drum’ who ‘telegraphed’ their arrival. By Saturday morning a large group of nearly a hundred natives, armed with cutlasses, had surrounded them and they were forced to row to Mungo. There they refused to leave the boat, warning of grave consequences if they were harmed. In the end the Mungo king demanded payment to pass on and was satisfied with the tribute of an overcoat, a blanket, some sugar and rice and a barrel of hard biscuits. Though only six miles from Bakundu the party felt they had little choice but to return to Victoria.
Their arrival was greeted with great joy — not only by Richardson but also the very elderly chief, Ta Ta Nambulee, and other headmen. They were so pleased that, at last, someone had come to teach the people about Christ. The next day was a Sunday so they gathered people into an old unoccupied house. It soon became apparent that the people were weighed down by superstition, idolatry and witchcraft but were eager to learn better ways.
There was a case of someone using casswood juice on a man who thankfully lived. As soon as the chief was told about it he put a stop to the practice. Johnson later wrote ‘When we first came to Bakundu we could hardly sleep at night for the yells of the people in their dance and their beating of the drums. This was kept up day and night. They knew nothing of a Sabbath; hence they continued their drum beating all the week round.’ Richardson spoke to the king about passing a law that drums should not be beaten on the Sabbath. From then on Richardson would blow a trumpet on Friday nights reminding people the next day was Saturday and they ought to lay in provisions for the coming Sunday. Many came to a simple but confident faith in the God of the Bible.
Many other changes came. The people generally went naked but began to ask for clothing to cover themselves. They were willing to give the missionaries meat in exchange for shirts. Johnson describes seeing a man come to church with his shirt under his arm. Before the service began he slipped it on, assuming that was the right procedure. People were also keen to see their children taught to read and write. Unlike other peoples of the area they were not warlike but farmers, raising corn, sweet potatoes, yams and cocoa and herding goats, sheep and cattle. They were in the grip of all sorts of petty fears and superstitions, however, that began to melt away at in the face of the gospel. The three ‘Ju Ju’ houses where secret meetings would take place began to lose their attraction. Richardson was even able to hold a meeting in one dispelling any claimed magical properties. Their childlike simplicity mellowed too as they became used to modern inventions such as matches. What a glorious thing it is when men and women are rescued from the living death of superstition and error.
Despite much sympathy for the Christian faith the old king’s superstition clung to him almost to the last. However, there was reason to hope he came to faith before he died. Near the end he told his son, ‘Etau, whatever these men (the missionaries) tell you, believe it, for I have found them to be true men.’ He died three or four months after their arrival. A dying wish was that the Johnsons bring up his youngest son, Ngatee and one of his daughters and that Richardson should immediately start a school for the boys of the town.
Throughout their brief time in Bakundu the Johnsons knew poor health. At the beginning of March, as Thomas’s own health began to improve a little, Henrietta was struck with a fever that she never recovered from, dying on July 9, 1879. They had been married nearly 16 years. Throughout May and June, as they built their new house, she seemed conscious she would not live long. Throughout this period, as before, she found great comfort in daily reading the Bible. On July 5, near the end, she slept all day. She remarked later on what a waste it had been not having been able to read the Bible. Thomas read John 14 to encourage her. In the morning she commented that though her mind was leaving her at times she had not lost sight of rest in Christ and the freedom found in him. Before she died she repeated her favourite text, I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness. The natives were moved at the loss of ‘Mamma’. Johnson himself wrote ‘I do not think a more devoted wife ever lived. Her heart and soul and service were with me in all my efforts for my blessed Jesus.’ Her death was reported the following January by Spurgeon in the Sword and Trowel.
Meanwhile Johnson was suffering with his liver, with sciatica and muscular rheumatism. With all the work falling on Richardson, Thomson, back in Victoria, decided it would be best to bring Johnson back down to the coast again. He was in such a bad way that he had to be brought all the way by hammock. The journey was not without incident as they met with opposition from hostile natives on at least three occasions. Johnson never forgot the ‘flashing eyes and awful expressions’ on the tattooed faces of men about to leap on him. But his prayers for safety were answered and he safely arrived in Victoria again. Sadly, there was no improvement in his health, however, and he was ordered by Thomson to return to England immediately. When the next steamer arrived Johnson, scarcely able to walk, was put on board. He arrived in Liverpool in January, 1880.
Ministering back in England and in America
By the time Johnson reached England he was feeling much better but was told that a return to Africa would mean dire consequences for his health. ‘I remember nothing more trying in all my life’ he wrote later, unless it was the conviction of sin he knew when he first sought the Lord. It was a devastating blow and without his dear wife, Johnson felt very much alone. Old friends rallied round. The Wigneys welcomed him into their home for a while and Alfred Baynes of the BMS was a great help, as were others. He lodged for a little while in Southampton with another family. His prayer now was ‘Since I cannot labour in Africa, please, Lord, let me do something for Africa’. This prayer too was answered.
On August 4, 1880, he sailed from Liverpool to New York. Kind words from Spurgeon were again a comfort to him, ‘If you don’t get on, let us know. We will not forget you.’ From New York he headed for Chicago, again receiving many kindnesses from different people. His old pastor Mr de Baptiste had arranged for him to speak at the Wood River Association in Jacksonville, where he urged on his fellow African-Americans the needs of Africa.
There and at three further associations in Missouri decisions were made to go ahead in outreach to Africa. At this time Johnson also published a 64 page booklet telling of his time in Africa and the great needs of that continent. Most importantly on October 12, 1 881, at Olivet Baptist Church, Chicago at a Baptist General Association of Western States and Territories it was resolved to form an African Mission to promote the sending of ‘coloured brethren’ to preach in the Congo.
Until then, the year 1881 had been taken up with raising funds for the Chicago church, following the rebuild necessitated by the great fire of 1874. Then on July 28 Johnson remarried. The bride, another African-American, was Miss Sara Artimeco McGowan. God later blessed them with a little girl, Ruth.
They proceeded to honeymoon on the SS Spain and in England where Johnson also engaged in missionary work. In March 1882 the news came that he had been appointed as missionary and financial agent of the BGAWST. He now moved from Manchester, where he had been based, to London and began on an exhausting round of missions and meetings throughout the British Isles, with the aim of evangelising the lost and stirring believers to missionary endeavour.
On his first visit to Scotland in 1884 he took a mission for W Y Fullerton in Airdrie. He went from there to Hawick. A black man was still a novelty in those days and he mentions some young people there going to check his bed clothes in the morning to see if the black had come off! In Ireland the following year children even took fright at his dark appearance. By far his worst treatment, though, came back in the Southern States of America, on visits there over the next few years.
After 1884 various laws were passed in the Southern States discriminating against African-Americans. Nothing shows the stupidity of racism more than the fact that when he wore a red fez, as he
sometimes did, and appeared African he was treated with great respect, but once it was discovered that he had been a Virginian slave the rules were all against him. He sought to identify with his people as much as he could and urged them to abandon all idea of using arms. ‘Go and seek God in prayer, as thousands of us did in the old slave days’ was always his counsel.
There were several trips back and forth across the Atlantic in the remaining years of the century. With his new wife’s assistance he launched a magazine The African mission Herald in October 1888. We get some idea of the esteem in which Johnson was held, especially by his own people, when we note the enthusiasm among many for him to be appointed US Consul to the fledgling African State of Liberia. It did not come to that but he was referred to as ‘a man of marked ability and national reputation ... highly endorsed by men of the old and new worlds.’
Health considerations led him to resign from the mission in July 1889. It was not an easy decision. Certainly there was no lessening of his desire to do good for Africa. He wrote ‘Africa for Christ shall be my theme. Africa for Christ, who reigns supreme.’ After a little while he went back to pastoring Union Park church, Chicago, thus uniting a divided congregation. His health did not improve at first but after some months away in Denver, by this time about eight times bigger than when Johnson ministered there, things began to improve. This led to a fresh offer of work for the mission, to which Johnson readily acceded.
Like others he was particularly stirred at this time by the earnest appeals of Dr Henry Grattan Guinness (1835-1910) for the Great Soudan. Much less known and explored than the Congo region the Sudan region was the vast tract of open savanna plains between the Sahara to the north and the equatorial rain forests to the south. The term derives from the Arabic bilad as-sudan - land of the black peoples, and has been in use from at least the twelfth century. The northern reaches of the Sudan comprise the semi-arid region known as the Sahel. The Sudan extends for more than 3,500 miles west-to-east from Cape Verde on the Atlantic to the Ethiopian highlands and the Red Sea. Johnson’s great concern was to see the millions of Muslims and animists in the area won to Christ.
The mission appointed him to travel to Liberia again so in November, 1891 he returned again to England. Sadly, he had to leave his wife and daughter behind as Sarah’s health was not good. In England he met with Grattan Guiness and was at Spurgeon’s funeral in February, 1892. He recalled saying to someone then ‘God never makes a mistake’. The very next morning back in Liverpool he received a letter saying that his little daughter, Ruth, had suddenly died. She was just six and a half This was a great blow and no doubt contributed to the ill health that followed and caused him to postpone his planned trip to Liberia. Thankfully Mrs Johnson’s health improved and she was able to join him in July. They set up house in the London area, in Sydenham.
From Sydenham he travelled to the west country to lead evangelistic missions in association with the YMCA. He especially delighted in the children he met and loved to see them coming to trust in Jesus. After this the Africa trip was again postponed due to ill health. Johnson spent three and a half months of 1893 in hospital.
Recuperating in a bath-chair in Bournemouth he found, he says, he had turned into a grumbler, quite forgetting the 56 years he had been kept out of hospital until then. When he was well enough his first sermon was on Romans 8:28! The rest in Bournemouth was greatly appreciated but following a mission in Ireland he fell ill again and once more felt compelled to resign his post with the African Mission.
We have already said that Johnson preached in all four home countries. Over the succeeding years of his life he knew health enough to conduct missions in Belfast, Bournemouth, Bristol, Clitheroe, Cork, Crewkerne, Croydon, Dublin, Edinburgh, Emsworth, Folkestone, Haywards Heath, Ilfracombe, Liverpool, Manchester, Margate, Reading, Southampton, Tewkesbury, Winchester and many parts of London. He also preached in the Isle of Wight, Isle of Man and on Guernsey. His travels in America had already taken him to at least 17 states, from Wisconsin to Louisiana, from Colorado to Maryland. With missions it was his policy not to make an issue of
payment for his services but to demand that a week of prayer precede the week. He spoke of the Saviour not only in public but also took opportunities for personal witness even to complete strangers.
His autobiogaphy gives several examples of apparently genuine conversions. He and Mrs Johnson lived from the 1890s in Boscombe, Bournemouth. Old age inevitably brings with it the death of good friends. His autobiography notes the deaths of the widows from two families that had been such a help to him - Mrs Stroud Smith on a trip to Liberia, in December, 1893 and Mrs Spurgeon in October, 1903.
In 1900 he accidentally knelt on a piece of coal which caused an injury that plagued him the rest of his days. In March of that year he was made a British Citizen. The following year, through the kindness of friends in Putney, a fund was established to provide for him in retirement.
His autobiography went through several editions. It was sold at meetings and by mail from his home. Aged 72 at the close of the seventh edition in 1909 he wrote ‘The hand of God has been with me down the years. He requires an appropriate return. I charge my soul as an unprofitable servant, reviewing all the opportunities and the advantages afforded me. He has kept my heart beating 70 times per minute, 4,200 per hour, 100,800 per day, 3,681,720 per year, and never losing sight of me, who am but one unit out of the 1,800,000,000 people in the world. O my soul, but for the blood of my blessed Jesus, where wouldst thou stand today? I have been to his feet as I have heard his voice saying, ‘Come unto me, and I will give you rest.’ And I have found that sweet rest. And so will all who come to my blessed Jesus. I still wait his will in whatever word or way or work he gives to me, and look forward to that time of the glorious emancipation of the soul and of the body, too, from the present bondage of this life to the glorious assembly and church of the firstborn written in heaven,. To God be everlasting praise. Amen and Amen.’
Another eighth edition appeared before his death. He also wrote a number of little booklets and leaflets bearing testimony, such as Out of darkness into light or how Jesus found me; God never makes a mistake; God knows all about it and, for children, Four fingers and a thumb a simple evangelistic tool. From 1910 onwards he was wheelchair bound and became a familiar figure around the streets of Bournemouth. For many local people he was the first black person they had seen up close. He became famous for saying ‘Shake hands - the black won't come off!’ Although he died in 1921, it is said that in Bournemouth the slave chains and whips that decorated his home and his Christian faith were remembered well into the 1980s.
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