The Army of Alba: Part One

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Part One The Pioneering Years Chapter 1.1 The Trailblazers (1879-81) ‘FOR a long time we have been looking for an opportunity to open in Scotland. Some years ago we remember being deeply impressed with the need for some such religious effort to reach the unsaved masses of the people, and being also impressed, during a few services we were invited to hold, with the glorious earnestness of the Scotch when their consciences were once awakened by the power of the Holy Ghost.’ With these words William Booth announced to the readers of his mouthpiece, The Salvationist, the momentous news that he was about to open fire on Scotland. The year was 1879, a year after The Christian Mission had changed its name to The Salvation Army and the Rev. Booth became known as the General. Scotland was to be his first opening outside England and Wales5 and, mindful of the failure at Edinburgh almost a decade before, he was taking care to ensure that it would be a total success. He was united in his determination to triumph with a valuable friend on the spot: Thomas Robinson, Esq., a justice of the peace of Hurlet near Paisley. This gentleman admired the achievements of the Army in London and knew of its runaway success south of the border,6 and so was willing to give it practical support if it would do something in Scotland. The Booths had got to know Robinson well, staying at his house several times during the late 1870s when William had preached at the Old Tabernacle, a Primitive Methodist church in Paisley, and through that ministry had made friends with believers of nearby towns and villages, such as Barrhead, Pollokshaws, Inkerman and Johnstone. Glasgow was to be the point of attack. In Scotland, as in the rest of the United Kingdom, the location of heavy industry was determined by the presence of coal and, because there were plentiful supplies in central Scotland, by 1850 it had become one of the nation’s fastest growing cities,7 serving the Midlothian coalfields, Paisley textiles and the Clydeside docks. As the hunger for jobs and hope for a better life caused an unprecedented shift of population from rural areas to the city, the number of Glasgow’s inhabitants swelled at an unmanageable rate, increasing fourfold between 1800 and 1850. Simultaneously, its area expanded to swallow up industrial districts such as Anderston, Calton and the Gorbals. The social and environmental damage wreaked by Glasgow’s accelerated growth was devastating. People living beside the open sewer that was the River Clyde had their health permanently ruined and it was no better for those who dwelt near poisonous industrial sites; furthermore, there was no living space: sometimes a dozen families crowded into a former mansion designed for just one, and others built hovels in parks and squares. It was an unsustainable situation and the authorities were forced to act and, considering the task they faced, they did well: by 1880 life expectancy in Glasgow had clawed its way back to the 1820 level, 42 for men and 45 for women. This, then, was the city chosen to be the bridgehead for General Booth’s invasion of Scotland. Robinson accompanied William to Glasgow to show him the hall he had rented for the Army (£60 for the first six months with an option of continuing at £130 per annum) with the promise of meeting the deficits until the work was self-supporting. It was the Victoria Music Hall, which could seat over 2,000 people and was situated in Argyle Street, Anderston, and it was there that two ‘Hallelujah Lasses’ opened Scotland’s first corps on Sunday 24 March 1879.8 Large posters had heralded their arrival; Robinson had financed the publicity and met other costs. He received a good return for his money insofar as ‘many precious souls’ were converted. William Booth did not invent the term ‘Hallelujah Lasses’ and was shocked when he first heard it, but when he learned of how its use drew the people he was satisfied. Hallelujah Lasses thereupon became the 5

A station of the Christian Mission had opened in Cardiff in 1874. By September 1978 there were 45 ‘stations’ around England and Wales, with new centres opening every week. 7 It had overtaken Edinburgh as Scotland’s largest city in 1821. 8 The Salvationist, 1/5/1879, p.125; however, the Annual Report for 1883-84 gave 16 March as the anniversary date and The War Cry, 20/6/1908, p.5, gave 8 March for the opening. The Salvationist was a journal which was only issued four times over the course of 1878. It was replaced in January 1879 by the weekly War Cry. 6

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