User:WilyD/William Case/Caleb Swayze
Caleb Swayze was a Methodist Circuit Rider.
Swayze was born in New Jersey, c. 1783. He was raised as a Methodist, but left the church in his youth. In 1811, he reconverted to Methodism by the prostelytising of Henry Ryan. He quickly became a preacher, working as an assistant to John Rhodes in Upper Canadaa during the War of 1812. On 5 June, 1813, he stayed at the house of Christopher Burkholder, within earshot of the Battle of Stoney Creek, and the pair travelled to the battlefield the next morning to see the leftover carnage.[1] In 1817, he was accepted on trial as a circuit rider, and assigned to the Westminister Circuit.[2] In 1817, he was assigned to the Westminster circuit, alongside David Youmans. That year, membership in the Methodist church along the Westminster circuit increased from 166 to 324.[3] In 1818, he was removed from the ranks of the circuit riders after an unfavourable evaluation of his preaching abilities, and became a local preacher again. He remained a local preacher until after the merger of the American Methodist church and British Wesleyan church in Upper Canada, and in 1835 he was assigned to the Long Point circuit as a rider. He continued riding until 1838, after which he retired.[4]
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- Carroll, John (1869). Case and his cotemporaries, or, The Canadian itinerants' memorial constituting a biographical history of Methodism in Canada, from its introduction into the Province, till the death of the Rev. Wm. Case in 1855. Vol. II. Toronto: Wesleyan Conference Office.