Chamberlain, Joseph H

Chamberlain, Joseph H.

a Baptist minister, was born at Thetford, Vt., Feb. 25, 1800. Early in his life the family moved from Vermont to Western New York, and there, in a log school-house, while attending a revival meeting, he became a Christian when he was seventeen years of age. He went, in 1825, to the Hamilton Institute, now Madison University, to prepare for the ministry. He was ordained in 1828, and settled in South Berlin, N.Y. His pastorate there covered the period of twenty-seven years, and his residence in the vicinity continued fifty-two years. For brief periods he lived in other places. He was, for a year and a half, agent of the Education Society at Hamilton. When not acting as a pastor, he performed a large amount of evangelistic labor in Norwich, Oxford, Greene, Coventry, the Hudson valley, and other places. He possessed more than ordinary gifts as a preacher. It is said of him that his eccentricities of speech and manner were marked, but it is thought that they added to rather than impaired his power. "When the heavenly gale blew upon him," as he often said, he loved to preach, and at such times his audiences heard him with delight. He was able to stir both the fountain of laughter and the fountain of tears. It is believed that during his long and laborious ministry he baptized more than one thousand persons on a personal profession of their faith in Christ. He died at Holmesville, N.Y., March 24, 1880. See New York Examiner, April 8, 1880. (J.C.S.)