Ryder, William

Ryder, William, a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, was born in Holliston, Middlesex Co., Mass., June 27, 1805. He joined the Church in Fort Ann, N.Y., in 1824, and in 1830 was licensed to preach. A year or two afterwards he entered the Troy Conference. He was ordained deacon in 1833, but was obliged through ill health in 1834 to take a superannuated relation. His disease was of a rheumatic-neuralgic nature, and so severe that in 1837 he lost all power of locomotion, and the use of almost every muscle. His sufferings were very intense, and from them he had very little release. He contrived to have a book so placed before him that he could read, and was thus enabled to beguile many painful hours each day. He died in 1849. See Wentworth, The Superannuate (N.Y. 1846); Minutes of Annual Conferences, 1850, p. 458.