Thompson, Samuel

Thompson, Samuel a Methodist Protestant minister, was born on the rocky shores of Maine, Oct. 5, 1782; he was converted in 1802, and at once began to preach. Three years later he was ordained deacon, and, after two more, elder. In 1812 he was located, and in 1816 removed to Wheeling Creek, W. Va., where he spent six and a half years, and then withdrew from the Methodist Episcopal Church, and united in the movement that eventually resulted in the Methodist Protestant Church. For fifteen years he labored to build up this new branch of the Methodist denomination, when from conscientious impulses he united others in raising an antislavery Church (the Wesleyan). In 1848 he removed to Iowa, and continued in connection with the Wesleyans until 1860, when, learning of the antislavery element in the Methodist Protestant Church, he reunited with them at Mount Pleasant, Ia., and continued to labor in their interest till his death, Oct. 24, 1867. See Bassett, Hist. of the Meth. Pirot. Church, p. 348.