Thomas Chalmers (1780–1847) in North America (ca. 1830–1917)

Abstract

When in the spring of 1817 the thirty-seven-year-old Scottish minister, Thomas Chalmers, descended upon London, the world's greatest metropolis was transfixed. The four benefit sermons that Chalmers preached between 14 May and 25 May produced electrifying results. “All the world wild about Dr. Chalmers,” wrote William Wilberforce in his diary. At the sermon for the Hibernian Society, which distributed Bibles to the Irish poor, Viscount Castlereagh, moving British spirit at the Congress of Vienna, and the future prime minister George Canning were visibly moved. For his final appearance the throng was so intense that Chalmers, arriving shortly before he was to preach, could neither get into the church nor, at first, convince the crowd that he was the preacher, so far did his nondescript appearance fall short of his grand reputation. When friends inside finally recognized Chalmers, they secured his entrance by having him walk on a plank through an open window up to the pulpit itself.