Excerpts from Life of … Caples

p. 7

WILLIAM GOFF CAPLES, son of R. F. and Charlotte Caples, was born April 23, 1819, in Jeromeville, Wayne county, Ohio.

Of his parents and his early life I know nothing beyond the fact that his educational advantages were limited, and that he was converted and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in his seventeenth year.

pp. 30-31

Naturally he was as ambitious as Julius Caesar.  The kingdoms of the world and the glory of them were in his eye.  They dazzled him.  For a time he allowed the gorgeous vision to master him Its force was greatly augmented, just at this critical juncture, by his marriage.  Miss Charlotte [name actually Emily] Gist, the daughter of Gen. George W. Gist, formerly of Maryland, was young, beautiful, intellectual, witty.  Her father was of an old, wealthy Maryland family, but had been reduced to poverty by being “surety for his friend.”  The exquisite, personal beauty and vivacious intellect of Miss Gist were an irresistible attraction to young Caples, and the brilliant, ambitious student of law was accepted by her with all the noble trust of young womanhood.  They were married, and none were ever joined with a deeper love.  Mrs. Caples’ views and hopes of life were all colored by the chosen profession of her husband, while his love for and pride in her would intensify his own ambitious impulses.

The wonder is that he did enter the ministry at all.  His wife felt it to be a cruel involvement of her in the poverty and humiliations of a calling with which she was not in sympathy—a blight of all her hopes.  He felt the same, for he was always most tenderly regardful of her.  Besides that, in devoting himself to the itinerant ministry, he crucified self in its most sensitive consciousness—his ambition.

p. 32

In 1839, General Gist, with his family, accompanied by his son-in-law, Mr. Caples, and his wife, emigrated to the State of Missouri, and settled at or near Westport—I think in the town.

pp. 75-77

Reference having been made to Mrs. Caples’ repugnance to the life of a preacher, it is proper to say that about a year before her death, at a session of the Conference in Glasgow, in 1847, she became deeply concerned on the subject of religion and presented herself for prayers.  From that time she seemed reconciled to the calling of her husband.  The following year they were in Brunswick.  Near the close of it she died, having been happily converted some short time before she passed away.  She was a woman of most decided character, and without any experience of the love of God, it was inevitable that her position as a preacher’s wife would involve many things distasteful to her.  But she was a true wife and mother, a woman of fine intellect and many noble traits of character.  If she could have lived after her conversion to God, no doubt her husband’s calling and character would have been the joy of her life.

Nor can I doubt that it was his steadfast devotion to his work that led her at last to the foot of the Cross.  If he had vascillated both would, perhaps, have become worldly, and been at last involved in sin and destruction.  As it was, she saw that religion was with him the one great concern of life, and though she held out against the strivings of the Spirit for years, he had the satisfaction of seeing her at last yield to the supreme attractions of the Cross; and when called to mourn her departure to the world of spirits he “sorrowed not as others who have no hope.”

When she died, the light of his life, so far as this world’s pleasures were concerned, went out.  It was a sad hour when, returning from the burial scene, he looked upon his motherless children.  But she was with God.  Already the angels had welcomed the new-comer to the joys of heaven, and she was at home in the midst of the innumerable company and Church of the First-born.  He was again “cast down but not destroyed.”

His second marriage, with Mrs. Bailey, of Brunswick, was in every respect happy.  She was a true mother to his children.  She had been converted under his ministry, and married him in view of his high calling.  All its privations she accepted with cheerfulness, and even joy.  Without grudging she saw the insufficient support of the Church supplemented out of her own resources.  Ever a cheerful presence in the midst of his household, she made his home at all times a happy retreat.

She lived to share with him the calamities of the war and to see him die.  After that dreadful hour, nerving herself to the task of a widowed mother without resources, she was faithful to the last.  But the time was short.  Her Father in heaven soon called her away from over-taxing labors and anxieties and “received her into rest.”

p. 100

Some years elapsed before I heard him again.  It was when he was stationed at Glasgow and I was on the Weston circuit, in 1846.  He visited the family of Gen.  Gist, his wife’s father, then living in my circuit…

p. 114

Mr.  Caples was in the active work of the ministry more than twenty-four years.  Eight years of this time he was a Presiding Elder and two years agent of Central College.  He spent over fourteen years as a Pastor, on stations and circuits.  He never imagined that he had filled up the measure of duty when he had met his regular appointments.

pp. 123-124

As an example of the heart of this man in his pastoral work I make the following extract from his diary:

Nov.  4, 1863.—Returned to town.  Called at brother Henry Lewis’.  Stayed at brother J. O. Swinney’s.  Little Billy very ill of scarlet fever.  The Lord spare him to his fond parents.

5, noon.—Billy is no better.  Dined and prayed with father Lewis, John and wife.

6.—Dined at Dr.  Walker’s.  Visited brother Swackers, brother Dunnica’s (Thomas suffering very much with his arm); Mr. Hutcheson (found Rebecca sick with fever); visited mother Watts, brother Pitts, etc.  Little Willie Swinney died this afternoon at 3 1-2 o’clock—a lovely child.  He was five years old the 20th of April last.  I hasten to offer such consolation to my afflicted brother and sister as I may be able.  An interesting conversation with brother Swinney, sister Thompson and others, on the providence of God and the state of the pious dead.  Brother S.  tempted to doubt the goodness of God in permitting such suffering in the case of innocent childhood.  Billy had learned to love God, yet suffered so much.  Is satisfied as he remembers the necessity for the violence of the storm to drive one into port so soon, and the eternity in which God rewards for these short sufferings.

7.—Billy’s funeral at 2 1-2 o’clock.  The day interspersed with pleasant conversations about him.  Brother and sister S.  resigned and tenderly submissive.  God’s grace, so far, has given victory.

pp. 298-299

1864, July 4.  This day twenty-six years ago I married.  Time in passing has carried many loved ones away, I trust to the better home above, and I, too, am hastening away.  Lord help me so to live that I, at last, may die in peace and join the good above! …

The following was written on his last birth-day.  I have lingered over it with tears:

April 23.  As this is my forty-fifth birth-day I have been reading Southey on Henry Kirk White, who died at twenty-one years of age.  O! my Father in heaven, is it so that I have been forty-five years on earth ? I used to write to my mother on my birth-days, but years have passed since.  Oh! what years have mine been—a conflict sometimes with poverty bordering on want, with domestic cares and afflictions burdening and almost heart-breaking—always with a sense of ignorance and want of qualification for any great enterprise, and yet a longing desire to be useful, if not great.  My father died when I needed him most, when I was not yet sixteen.  My mother left earth to join him in heaven near a dozen years since, and I, a parent, about whose heart hang ineffaceable images, not only of parents gone from earth, but dear, dear children, too.  And is it true that I have reached the summit of my strength, and must my steps hence grow feeble, and with so little done? I sigh for the rest of the grave, with no other claim upon the Church or the world than the exercise of charity in forgetting my follies and neglects.

God hath not dealt with me but in mercy, and only in that mercy, through the Crucified, do I hope for the future.  O! my gracious God, be compassionate to my weakness, and let not my family nor thine suffer for my ignorance or neglects.  O! my Savior, wash me from all impurity, and permit me to join my loved ones in heaven, and bring, oh! bring, at last, those I love on earth to that blessed home.  Thine be the praise.  Amen.

p. 369-376

But on Tuesday, the 11th of October, hope …

On the day following his decease (the 12th) we carried his remains to Brunswick.  On Thursday, the 13th day of October, A.D. 1864, all that was mortal of Wm. G. Caples was laid away to sleep beside his loved daughter, “Lottie,” and his former wife.