William Booth

William Booth 1829-1912, English religious leader, founder and first general of the Salvation Army , b. Nottingham. Originally a local preacher for the Wesleyan Methodists, he went (1849) to London and entered (1852) the ministry of the Methodist New Connexion Church, but in 1861 he began independent evangelistic work. In 1865, with the help of his wife, Catherine Booth, he started the East London Revival Society (soon known as the Christian Mission) in Whitechapel, London. The Christian Mission developed in 1878 into the Salvation Army. General Booth, a remarkable organizer, traveled widely, winning recognition wherever he went. In 1890 he published In Darkest England and the Way Out in collaboration with W. T. Stead. See Booth , family; Booth, Evangeline Cory .

Bibliography: See biographies by G. S. Railton (2d ed. 1912), H. Begbie (1920), St. J. Ervine (2 vol., 1934), H. C. Steele (1954), E. Bishop (1964), and R. Collier (1965); R. Hattersley, Blood and Fire (2000).

Booth, William (1829–1912). Founder and first General of the Salvation Army. His White-chapel ‘Christian Mission’ changed its name in 1878 to the ‘Salvation Army’. A strong advocate of rousing music (and of denying to the devil all the best tunes), he also introduced ‘the standard of the London cab-horse’, pointing out that many had to live on less money than was expended on maintaining cab-horses: the standard of the London taxi produces a similar result.

Booth, William (1829–1912). Revivalist and founder of the Salvation Army. Of lower middle-class background, Booth joined the methodists in Nottingham and in 1844 was converted. After experience in several different methodist connexions (including a ministry in 1858 in the methodist new connexion) he rejected them all as too staid and middle class to reach the mass of people needing salvation. Strongly supported by his wife Catherine, also an active methodist, he set up a mission in London's East End in 1865, from which developed the Salvation Army. For some time Booth waged his holy war solely on the spiritual front; but experience showed that poverty was a great impediment to salvation, and in his book In Darkest England (1890) he outlined plans for social reform. Booth was extremely authoritarian and the military structure of the Salvation Army reflected his temperament. No theologian, he was at times anti-intellectual: ‘do not argue, but pray,’ he advised his officers.

John F. C. Harrison