Rev. Cartwright traveled for nearly 70 years preaching the gospel throughout the midwest with the preacher's typical three books in his saddlebags: a Bible, a hymn book, and the book of Methodist Discipline. Rev. Cartwright stands unsurpassed as America's backwoods camp meeting preacher. His spiritual power, native wit, and ability to handle ruffians who would seek to break up his meetings made him famous around the world.

His calling was to evangelize pioneer America in its westward march toward the Mississippi River. Tens of thousands accepted Christ as their Saviour who otherwise would have never accepted Him. His "hellfire and brimstone" preaching matched his character and personality. He was opposed to easy religion, education and culture in the ministry.

It is only fair to say that Cartwright did object to the excesses of some of the camp meetings, labeling such things as the "jerks" the "barks", the "running" and the "trances" as works of the devil. His 70 years of traveling were in Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois where he spent his last 48 years.

He was born of poor parents, the Justinian Cartwright's. His father served as a Revolutionary soldier in the war of the American Revolution. He was an unbeliever, but the mother was Methodist. Shortly after the colonies gained their independence the family moved to Kentucky in 1790. The wilderness through which they passed was filled with hostile Indians, so 200 families banded together, with 100 well armed young men used as guards as they traveled. They first settled at Lancaster.

In the fall of 1793 the family moved to the southern part of the state, settling in Logan County, nine miles south of Russellville, and within one mile of the state of Tennessee. A traveling preacher, Jacob Lurton, was invited to preach in the Cartwright cabin, with the father consenting. A Methodist church was some miles distant from their home in a general region known as Rogue's Harbor. Here refugees from almost all parts of the Union were gathered. They had fled from the scenes of their law-breaking to escape punishment. Sunday was set apart for hunting, fishing, horse-racing, card playing and dancing. Into such an atmosphere Cartwright grew up.

Cartwright enjoyed all the sins possible. His father did not restrain him, and gave him a race-horse and a pack of cards. As civilization advanced churches sprang up, a school was opened and Peter went in for book learning for a short while during which time he learned to read, write and cipher.

In 1800 and 1801 an amazing series of meetings took place at Cane Ridge. Some 1,000 to 2,000 were converted including Cartwright. As many as seven preachers would be preaching at once to various groups.

Specifically his conversion was as follows. In late 1800 (age 15) he attended a wedding that had the usual dancing and drinking. Once home he got under conviction of son and fell on his knees asking God to have mercy upon him. His mother sprang from her bed, dropped to her knees and prayed for her son. Cartwright promised the Lord if he would be spared he would seek and serve Him. He returned his horses, gave away his cards, fasted, watched and prayed, still not saved.

In the spring of 1801 the local Presbyterian Church was having an awakening and overflowed it's facilities, so they met in a shady grove at a place called Cane Ridge. At this camp meeting many were saved, and Christians shouted for joy. On Saturday night, he heard as if it were a voice from heaven saying, "Thy sins are all forgiven thee." Divine light flashed all round him and unspeakable joy sprang up in his soul. It was the night of his conversion. It lasted all night. This was in May 1801. In June he joined the Methodist Church which he served the rest of his life. He soon began to speak and exhort in local meetings.

From this time, because of the impact of the Kentucky revivals, a religious revival movement prevailed through almost all the inhabited parts of the western country. The Methodist camp-meeting gad now been established. Cartwright soon became known as "The Kentucky Boy," later the "Backwoods Preacher." His only theological training appears to have been derived from the diligent study of his Bible and habitual prayer, along with experiences derived from his continuous labors in religious gatherings. He began to convert the lads of the neighborhood with much success.

In May, 1802, he received a certificate from the preacher-in-charge that he was permitted to excersise his gifts as an exhorter in the Methodist Episcopal Church, "so long as his practices were agreeable to the gospel." This was a license to preach the gospel, and he was only 16 years old. His salary as a signal man was supposed to be $80 a year. In the fall of 1802 the family moved into Lewiston County.

This new territory was 80 miles away from any regular circuit. When he applied to the presiding elder for letters of recommendation to the local Methodist Episcopal Church in the new region, he found that the paper which he had received authorized him to travel through all the region to which he was going to hold meetings and organize classes. In essence he was to organize a new Methodist Circuit. He felt th need for education and went to a place called Brown's Academy for a time. He soon collected a small class from the scattered Methodists around about, had a few conversions, and doors began to open. School lasted several months, but that was about all. In the fall of 1803 he reported his successes and the plan of the circuit, which was made up of scattered members, now organized into classes. It was called Livingstone Circuit. On October 10, 1803, having just turned 18, he threw himself into the ranks of circuit riding preachers, traveling through the large Red River Circuit of Kentucky, and then later the Waynesville Circuit which covered a part of Tennessee.

Although Cartwright did on occasions immerse, he sprinkled for the most part. He had a running conflict with the Baptists from place to place whose preachers would rush in, and try to take his converts off into the water. On one occasion Baptist preachers substituted for him. Cartwright was convinced that sprinkling was sufficient baptism, and when the local Baptists requested that his converts be dipped , he requested that he, being their spiritual father, ought to be allowed to join their church as much as the new converts. He testified of his baptism which was not immersion, and upon their refusal of him to become a member, all his converts decided to also follow Cartwright's leadership, so that a Methodist church was started on the spot.

At the conference held in October, 1804, he was sent as the junior preacher to the Salt River and Shelbyville circuits, which extended into Indiana. People dressed plainly, attended meetings faithfully, wore no jewelry or ruffles, and would frequently walk three or four miles to class-meetings on Sunday.

In 1805-06 he was on the Scioto (Ohio) circuit. It was during these days that a genuine attempt was made to break up one of his Sunday morning meetings. Two men deliberately tried to lead in a disruption of a meeting. Cartwright ordered the magistrate, who was drunk, to take the disturbers into custody. This was refused and Cartwright himself went into the audience, knocked both men and the magistrate to the ground. Soon law officials came to the rescue and before it was all over 30 were taken prisoner. Things were confused until the evening meeting which he described:

My test was, "The gates of hell shall not prevail." In about thirty minutes the power of God fell on the congregation in such a manner as is seldom seen; the people fell in every direction right and left, front and rear. It was supposed that not less than three hundred fell like dead men in mighty battle; and there was no need of calling mourners, for they were strewed all over the campground; loud wailings went up to heaven from the sinners for mercy, and a general shout from Christians, so that the noise was heard afar off. Our meeting lasted all night, and Monday and Monday night; and when we closed on Tuesday, there were two hundred who had professed religion, and about that number joined the Church.

On August 18, 1808, he married Frances Gains, on her 19th birthday. The Cartwrights were to have nine children, seven daughters and two sons. The 1808 Conference was held at Liberty Hill, Tennessee, on October 13th. A week prior on October 4th he was ordained an elder by Bishop McKendree. McKendree instructed him in English grammar and laid out for him a course of study and reading which the young disciple faithfully pursued. This was the year he lost his father, and had to take some time off to take care of arrangements at the homestead. In 1809 he attended the conference at Cincinnati, where he was appointed to the Livingston Circuit. this is where he began six years before. Active members numbered 427 in that area. The whole Western Conference (basically Tennessee and Ohio) jumped from 9,000 members in 1804 when Cartwright joined the conference to 30,741 members in 1811. He was made presiding elder in the fall of 1812 by Bishop Asbury at the Fountain Head, Tennessee, Conference held November 1st, a position he held for 60 years. In the fall of 1815 he was elected delegate to the second general conference of the Methodist Church in America to be help at Baltimore, Md., in 1816. From that time on he was always present (12 times) at the quadrennial gatherings of the denomination in the United States, except for on time (1832) when sickness in the family prevented it. For the local annual conferences which we have been describing he went 50 consecutive years to those except for one session, when a kindred reason eliminated his presence. Circuit riding and preaching at stated quarterly meetings and camp meetings filled his life. He was not afraid of bishops and often thundered at them to their faces at General Conferences. Each six weeks he made the rounds of his circuit and conference, visiting each church, preaching, holding revivals, presiding at business meetings and seeing hundreds of souls converted.

The 1818 conference in Nashville, Tennessee, had an often-repeated story transpire. On Monday night in early October, Cartwright was speaking at a Presbyterian church and had just repeated his text, Mark 8:36, when in walked General Stonewall Jackson. The host preacher pulled Cartwright’s coat and whispered loud, "General Jackson has come in; General Jackson has come in." Cartwright felt indignation running all over him and looking at the audience said audibly, "Who is General Jackson? If he don't get his soul converted, God will damn him as quick as a Guinea negro." The congregation, General Jackson and all, smiled and laughed out loud. The host preacher went to the hotel early the next morning to apologize for Cartwright's conduct. A little later Cartwright passed by the hotel, and met the General on the pavement. Jackson reached out his hand and said:

"Mr. Cartwright, you are a man after my own heart. I am very much surprised at Mr. Mac, to think he would suppose that I would be offended at you. No sir; I told him that I highly approved of your independence; that a minister of Jesus Christ ought to love everybody and fear no mortal man. I told Mr. Mac that if I had a few thousand such independent, fearless officers as you were, and a well-drilled army, I could take old England."

In June, 1820, another Cartwright incident took place.
On the return home from the Baltimore General Conference the 1,000 mile journey on horseback was fatiguing. Riding up to a tavern in Knoxville, Tennessee, for the purpose of dining, he and Brother Walker found it loaded with drunks. So they went to another tavern. Again the same reception, hence they again agreed on to stop. Finally they came to a house with a sign over the door, "Private Entertainment, and New Cider." They were refreshed but the cider was more than they anticipated would be, and they rode on to the next stop more drunk than sober. Cartwright bade Brother Walker goodbye and journeyed on toward his home in Christian County, Kentucky. Saturday night came, and found him in a strange region of the country, and in the hills, knobs, and spurs of the Cumberland Mountains. Cartwright desired to spend Sunday with God's people, but there was nothing but scattered population and no Gospel center. Weekends simply meant to hunt, drink, visit or dance. In the evening he hailed a decent house and asked the landlord for quarters. The host agreed he could stay, but said a party that night with dance would keep him awake. The next such lodge was seven miles distant, so Cartwright decided to stay here. He took his seat in one corner of the house as in his mind that he would spend the next day there seeking to preach to the group. Suddenly, a beautiful ruddy young lady walked gracefully up to him, dropped a handsome courtesy, and with winning smiles, invited him out to take a dance with her. Cartwright resolved to try a desperate experiment. He rose as gracefully as he could, with many emotions. This young lady moved to his right side, whereupon Cartwright grasped her right hand with his. They walked on the floor with the whole company pleased at this act of politeness by the young lady. The colored fiddler began to tune up. Cartwright asked the fiddler to hold a moment, and stated for several years he had not undertaken any matter of importance without first asking the blessing of God upon it, and further stated that he now desired to ask the blessing of God upon the beautiful young lady and the whole company, seeing that they had shown such politeness to a total stranger.

He continued, "Let's all kneel down and pray," and instantly he dropped to his knees and began to pray with all the power of soul and body that he could command. The young lady tried to get loose from him, but he held her hand tight. Presently she fell on her knees. Some of the crowd knelt, some stood, some fled, some sat still--all looked curious. The fiddler ran off into the kitchen mumbling. While Cartwright prayed some wept, and wept aloud and some cried for mercy. He arose from his knees and commenced an exhortation, then sang a hymn. The young lady lay prostrate, crying earnestly for mercy. Cartwright exhorted again, sang and prayed nearly all night. About 15 were converted. The meeting lasted all day Sunday and another15 were converted on the Lord's Day. Cartwright organized a society, voted 32 into the Church, and sent them a preacher. This was the beginning of a great and glorious revival in the region and several of the young men converted at this dance became useful ministers.

Determining to move from Kentucky in 1823 to Illinois (age 38) he set out to explore the state of Illinois and on November 15, 1824, reached Pleasant Plains with his family. This would now become his home for the rest of his life. His reasons for moving were:

First, I would get rid of the evil of slavery. Second, I could raise my children where work was not thought a degradation. Third, I believed I could better my temporal circumstances, and procure lands for my children as they grow up. Fourth, I could carry the Gospel to destitute souls.

The trip was not without tragedy for a freak accident killed one of his daughters en route. In October, as his family slept outside on their trip, a tree that had rotted away fell on their third daughter as they slept, killing her outright.

Cartwright was transferred to the Illinois Conference, and appointed to travel the Sangamon (Ill.)circuit. He was presiding elder here for 45 years, and attended 16 annual meetings of the Illinois Conference. He stayed with various circuits in the state for the remainder of his life.

In 1833 Cartwright ran for the Illinois legislature, and had the distinction of beating Abraham Lincoln for the position. He was chosen a second time for the same position. In 1842 he built a little church in Pleasant Plains so that his family would have a local place to worship. This was the same year that McKendree College gave him the honorary title of D.D. At the General Conference of 1844 at New York City, he resisted to the utmost of his ability the division of the denomination (over the slavery issue) into the Methodist Church North and the Methodist Church South. He also struggled hard against those tendencies in the church by which the merely itinerant character of its clergy was largely laid aside for the more stable and fixed salaries of local pastorates. Cartwright was known for many years as an inflexible opponent of slavery.

In 1846 he ran for Congress against Abraham Lincoln and this time he was defeated. He had charged Lincoln with infidelism. Lincoln once attended a Cartwright meeting, and at the conclusion the preacher asked all who wanted to go to heaven to stand. Lincoln remained seated, where upon Cartwright asked where he wanted to go. "To Congress," honest Abe quietly responded. In 1853 Cartwright requested his conference area be assigned to him for the first time, the Pleasant Plains District, home territory, which was granted him. Now at age 68 weariness was beginning to take its toll. Many times he had to defend his life against Indians and wolves, sleep on the ground, and swim the swollen rivers to make appointments. Once he started a training school where the tuition was $5 per month if paid in advance, and if the students did not have the money, they could trade in produce. He himself had empathy with the poor. He never would have succeeded in the fashionable eastern churches but he was God's man for the frontier. One while visiting Boston and preaching at a "high-falutin" church he arose as the organ peeled forth and said, "Stop that squealin' you have up there in the gallery. I will line the hymn...we don't worship God in the west by proxy or substitution." He rolled up his sleeves, unbuttoned his collar and went to work on the crowd.

In his autobiography written in his 72nd year (1856) Cartwright mentions some totals covering his 53 years of preaching up to that time. He had nine children, seven daughters and two sons. Besides the death of one previously mentioned, another married daughter had also died. By the time of Cartwright's death he had 50 grandchildren, 36 great grandchildren and 7 great great grandchildren.

He traveled eleven circuits, twelve districts; received into the Methodist Episcopal Church on probation and by letter 10,000; "baptized" 12,000 (children 4,000 and adults 8,000), preached 500 funerals and about 14,600 sermons. He closed his autobiography lamenting the fact that the old fashioned camp meeting was getting to be a thing of the past as the Methodist Church had become numerous and wealthy. The Methodists increased across America from 72,784 to 1,756,000 members during his 50 years of preaching. He did a bit of farming when not actively preaching and lived out his days in good health until old age took its toll.

In May, 1868 he attended his last General Conference and said (age 83) "Yet if after you have listened to my few remarks, any of you can beat them, come up and try...A lazy minister is a curse to the church of God...Ministers are raised in hot houses now."

The below Artacle was written by Peter Cartwright

Peter Cartwright was a Methodist circuit rider. The following excerpts describing the events of the Cane Ridge Revival are taken from Autobiography of Peter Cartwright (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1984).

"The power of God was wonderfully displayed; scores of sinners fell under the preaching,like men slain in mighty battle; Christians shouted aloud for joy." (p. 38) "I have seen more than a hundred sinners fall like dead men under one powerful sermon, and I have seen and heard more than five hundred Christians all shouting aloud the high praises of God at once; and I will venture to assert that many happy thousands were awakened and converted to God at these camp meetings. Some sinners mocked, some of the old dry professors opposed, some of the old starched Presbyterian preachers preached against these exercises, but still the work went on and spread almost in every direction, gathering additional force, until our country seemed all coming home to God" (p. 43).

 "Just in the midst of our controversies on the subject of the powerful exercises among the people under preaching, a new exercise broke out among us, called the jerks, which was overwhelming in its effects upon the bodies and minds of the people. No matter whether they were saints or sinners, they would be taken under a warm song or sermon and seized with a convulsive jerking all over, which they could not by any possibility avoid, and the more they resisted, the more they jerked. If they would not strive against it and pray in good earnest,the jerking would usually abate. I have seen more than five hundred persons jerking at one time in my large congregations. Most usually, persons taken with the jerks, to obtain relief, as they said, would rise up and dance. Some would run, but could not get away. Some would resist; on such the jerks were generally very severe. "To see those proud young gentlemen and young ladies, dressed in their silks, jewelry, and prunella, from top to toe, take the jerks, would often excite my risibilities. The first jerk or so, you would see their fine bonnets, caps, and combs fly; and so sudden would be the jerking of the head that their long loose hair would crack almost as loud as a wagoner's whip" (p.45). "I always looked upon the jerks as a judgment sent from God, first, to bring sinners to repentance; and, secondly, to show professors that God would work with or without means, and that he could work over and above means, and do whatsoever seemeth to him good, to the glory of his grace and the salvation of the world.

 "There is no doubt in my mind that with weak-minded, ignorant, and superstitious persons, there was a great deal of sympathetic feeling with many that claimed to be under the influence of this jerking exercise [i.e. mere human emotion]; and yet, with many, it was perfectly involuntary. It was, on all occasions, my practice to recommend fervent prayer as a remedy, and it almost universally proved an effective antidote" (p. 46).

"There were many other strange and wild exercises into which the subjects of this revival fell; such, for instance, as what was called the running, jumping, barking exercise. The Methodist preachers generally preached against this extravagant wildness. I did it uniformly in my little ministrations, and sometimes gave great offense; but I feared no consequences when I felt my awful responsibilities to God" (p. 46).

 Cartwright recounts another camp meeting in 1800: "At the close of the meeting we had many seekers who had not obtained comfort. Twelve of them got into a two-horse wagon, and myself with them. We had to go about fifteen miles, but before we reached our home every one of them got powerfully converted, and we sung and shouted aloud along the road, to the very great astonishment of those who lived along the way" (p. 84).

In 1812 a slave owner, Sister S. was struggling in agony for a clean heart. Cartwright recounts: "She then and there covenanted with the Lord, if he would give her the blessing, she would give up her slaves and set them free. She said this covenant had hardly been made one moment, when God filled her soul with such an overwhelming sense of Divine love, that she did not really know whether she was in or out of the body. She rose from her knees, and proclaimed to listening hundreds that she had obtained the blessing.... She went through the vast crowd with holy shouts of joy, and exhorting all to taste and see that the Lord was gracious, and such a power attended her words that hundreds fell to the ground, and scores of souls were happily born into the kingdom of God that afternoon and during the night" (p.94).