ASBURY, Francis, the first bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States. He was born in Hands worth, Staffordshire, England, 20 Aug. 1745; d. Va 31 March 1816. He joined the local ministry of the Methodists at the age of 16, the itinerant ministry six years later, and was sent by John Wesley as missionary to America at the age of 25. In 1772 he was ap pointed by Wesley general superintendent of the connection in America, the duties of which office he exercised through the entire period of the American Revolution. Until the termina tion of the war the Methodists of America had called themselves members of the Church of England, and their ministers laymen. They now considered the political changes of tke country as separating them from that Church, and therefore established an organization for themselves. Francis Asbury was constituted the first bishop of the new Church (1784), which office he held till his death. During the 30 years
of his episcopal labors he traveled annually from the Androscoggin to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, or dained not less than 3,000 preachers, and preached about 17,000 sermons. Identified with the religious interests of this country through the two great struggles which have so greatly modified our political and social char acter, he became eminently American in his sympathies and character, and left the mark of his native enthusiasm and energy upon the ec clesiastical history of the United States. He wrote his journals, published in New York 1852. (3 vols.).
Bibliography.— Briggs, F. W. As bury) (London 1874) ; Du Bose, H. M., (Fran cis Asbury) (Nashville, Tenn., 1909) ; Larrabee, W. C., (Asbury and His CO-Laborers) (Cincin nati 1853) ; Strickland, W. P., The Pioneer Bishop (New York 1858).