General Booth with His Big Bass Drum Enters into Haverhill, Massachusetts

Abstract

Captain Annie was no neophyte in the Salvation Army. A Christian Mission started by William and Catherine Booth in the slums of East London had developed gradually but inevitably by 1878 into a noisy and colorful organization marked by military titles and discipline, penitent forms and confessions, and a determination to wage all-out war on sin and the devil. It was only a matter of time before such a dynamic evangelical movement should spread overseas. On March io, 188o, the first official contingent of eight female warriors and the newly appointed Commissioner for America, George Scott Railton, landed at Castle Garden, New York. Two years before this event, however, Amos Shirley had migrated from England to Philadelphia, where he had become foreman of a silk factory. He was joined in 1879 by his wife Annie and his daughter Eliza, who had both been active in London under General Booth's command. Soon after their arrival the two