• Family Split
Family Split As a Quaker, Hannah had been taught to listen to the inner voice for guidance. She never received any doctrinal teaching, for the Bible was often read but seldom interpreted. To a Quaker, "a concern" coming from the inner voice was considered to have more authority than the Bible.
The Bible, after all, was God's voice of long ago; while the "concern" was His voice at the present moment, and as such it was of far greater importance.
Thus it came as a perfect blaze of illumination to Hannah when she made her summer-long search through the Scriptures and discovered that the Bible declared that Christ alone was her salvation. Since Christ bore her sins on the cross, she did not have to placate God by dressing in dreary clothes or by struggling to improve her character.
The Word of God declared that she was already right in His sight because of the free gift of grace. For Hannah, this awareness of salvation was like lifting a curtain in the land of shadows and stepping into a fair, new country.
Being Hannah, she brimmed over with her spiritual discoveries to friends and acquaintances. In the fall of 1858, any stray soul who wandered unsuspecting over the threshold of the Smiths' house was bound to be buttonholed by
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a zealous Hannah. The Bible was an unending source of illumination for her, and every day seemed to bring new insight, the glimpse of some new truth. She could not get enough of it. Robert was greatly affected by Hannah's obvious joy, and he too found new spiritual dimensions as they began to attend other churches.
Several months later, on a particularly blustery Sunday in January 1859, Hannah and Robert were sitting at their dining-room table after the midday meal. In the adjacent kitchen they could hear the pots and pans rattling as their servant girl prepared to wash up the dishes. Four-year-old
Frank had been taken upstairs by the nursery governess and was being put to bed for his nap. Icicles fringed the windows as Hannah stared outside at the frozen garden, where the dead stalks of her summer flowers stuck up through the light carpet of snow that had fallen during the night.
"Robert," Hannah began, ending the quiet reverie, "since we have given this matter much prayerful consideration, are we agreed that we must resign our membership in the Society of Friends?"
Robert nodded. "I don't see how we can remain Friends when we feel so strongly that we must be baptized as the Bible says we should. If only the Friends did not deny the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper to their practicing members!"*
Hannah's eyes filled with pain. "It's a radical step, to think about leaving the Society. It will bring great sorrow to our families. Mine more than thine."
"Yes," Robert answered somberly. "Thy parents will put up quite a fuss. And thy brother and brothers-in-law also."
Hannah's sister Sarah was 25 years old and had been married for several years to William Nicholson, a staunch
Quaker. Sister Mary was already a mother at age 22. A few *Author's note: The conservative branch of Quakerism to which the Whitalls and Smiths belonged in the 1850s was rigid and unyielding. Today, however, the Society of Friends is one of the most liberal of all Christian denominations, and is also known for its strong social conscience.
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years before, she had become the bride of Dr. James Thomas, a medical doctor and an even more fervent Friend than his brother-in-law, William Nicholson. Hannah's brother, James, at 24, was an earnest and somewhat rigid young man who would surely deplore her defection from the ranks.
"I have thought about this night and day," Hannah went fering to my family— on, plaintively. "The thought of causing such dreadful suf- " Her voice broke. "I have been asking my heavenly Father if He cannot let me die instead." 2
Robert patted her hand, quite unable to enter into his wife's sorrow. His own family was only marginal in their attendance at Meeting and in their belief. Robert was emotional and impulsive, but he lacked the deep, steadfast feelings Hannah so painfully expressed.
Hannah set her chin in a look of firm resolution that became so characteristic of her. "I love my family. But my
Lord must come first," she stated. "We must do it."
All through the spring and summer of 1859, Hannah agonized over this step. Finally, in September, Hannah took the plunge. First she resigned her right of membership in the Society of Friends. Almost immediately, she was baptized by immersion in the Baptist Church at Pottsville, Pennsylvania, by a German Reform minister. That very same evening, returning to the city, she celebrated her first
Holy Communion in Philadelphia at a revival tent meeting, with five thousand other Christians.
Hannah felt a great peace come over her after taking these decisive steps. Perhaps this was a sign of blessing.
Hadn't the Whitall family accepted Hannah's spiritual discoveries with love and patience, listening politely to her enthusiastic outbursts? Hannah's father was a warm, goodnatured man and described by Hannah as "the best playmate we children ever had." Her mother was "delightful
. not so full of fun perhaps as our father, but always ready to champion her children's cause at all times; an unfailing refuge to us in every emergency."
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Loving and understanding as they were, John and Mary Whitall were unbending in one area. They believed so deeply in their Quaker religion as the true faith that they called it "Truth with a capital T." Quakerism was the whole truth and could not be improved upon.
Little wonder, then, that Hannah nervously twisted a linen handkerchief into a knot as Robert drove her and little
Frank in the carriage to the Filbert Street home of her parents one day late in October. John Whitall greeted them at the door—but his usual smile was gone, and his lips formed a grim line. "Thee must come in, since thee is here," he said stiffly, motioning them inside.
Hannah glanced at Robert, whose face remained impassive. John Whitall knew what they had come for. This was going to be more awkward than she'd feared.
Apprehensively, Robert, Hannah, and Frank followed the forbidding figure of her father into the parlor. Hannah and Robert sat down on two straight-backed chairs, and Hannah pulled little Frank onto her lap. Distractedly, she hugged him close, burying her face in his soft curls.
John Whi tail's face softened a bit as he spoke to his grandson. "Frank, run upstairs and see if thee can find Grandma."
Hannah released her hold on the little boy and he trotted off obediently on his errand. When he was gone, the door to the study opened and Hannah's brother, James, came into the room and sat beside their father.
"Thee has been a birthright Friend," Hannah's father said to her directly, all softness gone now. "Thee and thy parents and thy grandparents. How thee could do such a thing, bringing disgrace to thy family, I do not know. But this I do know," he said; his voice rose and reverberated like thunder, "I will not have a renegade daughter in my house."
That thunderclap was followed by a storm of angry words.
"If thee chooses to turn thy back on thy people—on everyone thee loves—I cannot stop thee."
He brought his hand down with a resounding smack on
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the arm of the chair in which he was sitting. "I will not have thee in my house any longer, contaminating my family with thy ungodly doctrines."
Hannah was stunned. Robert said nothing. "But, Father," Hannah pleaded, beginning to weep. "Thee has heard how long and prayerfully Robert and I searched. Thee knows we have read and reread the Scriptures before we came to this decision—that as Christians we must be baptized. We resign from the Society of Friends only because we feel we must. Oh, dear Father, doesn't thee see—on grounds of conscience.
. ?" Her voice trailed off.
John Whitall's face was granite, and James was staring at the floor, unable to look Hannah in the face.
"I see no such thing!" her father shouted. "Thee has humiliated thy family and caused a stir among the Friends all over Philadelphia. This family will never be able to live down the mortification of thy action."
James stepped forward now. His voice seemed to drip ice as he spoke to Hannah, "And now, if thee pleases, thee will leave this house. Neither here, nor in the house of thy brother-in-law, William Nicholson, nor in the house of thy brother-in-law, Dr. James Thomas, is thee welcome. Remember, it is thee who has ostracized thyself from thy loved ones by thy lamentable behavior." 3
Hannah's face was drained of all color, as she struggled to her feet. Robert, still silent in the tense atmosphere of the room, took her arm and helped her to the door. Outside, she climbed woodenly into the carriage and sat there numb and disbelieving. In a moment, the front door opened again and little Frank ran out to join them.
As they drove away, the clomp, clomp, clomp of the horse's hooves beat like a hammer in Hannah's head.
For all she knew, her family would never speak to her again. She was to them a heretic and a disgrace.
Being banned from her entire family was a devastating
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blow that Hannah had not expected, but she did not fall apart. In a secret letter that she was able to smuggle to her sister Sally, she spoke of feeling "like an outcast from my earthly father's house. But not, oh thanks be to God, not from my heavenly Father's house! And I know that He is caring for me." 4
Hannah's decision at the age of 27 to take the radical step of resigning from the Society of Friends in order to be baptized and to receive Holy Communion was an unusual and courageous move. Despite her formal resignation she would hold on to many of her Quaker beliefs, and would even refer to herself as a Quaker later on in her life. Nonetheless, her willingness to accept the fury of her family was evidence of a new steadfastness within and the conviction she brought to her faith.
This decision was also a foreshadowing of her future.
More and more, Hannah would find herself clinging to God alone, struggling to depend more on His mercy and love.
Soon He would be the only pillar on which she could safely lean.