John Thomas, born in Hoxton Square, London, on 12 April 1805, was not particularly interested in religion in early life. His upbringing was respectably religious – his father, indeed, worked for part of his life as pastor to a number of different types of denomination.

John’s education was varied – the family followed Revd. Thomas’s lead in and out of professions and from area to area. Besides schools, John was educated by the various doctors and surgeons for whom he worked.

Eventually, he studied at Guy’s Hospital, from where he emerged a qualified surgeon. For some time, the distinct impression was given that medicine was a ‘vocation’ in the mind of John Thomas: he wrote frequently in The Lancet, produced a course of lectures on obstetrics and, as one professor among his detractors later sardonically remarked: ‘What a fool Dr. Thomas is. If he would only devote himself to his profession he might ride in the best carriage in Richmond.’

His interest in religion seems to have been kindled by an essay in The Lancet, entitled ‘On the Functions of the Brain’. This purported to demonstrate that man contained part of God’s essence. The article caused Thomas to brood about the nature of man’s physique, the nature of immortality and the purpose of resurrection.

A major spiritual conflagration occurred in John Thomas’s disposition, ignited by his very near shipwreck in the Marquis of Wellesley on its way to America in May 1832. Robert Roberts was later to describe the episode in these words: ‘He determined that if ever he got ashore again, he would never rest till he found out the truth of the matter [of religion], that he might no more be found in such an uncertain state of mind.’

John Thomas’s father, having been an Independent minister changed his allegiance to the Baptist cause just prior to the journey to America. Thus it came about that, on the ill-fated voyage on the Marquis of Wellesley in 1832, John carried with him letters of introduction to the Baptist fraternity in the U.S.A. These included letters to the President of the Baptist Bible Society of New York, and another Baptist preacher.

Professionally, John Thomas intended to take up the recommendations which he had obtained to the professor of surgery at Ohio Medical College, along with a letter of introduction to a Baptist preacher at Cincinnati. He was not too disturbed by New York Baptists’ worry that their western brethren had been ‘very much infected with “reformation”’.

Thus it happened that Dr. John Thomas found himself in the company of such Campbellites as Major Daniel Gano and Walter Scott. Scott, indeed, on his first meeting with Thomas, cornered him in argument into admitting the essentiality of the total immersion of believing adults, and, whilst Thomas believed himself to be only seeking truth, he was, there and then, at 10 p.m. in the moonlight, obliged to be immersed in the Miami Canal.

Soon after this event, Dr. Thomas met Alexander Campbell himself, who ‘pressed [him] into speaking duties’. Campbell was, evidently, well pleased by the performance of his protégé. In 1833 he wrote:

‘We have just received a pamphlet of 22 octavo pages, small type, containing a very able philippic against the Ismatic religions of Messrs. Hughes and Breckenridge, the celebrated disputants on the claims of the Pope and John Calvin. This pamphlet, from the pen of our much esteemed brother J. Thomas, M.D., presents a very lucid and forcible view of the true Church of Christ and the Christian Institution and exhibits in bold relief the real merits of the Papal and Protestant controversy. It is a document worthy of a very general circulation for its own sake, and is a striking proof of the irradiating, emancipating and emboldening influence of the original Gospel and order of things on the minds of all who cordially embrace the Apostles’ doctrine. Brother Thomas is but an infant of one year old in the Christian Church, and here we find him in the very Temple of Apostate Christianity, successfully grappling with the Doctors of the two great parties in the apostasy; and certainly while contending with them, he proves himself, when panoplied with the armour of Light, more than a match for the rulers of darkness of this world, with all their Holy Orders and traditions of the See of Papal Rome.’

John Thomas allowed himself to be encouraged by this support, and not only spoke publicly and studied the Bible extensively, but also decided to become editor of a small monthly magazine. This produced its first issue in May 1834, being known as The Apostolic Advocate. It was to run (with a change of name in May 1837 to The Apostolic Advocate and Prophetic Interpreter) until 1839.

In 1834, John Thomas’s tours of Campbellite church circuits involved frequent and lengthy addresses. Despite a professed disinclination towards public oratory and a desire to present to congregations Biblical exegesis rather than emotive rhetoric, Thomas was in increasing demand amongst Campbellite congregations. Such was the support of those who had become enamoured of Thomas through his exposition of the Bible that, in the troubled waters that lay ahead of him in his relations with the Campbellite hierarchy, congregational petitions came to his aid on several occasions.

The editing of The Apostolic Advocate was a decisive move for John Thomas. He himself summed up his position in a book written thirty years later:

‘In those days, the author of this exposition of the apocalypse, then a young man of about thirty years of age, found himself among them, before he understood their theory in detail. He applied himself diligently to the thorough understanding of it by the study of the writings current among them. This he acquired; so that he needeth not that any should testify of Scotto-Campbellism; for he knows what is in it, and that it falls infinitely short of its pretension to be the “restoration of the ancient gospel and order of things.” 

The author adopted with great zest and zeal the sentiment of their legend. He proceeded to “prove all things,” and to “hold fast what” he believed to be “good;” and to call no man father, teacher, or leader, but Christ, THE TRUTH—John xiv. 6. In doing this, he devoted himself to the study of the prophetic and apostolic writings, under the impression that he was engaged in a good work; and, as he was then publishing a periodical entitled The Apostolic Advocate, he would from time to time report to his brethren for their benefit, what he found taught therein. In pursuing this study, he found many of their principles to be at variance with “the word,” which was made void by them. Perceiving this, and supposing that the spirit of their legend was the spirit of their body, he did not hesitate to lay his convictions before them that they might prove them, and hold them, or reject them, according to the testimony. This raised quite a storm among them, the thunderbolts of which were aimed at him by the thunderer of their sect. This uproar caused the author to discover that he had made a mistake in his reading of their legends; and that their reading of Paul’s words was, “Prove all things which we have proved; and hold fast what we believe to be good;” and of Jesus, “Call no man father, teacher, or leader, but Alexander Campbell.” These were readings that he had never agreed to; and, therefore, he continued to read and publish according to the old method, very much to the indignation and disgust of the Simon Pures who misled the multitude.’ 

Elsewhere, speaking retrospectively of his views as a young man on the main tenets of Campbellism, Thomas said: ‘He was not quite clear upon these topics himself’.

In an extremely ingenuous way, then, John Thomas was simply attempting to assess a creed, into which he had been hastily enrolled, as to its logical consistency. He was not so much certain that he had found it wanting, as certain that he needed answers. Equally certainly, the community – at least as represented by some of its leaders – of which he was asking these questions was rather panicked at their very searching nature and, instead of interpreting the thrusts of his queries as the probings of disinterested inquiry, assessed them as wounds rendered by a wolf in sheep’s clothing. This vicious circle of antipathy accelerated during the years to come – mutual suspicion breeding mutual suspicion. The doctor’s arguments were unanswered; he came to believe they were unanswerable; and, to justify his suspicions, he probed further, but – silence came the stern reply!

For their part, the Campbellite leaders were astounded at the virility of his questioning mind and assumed the worst; in turn, when further questionings probed deeper, their worst suspicions seemed confirmed . . . until a break came.

In detail, this logic worked out as follows. In the October 1834 edition of The Apostolic Advocate, an article was published which provoked a furore in the correspondence column of the magazine over the following months. Thomas, along with others, reassessed his position and, in December 1835, produced a list of 34 questions under the heading ‘Information Wanted’.

These 34 questions were regarded by his critics as representative of opinions already held rather than open-ended queries. The emphatic way in which the points behind the questions were put made this interpretation easy to understand. Perhaps, subconsciously, John Thomas’s mind had already changed; but, in his own estimation, he still felt undecided. It was, he said, ‘their violent attacks, [which] threw him upon the defensive, and compelled him to fortify.’

A whole avalanche of consequences followed from the 34 questions, in this way. Alexander Campbell, in his magazine The Millennial Harbinger, began to attack John Thomas. These attacks were not only of a courteous, expositional or theoretical nature, but also contained ad hominem verbal assaults. In The Apostolic Advocate, Thomas reprinted Campbell’s articles, together with detailed analyses and refutations. The effect was, not unnaturally, to annoy Campbell even more.

Once again, with the start of a new magazine, Thomas’s latent energies and thought-processes were activated and galvanized. From the start of the Herald of the Future Age in 1844 to Thomas’s final organisational break with the Campbellites (in the shape of his ‘Confession and Abjuration’ and ‘Declaration’) was a step occupying only three years. Indeed, even before 1847, traits of a distinct independence movement were discernible. For instance, during 1844, in the first year of the Herald of the Future Age, Thomas removed to Richmond, Virginia, and stayed with a friend called Richard Malone. Together, they visited the Campbellite church of which Malone was a member, in a neighbouring town. Dr. Thomas, who was known to the locals, was invited to speak. Once again, the assembled congregation was polarised by the message of a Thomæan sermon. One section was so bitterly in opposition that Malone was expelled from the church; another group, however, was so impressed by Thomas that they broke off relations with the Campbellites and started a small church group run totally independently of the Campbellite assemblies. This, it seems, was the very first glimmer of organisation in what were, by 1848, to be known as ‘Baptised Believers in the Gospel of the Kingdom of God’ and, by 1864, as ‘Christadelphian ecclesias’. 

In October 1846, John Thomas visited New York for the first time in fourteen years. As ever, he was invited to speak in the local Campbellite church. This occasion marked the delivery of the ‘Ten Lectures’, later transformed in the pages of the Herald of the Future Age into a series of thirty points. In this course of addresses, Thomas set out to establish the earthly literality of the kingdom of God. He concluded, later, concerning the effect of his preaching then:

‘They no longer revel in the fancy sketches of wild and vain imaginings; they look for the realization of the promises made to the fathers Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and David; . . . They can no longer sing

“With thee we’ll reign, With thee we’ll rise, And kingdoms gain Beyond the skies!”

but, with the saints gathered unto Jesus, the New Song saying, ‘thou, Lamb of God . . . hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign ON EARTH.—Rev. v. 9.’

Despite the obviously radical nature of his message, some of his brethren clung to Thomas. He was, indeed, invited after these lectures to become the permanent preacher to a New York congregation, but, again, declined the offer.

A variety of commentators, including Thomas himself, have recognised the importance of the year 1847 in the development of both Thomæan theology and the organisation of believers which he himself began. The vital occasion was a day in February, when an article in The Protestant Unionist by Revd. J. H. Jones attracted John Thomas’s attention. This article, written by a Campbellite, attacked the fundamentals which Thomas had been seeking to propound. What startled Thomas was not that he had been attacked, or that new scriptures had been brought to bear of which he had been unaware – it was, rather, that he saw, clearly, for the first time that he had, in fact, become separate from the foundation on which the Campbellite creed was grounded. Following logically from this, the baptism with which he had been baptised so hurriedly in the Miami Canal was, he now believed, an inadequate one, since the knowledge-base upon which he had accepted the need for this rite was equal to that of the Campbellites – those from whose views he now so fundamentally differed.

Thus it was that Thomas asked a New York friend of his to re-baptise him. He said:

‘All I ask of you is to put me under the water, and pronounce the words over me, “Upon confession of your faith in the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, I baptize you into the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” I don’t ask you for any prayer or any ceremony. All that is necessary I will do for myself, except the mechanical part of putting me under the water, and your utterance of these words.’

The year 1847 saw the production, by Thomas, of his ‘Confession and Abjuration’, and ‘Declaration’—a full and clear statement of a new and different basis of faith from that on which Campbellism stood. It was dated 3 March 1847.

In the same year, Thomas produced his ‘Twenty Propositions’, along similar lines. In his own words, he had ‘illustrated and proved the . . . propositions to the conviction of increasing numbers’. In the same year, again, he proposed a debate with Alexander Campbell. This was to take the shape of counterpoised analyses on the issue of the nature of man and the immortality of the soul, written, alternately, in Campbell’s Millennial Harbinger and in Thomas’s Herald of the Future Age.

For the first time, Thomas now felt sure enough in his own mind of the security of the grounds of his belief that he set out actively to evangelise those who were, in his view, still in darkness. He was not, now, questioning or querulous: now he was fired by the zeal of certain conviction. He made a tour of the U.S.A., visiting places where he knew there were Campbellites disposed favourably towards him – places such as Baltimore, New York and Buffalo. In these places, he gave addresses on the kingdom of God, the return of the Jews to Palestine, and prophetic subjects in general.

In addition to touring Campbellite strongholds, Dr. Thomas visited Millerite assemblies. These, however, were still at this point predisposed to the view that the earth’s history was likely to be brought to a sudden end, and so found distasteful the long-drawn-out timetable suggested by the idea of the regathering of Jews from all over the world to the land of Palestine, prior to the setting up of the kingdom of God.

Thomas’s visit to Nottingham was interesting. It grew out of controversy amongst the Campbellites. In seven days during his stay there, he spoke thirteen times, in the Assembly Rooms, to packed congregations, including reporters ‘from the several journals issued in the town’. These included The Nottingham Review and The Nottingham Mercury, in both of which extensive reviews of Thomas’s talks were printed. Notwithstanding being in receipt of an invitation from the Millerites, Thomas had the temerity to lay bare what he felt were the weaknesses of the Millerite faith before his audiences, lecturing, ultimately, on the restoration of Israel (their bête noire) and the coming conflict between Russia and Britain over the Middle East.

Nottingham, which had been the headquarters of Campbellism in Britain, became, for many years, the town with the largest number of ‘Baptised Believers in the Gospel of the Kingdom of God’ in England. Not only was its size greatest – until a dispute in the 1870s – but also the growth-rate of the Nottingham ecclesia of Baptised Believers outstripped all others, including Birmingham.

At Derby, Thomas spoke in the Mechanics’ Institute, (the local Bench having opposed the use of the Town Hall for the occasion) and, on successive nights, was listened to by audiences of about a thousand. Further talks were given by Dr. Thomas in the Assembly Rooms, the Mechanics’ Institute Committee having decided to follow in the wake of the town magistrates by refusing Thomas’s supporters further lettings.

At Lincoln, Thomas gave lectures in the Council Chamber and in the house of his friends. Two interesting consequences followed from the delivery of his talks at Lincoln. One was that the town’s Unitarian minister urged Thomas to publish the subject matter of his lectures. This type of request was to be made again later, in Glasgow and Edinburgh, and was the basis of Thomas lengthening his stay in Britain to write and publish his first major work, Elpis Israel (The Hope of Israel). The second consequence was that, before Thomas left Lincoln, two individuals were baptised into the faith he was propounding. Whilst congregations had previously been known to side with him in disputes and to follow his teachings, this was the first record of someone, besides John Thomas himself, being baptised into a baptism extra to the Campbellite one. Thus, this August 1848 visit to Lincoln was a crucial turning point.

Members of the Newark Bethanian (Campbellite) Congregation, having heard Dr. Thomas’s Lincoln lectures, canvassed influential members of their church to invite him to speak to them. Although one of their ‘respected elders’, Newark bank manager John Bell, refused to sanction ‘an official invitation’, an unofficial invitation, and visit, did take place, though it was deferred until November 1848 because of Thomas’s impending tour of Scotland. However, Bell’s attitude was to change when, after hearing Thomas’s lectures, and in prospect of a second (1849) visit, he gave his undertaking to support Thomas in making ‘all necessary arrangements’ for his comfort ‘and for the accommodation of the public.’

From Glasgow, at this point, and supported by Edinburgh subsequently, came a request that the Doctor should not merely disappear to America, having lit the torch of truth, but should stay awhile and make permanent the effects of his teaching by codifying them in a book. Such encouragement brought about Dr. Thomas’s commitment to the production of Elpis Israel and, ultimately, the rather lengthy extension, by almost two years, of his tour to Britain.

Before he would allow himself opportunity to write, however, John Thomas felt obliged to complete his speaking tour of Scotland and the Midlands, which he did – after a brief respite, in the West of Scotland, from the pressures of frequent and lengthy speaking. Despite his holiday, when he returned to his duties in Edinburgh on 27 October 1848, the tensions of speaking soon began to tell on him again.

Of his visit to Edinburgh, Thomas wrote:

‘Our audiences were drawn neither from the high nor low, but from the odds and ends of Edinburgh, who in every city are the most independent and Berean of the population. We addressed them some ten or a dozen times, mostly at the Waterloo Assembly Room, in Princes street [sic], a spacious and elegant apartment, and capable of seating some thousand to fifteen hundred people. The impression made upon them was strong, and, for the time, caused many to rejoice that Providence had ever directed our steps to Edinburgh. Our expositions of the sure word of prophecy interested them greatly, causing our company to be sought for at the domestic hearth incessantly, to hear us talk of the things of the kingdom and name of Jesus, and to solve whatever doubts and difficulties previous indoctrination might originate in regard to the things we teach.

Our new friends had but little mercy upon us in their demands upon our time. They seemed to think that premeditation was unnecessary; and that we had nothing to do but to open our mouth, and out would fly a speech! Of our two hundred and fifty addresses in Britain, all were extemporized as delivered. There was no help for it, seeing we had to go oftener than otherwise from parlor conversation to the work before us in the lecture-room.—Indeed, our nervous system was so wearied by unrest that we could not have studied a discourse. Present necessity was indispensable to set our brain to work. Certain subjects were advertised, and had to be expounded. We knew, therefore, what was to be treated of; and, happily, understanding “the Word of the Kingdom,” we had but to tell the people what it taught, and to sustain it by reason and testimony. In this way we got along independently of stationary [sic] and sermon-studying, which would have broke [sic] us down completely, and would have absorbed more time than our friends allowed us.’

Indeed, Thomas was so much in need of rest that, right at the end of his tour, in 1850, he was to spend two weeks on the Continent, mainly in the Netherlands, Germany and France before departing Britain for America.

Having returned to London, Thomas commenced work on his first book, Elpis Israel. Of the initial (January and February 1849) period he said: ‘For six weeks, the world without was a mere blank . . . for during that period I had no use for hat, boots, or shoes, oscillating, as it were, like a pendulum between two points, the couch above, and the desk below.’ In the months following he busied himself in producing this book, entrusting to those who had requested it the task of collecting a list of subscribers. Despite the business of his schedule, Thomas found time to deliver ‘two discourses at Camden Town, and two at a small lecture room near my residence, and an opposition speech at a Peace-Society [sic] meeting’.

Having completed the Elpis Israel manuscript Thomas set out, in 1849, on a second tour of Britain seeking subscribers for its publication; and, following its January 1850 publication, a third tour was commenced. These tours included certain towns he had been unable to visit in 1848, such as Lanark, Dundee, Aberdeen, Plymouth, Devonport, Liverpool and Birmingham, and also those previously visited, such as Derby, Newark, Paisley, Glasgow and Edinburgh.

The visit to Dundee, like those to many other towns, was born out of interest stirred by locals having heard John Thomas speak elsewhere and, then, inviting him to their home town. The visit began amicably enough. However, this changed when one of the Campbellite bishops was converted to Thomas’s way of thinking. At once, the atmosphere became electric! Thomas’s Campbellite friend, Mr. Lamb, who had entertained him with affection, became very hostile. A bitter atmosphere remained to be savoured by the new converts Thomas left in his wake.

A friend later wrote to him about the nascent Dundee Ecclesia:

‘Persecution has now assumed a very formidable appearance against us in Dundee. The first step was the deposition of him you baptized from what they term “the bishop’s office:”, and strange to tell, this has been done while as yet he has not opened his mouth upon any subject in the meeting since you were here. James Ainslie and company have become determined to check “the new night” in the bud; but contrary to their expectation the blade has made its appearance, and a stalk of no inconsiderable size has already sprung up. Since I last wrote, five have been baptized. Two of these have delivered addresses to the brethren upon the subjects of the “new light” which have thrown the people into a complete consternation. On Sunday week the deposed bishop is advertized to give a trial discourse before the church, on the “new doctrines” before he can be again elevated to the bishopric; which he says he will do in earnest.’

In Aberdeen, a number of subscribers to the Herald of the Future Age were visited by Dr. Thomas. Several of them were baptised while Thomas was in the town, and attended a breaking of bread service with him that same week. Even where Thomas’s visits did not reach, his influence was pervasive. For example, at Cumnock, in Ayrshire, Thomas’s followers, isolated from other ‘Baptised Believers’, made their existence known by writing to Thomas’s Herald of the Future Age magazine in May 1850. In other places, which he did visit, the effect of his influence was delayed, causing James Murray of Lanark, for instance, to be baptised four years after Thomas’s visit. On his return visit to Newark, Thomas’s efforts were effective though, again, the effects were delayed for some time. He spoke in the town on 7 July 1849, but the first indication of any success did not occur until the Nottingham Fraternal Gathering received delegates from the Newark Ecclesia a decade later. By that point, the Newark Ecclesia was sixteen members strong.

John Thomas’s April 1850 visit to Devonport and Plymouth stemmed from contacts provided, in 1848, by friends in Nottingham – possibly Millerites. Thomas’s initial contact was a man he named ‘Mr. Wood’, a former Millerite pastor then ministering to a Plymouth assembly of seventy. The Mechanics’ Institutes at Plymouth and Devonport were hired for lectures, which were delivered at intervals over an eighteen day period. At Devonport, the audiences rose to several hundred; the hearers were interested; forty-six copies of Elpis Israel were sold; and an ecclesia of seventeen members was started as a result. Over the next decade, the ecclesia in this naval town had problems with the immoral living of some of its members and, by 1859, it had shrunk to only nine. Although Thomas visited Liverpool and handbills were distributed, attendance at the meetings was disappointing and no ecclesia was started. No mention was made of ‘brethren’ until the publication of the Church Roll in August 1859.

John Thomas sailed for New York on 11 October 1850, well satisfied with the effects of his labours in Britain to that date.

From 1848, it is necessary to make a division in the narrative between the history of the Baptised Believers in Britain and that of the Bible Christians in the U.S.A. This is because, after the lecture tour of 1848, a spiritual momentum continued in Britain amongst Baptised Believers in the Gospel of the Kingdom of God despite the absence in the U.S.A. of John Thomas.

These two accounts are only brought together again in the person of John Thomas on the occasions of his remaining two visits to Britain – that is, in 1862 and 1869. They would have merged permanently from 1871 had not premature death prevented him from retiring to a country house at Olton, to the south of Birmingham.

Whilst it is true that Thomas, during his original visit, had paid approximately equal attention to the North and East Midlands on the one hand and to Scotland on the other, it is also the case that, in his absence, the momenta of the two places developed at very different rates, with Scotland much more vigorous. Table 1 below shows the number of British ecclesias developed in the period 1848–1864.

Two thirds of the ecclesias in Britain before 1864 were located in Scotland. The membership was divided in approximately similar proportions. Christmas Evans, in his series in The Christadelphian magazine, written over the period 1956–1963, noticed this phenomenon, too. He stated:

‘It would appear that Scotland was at first the home of the Truth in Great Britain, seeing that it sounded out more from there than from any other part of the British Isles. This may be largely due to the energies of such men as brethren George Dowie, John Forman, James and Richard Cameron, Tait, Laing, Mitchell, Ellis, Duncan, and of course the Norrie family and the well-remembered Robert Roberts.’

William Norrie, in his Early History, indicated that England’s Christadelphians were in such a state of ecclesial chaos in the 1850s that visits from Scots brethren, especially from Edinburgh, were required to stabilise the situation.

By 1862, Dr. Thomas, who had received a number of requests from Britain to pay a second visit for a lecturing tour, was contemplating doing just that, since, with his house on the Unionist side of the battle lines, and many of his followers living on the Confederate side, the continuance of his pastoral and didactic duties in America was proving impossible.

He landed in Liverpool in May 1862, and undertook what he described as ‘a very arduous tour’, visiting Huddersfield, Halifax, Leeds, Edinburgh, Birmingham, Nottingham, London and other places. Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come readers visited these centres from a great distance to hear Dr. Thomas, their magazine’s editor, speak; a certain John Richards visited Birmingham from Montgomery, Wales, for that purpose.

Despite baptising a number of his hearers, including, on 20 July, the said John Richards, Thomas was reputedly disappointed with the results of his efforts.

However, two very notable changes took place as a direct consequence of his visit. Thomas, later, summarised these events as follows:

‘I recollect when I was in Nottingham, I saw brother Roberts who had come from Huddersfield on a visit to meet me there. I suggested to brother Roberts that it would be much better for him to come to Birmingham than to waste his sweetness on the desert air of Huddersfield ... I also suggested he should commence a periodical. You know the rest.’

This advice was followed out. By July 1864 Robert Roberts had not only moved himself to Birmingham, but had also published the first issue of The Ambassador of the Coming Age magazine (later renamed The Christadelphian). It was, from the first, Roberts’s magazine; indeed, he wrote the whole of volume one, number one, himself, (apart from the ‘Intelligence’ reports section), and the bulk of succeeding numbers, too.

This periodical became, at once, the organisational pivot of the ‘Baptised Believers’ in Britain. Roberts was good at organisation – he was a sharp, accurate, thorough newspaper reporter by profession. As a staff member of the Birmingham Daily Post, he was highly commended by John Bright, M.P., who always asked for his Birmingham speeches to be covered by Robert Roberts.

Thus, whereas the ‘Baptised Believers’ had been bedevilled by muddle, disorganisation, lack of information about each other and lack of definition about their very status vis-à-vis each other, Roberts produced from the chaos, a neat, well-oiled machine that ticked over nicely. In this development lay some of the seeds both of sweet success during the period 1864–1885, and of a more bitter harvest, reaped from 1885.

Throughout this entire period, John Thomas’s routine was full of travelling for the purpose of building up the American ecclesias. He continued this heavy schedule even when he was ill, and also maintained his work as a writer, editor, correspondent and debater. The record of his itinerary alone presents the reader with an exhausting experience. Many of his lecture tours extended over periods of weeks. On Sundays, he would give two-and-a-half-hour addresses, and would give talks of equal length each week night. In the Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come for 1851, he described an experience he had when, having been ill, he ventured out, rather early in convalescence, to a three day meeting, to which a number of other speakers had been invited: 

‘We expected to meet two or three brethren at the meetings who would take upon themselves the labor of formally addressing the people, while we should have nothing else to do but to prove by our presence our willingness to speak to them, but our inability from extreme weakness to do it. Our dismay was considerable, however, when we found that they had not arrived, and that the work of faith and labor of love must be performed by us alone. Our principle is that difficulties which cannot be avoided must be met and overcome. It is bad policy to make appointments and not fulfil them. We therefore determined to do what we could, and to try to discourse even if we had to come to an abrupt and speedy conclusion. The first appointment was a three days meeting at Acquinton. A brother who accompanied us from Richmond attended to the preliminaries, after which, we, following the example of Jesus (not being able to stand) “sat down and taught the people.” At first our friends did not think we should be able to hold out fifteen minutes; but though weak in body the subject was itself an inspiration, and to our own surprise we spoke with comparative ease on the Representative Men of the prophetic word for upwards of two hours.

Encouraged by our success in this effort we did not doubt but we should be able to get along from day to day as the appointed times came round. We were strengthened by the consideration that sufficient to the day is the evil thereof; so that it was quite unnecessary to assume the evil of many days and lay it all upon one. We experienced, however, some relief from the fact, that one of the brethren announced to take part in the meetings, arrived at Acquinton on Lord’s day; so that had we proved unable to occupy the time there was help at hand to supply our place and to make up our deficiencies. He remained with us all the week, and was no little assistance to us in conducting the worship, and leaving us only the pleasant labor of “persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God,” and of “declaring all his counsel” to the people. “We spoke at Acquinton on three successive days; two days after at a school house; and on Saturday and Sunday at the old state-church house called West Point. At all these meetings put together we spoke about twelve hours and a half on things pertaining to the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ; and instead of increasing our debility, we recruited our physical energy every day. In our own person then we have proved, that the truth is an inspiration which gives health to the soul, through which it operates nothing but good to the outward man . . .”’

Civil War Restrictions

From 1859 until the end of the Civil War in 1865, restrictions were placed upon Thomas’s movements, although, at first, he was able to visit subscribers to the Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come in the South, which he did in 1860. In 1861, he again travelled South, crossing through the actual war zones, in order to visit believers.

War also brought certain other difficulties – it forced Thomas to consider carefully the attitude of the Christian to war. In the Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come for September 1861, an amended version of an article by H. Grattan Guinness appeared entitled ‘The Duty of Christians in the present Crisis’. The amendments, by Thomas, clearly indicated that a Bible Christian’s duty was not to fight literal battles.

Various consequences flowed from the serious limitations on John Thomas’s travel. One was a second visit to Britain; another was increasing concentration on a Christian duty which could be carried out from his home base, namely writing. It was in this period that the labours of twelve years’ digging were allowed to bear fruit in the shape of Eureka—Thomas’s mammoth exposition of the Apocalypse—volume one being produced in February 1861, volume two in January 1866 and volume three in November 1868. 

Despite the War, and despite his work as an author, Thomas found that he was still able to do some travelling in the Northern States of America. In 1864, for example, he covered 3,000 miles in these Northern States and in Canada. The American Civil War was also important in that it wrung out of the ‘Bible Christians’ (USA) and ‘Baptised Believers in the Gospel of the Kingdom of God’ (UK) a more terse, if less pronounceable, label, by which they, in almost all of their different permutations, have been known ever since—the name ‘Christadelphians’. 

In 1864, on visiting Illinois, Thomas encountered a great degree of anxiety amongst the brethren there about the forthcoming military draft. In calming their fears, the term ‘Christadelphian’ was formulated. Thomas himself described the birth of this new name in the following extracts from a long letter detailing the events of his 1864 tour:

‘. . . I told [the Illinois brethren] that the Federal law exempted all who belonged to a Denomination conscientiously opposed to bearing arms on condition of paying 300 dollars, finding a substitute, or serving in the hospitals. This excluded all the known denominations except the Quakers; for besides this denomination, they not only proclaimed the fighting for country a christian virtue; but were all commingled in the unhallowed and sanguinary conflict. There was, however, a Denomination not known to the ignorance of legislative wisdom. It was relatively very small, but nevertheless a Denomination and a Name, contrary to, and distinct from, all others upon earth . . . It would be necessary to give the Name a denominational appellative, that being so denominated, they might have wherewith to answer the Inquisitors . . . I did not know a better denomination that would be given to such a class of believers than “Brethren in Christ.” This declares that true status; and, as officials prefer words to phrases, the same fact is expressed in another form by the word Christadelphians, or Χριστου αδελφοι Christ’s Brethren. This matter settled to their satisfaction, I wrote for them the following certificate :—

“This is to certify, that S. W. Coffman (the names of the ten male members in full here) and others constitute a Religious Association denominated herein, for the sake of distinguishing them from all other “Names and Denominations,” Brethren in Christ, or in one word, Christadelphians; and that said brethren are in fellowship with similar associations in England, Scotland, the British Provinces, New York and other cities of the North and South—New York being for the time present the Radiating Centre of their testimony to the people of the current age and generation of the world . . .

“This is also further to certify that the undersigned is the personal instrumentality by which the Christian Association aforesaid in Britain and America have been developed within the last fifteen years, and that therefore he knows assuredly that a conscientious, determined, and uncompromising opposition to serving in the armies of “the Powers that be” is their denominational characteristic. In confirmation of this, he appeals to the definition of its position in respect to war on p. 13 of a pamphlet entitled “Yahweh Elohim,” issued by the Antipas Association of Christadelphians assembling at 24, Cooper Institute, New York, and with which he ordinarily convenes. Advocates of war and desolation are not in fellowship with them or with the undersigned,

“John Thomas.”’

In July 1864, the export of Dr. Thomas’s Heralds having ceased three years previously, Robert Roberts commenced production of The Ambassador and a new chapter began in the history of the Baptised Believers.

John Thomas’s conversion from the Campbellites to what became the Christadelphians was no ‘Damascus Road’ affair: his views matured slowly during the period 1832 to 1847. By 1847, he had sympathisers; by 1848, he was the de facto leader of a new sect, having himself baptised the first converts to it; yet, still, he was unclear on certain matters – especially, though not only, regarding fellowship. The baptism of individuals into a faith with lots of vigour, enthusiasm and spirituality, but with no fixed creed, was not a recipe for tranquillity. This state of affairs largely explained why Thomas’s converts were spiritually diverse. The subsequent concentration of authority in the hands of Robert Roberts, and Roberts’s penchant for clarity of thought, and intermittent casuistry, in matters spiritual, accounted for much of the turbulence in the years following 1864, when Roberts became founding editor of The Ambassador. The strong-minded individualism of some of these early pre-1864 converts constitutes part of the explanation of how the post-1864 turbulence created schism early in the sect’s existence: two splinter-groups emerging within a decade of 1864.

Thomas' exposition of Bible prophecy led to him making various detailed predictions about then current-day events many of which did not come to pass, as was noted in the foreword to subsequent editions of Elpis Israel after his death, a point that Thomas himself accepted could happen. 

On 5 May 1868, Thomas returned to England where he travelled extensively giving lecturers about the Gospel message and meeting with Christadelphians in England.
During this period of his life he found extensive support and help from Robert Roberts who had been converted during a previous visit to England by Thomas. Following his return to America, he made one final tour of the Christadelphian congregations prior to his death on 5 March 1871 in Jersey City.

 He was buried in the Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.