William Booth -- Founder of the Salvation Army Quiz

Answer: 1829

William Booth was born April 10, 1829. Before founding the Salvation Army, he was a Methodist preacher in England. Booth's wife Catherine (nee Mumford) was born about three months before him, on January 17, 1829. She is regarded as a co-founder of the Salvation Army.

As stated in the question, 1829 was the year in which the first Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race took place and Andrew Jackson was inaugurated as the seventh president of the United States.

In Canada, in 1829, the first Welland Canal was officially opened. It was also the same year the Swan River Colony was founded in Western Australia. The colony would later become home of the cities of Perth and Fremantle.

Answer: Nottingham

William Booth, the first general of the Salvation Army was born in Sneinton, a suburb of Nottingham, England. Booth's wife Catherine was born in Ashbourne, Derbyshire.

In addition to being the setting for the Robin Hood legend, Nottingham today is known for the hilltop Nottingham Castle Museum and Art Gallery. The city is also home of the William Booth Birthplace Museum which attracts visitors from around the world.

Answer: pawnbroker

Before becoming a full-time Methodist minister when he was twenty-three years old, William Booth worked as a pawnbroker. According to Wikipedia, Booth was born into a middle class family that was relatively wealthy by the standards of the day, but things changed dramatically in the early 1840s when the family became impoverished. Booth's father, Samuel, could no longer afford his son's school fees and at the age of thirteen, William Booth apprenticed with a pawnbroker. That same year, Booth's father died and the family's financial situation become even worse.

At the age of fifteen, and after being a pawnbroker for two years, Booth became a member of the Methodist Church.

Answer: London

William and Catherine Booth conducted their first series of evangelistic meetings in the slums of East London. They preached a message of accepting Jesus Christ as a personal Savior and Lord and becoming a "new creation in Christ", as per 2 Corinthians 15:7. Before long, the poorest of the poor, alcoholics, criminals and prostitutes started accepting the Booths' invitation to accept Jesus into their hearts.

According to various Websites, the Booths had found their personal calling and knew that they would be devoting the rest of their lives to preaching the Gospel message to the impoverished masses.

Answer: The Christian Mission

William and Catherine Booth called their ministry The Christian Mission when they first started reaching out to the destitute and the handicapped. They held Christian revival meetings nightly and the numbers swelled as people stepped forward and accepted Booth's message to receive Jesus into their hearts and follow Christ.

Many of Booth's converts were hardened criminals, alcoholics and prostitutes. The Booths practised what they preached. In addition to leading the people of the slums to Christ, they opened soup kitchens and helped the destitute in a variety of different ways, including helping them gain employment.

Answer: 1865

William and Catherine Booth started their Christian outreach to the impoverish people in 1865, the same year in which U.S. President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated.

A number of other significant events took place in 1865. It was the same year James Hudson Taylor started the China Inland Mission at Brighton, England. Meanwhile, the first train robbery in the United States took place in North Bend, Ohio, in 1865. Also, it was during 1865 that Jumbo, a young African elephant, arrived at the London Zoo and became a popular attraction.

Answer: True

William and Catherine Booth faced immense opposition in their early days. It seems everyone, from those who manufactured alcoholic drinks to some of those in organized churches, were vehemently opposed.

The manufacturers of alcoholic drinks were concerned about Booth's evangelistic efforts cutting into their bottom line while Lord Shaftesbury, a philanthropist, politician and evangelist described Booth as the "Anti-Christ." In the early days, the Church of England was highly critical of Booth's actions.

In her writings, Catherine Booth tells of her husband who would "stumble home night after night haggard with fatigue, often his clothes were torn and bloody bandages swathed his head where a stone had struck."

There was even a group called the Skeleton Army that opposed Booth and the Salvation Army by a variety of means. Skeleton Army members would do whatever possible to oppose Booth. They would attempt to disrupt gatherings and would assault Salvationists. According to Wikipedia, in 1882 six hundred and sixty-two Salvation Army soldiers were assaulted: two hundred and fifty-one of them were women and twenty-three of them were under fifteen years of age. The Skeleton Army group started to lose traction in the early 1890s.

On top of all this, Booth and Salvation Army members often faced a hostile press. Some even accused Booth of preaching a message of salvation to slum residents simply to line his pockets. However, there was absolutely no proof of the charge.

Answer: True

True. In his latter years, William Booth was warmly received by royalty and admired by the media. At one time, the world scoffed when Booth gave military titles to Salvation Army members -- referring to them as soldiers, lieutenants, captains, etc. and calling himself, the organization's leader, the general. Early on, most newspapers refused to use the title general in connection with Booth's name, but later there was an abrupt change with the media calling him General Booth as a term of endearment.

After a while, the accolades and acknowledgements were almost endless. Some examples are in 1902 Booth was invited to attend the coronation of King Edward VII and in 1906 London made Booth a Freeman of the city. It is the highest honor London bestows on an individual. The same year, he received an honorary degree from Oxford.

And the accolades continue today. In 1999, Agriculture Canada, a department of the federal government, developed what it called the William Booth rose. Then in 2002, a poll conducted by the BBC revealed Booth among the 100 Greatest Britons of all time.

When Booth died in 1912 at age 83, it is estimated 150,000 people filed past his coffin.

Answer: True

William Booth wrote a number of books and hymns but the exact number is difficult to determine as some of it has been lost to time. Various websites offer different accounts of Booth's contributions when it comes to books and hymns.

However, the consensus is he easily wrote more than forty books with 'Darkest England and the Way Out' being a best seller. The book was published in 1890 and according to Christianhistoryinstitute.org it "aroused more public interest than any other book since Henry George's 'Progress and Poverty'." The book can still be purchased today at a variety of on-line book-selling sites.

A FunTrivia friend of mine who is a captain with the Salvation Army and who wishes to stay anonymous, explains things this way when it comes to differing figures about the number of books Booth wrote: "The Salvation Army publishes their own books. Since Booth was the founder, they published just about everything that he wrote, and most of is is lost to time."

The same holds true when it comes to the number of hymns written by Booth.

My FunTrivia friend goes on to explain: "Likewise the Salvation Army published all of their own music as well, and every time they updated their song books, some stayed, some left, and some were added."

It's highly interesting to note Booth wrote many songs using familiar tunes of the day. As a result, it was not uncommon to have a song with a profound theological message set to the tune of a bar-drinking song.

"It is easier to sing when you already know the tune," my Salvation Army friend says. "Booth once said, 'Why should the Devil have all the best tunes'?"

"I would say he wrote maybe a hundred hymns, but most have found their way into the memory banks of the saints," my friend says.

Booth's masterpiece is called 'The Founder's Song', or 'O Boundless Salvation', according to my friend.

The song has a profound Gospel message set to music loosely using the familiar tune of 'My Jesus I Love Thee'.

"I suggest that you YouTube that one and listen a few times," my friend says. "It will quickly become your favorite song. The seventh verse ends with the words 'O boundless Salvation, for you and for me'."

My Salvation Army friend says he never makes it all the way through the hymn without becoming "profoundly emotional."

William and Catherine Booth had eight children and most of them also wrote a number of books and hymns.

Answer: All of them are by Booth.

All three quotes were made by William Booth. In addition to being a tireless evangelist for Christ and a helper to those in need, Booth was known for colorful quotes. Here's an example of some of his quotes:

-- "God loves with a great love the man whose heart is bursting with a passion for the impossible."

-- "No sort of defense is needed for preaching outdoors, but it would take a very strong argument to prove that a man who has never preached beyond the walls of his meetinghouse has done his duty. A defense is required for services within buildings rather than for worship outside of them."

-- "I consider that the chief dangers which confront the coming century will be religion without the Holy Ghost; Christianity without Christ; forgiveness without repentance; salvation without regeneration; politics without God; and Heaven without Hell."

-- "We are not sent to minister to a congregation and be content if we keep things going. We are sent to make war and to stop short of nothing but the subjugation of the world to the sway of the Lord Jesus."

-- "Work as if everything depended upon work and pray as if everything depended upon prayer."

-- "Look! Don't be deceived by appearances -- men and things are not what they seem. All who are not on the rock are in the sea!"

-- "If I thought I could win one more soul to the Lord by walking on my head and playing the tambourine with my toes, I'd learn how!"

Read more: https://www.christianquotes.info/quotes-by-author/william-booth-quotes/#ixzz5HI1WwUTB


Booth died in 1912 with no less than 150,000 people filing past his coffin. It is estimated his funeral service was attended by 40,000 people, including Queen Mary. Booth's funeral procession consisted of 10,000 Salvation Army members in uniform while no less than forty Salvation Army bands played the 'Dead March'.

One hundred and fifty years after it was founded, The Salvation Army operates in more than 125 different countries with a world-wide membership of 1.5 million people.