PETER CARTWRIGHT: Pioneer Circuit Rider

For more than fifty years Peter Cartwright missionized for the Methodist Church, first as a circuit speaker (""preach, pray, and pack""), then as a ""located"" clergyman. His was a busy life: the rigors of his vocation, the needs of a wife and nine children, a brief political career. A strong opponent of slavery, he precipitated a schism in his church by calling for a unified stand against the institution. He knew Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln as friends, preferred the energies of a camp meeting to the reserve of a Boston service, and evidently never made a mistake in his life. This highly fictionalized biography follows his life closely, yet fails to offer substantial insight into his psychological anatomy. Like The Spider of Brooklyn Heights (1967, p. 138, J-50), he does sound exceptionally well-motivated and a bit stiff.