© MARGARET MARKLEW

JJ’s Goodwin Ancestors  

Reference to JJ’s Methodist ancestors can be found in the John Rylands Library, Manchester, England.  It is evident that the family was very proud of John Goodwin, who, as an early associate of Fletcher and Wesley did much to establish the framework of chapels that was to form the basis of the later surge in the influence of Methodism.  It is important to note that early Methodists saw themselves as working within the Church of England and many had an innate conservatism that in many cases led them back to the Anglican Church. They wanted the Established Church to stop being elitist and go out to the people in the industrialising parts of the country.   Fletcher, John Goodwin’s friend, was Vicar of Madely in Shropshire in a rapidly industrialising part of Britain now known as “the cradle of the industrial revolution”.

John Goodwin’s third son, Josiah attended a school at Kingswood near Bristol which Wesley established according to his theories of education. The boys were separated from their families from the age of six or seven onward, and had no holidays.  Play was not allowed, and the school day started at 5.00 am.   Josiah Goodwin seems to have thrived in this regime, becoming a scholar of Latin, Ancient Greek and Hebrew, before leaving to become a tutor to young gentlemen. He was not permitted to follow his father into the Methodist itinerancy until his father died in 1808. He was an itinerant minister for 44 years, and died in Birmingham aged 81.

A letter dated 1833 from Josiah to his son also called Josiah expresses his strong religious convictions