100593 | IRELAND. Samuel Bates engraved copper Methodist Token.

100593 | IRELAND. Samuel Bates engraved copper Token. Dated 1786. Commemorating the Wesleyan Methodist preacher (28mm, 8.73 g, 7h).

 

Bates seated slightly left upon rock below overhanging tree, preaching from scriptures / "S. Bates / 1786" in stylized script.

 

Virtually as engraved. Host coin worn smooth, engraving with a few old deposits. A charming and interesting piece of Wesleyan exonumia.

 

Though a native of Yorkshire in England, Samuel Bates found himself in Northern Ireland as a traveling preacher. In November 1785, John Wesley, the leader of a revival movement within the Church of England, wrote to Samuel urging him into his Methodist itinerancy. Bates accepted, and began his ministry at Lisburn the next year–the likely cause for the commemorative engraving on this token. He followed this with a stay at Charlemont in 1787, two years in Omagh from 1788-9, and then a return to Charlemont as a supernumerary minister from 1790 until his death in 1803.

 

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