David Huddleston: A Plain Friend and his Journal

DAVID HUDDLESTON (1801-1890) (See article on pages 75-91) DAVID HUDDLESTON A PLAIN FRIEND AND HIS JOURNAL By Opal Thornburg* READERS of The Friend (Philadelphia) in the decade 1880-90 were well acquainted with the name of David Huddleston of Dublin, Indiana, whose articles and poems on religious topics appeared at frequent intervals. The Friends Review (Philadelphia) and The British Friend (Glasgow) occasionally published such articles by him, and even The Western Friend (Baxter Springs, Kansas) and The Christian Worker (Chicago), although the two last named were less receptive because of differences in views. An editorial in The Friend by Joseph Walton soon after David Huddleston's death stated, "He bore a faithful testimony against the departure from [Friends] principles, which, of latter time, have received the countenance of so many of its members. A few years before his death he twice attended Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, and visited considerably among Friends in these parts. The humility, tenderness of spirit, and sweetness of disposition which he then manifested, endeared him to many."1 But the most valuable of David Huddleston's writings have never been published except a small portion which appeared recently in this Bulletin.2 Their very existence has been unknown until three years ago except by members of his family. These writings consist of twenty-eight small notebook journals beginning on Tenth Month 6th, 1872 and extending almost to the last week of his life, Ninth Month 23rd, 1890, when he was ninety years old. All but nine of these manuscripts are now at Earlham College, partly by gift and partly on deposit, and it is * Opal Thornburg is Executive Assistant to the President of Earlham College. 1 The Friend, 64 (1890), 96. 2 "A Visit to Earlham in 1884," edited by Opal Thornburg, Bulletin of Friends Historical Association," 36 (Autumn, 1947), 78-79. 75 76The Bulletin of Friends Historical Association hoped that the remaining books, still in the possession of two of his descendants, will eventually be available to complete the collection. David Huddleston was not unaware of the value of his journal, for two years before his death he made this entry: Today I wrote an agreement consigning my numerous writings to Albert's3 care & disposal after I am done with them. But to be left for use if any competent one should be found willing to compile a publication from them & then return the original to Albert.4 Like so many of his generation, David Huddleston was largely self-taught. His books were the Bible, the writings of George Fox, Robert Barclay, and other early Friends, and his periodicals were the Friends publications and the Richmond and Dublin newspapers. His journal consists largely of his reactions to happenings in the Friends Meeting at Dublin and elsewhere, accounts of incidents illustrating the testimony he bore, and what he thought of the state of the Society. The value of the journal consists in its intimate picture of Midwestern Quakerism as seen by one who was deeply concerned over the widespread departure, not only in America but in England and Ireland, from what he believed to be the true faith of Friends. Since David Huddleston was already an old man when he began his journal at the age of 71, and since it was never his intention to relate his personal history, the events of his life are revealed only by chance references. He was born of Quaker parents in North Carolina on the 6th of Tenth Month, 1801, the eldest of a family of thirteen children. His parents, caught up in the great Quaker migration to the Northwest Territory, moved when he was young to Union County, Indiana, near Salem, a 3 Dr. Albert Huddleston, physician in Winchester, Ind., a grandson of David Huddleston. On the death of Dr. Huddleston the manuscripts came to his daughter, Ina Huddleston Oler, Richmond, Indiana, who distributed them to interested members of the family and later reassembled them for deposit at Earlham College, with the exception of six given to Earlham directly by Dorothy Walton Ronald, Richmond, and nine still in the possession of others. 4 Journal, 11/19/88. David Huddleston77 Quaker settlement southeast of Liberty. As a young man...