Arthur Whalley, Kington, Herefordshire, 1834

Arthur Whalley was a master in the Free  Grammar School and Lecturer in the Parish Church of Kington, Herefordshire [present day website]. (The school’s trustees included the Bishop of Hereford.)

He was an ordained priest in the Church of England and by 1833 had drifted away from orthodox Anglicanism. His case was first heard on 13 February 1834 in Hereford Consistory Court (the Bishop’s court) before Chancellor Taylor. Twenty-one charges were laid against him, though these were reduced in the process of adjudication and can perhaps be summarised as two: that, by preaching in public places and by the content of that teaching, he had dissociated himself from the Church of England; and that he no longer conformed to the worship of that church. 

Whalley accepted as fact the allegations put to him, and wanted the matter dealt with quickly as the court itself, in his view, “was of Anti-christ” and, despite having “the head of all power” on his side, it would find against him. 

At his second appearance in March Whalley accepted all the charges against him, and boiled them down to ten. He read his defence “in a loud and energetic voice” and those in the well-attended court “seemed to listen to the defence with a great deal of interest. It occupied nearly an hour in the delivery.”. 

He had, he said, preached in the open air and the example of Christ and his Apostles was his authority. He had not argued against the doctrine of the Church of England, but had preached “in conformity with the doctrine of the Church in the true sense of the word” (iio). He had not separated himself from the Church nor attempted to separate others, nor formed a new brotherhood, nor sought schism. He had suggested that the drying up of the river Euphrates so that people could cross it to worship in Jerusalem (see Revelations 16:12) symbolised the visible decline of the Ottoman empire. 

And he foresaw that judgement would be made against him. This would, he said, place him in good company: that of the Protestant reformers Wickliffe, and Huss, Jerom [sic. Jerome of Prague], Luther, Latimer and Ridley “who were all accounted Heretics in their day by the ascendant party in the church”. He may have over-reached himself a little. 

The court  was adjourned before sentence to allow time for reflection and repentance. But Whalley, anticipating the court’s decision, said “there is not the slightest probability of my retracting for I know it is God’s truth.” and … “I hold myself responsible for it to Christ, who will shortly come.”

Sentence was duly announced on April 3, 1834, in a court held in Exeter Cathedral. The Chancellor declined to adjudicate the charge of heresy, but said Whalley had been guilty of great irregularity as a minister.  He pronounced sentence:

“That he, Mr. Whalley, be suspended for the term of three years from the exercise of all his ecclesiastical functions, and from the receipts of any emoluments attached to or arising from them; that at the expiration of the three years he shall appear in that court, producing a certificate signed by three clergymen of the established church, attesting that during the period of his suspension he has been of good behaviour and conducted himself with morality, and also that he shall, at such time of his appearing before that court, conform in every respect to the spirit and words of the canons which he has at present transgressed, or, failing in either of these demands, the suspension shall still remain in force and continue so to do, until they be complied with; the reverend gentleman to pay all costs in this proceeding, and the sentence to be publicly proclaimed in the parish church of Kington on the 6th day of the present month, or on the 13th, without fail.” 

To the best of my knowledge that was the end of the matter, at least as far as the Church of England was concerned.