Henry White's Death at Fort Howland Season 2 | Episode 15
Topsham, Maine is located about 25 miles north of Portland, Maine
and is the home of Fort Howland,
the home of Stockbridge Howland,
an important place in early sabbatarian Adventism.
This town would have had a population of around 2,000 in the 1840s
and the principal industry would have been the mill factories
along the Androscoggin River.
Stockbridge was a close friend of James and Ellen White
during the early years of their marriage,
and they would spend a lot of time in his house,
today located on 7 Elm Street, also living there for some time.
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Joseph Bates had recently published a tract
that linked the Sabbath with the sanctuary based on Revelation 11:19,
marking a progression in the development of this doctrine.
It was shortly after this in April of 1847
when in this house behind me Ellen White had her Sabbath halo vision.
She saw the Ten Commandments of God inside the Ark of the Covenant
with a special halo of light around them.
This marked the Sabbath as being present truth,
for they saw Jesus before the Ark in the Most Holy Place.
Shortly after this, James White published a tract
that crystallized the views of the founders of Adventism entitled,
'A Word to the Little Flock.'
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In October of 1847 the Howlands invited the Whites to move in with them
and they moved into the upstairs floor of the house.
James White got a job nearby hauling stone for the railroad
as well as cutting wood for 50 cents a day.
This was barely enough to live on,
but he would still use much of the money to publish tracts to share with people.
The sacrifice of these early pioneers is remarkable,
considering the poverty that they were living in.
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Topsham, Maine is also the location
of one of the six Sabbath conferences of 1848 in the Howland home.
It was after this conference that the Whites realized
they could not travel with Henry everywhere due to their busy schedule.
He thus spent the next several years living with the Howlands
and it wasn't until his parents moved to Rochester, New York
that he moved back with them.
Such were the sacrifices that they made early on
due to the busy traveling and speaking life that they had.
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During the fall of 1863 the Whites would return to New England
and spend some time in the Howland home.
It was good to be back with old friends
that they shared so many happy memories with
from almost 20 years prior.
The work that had started here had progressed a lot.
The church was now officially organized, had publishing houses,
and believers were growing all over the country.
As they came back to a place that reminded them
of the extreme sacrifice they had to make both financially and as parents,
they would experience a terrible loss.
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Henry was assisting in the completion of the 1863 prophetic chart
by gluing them on to the cloth back,
when in the process of doing this he contracted a cold
which turned into pneumonia, resulting in a sudden death.
This was a terrible shock
and caused deep sadness for the whole family.
His funeral was held just down the road in the Baptist Church here,
but his final resting place would be in Battle Creek (Michigan).
He said he wanted to be buried near his brother John Herbert,
in case his parents were away traveling,
he could be near to him on the resurrection morning.
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Shortly after the death of Henry,
Ellen White would publish this book, 'An Appeal to Youth',
which included some of her letters to her children.
Writing shortly afterwards, Ellen White commented,
'But God comforted us in our bereavements,
and with faith and courage we pressed on with the work God had given us,
in the bright hope of seeing our children who had been torn from us by death,
in the land where death and sickness will never come.'
If you have experienced a similar loss in your life,
I pray that you may find comfort as well.