CRISP, ROBERT SAMUEL (1848-1941)

CRISP, ROBERT SAMUEL, Methodist minister, Chatham circuit, 1875-77 and 1888-90; b. Norwich, England, 1 Jul 1848, s/o James Crisp Sr and Sarah Field; brother of James Crisp; m. 1875, Matilda Elizabeth Wilson, of Halifax; d. Saint John, 10 Jan 1941.

Robert S. Crisp was educated in England and was one of twelve young men from that country who came to Halifax in October 1871 with the intention of joining the Eastern Conference of the Methodist church. The twelve also included G. Wells Fisher, William Harrison, and Thomas Marshall.

After spending four years as a probationer in rural New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, Crisp was ordained in 1875. His first regular assignment was as minister of the Chatham circuit. Most of the rest of his ministry was also devoted to urban circuits in New Brunswick, and he occupied some of the most coveted pulpits in Saint John, Moncton, Woodstock, and elsewhere. He was renowned as a pulpit orator, as well as a public speaker. One of his most popular lectures was a humorous one entitled "Your Wife's Husband," which he delivered at Mount Allison University in 1887. Another was "Is the World Worth Saving?" which drew a large audience at Rexton in 1889. He spoke on serious subjects too, such as "The Progress of Civilization," which was the topic of an address which he gave in Chatham in 1896.

During his second term in Chatham, Crisp came into collision with David G. Smith, the editor of the Miramichi Advance, who was not a supporter of the Methodist temperance agenda. In Smith's view Crisp lacked "solid sense and broad Christian charity" and displayed "recklessly belligerent qualities." Only a "bird of passage," he declared, which could "gather up its belongings every two or three years and occupy a new field" could afford to behave in such a manner. Crisp appeared to demonstrate such qualities in his farewell sermon at the Carleton Methodist Church in Saint John in 1892 when he castigated members of the congregation for making his wife's life "a veritable hell on earth" and stated that if the offending persons were "exchanged for convicts from Dorchester penitentiary the church would get the best of the bargain." The Saint John newspaper Progress informed its readers that the troublemakers, who had in fact forced his transfer to another church, were individuals who objected to his "kissing proclivities," his habit of caressing "blooming damsels," and his practice of "putting on the rubbers of pretty choir girls."

In 1893 Crisp was summoned before a church court to answer a charge of immorality in respect to an event which was alleged to have taken place with a young woman nearly ten years previously. The controversy which surrounded the matter was not completely laid to rest when he was exonerated by a 3-2 decision of the court, but he insisted on his innocence and continued with his ministry.

Crisp was pastor of Carmarthen Street Church in Saint John immediately prior to his retirement in 1917. He lived in the city for the rest of his life, with his wife, Matilda E. Wilson, until her death in 1926, and later with his daughter and only surviving child, until his own death, at age ninety-two.