REV. ELAM WADDELL, aged nearly 76 years, 50 years a minister of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, now lies in state at the residence of his son, W. P. Waddell, near Ain, Grant county, Ark. He was feeble, not sick, but simply fell asleep in Jesus, this morning about 4 o'clock (April 15, 1882), alone in his room, the most natural corpse I ever beheld. His face wears a heavenly smile. How blest the righteous when he dies! His biography will be written and forwarded by some suitable person.

W. J. WALLACE.

[Source: The Cumberland Presbyterian, April 27, 1882, page 4]

WADDELL.--The Rev. Elam Waddell was born on the 26th of May, 1806. He professed religion when about twenty years old, and was licensed to preach the gospel by the Hopewell Presbytery in Tennessee, in 1833, soon after which he removed to the State of Mississippi, where he commenced his ministerial life. At that time the country was almost a wilderness, but he had the Spirit of the Master, and went to his work preaching, organizing, and building up churches all over the country, until the year 1859, when he came to this country and assumed his labors in Bartholomew Presbytery, where the remaining portion of his life was spent as a faithful minister of Jesus. He died on the 15th of April, 1882. He was always a pioneer preacher, working wherever he was most needed. The writer of this memorial was intimately acquainted with Father Waddell, and can say that he was the messenger of the Lord of hosts. In the pulpit he explained and enforced the divine commands, opened and applied the precious promises, and also revealed the awful threatenings of God to those who violated his law. His instructions wre not confined to the pulpit, but he went from house to house, as the pastor of his flock, scattering the seeds of knowledge with a liberal hand. He visited the sick, the fatherless, and the widow, and poured instruction and consolation into their troubled hearts. When he mixed with company in the private circles of friendship, he was not out of his work. There he watched for suitable opportunities of conveying instruction to all around. He did not, like a stern inquisitor or a Jesuitical hypocrite, put on gloomy and melancholy airs, for this, in his judgment, would render no service to the cause of truth. He was always cheerful without frothy levity, and scrious without austerity. The manner in which he dispensed knowledge on all occasions was not stiff or formal, haughty or overbearing, but easy, affable, and sweetly engaging. He was honored in all companies--a faithful friend, a pleasant companion, and a venerable father. He considered the world his parish, and his circuit to reach the ends of the earth. He lived respected and died lamented, and his memory is precious. We have good reason to believe that there are now scores in heaven and thousands on their way thither, who have been rescued from darkness and death by the instrumentality of Brother Waddell. A few years before his death his hearing became injured, and he requested the Presbytery to excuse him from regular work, which it did; but he continued to preach and labor in the cause of his Master until within a short time of his death. He died at the home of his eldest son, William Waddell, thirty-five miles from where he was living. He went there to see his children, who were nearly all living in that neighborhood. The night previous to his death he conversed freely and cheerfully, and thought, as he sstated to his daughter-in-law, that he would be able to return home in a short time, and be able to preach again; but on the next morning, when called to breakfast, no answer was given, and when his son entered his room he was sitting up by the side of his bed, leaning against the wall, with his arms clasped on his breast, wtih a smile on his face, his eyes turned upward, giving evidence that his spirit had fled and joined in brotherly embrace with the saints and angels in heaven. It certainly becomes the members of Bartholomew Presbytery and the Church to be humble and submissive under the hand of God, who has diminished their numbers and weakened their strength by taking away a member and a minister whose services they not only desired, but needed. This circumstance displays the sovereignty of God. So it lays us under peculiar obligations to look to him for his special direction in the path of duty. Let it be the heart's desire and prayer to God that we would completely repair the breach he has made amongst us. Not only the Presbytery and Church, but the people, and especially those of his acquaintance, ought to be deeply affected with the death of a minister whose face they beheld, whose voice they heard giving instructions and warning, and whose company they enjoyed with a great deal of pleasuare. He taught them how to live and how to die; he has left them an example which they may follow with safety and advantage--by which, though dead, he now speaketh--and whoever will live as he lived may hope to die as he died--in favor with God and man. The bereaved widow has much occasion to mourn, but not to mourn as those who have no hope. The children are all capable of feeling and duly estimating the great loss they have sustained by the death of a dear and indulgent parent. After holding them long in doubtful expectation, God has taken him to his bosom. It becomes them to bow in silent and cordial submission to God's holy and righteous sovereignth. They ought to be thankful that God graciously preserved the life of their father until they came to years of discretion and self-direction. It is now their indispensable duty to remember his instructions and counsels, and to imitate every thing amiable in his character and conduct.

S. W. THOMAS,
Chairman of Committee.

[Source: The Cumberland Presbyterian, May 7, 1885, page 2]