The Banker's Son Who Left the Desk to Decipher Jaffray's Diary
“It is enough for me, quietly to devote myself to the accomplishment of such share, in laying the foundation and erecting the scaffolding, as seems required at my hands.” — John Barclay
'The son of Robert and Ann Barclay', he 'was born at Clapham in Surrey, in the year 1797'; his parents were members of the Society and 'his mother died whilst he was very young'. He was sent to a public school, and remembered hearing Thomas Shillitoe preach at Wandsworth meeting 'when but very young and at school'.
Began keeping little books he called 'Accounts of Time' in the fourth month 1814, 'in the 17th year of his age', just as he was initiated into business at 'my father's banking house'; they were left off about the eighth or ninth month 1816.
Attended his first monthly meeting, at Wandsworth, on the 23rd of the second month, and 'the yearly meeting for the first time, this year, through all the sittings'.
His father, 'who had been long an invalid', died on the 25th of the first month 1816; that autumn began his friendship with J. F. Marsh of Croydon, 'at a time when his mind was sweetly visited by the day-spring from on high'.
From the 4th of the fourth month 1817 his memoranda drop 'the usual fashionable style of the world' for Friends' dating. That summer he wrote to Thomas Shillitoe from Clapham, confessing he had once been 'ready to laugh thee to scorn', and from this year took in hand 'drawing up accounts for Piety Promoted' and 'collecting and copying letters of Friends'.
'Early in the year 1820, he believed it right for him to remove from the family circle, and to reside for a time at Poole in Dorsetshire; and about the end of the same year, he was married to Georgina Hill.'
His wife died at Marazion in Cornwall on the 23rd of the sixth month 1823; at the grave he was 'strengthened to utter these words in public, on bended knees', and 'in the autumn of that year he spoke as a minister'.
'He was acknowledged a minister by his Friends in Cornwall in 1825, and in the following year was married to Mary Moates, and removed to Alton.'
With a certificate from Alton monthly meeting he left home on the 19th of the eighth month for Newcastle, Edinburgh and the half-year's meeting at Aberdeen; at Ury 'the proprietor, Robert Barclay, received me very kindly' and he 'examined the library throughout', carrying away 'what was valuable' — the source of the Jaffray manuscript.
Removed to Croydon in the ninth month 1829, 'much engaged in the preparation of works for the press'; the diary he had discovered at Ury demanded 'decyphering' and his note-book records days 'at Jaffray' of 'seven' to even 'nine hours'.
Obtained a certificate from Kingston monthly meeting in the eighth month 1830 to visit the meetings and families of Dorset and Hants, with liberty for Kent, Sussex and Surrey, and returned it in the first month 1831.
In the spring of 1833 'he was first attacked with an inflammatory complaint in the knee-joint', aggravated it was believed by 'his too close application to the Diary of Alexander Jaffray'; the limb never recovered and walking became difficult.
Removed to Stoke Newington, within Gracechurch Street monthly meeting; the editor notes that 'the publication of the work called the Beacon, which occasioned so much painful excitement in the Society, occurred about the beginning of 1835', after Barclay had already warned of 'a shaking sifting crisis' among Friends.
'In the eleventh month, 1836, he paid an acceptable visit, in the love of the Gospel, to the families of Friends at Brighton.'
In the eleventh month 1837 he laid before his monthly meeting a concern to visit the families of his own meeting; after 'nearly half the families', his constitution failing, he returned the minute in the second month 1838 with a letter: 'hard things were made very easy, and bitter things full of sweetness'.
Removed by medical advice from Brighton to Tunbridge Wells on the 8th of the fifth month; on the 11th 'he peacefully passed away, aged forty-one years, a minister about fifteen years', and was interred at Winchmore Hill, Middlesex, on the 18th.
In a letter from Clapham on the 30th of the sixth month 1817 he told Shillitoe that as a schoolboy he had heard him 'largely and powerfully engaged in testimony' at Wandsworth and had despised him, but was now 'brought to such a pass' as to espouse the cause unreservedly, and that Shillitoe's concerns at the last yearly meeting had been 'deeply felt by me'.
Opening a book at random 'in great fluctuation and sore grief of mind' over his choice of business, he lit on a passage from Penn's No Cross, No Crown: 'here was a revelation indeed to me, if ever there was one'. He quotes Penn's Rise and Progress and other sayings repeatedly in his letters.
Quotes Penington in his letters and saw 'some original letters of Isaac Pennington' at Jordans; the editor of Letters of Early Friends records that a considerable number of the Penington manuscripts in London 'have been printed by John Kendal, and by John Barclay'.
'The character of George Fox is as good an illustration as I can give, of what I desire in this respect for myself and for my friends'; on his 1826 journey Friends showed him the rock at Pardshaw Crag 'mentioned in George Fox's Journal', where Fox preached among the mountains.
Appeals to Woolman's principle that the Truth 'leads those, who faithfully follow it, to apply all the gifts of Divine Providence to the purposes for which they were intended', and to what 'John Woolman told his attendant' about rejoicing evermore.
His brother A. R. Barclay's 1841 selection, reprinted in the Friends' Library, volume 6 (1842), from the memoranda and 'Accounts of Time' he had kept from 1814 under the title 'Some Memorials of the Lord's goodness to a poor creature', and from letters to his friends, with the testimony of Gracechurch Street monthly meeting.
The diary whose original manuscript he 'discovered at Ury in Scotland' and deciphered for the press at Croydon, 'a line of service marked out for him by the Divine hand'; he commended 'the latter part of Jaffray, which contains the history of Friends in Scotland'.