Ashbel Green Simonton

Ashbel Green Simonton
Reverend Ashbel Green Simonton
Born	January 20, 1833 West Hanover, southern Pennsylvania
Died	December 9, 1867 (1867-12-10) (aged 34) São Paulo, Brazil
Burial place	Protestant Cemetery, São Paulo

Ashbel Green Simonton (January 20, 1833 – December 9, 1867) was a North-American Presbyterian minister and missionary, the first missionary to settle a Protestant church in Brazil, Igreja Presbiteriana do Brasil (Presbyterian Church of Brazil)

Early life

Simonton was born in West Hanover, southern Pennsylvania, and spent his childhood on the family's estate, named Antigua. His parents were the doctor and politician William Simonton (elected twice to Congress) and Mrs. Martha Davis Snodgrass (1791–1862), daughter of James Snodgrass, a Presbyterian minister, who was the pastor of the local church. Ashbel was named after Ashbel Green, president of New Jersey College. He was one among nine brothers and sisters. The boys (William, John, James, Thomas and Ashbel) used to call themselves the "quinque fratres" (five brothers). One of his brothers, James Snodgrass Simonton, four years older than Ashbel, was also a missionary to Brazil, spending three years as a teacher in the city of Vassouras, in the state of Rio de Janeiro. One of his four sisters, Elizabeth Wiggins Simonton (1822–1879), also called Lille, married the Presbyterian minister and missionary Alexander Latimer Blackford, a colleague of Simonton in Brazil and the co-founder of the Igreja Presbiteriana do Brasil.

Conversion

In 1846, the family moved to Harrisburg, where Simonton finished high school. After graduating in New Jersey College (the future Princeton University), in 1852, he spent about a year and a half in Mississippi, working as a teacher for young boys. Disappointed with the lack of attention by the local authorities for teaching, Simonton went back to Pennsylvania and tried to become a lawyer, although by that time many people would advise him to become a minister, something to which his mother had consecrated him at his birth. In 1855 he had a deep religious experience during a revival and went to the Princeton Seminary. In his first term, he heard in the seminary's chapel a sermon by Dr. Charles Hodge, one of his teachers, which moved him to the missionary work in foreign lands. He was ordained in 1859 and arrived in Brazil on August 12, the same year.

Ministry

Soon after organizing the Presbyterian church in Brazil (January 12, 1862), Simonton spent his vacation in the United States, where he married Helen Murdoch, in Baltimore. They came back to Brazil in July 1863. In the next year they became parents to Helen Murdoch Simonton, Simonton’s only daughter.

Besides the Presbyterian Church, Simonton created a newspaper, Imprensa Evangélica (1864), along with a presbytery (1865) and a seminary (1867).

Death

Tombstone of Rev. Ashbel Green Simonton, Protestant Cemetery, São Paulo

In 1867, feeling ill, Simonton went to São Paulo, where his sister and brother-in-law were raising his daughter. Simonton died on December 9, 1867, victim of a tropical disease named "febre biliosa".

External links

• Sons of the Prophets: Leaders in Protestantism from Princeton Seminary

Protestant missions to Latin America
Background	Christianity Protestantism History of Central America History of South America Catholic Church and the Age of Discovery Timeline of Christian missions
People	Auca Missionaries Chet Bitterman Thomas Bridges Frank Drown James Cooley Fletcher Louis Francescon Francisco Penzotti Allen Francis Gardiner Henry Grattan Guinness Juan Bautista Canut de Bon Gil Daniel Parish Kidder Justus Henry Nelson Joy Ridderhof Rachel Saint Ashbel Green Simonton Waite Stirling William Cameron Townsend
Missionary agencies	South American Mission Society Wycliffe Bible Translators American Bible Society TEAM HCJB Regions Beyond Missionary Union Mission Aviation Fellowship Mission to the World United Andean Indian Mission
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