John Parnell, 2nd Baron Congleton
Encyclopedia
John Vesey Parnell, 2nd Baron Congleton (16 June 1805 – 23 October 1883) was the son of Sir Henry Brooke Parnell, 1st Baron Congleton (3 July 1776 – 8 June 1842) and Lady Caroline Elizabeth Dawson-Damer (died 16 February 1861).

Life

Sir John Vesey Parnell was educated in France, then at the University of Edinburgh
University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, is a public research university located in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The university is deeply embedded in the fabric of the city, with many of the buildings in the historic Old Town belonging to the university...

, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. He succeeded to the title of 2nd Baron Congleton, of Congleton
Congleton
Congleton is a town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East and the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England, on the banks of the River Dane, to the west of the Macclesfield Canal and 21 miles south of Manchester. It has a population of 25,750.-History:The first settlements in...

, Chester
Chester
Chester is a city in Cheshire, England. Lying on the River Dee, close to the border with Wales, it is home to 77,040 inhabitants, and is the largest and most populous settlement of the wider unitary authority area of Cheshire West and Chester, which had a population of 328,100 according to the...

 on 8 June 1842. He succeeded to the title of 5th Baronet Parnell, of Rathleague, Queen's Co. on 8 June 1842.

His first marriage was to Nancy Cronin, daughter of the homeopathist
Homeopathy
Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners claim to treat patients using highly diluted preparations that are believed to cause healthy people to exhibit symptoms that are similar to those exhibited by the patient...

 Edward Cronin
Edward Cronin
Edward Cronin was a pioneer of homeopathy in England and one of the founders of the Plymouth Brethren movement.-Life:...

, in 1831. An Armenian
Armenians
Armenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....

 widow, living in Persia, madame Khatoon Moscow, daughter of Ovauness Moscow, became his second wife in 1833. His third marriage was to Margaret Catherine Ormerod, daughter of Charles Ormerod, on 21 February 1867 - with her Parnell had his only daughter, Sarah Cecilia (5 August 1868 - 26 April 1912).

He was related to the Irish patriot Charles Stewart Parnell
Charles Stewart Parnell
Charles Stewart Parnell was an Irish landowner, nationalist political leader, land reform agitator, and the founder and leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party...

. Parnell's life was marked by simplicity: when he lived in Teignmouth
Teignmouth
Teignmouth is a town and civil parish in Teignbridge in the English county of Devon, situated on the north bank of the estuary mouth of the River Teign about 14 miles south of Exeter. It has a population of 14,413. In 1690, it was the last place in England to be invaded by a foreign power...

, Devon
Devon
Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...

 he took a modest house for the annual rent of £12.00. His uncarpeted home was furnished with simple wooden chairs, a plain, unvarnished deal table, steel cutlery and pewter teaspoons. and generosity: he was accustomed to devote half his income to Christian works. Among his friends he counted George Muller
George Müller
George Müller , a Christian evangelist and Director of the Ashley Down orphanage in Bristol, England, cared for 10,024 orphans in his life...

, the well-known Brethren philanthropist of Bristol.

Congleton died early in the morning of 23 October 1883 on a simple portable iron bedstead. Among his last utterances was reputed to be the words of the Christian marytr, Stephen
Saint Stephen
Saint Stephen The Protomartyr , the protomartyr of Christianity, is venerated as a saint in the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Orthodox Churches....

, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."

Plymouth Brethren and Mission work

Parnell first met with other like-minded Christians in 1829 in Dublin, including John Nelson Darby
John Nelson Darby
John Nelson Darby was an Anglo-Irish evangelist, and an influential figure among the original Plymouth Brethren. He is considered to be the father of modern Dispensationalism. He produced a translation of the Bible based on the Hebrew and Greek texts called The Holy Scriptures: A New Translation...

, Edward Cronin
Edward Cronin
Edward Cronin was a pioneer of homeopathy in England and one of the founders of the Plymouth Brethren movement.-Life:...

 and Francis Hutchinson. He paid for the rent of a large auction room in Aungier Street for the use in communion
Eucharist
The Eucharist , also called Holy Communion, the Sacrament of the Altar, the Blessed Sacrament, the Lord's Supper, and other names, is a Christian sacrament or ordinance...

 and prayer
Prayer
Prayer is a form of religious practice that seeks to activate a volitional rapport to a deity through deliberate practice. Prayer may be either individual or communal and take place in public or in private. It may involve the use of words or song. When language is used, prayer may take the form of...

 on the Lord's day
Lord's Day
Lord's Day is a Christian name for Sunday, the day of communal worship. It is observed by most Christians as the weekly memorial of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who is said in the four canonical Gospels of the New Testament to have been witnessed alive from the dead early on the first day of...

 (Sunday). He thought that the Lord's table should be a public witness of the "brethren"'s position. Aungier Street was the first public meeting room for the movement that became known as Plymouth Brethren
Plymouth Brethren
The Plymouth Brethren is a conservative, Evangelical Christian movement, whose history can be traced to Dublin, Ireland, in the late 1820s. Although the group is notable for not taking any official "church name" to itself, and not having an official clergy or liturgy, the title "The Brethren," is...

 and they commenced celebrating Lord's supper
Lord's Supper
The Lord's Supper may refer to:*Eucharist, Mass or Communion, a rite in Christianity*The Last Supper, the last meal Jesus of Nazareth shared with his disciples in the collection of Christian Scriptures called The Holy Bible....

 (the Breaking of Bread) in the spring of 1830. When he moved to London he lived at Welbeck Street, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, where the brethren meeting room was located..

He was a life long member of the Plymouth Brethren
Plymouth Brethren
The Plymouth Brethren is a conservative, Evangelical Christian movement, whose history can be traced to Dublin, Ireland, in the late 1820s. Although the group is notable for not taking any official "church name" to itself, and not having an official clergy or liturgy, the title "The Brethren," is...

, and was one of their pioneer missionaries; Parnell went in September 1830 to Baghdad
Baghdad
Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, as well as the coterminous Baghdad Governorate. The population of Baghdad in 2011 is approximately 7,216,040...

 in Asiatic Turkey with his brother in law Edward Cronin
Edward Cronin
Edward Cronin was a pioneer of homeopathy in England and one of the founders of the Plymouth Brethren movement.-Life:...

 and Dr John Kitto
John Kitto
John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.-Biography:Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three...

 to visit Anthony Norris Groves
Anthony Norris Groves
Anthony Norris Groves has been described as the "father of faith missions". He launched the first Protestant mission to Arabic-speaking Muslims, and settled in Baghdad, now the capital of Iraq, and later in southern India. His ideas influenced a circle of friends who became leaders in the Plymouth...

. The party went with books, medicine and a printing press and arrived in June 1831. The whole party found extreme resistance from local Muslims to their efforts and withdrew to India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 until 1837 where Groves established an enduring faith mission work.

When Lord Congleton became the 2nd Baron, being a Plymouth Brother, he would not side with any party and entered the House of Lords
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....

 as a cross-bencher
Cross-bencher
A crossbencher is an independent or minor party member of some legislatures, such as the British House of Lords and Australian Senate. They take their name from the crossbenches, between and perpendicular to the government and opposition benches, where crossbenchers sit in the chamber; compare...

. Plymouth Brethren generally abstain from party politics.

He published his translation of The Psalms
Psalms
The Book of Psalms , commonly referred to simply as Psalms, is a book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Bible...

at William Yapp's publishing house of 70 Welbeck Street, London in 1860, with a revision in 1875 containing interpretative notes published by James E. Hawkins of the same address. Congleton also published a booklet The Open Meeting describing the manner of ministry among Plymouth Brethren
Plymouth Brethren
The Plymouth Brethren is a conservative, Evangelical Christian movement, whose history can be traced to Dublin, Ireland, in the late 1820s. Although the group is notable for not taking any official "church name" to itself, and not having an official clergy or liturgy, the title "The Brethren," is...

.
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