Religious Studies

480 pages, 6 x 9

978-0-86554-744-5, H603,

$55.00s, Cloth

Index, bibliography, illustrated

Religious Studies

480 pages, 6 x 9

978-0-86554-870-1, P279,

$22.00t, Paper

Index, bibliography, illustrated

Rescue the Perishing
Selected Correspondence of Annie W. Armstrong

Keith Harper, editor

The most comprehensive collection of letters of one of the most influential women in American Church History.

Annie W. Armstrong, more familiarly known as "Miss Annie," served as the first corresponding secretary of the Women’s Missionary Union, Auxiliary to the Southern Baptist Convention. Between 1888 and 1906 she wrote hundreds of letters on behalf of Southern Baptist missionary enterprises. Almost all of her letters inimitably expressed her opinion of "how things ought to be."

Rescue the Perishing offers for the first time a selection of letters from this remarkable woman’s life. As a group, these letters indicate that Armstrong was both an innovator and tireless promoter of numerous missionary projects at home and abroad. Stubborn and forthright, some might even say abrasive, Miss Annie’s correspondence demonstrates that she was a gifted administrator with unparalleled organizational skills. Her guiding hand shaped the WMU’s role in Southern Baptist life. Moreover, her ability to work with a variety of denomination leaders in different contexts influenced Baptist polity and helped forge Southern Baptist denominational identity.

These letters have never been available to the general public, and they offer great insight into the life and development of the Southern Baptist Convention.

In 1934 the WMU recognized Annie W. Armstrong’s legacy by naming their Easter offering for Home Missions in her honor. As these letters show, the recognition was well deserved.

Keith Harper is associate professor of Church History at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is the editor of Send the Light: Lottie Moon’s Letters and Other Writings (Mercer), and The Quality of Mercy: Southern Baptists and Social Christianity, 1890-1920 (Alabama).

Titles of related interest

Send the Light: Lottie Moon’s Letters and Other Writings

Southern Baptist Sisters: In Search of Status, 1845–2000

Selected Spiritual Writings of Anne Dutton: Eighteenth-Century British Baptist Woman Theologian: Volume 1, Letters