The Methodist Man

$25.00

It’s 1840, and Robert Terrill Rundle—sent from Cornwall, England, to Christianize the wild Indians of the Canadian plains—is stepping into a harsh world. The whites cling to their isolated forts, while two powerful First Nations groups—the Blackfoot Confederacy and the Plains Cree Alliance—struggle for control of their hunting grounds and the diminishing buffalo herds.

Enter Rundle, a Methodist missionary armed only with the Bible. When he realizes that only a handful of Indians ever come to the forts, he decides that he must go to them, despite the many dangers that the Company men regularly and quite happily point out. But neither these warnings, nor his frail health will stop him from fulfilling his mission.

Terrence Rundle West, a descendent of Reverend Rundle’s older brother, John, has used these first-hand accounts as the basis for his fictionalized account of Rundle’s time in the northwest. He adeptly brings to life such historic figures as Chief Factor John Rowand and Chief Trader Ted Harriott of the Hudson Bay Company, Cree Chief Maskepetoon, Peigan (Blackfoot) Chief Many Swans, Assiniboine (Sioux) Chief Piapot, and Jesuit priest Jean De Smet. A long-established way of life for fur traders and First Nations alike was coming to an end, and Rundle found himself in the middle as the various factions fought to survive.

Other books by Terrence Rundle West are: Not in My Father’s Footsteps and Run of the Town.

Visit the author’s website here.

ISBN:978-1-77257-167-7 (PB)

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Additional information

Weight .41 kg
Dimensions 25.4 × 19.5 × 1.5 cm

2 reviews for The Methodist Man

  1. Tiffany Yemen

    An excellent read and a real eye-opener to prairie politics in the 1840s. And what politics! The Methodist Man makes Parliament Hill look like a pyjama party.
    Constantly switching the narrative point of view between Reverend Rundle and the Blackfoot hunter, Sees Far, considerably broadens the scope of this novel. The intertwining of the two perspectives keeps the plot moving briskly.
    One quickly learns a respect for Rundle, the health-hampered missionary. He dares to thwart the Hudson’s Bay to bring Christianity directly to the indigenous populations of the great plains. However, Rundle’s promise of a Christian heaven is a tough sell to natives who, of course, wish for reunion with their late friends and their family, already safely in their own “happy hunting ground” concept of an afterlife.
    ~ Ian McKercher, author

  2. Tiffany Yemen

    Very much enjoyed, hard to put down. A great trip into Canadian History in the early 1800’s.

    ~ Scott Rodden

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