They Loved Each Other – The Life of the Booths

How does a marriage work when both husband and wife are public figures? What if both are strong minded and dogmatic? Catherine Booth was as famous as her general husband, William Booth.  No wonder, their marriage survived and was successful too.  No religious movement has ever been more the product of a husband and wife team than the Salvation Army. It is also said that no family has ever disseminated the gospel farther and more effectively than William and Catherine and their eight children.

In some ways, they seemed an unlikely couple. He was tall (about six-foot-one), gangling, a bit awkward sporting a black beard and usually wearing a dark frock coat. She was dark, slightly built, had lustrous brown eyes, and carried herself with obvious refinement.  Both William and Catherine were intense, opinionated, determined. Both were frequently moody and prone to depression. Did their marriage work out? It worked and both lived to see the Salvation Army which they began in the London slums which has spread to fifty-two countries. The merger of social concern and aggressive evangelism among all types of people in Salvation Army added a refreshing new dimension to Christendom.

Catherine had definite thoughts on the kind of man she wanted to marry. He would have to have religious views similar to hers. He would have to be a man of sense and character and he would have to have similar tastes. She also believed that she must be physically attracted to him. Lastly he should be a total abstainer. Besides that, she had a personal preference for a minister. William Booth met all the qualifications except for not being a total abstainer. She soon convinced him of the importance of total abstinence, and that made him her perfect match.

William felt strongly that every minister’s wife should play the piano. So Catherine tried to learn the skill before she would be married to him. But that was not easy, because she lacked any musical sense. One day with bitter tears she said to herself, “William, I do this for you. Measure my love for you by this standard.” But what came easy for Catherine was writing sermons for him.

Catherine developed four rules for their married life: 1) Never to have any secrets between them 2) Never to have two purses 3) Talk out differences of opinion to secure harmony and not to try to pretend that differences don’t exist 4) Never to argue in front of children. The fact that two of the four had to do with differences of opinion underlines the fact they had some.

One area where they initially differed regarded women.  Catherine won the argument. Interestingly it was William who prodded her into preaching, and a decade later she was more in demand as a preacher than he was. When a nearby minister attacked women’s right to preach, Catherine responded with a thirty-two page rebuttal. To her mother she wrote: “Would you believe that a congregation half composed of ladies could sit and hear such self-depreciatory rubbish?”  She could never understand why reports on sermons by women preachers seemed to concentrate more on fashion than on content. As a female preacher, her delivery was calm, precise and clear without the least approach to formality or tediousness.

Catherine wanted to accompany her husband everywhere, for his sake as well as hers, but her health could not take it. When the Booths were nearly sixty and the Salvation Army had become international with their children spreading the message into distant lands, it was then Catherine discovered a cancerous growth on her breast. When she was given eighteen months to live, she told her husband that her first thought was that she would not be there to nurse William, when he comes to his last hour.  It was a crushing blow for William. He writes that for the first time, he had a sorrow that he could not cast on HIM. He felt that life became a burden and it was too heavy for him to bear. Later he writes: “To stand by the side of those you love and watch the ebbing tide of life, while the stabs of pain make the eyes flash fire and every nerve quivers, forcing cries of suffering from the courageous soul – is an experience of sorrow words can but poorly describe.”

Biographers state that both William and Catherine came from parents who had problem marriages. One would not expect the love and commitment that was evidenced by the Booths.  But they needed each other. At times they admonished each other. At other times they propped each other. The fact of the matter is, they loved each other.

"Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly scorned." (Song of Solomon 8:7)

(I have copied lines from William J. Petersen’s “Martin Luther Had a Wife” for this article.)