Marching for God

A lifelong member of the Salvation Army in Londonderry, Leslie Smyth talks to Sentinel Reporter Olga Bradshaw about his association with the religious movement and his research on its history. The Salvation Army is 130 years old this year.

You are a member of the Salvation Army.

Yes. I was actually born into the Salvation Army.

Were your parents involved?

I entered this world on June 14 1923 at 3 Ferguson Street off Bishop Street and my parents were both uniformed members of the Salvation Army.

Right.

So my formative years were with the Salvation Army Sunday School and then of course you go through the stages and when it comes to you are 16 then they ask if you will become a senior member or a 'Senior Soldier' as they call it. But you have to profess that you have accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour and ask God to forgive you for your sins. And, so, I eventually did that and went into the band when I was about 16.

So you were in the Salvation Army Band?

I was in the Salvation Army Band.

Can I ask you what you played?

I played a tenor horn.

Right, so you weren't a tambourine man then..!

No, no, no!

That 's an image an awful lot of people have when they think of the Salvation Army isn't it?

And that's a totally wrong image. The Salvation Army is a Church in its own right.

Right.

Tragically, not only most people don't know the history of the Salvation Army or what the Army has done. Many Salvationists don't even know their own history.

You have written a book on this haven't you?

Yes. I wrote a book about the first 100 years of the Salvation Army. But I was up in Belfast there because they had a heritage exhibition a few weeks ago, celebrating 130 years, and I was talking to the leader of the Salvation Army in Ireland, a Major Alan Waters over a cup of tea and I said 'you know, I'm glad about the heritage, because we forget about where we came from and where we are now," and he said 'Leslie I couldn't agree more with you," he says. He said 'We have got to think about where we are going'. You see the Salvation Army were opposed in England. There was strong opposition to them.

Why?

Because there was women preachers, and that was frowned on. It was never known before. I tell people William Booth was at least 100 years ahead of his time because William Booth saw no difference in gender, race, colour, Creed. Everybody was the same. He actually put women in charge of men and those women came to Londonderry on June 1, 1880. Three 'Salvation Army lasses' as they were called.

Lasses?

Lasses, yes. And property was acquired for the Salvation Army on the Strand Road at an old skating rink. They held open-air meetings up in the Fountain and marched down past the Town Hall which was then in the Diamond and down to where they held their meetings. There was some opposition to this from some element of the Catholics, but the opposition didn't come from the Catholics as much as it did from the Protestant members of other churches.

Why?

Because this was awful to take the Gospel out on the street - to take the church to the people.

And to have women doing it?

And to have women doing it was unheard of. Now, I was not present at the first meeting, I have to stress that (laughs), but reading the Londonderry Sentinel back in time, it said when the women started to pray and speak the men started to swear at them, curse at them and they lit pipes and started to do their smoking, and it was really a hostile reception for them. Though there were some very eminent people there. One of the first people who was there was a gentleman by the name of Frederick Simmons, who became the mayor of Derry, and there was the man James Hamilton who had the factory at the top of John Street. But, the women carried on doing their ministry and on one occasion they were followed by a hostile crowd and they were so hostile to them that they had to seek sanctuary in a house up in Pump Street...

Good gracious.

The Army grew in this sense, that people got to use the term 'converted' or 'saved' and their lives changed and while they were not preachers, they gave what we call their testimony, how getting converted had saved them when they were drunkards or alcoholics and so forth, but they had given up that way of life because it had changed them. They influenced others and as the process built, more and more people came. I remember there was one letter in the Sentinel talking about an Army Band and banging a big drum and the gentleman signed it 'infuriated Presbyterian'. Somebody replied to him and he was a gentleman by the name of Charles Gordon who used to have premises up on the Diamond, and he replied saying that perhaps the Army drum was a call like a church bell to call people to prayer, but what should be assessed was the good work that the Salvation Army were doing when they changed the lives of so many people in the City.

You see a lot of people could be forgiven for thinking it was a charitable organisation, as opposed to a religious one.

You see the Salvation Army because of its charitable work is seen as a group of 'do gooders'. That's only a part of their work. You see William Booth looked at people and thought to himself 'Look at the cab horses in London, if they fall the first thing they'll do is try and raise them up, then by that act they have got to have shelter, they have got to have food and they have got to have work'. He said there were people who didn't have that and asked who was going to help people when they were down and out? Who would provide for them? Where would they get food and so forth? So he started up a City Colony and that centered around homes for what they called 'ladies of the street' or rescue homes for women. Then he started up a home for inebriates or people with alcohol problems and homes for people discharged from prison. Then he started up a farm colony for people who wanted to go and work on farms or establish farms and provide employment for them. William Booth founded the first labour bureau and looked at people and asked 'Who wants to work and how will they know where to go?' So he got a register and put people's name on them. Then he got a list of people who could employ people.

Basically he set up the first job centre in the City...

The very first job centre and it turned out that there was just over 2,000-odd applied for work.

You are a lifetime member.

I am. I've never belonged to any other church and have no desire to do so, because to me the Salvation Army suits me in its Gospel message, because it incorporates with it a social policy. There is no use in standing up in a pulpit and preaching as William Booth said 'The Bread of life' if the people don't have bread to eat.