Caroline Augusta White Soule, Universalist apostle to the Presbyterians of Scotland, was born on this day in 1824.
Caroline White worked as a teacher and the unpaid principal of the female department at the Clinton (New York) Liberal Institute. The principal was Henry Birdsell Soule, who also preached at local Universalist churches. The two married and would have five children. Henry went on to serve a half dozen Universalist churches before his untimely death in 1852.
For several years Caroline supported her family through writing and editing. During these years she also founded the Women’s Centenary Aid Association, later called the Association of Universalist Women, the national organization for Universalist women. Her efforts on behalf of this organization, particularly her pulpit eloquence attracted considerable attentin within the denomination.
In 1877, the WCA voted to send her to Scotland as a Universalist missionary. She preached around Scotland and even down into England. In 1880 the Scottish Universalist Convention ordained her, making her the first woman to be ordained in the British Isles in modern times. She settled as the minister of St Paul’s Universalist church in Glasgow. Except for a four year return to the United States, she would remain their minister until her retirement in 1892.
Caroline Soule died in Scotland in 1903.
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