Transcript:Friend (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States)/Biographical Sketch: Mary Simcock

Biographical Sketches,

Of Ministers and Elders, and other concerned members of the Yearly Meeting of Philadelphia.

Mary Simcock.

Mary Walln, a daughter of that worthy minister of the gospel of Christ, Nicholas Walln, and Jane his wife, was born in Middletown, Bucks county, in the year 1686 or 1687. Her parents, soon after her birth, removed into the limits of Philadelphia Meeting, and there she was brought up. Being tenderly visited in early life by the Spirit of the Lord Jesus, and giving up thereto, the pious precepts and example of her parents were blessed to her, and she was enabled to manifest by conduct and conversation that her soul was enamoured with the beauty of holiness, and the blessed consistency of the Truth. Early in the year 1706, when about nineteen years of age, she was married to John Simcock, the son of that eminent minister of that name, who resided near Chester. The newly married couple resided near Abington for many years, where Mary received a gift in the ministry which she exercised to the comfort of Friends. After passing many years of use fulness in that neighbourhood, both in the church and in the world, they, about the year 1740, removed to Kingwood, New Jersey.

Her husband, after her death, gave forth this brief memorial concerning her. “ She was a daughter of Nicholas and Jane Walln, of the Northern Liberties of the city of Philadelphia, honest Friends, to whom she was obedient in her youth. As she grew in years, she was concerned to be a sensible witness of the operation of Truth in her own heart, and keeping carefully under this concern, she was many times sweetly comforted in spirit, which favour she prized above the enjoyment of any earthly treasure. She was likewise engaged in concern for the good of her fellow-creatures, and after some reasonings in her own mind, she gave up to declare in a public manner what the Lord had done for her soul. After which she frequently appeared in public, while she was of ability to attend meetings. Her testimony was well received, and when her natural strength and faculties were much impaired, it was evident he still retained that good part, which had been her early choice. Several Friends of Kingwood Meeting coming to visit us a few months before her departure, after a time of silent waiting she appeared both in testimony and supplication, in a solid, sensible manner, which plainly demonstrated that the Lord still favoured her with his living presence, giving ability to her, who had no strength of her own. She was a loving, faithful wife, an exemplary mother, and a true helpmate, in things pertaining to our everlasting well-being, patient in affliction of body and mind, and departed quietly without any apparent illness, the 19th of the Fifth month, 1771, in the eighty-fifth year of her age ; a minister upwards of fifty years.”

The Monthly Meeting at Kingwood, expressing unity with her husband's testimony, say that her ministry, although not large in word, “ was edifying to those whose hearts were prepared of the Lord.” “ Though, through age and infirmity of body, she was incapable of attending meetings, for some years before she died, yet as she retained her love to Truth and Friends to the last, we doubt not she has made a happy change, and is now enjoying the reward of the righteous in the mansions of everlasting rest.”