13 Facts About Amanda Smith

Amanda Smith was an American Methodist preacher and former slave who funded the former Amanda Smith Orphanage and Industrial Home for Abandoned and Destitute Colored Children outside Chicago.

Amanda Smith was a leader in the Wesleyan-Holiness movement, preaching the doctrine of entire sanctification throughout Methodist camp meetings across the world.

Amanda Smith's father was a well-trusted man, and his master's widow trusted him enough to place him in charge of her farm.

Amanda Smith purchased his own freedom, then that of his family; they then settled in Pennsylvania.

Amanda Smith worked as a cook and a washerwoman to provide for herself and her daughter after her husband was killed in the American Civil War.

Amanda Smith immersed herself in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and met Phoebe Palmer, a Methodist preacher who led the Wesleyan-Holiness movement.

In 1868, Amanda Smith testified that she had experienced entire sanctification.

In 1867, the National Camp Meeting Association for the Promotion of Holiness was organized and Amanda Smith began preaching the doctrine of entire sanctification at camp meetings.

Amanda Smith always wore a plain poke bonnet and a brown or black Quaker wrapper, and carried a carpetbag suitcase.

In 1878, Amanda Smith arranged for her daughter, Mazie, to study in England, where they both stayed for two years.

Amanda Smith next traveled to and ministered in India, where she stayed for eighteen months.

Amanda Smith then spent eight years in Africa, working with churches and evangelizing.

Amanda Smith was a strong proponent of the temperance movement both in Africa and in the United States, and was invited by temperance advocate Rev Dr Theodore Ledyard Cuyler to preach at his Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn, New York, then the largest church in its denomination, on her return to America.