On January 21, Christ Church Jerusalem celebrates the arrival of Bishop Michael Solomon Alexander into Jerusalem in 1842. We have an artist’s rendering, seen above, of the occasion in an archival postcard, but it is ultimately flat. We have, however, unearthed from our archive an eye-witness account of the journey, full of color and life.
In 1919, not long before she died, Deborah Ransom, a daughter of Bishop Alexander, spoke at a CMJ meeting about her memories of being in Jerusalem with her family.
Deborah was 10 when the Alexanders went to Jerusalem. She recalled at her father’s farewell sermon in London that “the Hebrew boys and girls of your Society’s schools were there singing in their tuneful voices, ‘Jerusalem, my happy home’ and ‘Hosanna to the Prince of Peace.’ ” She also remembered her father’s consecration in Lambeth Palace, just two days before Queen Victoria gave birth to her eldest son who would become King Edward VII. Deborah said that very soon after their arrival in Jerusalem, her father “obtained some water from the River Jordan, had it hermetically sealed in a tin, and sent home for the baptism of the Royal infant.”
The trip to Jerusalem started on December 3, 1841, from Gosport, England, and proceeded to Lisbon, Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, Beirut, and finished in Jaffa, Ottoman Palestine. Deborah described how they reached Jerusalem:
“At that time there were no roads in the Holy Land, only camel tracks; no trains, no carriages of any kind; riding was our only method of locomotion, and we had to travel either on camels, horses, mules or donkeys. If you rode a camel, you would be seasick, if a mule or a donkey, the chances were you would be kicked off; and horses were rare. Nevertheless, on we went, variously mounted, and crossed the fertile flowery Plain of Sharon, sparkling in the early dew.”
They all stopped to eat at midday at the edge of the Judean hills.
“After our meal, we climbed up the rough road to the top, where, lo and behold at our feet, surrounded by hills, calmly lay the shining City of the Great King. Then my parents were so moved that they knelt upon the ground and wept tears of joy.”
As they approached Jerusalem, they were met by the area governor and his entourage “mounted on superb Arab horses, gaily decked with gold-wrought saddle-cloths and crimson streamers, accompanied by the English, French, Prussian and Sardinian Consuls, and Turkish soldiers playing the tom-tom. Europeans and natives, in various dresses, all shouted and clapped their hands. Above all thundered the cannon from the Castle of David.” Deborah explains there were three reasons for the boisterous welcome: the presence of the British Consul General, Michael Solomon’s position as a bishop, and it was Eid al-Fitr (the end of Ramadan).
Deborah also spoke about the trials and tribulations of building the Christ Church building, mentioning that her mother, also Deborah, laid the cornerstone with an unusual tool. “For the ceremony, no silver trowel was forthcoming, so my father lent our silver fish-slice, which my mother used in place of the non-existent trowel. The fish slice was engraved afterward with the record of the use to which it had been put, and is now in possession of the family.”
Her father, Bishop Alexander, died suddenly in Egypt on the way to visit Great Britain in 1845. He left behind his wife, nine daughters and two sons.
“Can I not truly say, “Jerusalem, happy home”?” Deborah said, “having lived there for four years of my eventful life, and where under the sacred soil of Mount Zion, rest my beloved father and my little sister, born just after we reached Jerusalem. There they await the Resurrection morn, when the feet of the Son of Man shall stand upon the Mount of Olives.”