The Sleeping Preacher" Major Perry 1831-1925 [cover title]

[Saluda, S.C.: Wesley Chapel C.M.E. Church, 1970. Very good.. 10pp. Illustrated with photographs. Original pictorial wrappers, stapled. Moderate staining and toning to wrappers, small chip to bottom rear corner. Light even toning to text. A rare biography of "The Sleeping Preacher" Major Perry, a former South Carolina slave who gained notoriety for delivering prayers, hymns, and sermons in his sleep (or in a trance) beginning in 1880. He was also apparently delivering a sermon in his sleep when he died in 1925. The present work prints a biography of Perry followed by a genealogy of Perry from his father to some of his 300 descendants at the time of the work's publication in 1970. The front cover is illustrated with a photographic portrait of Perry, and the text contains a diagram of the area where Perry lived and two more photographs of various parties standing behind Perry's headstone -- one showing Perry's son and his family and another picturing Daivid W. Roston, the minister of Wesley Chapel C.M.E. Church in Saluda, South Carolina. The latter photos are credited to the local newspaper, the Saluda County Sentinel, who may have printed the work. OCLC lists just three institutional holdings, two at Emory and one at Duke.