Born in the parish of Wrangle, Lincolnshire, on March 20, 1779, he was son of a farmer who had come under the influence of John Wesley. After receiving some education at a nearby free school, he was apprenticed to a general shopkeeper at Burgh. On the expiration of his term he became assistant in a shop at East Retford, Nottinghamshire, of which he in time became proprietor. Here he began to associate with a group of Congregationalists, for whom he sometimes preached.
