A ‘heated discussion’ with General Bramwell Booth
BY BARRY GITTINS
Being the General of The Salvation Army must be a stressful role, with all the burdens, pressures and responsibilities the job entails.
The level of agitation and nervous energy of these leaders may be heightened by inquiries from the fourth estate (journalists are not always known to play nice or act with contextual rigour).
One strategy General Bramwell Booth used to ease his interview jitters – as the 29 June 1929 issue of the War Cry informs us – was to schedule the conversation at a time and place of his choosing, often a Turkish bath* in London’s city centre.
The General’s anonymous journalistic inquisitor is referred to as the editor of The Young Man, a publication that, even then, had “ceased publication [and] took place at the time of the last International Congress in London”.
The headline? ‘A “heated” discussion with the General’!
The journalist wrote that modern interviews were generally conducted “under difficulties [with] as little heat as possible”, with “no-go areas negotiated, rendering discourse stiff, formal, hurried and unpleasant … Not so in a Turkish bath”.
The article continued: “There, all men are placed on a level, in more sense than one; and whilst its physiological adornments are scanty, they are sufficient, and a warm, genial time is assured.”
The journalist avowed his interview with General Booth was “so revelatory and charming that I have resolved, if ever asked to interview any great men, to find out the baths they patronise! The advantages are obvious; they cannot get away quickly, and must sit it out”.
Bramwell was described as “a man with snow-white hair and serene face, who left an impression [of] steady, soldierly greatness. He looked hard at me, and I at him, and at last we smiled at each other”.
The General was quizzed on subjects including the differences and relationships between the Salvationists and the churches, on liberal theology, the Army becoming “too respectable”, emotional preaching, and the working of the Holy Spirit.
Bramwell listened as the reporter remembered sitting in the Army’s ‘Congress of the Nations’ meetings in the Royal Albert Hall, where he “laughed and cried like a child [as] you have a singular capacity for touching the heart”.
“Ah!” Bramwell responded, “and is that not the place to get at?”
“Man is a soul,” the General continued, “[so we must] drive that home! Don’t fear! Speak out! Ah, Fire, Heat! That’s what is needed. “Christianity dying? Absurd! The power is here. Let the churches use it.”
The interviewer gently suggested to the general that “it is getting hot here”, and Bramwell laughed, called the journalist an “abnormal”, and promised to visit his church “since you press me”.
The chat concluded “in 200 degrees of heat [and] a hearty grip of the hand”; the interviewer bade Bramwell have a good day while thinking he’d come up with good copy. The editor was left wishing for “a liberal supply of ice water”.
Customs and language change, but Bramwell’s concern that we deal “with men’s heads [while] leaving their hearts out” remains ever-relevant.
* A Turkish bath, or hammam, seems an unusual place for a media encounter. Bathers are segregated, with men in the public baths tending to strip down and wear a pestemal (bath wrap) around their undercarriages. Bathers proceed through progressively warmer rooms to sweat, be ‘steamed’, exfoliated and receive soap massages as part of the cleansing process.
Three images of Bramwell Booth as he aged through life.
