clergyman missionary secretary
Robert J. Willingham, Sr. was born on May 15, 1854, in Beaufort County, South Carolina, the son of Benjamin Lawton Willingham, who moved from the Beaufort County to Macon, Georgia, where he amassed a considerable fortune as a cotton factor, and Elizabeth Martha Baynard.
Willingham, Sr. entered the University of Georgia at the early age of fourteen and in 1873 was graduated with high honors. From 1874 to 1877 he was the principal of the high school of Macon, Georgia. During this period, he read law, preparatory to taking the bar examination.
Abandoning his intention of entering the law, he enrolled in the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and remained there as a student from 1877 to 1879.
He was ordained in Macon, Georgia, June 2, 1878, and served as pastor of the Baptist Church, Talbottom, Georgia, and of two other nearby country churches from 1879 to 1881.
During the succeeding five years he was pastor of the Baptist Church at Barnesville, Georgia. Accepting the pastorate of the First Baptist Church, Chattanooga, Tennessee, in 1887, he led in the erection of a new edifice.
In 1891 he was chosen pastor of the First Baptist Church, Memphis. Two years later, he accepted the invitation of the Foreign Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention to become its secretary. When he took charge, the board not only was without funds but was burdened with a heavy debt. The whole country was suffering from a severe financial depression. So impassioned were his appeals, so arduous were his labors, and so widespread were his activities, however, that within the twenty-one years he served as secretary the annual contributions increased fivefold; the missionaries employed, over threefold; and the number of baptisms reported annually, over twelve-fold; while the schools, colleges, and seminaries under the control of the board increased from 16 to 266.
He visited Mexico in 1895 and made a trip around the world in 1907, studying the mission work in Japan, China, Burma, India, and Italy. Upon his return to America, he interpreted foreign missions in a broader way but with no less enthusiasm. One-third of his time was spent traveling over the widely extended territory of the Southern Baptist Convention and under the strain of his unceasing labors his health failed. Robert Josiah Willingham, Sr. died on December 20, 1914. At his death he was buried in Hollywood, Richmond, Virginia.
On September 8, 1874, Robert Josiah Willingham, Sr. married Sarah Corneille Bacon, by whom he had five sons and four daughters.
