The Ellen G. White Letters and Manuscripts: Volume 1

BYINGTON, John Fletcher (1832-1872) and Martha Louisa (née SMITH) (1834-1920)

Printer, schoolteacher, dentist, physician, and son of John Byington, first president of the General Conference, John Fletcher Byington became a Sabbathkeeping Adventist in 1852. By 1853 he was working as an apprentice at the Review and Herald printing office in Rochester, New York. Ellen White wrote in August 1853, “Stephen Belden and Fletcher Byington do not return from the office until 10, 12, 2 or 3 o'clock. They have labored uncommonly hard of late.” 1EGWLM 803.4

Byington continued his work at the Review “for some years,” but during the 1850s he also taught school intermittently. In 1855 he taught at the first school to be operated by Sabbatarian Adventists in Buck's Bridge, New York, and in 1858 at a similar school in Battle Creek, Michigan. The same year he married Martha Smith, daughter of Cyrenius and Louisa Smith. He graduated from the Homoeopathic Medical College of Cleveland, Ohio, in 1863 and entered into private medical practice. For about one year he served at the Western Health Reform Institute in Battle Creek. An action taken by the directors on May 27, 1867, stated that “the wages of Dr. Byington be fixed at $15 per week.” According to his obituary, he died in 1872 “of cerebro-spinal meningitis … in the 40th year of his age.” 1EGWLM 803.5

J. F. Byington boarded with the Whites while at Rochester. Years later Ellen White wrote appreciatively of “Brother Fletcher Byington, who was a member of my family for years. He seemed like a brother, and we were thoroughly united in the truth.” The only negative comment by Ellen White concerned Byington's involvement around 1860 in the general resentment shown by Review workers against James White. 1EGWLM 804.1

See: Obituary: “Dr. J. F. Byington,” Review, June 25, 1872, p. 15; obituary: “Martha Louisa King,” Review, Oct. 14, 1920, p. 31; Ellen G. White, Lt 7, 1853 (Aug. 24); Lt 28, 1859 (June/July); Lt 7, 1860 (June); Lt 174, 1906 (June 7); Grace Amadon, “The First President of the General Conference: John Byington, Farmer-Preacher,” Review, June 22, 1944, p. 7; James White, “School at Battle Creek,” Review, Jan. 14, 1858, p. 80; C. Smith, J. P. Kellogg, “A School in Battle Creek,” Review, Oct. 14, 1858, p. 168; Records of the Board of Directors of the Health Reform Institute at Battle Creek, Mich., April 25, 1867-Oct. 8, 1876 (Berrien Springs, Mich.: Center for Adventist Research, n.d.), p. 23; Herbert Cornelius Andrews, Sanford Charles Hinsdale, and Alfred L. Holman, Hinsdale Genealogy: Descendants of Robert Hinsdale of Dedham, Medfield, Hadley, and Deerfield, With an Account of the French Family of De Hinnisdal (Lombard, Ill.: A. H. Andrews, 1906), pp. 272, 273. 1EGWLM 804.2