Messenger of the Lord

The Up-and-Down Experience of Fannie Bolton

The sad story of Francis (Fannie) E. Bolton would not be mentioned here except for the fact that critics still use her to cast a cloud over Ellen White’s integrity. Shortly after 28-year-old Miss Bolton was baptized in early 1888, she was enthusiastically recommended to Ellen White for employment. Although she knew relatively little about Mrs. White before joining her staff, she worked, on and off, as a literary assistant for about seven years. The files contain a long exchange of letters between Mrs. White and Fannie Bolton, as well as other correspondence between Fannie and others until her death in 1926. ⁸ MOL 479.4

Miss Bolton, a gifted writer with an artistic bent, seemed at first to be an ideal co-worker for Marian Davis. ⁹ Soon, however, difficulties arose. After a few months, Ellen White wrote about her concern for Fannie: “I want her to recover from this nervousness ... and in order to do this she must take time to rest the brain that the nerves may not be completely out of tune like our old organ.... I want you to get waked up to this matter. Do not be a creature of impulse.” ¹⁰ MOL 479.5

Because of Fannie’s nervous, unsettled temperament, Ellen White decided not to take her with her on speaking appointments: “Fannie is not the one to go with me [on trips]. It is too great a tax for her to take the discourses and to write them out. As soon as I came here they fastened upon her to get out articles for the paper, but after a little [time] I could not consent to it and again she feels so intensely that she becomes ... much exhausted.” ¹¹ MOL 479.6

Fannie Bolton’s nervous weakness made her “utterly exhausted” when she prepared some of Ellen White’s letters of reproof. ¹² In addition, she thought that she could make the letters better by substituting her words for Ellen White’s, leading Mrs. White to write: “I think Fannie feels that many of my expressions can be bettered, and she takes the life and point out of them.” ¹³ MOL 479.7

Not long after Fannie Bolton had been hired (June 1889), W. C. White, the overseer of Ellen White’s editorial assistants, concluded that Fannie could do her best work elsewhere: “I believe that Sister Fannie Bolton is much better qualified for work on a journal like the Pacific Health Journal, for in this she would have more occasion for original work, and it would not demand the accuracy which our work on the Signs must have.” ¹⁴ MOL 479.8

Was Fannie Bolton instructed carefully about her role as an assistant? Was she familiar with the way prophets received divine revelations? Did she work from a background of verbal inspiration rather than thought inspiration? MOL 480.1

In 1933 W. C. White and D. E. Robinson (another editorial supervisor) reviewed how she was instructed, emphasizing that “only Mrs. White’s thoughts were to be used” and only “her own words as far as grammatically consistent in expressing those thoughts.” ¹⁵ MOL 480.2

Editing another’s manuscripts was a pleasurable challenge to Marian Davis ¹⁶ but not for Fannie. She soon felt that she was burying her own talent in editing someone else’s materials, and so she was released in 1891 to attend college at Ann Arbor, Michigan. ¹⁷ Shortly after Fannie was released, she wrote a warm, congenial letter to Ellen White which included: “Dear Sister White, forgive me [for] all; I know you do. I do love you, and thank you for all your many acts of love toward me.” ¹⁸ MOL 480.3

Five times Ellen White endured this pattern of confrontation and Fannie’s confession of misrepresenting her, until Fannie finally left Mrs. White’s employ in May 1896. On her ocean voyage returning to the United States from Australia, Fannie wrote: “I know your prayers will follow me. Thank you again for your patience and kindness and mercy to me. I go home with much lighter heart than I could have done before this.” ¹⁹ MOL 480.4