Ellen White: Woman of Vision

Long-Distance Counselor

During the nine years that Ellen White was in Australia she did not lose sight of what was going on in America. Although her mind was burdened and pushing forward the message in Australia and New Zealand, choosing sites for schools and tent meetings, she managed to keep up an almost overwhelming amount of correspondence across the sea. WV 347.1

Mail each way across the Pacific took a full month, and mail boats ran once a month. Preparing the mail to go on schedule was no small task for Ellen White and her secretaries. There were serious problems and agonizing situations. Her diary records the depth of concern she felt for leaders and individuals. WV 347.2

On April 9, 1894, she wrote of preparing the American mail while the house was full of visitors. “Elder Starr had to do most of the entertaining,” she wrote, “for my letters must be prepared for the American mail” (Manuscript 23, 1894). And on April 16, the day the mail closed, as she finished her letter to A. T. Jones, she, in weariness, declared: “I can write no more. This mail carries out more than one hundred pages” (Letter 68, 1894). The May American mail carried 150 pages, some addressed to the president of the General Conference. WV 347.3

The communications ran from four to 12 pages of double-spaced typewritten material, and the few lines quoted in this volume, although selected as epitomizing the thrust of a respective message, represent but very brief samples of the many, many messages painstakingly penned. WV 347.4