George Charles Smith of Penzance

• Far from home, seafarers face natural dangers, social mistreatment, and loneliness even in cramped quarters. Yet ever since Christ rode the waves, his followers have blessed seafarers. Read this book for a stirring true account written by the leading historian of maritime missions. You will never look at the ocean in the same way.

  — Miriam Adeney, PhD, world mission professor at Seattle Pacific University and Regent College, Vancouver BC

• It has been a delight to read this first-ever biography of George Charles Smith, the founder of the worldwide Seafarers’ Mission Movement. With source materials about Smith’s stormy life scattered in so many places, Dr. Roald Kverndal has undertaken a mammoth task in compiling the data for such a formidable enterprise. I am not aware of any statue or blue plaque having yet been erected to Smith’s memory. This book will therefore help to raise rightful awareness.

  — Dr. Stephen Friend, co-founder of the International Association for the Study of Maritime Mission

• Wisdom, it is said, is often best taught by experience. In the case of “Boatswain Smith,” he gained the wisdom to become the worldwide grandfather of Christian ministry among seafarers by himself “coming up through the hawse pipe.” The author has knitted together a fascinating series of vignettes from Smith’s own words into the inspirational life story of a man of extraordinary vision and faith.

  — Monsignor James E. Dillenburg, formerly international secretary of the Apostleship of the Sea at the Vatican

• This book is a tremendous treasure. Tracing the life of the founder and fearless advocate of ministry among People of the Sea, the book belongs to the practical theology of seafarers’ chaplains everywhere. It can also serve as a wonderful challenge to seafarers themselves to minister among their own. When I recently shared a glimpse of this Pioneer Pastor from Penzance with a seafaring friend of mine, he was just all ears and begged me for a copy one day.

  — Reverend Peter Ibrahim, veteran port chaplain to International Seafarers in Hamburg

• Ever since George Charles Smith received his original call to seafarers’ mission in the early 1800s, he has been an icon and inspirer for others—across all denominational boundaries. I too have been greatly indebted to him—not least during my many years of service in the Norwegian Seamen’s Church in London, as a direct successor to Smith’s groundbreaking ministry in the Danish-Norwegian Temple there. Dr. Roald Kverndal deserves our thanks for researching the life story of this truly heroic pioneer.

  — Reverend Dagfinn Kvale, thirty-year chaplain in the Norwegian Seamen's Mission

Author

• Roald Kverndal
  Roald Kverndal

  Roald Kverndal has been associated with the sea throughout his life. Born in England of Norwegian parents, he belonged in his childhood to the Norwegian Seamen’s Church in London. Later he served as merchant seafarer and marine lawyer before entering the ministry as seafarers’ chaplain in different ports around the world. In 1984, he was awarded a Doctorate of Theology in Oslo, Norway. His dissertation on “Seamen’s Missions: Their Origin and Early Growth” was published in1986 as the world’s first documented history of the movement. From the late 1970s to the early 1990s, he served as executive secretary of the North American Maritime Ministry Association, as well as maritime ministry consultant for the Lutheran World Federation and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. He and his wife reside at Mercer Island/Seattle, Washington.

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