A Sad Announcement

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jun 17, 1913

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 40, No. 24.

A Sad Announcement

A PREEMINENTLY sad thing has spread a cloud over our General Conference that has just closed its session in Washington, D. C. One of our most honored and veteran workers, Elder George A. Irwin, died quite unexpectedly of heart trouble. Elder Irwin has been prominently known among our people for many years. He became connected with our work in Ohio, serving as president of the Ohio Conference for some time. He also served on the General Conference Committee while holding the position of president of the Ohio Conference. In 1897 he was elected president of the General Conference, and in 1899 he was reelected to that position.

He has labored extensively in many parts of the United States. He spent considerable time also in Australia and among the islands of the Pacific. He traveled in Europe, as well as Asia and Africa, in the interests of the foreign mission work. And in addition to these arduous labors that he gave to this great message, he presented four years of the best of his life to his country, having been a soldier on the side of the North in the great rebellion that broke out in 1861. He was for a number of months a prisoner in both Libby and Andersonville; but notwithstanding the hardships of the war and the trying labors of his after-life, he seemed to be in the best of health. There were very few of us, if any, who would have thought, from his general appearance, that he was a man as far along in life as he was, being in his sixty-ninth year when he died. He manifested the vigor of a man much younger. His death came as a very sad blow upon the conference. He had been ailing for only a short time, and took part in some of the first meetings, and was thought to be improving, when suddenly the end came.

The funeral services were held in the large tent, and he was laid to rest in a cemetery near. The majority of those attending the conference had met Elder Irwin as he had labored in different parts of the world. Their sincere sympathy and respect for their fellow laborer in this great work served to soothe the bitterness of anguish that was felt by the wife and son, who were also present at the conference, and who were so unexpectedly called to this deep mourning.

As our much esteemed companions in labor are laid away to rest, it gives an added joy to the thought that the great resurrection day at the second coming of Christ is very near at hand, when it will be our indescribable privilege to greet them again. And then, in the possession of immortality, all sadness and all partings will be forever at an end.