Researching William Shedd

In 1835, Shedd enrolled at the University of Vermont, and became a protégé of UVM president James Marsh. Under the influence of his mentor, Shedd was deeply affected by the thought of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Transcendentalism. He graduated from UVM in 1839 and taught school for one year, during which time he began to attend the Presbyterian church. Being called to the ministry, Shedd entered Andover Theological Seminary in 1840 and studied under theologian Leonard Woods. He graduated in 1843.

After a short pastorate at Brandon, Vermont, he was successively professor of English literature at the University of Vermont (1845–1852), professor of sacred rhetoric in Auburn Theological Seminary (1852–1854), professor of church history in Andover Theological Seminary (1854–1862), and, after one year (1862–1863) as associate pastor of the Brick Church of New York City, of sacred literature (1863–1874) and of systematic theology (1874–1890) in Union Theological Seminary. He died in New York City on November 17, 1894.

Dr. Shedd was a high Calvinist and was one of the most notable systematic theologians of the American Presbyterian church. His great work was Dogmatic Theology (3 vols, 1888–1894). He served as editor of Coleridge's Complete Works (7 vols, New York, 1894). He also wrote:

*Lectures on the Philosophy of History (1856), in which he applied to history the doctrine of organic evolution*Discourses and Essays (1856)*A Manual of Church History (2 vols, 1857), a translation of Guericke*A History of Christian Doctrine (2 vols, 1863)*Homiletics and Pastoral Theology (1867)*Sermons to the Natural Man (1871)*Theological Essays (1877)*Literary Essays (1878)*Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (1879)* Sermons to the Spiritual Man (1884)*The Doctrine of Endless Punishment (1885)

He was born January 24, 1865, in the little mountain village of Seir, overlooking the Urmia Plain, from missionary parents John Haskell Shedd and Sarah Jane Dawes Shedd, who had come to devote their lives helping the Assyrian community. Upon the completion of his education at Princeton University, he spent the rest of his life among the Assyrian Christians of northwestern Iran. In 1904 he published a book called Islam and the Oriental Churches: Their historical relations.

In 1918 it became necessary for Dr. Shedd to distance himself frommissionary work and to apply himself to consular work, as the US Consul in Urmia. He tried to reconcile the Assyrians and the Muslim Persians but without success. However, he has been accused of being among the foreign missionaries flaming the religious conflicts in the first place.

In July 1918 after the Ottoman army advanced toward Urmia, the mass flight of Assyrian Christians from Urmia to the safety of British-occupied Hamadan started. Dr. Shedd and his wife, Mary Lewis Shedd, were with the Assyrians in this flight, and when they had reached Sain Ghala, Dr. Shedd died of cholera and was buried somewhere there. His body was later recovered by his wife and buried in the Armenian Cemetery of Tabriz.