* John Wesley was the 15th child of a family of 19. He was brought up in near poverty, his clergyman father even being imprisoned for debt.
* He was almost burnt to death in a fire at his home in 1709 when he was just five years old.
* Until he was 11, he was taught at home by his intellectually-gifted mother. He was later educated at Charterhouse School and Christ Church, Oxford. He was ordained a priest on September 22, 1728.
* From centres in London, Bristol, Newcastle and Dublin, he rode 250,000 miles on his missionary journeys. He preached 45,000 sermons.
* He issued nearly 400 publications, including books on medicine and religious works in Hebrew, Greek, French and English.
* When he was 86, Wesley embarked on a nine-week tour of Ireland, preaching 100 sermons in 60 towns and villages.
* He set up a free medical dispensary, spinning and knitting shops for the poor and adapted an electrical machine for health cures.
* His younger brother, Charles, wrote more than 7,000 hymns.
* Wesley visited Weardale at least 13 times, the last time on June 10, 1790, aged 86.
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