George Storrs was born in Lebanon, New Hampshire, on December 13, 1796. His father was an industrious mechanic working as a wheelwright in the Revolutionary army. After the war, he married Lucinda Howe and moved to New Hampshire where he became a wealthy farmer. The two had eight children. George was the youngest. As a child George was afraid of God and felt alienated from Christianity because of the sermons he had heard about the eternal torment of the wicked in hell. At the age of 17 he began earnestly to seek to know the goodness of God. Through his studies and his mother’s prayers and constant religious instruction he gave his heart to Christ and joined the Congregational Church at the age of 19.
When George was 22 he married, and at 28 he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. After his first wife died, he married her sister, Martha.
As George continued to grow spiritually, conviction deepened that he was called of God to preach. Under the influence of a godly Methodist minister, who showed kindness to him during his wife’s illness, he joined the Methodist ministry in 1825. Slavery was the main burden of Storrs’ preaching. This was not a doctrine approved by the local bishop who did everything in his power to suppress all discussion of the subject. During an antislavery society meeting in 1835 at the Sanbornton Bridge Methodist meetinghouse George prayed for the slaves. While praying, the deputy sheriff arrested Storrs and took him to jail. After the trial he was set free.
While traveling on a train in 1837, Storrs read a small tract written by Deacon Henry Grew of Philadelphia which led him to study the subject of the state of the dead for himself. After several years of study, conversation and correspondence with some of America’s most eminent ministers, Storrs reached the conclusion that man does not possess inherent immortality but receives it only as a gift through Christ, and that God will utterly exterminate the wicked through fire at the second death. The dead are asleep now and there is no ever-burning hell. The idea of the wicked in an eternal burning hell was considered by Storrs as a blot on the character of God. This Bible understanding is a foundational truth for the end time.
The natural response of the human heart is to reject the pastor who holds a doctrine that differs from what is currently believed to be truth. This rejection George Storrs experienced. He was even persecuted for his faith. After several years of study and heart-searching George Storrs left the Methodist church where he had been a minister for 11 years and it was because of the doctrine of the state of the dead.
After leaving the Methodist church George visited Albany N.Y. where a small congregation invited him to be their pastor. He accepted this call, taking for his guiding principle: “The Bible as the only creed and Christian character the only test.”
Not long after this, George heard the Millerite Message from Calvin French. He was so impressed that he arranged for Charles Fitch to hold a series of tent meetings that thousands attended. After that series, Storrs was convinced of the soon coming of Christ and left Albany that year, (1842), to preach the Advent message to thousands. He became one of the leaders of the Advent Movement. He did not preach any other message now except the Advent message. He worked closely with William Miller and Joshua Himes.
During this time, Storrs shared with some Adventist leaders the study he had done regarding the subject of the state of the dead, which he had been studying for years. He preached some sermons on the subject and six of them were put into a book.
Charles Fitch wrote to Storrs a letter dated January 25, 1844: “As you have long been fighting the Lord’s battles alone, on the subject of the state of the dead, and of the final doom of the wicked, I write this to say that I am at last, after much thought and prayer, and a full conviction of duty to God, prepared to take my stand by your side.” This was the first ministerial convert to the truth about the state of the dead. It was not the last.
Many Adventist pioneers recognized the influence of Storrs on the theology regarding the state of the dead. James White wrote: “Storrs’s Six Sermons on the immortality question were being widely circulated among Adventists, and the doctrine of man’s unconsciousness in death and the destruction of the wicked was being adopted by some and regarded with favor by many.”
Sadly though, Storrs was disappointed when Jesus did not return October 22, 1844. He had been one of the most vigorous preachers who taught that Jesus would return in 1844, but, immediately after the great disappointment of 1844 he was one of the first to disclaim the movement, attributing it to “mesmeric influence.” He did not accept the sanctuary message or the seventh-day Sabbath message but he did continue to believe the Bible truth about the state of the dead.
George Storrs died at home in Brooklyn, N. Y., on December 28, 1879 at the age of 83. His widow, Martha Waterman Storrs, died at the same place March 15, 1882, at the age of 82.