Allen Wyley was not an ordained minister, but late in his life he did preach and exhort the brethren. After being baptized by David Thomas in 1765 he yearned to have a Baptist preacher to come to Culpepper, Virginia, to evangelize the people and possibly to start a church. He had heard about a man named Samuel Harris, and he set out to look for him. In the will of God he found his man and told him of his errand. Harris agreed to follow him into the spiritual darkness of the Virginia Colony. The party preached in Culpepper, where they were violently mistreated, but neither Harris nor Wiley gave up their efforts for the Lord. Sometime later, in nearby Orange County, Mr. Wyley was with a group of Baptist preachers who were arrested, tried and imprisoned. Court records read: “This day Allan Wiley, John Corbley, Elijah Craig and Thomas Chambers [are] charged as Vagrant and Itinerant Persons… For assembling themselves unlawfully at Sundry Times and Places under the denomination of Anabaptists for Teaching and Preaching Schismatick doctrines. Whereupon the Court [is] of the opinion that said Allen Wiley, John Corlby, Elijah Craig and Thomas Chambers are Guilty… and [are] ordered to enter into bond each in the sum of 50 pounds… each… until the 25th of October next, and in case they fail to enter into such bond as aforesaid that each of them so failing shall be committed to gaol until the same shall be performed.” While is it not said, it is doubtful that any of those men paid their bond and were therefore jailed for some time.
– This Day in Baptist History III, David Cummins