William Branham (April 6, 1909 - December 24, 1965)
Life StoryZurich, Switzerland June 26, 1955
When I was born, I come from parents that was not Christian. Before me, my father and mother’s people were Catholic. And they come from Ireland. They had immigrated to the U.S. But my father and mother did not go to church. And I was born up in the mountains, in a little log cabin; no floor, just the ground. We didn’t have a table. Father had cut a stump in two . . . or, log, and made a table. We had no lights. We had grease in a can, and a piece of goods in there, to burn for a wick. There was no windows in the house, just a little door you opened up. Our mattresses on the bed was made of straw. Very poor.
My mother was fifteen, and my daddy was eighteen. And the morning when I was born, April the sixth, 1909, at five o’clock in the morning. There was no doctor; they had a mid-wife. And when I was born, I only weighed five pounds; very small.
And mother wanted to see what I looked like. The little candle light didn’t give enough light, so they opened up the little window over the bed. It was daylight. And when they opened the window, that light of fire sailed in. They all started weeping. They didn’t know what that meant. It was right over where I was at.
The same picture that they’ve taken in America (We have it here.), and the write on it, that tells from the scientific world, it’s absolutely a supernatural being. The man said the mechanical eye of the camera wouldn’t take psychology. And he is one of the head of the FBI, Federal Bureau of Investigations. And he is right. He said, “The light struck the lens.”
When I was about eight, ten days old, my mother taken me to a little Baptist church. That’s the only church in the country. That was my first visit to the house of God. Later we moved to Indiana. That was in the state of Kentucky.
And later on, at the age of about seven years old, I was packing water one day from a well. And I passed by a tree. I was weeping. I didn’t want to pack the water. I wanted to go fishing with the rest of the children. But when I heard something in the tree, like a roaring of a wind, I looked up. I seen nothing but just a place in the tree, about that big around, roaring around. And I kept looking, and I wondered why it just stayed there, like a little whirlwind. And none of the rest of the leaves were shaking. And I heard a voice of a man up there, said, “Don’t never drink. Don’t drink, and don’t never smoke, or defile yourself with women, for there is a work for you to do when you get older.”
Oh, I was scared. I dropped my bucket, and I ran to the house, screaming. And I jumped in my mother’s arms. And I said, “There’s a man in that tree.” They went down to look; nobody there. They called the doctor, and he said I was just nervous. I said, “No, I seen, and I heard Him speak.” And I never would go by that tree.
A little later on, about two weeks later, I was playing marbles with my brother, and I felt something come to me. We lived up on a hill, and the river was below us; a wilderness around. And I saw a bridge come up out of the wilderness. And it started across the river. Sixteen men dropped off into the water, and perished. And I seen a big sign; it said, “Twenty-two years.” I run in and told my mother. Oh, she said, “Son, you’re nervous. You went to sleep and you were dreaming.” I said, “No. No, I saw it.”
So, they wrote it down on a piece of paper. And twenty-two years from then, the great bridge crossed the river, and sixteen men dropped off of it, and drowned in the river. Every time, it’s perfect.
When I went to school as a little boy, many children had been born into the family. My father and mother had nine boys and one girl, nine boys and one girl. And then the girl was the baby. I am the oldest. We had to work very hard. I went to school poorly dressed. I would go sometime, with one of my father’s shoes on one feet, and my mother on the other. And very poor. We wanted to take something to eat. I’d take a little piece of bread, wrapped up, and take a bucket with some greens in it. My brother and I were ashamed to eat with the rest of the children. We’d go out in the woods, and sit down, and take a spoon, and each eat out of the bucket, and give each other a bite off the bread.
I remember one time at Christmas, my mother had popped some corn. And she give it to us in a little bucket. And we went to school with it. So, I did wrong: I asked to be excused during time of school. And when I went through the cloakroom, I took a big handful of popcorn out of the box, and went out and eat it, to be sure I got my share. We didn’t have it very often, maybe every two or three years. And then when brother come out and we went to eat, he seen part of it was gone. I was sorry.
A few . . . about two years ago, I was standing at the same place. My brother is in Heaven now. I would do anything I could if I could take that handful of corn to him today. I can’t now. So, don’t never do anything wrong, ‘cause it’ll come back to you someday.
I remember when we went to school together, there come a great snow, and all the boys had sleighs to ride on. But we didn’t have any, so we got a big dishpan and slide down in it. Well, we wasn’t in as much class as the rest of them, but we were sliding.
Well, life went on. When I become a young man. . . . Why, I was about fourteen---fifteen years old. You know how boys get about that age. Well, I wanted to get a little girl friend. So, I found a little girl I thought was very pretty. You know, brethren, your first girl friend: Eyes like a dove, and teeth like pearl, neck like a swan. You love them? Just a boy. Now, you know, brethren, you’ve been through the same thing. And so, a neighbor of mine, his boy, my age, why, he got his father’s car, so we taken our girls for a ride. And we had just a little bit of money, so we got some sandwiches and Coke. And when I returned, to my surprise, my pretty little girl was smoking a cigarette. My, I didn’t want none of that. Hmm! I think that’s the lowest thing that a woman can do. I haven’t changed my mind since.
Your lovely country here, I appreciate the morals of your country. I have never seen a woman with immorally dressed, or any woman smoke a cigarette. I love you for that. Our America is polluted with it. Don’t never do that, sister. Very bad! Now, when she had this cigarette, acting smart, I looked at her. And she said, “You want a cigarette, Billy?” I said, “No, ma’am.” I said, “I don’t smoke.” She said, “Now, you don’t smoke, you say you don’t dance, and you don’t go to theaters.” Said, “What do you like to do.” I said, “Go fishing and hunting.” But that didn’t interest her. And she said, “Take a cigarette.” I said, “No.” She said, “You big sissy.”
At the same time, I was training to be a boxer. Which, I did win the bantam weight championship, and was going up for the world championship, and I give it up for the Gospel. But I said, “Give me the cigarette, and I’ll show you whether I’m a sissy or not.” So, I took the cigarette, with determination to smoke it.
But when I started to light it, I heard something a whirling around. There come that tree back before me again. And I knew that God said, “Don’t you never smoke.” So, I threw it down, and run away, and went out in the field and started crying. And I asked God to let me die. Nobody wanted me; my people didn’t, the young people didn’t want me, so I wasn’t wanted. But He’s come to me. He said, “I will give you friends; just follow Me.”
Went on down through life. I was very bashful then, backward. And I guess you wonder how I ever got married. One day, I met a lovely girl. She was a German girl, and she was a Christian. And I started keeping company with her. Now notice a moment, I want you to get this part of it. I then become a Christian. Going with a girl; after a while we got married.
We didn’t have nothing of the world, but we had each other. When the day we got married, we had an old stove . . . old stove, an old bed, and a little old table. But we loved one another, and that’s the main thing. I worked hard to make her a living. After a while, God gave us a little boy, my little Billy Paul. And then, later, a little girl come.
And then one day, I was coming down from Michigan, and I met a church group. They called them the Pentecostals. I had become a minister of the Baptist church. But I heard these people; they were happy, and they were rejoicing. And I wondered why they were so happy. I’d never heard of that kind of religion. I stopped to listen, and I heard them preaching. I stayed all night. The next day theyasked me to preach. And I got up and started preaching, and hundreds and hundreds came to Christ. And the ministers come around, and said, “You’re a Baptist?” I said, “Yes.” Said, “Come preach for us.”
So, I put down all the invitations, and I hurried home to my wife. And when she come to meet me, I told her about these happy people. She said, “Oh, Billy, I would like to have that experience.” Said, “What do they call it?”
And I said, “They said it was the baptism of the Holy Spirit.” I said, “Let us go find Jesus like that.” So, we did, and we both received the blessing. So, I was going to leave then, to go on evangelistic work.
So, we went to tell our parents. Now, her mother was a refined type of woman, belonged to a great big church. She said, “Now, Billy, them people are nothing but trash. There is nothing to them. You stay away from them. I don’t want my girl around them.” I said, “Oh, but they were real.” She said, “No. No.” And I said, “I believe they are. And so, my wife started crying. And there’s where I made my fatal mistake.
Now, from here, listen. I listened to my mother-in-law instead of God, and forsaken the church, and went on back with the Baptist people. Right away, plagues hit my home. My wife took sick, my father died on my arm, my brother was killed. And everything happened just in a few days. A great flood hit the country, and washed away the homes. My wife was in the hospital. And I was out on a rescue with my boat. And one night, out in the water, my boat got in the current, and was going over a big falls. I couldn’t get the motor started, and I raised up my hands, and I said, “Oh, God, don’t let me drown. I am not worthy to live, but think of my wife and baby.” And I tried again, and it wouldn’t start, and I cried again to God. And then, just before going over the falls, the motor started, and I got to the land.
And then I tried to find my wife. And when I got to the hospital, it was covered over with water. The dike had broke, and all the waters gushed in. Where was my wife and baby? I begin to find people, [Blank spot on tape.] see if there was anyone drowned, but they got away on a train. And here I was sitting on an island, by myself. God gave me a chance, whether to call people trash or not. I said, “God, I know I’ve misbehaved myself. Don’t let my wife be killed.”
