Prove it or refute it ...

 

This needs verification or refutation. 

After a failed prediction general among Advent Christians that Christ would come in 1885, most pointing to January that year. “Rev. Mr. Sergisson, an Advent Preacher of Philadelphia” was interviewed by a newspaper. The interview was republished in The Beverly Banner. Sergisson reviewed Adventist history, discussing the influence of “Time-ists,” saying:

 “Many such cases have thinned our ranks; perhaps Nelson H. Barbour’s prediction of 1873 caused the loss of as many as others. Barbour was a hatter’s clerk in Rochester, N. Y. His story was that an angel appeared to him in a vision while at sea and imparted to him the hour at which the world should end. Then the angel bade him tell all men what he had seen. He declared that the end would come in a certain day in April 1883 [sic. a Typesetter’s Error for 1873.] He had many opponents among the ministry, still thousands flocked to him.”

 Can we establish or refute the claim that Barbour was for a while a ‘hatter’s clerk’? 

Can we establish or refute the claim that Barbour saw a vision? 

If we can do neither, what do you see as most probable?