Cooper, William Alfred (1882-1962)

Obituary from the Minutes of the Methodist Conference

Born in Norwich in 1882. It was in 1903 that he went as a pre-collegiate to Wigan because of the death of a minister.

Entering the Ministry of the United Methodist Free Churches in the following year, he served first of all at Bolton, and afterwards at Penarth, Burnley, Redditch. Bristol, Mansfield, and then in London at Forest Gate, Lee, Paddington and Broomwood.

He became an active supernumerary at Chalfont St Giles before his full retirement.

He had a gentle spirit, which was sustained by a real devotion to Christ. He loved preaching, and people wanted to hear him. Young men especially owed much to him, and he was a great encourager to any who wished to preach or enter the Ministry, and throughout his time he was a true pastor of his flock.

His last years were full of difficult illness, but he triumphed over it most certainly. In great weakness he remained a man of grace.

He died on 5 May 1962, in the eighty-first year of his age and the fifty-ninth of his ministry.

©Trustees for Methodist Church Purposes 1962

Family

William was born during the first quarter of 1882 in Lakenham, Norwich, the son of James W. and Mary N. Cooper. His father was a bank clerk.

He married Edith Frances Sales (1881- ) during the second quarter of 1908 in Norwich.  They had a daughter

• Constance (born 1910)

William is one of those individuals who seem to have avoided the census enumerators. If anyone has any information about his pre-ministerial work, or his family, it would be welcomed.

William died on 5th May 1962 in Harpenden.

Circuits

• 1903 Bolton Hanover
• 1905 Grimsby
• 1907 Barry Dock
• 1908 Cardiff Newport Road (received into Full Connexion)
• 1911 Burnley
• 1914 Redditch
• 1918 Kingswood
• 1924 Mansfield
• 1928 London Forest Gate
• 1932 London Lee
• 1936 London Paddington
• 1940 London Broomwood and Stockwell
• 1949 Barnet (supernumerary)
• 1954 Harpenden (supernumerary)

References

Oliver A Beckerlegge, United Methodist ministers and their circuits: Being an arrangement in alphabetical order of the stations of ministers of the Methodist New … and the United Methodist Church, 1797-1932

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers

Minutes of the Methodist Conference 1962, page 215