Price, William (1825-1911)

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Primitive Methodist Magazine 1877

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Primitive Methodist Magazine 1911

Early years

William was born on 20 February 1825 at Ravenstone, Leicestershire. His family moved to Coalville when the coalmines first opened there. That event brought a number of miners from the north-east to the area which developed the work of Primitive Methodism. William was converted at a cottage prayer meeting in 1841. Like his father before him, William was a joiner.

Ministry

William entered his first circuit in September 1847 as a supply for the Rev John Verity who had been taken ill. He was received by Conference in 1848 as a probationary minister.

The Primitive Methodist Magazine 1877 records; ‘By his powers of description and imitation, he can make the persons and events of their days, as well as the present time, live, and move, and breathe, as it were, before the eyes of his congregation, while his delineations of the sins, follies, foibles and idiosyncrasies of individuals are frequently graphic and telling.’

His obituary records that William was endowed with a fine presence, a magnificent voice, powers of description and imitation, had a passion for souls, and while his sermons and addresses were always spiritual and practical, they sparkled with wit and humour.

Family

William married Emma Haslam (1826-1873) at Brampton Derbyshire in 1854. Census returns identify four children.

• Samuel (b1855)
• Adela (1859-1937)
• Charles William (1860-1840) – a fish merchant
• Emma (b1863)

William married Sarah Ann Woollerton (1841-1929) in 1876 at Quorndon, Leicestershire.

William died on15 February 1911 at Cleethorpes, Lincolnshire. He was buried on his 86th birthday.

Circuits

• 1848 Chesterfield
• 1849 Lincoln
• 1850 Ingham
• 1851 Leicester
• 1853 Leicester ll
• 1854 Milford
• 1855 Belper
• 1856 Oxton
• 1858 Nottingham ll
• 1860 Winster
• 1863 Newark
• 1865 Ripley
• 1869 Sheffield l
• 1872 Wirksworth
• 1873 Loughborough
• 1876 Nottingham ll
• 1879 Mansfield
• 1882 Sheffield V
• 1885 Gainsborough
• 1890 Grimsby ll
• 1892 Filey
• 1893 Nottingham l (S)

References

Primitive Methodist Magazine PMM 1877/193; 1911/316

PM Minutes 1911/29

H B Kendall, Origin and History of the PM Church, vol 1, p468 (portrait)

W Leary,Directory of Primitive Methodist Ministers and their Circuits , 1990

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers