Ball, Edgar (1867-1945)

Primitive Methodist Magazine 1920
Primitive Methodist Magazine 1920

Early years

Edgar was born in 1867 at Hereford to parents Enoch Ball and Sarah Vines. Enoch was a PM Minister. Brothers, Charles and William, were also PM Ministers.

Edgar became a member of the Church in 1881, and three years later he preached his first sermon in Gibbett Road Church, Halifax. He had two short terms as a hired local preacher before being accepted for the ministry by the Conference in 1890.

Ministry

Edgar was a man of striking personality and strong convictions, held with more than ordinary tenacity. He had contempt for all duplicity, and a severity of judgement that seemed to some people to detract from the success of his work. He was a fluent and forceful speaker; and his sermons bore the stamp of originality. In debate he was wonderfully alert. John Mayles speculated that had he been a lawyer, litigants with a poor case would have had a rough time under his cross-examinations. John went on to record that Edgar had mellowed with the passing years.

Edgar served for five years as Secretary of the Itinerant Preachers’ Friendly Society. During his term of office Edgar lead an investigation its finances, which resulted in radical steps to improve the position.

Family

Edgar married Lydia Cooke (1872-1958) in the summer of 1895 at Gravesend, Kent. Lydia was a daughter of Rev G J Cooke. Census returns identify three children.

  • Edgar Dale (1896-1965) – an engineer (1945); later Hon Secretary of the Institution of Production Engineers
  • Margaret (b1897)
  • Winifred Muriel (1899-1988) – married William Peters in 1924

Edgar died on 11 March 1945 at Mansfield, Nottinghamshire

Circuits

  • 1890 Dover & Deal
  • 1891 Walthamstow
  • 1893 Buckingham
  • 1894 Paisley
  • 1896 Tamworth
  • 1899 Bath I
  • 1901 Beccles
  • 1903 Melton Mowbray
  • 1907 Manchester VII
  • 1910 Church Gresley
  • 1912 Portsmouth I
  • 1916 Derby I
  • 1921 Mansfield
  • 1925 Willesden Green
  • 1930 Derby (Sup)

References

Primitive Methodist Magazine 1920/78

Methodist Minutes 1945/133

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

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers

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