Transcription of obituary published in the Minutes of Conference
JOHN WILLIAM FELTON: born in Croxton, Staffs., in 1898, where he worked as a young man on the coal mines. He came under the influence of a blind local preacher with whom he took long walks in the country. When the call to preach came to him, he was not ashamed to take his Bible into the pits to study during his dinner hour. The severe tests to his faith during service in the army seemed, in the end, to have strengthened his call to the ministry where he was always known as a “man’s man.” He had a genius for making friends, many of whom kept in touch with him up to the time of his death. In his own experience, he was intimately associated with suffering which enlarged his sympathies and made him a helpful pastor to his people. He never paraded his gifts but exercised them in a quiet, effective manner. Thoroughness characterised everything that he did. His sermons were carefully prepared, and his administrative ability ensured smooth working in his circuits and churches.
All his ministry was spent in the North and his knowledge of the area enabled him to make a valuable contribution to work on the Replanning Commission. After training at Hartley College, he served the Church in Staithes, Tranent, Kirby Moorside, Scunthorpe, South Shields, Newcastle, Hull, Seaham, South Shields and Ashington. He came to Pickering to enjoy a well-earned rest, but an operation which he underwent ten years previously had left its mark and he died on 4 May 1964, in his sixty-fifth year, the fortieth of his ministry.
Family
John was born on 15 June 1898 at Croxton, Staffordshire, to parents William, a bricklayer, and Ada.
He married Lizzie Trattles (1889-1955) in the summer of 1927 at Whitby, Yorkshire. Birth records identify one child.
- Noreen E. T. (b abt1929) – married John Felton in 1965
John died on 4 May 1964 at Pickering, Yorkshire.
Circuits
- Hartley
- 1923 Staithes
- 1926 Tranent
- 1927 Kirby Moorside
- 1931 Scunthorpe
- 1938 Newcastle Heaton
- 1944 Hull North
- 1948 Seaham
- 1952 S Shields
- 1958 Ashington
- 1963 Pickering (S)
References
Methodist Minutes 1964/216
W Leary, Directory of Primitive Methodist Ministers and their Circuits, 1990
Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers
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