Lawson, Herbert Stephen (1889-1963)

Transcription of obituary published in the Minutes of Conference

HERBERT STEPHEN LAWSON: born in Kirkby Stephen, Westmorland, in 1889. He was accepted as a candidate for the Ministry in 1913, and in the same year entered Hartley College. During the First World War he served in the Royal Army Medical Corps in France. 

He travelled in the following Circuits: St. Austell, Brinkworth, Hoyland & Wombwell. Rhondda Valley, Preston, Farnborough, Reading, Newcastle-under-Lyme and Hebden Bridge where in 1958, owing to a breakdown in health, he was compelled to become a supernumerary. 

A man of quiet ways, he exercised a gracious pastoral Ministry and is remembered by many with affection and gratitude. A truly christian gentleman, he radiated cheerfulness, kindness and sympathy in all his dealings. A man of great fortitude, he bore his affliction with undiscouraged pluck. During his retirement he would take preaching appointments often under great strain but he never complained. It was difficult to get him to talk about his life and work and his reluctance was obviously due to his lack of concern for himself and reflected a deep humility. Besides, he refused to dwell on the past, however precious the memories. 

He died peacefully on 29 November 1963, in the seventy-fourth year of his life and the fiftieth year of his ministry.

Family

Herbert was born in 1889 at Kirkby Stephen, Westmorland, to parents Joseph and Hannah.

Before entering the ministry, Herbert was a grocer’s assistant (1911).

He married Elizabeth M Moore (1894-1942) in the summer of 1921 at St Austell, Cornwall. The 1939 Register records two children.

• George Hamilton M (19182005) – clerical officer in Civil Service (1939)
• Kathleen (1925-2011) – married George H French in 1946

Herbert died on 29 November 1963 at Preston, Lancashire.

Circuits

• Hartley
• 1915 Supply- serving in RAMC
• 1919 St Austell
• 1922 Brinkworth
• 1925 Hoyland
• 1927 Rhondda
• 1929 St Austell
• 1933 Preston
• 1937 Aldershot &c
• 1947 Reading
• 1951 Newcastle Staff
• 1955 Hebden Bridge
• 1858 Hebden Bridge (Sup)

References

Methodist Minutes 1964/198

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

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers