Walters, Joseph (1879-1954)

Transcription of obituary published in the Minutes of Conference

JOSEPH WALTERS: born 1879 at Walsall. He entered the Primitive Methodist ministry in 1905, and among his circuits were Barton-on-Humber, Intake (Sheffield), Balby (Doncaster), Goole, Worcester, and Prees Green. 

He was a man of saintly character who gave himself to prayer and the ministry of the Word. The Bible was his constant companion, and he read deeply in the mystics. In his preaching, he dwelt much upon the Person and work of the Holy Spirit, and the privilege of the Christian to receive Him. He believed whole-heartedly in the Methodist witness to full salvation. Many thank God for his faithful ministry, and, in the circuits he travelled there is to-day ‘fruit that abides’ in the lives and service of those he led to Christ. 

He was a great pastor, and loved to pray in the homes of his people. His own home was a very happy one. He entered Higher Service on 9th April 1954, in the seventy-fifth year of his age and the forty-ninth of his ministry.

Family

Joseph was born 18 November 1879 at Walsall, Staffordshire, to parents John Walters, a gas tube socket and fitting sewer (1891), and Catherine Pugh.

Before entering the ministry Joseph worked as a bridle cutter (1901).

He married Margaret Rotherford Normandale (1882-1951) in the summer of 1909 in the Ely Registration District, Cambridgeshire. Margaret was a daughter of Rev J.W. Normandale. Birth records identify seven children.

• Evelyn Mary (1911-1981) – married John Ernest Caukill, a clerk (1939), in 1933        
• Joseph N (1912-1975) – merchant navy navigation officer (1939)
• Alice M (b1913)                  
• Beatrice G (1915-1915)     
• Florence M (b1915)             
• Vera E (b1916)                   
• Grace R (b1924)               

Joseph died on 9 April 1954.

Circuits

• 1905 Wickhambrook
• 1907 Yarmouth
• 1909 Pembroke Dock
• 1910 Spalding
• 1913 St Ives, Hunts
• 1915 Barton on Humber
• 1919 Hoyland
• 1925 Sheffield Int
• 1928 Goole
• 1931 Doncaster Sp G
• 1935 Worcester
• 1938 Prees Green
• 1942 Welshpool
• 1945 Minsterley
• 1947 Wrexham (S)

References

Methodist Minutes 1954/138

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

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers