HUGHES, Reginald Joseph 1899 - 1962

Born in Worcester in 1899. His family moved to Walsall and here he grew up and was educated. He came from a strong Methodist background and began preaching at the age of 17.

He entered the Wesleyan Methodist ministry in 1926. After a pre-collegiate year at Kirkoswald and training at Didsbury College, he served in the North Scotland Mission, Ticehurst, Pontefract, Malton, Girvan, Rhondda, Bingham, Pateley Bridge, Thornley, Brompton, Elland, Leeds and Bradford circuits.

At the time of his death he was Superintendent minister of the Motherwell and Wishaw circuit.

He had an active mind and a keen interest in Greek and Hebrew. His preaching was enriched by a thorough knowledge of the Bible and by wide reading. In his pastoral work he was kind and attentive to the sick and his quiet and unobtrusive help to the needy was greatly appre ciated. He was at home in the company of other men and those who knew him discovered a quiet, strong and generous personality beneath a rather shy exterior.

As a colleague he was helpful and brotherly and always ready to assist those younger than himself in the ministry.

The last eleven months of his life were spent in hospital where, despite many set-backs and continual pain, he struggled manfully and cheerfully to overcome the effects of a severe stroke. The way in which he bore his disability had a marked influence on the patients in his ward. Right to the end he never gave up hope of some measure of recovery.

He died quite suddenly and peacefully on Whit Sunday, 10 June 1962, in the sixty-third year of his age and the thirty-sixth of his ministry.

©Trustees for Methodist Church Purposes 1962