Author: SUTCLIFFE, William
Biography:
SUTCLIFFE, William (c. 1772-1833: findmypast.com)
William Sutcliffe, a native of Yorkshire, was a Wesleyan Methodist missionary sent out to Nova Scotia in 1804. (His name is common enough in Yorkshire that it is not possible to be certain about his parentage: in Halifax in 1771, for instance, there were two boys of that name baptised, and if his parents were non-conformists there might be no baptismal record.) From Nova Scotia he went to Bermuda, where he worked with a “local preacher” to build up a congregation and was well thought of. He left Bermuda in 1819 following an outbreak of yellow fever and spent two more years in Canada before returning to England “in a distressing mental state” (Findlay) from which he only partly recovered. His preface to The Trial of Cain (1823) alludes to his semi-retired situation. He remained a “supernumerary” Methodist preacher and settled in Manchester with his wife Sarah Whittle (1771-1833), whom he married in Manchester on 8 Dec. 1823. But she died on 4 Apr. 1833 and he on 8 Apr., apparently of the same illness. They were buried as non-conformists in the Wesleyan burial ground on 7 and 11 Apr. respectively. (ancestry.com 19 Dec. 2024; findmypast.com 19 Dec. 2024; Halifax Books, 248; G. G. Findlay and W. W. Holdsworth, The History of the Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Society [1921-24], 2: 251-2; Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine Feb. 1834, 157)
Other Names:
- W. Sutcliffe