Revd William Mather

Rev. William Mather was the minister of the Congregational Church in Quoiting Square Marlow from 1880 to 1882.

He started out in life not in the church but as a chemist and druggist like his father, also called William. That trade and nonconformist Christian worship were both strong features of the wider Mather family in the Wellingborough region of Northamptonshire, from which the William Mather of this post originates.

He was baptised in 1815 with the full name William Morton Mather. The Morton came from the maiden name of his mother Mary.

When William was only seven he lost his 40 year old father who was buried in the Mather family vault at Bunhill Fields burial ground in London which was for nonconformists. 

William was sent to boarding school before training as a chemist. His first job was in Bath where he was inspired by preacher William Jay to decide to be a preacher himself one day.

I found William in 1839 as a chemist and druggist working for E Randall "Chemist to the Queen" and lemonade maker in Southampton High Street. He was also a Sunday School teacher in Southampton.

Two years later he announced that he had taken over a chemist's shop at 24 King Street Reading, Berkshire.

When a cholera outbreak erupted in 1848 William was quick off the mark to meet the needs of a worried public, offering a selection of recommended medicines against cholera complete with detailed instructions as to how to combine them packed together in a "neat box" to be cracked upon by concerned families as soon as the first member of the household was seen to be visiting the toilet with increased frequency!

As well as teaching in the Sunday School William travelled to nearby Berkshire villages to preach. In 1846 he led a group of around 20 to 30 worshippers, including his two apprentices, away from the Congregational Church in Broad Street Reading after doctrinal disputes with others in the congregation. He was not yet a paid minister himself but was instrumental in setting up a temporary place of worship for the breakaway group while such minister was found and sufficient funds were raised for a permanent chapel of their own.

William was one of those present when the corner stone of the new chapel - Trinity Chapel- was laid in 1848.

William gave up his Reading shop in 1852.

By 1860 he was an ordained minister and began his church career in the beautiful village of Burwash in Sussex. The next year he married Mary Henrietta Turner and moved to London. In 1871 he was censused as a Minister in Lambeth where he had raised money for the building of an iron church there (cheaper and quicker than stone buildings, these were popular projects for nonconformist groups). He also worked at Sunbury, organising the reopening of a closed up and failing Congregational church and the establishment of a Sunday School. A bout of ill health meant he needed to scale back his commitments and he ceased for the time being to be a minister responsible for any particular church. He was obviously burning the candle at both ends as during this time he was also travelling throughout the home counties to preach in the villages.

He would next become the Traveling Secretary for the Turkish Mission Aid Society and Honorary Secretary of the Christian Instruction Society in London, though whether either job represented much of an opportunity to rest is debatable.

William and Mary moved to Marlow in 1880 for the start of his job there. Their home was the manse in Chapel Street. They used the name Chapel House for it.

William did not live long to enjoy his new home or ministry. He seems not to have then fully recovered from his earlier illness and he had to cease preaching in the Autumn of 1881 to try a seaside cure after his health again declined. This failed and he passed away in February 1882. Though he had little opportunity to carry out his work in Marlow the South Bucks Free Press said in an obituary that he had been a kind teacher to the young in his congregation and would be remembered for his geniality and "animated delivery".

His wife Mary quickly moved to no 4 Kenton Villas in Glade Road where she set up a small day and boarding school for girls. (Opened July 31st 1882) If she needed any tips on running a school she need only have looked to her late husband's sisters Susan, Ann and Caroline who ran a boarding school for girls from their home in Hove, Sussex by 1871. Their elderly mother lived with them.

Mary died in 1885 at Hastings aged 61.

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Sources:

History of the the Congregational Churches in the Berkshire, South Oxfordshire and South Buckinghamshire Association. Digitized by Google and made available at Archive.org.

Berkshire Chronicle 7th August 1841 and 2nd September 1848. Copies in the archives of the British Library. Accessed via the BNA. 

Reading Mercury 25th October 1848. As above.

South Bucks Free Press and Maidenhead Journal 3rd March 1882. As above.

1881 census Great Marlow and 1861 census Burwash transcribed by me from microfilm.

https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VFDC-WK8 [census for William's sisters]

GRO Death Registration and Marriage Registration Indexes.

Post Office Directory of the Borough of Southampton by William Cooper. 1843. Digitized by Google.

Wills of Jane Comley of Southampton. Written 1839, proved 1845 and William Mather of Wellingborough 1822. Both at National Archives and transcribed by me.

1871 census London thanks to Jane Pullinger.

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