At this time he commenced “outlying work” in the rural hinterland, leaving a description of Mass in a “rough hut of sticks”, the altar “a packing case with my portable altar on the top – yet all was reverent as in a cathedral” – “it reminded me of Bethlehem.”[4] His most distant mission work in 1905 was at Khosis north of Postmasburg.
In 1916 Bishop Wilfrid Gore Browne described how Lawson traveled “1040 miles every two months, on horse-back, staying at farms on the way.”[5] During World War I Lawson served as Chaplain first to the Kalahari Horse in the German South West Africa Campaign and later volunteered for work in Europe.
[6] Upon his death Lawson left a collection of 247 original drawings and engravings by French, Dutch, Flemish, English and Italian masters.
It includes works by Stefano della Bella, Sebastion Bourdon, Jacques Callot, Simone Cantarini, Annibale Carracci, Sir Anthony van Dyck and Guercino and many others.
Lawson prepared herbarium specimens and presented plants for identification to Maria Wilman, who was then director of the McGregor Museum in Kimberley.