He spent six years ministering in Pietermaritzburg; after his return to England, he became known as the "Rail men's Apostle" for his work with railway workers in Oxford.
[1] His father, William David Jenkins, could allegedly trace his ancestry back to Iestyn ap Gwrgant, the last Prince of Morgannwg.
[1] He became a good classical and oriental scholar whilst at Oxford, developing a fluency in modern languages in later life.
[1][2] Jenkins remained in Pietermaritzburg for six years, working particularly with the armed forces as Chaplain to the 45th Regiment and Battery of Field Artillery.
Colenso, however, refused to attend at the hearing and subsequently succeeded in his application to the Privy Council for an order that the Bishop Gray's judgment had been illegal.
Ill-health (the early stages of liver cancer) caused Jenkins to leave South Africa in 1858 and return to Oxford.
[1] Jenkins's "abiding compassion for the less fortunate", as it has been termed, was first demonstrated with his work with the army in South Africa, where one of his contemporaries said that "his influence for good was boundless".
[2] After his return to Oxford, he became involved with the Society of the Holy Cross, an Anglo-Catholic clerical organisation founded by Pusey and others.
He worked with Nonconformists to promote local friendly societies and was sufficiently well-regarded to be presented in 1874 with a testimonial noting "his genial and affectionate regard for the hardworking and humbler classes of society" and his involvement with the South Wales Choral Union, which had won a national competition at The Crystal Palace in 1872.
He helped form an Aberdare branch, and addressed meetings at local and national level, stressing the need for unity amongst the workers and the importance of providing for sickness and old-age whilst in good health.
At his funeral, conducted by his college friend Griffith Arthur Jones, the union's general secretary, Fred Evans, said:[2] The latter part of his life has been a Chapter of kindly acts and personal sacrifices for the happiness of the working classes, and more especially the railway servants and Welsh miners, who had long learned to reverence the good man and look to him for kindly counsel and assistance.Jenkins also played a conciliatory role in the mining disputes which became increasingly prevalent in the Aberdare Valley during the 1870s.