Joseph Hocking

Joseph Hocking (7 November 1860 – 4 March 1937) was a Cornish novelist and United Methodist Free Church minister.

He regarded fiction as a highly effective medium for conveying his Christian message to the public, and combined his writing with his church duties, until ill health forced him to resign from the ministry in 1909.

His last pastoral charge was the large and important United Free Church at Woodford, Essex, which he was instrumental in having rebuilt by the advanced arts and crafts architect, Charles Harrison Townsend.

He died in St Ives, Cornwall, and was survived by his wife, Annie, who he had married in 1887, and four daughters, three of whom become published novelists in their own right (Anne Hocking, Elizabeth Nisot and Joan Shill).

[1] Hocking features as one of the main characters in the 2009 play Surfing Tommies by Cornish playwright, Alan M. Kent.