The William Arthur Memorial Church is located on the Bangalore-Honavar Road at Gubbi Town, about 80 km from Bangalore.

[1][2] The church is named after William Arthur, an Irish Wesleyan missionary and Canarese scholar, who served in Gubbi.

[7] Thomas Hodson preached his first sermon at Goobbe on 1 September 1836, near its gates, from an unoccupied shop which opened to the street.

Arriving as a guest of Captain Dobbs, after spending a few days at Toomcoor, Hodson rode the 20 miles to Gubbi.

He was received about a mile from the gates of Gubbi by some of its prominent citizens, who accompanied Hodson till the town.

A short while after the first sermon, Thomas Hodson sent Franklin, an assistant missionary to make arrangements for setting up a mission station at Goobbe (p. 41-46).

Women of the village brought their sick children to the mission house, and Mrs. Hodson would provide them with basic medicines.

[7] According to William Arthur, after Thomas Hodson acquired land and started constructing a mud house to live.

After the house was completed, Mr. Jenkins joined the Gubbi Mission, and Thomas Hodson moved to Mysore (p. 188).

A few days after its completion, another missionary John Jenkins along with his wife and child were assigned to the station and came to live at Goobbe.

[7] In 1851, the Wesleyan Missionary Society was in large debt and was forced to close several mission stations.

Thomas Hodson returned to India on 1 January 1854, and after spending several months in Madras, arrived at Bangalore.

The government of Mysore agreed to resell the chapel to the Wesleyan Missionary Society, and the house building was repaired under the supervision of Mr. Sullivan.

[7] An original sketch by Thomas Hodson, detailing the Goobbe Chapel, with the opening date of 12 June 1860 scribbled, is in the possession of the Museum of Sydney, The Rocks.

Wesleyan missionaries were supposed to take up the dual task of educating and preaching to the locals.

Around this time, Hodson decided to start a mission at Gubbi, which a native town in the Mysore Kingdom.

The reason for Hodson choosing Gubbi to set up the mission was because in Bangalore, he found that his time and efforts were taken away in preaching to the British and European officers, and he could not concentrate on the local population.

At this time William Arthur (an Irishman, after whom the William Arthur Church at Goobie is named after) and Peter Batchelor, laymen who came to Madras to run the Church Ministry Service (CMS) Press, joined the Wesleyan Mission, and were transferred to the Wesleyan Tamil Mission at Bangalore Cantonment.

[9] Thomas Hodson recorded the experiences of the Gubbi Mission in his book Old Daniel, Or, Memoir of a Converted Hindoo: With Observations On Mission Work in the Goobbe Circuit and Description of Village Life in India, which provides an excellent account of village life in the 19th-century Mysore State.

[7][10] William Arthur (1819–1901) was a Wesleyan minister, who was born on 3 February 1819 at Glendun, County Antrim, Ireland.

William was the son of James Arthur, whose traced his ancestry to the Limerick and Clare counties.

The town people traded items such as coffee, grains, betel-nut, etc., which were purchased from Nuggur (Bednore) and sold in the markets of Bangalore and Wallajanuggur (Vellore).

Goobbee like other Indian cities was surrounded by a mud wall, used to repel wild beasts and thugs.

[10] A series of sketches associated with Gubbi Chapel, currently in the possession of the Museum of Sydney could unfortunately not be displayed here, due to licensing issues.

It can be seen at these links below: A photo of the William Arthur Memorial Church, from the Fred Goodwill collection, dated early 20th century