William Jeffries (minister)

Jeffries was born in Fairfield, Liverpool, where his father was a prominent Methodist and his mother a daughter of a Captain Williams of the Royal Navy.

[2] He was educated at the Liverpool Collegiate school and became interested in Methodism at an early age, and was accepted as a candidate for the Wesleyan Methodist ministry at the British Conference of 1869.

He preached and ministered in the Blackburn circuit, England, for twenty years — at Welshpool, Mold, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Tunbridge Wells, Derby, Oldham, and Stockport,[3] before in 1889 requesting and receiving a posting to Australia, taken in the hope of the warmer climate being beneficial to the health of his wife.

[2] His first appointment in South Australia was to Kadina in early 1898,[5] but was only there a year before he was urgently transferred to Broken Hill, where the Methodist church was in deep trouble.

The ethical side of a question always appealed to him, and he was ever a moderating force in matters where difference of opinion arose.

His courage, his geniality, his wisdom in counsel made him a conspicuous figure in dealing with the business side of Church affairs, and he never under the stress of keenest controversy lost sight of the highest spiritual interests which were involved.

he was a chivalrous Christian gentleman, and he exercised a wide influence in his own Church and in the religious life of the community.