PARRY, ABEL JONES (1833 - 1911), Baptist minister

b. 21 Nov. 1833 at Temperance Bach, Rhyl, son of Thomas and Susie Parry. The family moved to Abergele and later to Liverpool, where he joined the Calvinistic Methodists, but shortly afterwards became a Baptist. In 1854 he began to preach and was admitted to Pontypool College. In 1858 he was ordained at Zion chapel, Cefn-mawr, as successor to Ellis Evans (1786 - 1864), and became the first secretary of Llangollen Baptist College. In 1867 he went to Great Cross Street chapel, Liverpool, which he left in 1871 to take charge of Cloughfold, an English chapel at Rossendale. In 1877 he received a call to Bethesda chapel, Swansea, to succeed R. A. Jones. In 1885 he went to Caernarvon to edit the Genedl Gymraeg but, later in the same year, left to take charge of the English Baptist church at Carmarthen where he remained until 1888 when he returned to his first charge at Cefnmawr. In 1893 he retired to Rhyl, but continued to preach to within a few months of his death in 1911. He was twice married. He was president of the Baptist Union of Wales in 1896. Through the school for young preachers, which he opened at Cefnmawr, he exercised a profound influence over the preaching of his denomination — his own sermons were works of art. He had edited Y Greal, Y Genedl Gymraeg, and Cenhadydd Cwmtawe, and the periodicals are sprinkled with his writings. His principal work was his able commentary on the epistle to the Romans, 1896. He d. 26 July 1911, and was buried at Rhyl.

Author

• Reverend Principal Tom Ellis Jones, (1900 - 1975), Bangor

Sources

• Hanner canrif o lafur gweinidogaethol y Parch. Abel J. Parry, D.D., Rhyl yn cynnwys bywgraphiaeth, a phregethau (XXV) ei "Adgofion" o'i febyd hyd derfyn ei weinidogaeth yn y Cefn Mawr, ganddo ei hun
• Hanes y Bedyddwyr yn Nghymru (1893–1907), iv, 75, 354;
• Y Greal sef Cylchgrawn Misol at wasanaeth y Bedyddwyr, 1911, 245;
• Seren Cymru, Aug. and Sept. 1911.

Additional Links

• Wikidata: http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q20732611

Published date: 1959

Article Copyright: http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/