One of the more adventurous
ministers at the Baptist Chapel in Bourne from past times was the Rev
Thomas Deacon who never achieved high office in England but eventually
made his mark in Australia as a pioneer of his chosen religion. He was only the second Baptist
minister to serve in Queensland although he lived there for less than a
decade and was almost 60 years old before he began his formal ministry.
Yet his reputation survives to this day as “a gentle man of marvellous
sweetness of character and richness of grace who left a legacy of service,
devotion and piety that is hard to match”. In
the early 19th century, church officials in Bourne decided that they
needed an assistant preacher and funds were raised to support the
appointment and on 3rd August 1843, they invited Thomas Deacon “to
labour in the sphere appointed for a period as long as shall be mutually
agreeable and that his remuneration be £50 per annum”. At this time,
services were being held in a number of surrounding villages including
Dyke, Haconby, Kirkby Underwood, Castle Bytham, Stainfield and Manthorpe,
and the new preacher was to have particular responsibility for “the
villages, and the Sabbath afternoons at home”. Morton
was an important centre and a chapel was erected there in 1846 by Jane
Redmile, a determined Baptist pioneer from Dyke village, and Thomas Deacon
was specially selected by her as one of the preferred preachers for the
opening. The minister at Bourne was the Rev Charles Mills, a former
schoolmaster and graduate from Stepney (now Regent’s Park College), but
from the time of his ordination at Bourne in 1844, his health was not good
after catching a severe cold while returning from a preaching engagement
at a nearby town. As a result, he spent most of that year abroad and even
on his return, he could not resume either the pulpit or his pastoral
duties. Mills died in London on 25th September 1846, aged 35, and so, without formal training or previous experience as a full time minister, Thomas Deacon virtually took over the role of pastor. It was a beneficial appointment and the church reported to the General Baptist Association: “We have regularly enjoyed the zealous and faithful labours of Mr Deacon who, previous to our pastor’s illness, had engaged to conduct one service on the Sabbath, and to preach in the surrounding neighbourhood.” Nevertheless, the church decided to appoint a new pastor and the job went to the Rev J B Pike while Deacon resumed his role as assistant. But
it soon became a struggle for the church to maintain the financial outlay
of two ministers as well as an outstanding debt for the building and
Deacon’s salary was mentioned as a cause for concern at church
gatherings. This
worried Deacon because he was not a young man. He
was born at Leytonstone, Essex, in 1788 but was still a boy when his
family moved to Billesdon, near Leicester, where a church had been
established in Friar Lane in 1811. It was here that he married Mary
Garfield of Slawston on 6th November 1815 and two children were born, John
on 1st October 1817 and Eliza on 13th April 1821. It is not known what
occupation Thomas followed but he became a lay preacher “with much
experience and considerable success” and eventually the family moved to
the Dover Street Church in Leicester which had been formed by a movement
that had broken away from the Friar Lane congregation. It was from here
that he moved to Bourne as an assistant minister although from that time
onwards, nothing more is known of his wife or older children who had
apparently died by 1849 or perhaps even before he moved to Bourne, which
may have accounted for his willingness to relocate. Thomas
Deacon’s youngest son William was born at Leicester on 15th
February 1824 and after being baptised at the Friar Lane chapel in 1840,
began his studies for the ministry although he earned his living as a
saddler. When his father moved to Bourne, he preached at the chapel on
several occasions, particularly during the entire month of July 1846. A
few months later, he moved to Spalding where he contracted tuberculosis
and instead of resuming his studies, returned to Bourne to live with his
widowed father. In the following months, he learned of the efforts of the
visionary Presbyterian minister from Sydney, the Rev Dr John Dunmore Lang,
to promote an ambitious immigrant scheme to Australia. Lang was then
touring Britain publicising his views and seeking recruits and William was
persuaded that the warmer weather would be beneficial to his health and
decided to leave with the first party of migrants. In preparation for the
journey, he married Louisa Shenton, aged 27, a milliner, at the Dover
Street Church in Leicester on 15th August 1848, and a month later they
left London aboard the ship Fortitude carrying 200 immigrants
selected by Lang. Thomas Deacon anxiously awaited news of the
ship’s safe arrival at Moreton Bay and it eventually docked on 20th
January 1849. William Deacon’s health was much improved and so he and
his wife set about starting their saddlery and millinery businesses in
Brisbane where, to their delight, they found other immigrants from Bourne.
Their businesses made steady progress and later that year they moved to
the expanding town of Ipswich in Queensland where they set up home and
started a family. Meanwhile,
the financial difficulties at the Baptist Church in Bourne had not
lessened and so by April 1850, Thomas Deacon decided to resign and after a
few months of discussion, severed his links with the church and made
arrangements to join William in Australia. The Stamford Mercury reported on Friday 20th September 1850:
Deacon
boarded the 567-ton Tartar that sailed from Plymouth on 26th October and arrived at Sydney on
8th February 1851. Also on
board were his niece Eliza Thorpe, aged 15, and several members of his
daughter-in-law’s family who had been encouraged to emigrate by Louisa.
He was then 62 years old and he settled in Ipswich to be close to his son
and purchased land in a central location, deriving income from shops which
were set up there and he soon came to be recognised in the community as a
devout and saintly man. He also found another wife and on 9th February 1853, married Rachel Gosling at the United Evangelical Church in
Brisbane. But
William’s health finally gave way three years later and he died on 27th
November 1853, aged 28, and his distraught father, who had barely arrived
in the country after a long and traumatic journey, was left to comfort his
daughter in law and young family. He was, said his friends, “a talented
young man, greatly endeared to his family and intimate friends by his
social virtues, universally respected in the district as an upright
tradesman, an independent citizen, a sincere patriot, and thoroughly
consistent Christian.” Thomas
Deacon went on to make his mark in the life of the church and, despite his
age, willingly agreed to become official pastor of the new union church at
Ipswich embracing both Baptists and Congregationalists which was formed on
17th March 1853. He knew that he could not lead the church for long
although he continued in office until the following year when the
Congregational Mission sent a young man out from England, the Rev Edward
Griffith, who preached his first sermon at Ipswich on 12th March 1854. Deacon
retired but continued his dedicated involvement in various aspects of the
expanding church’s activities and the community, in inter-church groups
and the British and Foreign Bible Society. Life was also eventful on
occasions because one night while he was at church, his home was broken
into and almost burned down. A large sum of money was later stolen from
him and he also witnessed the escape of a convict on board a
river boat returning to Ipswich and his testimony exonerated the
unfortunate constable whom the prisoner had outwitted. He
and his wife Rachel remained members of the United Congregational Church
until August 1859 when a final opportunity for ministry occurred. It was
also the most satisfying for him because he was able at last, in his old
age, to pioneer a church, “maintaining and enforcing those specific and
distinctive New Testament teachings” he had held as a Baptist. His old
church accepted his resignation with good grace and he was appointed
minister of a new Baptist church that had been established in his own home
at Ipswich that opened for services in May 1859. Deacon’s home was used
until a disused bowling alley was rented for the purpose and then he
offered part of his garden as a site for a new chapel, built at a cost of
£200, and which opened on Sunday 26th August 1860. A
tea meeting was held on the following Tuesday evening but Deacon, who had
been seriously ill for several days, died early the following morning at
the age of 72, having seen his long held hope of a Baptist Church in
Ipswich come true. His obituary in the Ipswich Herald recorded his
dramatic passing:
His
widow Rachel was inconsolable and hardly able to bear her grief and the
following year she was disciplined by the church for “immoderate use of
intoxicating liquor”, possibly because of the difficulty in coping with
her bereavement. But she did overcome her loss and married twice more before she died on 27th November 1887, although
by then she had relinquished her
interests in Thomas Deacon’s properties in favour of the church. The
original church building which stood on Thomas Deacon’s land and funded
largely by him continued in use until 1875 when it was replaced by a new
building on a nearby site two years later and although there have since
been major alterations, it remains the oldest Baptist building still in use
in Queensland. Based
on extracts from Thomas and William Deacon – General Baptists in
Queensland See also Bourne Baptist Church
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