William Charles Cotton

William Charles Cotton

Reverend William Charles Cotton (born January 30, 1813 in Leytonstone (at that time still part of the now defunct Essex County; today part of the London Borough of Waltham Forest ), Great Britain ; † June 22, 1879 in Chiswick , Great Britain) was an Anglican priest , Missionary and beekeeper . He received his ordination after training at Eton College and Christ Church College , Oxford . He was a chaplain in New Zealand under George Augustus Selwyn , the first bishop of New Zealand . In addition to his work as a clergyman, he worked as a beekeeper on the North Island . He has authored several books on the subject. Later he was Vicar of Frodsham (Great Britain). During his time as vicar, he restored the parish church and the parsonage there, but was restricted in his spiritual activities due to a mental illness.

Early years

William Charles Cotton was born in Leytonstone as the eldest child of William Cotton and his wife Sarah. His father was a businessman who served as Governor of the Bank of England from 1842 to 1845 . His younger brother was the lawyer Henry Cotton .

Cotton was first taught by home tutors . Then at the age of 14 he came to Eton College. There he became a skilled rower and good student. In this context, he was awarded the Newcastle Prize in his final year for outstanding achievements in the subjects of theology and classical studies . In 1832 he enrolled at Christ Church College, Oxford and graduated in 1836 with a Bachelor of Arts . Cotton decided to pursue a career as a clergyman and was appointed curate at Baston , Lincolnshire . In the following years, however, he returned to Oxford to do his Master of Arts . He was ordained a deacon in 1837 and that of a priest in 1839. Cotton received his Master of Arts in 1838. In 1839 he was appointed vicar at St Edward's Church in Romford, Essex County. At that time he was already showing signs of mental illness. Cotton took a vicar point on the parish church of St John in Windsor ( Berkshire on). There he befriended George Augustus Selwyn, a fellow vicar who was his senior for five years .

missionary

In the summer of 1841 Selwyn was named New Zealand's first Anglican bishop. Cotton then offered to accompany him as his chaplain. That decision met with the disapproval of Cotton's father. In this regard, he said the following:

"You are not missionary material."

Cotton had some practical skills that made him valuable to the undertaking: he could use a variety of tools including a lathe , ride a horse, row, and sail boats. The Bark Tomatin sailed from London to Plymouth Sound . At the same time the clergy were traveling overland to Plymouth to board the ship. Cotton had previously had some beehives loaded on board the Tomatin in London, but they were not safely stowed in a wine barrel ( hogshead ), as listed in My Bee Book . Headwinds in the English Channel threw the beehives on board the Tomatin and went overboard in Plymouth Sound in the absence of Cotton. Selwyn and Cotton were part of a missionary group of 23 people. They set sail from Plymouth on December 26, 1841. On the ship, in addition to their luggage, there were various animals on board and possibly an unknown number of beehives. A letter from Cotton, dated December 30, 1841, was delivered to a homeward brig on January 21 . In it, Cotton states that the bees are safely stowed away. Given the limited time between the Tomatin's arrival in Plymouth Sound on December 19 and the missionary group's departure on December 23, there is little chance that Cotton had time to organize replacements for the lost beehives . The fate of the bees is unknown; they did not arrive in Sydney . On board the barque was a Māori boy who taught some of the passengers, including Cotton, the Maori language . In April 1842 the Tomatin reached Sydney. The ship was damaged by a rock when it reached its landing site. Instead of waiting for repairs, some members of the missionary group, including Selwyn and Cotton, set sail for New Zealand on May 19 aboard the brig Bristolian . They arrived in Auckland on May 30th . After spending some time as guests of Captain William Hobson , the first governor of New Zealand , Selwyn and Cotton boarded the schooner Wave on June 12 and set sail for the Bay of Islands . They reached their destination on June 20th. Among the group was William Bambridge , an artist and later Queen Victoria's photographer .

Selwyn decided to settle at Waimate Mission Station , about 15 miles ( 15  miles ) from Paihia - a settlement established 11 years earlier by the Church Mission Society (CMS). On July 5, 1842, Selwyn began a six-month trip to visit his diocese . He left the Waimate Mission Station in the care of his wife Sarah and Cottons. During his absence, Cotton served as head of mission, director of the college, and minister of the Church. In October 1843, several missionaries arrived at Waimate Mission Station. Cotton was therefore able to accompany Bishop Selwyn on his second trip, this time to the mission stations and local settlements in the southern part of the North Island. On their journey they were partly in a canoe , but hiked most of the way, often over long distances in difficult and dangerous terrain. Selwyn finally decided to split up the group. He cited one part and Cotton the other. After nearly three months of absence, Cotton was the first to reach the Waimate Mission Station in early 1844. Selwyn arrived a few weeks later.

Panorama of St. John's College in Tamaki (painted by Caroline Harriet Abraham in 1862)

Later in 1844, Selwyn decided to move 160 miles (257 km) south to Tamaki near Auckland, where he acquired 450  acres (1.8 km²) of land, which he named Bishop's Auckland . The group left Waimate Mission Station on October 23 and arrived in Auckland on November 17. During the first six months of 1845, Selwyn was out and about much of the time. During this time Cotton was responsible for the administration of the settlement and especially the schools. Cotton then continued his work in Bishop's Auckland. He was the headmaster of St John's College , but also had spiritual and practical duties. He finally left New Zealand with Bambridge in December 1847 and arrived in Great Britain in May 1848.

beekeeper

Cotton has had a passion for bees and beekeeping since childhood. At the University of Oxford he was the founder and first secretary of the Oxford Apiarian Society. In 1837 he published his first work on bees - A Short and Simple Letter to Cottagers from a Bee Preserver - with a circulation of 24,000 copies. A second letter followed three years later. In 1842 he published the work My Bee Book, in which, among other things, advice was given on how to make bees semi-unconscious instead of killing them to get to the honey.

New Zealand is home to two native species of bees, but they are unsuitable for honey production. The first honey bee in New Zealand was introduced in March 1839 by Mary Bumby, the sister of a Methodist clergyman. During a stay in Sydney in April 1842, Cotton arranged for beehives to be sent to him in New Zealand. However, this took longer than Cotton expected. It was not until March 1844 that he received his first swarm of honeybees at Waimate Mission Station. When he moved to Bishop's Auckland, he successfully relocated it. He spent much of his time training settlers and Māori in the practice of beekeeping and honey harvesting. Towards the end of 1844 he published A Few Simple Rules for New Zealand Beekeepers. He later wrote a number of articles on beekeeping in The New Zealander. These articles were published collectively as A Manual for New Zealand Beekeepers in 1848 . Another work in Maori - Ko nga pi (German: The Bees ) - appeared in 1849. According to tradition, Cotton is said to have been responsible for the introduction of honeybees to New Zealand. This is not true. However, he was largely responsible for training immigrants and locals in beekeeping.

When Cotton was later appointed Vicar of Frodsham, he continued his beekeeping activities and conducted experiments with bees. On one of his trips to the continent , he acquired a copy of a book by Wilhelm Busch called Schnurrdiburr , which contained comical illustrated stories about a beekeeper and his bees. Cotton then published his own version of this work with his own verse on the illustrations entitled Buzz a Buzz or The Bees - Done freely into English . He took an active part in the discussions that led to the creation of the British Beekeepers' Association and was vice president of the association. Cotton had a library of over 200 books on bees and beekeeping, which he bequeathed to the Frodsham community after his death. In 1932 these were deposited with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) and transferred to the Reading University Library in 1987 .

Oxford

Little information is available about the nine years after Cotton's return from New Zealand. Cotton remained a fellow at Christ Church College, Oxford, but lived there sporadically. He spent some time on the continent. In 1855 he was in Constantinople , and in the summer of 1857 he visited Avignon and Paris . In December 1855 he was appointed curate of St Mary Redcliffe in Bristol - a post he held until his resignation in May 1857. In Oxford he met Lewis Carroll , through whom he became interested in photography.

Vicar of Frodsham

William Charles Cotton in later years

In the summer of 1857 Cotton was appointed vicar of Frodsham - a market town in northern Cheshire . The parish had serious problems at that time, especially the lack of financial support for the surrounding parishes. In addition, the structure of the parish church of St Laurence was in poor condition. The elevated location above the city also made access to the church difficult. As a result, Cotton sank into a state of apathy and despair. In the autumn of 1865, he spent several weeks at the Manor House Asylum in Chiswick, which was then run by Dr. Seymour Tuke was headed. There was some improvement in his state of mind. In 1870 Cotton began to restore the parish church. At that time there was competition from other denominations, particularly the Methodists. Financed by the soap and lye maker Thomas Hazlehurst from near Runcorn , a member of the Hazlehurst & Sons family business , a small chapel has already been built near the parish church and another, larger and more magnificent chapel is planned in the center of town. Cotton organized the construction of a makeshift branch church in the center of town. It was made of iron and was known as the Iron Church . It was erected in a very short time on land donated by the Marquess of Cholmondeley . In addition to the restoration work on the parish church, Cotton began to organize the restoration of the rectory. In the fall of 1872 he hired the architect John Douglas to work out the plans. Douglas was also asked to design a house for him to live in while the rectory was being renovated. Cotton improved the supply of church schools in his parish. During his ministry, he took boys from his parish to various events, both near and far, as far as Manchester and Liverpool .

In the late 1870s, Cotton's mental state began to deteriorate so much that he was no longer able to carry out his duties. In 1879 a sequestration order obtained allowed John Ashton to take over parish affairs. Cotton was re-admitted to Manor House Asylum earlier this summer, where he died in June. His funeral was held at St John the Baptist's Church in Leytonstone, and he was buried in the family grave in the cemetery. A memorial service for him was held on the same day at his church in Frodsham. In Frodsham Parish Church , a monument was erected for him. The symbol of a honey bee appears on the chain of the Mayor of Frodsham and various other locations in the city, one street in Frodsham is called Maori Drive , and there is still a Māori inscription on the door of the old Cotton rectory.

Mental health

There is no doubt that William Charles Cotton was a talented man whose performance was marred by his mental illness. There are numerous examples of the unpredictable behavior of Cotton, especially for his excessive expenditures and his periods of depression. He was most likely suffering from bipolar disorder . His biographer Smith speaks of a "manic depression." Cotton achieved a lot, especially during his years as a missionary and in the beekeeping sector. In old age his state of mind deteriorated, especially during the time he was Vicar of Frodsham. In view of his achievements in Frodsham, including the construction of the Iron Church, the restoration of the parish church and the rectory, the development of the church schools in his parish, the remark " he had occasional periods of effectiveness " seems very unfair.

literature

• Latham, Frank A., ed .: Frodsham, Local Historians, 1987, ISBN 0-901993-06-9 .
• Smith, Arthur R .: William Charles Cotton MA: Priest, Missionary and Bee Master, Birkenhead: Countyvise, 2006, ISBN 978-1-901231-81-6 .

Web links

• William Charles Cotton on the gutenberg.org website
• William Charles Cotton on the archive.org website

Individual evidence

1. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 9.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Cotton, JS: Cotton, Sir Henry (1821–1892) ( Memento of the original dated November 22, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004.
3. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 10-14.
4. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 14.
5. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 20.
6. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 21f.
7. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 25.
8. ↑ Barrett, Peter: The Immigrant Bees, Volume 5, 2013, pp. 423-429.
9. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 26-29.
10. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 36-45.
11. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 56-65.
12. ↑ William Bambridge (1819–1879) - Extract from Auckland Waikato Historical Journal No 41, Sep 1982, bambridge.org
13. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 65f.
14. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 69, 82-85.
15. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 114-122.
16. ↑ Panorama , natlib.govt.nz
17. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 134f.
18. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 147.
19. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 155-161.
20. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 7 and 9.
21. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 18
22. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 88.
23. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 151-154.
24. ↑ Latham 1987, p. 49.
25. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 7.
26. ↑ Barrett, Peter: Myth, Fable and Speculation - WC Cotton's attempt to ship bees to New Zealand in 1841, Journal, 39, 2009, Frodsham: Frodsham & District History Society, pp. 13-19.
27. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 197-203.
28. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 162-169.
29. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 171-188, 209.
30. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 203-205.
31. ↑ Latham, 1987, p. 87.
32. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 205f.
33. ↑ Latham, 1987, p. 66.
34. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 8.
35. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 20-21, 99, 171, 190-193.
36. ↑ Smith, 2006, pp. 13-14, 21, 142, 163-164, 193-194.
37. ^ Smith, 2006, pp. 14, 20, 162.
38. ^ Smith, 2006, p. 208.