ing Bank.

Mr. Pratt pays a high tribute to the efforts of the Tildesleys and the
Harpers, but with a sense of justice he does not forget the mead of
gratitude always due to those early pioneers from Darlaston, placing on
the same bright scroll of fame the names of Foster, Wilkes, Rubery,
Silcock, Bowen, and Banks.

In the earlier history of local Wesleyanism, one of its chief supporters
was James Carpenter, founder of the existing firm of Carpenter and
Tildesley. Another pillar of Wesleyanism was Jonah Tildesley, followed
later in the good work by his two sons, Josiah and Jesse, his grandson
Thomas, George Ley Pearce, and Isaac Pedley; and in a lesser degree by
James Tildesley (who married Harriet Carpenter), and the late John
Harper, founder of the Albion Works, now the largest place of employment
in the town.

One outcome of the Wesleyan spirit was seen about the year 1820, when
James Carpenter, George Pearce, William Whitehouse, and other leading
inhabitants made a determined effort to put down some of the coarser
sports by which the annual Wake was celebrated. Through their
instrumentality many of the ringleaders in the brutal sports were
summoned and brought to justice. The reformers dared to go even
further--they lodged a complaint with the bishop of the diocese against
"Parson Moreton" for encouraging these barbarous pastimes among the
people. The bishop, however, professed that he was powerless to deal
with the delinquent, owing to the exceptional manner in which he was
appointed to the living. But the parson on his part was very wroth, and
from his pulpit he solemnly forbade any one of the name of Carpenter,
Pearce, or Whitehouse ever to enter the portals of Willenhall Church.

It cannot be said the injunction was enforced; but it is a fact that from
that time many church-goers were driven into the Methodist fold.

The romantic side of the evangelisation of the Black Country has been
idealised by Mr. J. C. Tildesley in his "Sketches of Early Methodism," a
series of short stories founded on fact, and giving most graphic pictures
of the moral and social condition of the neighbourhood at that time.
This little volume may be regarded almost as one of the classics of the
Wesleyan Book Room.

A short history of local Methodism, it may be mentioned, was deposited in
the memorial stones of Wednesfield Chapel in 1885.

The existing Wesleyan Chapels, now under the direction of the Rev. A.
Hann and the Rev.