STARVE OR BORROW.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XL, Issue 9197, 7 January 1920, Page 3

STARVE OR BORROW.

VICAR'S FIGHT TO LIVE.

A tragic : stpiy of a vicar's struggle with poverty was told at the' Bradford Bankruptcy Court, when Joseph Baldwin Meredith' Chaplin, Vicar 'of Hubberholme, near Skipton, came up for his public examination (writes the Bradford -correspondent of the "Daily News") His deficiency was £807. Detailing his history, debtor said he obtained a. curacy at Warrington ' at £140 a year. He had to bbrrmv money, and) resorted' to moneylenders. He afterwardsi obtained a curacy at Swinton, Yorkshire, at £160 a- year. Two years latter he took a curacy near Stoke' at £120 a year.' He was four years curate at Bucknall and BagnalljStaffs, at £150 a year: In May last he was appointed vicar of Hubberliolnie at £200 a year.

He added 1 that hi 1, dealt with soven different, moneylenders. In one transaction lie received £90, and repaid £130, in another he received £15 and ■signed for £50, in another ho received £100, and signed! for C2o(). Again, he signed for £280 and received £200.' There was", one ease in which''ho received 1 £255, repaid COo, and still' owed £290. He had been guilty of no extravagance. The Official Receiver: Yon have lost no money in gambling or .spent it on drink?—."Oh, no." "I haw© four children," continued ithe vicar. "My wife ha<i been out •sick nursing, but is now engaged as a waitress in London to keep tho pot ■boiling." .. The Official Receiver: In order to •educate .your children, you and your wife have had to suffer, for want of tho bare necessities of-life? Debtor: Yea. Since March I have been living- at the vicarage with praci tically 'no furniture. | Can I take it your church accounts are all straight.—"Yes.'' The Official' Receiver: I stand 1 beside this debtor, who has been faced with ■the alternative of the starvation of his, wifo and children or of resorting to mone.ylen.aers. He went to them, and 1 from that time his Jit'o ha * boon a. hard one. If the Church and other denominations do nob see tbf'ir clergy are better paid, if Christianity does not compel them to do it. then humanity ought, and we should' not have- people of education faced with such a horrible alternative.