OBITUARY.

North Otago Times, Volume CIV, Issue 13723, 14 November 1916, Page 8

OBITUARY.

THE-EEV. T. W; ISITT, The Bcv. P. W.': Isitt, of Duncdiri, the well-known Methodist Minister and temperance reformer, died suddenly from heart failure at his residence, Eoslyn, on Saturday evening. Mr lsitt'. was. born in Bedford in 1816, He was educated at tlio Bedford (jrammar School, ami, determined on a commercial career, he proved so energetic and able that at a very early age he occupied the position of London shipping agent to the well-known linn of Gillies Garnet. Abandoning business prospects, however, he entered the Wcsleyau Methodist Ministry, and offered for mission work. After taking a theological course at the ■Richmond College, he was appointed to New Zealand, then a mission station; and, in company with the' Bcvs. W. .7. Williams, J. J. Lewis, and J. S. Smalley, he arrived in Auckland in 1870. His first appointment was to Balclutha, and it was what lie saw of the effects of drink upon the settlers in that.young township that displaced a contempt for teetotalism by convictions that largely shaped his after career. In .7874 lie married Miss Mary Purdic, the daughter of Dr W. Purdic, 'one of the first medical men to practise in Dunedin. After occupying the Port Chalmers and New Plymouth circuits, ho broke down in health, and for eight years conducted au agency business in Christchurch. He then resumed his ministerial work, ami was successively appointed to lnvercargilf, Nelson and Christchurch. He occupied the position of secretary and organising agent of the New Zealand Alliance, and it was Under his zealous and efficient leading that the prohibition movement attained the strength and influence it at present possesses in this Dominion. Passionately fond of children, in days when orphanages were few, with infinite trouble he sought out homes for orphaned and destitute little ones, and to-day there are scattered throughout tlio length and breadth of New Zealand prosperous men and women, some of whom will never know that they arc not the sons and daughters of the people who at Mr lsitt's instance adopted them. An able speaker, a man of wide reading, broad thought and of genial sympathy, Mr lsitt has served his day and/generation nobly, and holds rank with the foremost of those pioneers to whose self-sacrificing and persistent efforts and lofty citizenship New Zealand owes so much.