BISHOP OF MELANESIA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21232, 12 July 1932, Page 10

BISHOP OF MELANESIA.

AN APPOINTMENT MADE.

THE REV. W. H. BADDELEY.

DISTINGUISHED WAR RECORD.

The bishops of the Anglican province of New Zealand have appointed tho Rev. Waltor Hubert Baddeley, D.5.0., M.C.» M.A., vicar of South Bank, Yorkshire, to be Bishop of Melanesia, in succession to the Rt. Rev. F. M. Molyneux, who resigned some months ago owing to a serious breakdown in health. Mr. Baddeley has accepted the appointment and will sail from England in October. Tho bishop-elect, who is understood to be a. little under 40 years of age, was at Keble College, Oxford, at the outbreak of the Great War. Ho enlisted as a private and at the Armistice held the rank of colonel. In 1917 he received the Military Cross and in 1918 'a bar to the cross and the Distinguished Service Order. On returning to civil life he resumed his studies and graduated 8.A., third class in modern history, and M.A. in 1920. He entered Cuddesdon Theological College in the Bamo year and was ordained deacon and priest in 1921 by the Bishop of Ripon. From 192!1 to 1924 he was assistant-curate at. St. Bartholomew's, Armley, Leeds, and was then appointed by the Archbishop of York to the parish of South Bank, an industrial district with a population of over 17,000. Ho has been a proctor in tho Convocation of York since 1929.

Mr. Baddeley was considered last year when stops wero being taken to appoint an assistant-bishop to the dioceso of Melanesia, but tho Archbishop of York, Dr. William Temple, as his diocesan, was unwilling to release him from his parochial duties. He was warmly commended in the present instance by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Cosmo Lang; tho Archbishop of York; the Bishop of Wakefield, Dr. J. B. Seaton, who was principal of Cuddesdon during Mr. Baddeley's studentship; and tho London committee of tho Melanesian Mission.

The appointment was made by the New Zealand bishops, subject to Mr. Baddeley's acceptance, at a meeting in Wellington last Tuesday, after consultation with two representatives appointed by the synod of the diocese of Melanesia. The new bishop will bo the seventh holder of the#title. The first Bishop of Melanesia was John Coleridge Patteson, who was consecrated at Auckland in 1861 and was murdered on the island of Nukapu in 1871. His successors were Bishops J. R. Selwyn, Cecil Wilson, C. J. Wood, J. M. Steward and F. M. Molyneux. *