Octavius LAKE

LAKE, OCTAVIUS (b. Monmouthshire, Wales, 1 May 1841; d. Adelaide, SA, 9 Sept 1922). Bible Christian Methodist minister.

Lake was educated at Shebbear College in Devon and received as a probationary minister by the Bible Christian Conference in 1863. He served in four English circuits before emigrating to South Australia in 1869. His first appointment was to Auburn (SA) where he renewed his acquaintance with the itinerant evangelist, Serena Thorne (q.v.). They were married in 1871.

In all Lake ministered in 13 Bible Christian circuits in SA and, after Methodist Union in 1900, in a further five as a Methodist minister. In 1875 he was at Moonta during the religious revival that occurred in the largely Cornish community at the top of Yorke Peninsula. Lake's active ministry spanned 48 years: he retired in 1911. Thereafter, until his death, he was a tutor at the Brighton Training Home run by Dr William Torr (q.v.).

During World War One Lake was editor of the Methodist weekly, the Australian Commonwealth. He had a ready pen and wrote scores of devotional meditations and hymns. The most marked characteristic of the paper under his editorship was his unqualified support of the allied war effort. Reflecting the public attitudes of the time he was venomous in his attacks on Germany. A supporter of conscription, he regarded many Roman Catholics and Australians of German birth or descent as being lukewarm in their support of the imperial cause. Always a temperance campaigner, he was vehemently hostile to the liquor industry in wartime.

Lake was widely regarded as an eloquent preacher, capable of the memorable phrase, but his advocacy of the gospel was often tarnished by his vehement criticism of those with whom he did not agree. He was president of the Bible Christian Conference in 1886 and of the Methodist Conference in SA in 1915.

A D Hunt, This Side of Heaven: A History of Methodism in South Australia (Adelaide, 1985)

ARNOLD D HUNT