Richard WOOLCOCK

WOOLCOCK, RICHARD (b. Tywardreath, Cornwall, England, 27 Dec 1845; d. Mallala, SA, 11 Sept 1919). Churches of Christ and Baptist evangelist and minister.

With his parents, Richard Woolcock (182259) and Grace née Bottrill (1824-88), Richard migrated to Adelaide in 1854. The family settled at the coppermining towns of Kapunda and Burra where his father died. Woolcock worked as an ore-sorter, continued night school, and his family's allegiance to the Bible Christians, serving as a home missionary. He married Caroline Bottrill in 1871. Convinced about 'believer's baptism' by visiting Churches of Christ evangelist Dr Thomas Porter, Woolcock was baptised in Mosquito Creek, and subsequently joined the Churches of Christ. By 1870 Woolcock was one of five in training as evangelists under H S Earl (q.v.) and T J Gore (q.v.). His preaching and church founding commenced at Two Wells where he was appointed at the time of his marriage. Thence he served at Norwood, Alma Plains, Millicent and Mallala. Gore wrote (1880): 'Bro. Woolcock is a modest young man, and no doubt has been by this amiable virtue prevented' from reporting 'near thirty additions by faith and obedience' in and around Mallala.

In 1877 Woolcock was the only 'general evangelist' appointed by the Churches of Christ Evangelistic Committee of SA (founded 1875) and remained with the Churches of Christ until 1885. His service was pioneering and evangelistic; it required organisational, preaching, church-founding, and journeying skills over sea to the south-east, and overland extensively throughout the lower-north of SA. Thus, for example, he was considered 'among the successful' preachers at Mallala, preaching there on 'Prejudice and its Power in the Way of Reception of the Truth' on the platform with Gore; and chaired the first business meeting at Long Plains, 1881, serving there also as evangelist.

With H T Smith, minister at Hindmarsh Church of Christ, Woolcock edited and published the periodical Faithful Witness. In 1883-4 he published three booklets based on articles from it. These ventures supported a theological distinction between belief (salvation) and baptism, without weakening the call for the latter, thus challenging basic tenets and interpretations of the Disciples 'restorationism'. J J Haley and Gore severely criticised Woolcock and Smith for their 'Plymouth-Baptist' views in Australian Christian Watchman. Concurrently, Church of Christ leaders debated 'open communion' both among 'the Disciples', and with Silas Mead (q.v.) on behalf of Adelaide Baptists. Woolcock conscientiously persisted with the liberal stance, subsequently transferring to the Baptist Association (Baptist Union from 1895), but without loss of acceptance by Church of Christ members, especially in country centres, where his preaching, pastoral ministry and support for joint Churches of Christ-Baptist cooperation was known. Woolcock wrote: 'We consider there is sufficient liberty in Christ for brethren to have different views, say concerning the new birth and the aims of baptism, providing they concede liberty to each other and refrain from misrepresenting and maligning those who differ from them. There are truths which none will, and none ought to yield, because they are foundation truths; but any one who cannot see a difference between the truths relating to the person of Jesus Christ, and things we have mentioned cannot distinguish very much.' (Australian Christian Watchman, 1 May 1884)

Woolcock accepted SA Baptist appointments in suburban and more isolated country areas, first at Port Pirie and Telowie, 1886-8; followed by Mitcham and Coromandel Valley, 1888-95 (with a brief period as minister without pastoral charge, 1888-9), then Minlaton, Coobowie, Curramulka and Minlacowie, 1896-99, and at Clare and Saddleworth, 1900-02. Minlaton and Clare meant separation from family for schooling in Adelaide. Woolcock then accepted another Church of Christ appointment, returning to his beloved Mallala to be closer to Adelaide before his final Baptist appointment at Grange, 1910-15.

All these appointments required tact in managing denominational relationships, for example, at Port Pirie; service to isolated saltbush settlers, for example, at Telowie and at the then recently surveyed emu country at Curramulka; continued evangelistic work, for example, at 'Clare ... (where) ... converts were won to Christ'; and a suitable managerial touch, for example, he successfully put up an amendment for 'a more democratic' mode of electing denominational vice-presidents, 1889. Woolcock served as president of the Northern District (Baptist) Association (1887).

Woolcock and Caroline had 10 children eight surviving: Alice Mabel Worden, Hilda Agnes Burnard (q.v.), James Gilbert, Horace, Mary Edith Page, Morton Burnett, John Milton and Arthur Henry, whose successful education despite Woolcock's extensive absences and limited income led either to successful commercial, industrial, or mining enterprises, and/or to significant Christian leadership. Caroline was 'much beloved as a true friend of the people and a valued helper in her husband's ministerial work'. (Register, 2 Oct 1918)

Woolcock was evangelical in disposition, a pioneering evangelist, an able articulator, an early Adelaide-trained Christian minister, firm in his views, but irenic, recognising the priority of individual choice, conscience, and personal faith, over denominational policy. He exemplified the effect of American evangelical influence in SA, but demonstrated independence of mind. With his family he typified successful social and denominational mobility without loss of evangelical principles in a developing colony. He revealed the courage required to establish Nonconformist evangelistic enterprises within isolated and pioneering but socially important communities, and showed the effective way Christian-based family values were transmitted during an economically rough period of transition from colony to State. He is remembered by his family and denomination as 'well loved'.

T J Gore (ed), That They All May Be One: A Century's Progress and a brief review of the efforts to promote Christian Union and restore New Testament Christianity 1809-1909 (1909); J J Halley (ed), The Australian Christian Watchman (Melbourne, 1880 onwards); H E Hughes, Our First Hundred Years: The Baptist Church of South Australia (1937); H R Taylor, The History of Churches of Christ in South Australia 1846-1959 (1959); Bruce Woolcock, A Family Who's Who: Woolcock and Field Family History in Australia 1839-1981; Richard Woolcock & H T Smith (eds),The Faithful Witness (periodical, Adelaide, 1883-5); Papers of Hilda Agnes Burnard, held by Donald F Burnard, Blackwood, SA

SELECT WRITINGS: Birth from Above, 1883; Christian Baptism According to the Scriptures, 1884; The Position and Importance of Christian Baptism, 1884

IAN R BURNARD