George Parsons

George Parsons was from Laverton, near Frome. Two weeks after his ordination in 1838, he married Sophia Rawlings of London. They soon departed for Calcutta as BMS missionaries on the Moira, arriving there in late February 1839. His health was poor from the beginning, and in October 1839 the Parsons removed to Monghyr, where he applied to the BMS board for permission to have his brother, John, a village preacher in England at that time, join him at Monghyr. The Parsons brothers were nephews of John Dyer, BMS secretary. George Parsons was apparently gifted in language acquisition, for he was preaching in the native language within one month. His health, however, continued to decline, and he died at Calcutta on 13 November 1840. John Parsons married Jane Rawlings (Sophia’s sister?) and sailed for India in July 1840; they arrived in Calcutta one week after the death of George Parsons. John Parsons served the BMS in India until 1869. Sophia Parsons returned to England in 1842, and did not return to India. George Parsons was the nephew of John Dyer, former BMS secretary. Sophia Parsons contributed £16 for the work at Patna in September 1842. See Missionary Herald (November 1842), 614; see also Baptist Magazine 33 (1841), 472; W. H. Carey, ed. Oriental Christian Biography, Containing Biographical Sketches of Distinguished Christians who have Lived and Died in the East. 3 vols. (Calcutta: J. Thomas, Baptist Mission House, 1852), 2:344-356; Ernest A. Payne, “The Journal of Jane Parsons,” Baptist Quarterly 23 (1969-1970), 266-267.