Joseph Gilbert

Joseph Gilbert (1779–1852) was an English Congregational minister. Life Born in the parish of Wrangle, Lincolnshire, on March 20, 1779, he was son of a farmer who had come under the influence of John Wesley. After receiving some education at a nearby free school, he was apprenticed to a general shopkeeper at Burgh. On the expiration of his term he became assistant in a shop at East Retford, Nottinghamshire, of which he in time became proprietor. Here he began to associate with a group of Congregationalists, for whom he sometimes preached. In 1806 he gave up business and entered Rotherham College. His college course finished, he became minister at Southend, Essex. After a residence of eighteen months there he was appointed classical tutor in Rotherham College. On 8 December 1818 he was ordained pastor of the Nether Chapel, Sheffield, still retaining the tutorship, spending the Sundays and Mondays in Sheffield and the rest of the week at Rotherham. In July 1817 he became minister of Fish Street Chapel, Kingston upon Hull. In November 1825 he removed to James Street Chapel, Nottingham. A new meeting-house was built for him in April 1828 in Friar Lane, Nottingham, and in this he ministered from then on. His health giving way, he resigned his charge in November 1851, and he died on Sunday, 12 December, 1852 at the age of 73.