Bowery, James

Bowery, James, an English Congregational minister, was born at Bristol, July 20, 1816. In 1834 he joined the Congregational Church at Zion Chapel. During the week-days he was engaged in business, yet he managed to prepare himself for the ministry by the time he was twenty-one years of age, and became pastor of the Congregational Church at Whitehurch, Hants. After seven years' work there he offered himself to the London Missionary Society; was accepted and appointed to Rodborough, Berbice, where he labored for nine and a half years, and became very popular. His sermons were clothed in simple language, admirably adapted to his people, full of stirring thought and striking illustrations. In 1854 he was driven from his missionary work by colonial fever. He returned to England, and in 1856 became pastor of Ebenezer Chapel, Shadwell, where he continued as pastor until his death, Aug. 15, 1877. Mr. Bowery's mind was logical rather than imaginative. To feelings of ambition and pride and envy he seemed a stranger. The poor, the suffering, the perplexed not only found in him a sympathizer, but a sharer. See (Lond.) Congregational Year-book, 1878, p. 308.