▶Date of birth:  1850        Place of birth: Manchester, Lancashire

▶Father:  Edward Walker     Mother:  Mary Jane Deck

▶Spouse(s):   Edith Ann Borlase     Date(s) of marriage:  1880     Place(s) of marriage:

▶Occupation: Clergyman

▶Lifestory: The Revd. James Edward Walker was born in Manchester, the second son of the Revd. Edward Walker (later incumbent of Cheltenham Parish Church). He was educated at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, BA 1872, MA 1878 and was ordained as a minister in the Church of Scotland in May 1880. Also in 1880 he married Edith Ann Borlase and they lived with his mother at 15 Pittville Villas.

He was the author of several published sermons and other theological works including Christ, the key of the Psalter, with especial reference to the titles, by an Oxford graduate (1888), The blessed dead in paradise: with some reply to Canon Luckock's ‘After death’ (1891), The true Eucharist (1894), and The story of Matthew and Mercy: being a third part to Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress ... With biographical notice, and an appreciation of the author and his work by the Rev. James Ormiston, etc. (1911)..

From his own funds Walker erected two Presbyterian (iron) churches. The first was on Whaddon Lane in 1877, which from 1912 was known as the Walker Memorial Church (it was replaced by a new chapel in 1988) and the second was at Woodmancote, Cleeve Hill, in 1883.  On Sundays he would walk between the two churches.  As he was a man of means he took no salary from the two congregations.

On the death of his parents, Walker inherited £2,500, which he gave to worthy causes in Cheltenham and elsewhere. He maintained cordial relations with Anglican clergy and was a friend of the Revd. Charles Dent Bell, Rector of Cheltenham 1872-95: both were supporters of the Anti-Vivisection movement. Apparently Walker was the first clergyman to take a church collection on behalf of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

During his last year of life, he suffered from poor health and died om 20 May 1911; he was interred in Cheltenham cemetery.  The service in Whaddon Church was conducted by two Anglican ministers, Percy Waller (Vicar of Holy Trinity) and William Morris Buther, a former Curate of Cheltenham Parish Church. On his death he left £1,859.

▶Sources: British Newspaper Archive: Aberdeen Free Press 29 May 1880, Cheltenham Examiner 25 May 1911, Gloucestershire Echo 25 May 1911, Belfast Telegraph 5 June 1911, Cheltenham Chronicle 5 August 1911; A. Munden, Wearing the Giant’s Armour.  Edward Walker (1823-1872) The First Rector of Cheltenham (Cheltenham, 2003).

▶Moved to Pittville from:        Moved from Pittville to:

▶Date of death:  20 May 1911      Place of death: Hilcot, Battledown, Cheltenham

▶Date of burial:         Place of burial:

▶Notes:        ID: 7998

Contributor(s):  Alan Munden