Topping, Sister Lilian
1904-2001

Born on 15 September 1904 at Haydock Lanes, Lancs. For four years she was assistant to the Senior Science Master at a local grammar school; then spent five years at the London Hospital, preparing for missionary work. Entering the Wesley Deaconess Order in 1931, she sailed to Burma (now Myanmar) in 1932, but was forced by ill health to return home in 1933. She was Assistant Home Sister at the Deaconess College, Ilkley in 1934-35 and ordained into the Order in 1940. She was stationed at the Queen's Hall in the Hull Mission (1935-1937), at Bishop Street, Leicester (1937-1939) and then for eleven years (1939-1950) in the London South West Circuit as the General Secretary of the Nurses' Christian Movement/Nurses' Missionary League, an interdenominational and international organization.

In 1951 she joined the staff of the Wesley Deaconess College, where she was Home Sister 1951-1955 and tutor in New Testament Studies (1955-1962). When Sister Dorothy Farrar retired in 1962, she succeeded her as Vice-Principal of the College until her own retirement in 1965. She was secretary of the first three meetings of the Oxford Institute of Methodist Theological Studies, in 1958, 1962 and 1965, working with A. Raymond George. On retirement, she lived in [[Entry:1456 Ilkley] until moving to the Wirral in 1991. She died on 12 September 2001.