Harris, William Gregory
1865-1952; e.m. 1889

Born at Tavistock in 1865, he was educated at Tavistock Grammar School and Queen's College, Taunton, and trained for the WM ministry at Richmond College. Despite a long-term problem with deafness, he was a popular minister, who also established a reputation as an expert on West Country life. He had a particular interest in regional dialects and dialect writers; his West Country Volk (1923) remains a useful and pleasant introduction that is none the worse for his avoidance of 'the technical side of this subject which naturally proves more interesting to scholars than to the general public'. He retired to Portishead and then to Bath in 1924, becoming vice-president of the city's Shakespearian Society. Music and cricket were among his other interests. He died on 9 June 1952.

Sources
  • Methodist Recorder, 19 June 1952