Leon Atkin

Leon Atkin (1902–1976) was a minister for the social gospel and a human rights campaigner. He was born in Lincolnshire, England, where (although his parents were Anglican) he attended activities in the local Methodist church, and became a Methodist. In 1914 his family moved to the Biddulph area, and in 1916 he became a boy preacher there. After completion of an engineering apprenticeship he expressed interest and was accepted as a student for the ministry, receiving training at the Methodist College in Handsworth, Birmingham, being appointed Probationer Minister at St John's Church, Risca, Gwent, in 1930. Adopting the Social Gospel he challenged the secularist movement in the mining valleys of Monmouthshire, holding weekly ('Donald Soper'-type) open-air meetings, debates in the local Working Men's Club, and Sunday evening services attended by eight to nine hundred people. In 1932 he transferred to an appointment at the Methodist Central Hall in Bargoed, where he utilized the large chapel and its schoolroom to assist the unemployed by opening the building every day of the week, including a kitchen which provided free meals, and other facilities, however, the authorities, angered by his activities threatened him with prosecution for ‘obstructing the administration of his Majesty's Government’, and the synod, disturbed by the disruption he was causing, requested he accepted an appointment in Cornwall. This he refused, opting instead for an invitation from St Paul's, Swansea, a church of 12 members, and a debt of £2,000. Continuing with outdoor ministry, his congregation grew from 12 to more than two hundred on Sunday nights. In 1940 (although previously a pacifist) he joined the Royal Artillery, but when the United Chaplains Board heard of his decision he was invited to be an Army Chaplain. On return to Swansea he found that his deacons at St Paul's had terminated his ministry, and the chapel had been locked. He re-kindled the initiative with open-air addresses at the Forum, and with the support of ex-servicemen, developed his ministry among needy people, and his care for the disadvantaged. He died in Swansea in November 1976.