Joseph HockingJoseph Hocking was a Cornish novelist and United Methodist Free Church clergyman who died on March 4, 1937. Hocking was born in St Stephen-in-Brannel, Cornwall, to tin mine owner James Hocking and his wife Elizabeth (Kitto) Hocking. He was ordained a a Methodist clergyman in 1884. He wrote his first novel, Harry Penhale - The Trial of his Faith, while in London in 1887, while working in various places of England over the next few years. He saw fiction as a powerful tool for communicating his Christian message to the public, and he balanced his writing with his church obligations until ill health compelled him to leave from the ministry in 1909. His final pastoral responsibility was the huge and significant United Free Church in Woodford, Essex, which he was influential in having renovated by the renowned arts and crafts architect Charles Harrison Townsend. Following his recuperation, he became a greatly sought-after preacher throughout the United Kingdom, and he traveled extensively in the Middle East. He continued to write and was the author of approximately 100 novels during his career. Although he is now completely forgotten, he was enormously popular in his day. Read More Read Less