GARLAND, CHARLES HUGHLINGS (1857-1918) was born in London, a son of T. C. Garland (for 50 years lay agent of the Wesleyan Seamen's mission in London). Garland assisted his father in his work, and at 16 became a Methodist local preacher. He was a teacher in the Hale Street school, Poplar, and later undertook tutorial work. He was accepted for training for the ministry and studied at Headingley and Wandsworth Theological Colleges.

Garland was one of three clergy selected by the British Methodist conference to replace those drowned in the Tararua (1881) and he reached Wellington in Sep 1882. He began his New Zealand ministry at Northern Wairoa and was soon transferred to Christchurch. He was ordained (1884) and married (1885) Eleanor Jackson, of Tunbridge Wells, England. He was a man of rare gifts and a preacher of singular charm and power. At an early age his gifts brought him to the front rank and he filled many important positions. On five occasions he was a member of the Methodist general conference of Australasia and in 1914 sat on the board of missions. In 1891 he published a pamphlet Christianity and Secularism. In 1893 he delivered the official lecture at the Wesleyan conference in Dunedin on The Bearing of Higher Criticism on Leading Evangelical Doctrines. This made Garland the storm centre of a theological controversy. Pamphlets attacking his orthodoxy were published by the Rev David McNicoll and by William Shepherd Allen (q.v.), to which Garland convincingly replied in a pamphlet entitled The Authority of the Bible. In 1901 he was elected president of the Methodist conference; in 1911 he was acting editor of his church paper and in 1912 he was appointed principal of the Methodist Theological College in Auckland. He held this office until his death on 4 Nov 1918. During the great war Garland undertook the pastorate of the Mount Eden Church in addition to his principalship.

M.A.R.P.

Reference: Volume 1, page 160

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