CHARLES H. WELCH
38
is the tag I place on this period, for in the same neighbourhood a few years later, music and Christian service could
be the changed slogan. The accompanying drawing shows two buildings, the Church in the foreground, and the
Bermondsey Gospel Mission then called `Percy Hall' in the rear.
Now to return to Flockton Street. In 1882 this mission used to hold open air meetings in the surrounding
neighbourhood, and as a child of two I used to join in singing the hymn `Whiter than the snow' with an eye I suspect
on the old lady who kept the sweet shop, who would exclaim `Bless his littleheart' and add to the spoken blessing a
screw of sweets! When at the age of 72 I spoke at a meeting at the Bermondsey Gospel Mission and told them that
my first active fellowship with the mission was 70 years earlier, I could see some bewildered mental arithmetic
proceeding.