BELL, CHARLES ARTHUR (1867-1947)

BELL, CHARLES ARTHUR, Baptist minister, Upper Blackville and Underhill, 1935-41; b. Hoyt Station, Sunbury Co., N.B., 16 Sep 1867, s/o Thomas Bell and Phoebe Ann DeWitt; brother of Thomas Downey Bell; m. 1896, Clara E. Kelley, of Dyer Brook, Me; d. Fredericton, 6 Sep 1947.

Charles A. Bell went to Maine to work as a young man and was converted and called to the ministry in that state. His first church was at New Limerick, in Aroostook County, where he was ordained in 1899. After spending eight years there and five years as the Baptist minister in the nearby town of Houlton, he returned to New Brunswick. He served at Hoyt Station, Oak Bay, and Harvey (Albert Co.), and had a seven-year pastorate at Temperance Vale. He was called to the Upper Blackville and Underhill churches in 1935.

Bell was said to have been a good preacher and a friend to all at Blackville, where he ministered for six years. He then served for one year at Point Pleasant, P.E.I., and for another short term at Hoyt Station, before retiring in Fredericton in 1944. He was survived in 1947 by his wife, Clara E. Kelley, a son, and a daughter.