James Roskell was the eldest son of Robert Roskell (1762-1854) and Isabella nee Silcock (1768-1851), who lived at Over Wyre farm near Hambleton in the Fylde, Lancashire. He was given a basic education by his parents and was trained in farming skills with a view that he would help his father run their homestead farm. As a teenager James joined the army, serving with Wellington's forces in the Peninsula at Torres Vedras, Salamanca, Talavera and Badajos, where he was badly injured. Stationed at Clonmel in Ireland after 1815, James joined a group of soldiers attending a Methodist meeting, and was converted. On discharge James returned home to the farm in Rawcliffe. He sought out and joined the only Methodist Society in the area across the river Wyre at Thornton and was soon asked to take over the leadership. He met the class in the morning and led a prayer meeting in the afternoon. He then ferried over the Wyre in time to walk home to do the evening milking. James gathered a Sunday School in his home and eventually a modest chapel was built in a farmer’s field. In 1830 James Roskell moved to Little Layton on the outskirts of [[Entry:4338] Blackpool]. During the summer on Blackpool beach services were held for the holiday makers and locals when a preacher could be found. James went to the services and soon saw the need for a Methodist chapel in the town. At the beach services he met Robert Baird (1792-1850) a Preston Methodist linen draper who had opened a summer season branch in a cottage in Blackpool next to the Aquarium. In 1832 Roskell and Baird started a Methodist class-meeting in Bonny’s Bathing House on the South Beach. At the Garstang Circuit Local Preachers' meeting on 24 September 1832 it was resolved 'that Blackpool shall be tried once a month as a preaching place, services to be held at six o’clock on Sunday evening.' Although Roskell never became a Local Preacher he led the first Blackpool Methodist Society. James never married and eventually went to live in a cottage in Fleetwood where he spent his last few years caring for the poor people who knocked on his door for help. He died in 1842.

Entry written by: DHR
Category: Person
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