Henry Ardern Lewis

In 1905 Lewis was appointed as an assistant chaplain to the South African Church Railway Mission (SACRM), a philanthropic and religious organisation focusing on the moral and spiritual well-being of railway workers and their families.[7]

Lewis returned to England in August 1908 taking up the position of curate at the Tewkesbury Abbey Church of St Mary the Virgin, Gloucestershire.[8] The following month, on 22 September, Lewis married Dorothy Lewis (née Lewis),[9] only child of the Rev. George Lewis, rector of Icomb, near Stow-on-the-Wold.

In October 1910 Lewis was appointed missionary priest to the diocese of Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan province, Canada.[10] The diocese of Qu'Appelle was established in 1884 to serve a thriving network of commercial trails leading across the Canadian prairies.

On 19 May 1915, Lewis entered service as a temporary chaplain Royal Navy (T.C.R.N.) aboard HMS Sutlej,[11] a 12,000-ton Cressy-class armoured cruiser built around 1899. As part of the 9th Cruiser Squadron, Sutlej's main duties were escorting convoy ships from the South Atlantic seaboard of West Africa. In addition to divine service, Lewis provided emotional and spiritual support for the 250 Church of England sailors aboard ship.[12] On 24 March 1917, Lewis was transferred to HMS Bacchante, flagship of the 9th Cruiser Squadron, where he remained until June 1919.[13]

After his discharge from the Navy, Lewis went to Sierra Leone as chaplain to Bishop John Walmsley. The two men had first met aboard HMS Bacchante, when the bishop took Divine Service and confirmations. In a written tribute to Walmsley after the bishop's death on 9 December 1922, Lewis described him as 'our Bishop and our best friend.'[14]

Lewis returned to England in 1920, taking up the position of organising secretary for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, in the diocese of Oxford. The S.P.G. was founded by royal charter in London by the Rev. Dr. Thomas Bray in 1701. The aim of the society was to promote the Gospel message in colonies of North America, but quickly expanded its operations to include Canada, New Zealand, Australia and West Africa. Bishop Walmsley occasionally paid the Lewis' flying visits 'when he was up in Oxford for a gaudy at his old college.'[15] Sometimes he would stay with them at their 'little Cornish cottage on the moors.'[16]

In December 1922, Lewis was appointed colonial chaplain at Lagos, Nigeria.[17] Three years into his service at Lagos, Lewis approached the wealthy industrialist and philanthropist, Lord William Leverhulme, for a donation towards Church funds. In the early 1900s, Lever was using palm oil for its Sunlight Soap products, produced in the British West African colonies. The letter from Lord Leverhulme's secretary, dated 27 January 1925, expressed his regret that he was unable to donate funds to the Church.[18]

In 1929 Lewis returned to England to take up the position of vicar of the parish church of St Cleer.[19] It was here that he met the archaeologist Charles Kenneth Croft Andrew, a founder member of the Looe Old Cornwall Society in 1927. Due to their mutual interest in antiquarian subjects, the two men struck up a close personal friendship.

In 1933 Lewis took up the residence at Talland Church.[20] In a letter to W.H. Paynter, recorder of the Looe O.C.S., Croft Andrew states that: 'When he [Lewis] took up the living at Talland, I told him the story of the legend of Lammana, which he afterwards developed into his booklets The Child Christ . . . Ab Antiquo &c.'[21] The Medieval Priory of St Michael of Lammana was owned by the Benedictine monks of Glastonbury Abbey, from c. 1144 to 1290. A local legend of unknown antiquity stated that 'in ancient times, Joseph of Arimathea, the rich mam of the Gospels, was a tin merchant who used to visit Britain in order to purchase tin. On one such visit, he brought his young nephew with him. Whilst Joseph went ashore to the mainland to trade with the Cornish tinners, the boy Jesus played on the beach of Looe Island until his uncles return.'[22]

On Saturday 20 January 1934, Lewis gave a talk on the legend of Lammana at the monthly meeting of the Looe Old Cornwall Society.[23] The talk was printed in The Cornish Times on Friday 26 January 1934, as Did Christ Visit Cornwall?, and printed as a booklet the same year entitled The Child Christ at Lammana, distributed by W.H. Smith & Son.

Eighteen months after the publication of The Child Christ at Lammana, Lewis published Ab Antiquo, subtitled 'The Story of Lammana (Looe Island),' dedicated to Prior Helyas, the first documented incumbent of the priory in c. 1200, 'and All His Predecessors.' Using a wide range of historical documents, from Episcopal Registers, Close and Pipe Rolls, Deeds, Feudal Aids, and Charters, Lewis traced the medieval history of Lammana from the mid-12th century to the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The title was taken from the charter of Hasculf de Soleigny, c. 1200, in which he gives the island of St Michael of Lammana and all its lands 'as a gift of my predecessors ab antiquo [from ancient times] to the Church of St Mary of Glastonbury.'

In December 1943, Lewis was given permission to officiate in the diocese of Truro.[25] By the beginning of 1944, he had taken up the residence of the Parsonage, St Martin's Church on the Isles of Scilly. During this period, Lewis began a series of archaeological investigations at Knackyboy and Yellow Rock Cairn, at Middle Town, St Martin's, publishing a booklet in 1945 entitled St Martin's, St Helen's and Tean (Iseles of Scilly) in legend and history, and an article in the Antiquities Journal, volume 29, 1949.[26]

On Saturday, 4 September 1948, at the Gorsedh Kernow held at Carwynnen Quoit, near Camborne, Lewis was made a Cornish Bard for his services to archaeology at St Martin's.[27] His bardic name was Dyskybel Malgan, 'Disciple of Maelgwin,' after a 6th-century King of Gwynedd.

Following the death of Dorothy in October 1951,[28] Lewis returned to the mainland and retired to No. 4, Regent Terrace, Penzance.[29] On 28 March 1957, after suffering from a bronchial illness, Lewis passed away aged 77, at the West Cornwall Hospital. He is buried at Paul Parish Church, Penzance.[30]