Owing to his weakness he was unable to leave the city to enjoy a period of recuperation and his condition gradually deteriorated.
It was during his days at Spurgeon’s that Mr. Hay met Miss Alice Williams, who later became his wife. At the time both keenly interested in social welfare work in the East End of London and actually met at what was known as the “ Ragged School” an establishment maintained for the feeding and spiritual uplift of the poorer classes. Mr. Hay came to South Africa alone, but within a few months Miss Williams followed and the Rev Thompson Adamson who had been a fellow student of Mr. Hay in London married the two in Port Elizabeth during September 1890.
It was characteristic of Mr. Hay that throughout his long ministry in East London He always marked the anniversary of his sermon in the city by preaching to the same text: “For I am not ashamed of the Gospel Of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believeth.”
Mr. Hay never forgot the young people of the city. He took a keen interest in the Sunday school at all stages of his ministry. He did much for the temperance cause and was on many occasions spokesman for the South African Temperance Alliance at its meetings and at sittings of the Licensing Board in East London.
Captain E C Barrie for many years a pilot at the Buffalo Harbor writes that he first met the Rev DH Hay about 1896 at a meeting in the Old Court House on the West Bank where stands the present post office. Captain Barrie thanks God that ever since then he enjoyed the friendship of this truly Christ-like man who accomplished so much during the 56 years that he worked for all that was good in East London.
David Hay passed over having made no riches here a so-called poor man but neither rich indeed in all that matters and where neither rust nor moth can reach.
Written by: Syd Hudson-Reed
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