Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Charles, David
CHARLES, DAVID (1762–1834), of Carmarthen, Welsh preacher and writer, a younger brother of the celebrated Thomas Charles of Bala [q. v.], was born at Llanfihangel-Abercowin. He was apprenticed to a flax-dresser and rope-maker at Carmarthen, afterwards spent three years at Bristol, and finally married and settled down at Carmarthen. Long connected with the Calvinistic methodists, he began to preach at the age of forty-six, and was one of the first lay-preachers ordained ministers in South Wales in 1811. He soon won an exceptional reputation as a preacher, both in Welsh and English. He travelled all over South Wales, and was especially distinguished by his extending the influence of the methodists to the English-speaking districts He was possessed of sufficient means from trade, and received nothing for his preaching. Paralysed in 1828, he died on 2 Sept. 1834, and was buried at Llangunnor. His eloquent ‘Sermons’ were published at Chester in 1840, and were translated in 1840. They have been several times reprinted.
[Memoir by H. Hughes, prefixed to English edition of Charles’s Sermons.]