Touching tributes have been paid to an extraordinary woman who helped set up Weymouth Food Bank.

Lily Mockett sadly died on Sunday, November 25 at the age of 80. She was known throughout Weymouth for her work helping the town’s most vulnerable people.

Her daughter-in-law, Julia Mockett, has paid tribute to her.

She said: “Lily was born on the July 30, 1938. She was brought up by her mother in a tenement building in Glasgow, after her father was killed clearing a French village of mines on his way back from the Second World War.”

She added: “She moved to Eastleigh, Hampshire, at the age of fourteen where she was given elocution lessons, became a Christian through the local Anglican church and met Bob Mockett, who she married at the age of 18.”

“While pregnant with her first child Katrina she damaged her back while riding a motorbike which lead to many years of severe back pain and was advised to abort her second child, but she refused and gave birth to Peter.”

She explained how Lily experienced poverty first hand in her own life and said: “When her children were young they went through periods without much money and once only had a tin of peas left and they gave it to the children to eat.”

She added: “Lily always read her bible and was keen to put the teaching of Jesus in to action in her everyday life.”

Julia explained how it was god that instructed her to help the town’s most vulnerable people.

She said: “During one such time she felt convicted by Jesus’s instruction to feed the poor but was perplexed about how she could find the poor in Weymouth.

“She then heard about a Food Bank in Dorchester, so she got on the phone and arranged to meet them.

“With the support of Bob, they decided to set The Weymouth Food Bank in the New Year, but as they gathered support from across the churches and made connection with social services they found that they were providing food to families before the month was up.”

Julia said it was Lily’s personal experience of poverty which made her so understanding.

She added: “She always wanted to treat the clients with dignity, respect and sympathy as she knew from her own personal experience that anyone through no fault of their own could live through periods of being without the essentials. The Food Bank has grown and grown, and Lily only stepped back from her role when she contracted Leukaemia three years ago.

“ I am sure many people are grateful that Lily followed God’s prompting.”

There will be a thanksgiving service in memory of Lily’s life at Weymouth Baptist Church on Monday, December 17 at 12pm. All are welcome to attend, but she has requested that people wear colourful clothes.

For more information about Weymouth Food Bank visit www.weychurch.co.uk/food_bank.html