Definition of "sidesman" [sides•man]

• An assistant to a churchwarden, one of whose duties is to collect offerings during a service. (noun)

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• "As we rose from our knees one Sunday a sidesman said, ` Vicar, I wish you would pray for my boy."
• "The sidesman gave him a prayer book and a hymn book, and he chose a seat towards the back, because the order of the service was still strange to him and from there he could see when other people knelt, and when they stood."
• "When he began to make money, he went over to the Church and took the plate round at collecting time, and got to be a sidesman, and a trustee, and I don't know what all."