Oliver Aveyard Beckerlegge was born into a Methodist home in 1913 in Sheffield. He studied Modern Languages at the University of Sheffield, graduating as BA in 1935, as MA in 1936, and with a PhD in 1940. His PhD was an edition of an early medieval text by Pierre d’Abernun of Fetcham from the Bibliotheque Nationale, published in 1944 as 'Le Secré de Secrez' by the Anglo-Norman Text Society.

Beckerlegge spent time teaching in Germany after which he returned to the United Kingdom and took up a teaching post in Derby. In 1944 he published 'A School Certificate Revision Course of Exercises in German'. In 1943, he was accepted as a candidate for the Methodist ministry and trained at Richmond College; he served on the circuit for many years. He also wrote extensively on radical Methodism, was an expert on John and Charles Wesley, as well as editing hymnals and books of poetry. Throughout his life, he was a keen collector of early printed bibles. Oliver Beckerlegge died in February of 2003.