PLYMOUTH |
The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History |
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BIBLE CHRISTIAN CHAPELS
The Bible Christians, sometimes known as the "Bryanites", were set up at Lake Farm, Shebbear, Cornwall, on October 18th 1815. They began their ministry in Plymouth in 1819, preaching in any houses or rooms they could hire. At one time they held meetings in a first-floor room in Willow Street and this was followed by a room over the Golden Fleece Public House in Notte Street. During the ministry of Mr Jacob Hunt Prior they acquired ther use of a sail loft over a tinsmiths shop on the Parade, down on the Barbican. [1] They worshipped there for about twelve years until in 1835, tired of the room and the access to it up a narrow and ill-lit pole staircase, they courageously decided to build their own chapel. The site chosen was on the western side of what was then known as Old Church Lane, now Catherine Street, where the Mayor and Commonalty owned a tenement in which lived a widow by the name of Hannah Gilbert. Luckily the house and grounds to the north of it were also in the hands of the Corporation, who administered it on behalf of the Joan Bennett Trust for the benefit of the poor at Maker in Cornwall. [2] But it was a congregation in Devonport that got the first purpose-built Chapel, for Worth declares that the Ebenezer Bible Christian Chapel in King Street, Devonport, bore the date 1845. [3] It was not until 1846 that fifteen men from the Plymouth congregation formed themselves into a body of trustees responsible for the purchase of the land and the erection of the chapel. The foundation stone was laid on November 24th 1846 and the Zion Bible Christian Chapel was opened in August 1847. [2] The East Street Bible Christian Chapel in East Stonehouse was opened in 1858 and this was followed in 1865 by the Haddington Road Bible Christian Chapel in Devonport. Although Wesleyan Methodists had been meeting out at Elburton, in the parish of Plymstock, it was Bible Christians who opened a chapel there in 1869. Plymouth got two more chapels, quite close to each other: the Greenbank Road Bible Christian Chapel (1886) and the Embankment Road Bible Christian Chapel (1903). The last one to be erected was the Saint George's Terrace Bible Christian Chapel at Ryder Road, Stoke. This opened in 1906. On September 16th / 17th 1907 the Bible Christians merged with the Methodist New Connexion and the United Methodist Free Church, taking the last-named title. They in turn merged with the Wesleyan Methodists and the Primitive Methodists in 1932 to become simply the Methodist Church. Sources:
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