PLYMOUTH |
The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History |
|
|
PROVIDENCE CHAPEL The origins of the Plymouth Brethren movement go back to 1825 and to religious meetings held in Dublin, Eire, by Lord Congleton, and Messrs Edward Cronin, J N Darby and A N Groves. So how did it come to get associated with Plymouth? It transpires that Mr Groves had been practising in Plymouth as a dentist before he emigrated to Eire to train as a missionary. He may have kept in touch with people in the Town because it was three gentlemen who were later involved with the local movement, Captain Percy Hall, Mr George Vicesimus Wigram and Mr Benjamin Wills Newton, who in August 1830 invited him to Plymouth to preach. At first the meetings were held in private houses but such was the effect that the congregation grew rapidly and a chapel was needed. In February 1831 a Mr Samuel Westlake, acting on their behalf, purchased a site on a new road that was being created off Frankfort Street. The site cost him £120 16s. Upon the site were erected a chapel and a residence, both designed by the eminent local architect Mr John Foulston. Upon its completion in December 1831, the chapel was sold to Mr G V Wigram for £749 19s, to be held on trusts to be decided upon by Mr Wigram, Mr Newton and a Mr Herbert Mends Gibson. On December 12th 1831 the Providence Chapel was registered with the Bishop of Exeter as a meeting place for Protestant dissenters. The registration was in the name of Mr George Vicesimus Wagram, Mr Arthur Backalake, a builder, and Mr John Snook, yeoman. The Chapel was re-registered on December 28th 1836, possibly because of a change in the people responsible for the running it. This seems to have been the first chapel erected in England for the Brethren movement and as a consequence the name of Plymouth became attached to the movement. For the next fourteen years it progressed but in 1842 Mr B J Newton published a book about the Apocalypse which Mr Darby thought was heretical. Mr Darby attempted to get the book condemned and on October 26th 1845 he left the Providence Chapel to set up his up branch of the movement, which is thought to have been in Compton Street. Their failure to make returns in connection with the Ecclesiastical Census of 1851 brought about the end of the movement, at least in Plymouth. By the 1890s the Providence Chapel had become a public hall and the premises in Compton Street had become the home of a Evangelical Protestant Chapel. The building in Raleigh Street later became a temperance hall but was destroyed in the Second World War. The one in Compton Street survived the Blitz only to be pulled down by the Council when the Drake Circus shopping area was erected in the 1970s.
|
