Non-Conformists

[Excerpt from The British Association Handbook of Birmingham, 1886]

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The earliest nonconformist place of worship, of which any record remains, was "The Old Meeting," which, with its graveyard, has so recently as the year 1882 been removed for the enlargement of the railway station in New Street.

As old Birmingham was not a corporate town it did not come within the provisions of The Five Mile Act (A.D. 1665), and was naturally the resort of persecuted Nonconformists from the neighbouring boroughs. On the first Declaration of Indulgence put forth by Charles the Second in 1672, rooms were licensed for public worship, and in 1687 eleven dissenters bought a plot of land in what was then called Philip Street, and built a meeting house, finished in 1689, the year of the passing of the Toleration Act. As the total cost of land and building was only £220, it could not have accommodated many hearers, and we find that another meeting house, called the "Lower Meeting House," was built in Deritend in a yard which was until lately called "Meeting House Yard," now taken into the continuation of Milk Street into Deritend. This second chapel was injured in the Sacheverell Riots, in 1715, and afterwards the congregation removed, in 1732, to what was formerly the "New Meeting," in Moor Street, where they remained until the last day of the year 1861.

The worshippers at both these two original meeting houses called themselves, and were called "Presbyterians," used as the antithesis to "Episcopalian," although they were really "Independent" in their form of church government. In theology both congregations were at first Calvinistic, but Mr. Howell, the sixth in succession of the minsters of the Old Meeting, having become an avowed Arian, the more orthodox minority withdrew in the year 1747, and founded the church in Carr's Lane—(see Congregationalists.) It is creditable to the good feeling of the separatists that none of them sold their shares in the "Old Meeting" and one of them was re-appointed a trustee thirty years afterwards. From Arianism the congregations of both Old and New Meetings gradually became Unitarian and are henceforth treated under that title.

Unitarians
The Old Meeting House, built in 1689, was burned in the riots of 1791, and afterwards rebuilt. It has attached a burial ground which was used by both the congregations of the Old and New Meetings, and in which were interred the remains of many of the foremost men in the public life of Birmingham for two centuries. As before stated the meeting house and ground were sold to the London and North Western Railway Company in 1882, and the remains of the dead were transferred to a separate piece of ground in the Borough Cemetery at Witton, and the Congregation have built a new
   OLD MEETING CHURCH, in the Bristol Road, which was opened in 1885.
   THE NEW MEETING HOUSE, of which Dr. Priestley was the minister from 1780 to 1791, was destroyed in the riots of 1791 and rebuilt on its original site in Moor Street. The situation having become inconvenient it was (1861) sold to the Roman Catholics and became St. Michael's, Moor Street, and the New Meeting congregation removed to
   THE CHURCH OF THE MESSIAH, Broad Street, opened 1st January, 1862. The Rev. H.W. Crosskey, LL.D., is the minister
   NEWHALL STREET CHAPEL was built in the year 1844 by members of both congregations, who had previously a house for worship and Sunday schools in Cambridge Street.
   HURST STREET CHAPEL was built in the year 1844 as a mission chapel and has been since enlargened. Another mission more immediately connected with the New Meeting is
   LAWRENCE STREET CHAPEL, which was originally built as a place of worship for the Baptists then occupied by the disciples of Zion Ward, and afterwards used by the followers of Robert Owen, who were at one time numerous in Birmingham.
   THE BIRMINGHAM FREE CHRISTIAN SOCIETY have a chapel in Fazeley Street, served by lay preachers.

Baptists
It is somewhat singular that two of the oldest chapels belonging to this body, namely Cannon Street and Freeman Street, have now ceased to exist. Cannon Street Chapel was built in 1737 on a part of what was then a cherry orchard (which gave its name to Cherry Street). The original building was greatly enlargened in 1806. In those days the well-to-do tradesmen of Birmingham lived in the town, and the town chapels consequently frew their occupants from the immediate neighbourhood. Gradually, however, the old members died, and their sons and daughters went to live in the suburbs, and so Cannon Street, which was the flourishing mother church of the Particular Baptists, dwindled in numbers. Fortunately the site of it was required by the Corporation of Birmingham, and it was sold for £26,500, and is now occupied by the Central Arcade in Corporation Street. The purchase money was, under a scheme sanctioned by the Court of Chancery, expended in aid of several Baptist Chapels in the town and suburbs.

The Chapel in Freeman Street is sait to have been older than Cannon Street to which place the worshippers at Freeman Street joined themselves in 1752, and the edifice itself was taken down in 1856. The next chapel in order of date was built in Bond Street (near Constitution Hill), was opened in the year 1786, and was for many years a flourishing church, but gradually decayed in numbers and influence, and is now occupied by the United Methodists.

The chief existing places of worship now belonging to the Baptists are
   NEWHALL STREET CHAPEL, originally built in 1791 by the followers of Emanuel Swedenborg.
   GRAHAM STREET or MOUNT ZION CHAPEL, opened in 1824 by the celebrated Edward Irving. Twenty years afterwards the pulpit was occupied for some time by the late Geaorge Dawson, and subsequently, from 1851 to 1874, by the Rev. Charles Vince, whose death was felt as a public calamity.
   HENEAGE STREET CHAPEL, of which the foundation stone was laid 1st August, 1838, to commemorate the emancipation of the West Indian negroes.
   CIRCUS CHAPEL, Bradford Street, opened 1848, so called because it was formerly a circus.
   WYCLIFFE CHURCH, in the Bristol Road, opened in 1861.
   CHURCH OF THE REDEEMER, Hagley Road, built by a portion of the congregation of Graham Street, aided by a contribution of the Cannon Street trustees, and opened in 1882.

There are also chapels in Guildford Street, Hope Street, Lodge Road (Hockley), Great King Street, Stratford Road, Spring Hill, Victoria Street (Small Heath) Warwick Street (Deritend), and Wynn Street (Grreat Colmore Street).

There is also a chapel belonging to the Particular Baptists of Calvinistic views in Frederick Street (Newhall Hill), built in 1850 with the proceeds of an old chapel in Bartholomew Street, which was called the "Cave of Adullam," and removed by the extension of the railway into New Street.

The General or Arminian Baptists had the chapel in Freeman Street (now removed), and in September, 1786, opened the existing chapel in LOMBARD STREET.

Congregationalists
   CARR'S LANE.—This church was formed, as before stated, in 1747, by members of the Nonconformist Meeting House, the "Old Meeting," who did not agree with the arianism of the then minister, Mr. howell. The first building was opened in 1748, and was then, as was the custom with meeting houses, built in a yard to screen it from observation. It has been several times enlarged and rebuilt. The names of the Rev. John Angell James, who was minister here from 1806 to his death 1st October, 1859, and of his successor, R.W. Dale, LL.D., the present minister, are known throughout the Christian world.
   EBENEZER CHAPEL, in Steelhouse Lane, was built in 181 by the admirers of a minister celebrated in his day, the Rev. Jehoiada Brewer, who laid the foundation stone in 1816, but died before the building was finished. [Footnote: In the order of time there was an intermediate meeting house in Livery Street, originally a circus, and used by the congregations of the Old and New Meetings, whilst those meeting houses were being built after the riots of 1791. It was afterwards occupied by a part of the Carr's Lane congregation, on Mr. Brewer's resignation of the pastorate there in 1802, and, it becoming too small, it was resolved to build Ebenezer Chapel. The chapel in Livery Street was pulled down in 1853, and the printing establishment of M. Billing, Sons, and Co., is built on the site.]

From endowments furnished by three members of this congregation, Mr. Mansfield and his two sisters, Miss Mansfield and Mrs. Glover, a college for the education of ministers was established at Spring Hill, Dudley Road, then removed to Moseley, and is now intended to be reconstituted at Oxford as "Mansfield College."
   HIGHBURY CHAPEL, Graham Street, originally formed by the remnant of the Livery Street congregation, was opened in 1845.
   FRANCIS ROAD (Edgbaston) CHAPEL was built to commemorate the fiftieth year of the pastorate of Carr's Lane Chapel, by the Rev. J.A. James. He laid the foundation stone 11th September, 1855.
The congregationalists have also chapels in Gooch Street, Moseley Road, St. Andrew's Road, Saltley, Small Heath, Parade (Tabernacle), and Winson Green Road, and several others outside the Borough, but in immediate proximity to it.

Society of Friends
George Fox records in his journal that he held a meeting in Birmingham in the year 1655, and there is good reason to believe in the existence of a small society from that date, meeting in private houses until 1703, when a plain brick meeting house fronting Bull Street was built. There may have been an earlier meeting house in Monmouth Street, where there was a burial-ground, acquired in 1851 by the Great Western Railway, and now the site of the Arcade. The meeting house in Bull Street was several times enlarged, and in 1856 it was pulled down, shops built fronting the street, and a more commodious meeting house built in the rear. There is also another meeting place in Bath Row. Meetings for religious worship and instruction, conducted by members of the Society, are held on Sundays at Severn Street Schools, and the Board Schools in Moseley Street and Bristol Street. The Early First-Days Morning School, and the other schools and classes at Severn Street, established by the Friends, have done, and are doing an incalculable amount of good.

Wesleyan Methodists
John Wesley preached his first sermon in Birmingham in 1743, but it was not until 1764 that his followers acquired an old play house in Moor Street as their first chapel, which he opened. In 1782 they had so prospered as to build a chapel in Cherry Street, which was opened by John Wesley himself, then in his eightieth year. This chapel, enlarged in the year 1823, is now (July, 1886) to be pulled down, and a new chapel built in Corporation Street.

The rapid increase in numbers necessitated additional chapels in Bradford Street (1786), BELMONT ROW (1789), MARTIN STREET (Broad Street) (1834), NEWTOWN ROW CHAPEL (1837), WESLEY CHAPEL, Constitution Hill (1838), besides a chapel in Bell Barn Road for which the present BRISTOL ROAD CHAPEL (1854) was substituted.

For the purposes of connexional organization the Birmingham district is divided into seven circuits, which include not only the chapels already mentioned but also thirty-three others within the Borough and its suburbs, including Smethwick.

   METHODIST NEW CONNECTION.—This section of the Methodist Community, which separated from the Wesleyans in 1797, only on questions of the share of the laity in church government, first built a chapel in Oxford Street (1811) now disused, then another in the northern part of the town, Unett Street (1838), and have since built smaller ones in Moseley Street, Priestley Road (Stratford Road), Ladywood, Heath Street and Crabtree Road (Brookfields) in the Borough. These and a chapel at Smethwick are divided into two circuits supplied by three circuit ministers.

   THE PRIMITIVE METHODISTS.—This body has thirteen chapels in and near to the borough, divided into three circuits, and served by four regular ministers. The largest of these [circuits, presumably, not ministers! —AS] is in Gooch Street, and the others in the Borough are in Sparkbrook, King Street, Lord Street, Nechells, Garrison Lane, Whitmore Street (Hockley) and Ladywood.

   THE UNITED METHODIST FREE CHURCHES.—have two circuits and two circuit ministers and chapels in Rocky Lane (Nechells), Bond Street (recently acquired from the Baptists), and Muntz Street (Birmingham Heath) besides one at Washwood Heath.

   THE WESLEYAN REFORMERS.—have one regular minister and two chapels in Upper Trinity Street and Floodgate Street.

The English Presbyterian Church
These are the orthodox Presbyterians, as distinguished from the churches which, like the Old Meeting congregation, became Arian or Unitarian. They first occupied what is now the Baptist Chapel at Mount Zion, which was opened by the celebrated Edward Irving (see Baptists), and then a chapel in Newhall Street, afterwards the church in BROAD STREET, which is their principal edifice. They have also churches at Camp Hill and New John Street West.

The Christian Brethren
Have a head place of worship at the Central Hall, Great Charles Street, and other Meeting places in Green Lane (Small Heath), New John Street West, Camp Hill, and Icknield Port Road in the Borough, and four others in the outskirts. Several other religious bodies have only one or two places of worship, and among these may be named—

The Bloomsbury Institution, Mission Hall, in Bloomsbury Street.

The Boatmen's Hall in Bridge Street (Broad Street).

The Catholic Apostolic Church in Summer Hill Terrace, a new church built by the congregation formerly assembling at what was called the Irvingite Church, in Newhall Street.

The Christadelphians, who meet in the Temperance Hall, in Temple Street.

The Church of the Saviour, in Edward Street (Parade), built in 1847 for Mr. George Dawson M.A., on his leaving the Mount Zion (Baptists) Chapel. A free church, founded on the principle that common Christian worship and pursuit of religious truth, and not doctrinal agreement, are the true bases of Christian union.

The Jewish Synagogue, in Blucher Street, top of Severn Street, was built in 1856, to supply the place of a smaller synagogue in Severn Street. It cost upwards of £8,000.

The New Church, or Swedenborgians, had for their first chapel the one in Newhall Street, now occupied by the Baptists then, in 1830, removed to a new chapel in Summer Lane, and subsequently, in 1875, to an elegant church, a little way over the Borough boundary, in Wretham Road (Soho Hill).

The Welsh Calvinistic Methodists, who have a chapel in Granville Street (Bath Roaw), and another in Hockley hill, just over the Borough boundary.

The Welsh Congregationalists have a chapel in Wheeler Street.

Roman Catholics
There is no record of any Roman Catholic place of worship in Birmingham from the Reformation until the publication, by James the Second, of the illegal Declaration of Indulgence in 1687. In that year the foundation of a church and convent, dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene, was laid near the street still called Masshouse Lane, and probably on the site of the present Church of St. Bartholomew. It was scarcely built when it was pulled down at the revolution of 1688. The priests (who were of the order of St. Francis) removed to a farm house in a lane near Harborne, the approach to which, at the top of Richmond hill Road, Edgbaston, was known as Masshouse Lane.

The first chapel in the town was the one dedicated to ST. PETER, in St. Peter's Place, a little way out of Broad Street, built in 1786, and a burial ground and schools added and subsequently enlarged.

The next was a chapel in Chadwell Street, built in 1809, and dedicated to St. Chad, which afterwards gave place to ST. CHAD'S CATHEDRAL, Bath Street, built after the designs of A. Welby Pugin at a cost of £60,000, and consecrated June 22, 1841.
   ST. ANNE'S, Alcester Street, was originally a distillery, and was acquired by the Fathers of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, of whom John Henry (now Cardinal) Newman was one. In 1852, the Fathers removed to the Hagley Road, and St. Anne's became a secular mission.
   CHURCH OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION, Hagley Road, Edgbaston. Here, in addition to the Church, is a residence for the Fathers of the Order of St. Philip Neri, and a school for the education of the sons of the Catholic gentry. It is interesting to every educated man as having been for more than a quarter of a century the abode of John Henry (Cardinal) Newman.
   ST. MICHAEL'S, Moor Street, formerly the New Meeting House of the Unitarians, and purchased from that body in 1861, and opened in 1862.
   ST. JOSEPH'S, Nechells, formerly only a chapel of the cemetery there served from St. Chad's, became a church with two priests in the year 1872.
   ST. CATHERINE OF SIENNA, in the Horse Fair, was consecrated September 28, 1875, and
   ST. PATRICK'S in the Dudley Road was opened in 1876.

Birmingham is one of the Roman Catholic sees created by the celebrated Papal Decree of 29th September, 1850. To that date from 1584, when the last of the old Roman Catholic Prelates died, the English Romanists had been governed in matters ecclesiastical by Vicars-Apostolic, of whom the last and best known was Bishop (in partibus) afterwards Cardinal Wiseman.

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