Sutton Bridge Primitive Methodist chapel

Allenby's Chase, Sutton Bridge PE12 9SY

Sutton Bridge Primitive Methodist chapel
Keith Guyler 1997
Photograph of the 1855 chapel
https://www.bridgewatch.org.uk/town.html#churches

The Bridge Watch website  tells us that Sutton Bridge Primitive Methodist chapel (known as the Independent) was erected on the corner of Allenby’s Chase in 1855.

However. the opening of a new chapel ten years later on 24th April 1866 is described by R Eaglen in the Primitive Methodist magazine of that year. It says that they had previously worshipped in a “small and inconvenient place”, so is the 1866 chapel a different one or is there confusion over dates? The new chapel is described as seating 300 and costing £670. Preachers at the opening celebrations which included tea for 300 in the Wesleyan chapel hall included S Antliff, George Prest, M Taylor, J Skews, R Eaglen, H Pentney, C Hirst, R Baxter andR Ducker. Donors included Mrs Lyon, R Eaglen and Capt Hoole.

The building in Keith Guyler’s photograph dates from 1888 and is the Sunday school of the former Primitive Methodist chapel. At the time of the photograph in 1993  it was empty and for sale.

The chapel itself was demolished and a small cluster of terrace houses was built on the land behind it.

On Google Street View the Sunday school building is still there and appears to be in use as a house.

location: TF 475213

Reference

Sutton Bridge Bridge Watch website accessed March25th 2019 at http://www.bridgewatch.org.uk/town.html#churches

Primitive Methodist magazine September 1866 pages 555-556

Comments about this page

  • To my knowledge, this chapel was never known as the Independent. I think the confusion comes from White’s 1856 which records two chapels viz the Wesleyan Reform (the Wesleyans, having been evicted, met in the village school until Reformers built their own chapel), and the Independent. The latter was a small and short-lived offshoot of the Independent (Congregational) chapel at Long Sutton. The PM of 1855 is not mentioned in White’s – it probably went to press before, or during, the building of the chapel.

    The PM in the photo is the one opened in 1866 (on the site of the former and smaller chapel of 1855). The foundation stone was laid in July 1865 by Mr J. Mason of Walsoken. It was licensed for marriages in 1867; the first marriage to take place in the chapel was that same year – Albert Burton to Betsy Evison. Improvements in 1888/89 included a new gallery and an attached Sunday school. The Centenary was celebrated with special services in 1965; two years later it was declared unsafe. Demolition took place in 1968 (Spalding Guardian 16/02/68 with report and picture of chapel). The Sunday school was utilised as a chapel until closure in 1997.

    By David Secker (15/02/2022)
  • There were once three Methodist Chapels in Sutton Bridge, but at Union the Primitive Methodist was chosen for the united church as the best building. Unfortunately it developed structural faults in the 1960s and had to be demolished. After that the schoolroom was converted into a church and used for worship for many years, probably until the 1990s. I was married there in 1970.

    By Rachel Larkinson (09/06/2020)
  • I’ve just added detail of the opening of the chapel from an account in the 1866 Primitive Methodist magazine. However, this is 11 years after the date given above. What’s the story?

    By Christopher Hill (25/03/2019)
  • Lincolnshire Archives, Lincoln:

    Ref. MLI97768: Photographs of PM Chapel, Sutton Bridge, now a private home, to include plaque: ‘1888, Primitive Methodist’ .

    The word Chapel not included because it was the PM Sunday School.

    By Ray & Marie (Mr. & Mrs. Ella) (10/02/2018)
  • The photograph of the 1855 chapel (included above as you cannot add a photograph in a comment) comes from the website of Bridge Watch Sutton Bridge [and can be found at http://www.bridgewatch.org.uk/town.html#churches] where it is also noted that the schoolroom was built in 1880. The website also comments, rather erroneously, that “the title ‘Primitive Methodist’ was usually given to Methodist lay preachers (non-ordained), so the chapel on the corner of Allenby’s Chase would have been the place where the Methodist laity could preach.”

    By David Noble (18/06/2016)

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