In 2022, Geoffrey Goodman, Southampton District Archivist and Local Preacher Secretary, completed a project he had been working on for twenty years, to identify all the chapels of the Methodist Connexion going back to early days. The complete project, in three large folders and in paper format, is now with the Museum of Methodism, City Road, London.
Geoffrey has now digitised the files and you can access them here by clicking on the District link below.
The chapel listings are organised in Methodist Districts and, within each District, in Circuits (local co-operating groups). For each chapel the table records:
- whether it was still open in November 2022 – shown by a pale blue background or a pink square at the start of the line;
- whether it was formerly Wesleyan (W), United Methodist (U), or Primitive Methodist (P) – shown by colour coding;
- notes and records of the chapel and its predecessors, including those where the National Archives (NA) index tells you where the notes and records are kept;
- whether the chapel appears (as of November 2022) on one of the Methodist Community Archive websites – My Wesleyan Methodists (MWM), My United Methodists (MUM) or My Primitive Methodists (MPM);
- in the Cornwall & Isles of Scilly District, whether a chapel was formerly Bible Christian (BC)
| Chapel | W (Wesleyan) | U (United) | P (Primitive) | Notes | MPM/ MWM/ MUM |
| open chapels shown on blue | |||||
As the tables show, many of these chapels have a page on one of Methodist Community Archive websites – and new pages are being added all the time The easiest way to find the page is to use the “Search the network” box at the top of each web page. If you find out more for that chapel, add a comment to the chapel’s page. If there isn’t a page for a chapel, add one with any information you find.
The District lists are available here in pdf format, for ease of access. It is planned to also make them available as spreadsheet files so they can be used more flexibly.
Maps for each Circuit in each District will be added to this group of pages as they are digitised.
As Geoffrey says, whether or not the project is complete, only time will tell!
Comments about this page
I am not sure that you are aware that there were two Methodist Chapels in Billy Row Green?
The Primitive Chapel is in your list under Darlington Circuit, and comments correctly refer to that. It is now a house, and is at the bottom of The Green.
However the Wesleyan Chapel, at the top of The Green, closed for worship circa 2001, was beautifully renovated and is now a house, is not listed at all!
Please note:
1 The Burnham Chapel listed in Barton and Brigg is actually in the Epworth & Scunthorpe Circuit being onlytwo miles from Epworth.
2 The Langley Moor and Kirk Langley PM chapels are missing from the Derby circuit list.
Petre Street Primitive Methodist chapel in Sheffield was an impressive building – at one time the largest Primitive Methodist chapel in the city. You can read about it here: https://www.myprimitivemethodists.org.uk/content/chapels/yorkshire/sa-sha/petre_street_primitive_methodist_chapel
On that page you can also see a picture of the presentation inscription in the book presented to Aubrey Oates as School Captain.
My Father Albert Aubrey Oates was school captain of Petre St Primitive Methodist in 1929 and they and presented with a Hymn Book on May 1st 1929. It looks to be signed by a J Drury Smith (Drury could be something similar)
I am in possession of the hymn book
(His father (also) Albert Oates was a Sheffield Councillor
I am currently researching an ancestor’s methodist hymn book. It was presented to her by “Pickhill Wesleyan Sunday School, Christmas 1918”. I have found a geograph photo https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/687602 and information that suggests it was erected c. 1864. It would have been part of Thirsk & Northallerton circuit. I am adding a story to the my Weslyan site, but thought worth adding to this project.
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