Westbury-on-Severn: Nonconformity

NONCONFORMITY.

In 1603 there were said to be 40 recusant Puritans (including Joseph Baynham) at Westbury. (fn. 1) There was a Quaker meeting in the parish by 1670, (fn. 2) and most of the 12 nonconformists recorded in 1676 presumably belonged to it. (fn. 3) The Quakers registered a meeting-house at Elton in 1690, (fn. 4) and acquired a burial ground there in 1724. (fn. 5)

Independents and Wesleyan Methodists were among groups who registered houses in the parish between 1810 and 1829. The Independents were meeting at a house in Northwood in 1816, (fn. 6) and in 1838 they built a chapel at Adsett; it had congregations of 80-160 in 1851. (fn. 7) From the later 19th century it was called a Congregational chapel. (fn. 8) By 1889 the Congregationalists also had a small mission chapel at Lower Ley, (fn. 9) and in 1893 they built a lecture hall in Westbury village; (fn. 10) both buildings remained in use in 1939 (fn. 11) but the mission chapel was later dismantled and removed to Northwood for use as a shop, and the lecture hall was a hairdresser's shop in 1969. (fn. 12) The chapel at Adsett, a Gothic stone building, was still used each Sunday in 1969 by a small congregation with a visiting minister. (fn. 13)

The Wesleyan Methodists built a small stone chapel at Stanley in Bollow in 1822; it had congregations of 80-140 in 1851. (fn. 14) By 1969 the congregation had died out and the chapel had been incorporated in a private house. Another Wesleyan chapel built at Broadoak before 1865 (fn. 15) remained in use until c. 1950, (fn. 16) but by 1969 had been partly dismantled.