Yorton Heath Primitive Methodist Chapel Shropshire

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• PRIMITIVE METHODIST MAGAZINE, 1859, page 506/
  “YORTON HEATH, HADNALL CIRCUIT.
  We opened our new chapel at this place, May 1st. 1859, and sermons were preached by Messrs. Taylor of Wem, and Bennett of Shrewsbury; the congregations were good and the collections liberal … The chapel is a neat substantial brick building, covered with blue slates; it is 21 feet by 18, and 15 feet from the floor to the ceiling; it has a boarded floor, and is fitted up with a good pulpit and railback forms, it is lighted by four windows, two on each side. The total cost is 95£, towards which we have obtained, by opening collections, and profits of the tea=meeting, donations, subscriptions, gift of leading materials, and land, the sum of 50£, leaving a debt of only 45£ on the sanctuary. The trustees have agreed to pay this off in four years …”.
  ———————————-

  By Janice Cox (27/08/2021)

• Elaine and Richard have identified that the picture published in the 1906 Christian messenger is in fact Forton Heath Chapel, not Yorton Heath.
  I have removed that picture and associated text from the page.

  By Geoff Dickinson (04/01/2021)

• I had also casually assumed that the alterations to Yorton Heath chapel in 1881 involved switching the entrance from the side of the building, although why would they? I do agree that the photograph used in the 1906 Christian Messenger article on the Hadnall Circuit does not look right. If such a significant alteration had been carried out, it might reasonably be expected to be recorded: ‘That application be made to the building committee for permission to make necessary alteration, clean and paint Yorton Heath chapel at a possible cost of forty pounds’- minutes of Hadnall Circuit Committee held at Clive 25 August 1880. A similar sum was proposed for the Clive chapel at the same meeting and had specified installation of heating apparatus.
  It seems that the article has used a photograph of the FORTON HEATH chapel, also in the Hadnall Circuit, and particularly easy to confuse in the handwritten minutes. Janice Cox has a photograph of this chapel on her website, which makes this clear.
  I have re-read the article itself; this also seems to have muddled the two. The ‘Yorton Heath’ paragraph more closely follows the narrative in the contemporary report by J Heath (circuit minister) of the opening of FORTON HEATH chapel in 1863; rather than that described by William Wood of the opening of the Yorton Heath chapel in 1859). The article names notable local figures – Edge, Hayward and Tudor; circuit records (circuit minutes, trustee lists preachers plans) show that they were associated with the FORTON HEATH rather than Yorton Heath society.

  Hadnall Circuit, Article by Fenton Allen in Christian Messenger 1906 (www.myprimitivemethodists.org.uk)
  Minutes of Hadnall Circuit Committee held at Clive on 25 August 1880 (Shropshire Archives)
  Forton Heath Chapel (www.users.waitrose.com/~coxfamily/forton.htm)
  Opening of Forton Heath Chapel by J Heath in Primitive Methodist Magazine 1864 p559 (www.myprimitivemethodists.org.uk)
  Opening of Yorton Heath Chapel by William Wood in Primitive Methodist Magazine, 1859, p500 (www.myprimitivemethodists.org.uk)
  Hadnall Circuit Minutes, incl. Trustee Lists (Shropshire Archives); Hadnall Circuit Preachers Plans (www.myprimitivemethodists.org.uk)

  By Alison Shepherd (13/12/2020)

• I have added a picture from the Christian Messenger of 1906 labelled Yorton Heath Chapel, and it doesn’t look anything like this picture. The Christian Messenger article, about Hadnall Circuit, also gives two opening dates for Yorton Heath chapel – one in 1859 and the other in 1861.

  One possible explanation is on the Shropshire’s Nonconformist chapels website where it says that the chapel was altered and improved in 1881 – but that’s quite a substantial alteration.

  What’s going on?

  By Christopher Hill (04/08/2020)

• Further information on this chapel can be viewed by following the link to Shropshire’s Nonconformist Chapels.

  By Geoff Dickinson (17/12/2013)