The reign of King Henry VIII (1509-1547) saw great changes in the religious structure of England. Henry had been married to Catherine of Aragon when he became King of England. In 1527 he wished to divorce Catherine and take a new wife, Anne Boleyn, as Catherine had failed to reproduce a male heir to the throne. The religion of England at this time was Catholic, which forbade divorce, and so the Pope in Rome refused Henry permission to divorce.

In order to remarry, Henry VIII decided to assume control of the religion of England. In 1530 twenty-two Abbots signed a petition to the Pope requesting Henry’s divorce from Catherine. At the same time Henry commissioned a survey on the need for an English version of the Bible and it was agreed that there was a need for one. The English clergy recognised Henry as the new Supreme Head of the English Church. In 1533 he married Anne Boleyn and annulled his marriage to Catherine. He later formally asserted his control over the Church of England and severed all ties with Rome. In 1534 the Act of Treason threatened a death sentence on anyone who denied Henry’s power over the Church.

Up until the Reformation very few English people had been able to read the Bible as it was written in Latin and English translations were banned. A man called William Tyndale printed transaltions of the New Testament and half of the Old Testament between 1520 and 1535, but he was forbidden from working in England. His pocket sized bible translations were smuggled into England but he was condemnend as a heretic and strangled and burned in Brussels in 1536, partly at the instigation of Henry VIII. His work was finished by Miles Coverdale. By 1538 all Parish Churches were forced to purchase a copy of the English Bible. The English translation of the Bible was important for many people as it meant that there was no longer anybody between them and God, they could read his teachings directly from the Bible for the first time.

In 1535 Henry VIII sent out inspectors to the monasteries in England to write reports on their wealth and moral conduct, many of the reports which favoured the monasteries were sent back and the inspectors ordered to be more critical. Below is a typically unfavourable extract from the inspector’s reports.

About Crossed Friars monastery, London:

In 1536 Henry began the Dissolution of the Monasteries and all monastic property passed into the hands of the King. The Reformation meant that Henry could not only divorce Catherine but also vastly increase his wealth and power by seizing the possessions of the monasteries and selling them off for his own profit. Before the dissolution of the monasteries Henry had been on the point of bankruptcy. He had fought some very expensive wars in Europe and was in desperate need of funds, the monasteries at this time owned over one quarter of the land in the country.

Abbey Dore

The dissolution of the monasteries was a move that was favoured by a great number of people. For many years the Catholic clergy had been unpopular with the masses, who resented their huge wealth and privileges, saying that they used this wealth to live in luxury instead of helping the poor.

Some people were opposed to Henry’s action against the monasteries and they wished to return to rule by the Pope. In Yorkshire over 30,000 people took part in a ‘Pilgrimage of Grace’, it was a peaceful demonstration but Henry executed over 200 of the leaders.

In 1547 Henry VIII died and his young son Edward VI became King. In 1549 Edward passed the Act of Uniformity authorising the use of the Common Book of Prayer and demanding that all should worship from this book.

In 1553 Edward died of Tuberculosis and for nine days Lady Jane Grey, a relative of the Tudors, sat on the throne before being deposed by Henry’s daughter, Mary I. Mary, a staunch Catholic, negotiated the renewal of contact between the Church of England and the Pope, who once again became head of the English Church. Protestants were persecuted and some religious houses were reinstated. This period of change is known as the Restoration.

In 1558 Mary I died and was succeeded by her half sister Elizabeth I. Elizabeth, the daughter of Henry VIII and his second wife Anne Boleyn, suppressed the re-founded religious houses, and followed her father’s example and declared herself the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. She passed a second Act of Uniformity, ordering the use of the 1552 Prayer Book. Catholics were persecuted and priests forced into hiding.

During the changes from Reformation to Restoration and back to Reformation many people were becoming disillusioned by the religion on offer in England. These people are generally referred to as Puritans and Separatists.

Puritans were members of the Church of England who believed that it could be reformed from the inside, they wanted a church that put more emphasis on the preaching of God and less on the clergy. They also wanted fewer prescribed prayers and more time for personal prayer and reflection.

Separatists saw no option but to leave the Church of England and start again with their own format. These people are generally put under the banner of ‘Nonconformists’.

The ‘Nonconformist conscience’ reflected the principles of a wide section of the community and influenced commercial, social, and political morality.

Henry VIII’s break from the Pope, which began the Reformation in 1537, allowed people to find their own forms of religion that satisfied their own needs and beliefs. To begin with the Reformation caused two major new religious groups to be formed. Puritans wanted to reform the practices of the Church of England from within the institution, whilst Separatists could see no way that change was going to occur without leaving and setting up on their own.

By 1567 congregations belonging to these nonconformists groups (also known as Dissenters) began to meet together in private for religious services. These ‘Independent’ units gave rise to the Congregational Churches, with the Baptists emerging later in 1603. The Presbyterians came into their own during the English Civil War. Presbyterians were part of the Church of England who had tried to modify the way that the Church was governed. In 1662 the Act of Uniformity was passed, which called for all ministers to swear by all that was written in the Common Book of Prayer according to the Church of England. All those who refused to comply were ousted from the Church of England. Presbyterians split further into two groups: Independents and Unitarians. In 1832 the Congregational Union joined together Presbyterians, Independents and Unitarians. In 1836 they began to set up their own churches.

At first these groups had to meet in relative secret because of the fear of persecution. They would meet in private houses, barns and even the open fields. In 1637 three Puritans, Mssrs Prynne, Burton and Bastwick were put on trial for writing pamphlets attacking the church and the monarchy. Archbishop Laud found them guilty and had them severely punished:

"The executioner cut off Mr Burton’s ears deep and close, in a cruel manner with much bleeding, an artery being cut. Mr Prynne’s cheeks were seared with an iron made exceeding (sic) hot, after which the executioner cut off one of his ears and a piece of his cheek; then hacking the other ear almost off, left it hanging."

The Baptist Movement first appeared around 1603 and originally had two main groups. There were the General Baptists who believed in free will and the Particular Baptists who followed the teaching of John Calvin and believed in predestination. The Baptist movement was present in Leominster by 1656, at this time meeting in private houses in the town.

In Herefordshire one of the earliest meeting houses to be built was the Quaker Meeting House at Almeley in the north west of the county. It was built by Roger Pritchard as a meeting house in 1672 and given by him to the Quaker Society in 1675. As you pass the building at first glance you would believe that it was nothing more than a simple timber framed house, and indeed it was designed to appear this way to protect its worshippers from persecution.

Almeley Quaker Meeting House © Paul Wood

Increasingly the Puritans became disillusioned with the government of England as they refused to bring about the changes to the Anglican Church that the Puritans had proposed, except for a new translation of the Bible, now called the King James Version. The Puritans began to gain strength in Parliament and became more and more opposed to the policies of the Crown, in 1642 War broke out between the kings troops (Cavaliers) and the Puritans (Roundheads). This war is known as the English Civil War, or the Puritan Revolution.

The Puritans were led by Oliver Cromwell and through him they eventually took control of government in 1649. This period of rule was known as the Commonwealth. The Puritans passed a series of unpopular measures designed to imbue better moral conduct in the population, such as the closing of theatres, alehouses and the banning of popular sports and pastimes. Their political power ended in 1658 with the death of Oliver Cromwell and power returned to the monarchy.

In 1664 the Conventicle Act was passed: this decreed that ‘any Nonconformists attending a religious meeting, or assembling themselves together to the number of more than five persons in addition to members of the family, for any religious purpose not according to the rules of the Church of England, should be punished with a fine of £5, or three months imprisonment; for the second offence, double; for the third transportation.’ This broke up Nonconformist congregations everywhere, and they were forced to meet in secret in secluded areas.

A year later in 1665 the Five Mile Act was passed. This act decreed that ‘No Nonconformist minister or teacher whatever should, except when passing along the road, come within five miles of any city, or town-corporate, or borough sending member to Parliament, or within the same distance of any parish or place where he had formerly preached or taught, under a penalty of £40 for every offence’. This meant that preachers were forced away from the congregations that knew them and would help support them and were forced to become wanderers struggling to survive and depending on the charity of strangers.

Charles II was at heart a Roman Catholic, but as England at this time was Protestant, Catholicism was a Dissenting religion. In order to favour the Catholic religion without bringing himself under persecution he set out the ‘Declaration of Indulgence’ in 1672, which granted to all Dissenters, Protestant and Catholic alike, the privilege of worshipping according to their own doctrines, though, in order to do so, licenses must be obtained, signed by himself. These licenses were for preachers and places alike. The Declaration was withdrawn the following year but in this time over 4,000 applications were entered. One such license was granted to "The house of John Bond att Bromeyard licensed as a Presbyterian meeting-place".

Members of the Church of England sometimes even had criminal action taken against members of the Nonconformist religions. For example in the Hereford City Records Miscellaneous Papers for 1673 stored in Hereford Record Office we have details of the " Deposition of Thomas Wood, carpenter, concerning a meeting of non-conformists at the house of Thomas Seaborne, ironmonger, for the suppressing of which the mayor and other officers approaches the meeting place, whereupon John Butcher and Hugh Phillips, both coopers (barrel makers), who were of the meeting, departed to the deponents house and made comments reviling the mayor’s action".

In 1689, during the reign of William of Orange, the Act of Toleration was passed effectively allowing people to practise different religions free from the fear of prosecution and persecution. However, this did not mean that the religions of the Dissenters were fully accepted by the Church of England as worthy counterparts. Between 1754 and 1857 all nonconformists still had to marry in an Anglican church except for Quakers and Jews.

The 18^th century was a period when ‘alternative’ religions truly began to emerge. These religious societies often started out as groups of students who met for Bible study. They were composed of laymen and so were often un-favoured by the Anglican Church. At the start nearly everyone in these Bible study groups still took their orders from the Established Church and most carried out good deeds in their parishes.

However more and more these groups began to become disillusioned with the Anglican ministry. They felt that the church was neglecting its duties and its members. In Essex of the 310 churches only 102 had services on a Sunday and some only had a service once a month. These Bible Groups recognised the shortcomings of the established Church and the need for a revival became great.

In 1739 Methodism truly emerged, inspired by the teachings of John and Charles Wesley. Their evangelism had an extraordinary impact on the working classes whose conditions of living predisposed them to enthusiasm and the quest for Utopia. Methodism had many different branches but in 1932 these joined to form the Methodist Church.

The Church of England remained the dominant religion throughout the 18^th century with 90% of the population swearing at least nominal allegiance.

Universities were Anglican and dissenters were kept out with the intention of keeping their education at a basic level. The Anglican clergy performed and recorded all baptisms and burials and church courts still had business over wills and marriage disputes.

Seeing the inequality in religion offered to the various classes of England some Non-conformists set up their own schools, with the religious minister acting as schoolmasters. The Baptists minister Edward Goff (or Gough) was born in Huntington, Herefordshire in 1738, the son of a farm labourer. In his early life he worked as a farm hand before becoming dissatisfied and moving to London and was employed as a coalheaver. He was such a hard working and honest man that his master eventually passed the business over to him. Edward Goff had no formal schooling and had taught himself to read and write. He was an active member of the Baptist Church and left money to found schools in Herefordshire and the surrounding counties for the education of the poor.

In Herefordshire these schools were set up in Huntington, Fownhope and Madley. Goff died in 1813 and is buried in an unmarked grave in Hay churchyard.

At the beginning of the 18^th century the population of England was approximately 5,826,000, by the end of the century this had risen to 9,156,000. Industry was developing and new towns and villages were growing all over the country. A class divide soon began to develop between the landed gentry, the factory owners and the workers. This ‘new’ commercial and industrial society was governed by a liberal national state based upon the principles of political equality and popular sovereignty.

The 18^th century was a period when rioting was endemic. The working classes felt that they were being oppressed and there were riots against The Corn Law and Turnpike taxes. Methodism truly erupted in Britain in the midst of this disharmony, especially during the wage riots of the 1760’s. The revolution in nearby France had brought about the overthrowing of the Roman Catholic Church and now people unhappy with the standard of religion in England could see that there was an alternative. That ordinary people had the right to assert their freedom of choice.

The dissenting religions offered ordinary folk the chance to seek a better life. They were religions accessible to the humble and unsophisticated. Salvation could not be bought, learnt or inherited; it had to be earned by conduct and morals. Membership to these churches was not dependent on your birth or land it was voluntary and required only commitment and piety. This is partly why many of the nonconformist religions practice adult baptism. They do not see membership of the church as a birthright but something that had to be earned and professed to when old enough to understand the implications of your faith.

The Sunday Schools attached to many of the Dissenting chapels provided a system whereby ordinary people, who were unable to attend other educational institutions, could learn to read and write.

One of the few members of the aristocracy that became a Baptist minister was the 16^th Lord Teynham, who before he succeeded to the peerage was a Baptist minister and was responsible for the founding of Ledbury Baptist Chapel in 1832. He left the Baptist ministry in 1842 and made his maiden speech to the House of Lords on the 7^th of March 1843.

During the 19^th century matters of morals and religion profoundly influenced English society. For millions of men and women religion gave them rules by which to live their life. It determined who they should marry, and conditioned the way they brought up their children.

The chief characteristic of 19^th century religion was Evangelicalism. The belief that every man and woman was heir to the sins of Adam and destined to spend eternity in Hell unless justified by faith. Evangelicals believed that only those who experienced a conversion and were willing to profess their faith would find Heaven after death.

Evangelicalism was mediated mainly through Baptists, Methodists and Congregationalists: the so-called ‘Dissenters’. Not all Dissenters were Evangelicals. Many Presbyterians could trace their ancestry back to Anglican clergy who were ejected in 1662 for their refusal to consent to everything written in the Common Book of Prayer and who rejected the Trinity in favour of the Unity of God. Many Quakers also rejected Evangelicalism.

England during this period was experiencing a rapid population growth and a boom in the industry of the country. During 1773 and 1851 the population has been estimated to have grown by 155% but the numbers of nonconformists grew by 975% in the same period. Not only had the congregation Nonconformists increased tenfold but the religious census of 1851 also showed that they outnumbered Anglican places of worship by 5,420.

Steadily a divide between classes was becoming more and more evident as many more people became landowners and businessmen carried along by the tide of the Industrial Revolution. The workers in the new factories often lived in appallingly cramped and squalid conditions and were expected to work long shifts to earn enough money to feed their families. These lower classes in society began to feel that they no longer fitted in with the Anglican Church with its grand architecture, procession and class based seating orders. It was within the poor and the unsophisticated that Evangelical Nonconformity found its greatest support.

Religious instruction was evident in education, philanthropy, leisure, class, as well as political and industrial life.

The extent of popular support for Evangelical Nonconformity is evident in the unique religious census of 1851 of England and Wales. The census revealed that 40% of the population had attended a religious service on Sunday 30^th March 1851, and of that 40% nearly half were Protestant Nonconformists.

It is also interesting to note that at this time 40% attendance was considered very low. It is worth noting that today the same attendance at religious services of any kind would be thought of as particularly good.

It has been suggested by Michael R.Watts (The Dissenters Volume 2) that Dissent grew up on soil that had been prepared by the Church of England but where the established church had proved incapable of reaping the harvest. Densely populated areas with high levels of poverty already felt excluded and alienated from the Church of England. In these areas the inflexibility of the Anglican doctrine, inadequate pastoral care and unemotional moralistic theology proved insufficient to meet their spiritual needs.

Nonconformist preachers required no specialist training or qualifications and, as today, many of them were laymen. What was required of them was evidence of their conversion to Christ, a passion for the salvation of their congregation and the ability to communicate their faith in simple terms.

Occasionally we hear of women that were preachers of the Dissenting religions, though not to the same extent as men. At basic level the participants in the religion believed in the spiritual equality of men and women. Yet not all members of the faith believed this to be so. John Wesley himself found it hard to decide whether women should be allowed to preach or not, praising some women for the preaching talent and then laying down laws that forbade them to take scripture. It cannot be denied that women preachers created a curiosity and certainly were responsible for drawing more men into the religion. By 1818 20% of Primitive Methodist preachers were women and by 1824 30% of the travelling preachers were women.

Most preachers from the nonconformist religions were itinerant, they travelled around the country spreading their faith preaching in the open air or at private meetings. As the numbers of preachers grew so did the area that they could cover and the number of circuits that they could complete. In 1746 there were 7 Methodist preaching circuits, in 1790 this had grown to 60 and by 1830 the number had exploded to 336. This was one advantage that the nonconformist religions had over the Church of England - they were flexible in structure.

In the first half of the 19^th century the majority of expansion of the nonconformist religion took place in the countryside, the industrial villages and the small towns of England and Wales where small scale urbanisation had begun but had not yet caused religion to become psychologically unnecessary or socially irrelevant. (Dissenters, vol II p134)

Nonconformist preachers tended not to be tied to one particular chapel. John Wesley even ordered his preachers not to remain at one chapel for any longer than two years. With this constant moving about and introduction of new blood into the chapels the nonconformist religions managed to achieve what the Anglican Church found difficult – an ability to remain fresh and relevant to the society in which they were preaching. To much of 19^th century society the Anglican Church lacked the excitement, congregational involvement and emotional spirit of the dissenting churches. The theology that the Anglican Church promoted appeared to lack the passion and commitment that members of the Dissenting churches found desirable.

The itinerant nature of the Dissenting religions was suited to a society that was growing and developing rapidly and yet was still largely made up of widely dispersed settlements.

It is interesting to note that in areas where the landscape was made up of small villages with most of the land owned by one landlord the majority of people worshiped in the traditional parish church. This is because in small villages where the inhabitants were close to the parish church they were less likely to feel let down and neglected by the pastor. Also in areas where the landlord was sympathetic to the Anglican Church he could prevent his tenants from worshipping in Dissenting churches. Landlords could also refuse to let their tenants have land on which to build Nonconformist chapels and meeting houses. One example is at Shobdon where at one time most of the land in the area was owned by one Squire who preferred people to attend the parish church and forced the dissenters in the area to meet in secret. The chapel on the left was finally built in 1924 on land donated by a Mr Williams.

Nonconformist Preachers in Herefordshire.

Although Hereford was not at the forefront of the so-called Evangelical Revolution it did benefit from the visits of three of the most important men in the Methodist Religion. George Whitfield, John Wesley and Charles Wesley.

George Whitfield visited the county in April 1743 and preached at Leominster before visiting Hereford and Ross, but without time to stop and preach.

John Wesley visited the county in August 1746. He had been preaching at Builth and was due to ride on to Carmarthen but by mistake notice had been given of his preaching in Leominster and he had to alter the course of his journey to preach in Herefordshire instead. He also preached in Kington. In 1762 John Wesley once again passed through the county and although he did not preach he stayed overnight at the Swan and Falcon (now the City Arms). Charles Wesley, brother of John, visited Herefordshire in June 1749 to join his wife and her family at the Swan and Falcon. He tried to preach at the Cathedral but found the doors closed to him. On June 8th 1749 he preached in Leominster and was well received.

Kington Methodist Chapel, built close to where John Wesley is thought to have preached in the town.

George Fox the founder of the Quaker movement also visited this county, staying at Leominster in 1657, where he preached in the open air to a large crowd for three hours. George Fox visited the town a second time in 1667 and the ‘Society of Friends’ was organised in the area.

Dissenters were persecuted by society in a number of ways. Sometimes when a dissenting congregation expressed their wish to build a meeting-house the vicar and his congregation threatened local builders and carpenters with loss of trade if they took any part in its construction. Often in small communities dissenters would be threatened with a loss of work and wages to try and prevent them from worshipping outside of the Church of England. Some dissenters were even taken to court for practising their religious beliefs. In Hereford the Primitive Methodists suffered much persecution in 1834 the superintendent of the Hereford circuit, Mr Morton, was thrown into jail for preaching in the open air (From Prison to Pulpit: The Life Story of the Late Rev. John Maylard).

We also have examples of property being confiscated from Non-conformists because of their religion. In July 1670 Nicholas Day of Eardisland had eight oxen taken worth £32 1s for holding a Quaker meeting in his house.

Despite the opposition and persecution Nonconformists still carried on worshipping in their own chapels. These chapels differed greatly to the parish churches of the Anglican Faith, they were of a much more simple design, usually rectangular in plan, with none of the ornate sculpture and mouldings found on Anglican churches. The idea was that the emphasis should be on the lessons being preached and not the luxury of the architecture.

These chapels were often small but had no system of seating based on class and all were welcome. This is most likely why chapels found favour with the middle and lower classes as they no longer felt like 2^nd class citizens especially in Hereford where most of the population was involved in rural economy and much of the land was owned by large landowners.

Non-conformists had to obtain licenses from the Bishop of their Diocese to build Meeting Houses or to turn Current dwelling houses into Assembly Houses.

At first preachers would be sent out from other chapels to surrounding areas to preach in the open air or in barns or private houses. Once a congregation had been established a small chapel would be built. The chapels of the nonconformists were at first designed to blend in with their surroundings, to look like simple houses or outbuildings. This was to protect worshippers from persecution for practising their faith.

Hereford has been described by several different religious leaders as one of the most difficult circuits in the county. It was thinly populated and as the Rev. Dixon wrote in 1813:

" The ignorance and bigotry of the people is amazing beyond anything you could imagine."

One reason for the ‘ignorance’ of the people of the County may have been because Hereford did not naturally fall in the line of many of the countrywide circuits travelled by nonconformist leaders in order that they might spread the Word. It wasn’t until 1807 that the Wesleyan Methodist Circuit was formed and in that year only one chapel was built in the County, at Weston Under Penyard.

As the chapel religion became more popular and more widely respected it came to realise that it was on an equal footing as the Anglican Church. More and more chapels became meeting-houses not just for the middle classes and the labourers but for intellectuals and ‘respectable persons’. It was soon noted that with this new group came money, and that an intellectual ministry would attract more intellectuals. By the middle of the 19^th century over 70% of men entering the Congregational ministry were college trained. Preaching was no longer the job of laymen. In 1856 the Calvinistic Methodist Association in Wales decreed that all new members of the ministry should undergo a series of tests to determine their knowledge of the faith.

This new training of ministers soon opened up a social divide. The middle and lower classes complained that the new ministers no longer preached in simple dialect or tended to their communities. Now the energies of the ministers went into chapel building to establish themselves as equals of the Church of England and the evangelism, which had once been the attraction of the chapel’s religion went into decline.

As the ministers were no longer laymen they began to rely on well attended chapels to supply their salaries and soon itinerant preaching, which had been the catalyst for nonconformist expansion, went into decline.

By the 1840’s it was becoming more and more usual for the Baptist Church to construct indoor baptismal pools as their previous practice of baptism in rivers and ponds was discouraging the more ‘genteel folk’.

Many chapels also began to charge a ‘pew rent’ (Bromyard) which meant that the wealthy once again had more influence.

In Herefordshire the membership of the nonconformist religions were often made up of just a few families in the village. Often the younger generations of these families would move away from the rural villages and into larger towns where there was more likelihood of work. They may have joined chapels in the towns but this left the rural chapels in Herefordshire with a declining membership.

Sadly the downfall in membership meant closure for many of the chapels in the most rural parts of Herefordshire. Most that closed were sold into private ownership for a relatively small amount and now have become storage facilities or been converted into unusual family houses. Fortunately the simplicity and quaint beauty of these buildings has meant that most remain largely unaltered and are still a standing testament to the religious revival of the 18^th century.

Broxwood	Woonton	Kingsland	Moorcot	Eardisland

MG

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