Building    From 29/3/1778  To 1944

Essex Street Chapel and Essex Hall

Categories: Religion

The first Unitarian service was preached by Theophilus Lindsey on 17 April 1774.  Supported by Joseph Priestley, Richard Price (see scientific life assurance) and others he used space recently vacated by an auction house, a simple hall built on the site of the old Essex HouseBenjamin Franklin was also present at this service.  The congregation grew and Lindsey's friends funded a purpose-built chapel on the same site, opened on 29 March 1778.

By the 1880s another Unitarian congregation had grown in Kensington but without a chapel. Also two Unitarian bodies required better offices: the British and Foreign Unitarian Association and The Sunday School Association. It was decided that the Essex Street congregation would join that in Kensington, in a new church (funded by Sir James Clarke Lawrence and his brother Edwin) and the old chapel would be redeveloped to become Essex Hall, the headquarters of British Unitarianism. With substantial funding from Frederick Nettlefold this was built in 1886, destroyed in WW2 but rebuilt and, 2012, is still the Headquarters of the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches.

The picture source website is excellent for the history of the building.

Comments are provided by Facebook, please ensure you are signed in here to see them

This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
Essex Street Chapel and Essex Hall

Commemorated ati

Essex Hall

{Plaque above seated men in picture:} Essex Hall Headquarters of the Genera...

Read More

Essex Street & Essex Hall

This plaque was first erected at 7 Essex Street in 1962 and then re-erected h...

Read More

Other Subjects

Canon Joseph Robinson

Canon Joseph Robinson

Joseph Robinson was born on 23 February 1927, the elder of the two children of Thomas Robinson and Mary Robinson née Wright. His birth was registered in the 1st quarter of 1927 in the Wigan Registr...

Person, Liveries & Guilds, Religion

1 memorial
St Marys, Haggerston

St Marys, Haggerston

Built by John Nash in the Gothic style with a tall tower. Destroyed by WW2 bombs and the site made into a playground.

Building, Religion

1 memorial
Dr. Nahum Sokolow

Dr. Nahum Sokolow

President of the world Zionist Organisation, statesman and author. Born in Russian Poland, Sokolow was a prolific writer and campaigner on behalf of the world Zionist movement. The city of Tel Avi...

Person, Politics & Administration, Religion, Israel/Palestine, Poland, Russia

1 memorial
Reverend Francis Evered Junt, Bishop of Stepney
1 memorial
Arthur G. B. West

Arthur G. B. West

We were delighted to find this Jack Boothe drawing of West in The Vancouver Province (British Columbia, Canada), 21 September 1935. The article, 'Big man with big hands comes out to start fifty boy...

Person, Religion, Australia

1 memorial