Default Image Place of Worship has been
Demolished.
Image by courtesy of
openclipart.org

Bethesda Chapel (Demolished),
Great George Street / Charlotte Street South,
Brandon Hill, Bristol, Gloucestershire.

Cemeteries

We believe the Chapel did NOT have a graveyard.

Note: any church within an urban environment may have had its graveyard closed after the Burial Act of 1853. Any new church built after that is unlikely to have had a graveyard at all.

Church History

This Place of Worship was founded in 1822, but we understand it was closed after 1940.

Bethesda is shown on the Bristol Town Plans of 1884 as a large, rectangular building on the north-east corner of the junction of Great George Street and Charlotte Street.

The Bristol Record Office hold records of the Chapel for the period 1822-1837, but the Chapel came to prominence through the joint ministry of the Rev. George Müller, and Henry Craik, following Müller's arrival in Bristol in 1832. Their partnership is described by John Latimer, in The Annals of Bristol in the Nineteenth Century (1887) - "the two friends laboured together as ministers of Gideon Independent chapel, in Newfoundland Street. Subsequently, Bethesda chapel, near Brandon Hill, was temporarily hired as an experiment, and the results were so satisfactory that it was permanently retained". The chapel was purchased outright in 1857 by Mr. C.W. Finzel, who "presented it to Messrs. Müller and Craik's congregation".

One of Latimer's footnotes explains that Mr. Finzel was a German by birth, and began his career in England as a working sugar refiner. He was exceedingly generous, and for many years is said to have given between £5,000 and £10,000 per annum to Mr. Müller's Orphanages.

The following notice in The London Gazette of 25th March 1853 (p.897) recorded its registration for marriages:

NOTICE is hereby given, that a separate building, named Bethesda Chapel, situated at Great George-street, in the parish of Saint Augustine the Less, in the city and county of Bristol, in the district of Bristol, being a building certified according to law as a place of religious worship, was, on the 3rd day of March, 1853, duly registered for solemnizing marriages therein, pursuant to the Act of 6th and 7th Wm. IV., cap. 85. Dated 15th March 1853.

There are further details of the Chapel, and its successors, on the Zetland Evangelical Church website. It is also mentioned on the Alma Church (Clifton Bethesda) website, Clifton Bethesda being founded in 1872 as a daughter church.

In the present day, Müller's Bethesda has been demolished, and its site has been reabsorbed into the open area known as "Brandon Hill". The Clifton Bethesda website says it was destroyed during WWII, but evidently it was not demolished immediately, as its building is still marked as late as Old maps of 1965-1967.

Denomination

Now or formerly Christian Brethren.

If more than one congregation has worshipped here, or its congregation has united with others, in most cases this will record its original dedication.

Maps

This Chapel was located at OS grid reference ST5806972894. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• Bethesda Chapel (Demolished), Brandon Hill, Bristol shown on a Google Map.
• Places of Worship in Bristol shown on a Google Map.
• Streetmap.co.uk (arrow on map shows the Place of Worship's location) (verified 2018-10-15)
• Bing (Ordnance Survey option) (verified 2018-10-13)
• Bing Maps ('Bird's Eye' View) (verified 2018-10-15)
• Ordnance Survey "getamap" (NB some of the 'Change Map' options may require a subscription) (verified 2018-10-15)
• OpenStreetMap (Maps © OpenStreetMap contributors, CC-BY-SA) (verified 2018-10-15)
• A Vision of Britain Through Time - useful for Boundary Changes (verified 2018-10-15)
• www.magic.gov.uk (Modern Maps with various overlays) (verified 2018-10-15)

Resources

I have found many websites of use whilst compiling the information for this database. Here are some which deserve mention as being of special interest for Brandon Hill, Bristol, and perhaps to Local History and Places of Worship as a whole.

• Information provided on the Zetland Evangelical Church website. (verified 2018-11-04)
• Information provided on the Alma Church website. (verified 2014-05-04)
• Notices of Civil Registration of Places of Worship for marriages are published in the London edition of The Gazette. Hint: search for registrations from 1998 by choosing 'Church' notices, and the option 'Registration for solemnising marriage'. (verified 2018-12-11)

The above links were selected and reviewed at the time I prepared the information, but please be aware their content may vary, or disappear entirely. These factors are outside my control.