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Copyright of John Williams

The Old Chapel,
High Street, GL14 1BU,
Newnham on Severn, 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 1864, but we understand it was closed in 1968.

The building in this location is marked as an Independent Chapel on OS Maps 1889-1891 1:10,560, and as a Congregational Church on Maps of 1924 1:10,560 and later. It is now in commercial use.

It is one of only two places of worship in Newnham listed in Kelly's Directory of 1923. The other is St Peter's Church. Their incumbents were, respectively, Rev. James H. Bolton, and (vicar of St Peter) Rev. Charles Herbert Murray Fasson M.A.

The site for the chapel was given by Alfred and Tom Goold. When it opened in 1864, it replaced an earlier building in Littledean Road (now Dean Road) known as the "Newnham & Blakeney Tabernacle".

The following notice in The London Gazette of 1st December 1865 (p.6402) recorded its registration for marriages:

NOTICE is hereby given, that a separate building, named the Congregational Chapel, situated in the parish of Newnham, in the county of Gloucester, in the district of Westbury-on-Severn, being a building certified according to law as a place of religious worship, was, on the 29th day of November, 1865, duly registered for solemnizing marriages therein, pursuant to the Act of 6th and 7th Wm. IV., cap. 85. Dated 30th November 1865.

According to the Victoria County History series: A History of the County of Gloucester, Volume 10: Westbury and Whitstone Hundreds (1972), pp.49 (Newnham - Nonconformity), it was put up for sale in 1968, services were once again held in the former chapel, which in the intervening period had been used as the parish hall. Seemingly however it was not de-registered for marriages until 1971, the notice being recorded in the Gazette of 22nd June 1971 (p.6688).

Denomination

Now or formerly Independent/Congregational.

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 SO6906811857. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• The Old Chapel, Newnham on Severn shown on a Google Map.
• Places of Worship in Newnham on Severn 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 Newnham on Severn, and perhaps to Local History and Places of Worship as a whole.

• The Victoria County History series: A History of the County of Gloucester, Volume 10: Westbury and Whitstone Hundreds (null) (verified 2018-11-06)
• 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.