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Wesleyan Reform Church,
Main Street,
Birchover, Derbyshire.

Cemeteries

We believe the Church 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 by 1857, but we understand it was closed by 2011.

This building shows the typical layout a chapel built into a hillside; it has two stories, with the main entrance on the higher ground level, into the upper floor, and the lower floor reserved for (possibly) a schoolroom. There are pointed arched windows in the upper floor, with stained glass on either side of the entrance, whilst the ones on the lower floor are the more traditional square-headed design, as befitting a schoolroom.

There is a plaque above the entrance porch, which though eroded, may have said "Wesleyan Reform Church". The date of its foundation does not appear to have been included on the plaque, which is a pity, as there appears to have been some confusion, by the time the various directories were printed, as to which year it was built. Bulmer's Directory of 1895 says 1851, and Kelly's Directory of the same year says 1857, a date which is repeated in various sources online. However, the description accompanying one photograph of the Wesleyan Reform Church, Birchover on the Geograph website says it was built in 1851, and rebuilt in 1908, which being closer to the source itself than the others, suggests 1851 may be correct.

As the other Wesleyan Reform Chapels in the Stanton area are accounted for, the following notice in The London Gazette of 1st April 1910 (p.2282) may possibly relate to this building:

A Separate Building, duly certified for religious worship, named WESLEYAN REFORM CHURCH, situated at Stanton Hill Side, in the civil parish of Stanton, in the county of Derby, in Bakewell registration district, was, on the 29th March, 1910, registered for solemnizing marriages therein, pursuant to 6th and 7th Wm. IV, c.85. Dated 30th March 1910.

Kelly's Directories include the name "Stanton Hill Side" with Stanton in Peak parish, recording it as part of Birchover Street, but I have been unable to find either labelled specifically on Old Maps. Is it too fanciful to assume that "Birchover Street" referred to the main street through Birchover? If so, this chapel would fit the description.

It is still listed (as "Wesleyan Reform Church, Birchover") in Places recorded by the Registrar General under the provisions of the Places of Worship Registration Act 1855 (2010), and still marked as a Wesleyan Reform Church on Google Maps; but it has, nevertheless, every appearance of being closed, and indeed, an application of 1st February 2011 [NP/DDD/0211/0075] on the Peak District National Park Authority website records planning permission being sought to convert it into a holiday cottage.

Denomination

Now or formerly Wesleyan Reform.

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 Church was located at OS grid reference SK2399362180. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• Wesleyan Reform Church, Birchover shown on a Google Map.
• Places of Worship in Birchover 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 Birchover, and perhaps to Local History and Places of Worship as a whole.

• You may like to see photograph(s) of Wesleyan Reform Church, Birchover on the Geograph website.
• The Local Government website for the Peak District National Park Authority (null) (verified 2018-10-21)
• Places recorded by the Registrar General under the provisions of the Places of Worship Registration Act 1855 (2010) is available as a "Freedom of Information" document on the website What Do They Know. (verified 2018-10-14)
• 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.