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Unitarian Chapel,
Hartington Road,
Buxton, Derbyshire.

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 1725, but we understand it was closed by 1971.

Bagshaw's Directory of 1846 records that the Presbyterians had a chapel in Hall Bank, supposedly erected in 1795. It is mentioned likewise in White's Directory of 1857, but its date of erection is given as 1725.

The story is continued in the Archaeological Assessment Report for Buxton, on the Archaeology Data Service website (part of Derbyshire Extensive Urban Survey, p.19). There is no mention of an earlier chapel, but it records a Unitarian chapel, built for the Presbyterians on Hartington Street, in 1875.

This is, I assume, the same building referred to in Kelly's Directory of 1912 - "the Unitarian chapel in Hartington road, built in 1875, is in the Decorated style, and will seat 150 persons". The date of its foundation is given as 1725.

Thus it is curious that there is no mention of it in the Religious Census of 1851; perhaps it had closed temporarily, pending the erection of the new building in 1875.

It was, however registered for marriages, as the following notice in The London Gazette of 28th July 1893 (p.4304) indicates:

NOTICE is hereby given, that a separate building, named Hartington-street Chapel, situate at Hartington-street, Buxton, in the parish of Buxton, in the county of Derby, in the district of Chapel-en-le-Frith, being a building certified according to law as a place of religious worship, was, on the 21st day of July, 1893, duly registered for solemnizing marriages therein, pursuant to the Act of 6th and 7th Wm. 4, cap. 85. Dated 21st July 1893.

A corresponding notice of cancellation of the registration of "HARTINGTON STREET CHAPEL, Hartington Street, Buxton" was published in the Gazette of 29th June 1971 (p.6972).

Derbyshire Record Office's Non-Conformist Register Guide includes records of baptisms 1939-1964, marriages 1939-1963, and deaths 1940-1964.

Denomination

Now or formerly Unitarian.

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 SK0561673101. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• Unitarian Chapel, Buxton shown on a Google Map.
• Places of Worship in Buxton 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 Buxton, and perhaps to Local History and Places of Worship as a whole.

• The officially accredited archive of heritage data - Archaeology Data Service (null) (verified 2021-09-12)
• 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.