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

St Matthias on the Weir Church (Demolished),
Stratton Street / Rope Walk (Wellington Street),
Bristol, Gloucestershire.

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 in 1851, but we understand it was closed in the 1920s.

According to John Latimer's The Annals of Bristol in the Nineteenth Century (1887), the ecclesiastical district of St Matthias was created in 1846, out of the parishes of St Paul, St Peter and St Philip. A piece of ground was selected in 1847, but a dispute over the purchase price delayed construction, and it wasn't until 1850 that the foundation stone was laid. In addition, "much difficulty was encountered in the construction of the edifice, owing to the marshy nature of the site".

Phil Draper, on his ChurchCrawler website, records that it was built to a design by John Norton. Available parish records cover the periods 1847-1940 (baptisms), and 1852-1940 (marriages), which suggests it was a casualty of WWII bomb damage, but Phil says not. It did however close soon after, and in 1952, was demolished. Note that the Church of St Jude, in Braggs Lane, is recorded on the British Listed Buildings website with the joint dedication of "St Jude the Apostle with St Matthias on the Weir", which suggests that after closure, its parish united with St Jude.

It was situated on the south-west junction of Rope Walk with Stratton Street; opposite it, on the Stratton Street side, were "Baths & Wash Houses", which by 1971 had become "Public Baths", and St Matthias was evidently demolished. The Baths have gone now as well, and in the present day, have disappeared beneath the carriageways of Temple Way. Phil says a part of St Matthias's Sunday School buildings survives, but I'm not sure where they were, as they are not marked on any of the Maps I've consulted.

The name still survives in "St Matthias House", a block of flats, built by 1951; and St Matthias Park - the approach to the Church from the south-east. "The Weir" (I assume) was a reference to a weir on the River Frome ('Froom'), which was ultimately channeled underground.

Denomination

Now or formerly Church of England.

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 ST5949873377. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• St Matthias on the Weir Church (Demolished), 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 Bristol, and perhaps to Local History and Places of Worship as a whole.

• The Church officiando's “Bible” - Phil Draper's ChurchCrawler (null) (verified 2018-10-16)
• Learn more about Buildings of special or historical interest on the British Listed Buildings (null) (verified 2018-09-19)

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.