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Staple Hill Congregational Church,
Soundwell Road, BS16 4NQ,
Staple Hill, Mangotsfield, 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 1893, but we understand it was closed in 1998.

Staple Hill Congregational Church was first noted on Old Maps of 1903, with the same profile as in the present day - a building aligned north-south, lying parallel to Soundwell Road, with an extension to the rear. On the early Map there was an open area to the rear, which may, or may not have belonged to the Chapel.

The following notice in The London Gazette of 3rd May 1904 (p.2867) indicates its registration for marriages:

A Separate Building, duly certified for religious worship, named CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, situated at Soundwell-road, Staple Hill, in the civil parish of Mangotsfield, in the county of Gloucester, in Keynsham registration district, was, on the twenty-eighth April, 1904, registered for solemnizing marriages therein, pursuant to 6th and 7th Wm. IV, c.85. Dated 29th April 1904.

Its closure was recorded in a similar notice published in the Gazette of 9th October 1998 (p.10974). The building survives in the present day, but its use is uncertain, but is probably commercial. It is single-storey, built of stone, with a front of five bays, separated by buttresses. The leftmost bay has an entrance doorway, and the other bays have twin lancet windows, the whole dressed in lighter stone. There is a triple lancet window in the north wall, and a second doorway, opening onto a car park. Vehicular access is via North View, and a sign by the entrance reads "Church Court".

Phil Draper, on his ChurchCrawler website says it a "nice lancet church of 1893... all one cell with single lancets... designed by Frank Wills of the tobacco company family... closed 1998 with congregation of four...", and (in 2012) an office building.

Denomination

Now or formerly 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 Church was located at OS grid reference ST6481675562. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• Staple Hill Congregational Church, Staple Hill, Mangotsfield shown on a Google Map.
• Places of Worship in Mangotsfield 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 Staple Hill, Mangotsfield, 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)
• 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.