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

St Peter's Church (Demolished),
Jacob's Wells Road,
Clifton Wood, 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 1855, but we understand it was closed in 1938.

St Peter's Church has an intriguing history. John Latimer, in The Annals of Bristol in the Nineteenth Century (1887) records that its first building was built originally for the Wesleyans, and had opened in November 1833. As St Peter's, it was consecrated on 10th August 1855, however "in consequence of the largely increased population of the district, the accommodation of the building became insufficient, and a large, lofty, and ornate Gothic edifice was constructed on an adjoining site at a cost of £6,000, and was consecrated in September, 1882". By "adjoining site" it was effectively next door.

Kelly's Directory of Bristol of 1902 records that a separate ecclesiastical parish of Clifton Wood was created in 1859, out of the parishes of St Andrew, Clifton, and St Augustine. "The church, erected in 1881-2... is an edifice of stone and wood, in the Gothic style, consisting of nave and aisles, and has two bells and sittings for 900 persons". The parish records date from 1856, and the living was then a vicarage, in the gift of Simeon's trustees, and had been held since 1901 by the Rev. Hugh Edmund Boultbee M.A. of Durham University.

Latimer tells us the original building was bought by Bristol Corporation for conversion into a free library. As "Hotwells Free Library", the above Kelly records it on the north side of Hotwell Road, with Miss Lucy Curtis as its librarian. St Peter's Church is listed separately under Jacobs Well Road. The library had opened in 1888, but was closed in 1905, shortly before the new Central Library was opened at College Green, in 1906.

A later Kelly's Directory, of 1914 locates both "St Peter's Church" and "St Peter's Church Hall" in Hotwells Road, so we might deduce that at some point between 1906 and 1914, it became the Church Hall. This is confirmed on Phil Draper's ChurchCrawler webpages which refer to both the Church, and a Church Hall, formerly a Wesleyan Chapel, now however "all gone, the church demolished in 1938".

Both buildings can be seen on the Bristol Town Plans of 1884 and later, at the extreme south-west end of Jacob's Wells Road, where it meets Hotwell Road. St Peter's Church faced Jacobs Well Road, and the Church Hall faced Hotwell Road. The two were separated by an passageway labelled as "White Hart Steps". In the present day (2014), a pair of conjoined apartment blocks occupies the site, aptly named "St Peter's House".

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 ST5783672650. You can see this on various mapping systems. Note all links open in a new window:

• St Peter's Church (Demolished), Clifton Wood, 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 Clifton Wood, 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)

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.