MEM25518 - The Old Methodist Chapel, Wheddon Cross (Building)

A former Methodist Chapel built 1893, comprising a vestibule, chapel and school room and converted to domestic use after 2006. It has been suggested it replaced another chapel on the same site, but this is not the case.

The site of the chapel is recorded as a pasture field in 1842 at the time of the Tithe Map [1] A Mr Bennett, of Dunster, gave some land here to the Methodists of Cutcombe as a permanent site for a chapel. This was opened on 21 November 1839 and called the 'Centenary Chapel'. In April 1893 it was replaced by the present stone building erected on the same site. A small vestibule on on the north side gives access to the chapel and to a school room behind. It has a big west window with some tinted glass, five rows of seats and a central preaching platform. [2] A Chapel is stated to have been built at Wheddon Cross in 1839 ("The Centenary Chapel"), which was replaced on the same site by another building in 1893. The new chapel's final service took place on Sunday 8th October 2006, in "Thanksgiving for the life of the church and its witness to the community". [3] It is likley that the chapel opened in 1839 was located at SS 9250 3877, MEM25105, rather than on this site which is shown as pasture on the Tithe Map and OS 1st Edition map, and that the current chapel was built here, on a new site, in 1893. [1,4,5] Methodist Chapel (Wesleyan) marked at this location on the 25 inch 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey map. [6] The building is labelled "The Old Methodist Chapel" on the 2022 MasterMap data. [7] Photographs of the interior when in use as a chapel in the later 20th and early 21st century [8]n