Shrewsbury Unitarian Church
Shrewsbury Unitarian Church
Shrewsbury Unitarian Church is a Grade II meeting house on the High Street in Shrewsbury: the town's first dissenting congregation, founded in 1662, behind an ashlar facade of 1885 that still carries the inscription "The Church founded 1662".
- Location
- Shrewsbury, Shropshire
- Country
- England
- County
- Shropshire
- City / town
- Shrewsbury
- Address
- High Street, Shrewsbury, Shropshire, SY1 1LR
- Postcode
- SY1 1LR
- Built
- 1839-40 rebuilding of the 1715-16 chapel; High Street facade 1885; congregation founded 1662
- Architect
- John Carline (1839-40); A B Deakin (facade 1885)
- Denomination
- Unitarian Church
- Grade
- II
- Style
- Classical facade of 1885
- Materials
- Ashlar-faced facade
- Grid reference
- SJ 491 124
- Opening hours
- December and January: open 1pm to 3pm. Other months: open Tuesday 2pm to 4pm and Thursday 1pm to 4pm.
- Access
- Level access to the main areas. Accessible toilets nearby
Overview
Historic England lists the Unitarian Church (list entry 1254520, designated 17 November 1995). The listing records a Unitarian church of 1839-40 with a facade of 1885, ashlar-faced, of three bays divided by pilasters, with central pedimented double doors flanked by round-arched windows, a deep cornice and a central pedimented cartouche inscribed "The Church founded 1662". The interior has a lobby and vestry added to the front of an earlier chapel, a north-east gallery with an early-eighteenth-century panelled front, dado panelling and a central pulpit to the south-west.
Francis Tallents and John Bryan, ejected from St Mary's and St Chad's in 1662, gathered the congregation. A chapel on this site was built after Toleration (accounts differ between a 1689 garden chapel and a licensed building of 1691), enlarged in 1703, and demolished by a Jacobite mob in 1715. It was rebuilt the following year at government expense. John Carline rebuilt the fabric in 1839-40 when High Street was widened. In 1885 A. B. Deakin of Shrewsbury designed the present street facade, allowing meeting rooms over the former forecourt. The congregation's own history records a royal charter granted by George I, now hung over the pulpit.