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built in 1884 and sold to St Leonard's Church in 1979

The Wesleyan Chapel

The Wesleyan Chapel (10 Jun 2018)

This brief account of the chapel origins was published in the Eynsham Record 1, 1984 pages 31-2 (opens in new window) - based largely on a lengthy article in the Oxford Chronicle and Berks and Bucks Gazette of June 7, 1884.

For a year or two Eynsham Methodists had met in the Mission House [?] but, by 1884, this building was no longer large enough for their needs. A site for a new Wesleyan Chapel was sought, £100 was raised locally, and the Connexial Fund was approached.

On the morning of Whit Monday 1884, the children of the Wesleyan Sunday School paraded through the village and, in the afternoon, a ceremony took place on a site in Thames Street, acquired at a cost of £200, considered to be 'dear' but 'occupying a good position'. The Chapel was to be 'a brick structure with stone dressings of the ordinary character, with a classroom at the back'; and to be built by Mr Wilkins of Eynsham at an estimated cost of £487. It was to seat 250 people...

The formalities began with a hymn and a prayer, followed by a speech by the Rev Hugh Price Hughes,- "...when we came to Eynsham, we as Methodists were the friends of all and the enemies of none. If we came here, it was not in any opposition to any other kind of Church ...But there were a number of persons in Eynsham who desired that we should come, and who went to no other place of worship, and that was the reason"...

The foundation stone was laid by Mr Weller of Birmingham, and eight memorial stones by other invited guests. 'A number of Sunday School children then came up with purses with various sums, which they laid upon the stone bearing the date'.


In 1979 the Chapel was sold for £6,100 to the PCC for use as St Leonard's Church Hall; it was refurbished in 1980.

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