THE EARLY HISTORY

There is no certainty as to the origin of Methodism in Harrogate. John Wesley visited both Pateley Brid^ge and Otley, and, in his day, either place would have been counted as no more than a good walk from these parts. In an article on "Methodism in Harrogate," written for the May 1906 issue of the Methodist Magazine, the Rev Henry J Foster said. "But Harrogate Methodism had sprung from the village of Bilton, where, in the house of Mr J Brooks, whose family is still represented on the Circuit. Plan, a simple service had been held from Wesley's time. This was continued even when the work was, by and by, brought to a room over a smith's shop, still discoverable on Smithy Hill, near the point where the Grove Road of more recent clays enters the high road to Skipton. Outgrowing this, a clubroom was taken over an archway in the house at 20 Park Parade, now occupied by Mr Bernard W Evans, RA"

However, it seems certain that the Methodist chapel at Pannal was built nearly twenty years before the first chapel in Harrogate. The site of this chapel is marked by a plaque on the wall outside a cottage in Hillfoot Lane, which records also that Wesley preached there in 1788. Tradition also associated Wesley with an ancient chair which used to be in the vestry of the chapel. The chapel was built soon after the authorisation had been given by the Conference of 1778, but the old Post Office was the probable site of the early "preaching place," in the days when it was occupied by the family of Bryan Procter, himself a preacher. In that house John Pawson, later a President of Conference, preached, and Mary Bosanquet visited and preached in it in 1773. She was. staying in Harrogate at the White Hart and tells, in her diary, how she preached in the great Ballroom of the White Hart and how "company came in, even from High Harrogate, and the Lord gave me some fruit."

Some force is lent to the argument that our Methodism came in via Pannal, by the fact that in 1790 Harrogate was certainly paying its quarterly dues to the Otley circuit, and Pannal was in the Otley circuit.

Perhaps the "company" from High Harrogate were those same men who twenty-three years later, in 1796, occupied the house at 20 Park Parade and made of it our first Methodist Chapel in Harrogate. The house still stands, with its archway, and at the very top of the roof one can see the triangular cornice which may be all that remains of the front of the original chapel.

Although there must certainly have been shops to cater for the hotels around the Sulphur Well, the larger shopping area was to be found at what is now Devonshire Place. There was no real residential area; for the most part the houses were built on a line which followed Skipton Road, Park Parade, York Place and West Park, with very little development at all in the large area which these roads enclose. This early chapel, then, was well situated in the Harrogate of those days, and if the builders seemed to have ignored the hotels of the Spa area, it was perhaps because the early Methodists expected to draw but few from the class of people who would be found in those hotels.

Little is known of the life of this church. It belonged to the Knaresborough Circuit and appears from the records at Knaresborough to have paid its clues regularly. At some time during its twenty-eight years of life it witnessed the breakaway of those of its members who eventually became Primitive Methodists and built themselves a chapel in what was then known as "Westmoreland Entry" at the top of Westmoreland Street.

By the end of the Napoleonic Wars the emphasis in development had shifted from High Harrogate to Central and Low Harrogate. With great courage and foresight our common Methodist ancestors turned their eyes towards the centre of the town and decided to build at the corner of Beulah Street and Oxford Street. One can still see over the businesses which now occupy the site the unmistakable windows of a Methodist chapel. They showed their belief, too, in the development of Harrogate when they built a church capable of holding 550 people, and. there may also have been in their minds the thought that they would, at some time, no longer be the second chapel in the Knaresborough Circuit but be, instead, the first chapel in their own Circuit.

But however long they had dreamed of this chapel, it probably only became possible throu^gh the generous loan of £500 from a Mr Samuel Broadley of Leeds. The loan was received on April 14th, and only five months later the Chapel was opened, on September 12th, 1824, by the Rev R Newton. Collections and subscriptions received on that day brought the total of money received to £840. It is interesting to note that this chapel was built by James Simpson, whose son was to build the present chapel thirty-eight years later and whose family have maintained their connection with the chapel ever since that time. The total cost of the "Beulah" Chapel was £1,011.

The picture we have of this early Society is of a people paying its quota to the Circuit and to the wider interests of Methodism, yet stoutly maintaining itself by a system of "ad hoc" collections. We find collections for candles, a collection for "foot walk maicking," regular collections for horse hire for Local Preachers, for "Woodesgrove Scoole," all of which are carefully noted by Mr Joseph Horner, Chapel Steward from 1824 until 1841.

They had no resident Minister, being served by the two Knaresborough Ministers. The financial records were carefully kept and still exist, but there is little to be found about the Society itself. The Society Steward's book, which begins in 1826, has upon its fly leaf the inscription "Let all things be done decently and in order. St Paul," and below it the words "Let us walk by the above rule until we find a better. Joseph Mercer." It appears, however, that the Society Steward had found some difficulty in keeping his records decently and in order, for on the inside cover page we find an exasperated statement, "I have found this book nearly useless to me as the Society Steward therefore I now resign it up into the hands of the Chapel Steward Brother Horner, and I resign it up with all the monies that I have upon hand as far as I know, and to this statement my friends come forward with their hand."

Only three Trustees' meetings are minuted up to 1829 but one of these is interesting for it gives, in May, 1826, instructions to the Chapel Steward to discharge the Chapel Keeper, and we then find the first mention of John Benson who was to serve the chapel so faithfully as Chapel Keeper for fifty years, until he died in 1876, having been a class leader since 1829.

Leonard Hobkinson was appointed Class Leader in September, 1834, and we find an account presented by him on April 1st, 1843, for the eggs, butter, flour and seeds, etc, necessary for the making of the seed cake eaten at Lovefeasts. This ancient Methodist service is still occasionally to be found in country chapels and consisted of a service of testimony during which the congregation sipped cold water and ate seed cake, the traditional "feast."

Twenty years after the new chapel had opened the number of members listed is still only 105, though there would undoubtedly be a number of "adherents" and many hundreds of visitors during the summer months, now that Methodism had become more "respectable." The collections during the winter months were sometimes less than £1 for the day but a special occasion could draw the crowds. Missionary Meetings never failed to produce a good collection and a visit from the Independent Minister (Congregationalist) brought a collection of ten guineas. Yet somehow a Sunday School and a Day School were supported; the poor were very regularly helped by donations through their class leaders, and the Circuit received sums varying from £15 in 1830 to £65 in 1856.

In the early clays there was, of course, no organ, but music was provided by a quartet comprising violin, flute, 'cello and double bass, all seated on a rostrum just below the pulpit and making their joyful noise unto the Lord. And one sometimes wonders just how much such tunefulness (or lack of it) contributed to the rise of Primitive Methodism.

One of the most interesting aspects of the life of this early Church is its struggle to break away from the Knaresborough Circuit to form a Harrogate Circuit with Beulah as the main chapel. The desire had been strong even in the minds of the members of the 1827 Trust to have a resident Minister at Harrogate, but it was not until 1845 that the struggle began.

The Superintendent of the Knaresborough Circuit, the Rev Luke Barlow, was asked to attend a special meeting of the "Friends of Methodism in Harrogate" held in the Chapel Vestry to consider the question of the appointment of a resident Minister at Harrogate or of the break-away of Harrogate from the Circuit.

The meeting evolved two plans. The first was an ambitious plan which envisaged a Harrogate Circuit taking in Follifoot, Spofforth, Linton, Sicklinghall, Kearby and Kirkby Overblow from the Knaresborough Circuit; Dunkeswick and Harewood from Leeds; Weeton, Pannal, Rigton and Beckwithshaw from the Otley Circuit; Killinghall and Hampsthwaite from Ripon. Two Ministers were to care for it. It was a good wholesale plan and set off nicely the more modest second suggestion that there should be one Minister only to watch over a circuit taking in Bilton, Forest Lane and Follifoot from Knaresborough; Beckwithshaw and Pannal from Otley; Killinghall and Hampsthwaite from Ripon.

The meeting was held on Thursday, March 27th, 1845, and it was decided to place the two plans before the Quarterly Meeting at Knaresborough the following Monday. The good brethren of the Quarterly Meeting objected mightily to splitting the Circuit in this way but were prepared to recommend that a third Minister be appointed to the Circuit, so that their second Minister might then move to Harrogate. Honour was satisfied on both sides and the proposition went forward to the Leeds Conference via the District Meeting. September passed without either a third Minister or an explanation of his absence and Mr Pickersgill Palliser, a Circuit Steward, resigned "in disappointment and annoyance."

The following year Harrogate resumed the battle and the March Quarterly Meeting again sent a resolution to Conference for a third Minister but contented themselves with asking only for the annexation of Pannal and Beckwithshaw. Once more the resolution lay on the table at Conference and, as Mr Palliser later reported, "in many minds for many years the whole affair has remained in unexplained mystery." The collection which was taken in the September of '46 for the Third Preacher disappeared into the Trust Funds, and for ten more years the matter lapsed.

They had at least one thing to occupy their minds. Collections for Lighting show an increase in 1846. On January 18th the Oil Lamps were sold to Killinghall for 7/6 and a little later, for the first time in the accounts, there appears "the Gas Company" bill. It must have been a great day.

It may have been in 1850 that the orchestra was replaced by an organ, for there is an item in 1852 of £3 paid for two years' organ blowing. It was probably a small organ and equally probably sat on the rostrum. Its cost appears only in the accounts for a later organ and is shown as £42-5-0 for Old Organ and Repairs. Perhaps a large part of the sum was for repairs for they had soon set about collecting for a new organ. There had been some minor decorations in 1850 but the Trust evidently thought that, as so much alteration would need to he done to install a new organ, they might as well renovate the church completely.

So they set about taking down the old musicians' rostrum and put in more pews. Then they removed some pews from the gallery opposite the pulpit and installed their new organ. The organ itself cost £150 and was bought from a Mr Rawlings (whom Mr Barstow in his 1912 booklet describes as the "celebrated Adel Doctor"). The organ was officially opened on Thursday, July 5th, 1855, and the collection and sale of tickets realised £29. Miss Barlow, daughter of the Superintendent, became the organist, and from that time, too, collections for the Leading Singer become a regular feature. The decorations continued through that year and into 1856. The total expenditure was £697. In the subscription lists the names of Greensmith and Pickersgill Palliser appear four times with various sums, and when the total was still found to be £200 short, these same, gentlemen's names appear once more when they, together, made up this deficit.

Meanwhile they had decided to renew their demands for a Minister of their own, and a place as the head of their own Circuit, though it seems, through all the correspondence, quite certain that, had they been granted a resident Minister, they would have foregone their second claim to a separate Circuit. The subject was re-opened at the March Quarterly Meeting of 1856 but no decision or resolution for Conference was arrived at.

The officers of the Church therefore decided to take the matter into their own hands and wrote on July 24th to the Chairman of the Leeds District, the Rev George Taylor. Their letter says nothing of the difficulties they had had with the Quarterly Meeting and goes no further than to ask that "the Circuit should be provided with men of very acceptable pulpit talent." They urged that since the Independent Chapel was supplied with "the most attractive Ministers in their body" they would wish to compete in the same manner. A copy of this letter was sent to the members of the Stationing Committee, and a further letter from Mr Palliser emphasised to the Rev Taylor that his help would be needed to improve the position at Harrogate.

So much sympathy and encouragement reached them that they were able to write to the Circuit Stewards on September 22nd, a week before the Quarterly Meeting, saying that their letter of July 24th (of which the Circuit Stewards had also been sent a copy) had "elicited an almost universal opinion favourable to our immediate provision of a Minister's Residence."

"Acting on this opinion," the letter continues, "we procured a suitable house near the Chapel, which, with a view to his better comfort and accommodation, we offered to the Rev E R Talbot, the second preacher of the Knaresborough Circuit, and have made arrangements for defraying all expenses, so that no extra burden will be laid on the Circuit."

The Quarterly Meeting decided that the Minister's house in Cheapside, Knaresborough, be discontinued as a Minister's residence and that "another house in another locality " be found. A further decision allowed, though only for a period of six months, the removal of Mr Talbot to Harrogate. Two propositions asking for a request to he made to Conference for a third Minister, or for Harrogate to be formed into a separate Circuit, were again defeated. The Trustees met again on November 24th and arising out of that meeting a letter was sent on January 7th, 1857, to "The Office Bearers of the Wesleyan Societies in the Knaresborough Circuit." The letter pointed out their "deep conviction of the growing importance of this celebrated Watering Place, containing a population of about five thousand inhabitants and providing accommodation for about fifty thousand visitors during the summer months." They suggested that if the Circuit would recommend that a third minister be appointed (a single man), the Harrogate Society would undertake to pay the full expenses of the married man who should be transferred to them, and in addition to pay, for four years, the full expenses of the single man appointed to Knaresborough. In order to do this they expressed their readiness to raise, immediately, £600 to add to a promised loan from the Chapel Committee at Manchester of £400 to pay off all Trust Debts and thus be sure of providing for this extra burden from current income.

The Circuit could hardly have been unaware of the tremendous sacrifice which this entailed, following immediately as it did on their considerable expenses earlier in the year, and the Quarterly Meeting of December agreed, subject to the promise which Harrogate had made, to send a request to the District for a third Minister.

Once more the Harrogate Wesleyans set to work. The list of subscribers shows Greensmith, Palliser and Hobkinson at the top, and when, after a Bazaar and Tea Meeting on February 10th which realised £33, the target of £600 was still £80 short, this same trio made up the deficiency. They did more. Unwilling to leave anything to chance at the all-important March Quarterly Meeting, they, assisted by the Super, the Rev J Cadman, held meetings at Knaresborough, Spofforth and Whixley in order to explain their scheme, and at every meeting it was proposed and carried unanimously ". . . that this meeting pledges itself to support this Circuit movement . .. "

After twelve years of struggling and of what Palliser describes as "irritating discussion" it must have seemed that their goal was in sight, and they approached the March meeting with sonic confidence.

With mounting dismay they heard that meeting turn down every suggestion. No married minister for Harrogate; no single minister for Harrogate; and finally "manifestly resolved to ride rough-shod over the Harrogate friends" - no third preacher, married or single, for the Circuit. Mr Palliser then gave notice that it was the intention of the Harrogate Trustees to make their own application to Conference through the District Meeting for a resident minister.

If the friends at Knaresborough had decided that they would put an end, once and for all, to the endless discussions on Harrogate's aims, they succeeded. In July, 1858, the Liverpool Conference constituted Harrogate a District Circuit and sent the Rev Richard Hardy to "Harrogate Wesleyan" as Minister and Superintendent. The Knaresborough Quarterly Meeting would spend no more time discussing the claims and ambitions of the Harrogate friends. So the Rev Richard Hardy, our first Minister, arrived to find a Manse, No 2 Beulah Place, and a horse and gig in readiness for him.

He preached his first sermon on September 6th, 1858, to a church which must have been knit into a tight and real fellowship by the difficult times through which they had passed. Only seven years previously they had seen a congregation of 135 cut down to 71 by the secession of the "Reformers," the forerunners of the United Methodists, who broke away in April, 1851, and built their own Salem Chapel on the corner of James Street and Cross James Street, leading into the Market Place. Yet, despite this blow, they had maintained their full contribution to the Quarter Board; they had installed a new organ arid undertaken a complete renovation of the Chapel; they had cleared off all debts at tremendous cost, and finally they had seen their sacrifice and perseverance triumphantly rewarded. How their praise must have rung out on that September morning.

Two years later, in September, 1860, the Rev Henry Pollinger replaced the Rev Hardy. The people came in time to regard Pollinger with great affection but I should guess, if the story of his ultimatum to his Church Officers is true, that they regarded him rather thoughtfully that evening. They were being asked to build a new chapel capable of holding nearly a thousand people, yet their membership of 212 could not even half fill their present chapel on which they had spent so much. However, it seems that the Minister knew his men, and, however much one can admire his powers of persuasion, one must admire, too, those who caught the vision and set themselves to achieve the miracle.

If we ever feel disposed to regard our forefathers of a hundred years ago as the gentle and leisurely product of a slower and more untroubled day we should disabuse our minds of that idea. They moved purposefully to their task, handing out collecting books and writing to friends and sympathisers in every part of the country. A Bazaar was held in the February of 1861 and the money was raised to buy from the Victoria Park Company 1,584 square yards of land in "Allotment Fields" at 4/- per yard. £31 was paid as a deposit in March and the remaining £285 in June.

The collecting books had raised £223 by Wednesday, October 22nd, when Thomas Tombleson of Hull arrived for the stone-laying. A short service was held in the Chapel, and at one o'clock the children of the Sunday School led the procession of "important personages" along Chapel Street to the gaily-decorated scene of the ceremony. Mr Tombleson duly laid the foundation stone with a silver trowel presented by Mr Goodall of Harlow Grange, and the gathering was then addressed by the Rev J Rattenbury, President of the Conference. The collection on the ground realised £18 and an evening meeting brought a further £43. When these were added to the £223 from the collecting books it gave a satisfactory day's total of £284.

They must have watched with great pride as the building grew and took shape and the money continued to arrive. There were collections, too, in the chapel and one of these tells a story of an, anguished half hour during which the worshipper's mind must have wandered from the sermon, and a subsequent successful pleading, all of which is to be found in one line in the collection journal, which runs "to one sovereign given in mistake and returned to person." There is no note of the corresponding shilling which should have taken the place of the sovereign.

Still they continued to give generously to their other commitments. The Sunday School Anniversary saw a £20 collection, the Overseas Missions £40, and there was, too, a collection for "Distressed Lancashire."

So the time drew near. The new President had long since agreed to perform the opening ceremony and to preach, and he was to be supported by a list of notable personages. The meeting was advertised in the "Harrogate Advertiser," the handbills were posted and the day was upon them.