FORMER QUAKER MEETING HOUSES VALERIE GRAVES
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FORMER QUAKER MEETING HOUSES
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FORMER QUAKER MEETING HOUSES in COLCHESTER & COGGESHALL MONTHLY MEETING
VALERIE GRAVES with many thanks to Alison Bush, Helen Lewis and others for the photographs
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FORMER QUAKER MEETING HOUSES IN COLCHESTER & COGGESHALL MONTHLY MEETING (This account refers only to those meeting houses that were in use for worship in recent memory, not in the dustant past) In 1993, Arthur Frost, who was then Monthly Meeting Archivist and gave me all this information, took me to visit some of the old meeting houses and told me what he knew of their history. LAYER BRETON This meeting house, which was built in 1826 and demolished in 1987, is described in a separate album. COGGESHALL Probably the third Quaker Meeting House in the town, it is in Stonham Street. More detailed information about it is in the album “Coggeshall Quakers and the Doubleday family”. At one time it was divided in two (as were many old meeting houses, by partitions, often removeable, to permit separate meetings of men and women when required, usually for business meetings). Meetings for Worship were held in the whole room. These partitions are no longer there. There were raised elders’ benches, with a rail at one end. It was a busy meeting. The last elders were Edwin and Edith Doubleday. The Monthly Meeting still owns it, but it is leased to the local Library service, on a repairing lease. A plaque has recently been placed by the entrance door. Tilkey Cottage (or Quaker Cottage) is in Tilkey Road a short way from the meeting house. It was tenanted but sometime in the 1970’s it was sold. Part of the garden, which is very well looked after, was the most recent burial ground, still in use in the middle twentieth century. It can be visited on request. Many of the Doubleday family (a prominent Quaker family in the town for two hundred years) are buried there. Charles Smith was 7
1993 Coggeshall Meeting House, now rented to Library
Front of Former Coggeshall Meeting House
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Colchester & Coggeshall MM Trustees, John Lewis & Colin Keen
Close-up of Plaque on Coggeshall Library Wall (placed about 2002)
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Tilkey Cottage (Quaker Cottage) just up the road from former Coggeshall Meeting House
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Beautifully kept garden at Tilkey Cottage.
Quaker tombstones in the grass at Tilkey Cottage.
Part of tombstone of Harry Doubleday, deceased Friend of Coggeshall Meeting, who died in 1959, from Tilkey Cottage.
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buried there over 100 years ago. (There are Quaker Smith families in other parts of Essex and Essex & Suffolk General Meeting). Charles Smith was a doctor who went on a whaling ship from Hull, which was locked in the ice all winter. Their Quakerism, said Arthur Frost, kept them alive. Charles Smith was connected with the Hurnards, a big Quaker family who lived chiefly in Colchester. James Hurnard married Charles Smith’s sister, and they lived in Kelvedon, but emigrated to Ohio. Later he inherited money and came back to live in Kelvedon again. He wrote a 300 page autobiography in verse. In extreme old age he married another member of the Smith family, and they lived at Hill House (now a nursing home) opposite Lexden Church. He did much good work in Colchester. She never attended Meeting, but he bought a plot for her at the Roman Road Quaker Burial Ground. Being so much younger and living to be very old, she was buried there comparatively recently, in the 1990’s. (Just possibly, it could have been their daughter - there had been no contact with the family). Crouches, another old burial ground in Coggeshall, was taken over by Kings Seeds, a big concern employing many people. Osgood Hanbury gave Crouches to Friends a long time ago. I believe Kings Seeds no longer functions and I am not sure if any gravestones are still there. (In very distant times, Friends did not use headstones, and when they did, they had to be small and with very limited wording.) There was also Larkin Field, which was sold. Crouches was be the small piece of land near the meeting house, which was believed to be a Quaker burial ground. When Arthur took me to see it, it was completely overgrown with brambles and nettles. Recently (see Doubleday album) it was bought by a developer who built a lot of houses and also a beautiful garden for everyone to use. (It is right in the middle of the town.) There are a 12
Coggeshall: passage behind former Quaker Burial Ground, possibly “Crouches�, completely overgrown in the early 1990s. Later developers built houses and a public garden there.
Bocking/Braintree former Friends Meeting House, (photo 1995). Entrance to Meeting House, at tht time used by the Salvation Army.
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Sold to the Salvation Army but the Burial Ground is still owned by Colchester & Coggeshall MM.
The Burial Ground, Bocking, on land to the left of the entrance path.
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Halstead former Friends Meeting House (1993) seen from the road.
Front of Halstead Meeting House, then owned by Ciba Corning.
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few graves stones, which the developers carefully preserved, but they are large and elaborate, quite unlike Quaker stones. BOCKING (or BRAINTREE) MEETING HOUSE It was built in 1863 and is in Rayne Road. It was a good building, set well back. No meetings have been held there for a long time. The building was sold to the Salvation Army many years ago, but the burial ground, which has been well maintained, is still the property of Monthly Meeting. The stones are lined up against the wall now, and include the names of many Smiths and Catchpools. HALSTEAD This meeting House was known as the “Cathedral of the Monthly Meeting.” It is very large and has had a chequered history since Meetings for Worship finally stopped in 1971. It has been a library; was used as a toy-making factory by a Mr and Mrs Cleese; was for some time used by a firm making polystyrene beads, and in mid 1980’s it was sold to a pharmaceutical firm Ciba Corning. Since then I believe this concern has failed and i don’t know who owns it now. it was in very bad condition when I saw it in 1993. A very handsome building of considerable height, it was divided into two parts with what had probably been a partition but had become a non-moveable wall. There was a gallery which was full of polystyrene beads. When I saw it, it was being used as a storeroom but was probably unsafe to use regularly. There were also cellars. There had been a big burial ground but all the stones had been moved to the side and the area used as a carpark, all very decrepit. A number of Doubleday stones (a prominent Quaker family from Coggeshall) were there, but many stones were broken or illegible. It had been a big prosperous meeting, but, like so many others, it partly closed during the war because of transport difficulties among other things. It revived and was the biggest meeting in the Monthly Meeting (which was then Coggeshall MM), and indeed 16
Kelvedon: (1993) Former Friends Meeting House, boarded up and in a sad state of repair.
Kelvedon: Entrance to the Burial Ground, which is in the garden of a private house next to the Meeting House
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Kelvedon: tombstoness arranged round the wall of the garden.
Kelvedon: close-up of tombstoness in the private garden.
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children from Colchester in the 1950’s used to go to Halstead Children’s Meeting, as they did not have a regular one at Colchester. But weekly Meetings for Worship ceased in the 1960’s, when two faithful Friends met on first Sundays and later joined Earls Colne or Colchester. Halstead was still sending representatives to Monthly Meeting until 1971, some time after Coggeshall had ceased to be a MM and merged with Colchester. It was sad to see this big and beautiful meeting house in such a sad state of repair. Restoration would be prohibitively expensive; and as it is a listed building it cannot be altered and will eventually fall down. KELVEDON This Meeting closed, I believe, sometime in the 1930’s. The Meeting House was sold then to Moore Bros (buses) and at the time of writing (1993) to Eastern National. The Monthly Meeting still owns the burial ground, which is well kept, part of the garden of one of the houses adjacent to the Meeting House. (They pay £3 a year for it). The owner of the former meeting house became bankrupt and it is boarded up, the roof stripped. Again, it is a listed building and cannot be altered. It is now in a bad state, a fine, large, very tall building. The entrance to the burial ground is through a padlocked gate and a grassy path, to its left. SIBLE HEDINGHAM There was a burial ground. In early Quaker times, Friends often met in someone’s house, or a barn, but they had to have a burial ground, and there are many little pieces of land, used for burial but not attached to any meeting house. It was let to a builder a long time ago, then bought and sold for a small sum. Now old people’s bungalows have been built there.
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