Halstead Independent

Independents met in a barn in the yard of Halstead’s White Hart Inn from 1662, when Reverend William Sparrow was ejected from his parish church. In 1679, they built a meeting house on Parsonage Lane. In 1700, William Holman, an antiquary and congregational minister, transferred from Stepney in London, to Halstead. During his time at Halstead, he compiled materials for a history of Essex, which Morant drew on for his two enormous books on the county. Under Holman’s auspices, the meeting house was pulled down and replaced with a new one, which was enlarged in the early 1800s. Reverend John Savill resigned as minister in 1832, and the church was dissolved, with some leaving to form an Independent church on Halstead High Street. However, 21 members remained at the Old Independent Meeting on Parsonage Street, and formed their new church in 1833. Then, in 1864, the old meeting house was demolished, and an enormous, Gothic-style church was built to replace it; it opened in 1866 and was called the New Congregational Church (see image above). It still stands today, but has been converted into private housing. In 1946, the two churches united, to form Halstead Congregational Church.

Records available

Records are held at the Essex Record Office (ERO) and the National Archives (TNA). They are very patchy. Baptisms from 1761, 1762, 1786-1797, and 1822-1828 are found in the church book at ERO (D/NC 60/1/1), which also includes church “actings” (such as dates when people were excommunicated), and a list of members: when they joined, and sometimes notes such as whether they had died or left.

When centralised registration began in 1837, non-conformist registers were submitted to the government. The Old Meeting House submitted two books: baptisms in a pre-printed register, 1829-1837 (TNA ref RG 4/2539), and burials in an account book (RG 4/1513). The earlier book, held at ERO, wasn’t submitted – a letter including with the submission of the books says that they couldn’t find it at the time! The burials book has interesting information at the front, explaining how they came to have their burial ground, and the deeds and wills involved. The burials themselves are hard to transcribe, as it’s not immediately obvious what’s a burial and what is a subscription fee. Some burials of children don’t give their forename.

The High Street Congregational Church, whose membership appears to be smaller than the Old Meeting, submitted what looks like a small notebook, containing births 1828-1833, and baptisms 1833-1837 and burials 1832-1833 (TNA RG ref RG/6). Some of the High Street meeting burials were in “the barn”. Inevitably, some families from the High Street church will appear in Old Meeting’s registers if they had children before the split.

A collection of records from both churches, from 1600s to 1900s, is held at ERO (ref: A11688). It’s worth searching the ERO catalogue for more, including baptisms post-1837, rolls of members, monumental inscriptions, will extracts, etc. Monumental inscriptions can also be found on Findmypast.

Old Independent Meeting

• Baptisms: 1761, 1762, 1786-1797, 1822-1828 (ERO), 1829-1837 (TNA)
• Church “actings”, e.g. excommunications, and admissions of “brethren” and “sisters”, in some cases, stating that someone had died, moved away, or left (ERO) 340 entries (PDF – 66 KB)

High Street Congregational Church

There are a few dates when several children were baptised at the same time: 15 on 23 March 1834, 16 on 12 July 1835, 6 on 28 Feb 1836, four on 21 May 1837, and 11 on 9 June 1837.

• Births and baptisms: 1828-1837 (TNA)
• Burials: 1832-1833 (TNA)