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Protected Status

• Listed Building (II) 1356244: Tyldesley Chapel
• Conservation Area: Tyldesley Town Centre

Full description

Chapel. 1789. Now a pentecostal church. Flemish bond brick. 3-sided gallery plan of 3 x 1 bays with a 20th Century addition to the east. Gabled front has 2 panelled doors with moulded surrounds and flat hoods. Between them on each floor is an elementary venetian window with leaded glass. Roundel panel in gable bears date, topped by 19th Century bellcote. Bays 1 and 3 slightly set back. Each bay has window which was adapted from the venitian type to a round-headed window in the 19th Century. Coped parapet and gable. Blind Y- tracery window and gable pediment in brick relief to rear. Interior: gallery is supported on timber columns. 19th Century organ chamber. Panelling of 20th Century and pews from elsewhere. Plain ceiling. (1)
The Chapel later called Top Chapel, was the first place of worship to be erected in Tyldesley. Built in 1789-90 on land donated by Thomas Johnson. In 1919 it joined the Presbyterian Church of England & in 1978 transferred to the Pentecostal church. Walls are of brown brick.The north front has 2 entrances with 2 tiers of plain Venetian windows between & a rebuilt bell-cote on the gable, now of brick, reported earlier supported on 4 pillars. In side walls are 3 wide round-arched windows, upper glazing possibly altered, & in south wall blind windows with brick tracery patterns. Interior much changed, has galleries of various dates around 3 sides & box pews to lower floors. Pulpit originally on west side & communion table opposite. Basement rooms below chapel. (2,3)
The church has/had a graveyard. It was built in the Square in 1789 on a site of 1,300 square yards, for the Countess of Huntingdon's sect which had broken away from the Church of England. John Wesley had preached in Shakerley laying the foundations for a place of worship in the area. Later in the 1780s George Whitfield who had worked with John Wesley earlier on in his ministry also preached in Shakerley. The local squire, Thomas Johnson, gifted land on the highest point of Tyldesley for a chapel and Lady Huntingdon, a supporter of John Wesley, supplied money for the building materials. It became known as the Top Chapel due to its geographical location. It became a Pentecostal Chapel in 1970 after being in decline for a number of years. (4)
Burial ground recorded on 1907 & 1922 maps. (5) Photos in (5)

<1> Wigan MBC, List of Buildings of Special Hist/Arch Interest, 34 (Monograph). SGM12225.

<2> RCHME, 1994, Nonconformist Chapels and Meeting Houses, 144-5 (Monograph). SGM365.

<3> Presbytarian Historical Society, 1920, Journal of the Presbyterian Historical Society, 17-23 (Bibliographic reference). SGM6591.

<4> GENUKI, 2019, The Square, Elliott St Lady Huntingdons Connexion, Tyldesley: https://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/LAN/TyldesleywithShakerley/TheSquareElliottStLadyHuntingdonsConnexion, Accessed 28/01/2020 (Website). SGM14073.

<5> Saul Crawshaw, 2011, The Condition of the Burial Grounds of Greater Manchester, Ref 207 (Digital archive). SGM14066.

Related records: none recorded

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