Between 7th and 9th May, Dunmurry congregation was visited by four Unitarian ministers from Great Britain. These included Rev Laura Dobson, minister at Chorlton, Rev Mária Pap, minister at Mansfield, Francis Elliot-Wright, student minister at Knutsford, and Rev Jim Corrigall, the London District Minister. On the evening of Tuesday, 7th May Dunmurry congregation welcomed them, plus members of other congregations and a good number of local ministers, to a social evening in the McCleery Hall. I conducted an interview/dialogue with Jim who told us about his role as London District Minister, growing up in South Africa and his anti-apartheid activities, his decades as a journalist around the world which took him to Northern Ireland among other places, as well as the theological reflections which led him eventually to enter the ministry. As part of the evening Jim shared with us the reading that means most to him in his ministry – ‘God’s Grandeur’ by Gerard Manley Hopkins – and we listened to his favourite piece of music – Nkosi Sikelel iAfrika, God Bless Africa. It was a great night enjoyed by everyone.
Left to right Rev David Steers, Rev Mária Pap, Rev Lynda Kane, Rev Laura Dobson, Francis Elliot-Wright, Rev Jim Corrigall, Rev Rev Stephen Reain Adair, Rev Brian Moodie in the McCleery Hall, Dunmurry.
On Wednesday morning we made an early start in the company of a group of members of Dunmurry and First Church to visit six churches in Belfast and county Down and learn something about their history and witness. Thanks to Gary Douds we were taken around the churches in a minibus in great comfort and we were also blessed with fantastic weather.
Some of the party at Dunmurry, ready to set off at 9.00 am.
Laura, Jim, Francis and Mária visit the grave of Rev Alexander Gordon (Principal of the Unitarian Home Missionary College) at Dunmurry.
Outside Rademon later in the day.
In most of the churches I said something about the building and the history of the congregation and in Rademon Jim Ferris shared his historical expertise to give us a talk about his congregation. Our thanks go to all the ministers and members who welcomed us in our travels including Des McKeown, Rev Chris Hudson, Rev Dr Heather Walker, Mary Stewart and David Rooney, as well as Jim Ferris.
Des McKeown welcomes everyone to First Church, Rosemary Street.
Rev Chris Hudson welcomes everyone in the chancel in All Souls’.
We had lunch in Denvir’s in Downpatrick and returned to Dunmurry just 15 minutes later than our planned schedule had anticipated, so all in all a great day out.
In Downpatrick.
Jim Ferris explains the history of Rademon.
We visited in turn Dunmurry (1779), First Belfast (1783), All Souls’ Belfast (1896), Rademon (1713), Downpatrick (1711) and Clough (1837), buildings of different styles and ages but all with their own story to tell as part of our distinctive tradition.
The latest issue of the Transactions (Volume 28 Number 3) will soon be on its way to members. Details of how to join the Society can be found below.
As ever the journal is full of interesting articles and contains:
The National Conference 1882-1928 – a Unitarian Talking Shop
by Alan Ruston
James Martineau’s carte de visite
One year before the bi-centenary of the British & Foreign Unitarian Association Alan Ruston looks at the other less well-known institution which came together with the B&FUA to form the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches in 1928. Although not founded by James Martineau, The National Conference of Unitarian, Liberal Christian, Free Christian. Presbyterian, and Other Non-Subscribing or Kindred Congregations, to give it its full title, was always under the influence of the great man. Even if the body was essentially ‘a Unitarian Talking Shop’ it was nevertheless an institution that made an important contribution to the development of national Unitarian organization in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
‘Holding Space Sacred’: Struggles for Land and Home in Great Britain and Ireland, and Beyond
by Derek McAuley
The site of Croft Unitarian Chapel today featuring the new signage erected through the efforts of Cheyvonne Bower who has done so much to restore and protect the site.
Based on a talk delivered as part of a webinar presented by the Reckoning International Unitarian/Universalist Histories Project on 15 November 2022 on ‘Global Struggles for Land and Home in Unitarian/Universalist Communities’, this paper explores the themes of ‘land and home’ within nineteenth-century Unitarianism. It looks particularly at events in Wales, Ireland, the British overseas Dominions plus the legal challenges that led to the Dissenters’ Chapels Act of 1844, and the role of women. One woman who is particularly highlighted is Ellen Yates who helped to establish the Unitarian cause at Croft after they were dispossessed of their chapel at Risley.
Training for the ministry, 1903-1910: Ernest Pickering at Manchester College Oxford
by Oliver Pickering
From ‘The Non-Subscribing Presbyterian’ 1921
Oliver Pickering examines the rich training for the ministry received by his grandfather at Manchester College, Oxford between the years 1907 and 1910 which were preceded by four years as an external exhibitioner at the College while also studying Classics at Exeter College. This seems to have been something of a golden age for ministerial training at Oxford, and his seven years at Manchester College were the prelude to a remarkable career as a minister (at Hyde; All Souls’ Church, Belfast; Southport and Oldham), a Member of Parliament and a professor of English Literature in Tokyo.
This issue also includes Reviews and a Supplement: Obituaries of Ministers of Unitarian and Free Christian Congregations. Index and synopsis of references including new entries, additions and corrections from 1st February 2021 compiled by Alan Ruston.
This book (first published, I now realise, back in 2014!) has just been reprinted and, the original print run having sold out, is once again available. The publishers and printers have done an excellent job, it’s an attractive book, this time published in memory of Bernard Cliffe, Len Mooney and Rev Daphne Roberts, three contributors who have died since the original publication.
The full list of contributors and subjects is as follows:
Introduction, David Steers; Memorials of the Ancient Chapel of Toxteth Park, Bernard Cliffe; Jeremiah Horrocks 1618 – 1641, Bernard Cliffe; William Roscoe 1753 – 1831, David Steers; A Short History of the Rathbone Family, Annette Butler; The Unitarian Family of George Holt, Bernard Cliffe; Noah Jones 1801 – 1861, Philip Waldron; James Martineau 1805 – 1900, Len W. Mooney; Joseph Blanco White 1775 – 1841, David Steers; Kitty Wilkinson 1786 – 1860, Daphne Roberts; John Johns 1801 – 1847, David Steers; William Henry Channing 1810 – 1884, Richard Merritt; Charles Pierre Melly 1829 – 1888, John Keggen; Sir Henry Tate 1819 – 1899, Richard Merritt; Sir John Brunner 1842 – 1919, Len W. Mooney; Lawrence Redfern 1888 – 1967, Elizabeth Alley; Sir Adrian Boult 1889 – 1983, Richard Merritt; The Visitors’ Book of the Ancient Chapel, Bernard Cliffe.
Published by the Merseyside District Missionary Association the cover design is by Alison Steers and the book contains over 50 illustrations, many published here for the first time.
To accompany the republication we have produced a short video which incorporates a trip around Ullet Road Church which can be seen here:
Click on the video for a tour of Ullet Road Church and details of the book
The cover of the book
Liverpool Unitarians: Faith and Action Essays exploring the lives and contributions to society of notable figures in Liverpool Unitarian history
Edited by Daphne Roberts and David Steers
Published by Merseyside and District Missionary Association
ISBN: 978-0-9929031-0-7
Brand new edition for 2024
Price £10 (plus £2 post and packing). Available from Rev Phil Waldron, Ullet Road Church, 57 Ullet Road, Sefton Park, Liverpool. L17 2AA.
In the Introduction I say:
This book is not intended to be hagiography but it does try to outline how one group of people – members of a particular faith community with deep historical roots but with an aversion to fixed creeds – were inspired to serve their fellows in different ways. Their legacy can be seen all over the city – in its parks, in its monuments, in the university, in hospitals, in education, in art galleries and museums – and it exists in the long and continuing struggle to create a society that gives equality and opportunity to all its citizens. It is not meant to be an exhaustive account of all the eminent members of the churches and chapels in the region. Readers will notice that the names mentioned are part of wider connections of family and business which includes many others who could be included. There are other figures who could be the subject of such biographical accounts. But this is a selection of some of those who have followed the call of faith to be of service to wider society.
Hale is a pretty little place close to Liverpool and now in Cheshire, although traditionally located in Lancashire. Without doubt though, its most famous son is John Middleton, the ‘Childe of Hale’.
Click on the video above to discover the story of the Childe of Hale
Visiting the village recently I made this video to record the story of John Middleton who was said to have been 9 feet 3 inches tall, so tall that at night his feet were said to protrude out of the windows of his house.
John Middleton’s house
His life story is bound up with that of Sir Gilbert Ireland, whose body guard he was, and through whose connections he visited Brasenose College, Oxford and was presented to King James I in London.
Brasenose College, Oxford which has a number of portraits of John Middleton and still names the eights boat of the rowing club ‘The Childe of Hale’.
Modern statue of the Childe of Hale by Diane Gorvin
Although the village pub is named after him it used to be that there was a lot less visibly connected to him there, apart from his grave. Nowadays there is a plentiful supply of plaques and notices and a more than life size statue. But his grave is still the object of everyone’s visit to Hale. Strangely lettered the inscription reads, once you have worked it out, ‘Borne 1578 Dyede 1623 Here Lyeth the Bodie of John Middleton the Childe Nine Feet Three.’ Locally, in recent decades, he was always more associated with Speke Hall because his most famous portrait was long displayed there, but he had no direct connection with Speke Hall. The Ireland family, the local landowners whom he served, lived at the long demolished Hale Hall.
The grave of the Childe of Hale
Hale Hall, now demolished
Hale still has its Manor House, which once inspired John Betjeman to verse, and the local church is well worth seeing but you can hear the full story of the Childe of Hale by clicking on the video at the tope of this page.
The Manor House, Hale
St Mary’s Church, Hale with John Middleton’s grave in the foreground
I was pleased to be present for the inauguration of the new statue of Frederick Douglass on Monday, 31st July 2023. I only found out about it by chance but it was good to be there for the formal recognition of Frederick Douglass as part of Belfast’s history.
Frederick Douglass was born a slave in February 1818, on Holme Hill Farm, near Easton, Talbot County, Maryland. Although slaves were not supposed to be taught to read he was taught the alphabet, taught himself to read and developed a life-long reading habit.
In 1838, at his third attempt, he successfully escaped from slavery and managed to get to New York where he married Anna Murray (1813–1882) of Baltimore. He became a preacher in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and an associate of William Lloyd Garrison and an activist in the anti-slavery movement.
The Lord Mayor introduces the speakers
In 1845 he published the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, the first of three volumes of autobiography, and became so prominent in the anti-slavery movement that threats were made against him which led to him travelling to Britain and Ireland on a speaking tour. He spent two years speaking all over England, Scotland and Ireland. In Dublin he shared a platform with Daniel O’Connell and British supporters raised $700 to buy his freedom in the United States. This in itself was controversial as many thought it wrong to give any recognition to the idea that a human being could be bought or sold as someone’s property.
Some of those present
In the words of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, during his speaking tour:
He filled public halls, private homes, chapels, and churches, his audiences sometimes numbering thousands, and he often spoke on different subjects at more than one meeting a day. As well as making the abolitionist case, he spoke on women’s rights (he felt that he could not accept the vote as a black man if it was denied to women), temperance, land reform, education, and capital punishment, issues on which he never ceased to agitate.
Alan Beattie Herriot, sculptor
Of his time in Belfast he wrote:
I shall always remember the people of Belfast, and the kind friends I now see around me, and wherever else I feel myself to be a stranger, I will remember I have a home in Belfast.
Words which are among those inscribed on the plinth of his statue.
At the opening of the statue Professor Christine Kinealy said that in Belfast he spoke in Rosemary Street Presbyterian Church. But this is ambiguous because there were then three churches on Rosemary Street, two non-subscribing and one orthodox. The booklet available at the opening also suggested that he spoke in First Church on Rosemary Street. In fact he spoke at the meeting-house of the Second (Non-Subscribing) Congregation which stood behind First Church and was finally demolished in the early 1960s. He was granted the use of the meeting-house of the Second Congregation on 7th December 1845 ‘to lecture on behalf of the Anti-Slavery Society’. But it is very fitting that he should have such a fine statue erected in his memory so close to Rosemary Street.
The view looking towards Rosemary StreetLooking down Lombard Street
You can’t help but be impressed by Coventry Cathedral, impressed because everything is given such height. The entrance area that connects with the old cathedral; the glass entrance screen featuring angels and saints; the baptistry window; the Chapel of Unity; Graham Sutherland’s tapestry of Christ in Glory; the walls themselves – everything is so high. And it is all so redolent of the cutting edge of art in the mid-1950s. Of course, absolutely every building can only reflect the times it was built in but I think for a building as important as a cathedral some attempt at transcending the contraints of the present day are necessary. Now I may be very naive to imagine that a medieval Gothic cathedral ever did this, or any other type of cathedral for that matter, but if you want to be pointed to some deeper experience of the divine through the medium of a building you need something that says more than ‘This is 1954’ writ large. Even Liverpool’s Metropolitan Cathedral, which speaks volumes for the 1960s and the heavy constraints placed by money and circumstances on building a cathedral by that date, still communicates very well a more profound encounter with the truly spiritual.
Coventry Cathedral has developed a living and active ministry of reconciliation which has reached out to the whole world. Its response to the horrors of the blitz and the destruction of the old cathedral has been an inspiration to many. But as a visitor to the building, a very occasional one, I am never really sure how to respond.
The thing I remember most about visiting as a child is Jacob Epstein’s figure of St Michael conquering the devil. I think I found it a bit unsettling as a kid and I am not sure I feel any better about it now. What is it meant to communicate? Of course, I know literally what it is meant to mean, but what did it say to the world in 1962 when it was unveiled? And what does it say now? Outside the cathedral there is a slightly cloying poster which stresses the extent of the welcome given to visitors but what the ‘keep-fit mums, football dads, starving artists, tree-huggers, latte-sippers, vegans, junk food eaters…those who think the earth is flat, work too hard, don’t work, can’t spell, or are here because granny is visiting and wanted to look round’ will make of Epstein’s work is a difficult question. Cutting edge art of the 1950s has now become the imagery of horror, fantasy, comic books, movies, cartoons and anime. Does anyone feel liberated by seeing St Michael with swan’s wings getting one over the character from Hellboy? One thing we know for sure today is that evil in the world does not take that form.
But some parts of the cathedral are breathtaking. The baptistry window, designed by John Piper, floods that part of the building with an explosion of light and colour. Again its immensity hits you full on.
The same is true when you look back at the entrance screen with its dozens of ascending figures flying up in front of the old cathedral.
Again part of this is the scale, and the combination of massive candlesticks, the very high choir stalls and the stained glass that is only visible when you look back from the altar all contribute to this impressive immensity.
Even what might be termed the brutalist elements of the structure continue to impress. The wall that lets light on to the chancel and the tapestry has a grandeur and a solidity still, but if it had been placed out of doors in a housing estate or in a car park or shopping centre it would have had to have been demolished years ago:
The focus of the cathedral is Graham Sutherland’s tapestry of Christ in Glory. Once again this is so impressive because of its size; a massive tapestry, woven by hand in a single piece, weighing around a ton, it’s a remarkable piece of work. Standing between Christ’s feet is the figure of a man, emphasising humanity’s smallness before the grandeur of God.
The great height is continued in the Chapel of Unity
but not so much in the Chapel of Christ the Servant which is lined by walls of plain glass, giving a brightness and an openness to the chapel. When I was there a very moving exhibition of quotations from letters home from Indian soldiers serving in the First World War was on display, one on each window.
The Chapel of Christ in Gethsemane is also different, it resembles a cave and the sculpture on the wall by Steven Sykes shows Jesus being ministered to by an angel. It is viewed through a crown of thorns.
The ruins of the old cathedral emphasise the horrors of the blitz
and fittingly a memorial records the sacrifices of those who served on the home front in the Second World War.
One of the few things to survive the blitz in the old cathedral is the tomb of Bishop Yeatman-Biggs, the first Bishop of Coventry. He holds a model of the cathedral and, curiously, his mitre includes a swastika in its decoration. The guide book doesn’t call it a swastika but names it as a fyflot. But as the guide book also says this was an ancient religious symbol, used in different cultures before it was adopted by Nazi Germany. But it does look strange on his mitre and it has gradually become shiny as generations of visitors have pointed to it in shock or surprise.
As a building it is somewhere that I find impressive and intriguing. It does represent a positive response to the horrors of war and an affirmation that faith can overcome suffering and reach out where there has been hatred, and this is all for the good. Parts of it are wonderfully impressive and uplifting but I can’t say that, as a building, it really speaks to me in the way other cathedrals do. But it will always communicate a certain kind of optimism and fortitude that came out of the immediate post-war period.
The latest issue of Faith and Freedom (Spring and Summer 2023, Number 196) is now available and will be with subscribers. New subscribers are very welcome, details of how to subscribe can be found below.
Elmina Castle, Ghana (Photo: Aidan McQuade)
The cover picture features a collection of shackles used on slaves in Elmina Castle, Ghana, a photograph taken by Aidan McQuade who contributes our first article – Ireland – slavery and anti-slavery.
Cover picture – Photo Aidan McQuade
Aidan McQuade is a former director of Anti-Slavery International and has worked extensively in development and humanitarian operations, including leading Oxfam GB’s emergency responses to the civil war in Angola from 1996 to 2001. He writes of the horrors of the slave trade looking through the lens of Irish involvement and noting also those individuals who contributed to anti-slavery activism in the eighteenth century.
He writes:
“Over hundreds of years slavery devastated the African interior as wars and raids, encouraged by the European powers, kidnapped millions of people, many of them children, to feed the demand from the Americas for human beings who could and would be worked to death to produce cash crops, mostly for European markets.
As with today, it is easy to ignore the exploitation that occurs within the political economy – the systems that govern business, trade and employment – when the are concealed far away from us.
So, when it was first brought to public attention by Thomas Clarkson, the image of the Brookes ship shocked the world. It presented in stark detail a visceral reality of the slave trade: how slaves would be packed like sardines into the holds of the slave ships. Clarkson’s friend and comrade in the anti-slavery struggle Olaudah Equiano had direct personal experience of being treated as this sort of cargo and he described it in his auto-biography”:
…we were all put under deck …The stench of the hold while we were on the coast was so intolerably loathsome, … but now that the whole ship’s cargo were confined together, it became absolutely pestilential. The closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, … almost suffocated us. … many died, …. This wretched situation was again aggravated by the galling of the chains, now become insupportable; and the filth of the [latrine buckets], into which the children often fell, and were almost suffocated. The shrieks of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable… Every circumstance I met with served only to render my state more painful, and heighten my apprehensions, and my opinion of the cruelty of the whites.
The door of no return, through which slaves would leave Elmina Castle for the slave ships. (Photo: Aidan McQuade)
John Maxwell Kerr, is a founder member of the Society of Ordained Scientists. His paper, originally given at Harris Manchester College, examines The Search for Meaning in Nature. It is a wide-ranging and deep study using the author’s knowledge of science and religion, incorporating all the riches of literature and poetry, and reaching a surprising conclusion.
Rev John Maxwell Kerr
Barrie Needham’s article on ‘De-churching’ or To the church no more looks at patterns of belief and church attendance in the twenty-first century. What can churches do to overcome these tendencies, what do they need to offer?
Rev Frank Walker
We have an inspiring sermon by Frank Walker, Outlooks on life that still challenge and encourage us, and Graham Murphy provides a review article and essay on Matthew Teller’s valuable book Nine Quarters of Jerusalem, A new Biography of the Old City, which gives such insight to this troubled city, Graham writes:
“In his book about the Old City he describes a place we can visualise, though we may never have been there. We see in our minds eye a golden Dome set within castellated walls as if true to the plans in history books and illustrated bibles. How we imagine Jerusalem is freighted with biblical notions which Teller’s book tends to undermine with doses of reality. He draws our attention to lesser-known aspects of the city’s past and finds himself fascinated by the religious rituals. He interviews the people who live and work beside the pilgrim routes and sacred sites. He shows us how they regard their city, how they cope with its recurrent crises and the lack of rights for the majority who live there.”
And as ever we are blessed by some wonderful reviews. In this issue we feature:
Facing up to Climate Change
Mike Berners-Lee, There Is No Planet B – A Handbook for the Make or Break Years. Cambridge University Press, 2021 (updated edition) pp 316. ISBN 9781108821575, £9.99 pbk. Gaia Vince, Nomad Century – How to Survive the Climate Upheaval. Allen Lane, 2022, pp 260. ISBN 9780241522318, £20.00 hbk. Greta Thunberg, The Climate Book. Allen Lane, 2022, pp 446. ISBN 9780241547472, £25.00 hbk. Reviewed by Professor David A. Williams
A ‘warts and all’ attention to church history
John W. Nelson, A Short History of the Non-Subscribing Church of Ireland including sketches of individual congregations and a Fasti of ministers who served in them, published by The Rev Dr J.W. Nelson, 2022, pp 420, ISBN 9781739978501, £15 hbk. Reviewed by Philip Blair
Praying to an ‘unknowable God’
Bert Hoedemaker, Never-Ending Prayer – A Case for the Christian Tradition. The Lutterworth Press, 2022, pp 136. ISBN: 978 07188 96027, pbk £20. Reviewed by Jim Corrigall
Rev Jim Corrigall
and
Eavesdropping on fascinating conversations
Philip Allott, The Music of Time: Twenty-Four Fables for Today, Matador, 2022, pp 408. ISBN 9781803132228, £7.99 pbk. Reviewed by Frank Walker
Subscription Details
An annual subscription for each volume (two issues) costs £16.00 (postage included) in the United Kingdom. Single copies can be ordered at a cost of £8.00 each (postage included). Cheques should be made out to Faith and Freedom and sent to the business manager:
Nigel Clarke, Business Manager, Faith and Freedom, 16 Fairfields, Kirton in Lindsey, Gainsborough, Lincolnshire. DN21 4GA.
It was good to be at the Old Students Association meeting at Harris Manchester College, where some of the images of contributors seen above were taken. And good to see Rev Dr Peter Godfrey, Editor Emeritus of Faith and Freedom.
Assembling outside Clifton House at the start of the tour
On Friday, 21st April we had a wonderful congregational visit to Clifton House. Reputedly one of the oldest buildings in Belfast, having been built in 1774, it is actually only five years older than our own church in Dunmurry. But it is a very impressive building featuring its unusual spire which must have towered over Belfast when it was first built and certainly angered the Earl of Donegall who gave the land not expecting a building that would dominate the skyline and overshadow St Anne’s parish church.
Jason Burke, one of our guides, in front of a bust of Mary Ann McCracken
Right from the start it was a much more enlightened institution than its usual name of ‘Poor House’ would indicate. Even the ‘punishment room’ was equipped with a bed, something ordinary inmates of institutions such as the workhouse might not expect in the nineteenth century. Curiously the mostly Presbyterian founders had no hesitation in employing a lottery to set up Clifton House but through that scheme were able to build a Poor House and an infirmary.
I hadn’t realised either that the Belfast Charitable Society (to give it its full name) was set up by Act of Parliament and also had responsibility for the provision of water in Belfast as well as street lighting.
Water pipe made from elm dating from 1809
Early lamp bracket in use in Belfast in the 1770s
Examples of the English Elm which were used as water pipes were on show and such was the importance of this function the Water Commissioners had to make an annual payment of £800 in perpetuity to the Belfast Charitable Society. This still continues to this day with NI Water having taken the place of the Water Commissioners and still being obliged to pay £800 per annum to the Charitable Society.
Cross-section of water pipe
The Society played its part in the development of cotton spinning and weaving in Belfast when machinery was established in the basement of the building for children to work on.
It is an impressive and dignified building, beautifully restored in recent decades and still fulfilling its original function of caring for those in need.
View from the staircase
At the heart of the building is the boardroom, a room which also has a key place in so many aspects of the history of Belfast:
Charity board in the Boardroom
The extensive tour also took us round the Clifton Street graveyard. Another repository of Belfast history.
Sadly the graveyard suffered greatly from vandalism at the start of the Troubles, although its existence was threatened fairly dramatically in its early days when it was frequently targeted by grave robbers and we were told many tales of their nefarious activities over the years.
Vandalised grave of Robert Haliday
But there is still a great deal there that connects us with Belfast’s past, many of the people buried there being Non-Subscribers. Indeed throughout the tour many of the names we heard who had been associated with Clifton House were members of our denomination.
Grave of Mary Ann McCracken and possible resting place of Henry Joy McCracken
But in the graveyard we saw the graves of such notables as Dr William Drennan (poet, doctor, educationalist, United Irishman), John Ritchie (who established ship building in Belfast), and Thomas McCabe (who successfully opposed the establishment of a Belfast slave ship company) who were all Non-Subscribers, as indeed was Waddell Cunningham who it was who proposed establishing a slave ship company in Belfast (but who isn’t buried in Clifton Street).
Grave of William Drennan
Grave of John Ritchie
Grave of Thomas McCabe
It was a fascinating tour and we are grateful to our guides for such an interesting and illuminating morning.
Killyleagh, county Down is a town remarkable for its history, much of this related to the Non-Subscribing tradition in Irish Presbyterianism. In this video we look at some of this history, including Sir Hans Sloane and local rector Rev Edward Hincks, Egyptologist and son of Rev Thomas Dix Hincks who is buried in the parsh graveyard.
Thomas Dix Hincks was born in Dublin and educated at Trinity College, Dublin and the dissenting academy of Hackney New College, London. He became minister of the Old Presbyterian Church, Princes Street, Cork in 1790 and the following year married Anne Boult. In Cork he kept a school and helped to establish the Royal Cork Institution. He later moved to Fermoy where he ran the Fermoy Academy before coming to Belfast as Professor of Oriental Languages at the Royal Belfast Academical Institution which was then also a training college for ministers as well as a school. A pioneering educationalist and teacher he published widely over the years, he was awarded the degree of LLD in 1834 by Glasgow University and was a Member of the Royal Irish Academy.
He and his wife are buried in Killyleagh alongside their eldest son but together they established a significant Unitarian/Non-Subscribing dynasty which was influential in England, Ireland and Canada.
The grave of Thomas Dix Hincks and Anne Hincks in Killyleagh
They had seven children, two girls and five boys:
Hannah Hincks (d.c1873)
Anne Hincks (d.1877)
Rev Edward Hincks (1792-1866)
Rev William Hincks c.1793-1871
Rev Thomas Hincks (1796-1882)
Rev John Hincks (1804-1831)
Sir Francis Hincks (1807-1885)
Two of the brothers became ministers of Renshaw Street Chapel in Liverpool, amongst other things.
To hear the full story and hear more about Killyleagh click on the video at the top of the page.
Memorial window to Thomas Dix Hincks, Anne Hincks and Hannah Hincks in the First Presbyterian Church, Rosemary Street, Belfast.
A previous video explores something of the life of Rev Thoms Hincks (1818-1899) the son of Rev William Hincks (c.1793-1871). It can be seen here:
The 2023 issue of the Transactions of the Unitarian Historical Society includes Ian Wood’s article on his great great grandfather William Sunderland Smith, minister at Antrim from 1872 to 1912 and a figure of some note in the town at the time because of his writings on history, including the 1798 Rebellion, natural history, geology and theology.
W.S. Smith’s son William Ivan Smith was an enthusiastic amateur photographer and he took a number of pictures in Antrim in 1902 which are a main feature of this video which introduces the 2023 Transactions:
Click on the video above to find out about the Transactions and W.S. Smith
Prior to coming to Antrim in 1872 and after leaving the Unitarian Home Missionary Board in 1859 W.S.Smith had ministered successively at Aberdeen, Rawtenstall, Doncaster, Tavistock and Crediton. So he had a series of short ministries all over the country before crossing the Irish Sea and finding, one assumes, a deep sense of fulfilment in his last charge at Antrim. W.I. Smith’s visit to Antrim in 1902 produced a number of photographs which give us a splendid picture of his ministry and I am grateful to Ian Wood and his family for digitising them and for making them available.
So here is W.I. Smith’s portrait of his father:
W.S. Smith’s first wife died in 1868 but the following year, having moved from Doncaster to Tavistock , he met and married Clara Ann Clark. Ian Wood has found this cutting from the Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard which gives an engaging account of the wedding between the Cirencester Sunday School teacher and the Tavistock Unitarian minister on 9th November 1869:
In 1902 when William Ivan Smith visited Antrim he took this picture of his step-mother:
William Sunderland Smith arrived in Antrim, after a short ministry in Crediton, Devon, in 1872. He must have established a prominent name for himself in the town with publications such as Historical Gleanings in Antrim and Neighbourhood and Memories of ’98 as well as regular contributions to the Ulster Journal of Archaeology and the provision of ‘Nature Notes’ to the Northern Whig, including this account of toads in 1906:
W.I. Smith’s photograph of his father astride his preferred method of transport in Antrim suggests that he must have been a very familiar figure on the local roads at the time:
The Antrim meeting-house had been built in 1700 but under his ministry the interior was completetly refurbished in 1891. Ian Wood has found the following cutting from the Northern Whig seeking tenders to undertake this work:
This was a major undertaking which seems to have been successfully completed but images of the interior, either in its original form or in the remodelled layout created by W.S. Smith, are hard to come by. If you would like to see the interior as it looks today – denuded of its ecclesiastical furniture – click here. One postcard which I have acquired features the interior of the Antrim meeting-house as it originally looked. It is a strange picture that has been very amateurishly doctored with Rev John Abernethy’s portrait cut out from somewhere and stuck over the pulpit:
But when he came to Antrim in 1902 William Ivan Smith also took a picture of the interior of the church as it looked by this time. This is it:
Now, at first glance, this may not look like such an interesting image, but as the only surviving picture of the inside of Antrim complete with its pews it is not without importance. However, on top of that W.I. Smith was quite a skilled photographer and there is more detail in this high resolution image of a 1902 print than you might initially notice. If you click on the video above you can discover some more of what this picture contains.
Thank you to Ian Wood for researching his ancestor and for discovering these fascinating pictures and making them available.
You can find out more about the Unitarian Historical Society and the Transactions by visiting its website here.
You can see a bit more about the manse in Antrim on this website via this link.
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