Baptist Church

A postcard showing the wall and railings of the Hedingham Road Baptist Church being renewed in 1900. The church, and the Manse on the right, have since been demolished and the church was completely rebuilt through the generosity of Arthur Evans MBE of Colne House, Earls Colne in 1967/8. Meetings of non-conformists in Halstead first took place in 1662 in a barn behind White Harte Inn in the High Street. Within a few years they had divided into two groups, The Independant Meeting (now the United Reformed Church) and the Baptists. The latter met, starting in 1678, in a building formed out of two cottages in the Hedingham Road on the site where the present chapel stands and in 1799 a larger and more substantial church was erected. Increasing congregations by the early nineteenth century required the provision of a new larger church and one was built in 1816 although it was found necessary to enlarge it in 1834. This is the one we see above. It is worthy to note that the Reverend Charles Haddon Spurgeon preached here in 1857.