ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



In the case of Rochdale, though something is to be attributed to the pre- 

 paratory work of Dr. Fawcett in 1772, the actual origination is again from 

 Bacup. In 1773 John Hirst (who had succeeded Joseph Piccop at Bacup in 

 1772) baptized nine people in the river at Rochdale, and two years later 

 a church was formed there under Abraham Greenwood as its pastor. The 

 short-lived church at Crawshawbooth was an off-shoot from Rossendale. It 

 was formed about or before 1779 under Henry Taylor, being first intended to 

 be located at Rawtenstall, but was moved to Crawshawbooth even before the 

 completion of the building at Rawtenstall. The church was quickly dispersed. 

 Bolton church sprang directly from Bacup. For some years John Hirst of 

 Bacup preached frequently in Bolton and took some of the Baptist converts 

 thereinto his own church. About 1789 he advised them to take a room 

 and meet together, and in 1793 ten members were dismissed from Bacup to 

 form a church at Bolton. They erected a small chapel at the bottom of King 

 Street. This chapel was sold in 1806. 



Besides the above enumerated churches which can thus be traced to one 

 or other of the twin branches of the old Rossendale Baptist community, the 

 Bacup church was interested in and possibly also in part instrumental in the 

 opening of the Ogden church, 1783, Pendle Hill church, 1797-8, and Sutton 

 (reorganized 1768). 



The list of the Lancashire Baptist churches in 1763 as given by Ivimey 

 is as follows : — *^^ Lancaster, Rhode, Lumb, Tottlebank, Liverpool, Hawks- 

 head, Bacup, Gildersome, Rodhill End, Blackburn, Goodshaw chapel. Cowling 

 Hill, Carford, Manchester, BoUand, Accrington, 



Comparing this list with the chapels already noticed, it will be seen 

 that with the exception of the Hill Cliffe, Hawkshead, Liverpool, and 

 Manchester churches, the old Rossendale body had originated practically the 

 whole of the Baptist interest in the county. As to the separate histories 

 of the few exceptions named there is some obscurity. The Coldhouse 

 Baptist church at Manchester was under Mr. Winterbottom as early as 

 1745. On his removal in 1760 a division occurred as to the election of 

 a successor. Some of the Bacup Baptists who had settled in Manchester 

 formed a separate body, styling themselves the Tib Lane Baptists, under 

 John Harmer. From 1762 to 1765 this body resorted to Bacup for the 

 Communion, but in the latter year they appear to have rejoined Coldhouse, 

 then under the pastorate of Edmund Clegg. After moving in 1789 to 

 St. George's Road it is now in Rochdale Road. 



At Liverpool the Baptist cause is probably older (as far as a continuous 

 history is traceable) than at Manchester. On 28 July, 1700, Dr. Daniel 

 Fabius, an apothecary at Low Hill, obtained a licence from the Manchester 

 Quarter Sessions for his house as a meeting-place. In 1714 a wooden meeting- 

 house was built at Low Hill, but in 1722 the congregation moved to a barn 

 of the Townsend House in Byrom Street, within Liverpool. In 1789 it 

 moved to another part of Byrom Street, and in 1835 to Shand Street. It 

 is this church which in 1755 is spoken of as Dale Street.*^^ 



Apparently the only other eighteenth-century Baptist church in Liver- 

 pool was Stanley Street, formed in 1747 by John Johnson. In 1799 it moved 

 to Comus Street, and is now at Bootle. 



"' Ivimey, Hist. ofEtigl. Baptists, ii, 17. ''' Ivimey, op. cit. ii, 590. 



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