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H i s t o r y - First Chapel
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| The Start
In the year 1738, the Rev. John Wesley preached for the first time in the town from the steps of a house near the George Hotel. If we take this event as marking the starting point of Methodism in Knutsford, then the opening of the present church in 1865 followed an already-established history of over 120 years of Methodist-style worship in the town. The very same steps from which it is believed that Wesley
preached are now preserved (presented to the Chapel in 1932)
in front of the current church building. An attached plaque
quotes an entry from Wesley's diary at the time.
Click on the steps if you'd like a closer
look
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Thirty seven years later (April
1775) John Wesley, then aged 72, returned and preached again
in Knutsford, this time in a room near the Cross Keys Inn. He
recalled,
"The house would by no means contain the
congregation. The street too was filled; and even those who
could not hear were silent.
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The influence of Methodism across the
country actually evolved as a Society within the Church of
England. The initially small band of Knutsford Methodists
grew in the same way, its members continuing to attend the
Parish Church for morning services (and Communion) but also
holding their own separate meetings in hired rooms and private
houses.
In 1789 the group established its own Sunday School but it
was not in fact until 1796, two year's after Wesley's death
and twenty one years after his second visit to the town, that
the Knutsford Society of Wesleyan Methodists, having resolved
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