Kingsdown Anglican Church Alan Payne and Varian Tye September 2025
In the earliest copies of Box Parish magazine held in Box Library there is a reference to three Anglican churches under the control of the vicar of St Thomas a Becket: Parish Church, Chapel Plaister and Kingsdown Church. This article attempts to find the site of the Kingsdown Anglican Church and possible reasons for its existence.
Religion in Late 1800s
The Anglican movement lost ground to Methodism in rural England in the late 1800s for a variety of reasons which are sometimes listed as division within the doctrines of the Church of England, lack of spontaneity in Anglicanism, and the absence of a unifying mission.
The high church beliefs of the 1833 Oxford movement sought to influence Church of England practices towards an Anglo-Catholic creed with many of the doctrines of the pre-Reformation period. The practices advocated by the Catholic Revival included the greater use of incense, priests wearing liturgical vestments, priests hearing private confessions, the presence of Christ in conducting the sacrament of the Eucharist in front of the high altar, even some priests accepting papal supremacy. The absorption of these ideas into the Anglican movement appealed more to the conservatism of higher- and middle-class congregations.
The need to show respectability in the Anglican church often required working class residents to walk long distances in their Sunday best clothes, whilst many poorer residents were put off by having no respectable clothes. Upwardly mobile working-class people were discouraged by the lack of lay opportunity in Anglicanism with the vicar holding a position of absolute superiority (a situation evident in Box with public dislike of the Reverend Horlock after the death of his wife and sister-in-law).
Whilst town and city churches found a mission to improve the standing of the poor, there was no such Anglican imperative in rural areas. The enthusiasm of working-class Methodists to build churches is apparent in the speed and commitment of their congregations to fund chapels.
Situation in Box
There was a religious vacuum in the hamlets of Box with no church of any sort. This was rapidly filled by an expansion of Methodism into quarrying areas, encouraged by middle-class quarry-owners. Part funded by public subscription Methodist chapels sprang up in prominent locations at Box Hill, central Box, and Kingsdown. More specialized denominations of churches were opened by Primitive Methodists at Box Hill, Plymouth Brethren meeting houses at Lents Green and Quarry Hill, and a Mission Hall at Prospect.
The only Anglican “new” church was the discovery of an old one at Chapel Plaister by the Box curate, Rev Shirley Spooner in 1893. Even this reflected an academic exploration by Harold Brakespear and the discovery of its pre-Reformation religious history.
Anglican Response
The rise of Methodism was not exclusive to Box but a national development. The Public Worship Regulation Act of 1874 was a national attempt to limit the rise of the rituals in the Established Church as advocated by the Oxford movement. It was a private members bill brought by the Archbishop of Canterbury and supported by conservative Prime Minister Disraeli but opposed by the Liberals under Gladstone, a high church Anglican.
Its main provisions sought to limit the wearing of vestments, use of incense, and the significance of bread and wine in communion. But it significantly failed to promote greater preaching. The Act was controversial in allowing churchwardens or three adult male parishioners to bring proceedings against parish clergy to the Court of Arches. It was not regarded as successful and was poorly enforced with the prosecution of only five clergymen. It is questionable if it made any difference at all to religious beliefs in Box.
A better response in Box was to reach out to the working class by promoting Anglican missionary churches in the hamlets. They tended to be huts built rather quickly and cheaply, rather than stone buildings, which offered informality and greater lay involvement.
Kingsdown Anglican Church
Kingsdown resident, Victor Painter, recorded his memory of the Anglican mission hall in the years before the First World War.[1] He started by referring to the mission hall in general terms: Along the road from the post office was built a mission hall that was run by the Church of England and there was a Service every two weeks, but most people went to the Chapel.
He later gave more specific details: The very next cottage (to Mrs Brokenbrow) was called Plum cottage and the lady living there would sell any boy twenty ripe plums for just one penny, but not every day that a boy would have a penny so no plums. Not many more yards from Plum Cottage there was the Box Church Mission Hall and a church service was held for grown-up people every second Sunday in the evening time by the Vicar of Box Church. Mr Tommy Hancock (Ted and Herb's father) was caretaker of the Hall and Mr Tommy Hancock had a wonderful singing voice to lead the hymns. But only after a few years this Mission Hall was taken down for most people of Kingsdown went to the Chapel services 3pm till 4pm and 6pm till 7.15pm.
Now come the next cottage and that was the home of Mr. and Mrs. Britton Ford for this was the cottage called West View where they had moved to on leaving Jessamine Cottage, Mrs. Ford set up a little shop at West View and sold handy little things, also sold sweets and Mr. Ford sold the paraffin that everyone on Kingsdown needed. Behind West View was a wide gateway and cart track down to a cottage that was built in a field that was the home of a Mr. and Mrs. Jack West that had a small holding of a few fields.
Kingsdown Anglican mission hall isn’t recorded on any maps of the area but Victor Painter’s details are confirmed by the census records of 1901 and 1911. These list in order Annie Brokenbrow, widow, then William Harwood, postman, (recorded at Plum Tree Cottage in 1911), then John Filer in two rooms, then Thomas Hancock.
Religion in Late 1800s
The Anglican movement lost ground to Methodism in rural England in the late 1800s for a variety of reasons which are sometimes listed as division within the doctrines of the Church of England, lack of spontaneity in Anglicanism, and the absence of a unifying mission.
The high church beliefs of the 1833 Oxford movement sought to influence Church of England practices towards an Anglo-Catholic creed with many of the doctrines of the pre-Reformation period. The practices advocated by the Catholic Revival included the greater use of incense, priests wearing liturgical vestments, priests hearing private confessions, the presence of Christ in conducting the sacrament of the Eucharist in front of the high altar, even some priests accepting papal supremacy. The absorption of these ideas into the Anglican movement appealed more to the conservatism of higher- and middle-class congregations.
The need to show respectability in the Anglican church often required working class residents to walk long distances in their Sunday best clothes, whilst many poorer residents were put off by having no respectable clothes. Upwardly mobile working-class people were discouraged by the lack of lay opportunity in Anglicanism with the vicar holding a position of absolute superiority (a situation evident in Box with public dislike of the Reverend Horlock after the death of his wife and sister-in-law).
Whilst town and city churches found a mission to improve the standing of the poor, there was no such Anglican imperative in rural areas. The enthusiasm of working-class Methodists to build churches is apparent in the speed and commitment of their congregations to fund chapels.
Situation in Box
There was a religious vacuum in the hamlets of Box with no church of any sort. This was rapidly filled by an expansion of Methodism into quarrying areas, encouraged by middle-class quarry-owners. Part funded by public subscription Methodist chapels sprang up in prominent locations at Box Hill, central Box, and Kingsdown. More specialized denominations of churches were opened by Primitive Methodists at Box Hill, Plymouth Brethren meeting houses at Lents Green and Quarry Hill, and a Mission Hall at Prospect.
The only Anglican “new” church was the discovery of an old one at Chapel Plaister by the Box curate, Rev Shirley Spooner in 1893. Even this reflected an academic exploration by Harold Brakespear and the discovery of its pre-Reformation religious history.
Anglican Response
The rise of Methodism was not exclusive to Box but a national development. The Public Worship Regulation Act of 1874 was a national attempt to limit the rise of the rituals in the Established Church as advocated by the Oxford movement. It was a private members bill brought by the Archbishop of Canterbury and supported by conservative Prime Minister Disraeli but opposed by the Liberals under Gladstone, a high church Anglican.
Its main provisions sought to limit the wearing of vestments, use of incense, and the significance of bread and wine in communion. But it significantly failed to promote greater preaching. The Act was controversial in allowing churchwardens or three adult male parishioners to bring proceedings against parish clergy to the Court of Arches. It was not regarded as successful and was poorly enforced with the prosecution of only five clergymen. It is questionable if it made any difference at all to religious beliefs in Box.
A better response in Box was to reach out to the working class by promoting Anglican missionary churches in the hamlets. They tended to be huts built rather quickly and cheaply, rather than stone buildings, which offered informality and greater lay involvement.
Kingsdown Anglican Church
Kingsdown resident, Victor Painter, recorded his memory of the Anglican mission hall in the years before the First World War.[1] He started by referring to the mission hall in general terms: Along the road from the post office was built a mission hall that was run by the Church of England and there was a Service every two weeks, but most people went to the Chapel.
He later gave more specific details: The very next cottage (to Mrs Brokenbrow) was called Plum cottage and the lady living there would sell any boy twenty ripe plums for just one penny, but not every day that a boy would have a penny so no plums. Not many more yards from Plum Cottage there was the Box Church Mission Hall and a church service was held for grown-up people every second Sunday in the evening time by the Vicar of Box Church. Mr Tommy Hancock (Ted and Herb's father) was caretaker of the Hall and Mr Tommy Hancock had a wonderful singing voice to lead the hymns. But only after a few years this Mission Hall was taken down for most people of Kingsdown went to the Chapel services 3pm till 4pm and 6pm till 7.15pm.
Now come the next cottage and that was the home of Mr. and Mrs. Britton Ford for this was the cottage called West View where they had moved to on leaving Jessamine Cottage, Mrs. Ford set up a little shop at West View and sold handy little things, also sold sweets and Mr. Ford sold the paraffin that everyone on Kingsdown needed. Behind West View was a wide gateway and cart track down to a cottage that was built in a field that was the home of a Mr. and Mrs. Jack West that had a small holding of a few fields.
Kingsdown Anglican mission hall isn’t recorded on any maps of the area but Victor Painter’s details are confirmed by the census records of 1901 and 1911. These list in order Annie Brokenbrow, widow, then William Harwood, postman, (recorded at Plum Tree Cottage in 1911), then John Filer in two rooms, then Thomas Hancock.
Ordnance Survey dated 1844-1888 (courtesy of Know Your Place)
The Anglican church appears to have stood on the site of the Filer property on the Lower Kingsdown Road. It is difficult to be certain but the church may have stood around the area of the L-shaped cottages to the south of the footpath to Wormcliff Barn.
Jane Little’s Cottage
The reference in the Box Parish Magazine of 1897 appears to be at a time when the mission hall was not available and services were held instead in Jane Little’s Cottage. We know about Jane as she lived in Kingsdown from 1851 for the next five decades. She was born Jane Gale in Yatton Keynell in 1823 and married George Little, road labourer in 1846. They moved to Kingsdown and George got work locally as an agricultural labourer. Theirs was a difficult and impoverished life.
George died in 1880 and Jane was recorded as living with her son Jacob and his family (possibly in the same house that she had shared with George). By 1901 her son had moved out and she was maintained by parish relief, looked after by her eldest daughter Grenada Little (also supported by the parish) in a two roomed property. The house is listed as next to Totney Cottages. Jane lived on and apparently died in 1917, aged 94.
The reference in the Box Parish Magazine of 1897 appears to be at a time when the mission hall was not available and services were held instead in Jane Little’s Cottage. We know about Jane as she lived in Kingsdown from 1851 for the next five decades. She was born Jane Gale in Yatton Keynell in 1823 and married George Little, road labourer in 1846. They moved to Kingsdown and George got work locally as an agricultural labourer. Theirs was a difficult and impoverished life.
George died in 1880 and Jane was recorded as living with her son Jacob and his family (possibly in the same house that she had shared with George). By 1901 her son had moved out and she was maintained by parish relief, looked after by her eldest daughter Grenada Little (also supported by the parish) in a two roomed property. The house is listed as next to Totney Cottages. Jane lived on and apparently died in 1917, aged 94.
Modern map of properties on Lower Kingsdown Road (courtesy of Know Your Place)
Reference
[1] Derek Hawkins transcription of Victor Painter's memoires, http://www.choghole.co.uk/victor/victormain.htm
[1] Derek Hawkins transcription of Victor Painter's memoires, http://www.choghole.co.uk/victor/victormain.htm