Chapel, Blackburn Street, Radcliffe

BURY (LANCASHIRE) - Radcliffe Chapel, near Bury, has been opened for divine service. The chapel is built upon a plot of land in Blackburn-street, adjoining the schools in which the services of the congregation have hitherto been carried on. Its extreme inside dimensions are 76 feet 6 inches by 40 feet 6 inches and 28 feet 6 inches high. It is galleried round three sides for the congregation, with an organ and singing gallery formed in a deep recess behind the pulpit. The total number of seats provided is close upon 800. The cost of the building complete, including the architect’s commission and laying out of the grounds, but exclusive of furnishing and upholstering, is a little over ,3,000. The architects were Messrs Maxwell and Tuke of Bury. The walls are of brick, faced with stocks all round, those to the front being from Woolstenholme Hall, from whence also come the moulded and enriched bricks in the strings, arches, corbels and panels. The dressings are of polished Yorkshire stone, and carving has been sparingly introduced in the caps of the columns. The boundary walls are of Holcombe parpoints, coped with Yorkshire stone and surmounted with a plain rail. The ground floor is seated with open seats. In the arrangement of the pulpit and Communion, a strong moulded rail across the front only of a raised dias is surmounted by the table, which is supported by ornamental iron brackets from the rail. Behind this are chairs for the minister and deacons, and the pulpit, which stands upon a strong square base with dwarf columns at each angle. At the back of the pulpit is a screen, dividing the vestries from the chapel, and above this is the gallery for the singers and organ, the top panels of the front of which are filled with inlaid parqueterie panels by Mr Oppenheimer of Manchester. The front of the principal gallery has been treated in a somewhat different manner from that usually adopted. From the moulded ends of the tie beams of the gallery - which, in common with the rest of the gallery timbers, are visible - there arise quaintly designed iron brackets by M’Farlane of Glasgow. These support a low gallery front and above this a moulded pitch pine rod, between which and the moulded top of the front is stained cane netting, to act as a book-board. The panels are picked out with coloured lines on the natural wood. The decoration at present undertaken is only of a temporary character. The internal woodwork is of pitch pine simply varnished. The contractors for the building were: Messrs Openshaw and Buckley; stonework; Mr Charles Smith, brickwork; Mrs Colley, plumbing; Mr John Allen, woodwork; Mr John Smith, slating; and Mr Joseph Brooks, plastering and painting. The carving has been done by Mr Gregg, of Darwen, and the heating apparatus, rails and grates by Mr Downham of Bury.[Builder 18 October 1873 Page 835]

Reference           Builder 18 October 1873 Page 835