The Slaugham Archives

Methodist Chapel in Handcross High Street

Opposite the Post Office in Handcross High Street used to stand the Wesleyan Methodist Chapel. As a young lad, I can remember attending there with lots of other friends as the services were very short and were quickly replaced by party games, and “happy-clappy” songs.
I am not sure when it was built, but it does not appear in picture #90 taken in 1876, but it appears on a map dated 1898. Minute books, baptism records, correspondence, and other documents are held in the Surrey History Centre at Woking. It seems the earliest records date from 1892 but, of course, it could have been built a few years earlier.
In the 1960s it had not been used as a chapel for some years and it was converted to commercial use as a factory. It was at this time that the single storey brick extension was built for offices, etc.
Shortly after this picture was taken it was demolished as can be seen in picture #1314.
The Large Version shows a relevant part of the map surveyed in 1898. The blue line shows the pre-1957 boundary between the parish of Slaugham and that of Cuckfield Rural. I am not sure what the red line is yet, but it must have been some form of utility, perhaps sewage.

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