page_title: Ditchling Unitarian Chapel
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Ditchling Unitarian Chapel / History
caption_attribution_description: The Old Meeting House (right) and adjacent cottage (left and centre), The Twitten, Ditchling, District of Lewes, East Sussex. The meeting house, originally General Baptist and now Unitarian, was built in the 1730s as an extension to the adjacent cottage of 1672. They have been listed as a group at Grade II by English Heritage (IoE Code 292815)
context_page_description: Ditchling Unitarian Chapel is a Unitarian chapel in Ditchling, a village in the English county of East Sussex. A congregation of General Baptists began to meet in the 17th century in the village, which was a local centre for Protestant Nonconformist worship, and by the time the present simple Vernacular-style chapel was constructed in 1740 a large proportion of the population held Baptist beliefs. Along with other General Baptist chapels in Sussex, the congregation moved towards Unitarian views in the mid-18th century; this caused a schism which resulted in a new chapel being formed at nearby Wivelsfield. The character of the Ditchling chapel was wholly Unitarian by 1800, and it has continued under various names since then. People associated with the chapel include William Hale White, Henry Acton, Adrian Boult—who was married there—and G. K. Chesterton. The chapel is set back from Ditchling's main street and has an adjoining house and graveyard, all of which contribute to the character of the conservation area which covers the centre of Ditchling village. English Heritage has listed the chapel at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
context_section_description: In England, people and ministers who worshipped outside the Church of England but were not part of the Roman Catholic Church were historically known as Dissenters or (Protestant) Nonconformists.  Nonconformism became officially recognised after the Act of Uniformity 1662, which removed from their living those Church of England ministers who refused to recognise or abide by the Act's requirements.  Many alternative denominations developed, all focused on a person's personal relationship with God rather than on the rites and ceremonies of religious worship as in the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches.  This trend was seen throughout Sussex, and by the late 17th century "the all-embracing medieval Church" existed alongside dozens of newly established groups and denominations.
  Ditchling was a local centre for Protestant Dissent: 64 residents of the parish declared themselves Nonconformists in a religious census of 1676.  In 1724, 25 families out of 80 identified as Anabaptists (a term often used at the time in reference to various Baptist groups).  One such group was the General Baptists.  First identified by this name in the 17th century, General Baptists believed in unlimited atonement rather than the Calvinist view of salvation for those who have been so destined by God (limited atonement).  The movement was popular in Sussex, where radical preacher Matthew Caffyn was influential.  A congregation of General Baptists is known to have existed in Ditchling in the late 17th century, because in 1696 some of its members voted at the General Baptist Assembly against its proposal to exclude Caffyn.  His unorthodox, rapidly changing beliefs had caused a schism in the Assembly, and its response to his new theology was significant in the development of Unitarianism in the 18th century.  Worshippers apparently came to the village from all over Sussex and neighbouring counties: attendance and baptism records identify church members from such distant places as Sevenoaks and Cranbrook (Kent), Charlwood and Godstone (Surrey) and Battle, Walberton, Crawley and Pulborough (Sussex) as well as neighbouring villages such as Keymer, Westmeston and Streat.  There was no purpose-built chapel in the 17th century, though: a cottage built in 1672 on a twitten (narrow lane) off East End Lane may have served as the congregation's meeting place.  In 1716, the group registered another house in the village as a place of worship.  The Jointure, a timber-framed 16th-century building on the site of a Wealden hall house (of which some traces remain), was owned by a family of Dissenters.  (In the 20th century it was the home of artist Frank Brangwyn for several decades.)
  The present chapel was founded by Robert Chatfeild  [sic] of nearby Streat, who was born and baptised in Ditchling in 1675.  In 1730, he took copyhold tenure of the land next to the 1672 cottage off East End Lane.  Some sources suggest he built the chapel on to the side of the house in 1740, but his will of 24 February 1734 indicated that it already existed by then, and William Evershed preached there in 1736.  (Evershed, an important figure in Sussex Nonconformism, later founded Billingshurst Unitarian Chapel).  Chatfeild's son, Robert junior, acquired the freehold of the land in 1740; he passed it to the trustees of the chapel, who were said in 1901 to have "a singularly open trust deed ... when the number of trustees are reduced to five they are required to choose 12 more to act with them, the property to be applied to such charitable uses as [they] think most proper".
  The first written record of the chapel dates from 1737, when a list of members received into the congregation was started.  In its early years, the Ditchling cause was associated with Southover General Baptist Chapel in Lewes (built 1741), whose congregation later moved towards Unitarianism and joined the Westgate Unitarian Chapel in 1825.  This move from Baptist beliefs towards Unitarianism, influenced by Matthew Caffyn's teachings in the late 17th century, was seen in many General Baptist congregations in Sussex in the 
caption: The chapel (right) was built on to the site of an earlier cottage (centre) which was later extended to the south (left).[11]
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