Ebenezer Chapel, in Steelhouse Lane, was built in 1818 by the admirers of a minister celebrated in his day, the Rev. Jehoiada Brewer, who laid the foundation stone in 1816, but died before the building was finished.[39] From endowments furnished by three members of this congregation, Mr. Mansfield and his two sisters, Miss Mansfield and Mrs. Glover, a college for the education of ministers was established at Spring Hill, Dudley Road, then removed to Moseley, and is now intended to be reconstituted at Oxford as “Mansfield College.”
Highbury Chapel, Graham Street, originally formed by the remnant of the Livery Street congregation, was opened in 1845.
Francis Road (Edgbaston) Chapel was built to commemorate the fiftieth year of the pastorate of Carr’s Lane Chapel, by the late Rev. J. A. James. He laid the foundation stone 11th September, 1855.
The Congregationalists have also chapels in Gooch Street, Moseley Road, St. Andrew’s Road, Saltley, Small Heath, Parade (Tabernacle), and Winson Green Road, and several others outside the Borough, but in immediate proximity to it..
Society of Friends.—George Fox records in his journal that he held a meeting in Birmingham in the year 1655, and there is good reason to believe in the existence of a small society from that date, meeting in private houses until 1703, when a plain brick meeting house fronting Bull Street was built. There may have been an earlier meeting house in Monmouth Street, where there was a burial ground, acquired in 1851 by the Great Western Railway, and now the site of the Arcade. The meeting house in Bull Street was several times enlarged, and in 1856 it was pulled down, shops built fronting the street, and a more commodious meeting house built in the rear. There is also another meeting place in Bath Row. Meetings for religious worship and instruction, conducted by members of the Society, are held on Sundays at Severn Street Schools, and the Board Schools in Moseley Street and Bristol Street. The Early First-Day Morning School, and the other schools and classes at Severn Street, established by the Friends, have done, and are doing an incalculable amount of good.
Wesleyan Methodists.—John Wesley preached his first sermon in Birmingham in 1743, but it was not until 1764 that his followers acquired an old play house in Moor Street as their first chapel which he opened. In 1782 they had so prospered as to build a chapel in Cherry Street, which was opened by John Wesley himself, then in his eightieth year. This chapel, enlarged in the year 1823, is now (July, 1886) to be pulled down, and a new chapel built in Corporation Street.
The rapid increase of numbers necessitated additional chapels in Bradford Street (1786), Belmont Row (1789), Martin Street, (Broad Street) (1834), Newtown Row Chapel (1837), Wesley Chapel, Constitution Hill (1838), besides a chapel in Bell Barn Road for which the present Bristol Road Chapel (1854) was substituted.
For the purposes of connexional organization the Birmingham district is divided into seven circuits, which include not only the chapels already mentioned but also thirty-three others within the Borough and its suburbs, including Smethwick.
Methodist New Connexion.—This section of the Methodist Community, which separated from the Wesleyans in 1797, only on questions of the share of the laity in church government, first built a chapel in Oxford Street (1811) now disused, then another in the northern part of the town, Unett Street (1838), and have since built smaller ones in Moseley Street, Priestley Road (Stratford Road) Ladywood, Heath Street and Crabtree Road (Brookfields) in the Borough. These and a chapel at Smethwick are divided into two circuits supplied by three circuit ministers.
The Primitive Methodists.—This body has thirteen chapels in and near to the Borough, divided into three circuits, and served by four regular ministers. The largest of these is in Gooch Street, and the others in the Borough are in Sparkbrook, King Street, Lord Street, Nechells, Garrison Lane, Whitmore Street (Hockley) and Ladywood.