A History of the County of Essex: Volume 10, Lexden Hundred (Part) Including Dedham, Earls Colne and Wivenhoe. Originally published by Victoria County History, London, 2001.
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'Colne Engaine: Nonconformity', in A History of the County of Essex: Volume 10, Lexden Hundred (Part) Including Dedham, Earls Colne and Wivenhoe, (London, 2001) pp. 116. British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/essex/vol10/p116 [accessed 27 April 2024]
NONCONFORMITY.
Colne Engaine was 'a Quakers' nest' in 1655, and in 1657 a Meeting moved there from Earls Colne. (fn. 1) George Barnard, Christ's Hospital's tenant in the early 18th century, was a Quaker, and a house in the parish was licensed as a Quaker meeting house in 1709. (fn. 2) Despite conversions to the Church of England in the late 17th and early 18th centuries, (fn. 3) there were still 11 Quakers in the parish in 1766, but none was reported thereafter. The Society still owned 2 a. of land near Buntings green, given by William Bunting of Halstead for poor Quakers, in 1840. (fn. 4)
A Primitive Methodist chapel was registered in 1871 and deregistered in 1896. (fn. 5)
Earls Colne Baptist church established a mission hall or chapel in Brook Street in 1881. It apparently never attracted large congregations and closed in 1946; the building was used as a public hall, the World Union Hall, until its sale in 1966. (fn. 6)