Priory Plain

The Temple. * Ref, A. H. Patterson, "from Hayloft to Temple", (1903).

The Primitive Methodists, a group derived from the Methodists by Hugh Bourne and William Clowes amongst others, when expelled by Wesley from the main sect., who set up a place for their open air preaching at a spot outside the town wall near to the hospital (Market Place), called Hog's Hill. Their very first service was apparently held amongst the trees that grew in an avenue between the Fishermen's Hospital and St. Nicholas Church. When too wet, they would adjourn to a gig shed in row 8, the property of a Mr. Fryer. This was Mr. Robert Fryer, wheelwright, also blacksmith of Northgate Street (see photo., p.47, issue 5., vol. I ). In time they acquired premises which were a stable, and conducted their meetings in the Hayloft. Later on the same site a small religious building was erected, and it was on the same site that they erected the long lamented, that distinguished building standing on Priory Plain, on ground 130 years or so later, cleared for the new inner relief road. The temple was described to me in an interview with May Tuck in 1992, as being "like something out of 'Gone with the Wind' "!

The hayloft was a simple building, some 20 or so feet long. Its entrance was through a pair of stable doors, and inside, a flight of steps to the right led along the inside of the front wall, upwards into a hall, in which a number of wooden seats sufficient for 50 or so persons had been fixed. Light was admitted into this chamber on one side only, by three windows with many small panes. The entrance to the area, on which the hayloft stood, was between some old almshouses. There were other stables on one side, a saw-pit the other, and then a large open space in front of the hayloft itself. Although the upper floor was used by the Primitive Methodists, the ground floor was still used to quarter horses when attending the market.

The first purpose built structure they had was the "Tabernacle". A collection was started by Samuel Atterby in 1827, and the structure erected in 1829. Hugh Bourne and John Smith then appeared as preachers, and lodged in Split Gutter Row (5). Later the preacher resided at no.13 Fuller's hill, and towards the end of the century there was a parsonage in Paget Road. Sunday schools then were held in an upstairs room in the Garden Row (36). The Tabernacle held 5 or 6 hundred persons. A pulpit had its back to the front of the building, and so Hugh Bourne preached from the gallery so as to be better heard.

A public meeting was held on July 3rd. 1849, it was resolved to build a new temple. David Gourley, Mayor and founder of the Wesleyan day schools (British Home Stores site) was in the chair at a public meeting on the same subject, held at the Masonic Hall in December the same year. The cost of the subsequent rebuilding was £433-6s. This building was supplemented by a chapel in Queens Road in 1866. The second tabernacle at Priory Plain was of red brick, with a cobbled yard in front. Inside were lobbies of plain white painted match boarding and with green baize covered doors. Running either side from the lobbies were rather wide staircases. Upstairs were very small straight backed cubicles. The gallery formed a complete square, and later an organ occupied one side. The pews were very plain, and there were free seats only seven inches by three, which had no backs. Any sleeping during the sermon, and you fell off! Arches at the back of the chapel were actually the arches of the old town wall.

In 1875 the Temple was built. During the building, falling coping stones killed two men.(Mr. Thompson a workman walked on the unsecured coping stone, which fell with him and fatally injured Mr. Kirk also. Mr. Freeman of Hull was the first minister of the new Temple. A stone laying ceremony was held on 22nd. June, 1875. The dimensions of the Temple were 72 feet and 3 inches by 52 feet and 2 inches. In the basement were committee and class rooms, and an area for the heating boilers. On the ground floor were two spacious vestibules and lobbies, and at the back were two vestries and some offices. The height of the ceiling in the main chamber was 35 feet, and it held some eleven hundred people. It was re-opened after the second war on May 25th. 1950. "Structural improvements" had been made to the entrance. The building had been rewired and redecorated. A new ceiling had been provided.That it should succumb but a few years later to the building of a new road for motor traffic seems typical enough of this modern age. Demolition started in May 1972.

Number 4 Priory Plain was occupied by vagrants during 1986/7. It had water pouring in, and was semi-derelict. Permission was gained to convert it into flats. When the outbuilding was demolished, the wall was seen to be constructed of flint and brick, and to have a small vertical window in it. The whole appeared to be an eighteenth century building, and the wall would have presented a very interesting appearance if preserved in that state, but it was soon rendered over, and a new breeze block wing added upon it.

Number 2, next door, was also occupied by drug addicts and other squatters, and during the next year or so remained in that state. In due course it also was converted into flats. The broken windows can be seen in the photo. It became almost unreachable due to debris and rubbish for a while after this photo was taken.