Chapel
It wasn't until 1849 that the Primitive Methodist Chapel shown above on the right (pictured some time in the early 20th century), was opened about 40 years after the founding of Primitive Methodism, a major movement in English Methodism from about 1810. Primitive Methodism was less centralised and more democratic than main stream Methodism and its members tended to be poorer and less educated than the Wesleyans.
The land on which the chapel was built was leased to the chapel trustees by the Yarborough Estate for 99 years on 22nd May 1849 at a rent of £1 per annum. The freehold was included in the Wold Newton estate when it was purchased by the Wright family in 1871.
With the Methodist Union in 1932, the Chapel congregation became part of the wider Methodist movement.
On 4th February 1946, having inherited the freehold, William Maurice Wright gave it to the chapel trustees, an odd thing to do as it must already by then have been in decline.
The names and descriptions of the trustees on 2nd December 1901 and the reasons for their having ceased to be trustees by the time of the gift of the freehold on 4th February 1946 are given below:
King Henry Vlll's Act of Supremacy of 1534 gave the Church of England a monopoly over religious worship in England and Wales. Worship other than in a recognised church in accordance with the doctrines of the Church of England was illegal. Following the 'Glorious Revolution' and the accession of William and Mary to the throne in 1688, the Toleration Act 1689 gave some latitude in religious practices to protestants who dissented from the established church. Bishops were authorised to allow such dissenters to worship in places other than churches.
Methodism began as a movement within the Church of England but as it developed its adherents sought to distance themselves from many of its ritual practices and applied to their local bishop to register premises other than their church as places of worship. And so we find a small group of Wold Newton residents, William Smith, Ann Smith, Edward Gilliatt, John Farrow and Sarah Coffins certifying, with their preacher, Jeremiah Robertson, in December 1774 that the Smith's 'dwelling house ... is set apart and appropriated as [a] place of religious worship for those of his majesty (sic) protestant subjects dissenting from the Church of England Commonly called Methodists ...' and asking that it be so registered. Then on 20th July 1790 Robert Wilkinson, Jonathan Spring, Robert Murray and David Murray certify that 'the dwelling house of Richard Stamp, Situate in the Parish of Wold Newton ... is set apart and appropriated a place of worship for those ... commonly called Independents ...'
It appears that as the local trustees died off, they were not replaced. By 1946 only two remained and they were augmented by 19 new Trustees, only one of whom, George Davey, lived in the village, the others being mainly from North Thoresby and two from Grainsby.
Only 10 years after WM Wright had given the trustees the freehold of the Chapel, it closed and, on 16th October 1956, he bought it back from them for £50.
The chapel then remained empty and unused until it was converted into a cottage by Christopher Ollard in the early 1970s.