Sheffield Cemetery Road Baptist Church History

SHEFFIELD:
Sheffield Cemetery Road Baptist Church History up to 1912.

The Cemetery Road Church, which appears next in order of time, represents the incoming of a stream of Baptist life other than that which flowed so richly from Townhead. During the years, several General Baptists had come to reside in Sheffield. The difference between the two communities is thus defined by Mr. Larom:- "they are Low Arminians, those of our body High Calvinists." In 1837, a young man-Cornelius Atkinson-came from the ancient General Baptist Church at Retford. Retford hesitated to grant a transfer to Townhead, and Townhead was equally hesitant about receiving him.

Discovering others like-minded with himself, they gathered together for worship in a house in Rockingham Street, from thence removing to the Assembly Rooms, where, in 1839, eleven of them united in Church fellowship. In 1841, they called as their pastor Rev. T. H. Hudson, and, rapidly progressing, purposed immediately "to build a house unto the name of the Lord." The next year saw them in their own chapel at Eyre Street, but soon to be deprived of their pastor, who departed for missionary work in China.

During the following ministry serious trouble arose over the use of fermented wine at the Lord's Supper. In the Rev. Henry Ashbery's ministry (1851-64), they found their chapel too strait for them. The property was sold, and the Church removed to its present home. Here they had wisely acquired ground sufficient for future wide extensions. The building, opened on May 12th, 1859, was speedily justified by the increasing prosperity of the cause. In the advent of Rev. Giles Hester (1865-79) the Church found itself possessed of a man of exceptional ability. Of wide culture, and varied interests, he exerted a powerful influence in the city; his removal, owing to enfeebled health, was recognised as a great loss.

In 1883, the Rev. E. Carrington began a ministry which continued for twenty-two years. In its jubilee year the Church emancipated itself from debt, and almost immediately began the erection of new schools at a cost of 4150 This was entirely defrayed in 1909. The Rev. E. Price, B.A., B.D., succeeded Mr. Carrington, and in a brief but strenuous ministry of fourand-a-half years led his people successfully into several new fields of service. He resigned, in 1910, to undertake the Principalship of Calabar College, Jamaica, and was succeeded by Rev. C. E. Shipley.