The history of Clayton Gospel Hall is bound up in part with that of the Village School, which is now The Library and stands on land given in 1819 by the, then, Lord of the Manor, Richard Hodgson. The school was erected by public subscription. The population at that time numbered some 600. Maintenance and use of the school were overseen by an elected committee of villagers

Before this time the inhabitants of Clayton had no place of worship or day school, although a building called The Poorhouse had been used for preaching. The Poorhouse stood, by the roundabout, on the site of the former Gatehouse Working Men’s Club, which has been a Co-operative convenience store since Boxing Day 2006. The nearest Churches were at Great Horton, Thornton and Queenshead (Queensbury). For many years Anglicans, Baptists, independent and Wesleyans preached in the village school but, in time, each denomination was enabled to build its own place of worship. Clayton now has five church buildings: Anglican, Roman Catholic, Methodist and Baptist, besides the Independent Gospel Hall.

The “Gospellers”.

Clayton roundabout, 1996.

It has been told that a preacher, travelling on horseback, came to Clayton and spoke at the Wells, the village place of assembly (now the roundabout). This visit could have been in the early 1870s. Subsequently a Christian movement began amongst a group of working class villagers, known locally as “the Gospellers”. At first, they had no recognised meeting place but met in members’ houses. At one such meeting in a house in Town End a young man seated on the staircase was much moved and experienced a great change of life. This young man, Richard Stammers, later became the senior elder in this local “Gospellers” Church, or “assembly” as members preferred to call it, taking to themselves the English translation of the New Testament ‘ekklesia’- although they would not have wished to be known as an ecclesiastical body.

Minutes of The Village School Committee (August 1880) record that the “Gospellers” were allowed to use the school room on one night a week and on Sundays at a rent of nine pence a week. Minutes for January 1887 record a list of elected Village School Committee members, among whom Mr. Richard Stammers is named. Later that year “the Gospellers” were the only religious body in regular occupation of the School, although secular groups made use of it. A succession of village schoolmasters taught there, parents of pupils paying for their children’s education in “school pence”. The school room was last used as a day school in 1898.

Over the years the “Gospellers” increased in number. However in 1906 a difficulty arose. The District Council proposed to use The Village School as a public library. The “Gospellers” tenancy of their place of worship was in jeopardy. They had not the resources to build a place of their own, nor perhaps the ability to present a convincing defence of their position to officialdom. But God’s help was at hand. A young gentleman had come to lodge in the village - Mr. Ransome Cooper.

Mr. Ransome Cooper.

 Mr. Ransome Cooper was a qualified industrial chemist in the field of textile dying. He came for a while to work in Bradford, where the expertise of the Bradford Dyers Association was known worldwide. He was a linguist, widely travelled on the continent. More importantly, for the “Gospellers” at Clayton Village School, he came from a flourishing Brethren Assembly in the south of England. He was to act as their advocate.

In order to arbitrate on the issue of the “Gospellers’” continued occupation of The Village School representatives of The Charities Commission presided over a public inquiry held in the schoolroom on 16^th July 1906. The following statement, on behalf of the “Gospellers”, was prepared and read by Mr. Cooper at this inquiry:

"A stone built into the wall of the schoolroom above the original entrance states that the building was erected by public subscription in 1819 to be a weekly Sunday school for ever, and an occasional preaching House for all denominations who acknowledge the Divinity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

This was occasioned by lack of any suitable accommodation for the various religious communities then to be found at or around Clayton; and each being too poor to erect its own chapel or meeting house, this schoolroom was erected by public subscription and used in turn by the various religious bodies.

By degrees, however, each was enabled to build a more convenient and exclusive place of worship, with the exception of those simple Christians who now meet, and for the past quarter of a century have met each Sunday and during the week for the worship of God. They have been and are still too poor to erect a building for themselves, and whilst in no wise claiming exclusive right of use, they pray to be allowed to use this schoolroom in the manner intended by the original subscribers to its erection.

That the need for which this schoolroom was erected has not passed away is evidenced by the fact that over 50 persons come more or less regularly to the Sunday morning meeting, and 80 or 90 on average attend the evening Gospel meeting, whilst the Sunday school, held twice on a Sunday numbers more than 120 scholars. Such a congregation and school is drawn almost exclusively from the poorest classes of this village.”

In the summing up it was stated that the local authority had gone beyond its strict legal rights in attempting to appropriate The Village School for the sole use as a library. The original declaration, setting out the primary use of the school, had swung the judgement of the Commissioners in favour of the “Gospellers” case.

A library was subsequently opened in the building but the “Gospellers” remained in occupation for many years. The memorial tablet, still to be seen at the present library inner wall, records in stone the legality of their claim.

For many years after leaving Clayton, Mr. Cooper kept in touch with the assembly there, each Christmas time sending a supply of scriptural calendars to be distributed among the members he had known.

The Gospel Hall - Building.

The framework of Clayton Gospel Hall is built (1927).

After the alarm of 1906, it was thought wise to begin a building fund. Twenty years of, what must have been modest but sacrificial, giving to this fund resulted in the purchase from the local council of a plot of land, formerly allotment gardens, where Back Lane joins Bradford Road.

Plans would be drawn up, probably by a member of an assembly at Bolton Woods who had a building contractor and who took a continuing interest in the work. No doubt through his offices some building material would be acquired. It was thought that a mortgage was taken out, trustees and guarantors having been appointed. Building began in 1926-1927.

Trenches were dug and foundations laid, the majority of the work from beginning to end being done by the members of the assembly in the evenings or on Saturdays. Wood was obtained, some of it second-hand from the Yorkshire Show ground of that year. A timber frame was raised . A local joiner, then based in Town End, was called in to construct the roof. Only a limited amount of brick and stone work was incorporated. The concrete and pebble-dash walls, still to be seen, have stood the test of time. Inner walls, ceiling and floor boarding were fitted. The installation of gas-lighting, plumbing, coke-boiler and heating pipes was overseen by a tradesman member of the assembly. A pulpit was built and pine seating provided.

Memory recalls the wives and sisters of the assembly regularly bringing refreshments to the men-folk who laboured so long and devotedly.

A more dramatic recollection is of a night in 1927 when, during a violent storm, a thunderbolt fell on a nearby building and telegraph poles in Bradford Road were struck and split apart. By the grace of God, not a window of Clayton Gospel Hall was broken.

Eventually, after painting and decorating and scrubbing of floors, the building stood ready for occupation. The opening ceremony was held on Saturday 10^th March 1928. It was snowing that day! Leaflets had been printed for the occasion and had been sent out to other Brethren assemblies in the Bradford area - at Girlington, Wyke, Odsal, Bolton Woods and Shipley. In the mid-afternoon of that Saturday a procession took place ‘from the free Library to the new Gospel Hall’.

The Gospel Hall - Church.

Whitsuntide Walk, led by Mr. Charlie Firth and Mrs. Nancy Clayton (1950).

Mr. Richard Stammers, by this time aged 72, ceremonially opened the door of Clayton Gospel Hall and welcomed members and guests. Later a festival tea was served in the Baptist schoolroom. The evening meeting was addressed by a local leader and by two visiting speakers.

During the 1930s the Gospel Hall continued to make its modest contribution to the spiritual life of the village: its communion service each Sunday morning for the baptised; its Sunday evening gospel meeting, open to all, conducted by lay speakers from other parts of the city and sometimes further a field; its morning and afternoon Sunday schools, with never fewer than 60 or 70 children on roll; its monthly distribution of Christian tracts in the Town End and Bradford Road areas of the village; its occasional evangelistic campaigns which from time to time have seen the hall filled to capacity. Conference weekends were held occasionally, at which members gathered from Bradford, Leeds and Halifax assemblies to be addressed by speakers drawn from distant parts - even from the metropolis - or by missionaries at home on furlough.

Older villagers may remember special weeknight children’s meeting featuring “magic lantern” displays; Sunday school Christmas parties and prize giving, with homely entertainment; the Whitsuntide Walk, followed by games and races in the field at the top of Middle Lane, with mugs of tea and Halford’s long-buns served to refresh parents and children.

Sadly, as years passed, membership dwindled - through deaths, removals and other eventualities - until in the early 1970s the situation appeared uncertain. However, there came a time when the congregation was reinforced by the migration of a like-minded group from Girlington who had lost the tenancy of their own meeting place. The ensuing part of the history of Clayton Gospel Hall is told in the following chapters.

Mr. Richard Stammers.

Mr. Richard Stammers, seated on the foundations of Clayton Gospel Hall, with his grandson Douglas Hartley - aged 4 (1927).

Mr. Richard Stammers, senior elder of “the Gospellers” and the man who ceremonially opened the doors of Clayton Gospel Hall, died in August 1928. He had lived to see the conclusion of the building enterprise.

Mr. Stammers was not a native to Yorkshire but came as a young man from Norfolk, probably around 1875. He would be part of the movement of labour from agricultural to industrial England. He found work at Beck Mill (the “Old Mill”, Reva Syke) which has been leased by J. Benn and Co., advertised as ‘worsted spinners’. He worked not in the spinning sheds but in the stables across the cobbled lane. He was the waggoner and in charge of the horses. He married the eldest daughter of Isaac England, farmer at White Acre, Baldwin Lane. In later life they lived in part of Holme House, Reva Syke Road, now demolished. Before its division into three houses Holme House had been the dwelling of Alfred Wallis, who moved from there to the newly erected Glenholme.

To the end of his life Mr. Stammers remained a humble working man but known and respected in the village. A cutting from the Telegraph & Argus of 12^th August 1928 records:

The attendants in Clayton fairground stopped the whole amusements and stood with uncovered heads whilst the funeral cortege of Mr. Richard Stammers, a well known religious worker, passed the fairground on its way (from the Gospel Hall) to the parish Church.

A memorial headstone still stands in the churchyard of St. John the Baptist’s parish church, Clayton. It was erected by Mr. W. H. Benn in recognition of 50 years’ faithful service to the firm.

Chapter Two

The Kensington fellowship, from 1978-2008

This chapter has been produced, with thanks, by information provided by Pastor Peter Benn and brings Mr. Hartley’s history up to date, completing the history of Clayton Gospel Hall and the fellowships that have occupied it.

Mr. Charlie Firth’s Offer.

An offer, from the assembly at Clayton, of the gift to the Kensington Hall assembly of the hall at Clayton, was considered in detail. Brethren considered that, on the whole, the offer appeared to be acceptable, but the feelings of the whole assembly should be sought and, above all, there should be the certainty in all our hearts that such a move is the Lord’s will for us. The matter is to be put before the assembly fellowship meeting on Sunday April 2^nd.

The Girlington fellowship accepted. This blessing had followed a rejection of their application for permanent tenancy in Kensington Hall and the selling of “the tabernacle site”, which had also been considered. The Firths were assured that the hall would continue to be used for the purposes for which it was built and the Girlington fellowship had assurance of a permanent place of worship. The handover took place in April 1978 and a new era, in Clayton, began.

Mr. Charlie Firth was welcomed into the incoming fellowship and remained in attendance at the Gospel Hall until his death the following year. The words ‘With Christ - 3.2.79’ mark his passing, simply, in the register of attendance at monthly general meetings. Following this Mr. Edward (Ted) Hessey continued Mr. Firth’s duty of visiting Oakleigh Nursing, on a monthly basis, to administer communion there to Mrs Myra Muff. Just as Mr. Stammers had lived long enough to see Clayton Gospel Hall opened so Mr. Firth had lived long enough to see that its future was secure.

Kensington Hall

The fellowship that is now in occupation of Clayton Gospel Hall began when, in the late 19^th century, a group of believers broke away from a church, that met somewhere near the bottom of Thornton Road, to form their own independent assembly. The fellowship was permitted to rent Kensington Hall from 1896 to 1978 and could boast of similar activities to that of the Brethren assembly in Clayton.

One of the most prominent ministries that the church supported was the missionary work, in Zambia, begun by its member, Mr. Barry Haigh, and his wife, Mrs Rachel Haigh. The fellowship commissioned Mr. Haigh, a one time resident of Girlington, to go out to Zambia as a missionary in the 1960s. Upon their return to the United Kingdom, in 2006, Mr. & Mrs Haigh joined a fellowship in the Midlands, native to Mrs Haigh. Their work in Zambia is still being continued by others today.

As with most churches membership declined due to the change in British society after the Second World War but as many as 75 members can be recorded as late on as the early 1960s. 37 members (approx.) were in attendance in 1978, when the move to Clayton occurred. The fellowship, however, saw no more than around 20 committed members from 1984 up until to 2008. The current ambition of many is to see current growth continue so that the hall is filled once again.

Kensington Hall, situated on the corner of Kensington Street and Willow Street in Girlington, was also used as a dancing hall and library. Only the library still remains today and little of the promised refurbishment has taken place. Instead, a new community centre was built further up the street. Brethren assemblies, similar to what the fellowship used to be like in Girlington and early on in Clayton, still exist today in Bankfoot and on Rebecca Street, in the city centre.

A New Era.

The text above the pulpit, inside the hall.

In April 1978 the Girlington fellowship took possession of Clayton Gospel Hall and immediately closed it down for refurbishment, prior to re-opening on Sunday 22^nd October of the same year. The initial intention was to re-name the building “Kensington Gospel Hall, Clayton” but this never materialised. A baptistery was created, central heating and fluorescent lights were installed, wooden panelling was placed on the inner walls and both the insides and outsides of the building were painted.

The new trustees appointed were Mr. Trevor Hughes, Mr. Paul Varley, Mr. Ralph Denny (treasurer), Mr. Edward Hessey (retiring elder), Mr. David Jowett and Mr. Peter Benn (new elders). Eventually, due to the deaths of Mr. Hessey and Mr. Hughes and the departing from the fellowship of the others, Mr. Benn became known as “the Continuing trustee” and , as the sole leader of the fellowship, he was also given the title of “Pastor” in the early 1990s.

The minutes of 28/1/1980 record that ‘It was decided to have a text at the front of the hall: ‘He cares for you.’ This text, from 1 Peter 5:7, still remains as a summary of what Clayton Gospel Hall stands for and is read by every person that enters into the hall. The fellowship’s aim is to show the love of Christ to the community of Clayton.

The fellowship continued services, such as the Sunday morning communion and Sunday evening family service. Tuesday bible study was originally held at the home of Mr. David Jowett and later moved to the hall itself. Women began to contribute to services in spoken prayer from the early 1980s and a women’s prayer meeting began on Wednesday afternoons. This was originally held at the hall but the illness of life-long member, Miss Enid Bower, led to the women’s meeting being held at her home and communion being brought to her. After Miss Bower’s death, in 2004, it was decided to continue holding the women’s meetings in homes, rather than return to the hall, and so Miss Margaret Sinclair became the new host. A men’s prayer meeting was also started at the home of Pastor Peter Benn and a women’s bible study was begun by Miss Jackie Holdsworth on Tuesday mornings. Various musicians have also played at Clayton Gospel Hall through the years.

Many members now join in with separate weekend retreats for men and women, to Scotland, as organised by Calvary Chapel, Motherwell. The ladies also organise an annual retreat, each July.

Out-reach.

The scene at a faith supper, 2006.

Since the turn of the 21^st Century the main form of evangelism amongst adults has been monthly faith suppers, taking place on a Saturday evening. Here the fellowship provides a free meal and a gospel talk is given to introduce non-believers to Christ. These have provided the fellowship with an opportunity to invite outsiders to a more informal occasion and the success of these has seen newcomers be converted and welcomed into the church. Through such ministries the fellowship hopes to grow and continue making disciples of Christ in Clayton.

Children’s ministry.

Children's Summer Holiday Club, 2008.

Children’s work took place on Wednesday nights and a youth night was begun by Mr. Peter Benn, on Thursday nights for teenagers. This youth night was moved to Wednesdays in 1983, to follow on from the younger “Sunshine Special” meeting. Decreasing numbers led to these two groups being merged into one, in 1999, and the youth group has continued as such ever since. Groups of siblings can now come together that were prohibited to by the split age groups. The former Sunday schools were ended in September 1983, an alternative crèche being provided in members’ homes to enable parents to attend the Sunday morning service. During the 1990s the children of members would be taken into one of the smaller rooms during the sermon. This developed into the current Sunday school system when non-Christian children also began coming to the services. The current Sunday school caters for children up to the age of twelve.

In 1997, following the success of the “Riding the Wave” mission that was led by evangelist Mr. Mark Greenwood in the previous year, the children’s ministry was extended to the running of summer holiday clubs throughout the six weeks holiday, for two hours each morning. The holiday club still runs on every morning, except bank holidays, for four or five weeks each summer and often for the two weeks of Easter. A monthly youth club, “God's People”, was begun on Saturdays (later moving to Fridays) in 2007, by youth pastor Christopher Rushton, to maintain the interest of youths in their teens and twenties.

Pastor Peter & Mrs Lyn Benn.

Pastor & Mrs. Benn, 2006.