The Albany Chapel
Albany Street Chapel
Although the Albany Street Chapel (David Skae's architectural plan - See Edinburgh Dean of Guild Court 15 August 1815) is entered from Broughton Street, as it completes the south east end of the street it has been included in this account. The building was designed by David Skae and built by Messrs Peddie and Lumsden. Skae’s plan had its critics: ‘The scarcity of regular churches has occasioned an inundation of meeting houses, which are built in a very bad style. One, the appearance of which will be detestable, is about to be built in Albany Street.’ The Chapel, opened in 1816, was built for a congregation of Independents. This movement, sometimes called Separatists, was begun in the 16th century by congregations who wished to separate from the Church of England and form independent local churches. They were influentially politically in England during the time of the Commonwealth under Oliver Cromwell, who was, himself, a Separatist. Subsequently, they survived repression and gradually became an important religious minority. One group left England for Holland in 1608, and in 1620 some of them, the Pilgrims, settled at Plymouth, Massachusetts. A fundamental belief was the idea of the gathered church; that Christians of the same belief should combine to follow their agreed beliefs, in contrast to the territorial basis of the established church. This belief became a principal tenet of Congregationalism. The first minister at the chapel was the Reverend George Payne. In 1823, he moved to become President of the Lancashire Independent College in Blackburn, and was replaced by Gilbert Wardlaw who, in 1830, also moved to the Lancashire College. This college was an institution for training men: ‘devoted to the ministry at home or abroad of the Christian religion as professed by Protestants dissenting from the established Church of England, and from all other churches supported by or connected with the State.’ Wardlaw, who later became president of the college, wrote: ‘We are sadly broken-down in Lancashire…Religion has gone back, and the religious influence of our ministers and our body has declined within the last two or three years, and we shall need all help, human and divine, before we are right again.’ One of the early presentors at the chapel was John Hewitt, a silk hat maker, whose shop was on South Bridge. He was a composer and had several psalm tunes published.
Soon after the chapel was opened it was the scene of the grisly death described in this newspaper report. The pastor from 1833 to 1836 was the Reverend Henry Wilkes. His preaching was described thus: ‘His voice is rather weak, but his manner is admirable and his matter faultless.’ In 1826, Wilkes went to Canada to become pastor of the Congregational Church in Montreal. He was replaced by Alexander Fraser, who had trained at the Glasgow Theological Academy. At this time the average Sunday attendance at the chapel was 450. A few months later the Chapel was the venue for a meeting in support of a campaign for early shop-shutting. The meeting welcomed: ‘the present agitation for a curtailment of the hours of business…to us, and we would say to everyone not blinded by selfishness, that the movement has truth, justice, and even money on its side.’ In 1843, the Reverend Henry Grey of the London Missionary Society spoke at the Chapel, appealing for funds to enable the Society to send missionaries to China: ‘The peace with China having rendered that vast Empire now more accessible to Christian Missionaries, the Society has resolved to employ all means to increase the strength and efficiency of their Chinese Missions, and for adding to the number of Labourers already in the field.’ Alexander Fraser moved on, eventually becoming a minister in Melbourne, Australia, where he died in 1885. The Reverend William Pulsford became pastor in 1856 and, two years later, married Anna Hanson. In 1861, the Chapel held a ‘Great Bazaar’ to raise funds. Lottery tickets were sold and among the valuable prizes were: ‘a Handsome Rosewood Harmonium, a Walnut Easy Chair and Large and complete Sets of Heraldic Stamps’. However, a letter of complaint followed the prize draw, requesting that: ‘the managers would kindly announce, as is, I believe, the practice in such matters, who were the winners of the bracelets and the piano. At all events, such information would be satisfactory to myself and other subscribers who have heard nothing about these articles since we paid our crowns and half-crowns for pieces of pasteboard.’ Perhaps these grumbles added to Pulsford’s disenchantment with the position. He had become the Pastor with the ambition to give the church ‘an advanced position in the city’, but this required appropriate funding. The money raised by the bazaar and lottery fell far short of what he thought necessary. There may well have been doctrinal reasons as well. Whatever the reason, in 1864, Pulsford resigned. He appears to hint at promises made when he was appointed in his resignation being unfulfilled: ‘I blame no one, I may have been deceived but I felt that I could do no more. The question that will be asked, why do I leave now, just when the public have shown by their countenance of the bazaar so much goodwill and sympathy to the church – is one I cannot answer sufficiently.’ Pulsford moved to Liverpool and the Reverend James Cranbrook took over. One of Cranbrook’s early ‘discourses’ was on ‘Prayer in Relation to Divine Providence’ and The Scotsman reported: ‘The chapel was filled to overflowing, the passage, and even the stairs leading to the pulpit, being all crowded, and many unable to obtain admission.’ Yet Cranbrook’s popularity waned, and within two years tensions arose around Cranbrook’s religious doctrines. After a public airing of the dispute, he was forced to leave in 1867. This may have been responsible for a long bout of ill health that resulted in his death in 1869.
Internal dissensions calmed when, in 1868, Dr John Pulsford, the brother of the earlier minister, William Pulsford, was appointed, as he was a highly respected preacher. Robert T. Henry, in his book, The Golden Age of Preaching: Men Who Moved the Masses, wrote that Edinburgh was: ‘a veritable university of preaching. Notable preachers occupied the pulpits of the city such as Dr Matheson, the blind preacher, at St Bernard’s; Dr Walter Smith, the poet-preacher at Free High Church; Dr Landels, Dublin Street Baptist Church; and Dr John Pulsford, Albany Street Congregational Church.’ Edwin Paxton Hood, an English non-conformist and described Pulsford’s preaching as being: ‘Like the writing of Richter, it reminds us of all soft, soothing, lulling tones in Nature. The voices of flutes over the still mountain lakes at evening, or beneath the moonlight night — bells wafted on a calm Sabbath-day to a listener on the mountain height — an organ from some lake-girt and taper-illumined minster at midnight — such are the images which rise to our mind ; or, say in a word, it is the music of crystals shooting into shape, and beauty, and cohesion, - aerial, soft, but clear.'
Pulford’s arrival coincided with the re-opening of the Chapel after four months of extensive renovation. Changes included a revamped entrance, new pulpit, repairs to the organ, a new decorative ceiling and new sunlights to aid light and ventilation in the building.
In the early 1880s, the organist at the chapel was Mr Broatch. He was paid £60 per annum. As well as his employment at the Chapel, he played at concerts and also acted as a concert organiser. However, as he admitted when he appeared in the Bankruptcy Court, his grasp of business was poor. He explained to the court that due to illness over the winter, he had had not worked at all, which was why his finances were in a bad way and he had been unable to pay his rent. He expressed himself greatly unhappy at this state of affairs, for he had never owed money before. The court heard that his liabilities were £102, and that he had no assets. He offered to set a portion of his earnings towards paying off his debts and the court accepted his offer.
John Pulford left in 1884 and was followed by the Reverend A. B. Morris. He chaired a conference on the subject of non-church going. He reported that: ‘The church was about three-quarters filled, most of those present being ladies.’ And continued: ‘It is one thing to blame people for non-church going, and it is another thing to find out the real causes.’ Another speaker thought that the church must take some responsibility for the problem, but believed it also was: ‘due to the spirit and conditions of the time’. Yet it may have been that some non-attenders were put off by the internal tensions that yet again rose to the surface. This time the chapel’s ruling body, the deacons, were in dispute with Morris. In 1892, he was missing from the pulpit on three consecutive Sundays and on the third, the substitute minister read out a letter from him to explain why: ‘Dear Brethern, it has become my duty to acquaint you with the reasons for my absence from my pulpit. In doing so I am obliged to refer to a very painful experience. I was summoned to appear at a special meeting of deacons. At that meeting there was given to my mind and nervous system a shock that has rendered me unable to discharge my normal duties. Being greatly excited by certain accusations which were then made against me I requested the five deacons who made them to formulate them in writing. This they have refused to do.’
It transpired that the deacons had asked for Morris’s resignation, as they considered his preaching to be: ‘too scientific and not evangelical enough.’ They also charged him with neglect of is pastoral duties. A church meeting was called, presided over by a solicitor, Thomas Carmichael, who lived at Number 25. After what was described as a long and stormy meeting, the majority there expressed their support for Morris, and the deacons who had called for the resignation of Morris, all resigned from the church. A few months later, Carmichael, on behalf of the congregation, presented Morris with a silver salver, an autograph album and a purse with one hundred sovereigns. Carmichael complimented Morris on his ten years’ service to the chapel and said that the whole congregation hoped: ‘that he might long be spared in health and vigour to brighten and cheer their hearts and edify his congregation.’ Morris, clearly touched by those who had supported him throughout the disagreeable dispute, replied that his congregation had done much to confirm his confidence and promote his happiness.
In 1929, Scotland’s first woman minister, Rev Vera Findlay, of Patrick Congregational Church in Glasgow, addressed the congregation at the Albany Street church and it was reported that: ‘The fire of youth is still hers – she can only look back on a quarter of a century…In the few simple words she had to offer, she struck a note that is in tune with the best of modern thought when she appealed, with a certain impatience, of “different sects and creeds – what do they matter?”’
In 1936, the Reverend John Guthrie became the minister, having previously been minister of Oban Congregational Church.
The Chapel, which became called the Albany Street Congregational Church, closed around 1975. It is now the Edinburgh Assay Office. See Royal Visits The Edinburgh Assay Office is the last remaining Assay Office in Scotland and one of four which remain in the United Kingdom. The history of hallmarking at the Edinburgh Assay Office can be traced back to 1457 when the first hallmarking act of Scotland was created. It is an independent privately run business, owned by the Incorporation of Goldsmiths of the City of Edinburgh. Since 1457, the Deacon, or leader of the craft, assayed and marked the members' wares, but in 1681 a separate Assay Master was appointed to oversee this task. The first Assay Master was John Borthwick. The Incorporation's importance in the life of the city and country was confirmed in 1687 when King James VII granted it a Royal Charter. (1832 hallmark of Marshall & Sons - see Number 18)
