The Congregational Church Schoolrooms now called The Glenorchy Centre
The schoolrooms, situated on Chapel Lane, were built by the Congregationalists in 1857 because the church was not big enough to accommodate their expanding Sunday school. The children on the church books numbered about 100 at that time. This continued well into the 20th century.
The building was also used as ‘The British School’ for a time before becoming the first non-fee paying school in Wirksworth. It is Grade 2 listed.
This continued until the First World War. My mother- in- law, who was born in 1903 could remember walking down Chapel Lane and Coldwell Street in a ‘crocodile’ from the schoolrooms to the new senior school at Newbridge in 1912.
During the intervening years between the 2 World Wars it was used as a space for social events by the church and also as an ‘overflow’ from the infant and junior schools and also to serve school dinners. This continued after the Second World War and into the 1960’s, so within living memory. After the 2nd World War it was also used for a short time as a Labour Exchange. How many people living in Wirksworth today will remember going to school or having their dinner there? It would be interesting to find out.
The church also used it for social events such as bazaars, pantomimes and concerts. The ‘Congregational Players’ used to perform plays there and ‘The Glenorchy Glee Club’ started life there. The building has been many things to many people in Wirksworth. However, as society changed and with the advent of cinemas, television and the motor car people turned away from the local churches for their social and leisure time, so the church had to find a new use for the schoolrooms and in 1980 the congregation had to look at ways in which we could find another purpose for the building and still keep ‘community use’ in mind. So, The Glenorchy Centre was born. (The name comes from The Glenorchy Chapel which was pulled down when the A6 was widened at Masson Mill in Cromford. The chapel had originally been built by Arkwright’s workers, but was taken over by Lady Glenorchy, a Scottish noble woman who was visiting Matlock Bath to ‘take the waters’. It became a Congregational Church and was subject to a compulsory purchase order when the road was widened and the money was awarded to Wirksworth Congregational Church and was ultimately used to part fund the conversion of the schoolrooms into The Glenorchy Centre.)
After a lot of hard work by the congregation and involvement from people in the town and other churches the centre opened its doors in 1983 as residential self- catering group accommodation. Over the years we have welcomed all sorts of people young as well as older from all walks of life, some local and some further afield and the centre has been very successful both as residential accommodation with church use running along side when the centre wasn’t let.
Now, however, people’s tastes have changed once more and the building has been less used. The congregation now want to look forward once again to what the future holds for this venerable old building which has served the church and community so well over the last 170 years.
I would like to thank the older people in the congregation and the town for the information they have given me and also a member of our congregation who carried out research for his booklet entitled ‘Non-Conformity in Wirksworth’ published in 2000 to coincide with the 300th anniversary of the ‘Dissenting Chapel’ in Wirksworth which became the Congregational Chapel and is now The United Reformed Church.
Maureen Butlin.