Methodist Church, Box

From 1820 Methodists were meeting in the house of Samuel Roe in Mill Lane at Woodstock. The meeting was small but enthusiastic and in 1834 they built the Ebenezer Chapel in the High Street, on the site of the present Methodist Hall. In 1838 there were still only seven members but this had doubled to 14 by 1841. It is likely that more people than just the members came to the services. Over the next 50 years numbers increased and the original chapel was too small to accommodate them. The congregation engaged in a tremendous fund raising effort and built a new larger chapel alongside the old one at a cost of £1,200. The chapel was opened on February 6th 1897 and £500 of the cost had been raised by the opening day. In the early 20th century it was decided to build a hall and schoolrooms alongside the chapel and so the old Ebenezer chapel, previously used as a hall, and cottages on the High Street were demolished and a new hall and Sunday School classrooms built in 1907. In 2001 the Sunday School was sold and the money used to remodel the inside of the 1897 building in order that it could be used for Church and community activities. The website of the Church includes information on its history and that of Methodism in Box.