Wigan Album

An unusual thing(or is it?) 3 churches:- St Paul's. St John's and St Mary's, all within 100 yards of each other.

Ron. Not in any of the three mentioned churches would you get, in the present age, the same amount of congregation that you would have got in 1906, and times were much harder then. Today there is a lot to be thankful for.

Beware Ron as I once had my head chewed off for remarking that I found it unusual for two Pentecostal churches to be within a stones throw of each another in Leigh town centre, anyone would have thought I'd committed a mortal sin. LOL

The courtyard at the front later had cherry trees planted in there and they always looked spectacular every spring, there was also graves in there which were exhumed when the church closed in the early 1980s.

I'd always presumed the church to be built of solid stone, however when Len Gibson was renovating the building for offices it was found to be brick built with an outer skin of stone very much like how they now do cladding.

I remember going here for a job interview would be around 1989-90. By then the old church had been converted to offices for Wigan Metro Finance department. I seem to recall that the old Hope Street Congregation combined with St Paul's when Hope stret Church was demolished in the 1970's.

I seem to remember this church becoming a restaurant after Wigan Council stopped using it.

I think this church has now been converted into flats.

I wonder if it is haunted by ghosts ...

A very interesting history record of St Paul's church can be found here:- http://www.trinityurcwigan.org/history.html

An excerpt from the site.
In 1662 during the reign of Charles II, Ministers of the Established Church, were required to sign a declaration under the ‘Act of Uniformity’ accepting the Book of Common Prayer. Some 2000 pious and educated clergymen refused to sign and were ejected from the Church of England and forbidden to hold meetings of more than 5 people, excluding their families. These were known as Dissenters.

1695 Dissenters, from the Church of England, used a barn in Scholes, owned by Margaret Laithwaite, to practice their religion in. These dissenters later formed St. Paul’s Church.

The restaurant was Burridges Derek, it didn't last very long before closing though.

Does anyone know what happened to the bodies that were exhumed when the church closed?

I worked for social services in the early 90's the building was leased from Len Gibson I must admit I always had a shiver when near the bottom of the tower "could it have been a draught?" Not sure what happened to graves but remember the ground was heavily excavated during refurb would probably be documented on council building records .

Hi I'm adding information about this church onto my Uni work. Could anyone expand on the information about it being used for the council and a restaurant and also any dates (years would be fine). As i cant find anything much through the internet. Also when it was converted into apartments.