INDEPENDENT CHAPEL 1766-7 Stockwell Head (near top, to left). 'Independent Meeting-house, built in 1766' (Nichols, Leicestershire, 697) after the congregation had been meeting in a barn.
The Evangelical Magazine records in 1850, 'The state of this church, for some time back, has not been that of prosperity' (482). The other references to this congregation are: ibid. (1837), 221; Congregational Year Book (1848-54. Info from Dr David L. Wykes, Dr. Williams's Library, Gordon Square, London).
Above, left: Photograph of Independent Chapel - about 1880 (LRO). Above, right: location of chapel (4) on Robinson's town plan of 1782, opposite Wesley's Methodist Meeting House (34).
In June 1860 a meeting was held in the chapel to approve a motion to build a new chapel with schoolrooms (Hinckley Journal, 30 June 1860). The old chapel was duly closed before 1866, when the new Congregational Chapel was opened in the Borough. White's Directory (1863) reported that it was soon to be pulled down, but the building survived and subsequently became part of a hosiery factory. Later (by 1875) it was the armoury of the Leicestershire (Hinckley) Volunteer Corps (Baxter, History of Hinckley, 844) and from 1895-1900 it was occupied by Hugill and Collins Ltd.
The photograph of the facade (about 1880?) at the county record office (above, left) shows a brick building with steeply pitched roof and symmetrical front of simple arched windows and doorways in a vaguely gothick style. H. J. Francis, The History of the Church of Christ of the Independent or Congregational denomination worshipping at Hinckley (1918), provides a detailed history of this chapel and its successor in The Borough.
See also CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH 1866
ISOLATION HOSPITAL (SUNNYSIDE) 1912-15. A formerly substantial Victorian house set in spacious grounds off the Ashby Road towards Barwell, erected about 1880. In 1902 it was the residence of Samuel Goode, Esq. and was depicted in the Illustrated Guide to Hinckley (1911).
Above: Sunnyside from the 1889 Ordnance Survey.
The first plans of the wards for the proposed conversion to an isolation hospital were presented to Hinckley Isolation Hospital Committee in December 1911 (Hinckley Times, 9 December 1911).
Above: Sunnyside/Isolation Hospital, about 1910.
The amended plans were approved by the Committee in August 1912 (see the Hinckley Times, 24 August 1912). The architect selected was Sidney J. Walker of Heaton and Walker and the cost was £5,000. The hospital was opened in 1915 by Lady Edge, wife of Sir William Edge, MP.
At LRO (DE 2793/8/18) are drawings for Hinckley Isolation Hospital administration block: proposed extra bedrooms. These comprise elevation, section, ground and first floor plans. By Heaton and Walker, architects and surveyors, Hinckley, Sept 1924. These include plans for an extension to the building comprising 'yard', WC, 'coats' on ground floor and two bedrooms on first floor. This formed an addition to the original Victorian house made up of nine bedrooms on first floor, and kitchen/dining room/matron's room/nurses' room etc on ground floor. Also at LRO (DE 2793/8/5) is a 'plan for proposed blocks for advanced cases of tuberculosis at Melton and Hinckley' by McCarthy, Collings & Co, architects and civil engineers, Central Chambers, Coalville, November 1924. This includes a letter from the Clerk to the County Council containing the Hinckley plan for the 'proposed pavilion'. Also (DE 2793/8/17) a sketch plan on tracing paper showing 'old pavilion', 'scarlet fever' pavilion, 'typhoid fever' pavilion and 'proposed new block'. This is also by MacCarthy, Collings & Co. Now called Sunnyside Hospital and, although geographically now connected to Hinckley, situated within the parish of Barwell.
Above: Rear of Sunnyside Hospital, 2005, shortly before total rebuilding.
IVY HOUSE It was situated at the entrance to the old workhouse yard, Lower Stockwell Head. (Later Council Road.) Built possibly before 1722, to serve the Great Meeting. John Jennings ran a dissenting academy here in 1722-3 and John Lane a boarding school in 1796-1807, which was continued by Herbert Jenkins from 1808-1811.
Education continued here until at last 1847, but from c.1870 Unitarian ministers ceased to live here. Demolished 1906 when Council Road was constructed, the Chapel Trustees building eight, existing, houses on the site. The house was large, L-shaped, with box-timbering visible at one gable end.
See the Hinckley Historian, 23 and 36. There is a good view of it in 300 Years 1672-1972 - Tercentenary Celebrations - The Great Meeting Unitarian Chapel (above). Photograph of c.1880-90 at LRO. See also GREAT MEETING.
[Abbreviations: AAS - Associated Architectural Societies reports. HUDC - Hinckley Urban District Council. LRO - Leicestershire Record Office. NMR - National Monuments Record (Swindon). NRO - Northamptonshire Record Office. RCHM - Royal Commission on Historical Monuments for England. TLAS - Transactions of the Leicestershire Archaeological Society. VCH - Victoria County History]
