A Social History
Part One: The Start of Methodism
The Growth of St Just
St Just in the mid to late 1700’s was on the cusp of major change. The landscape, already marked from the small-scale tin mining benefitting only the wealthy local landowners is beginning to see investment in deeper copper mining. Martyn’s 1746 map shows only one copper mine in the St Just parish, roughly approximating with Cock. At this time the later development at Levant, Botallack and St Just United are still on the horizon. The local families divide their time and thus ensuring their survival through a combination of mining, farming and fishing. It was this St Just that the Wesley brothers first visited in 1743 and immediately spotting an unmet need within the parish community who had become both geographically and spiritually distant to the Anglican Church[5]. “Here it is” Charles Wesley wrote “that I expect the largest harvest.”[6] This St Just, consisted of a cluster of buildings surrounding the Church, most of Fore Street, the northern part of Market Square and the Plen-an-Gwarri, a population that was dispersed, largely rural and relatively small.
Charles Wesley’s visit to St Just on 30th July 1743 was the first of over 30 visits made by the Wesley brothers to St Just over the course of the next 40 years[7]. His visit swiftly followed by John’s, who preached from the Town Cross on the 10th of September of the same year, and returning a year later to find that the society was fully active[8]. However, the history books do not omit the work that was carried out prior to the Wesley brother’s arrival. Williams, from St Ives is said to have been the first Methodist preacher in St Just, preaching from the Plen, without a book, and acquiring the rather unfortunate nickname of the ‘Mad Priest’ prompting John Wesley to reflect that is was, “They admitted me into this Society, and not I them.”[9] It is during the 1744 visit that John Wesley states that “It is remarkable that those of St. Just were chief of the whole County for Hurling, Fighting, Drinking and all manner of wickedness but many of the lions have become lambs[10].” There is a rumour that Carn Praunter (the Carn of the Preacher in Cornish) in the mid Kenidjack Valley was so named after one of the Wesley’s had preached there to a large crowd of locals sitting on the valley slopes to the north. The Wesley’s, and other travelling preachers, took their hospitality from the Inn owned by William Chenhalls, directly opposite the parish church, the site of the first Methodist meetings. That building remains today but as a private home.
Although welcomed by huge numbers of ‘ordinary’ people who found little relevance in the parish church, the Wesley brothers were no strangers to trouble. Their presence led to the reading of the riot act and warrants for their arrest[11]. They were preaching against the backdrop of the Jacobite Rebellion, Methodism viewed by wealthy landlords as a potential threat to order. Despite the fact that the Wesley’s were Anglicans themselves, attended church services and whose aim was the reform of Anglicanism, not replace it. In St Just, the chief persecutors were two families, ‘Madron’ who lived in the Church Town itself and Eustick, of the Botallack estate[12]. John Wesley was almost twice arrested via a warrant signed by Dr. William Borlase and other travelling preachers also succumbed to similar treatment.
Yet, this accomplished nothing to stem the tide to the growth of the Methodist movement. Their message: one of personal salvation through grace, a recognition that transformation required the support of a community, this preaching of self-improvement was pulling this community together.
John Wesley kept diaries from 1725 to 1791, the year of his death. Contained within them are fascinating insights into his visits to St Just which show the gradual progression from the weekly cottage class meetings held at William Chenhells Inn (c.1744), to the first dedicated Meeting Room on North Row used for twelve years (c.1745-1756). John Wesley was in St Just again (13th September 1755) to preach from the foundation stone of the newly built chapel on what is now Cape Cornwall Road. Returning again in 1757 to preach within the chapel and saying “I preached in the new house at St. Just, the largest and most commodious in the County”.[13] On a visit in 1766, the congregation was so large that this ‘largest’ Chapel in the county couldn’t accommodate it, and once more John Wesley preached in the open air. The final visit of John Wesley is recorded as the 20th of August 1789. A decade later in 1798 the Chapel was widened by 28 feet to accommodate the still growing congregation, in 1818 the end gallery added. Finally, it was decided that there was no further option for expansion, it was no longer big enough.
This first part of this social history began with the question, where to start. Starting in the obvious place of the build of the chapel itself, would have discounted the c.100 years of history preceding and the foundations of the town’s identity that was the reason itself for the build. Two brothers and a small group of peers had travelled the length and breadth of the country, building the Methodist movement at a time when the population had been largely disillusioned by the Anglican Church. Here in St Just, despite the persecution of the movement, the town was rapidly building the ‘largest society in Cornwall[14]’ Organising itself around the Methodist principals and laying the groundwork for the generations to follow. Generations that in the next century would work hard, play hard, learn, innovate and begin taking their skills, language and methodist message across the globe.
[5] Cornish Studies Resources, (2025)
[6] Penwith Local History Group (2023a)
[7] Ibid
[8] MH book
[9] Penrose., (1933)
[10] Ibid
[11] Penwith Local History Group (2023a)
[12] Penrose., (1933)
[13] Penrose., (1933)
[14] John Wesleys’ Diaries
A forest stands on foreign lands, evergreen pitch pine whispering in the wind. If we stand long enough, we might hear the chatter of birds but there is something more industrious attracting attention. The sound of metal pushing through wood, the scent of almost burned pine and then a chorus of voices as the mighty tree falls. The trunk is split to timbers and transported to the waiting ships and a voyage. Sailing, timber on timber, through storms and sunny days, against and with the prevailing wind, under moonlit, star filled nights, through shrouded, clouded evenings. For leagues, until in the distance the first sight of land, a granite kingdom that is breathing tirelessly, hungry for the timber that is feeding its innovation. A port, the clamour of activity as they are hauled from the ships and loaded for the last part of their journey. There are roads now, the old rough paths transformed to take the weight and number of goods and materials transported to and from the mines. A group of small children stop to watch as these timbers arrive in their town, a procession forms, and they decide to follow. Through the Market Square, past the Plen-an-Gwarri, and down to the open downland. Unloaded, the timbers join the granite that has been blasted from the quarry, lying ready and waiting to feel the skilled hands of the community, and local contractors to start work.
Perhaps it is fanciful to have imagined the journey of the roof timbers, but the sheer scale of the operation is something that has captured the imaginations of the St Just community. The origin of the timber is unknown, but it is likely to have come from either Norway, or the virgin forest of the north American seaboard[1]. These were the sources of most of the pitch pine used in Cornish mines. There is much discussion of where it could have come into port, whisperings of being beached off Porthleddan but it is probable that it would have come into Penzance or even Hayle, which was a major import export port of the time and fed most of west Cornwall’s mines with coal and took their resultant copper ore to South Wales for smelting[2]. And likewise, the granite. Exactly where the granite came from is somewhat uncertain. Whilst the frontage of the 1860 rebuild is thought to have come from Lamorna, that used for the remainder of the building looks like typical local tabular granite. But where was the quarry? Possibly some from the small quarry on Carn Bosavern, possibly from that at Carn Praunter in the Kenidjack Valley, possibly from the quarry near the airport. But none of them seem large enough to have supplied all the building stone used in the great building phase in St Just in the 1830s and 40s. Some would have been dressed moor stone from fields, and moors, some might have been mine waste.
As with all things historical, there is always the question, where to start? We could have started with moment the doors opened for Divine Service on the 27th of September 1833[3]. Or perhaps the laying of the Foundation Stone, in 1832 by Reverend John Hobson, Superintendent of the Penzance Circuit at the time. But to understand the social history of the St Just Methodist Chapel, we need to go back further.
In 1729, John Wesley has returned to Oxford University to take up teaching duties. His younger brother Charles is still an undergraduate, and finally taking a more studious approach to his learning and his faith. Together, John, Charles and his circle of friends begin such a regular, methodical, schedule of study and religious observance that they are nicknamed the Methodists[4].
[1] Sharpe (personal communication) and Tomlison and Norseng (2024)
[2] Adam Sharpe (Personal Communication)
[3] Royal Cornwall Gazette, (1883)
[4] Wesley Memorial Church Oxford, (2025)