Bentham Quaker Meeting House and Burial Ground Walls

Bentham Quaker Meeting House and Burial Ground Walls

A Quaker Meeting House built in 1798, with later alterations including work in the 20th century by architect Michael Sykes. The building is constructed of roughly-coursed rubblestone with ashlar dressings, timber gutters carried on stone corbels, and a stone slate roof.

The rectangular building stands within the Quaker burial ground to the west of Burton Road, oriented north-south. It contains a full-height single-storey main meeting room with a gallery above the cross-passage and former women's business room. A gable roof incorporates a chimney stack to the north gable, and all window openings have stone surrounds.

The main east elevation comprises four bays. From left to right these are: two large twelve-over-twelve sash windows, a small gable-roofed porch, then a 19th-century three-over-three sash window at ground floor with an eight-over-eight sash window above lighting the gallery. The porch is built in tooled ashlar with a low plinth and impost band. Its gable end forms a simple pediment surmounted by a ball finial. The north and south gable ends are blind except for a built-up window to the south gable, and the chimney stack to the north gable projects slightly. The rear west elevation in three bays contains from right to left a large twelve-over-twelve sash window lighting the main meeting room, a fixed four-pane window lighting the gallery staircase, and a small sash window at ground floor with an eight-over-eight sash window above lighting the gallery.

The eastern porch leads to an entrance doorway that incorporates a lintel dated 1718, re-used from an earlier meeting house that stood approximately 300 metres to the south. A six-panelled door with iron latch opens into a stone-paved cross-passage. Centrally-placed door openings in the cross-passage walls provide access to rooms to north and south, while the gallery's stone-built dogleg staircase is fitted into its west end. This staircase has stick balusters, a closed string, square newels and a plain moulded handrail.

The main meeting room to the south has plainly plastered walls with fielded panelling dado reaching to the base of the window openings on the east and west walls. The south wall contains the Elders' Stand occupying the full room width, including two raked fixed benches with fielded panelling to the front bench and two short flights of steps at either end. Wrought iron folding brackets fitted to the rear of the front panelling formerly supported a missing hinged table. The floor is of wide pine boards, and the flat ceiling of pine tongue-and-groove boards dates to 1975. The doorway on the meeting room side has an architrave with fluted pilasters and a cornice supporting the gallery balustrade beyond.

The former women's business room to the north of the cross-passage has been altered and is now sub-divided into utility rooms. A six-panelled door opens into a kitchen, and the passage wall at the east end has been replaced with new partitions forming conveniences in the north-east corner. The gallery above the passage and utility rooms has a sloping floor supporting fixed raked benches and a balustrade overlooking the main meeting room with slender turned balusters carrying a moulded handrail.

The meeting house stands in the north-east quarter of a large square burial ground enclosed by mortared stone walls approximately 2 metres tall with half-round copings. The main entrance on the east side, aligned with the meeting house porch, has gate piers formed of tooled ashlar quoins. A small recent gateway in the south wall provides access to adjoining allotments.