The village, also known as Newton-in-the-Isle, lies about four miles north of Wisbech.
Standing on High Road, the chapel was built in 1868 under the auspices of the Wisbech Circuit of the United Methodist Free Churches (United Methodist Church from 1907). It may have replaced an earlier chapel or meeting room of Wesleyan origin.
There was seating for 130 but no Sunday schoolroom.
Reporting on a ‘shocking amount of immorality’ surrounding a paternity case in 1877, the local press alluded to ‘certain acts of familiarity having taken place in the Free Methodist chapel of Newton’. Doubtless not on the circuit plan!
It closed around 1980. Two years later, planning permission was granted for change of use to an onion peeling plant. By 1988, it had been converted into a dwelling.
The datestone remains on the front gable, as does the defaced name plaque below it – was this as a result of Methodist Union (1932) perhaps, when some folk were quick to expunge the old labels of division?
Sources
Wisbech Chronicle 26th May 1877
Free Methodist Manual 1899
Methodist Church Buildings: Statistical Returns 1940
Fenland Citizen 21st April 1982
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