Pilgrim Uniting Church

Pilgrim Uniting Church is a Uniting church located on Flinders Street, Adelaide in South Australia.

Pilgrim Uniting Church
34°55′37″S 138°36′03″E / 34.926891°S 138.600926°E / -34.926891; 138.600926
Location	Flinders Street, Adelaide, South Australia
Country	Australia
Denomination	Uniting (since 1977)
Previous denomination	Congregational (1865 – 1977)
Website	pilgrim.org.au
History
Former name(s)	Stow Memorial Church Union Church in the City
Status	Church
Founded	7 February 1865 (1865-02-07)
Dedication	Rev. Thomas Quinton Stow
Dedicated	12 April 1867
Architecture
Functional status	Active
Architect(s)	Robert George Thomas
Architectural type	Church
Style	Gothic Revival
Specifications
Capacity	1,500
Materials	Glen Osmond stone
Administration
Synod	South Australia
Clergy
Minister(s)	Rev. Mark Hewitt Rev. John Hughes
Laity
Organist(s)	Peter Kelsall Christopher Bridge

Social justice, as articulated by the Uniting Church in Australia in the inaugural Statement to the Nation (1977), and the Statement to the Nation (1988) for Australia's Bicentennial celebrations, is at the basis of the church's work. Pilgrim offers music programs to the public, and has the largest organ in Adelaide.

History

Pirie Street Wesleyan Church

The congregation was originally at the Gawler Place Wesleyan Chapel. The first minister at the Pirie Street site was Daniel Draper.^[1][2] The first service was held on 19 October 1852.^[3]

William Bowen Chinner was organist and choirmaster at Pirie Street from 1869 to around 1899. His nephew Norman Chinner filled the same positions from 1939.^[4]

Stow Memorial Church

The first Congregational chapel in South Australia was a temporary structure on North Terrace. George Strickland Kingston was the architect for a building in Freeman Street (now Gawler Place), with the congregation then moving to the Flinders Street site.^[5]

Stow Memorial Church, at 12 Flinders Street, Adelaide, was named in memory of the Reverend Thomas Quinton Stow, who had officiated at the first service in a tent on Adelaide's Park Lands in October 1837. The foundation stone was laid on 7 February 1865^[6] and the inaugural worship service was held on 12 April 1867.^[7] The first minister was Cadwallader William Evan. The organist, who served for 45 years, was James Shakespeare.^[8]

Union Church in the City

Pirie Street Methodist and Stow Memorial congregations united on 1 June 1969 to form the Union Church in the City. In November 1975 the church changed its name to become Pilgrim Church.^[9] The congregation joined the Uniting Church at its inauguration in 1977.

Buildings

Pirie Street

The foundation stone for the Pirie Street Wesleyan Chapel was laid on 15 July 1850.^[10] The church was designed by Henry Stuckey. Completion of the building, after Henry Stuckey's death in 1851, was under the supervision of Edmund Wright,^[10]

After the merger of the two congregations the building was bought by the Adelaide City Council and demolished in 1976.^[11] Wright was also the architect of the Methodist Meeting Hall, located between the Pirie Street and Flinders Street churches. The hall was built in 1862 and is the only remaining part of the Pirie Street property and is now part of the Adelaide Town Hall complex.

Flinders Street

The foundation stone of Stow Memorial Church, at 12 Flinders Street, Adelaide, was laid on 7 February 1865.^[7] It was designed in the Gothic Revival style^[12] by Robert George Thomas, who was among the first colonists, arriving in South Australia in 1836 aged 16 years.^[13]

Stow Hall, built 1872^[14] alongside at 16 Flinders Street, has been a popular venue for amateur theatre productions.^[15]

Organs

The organ in the Flinders Street building was initially installed in 1855 in the Pirie Street building^[16] with that from Flinders Street being sold to St John's Lutheran Church in Malvern.^[17] Improvements over the years have made it the largest organ in the state of South Australia.^[18]

Notable people

Pirie Street Methodist Church

• Henry Adams
• John and Mary Colton^[1][19]
• John Langdon Bonython
• Daniel Draper^[1][20]
• Benjamin Gould
• Frank Hambly^[21]
• John Hill
• Henry Howard (Minister 1902–1921)
• James Wedlock

Stow Memorial Church

• Mostyn Evan
• William Roby Fletcher, minister, appointed 1876
• Matthew Goode
• William Muirden^[22]
• William Parkin
• Arthur William Piper^[23]
• James Zimri Sellar^[24]
• Thomas Hyland Smeaton
• Alfred Depledge Sykes, minister 1904–1906 and 1907–1913^[25]
• Charles Todd^[26]
• George Wright (1917–1975), a judge of the Supreme Court of Western Australia, was the son of the Reverend George H. Wright, a minister at the Stow Memorial Church

Pilgrim Uniting Church

• Judith Blake^[27]
• Thea Gaia^[28]
• Basil Hetzel
• Penny Wong

Laneway renaming

In August 2022, the City of Adelaide renamed the laneway adjacent to the church, formerly Pilgrim Lane, to Paul Kelly Lane, after Paul Kelly, a well-known musician who grew up in Norwood. This was the fourth such renaming by the council, to honour musicians associated with the city.^[29]

Gallery

Church buildings relating to the Pilgrim Uniting Church congregation

•  

  The first Congregational chapel in South Australia (building on right) SLSA B-467

•  

  Gawler Place Wesleyan Chapel Engraving from a work by C. W. Calvert 1842 SLSA B-4500

•  

  View of the Wesleyan church in Pirie Street, Adelaide, demolished in 1976 SLSA B 62412-8

•  

  Stow Memorial Church (now Pilgrim Church), Flinders Street, Adelaide, about 1870 SLSA B 1941

References

1. "Odd Aspects Of City Church's Centenary". The Advertiser. Adelaide. 8 July 1950. p. 2. Retrieved 9 January 2016 – via National Library of Australia.
2. Hambly, William Frank (Frank) (1966). "Draper, Daniel James (1810–1866)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 9 January 2016.
3. "Opening Of The New Wesleyan Chapel, Pirie-Street". Adelaide Times. SA. 20 October 1851. p. 3. Retrieved 10 January 2016 – via National Library of Australia.
4. "Farewell Social to Mr. Norman Chinner, LRSM". Australian Christian Commonwealth. Vol. 52, no. 2636. South Australia. 28 April 1939. p. 3. Retrieved 24 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
5. Freeman Street Congregational Chapel, Adelaide Memories, State Library of South Australia
6. "The Stow Memorial Church". The South Australian Advertiser. Vol. VII, no. 2038. 8 February 1865. p. 2. Retrieved 18 February 2017 – via National Library of Australia.
7. "Stow Memorial Church". South Australian Register. Adelaide. 15 April 1867. p. 3. Retrieved 8 January 2016 – via National Library of Australia.
8. "A Veteran Organist". The Register (Adelaide). Vol. LXXI, no. 18, 473. South Australia. 27 January 1906. p. 7. Retrieved 25 August 2020 – via National Library of Australia.
9. Libraries Australia Authorities on Union Church in the City
10. "New Wesleyan Chapel, Pirie-Street". South Australian Register. Adelaide. 16 July 1850. p. 3. Retrieved 8 January 2016 – via National Library of Australia.
11. Pirie Street Methodist Church at Adelaide City Heritage, National Trust of Australia accessed 8 January 2016
12. Stow Memorial Church at Adelaide City Heritage, National Trust of Australia accessed 8 January 2016
13. Christine Sullivan, (2008), Architects of South Australia: Robert George Thomas, Architecture Museum, University of South Australia http://www.architectsdatabase.unisa.edu.au accessed 8 January 2016
14. "Adelaide City Heritage: Stow Hall". National Trust of South Australia. Retrieved 2 October 2022.
15. "Stow Hall". The Advertiser (Adelaide). South Australia. 6 September 1937. p. 12. Retrieved 2 October 2022 – via National Library of Australia.
16. Pilgrim Uniting (formerly Stow Congregational) Church, Organ Historical Trust of Australia
17. Organs in Malvern, South Australia, Organ Historical Trust of Australia
18. Pilgrim Uniting (Congregational) Church, Organ Historical Trust of Australia
19. Jones, Helen (2005). "Colton, Mary (1822–1898)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 11 January 2016.
20. Hambly, William Frank (Frank) (1966). "Draper, Daniel James (1810–1866)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 9 January 2016.
21. Hunt, Arnold D. (1996). "Hambly, William Frank (1908–1972)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 9 January 2016.
22. Condon, Brian (1986). "Muirden, William (1872–1940)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
23. Piper, R. W. (1988). "Piper, Arthur William (1865–1936)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
24. Warburton, Elizabeth (1988). "Sellar, James Zimri (1830–1906)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
25. Hilliard, David (1990). "Sykes, Alfred Depledge (1871–1940)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
26. Symes, G. W. (1976). "Todd, Sir Charles (1826–1910)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
27. Pilgrim Church website
28. Peacock, Glenys (2 July 2016). "thea Gaia née Dorothy Ivy Wacker: Feminist Foremother and a Great "Ponderer"". Feminism & Religion. Retrieved 8 March 2022.
29. Davies, Richard (4 August 2022). "Adelaide City Council renames laneway in honour of musician Paul Kelly". ABC News. Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 5 August 2022.

External links

• Official website