Methodist Church of Great Britain x United Methodist Church x Wesleyan Methodist Church x Primitive Methodist Church

Methodist Church of Great Britain x United Methodist Church x Wesleyan Methodist Church x Primitive Methodist Church

On 5 September 1688 James II issued letters patent incorporating a body of ten French ministers and granting them a licence to establish one or more churches for the Huguenot refugees in the City and suburbs. Two churches, both known as 'La Patente', were established by the ministers, one in Spitalfields and the other in Berwick Street in the parish of St. James, Westminster. In 1694 part of the congregation of the latter removed to Little Chapel Street (now Sheraton Street) off Wardour Street, Westminster, and became known as La Petite or La Nouvelle Patente.In 1784 the congregation merged with that of Les Grecs-La Savoie, which survived, latterly as the French Episcopal Church, in Shaftesbury Avenue, until c 1925.

For a period after 1784 the chapel was used by the Methodists, but in 1796 a lease of the building was taken by a part of Dr John Trotter's Scots Presbyterian congregation from Swallow Street (see LMA/4365). The Presbyterians continued to use the chapel, which by 1850 had become known as the Wardour Chapel, until 1889, when it was taken over by the Wesleyan West Central London Mission. The Wesleyans remained until about 1894, when the building was demolished to make way for Novello's printing works.

From: 'Wardour Street Area: Pulteney Estate', Survey of London: volumes 33 and 34: St Anne Soho (1966), pp. 288-296.