Patrick Comerford
I walked around Leighton Buzzard and Linslade recently, spending an afternoon looking at the historic buildings and churches, including All Saints’ Church in the centre of Leighton Buzzard, and Saint Barnabas Church in Linslade, two or three minutes walk from Leighton Buzzard railway station.
I also visited the Quaker Meeting House at 25 North Street, one of the hidden gems of the Leighton Buzzard is, tucked away out of sight behind the behind the houses and tall narrow gates.
There were Quakersor members of the Religious Society of Friends in Leighton Buzzard in the mid-18th century, but there was no meeting house there so they travelled to worship in Woburn Sands, where there was a meeting at Hogsty End.
The house of Joseph Brooks in Leighton Buzzard was registered for Quaker worship in 1761, but a regular meeting was not settled in the town until 1776, when meetings were held in a loft at the rear of premises in Market Square owned by John Grant, a grocer and chandler. John Grant built what is now the small meeting room in 1787 and registered it as a meeting house in 1789.
The main meeting room was added when the building was extended in 1812. At the time, the extension was for the women’s meeting. John Grant’s widow finalised the transfer to Friends of the meeting house to Friends in 1844, along with the adjoining cottages, which Grant had also bought. The cottages are now managed by a housing association.
The plain interior of the meeting house expressed the simplicity demanded of Friends at the time. The high windows and lack of distracting ornament were designed to help Friends detach from the world outside during the period of worship.
The meeting house was restored in 1953 and the wood stained to the colour it is today. The benches remain but are set to the side of the building, clearing a space for a circle of chairs in the centre of the room.
There is no hierarchy in meeting today, and worshippers are welcome to sit where they please, but this was not the case when the meeting house was built. The ministers’ gallery and facing benches remain where they were at the beginning of the 19th century when the endorsed ministers and the elders sat there.
The benches now placed at the side of the meeting room were once arranged in two rows, one for men and one for women, and faced towards the elders and ministers.
At the opposite end of the meeting room to the minsters’ gallery is the 19th century room divide. Since 1670, men and women Friends had held separate business meetings. The room divide made a space for each meeting and has shutters that can be opened for large meetings and for weddings and funerals.
When men’s and women’s meetings were set up, it was intended that they had spiritual equality and parallel agendas on church affairs but the meetings soon became gendered. Thus the women became responsible for the care of the poor and for the domestic arrangements in the meeting house and so on, while the men took responsibility for church affairs.
Towards the end of the 19th century, women began to question the separation and Quakers held their first fully United Yearly Meeting in 1909.
There is a further room divide in the small meeting room. This divide was built in the 1960s and provides a sound barrier between the two rooms, particularly when there are enough children for a children’s meeting or tea is being prepare while a meeting continues.
As part of the 1953 restoration, the gravestones were moved from the graves to the sides of the burial ground, and a lawn was laid over the burial area. In keeping with Quaker practice, the gravestones are of the same size and materials and have the same form of words. They were placed in the same manner in the burial ground to avoid distinction between rich and poor. Some of the gravestones have been re-laid to make a path to the far end of the garden.
Quakers established a Lancastrian or British School in Leighton Buzzard in 1813 and in 1835-1839 Leighton Monthly Meeting donated to American Quaker efforts to help runaway slaves from the southern plantations.
A number of prominent Friends in Leighton Buzzard were bankers such as the Bassett and Harris families. The Bassett family were probably the best known of these Quaker families. Peter Bassett was influential in creating a bank in the town, now Barclay’s Bank. Mary Bassett has a school named after her in the town. She died in London but her ashes are buried in Leighton Buzzard burial ground.
The garden in the burial ground behind the meeting house is now a quiet place to be still and find peace. There are occasional garden working parties and a labyrinth of sorts cut into the grass offers a spiral walk for meditation.
• Meeting for Worship is held in the Meeting House each Sunday at 10:45 am, and there is a 30-minute Meeting for Worship on the first Wednesdays at 12:30.
