Harlow, an ancient village and small town on the Essex/Hertfordshire border, north-east of London, was designated in 1947 as the site of a new town, intended to relieve overcrowding in the metropolis. An area with a population of around 3500 in the early 1930s thus expanded to a town of 90,000 by the late 1960s.

The Wesleyan Methodists began to hold services in Harlow in the 1880s. George Searle, a postman and baker, hired a room for preaching and this led to the opening of the Jubilee chapel, named for Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, at Burnt Mill on 13 June 1887. Meanwhile, outreach from the neighbouring Bishop's Stortford chapel and preaching by the Rev. Caesar Caine, District Missionary of the First London District, resulted in the opening of a school chapel at Mulberry Green on 15 May 1886.

The initiatives of the 1880s reflected Wesleyan efforts to extend village Methodism. The Harlow New Town development was met by the stationing of a minister, the Rev. Eryl W. Hughes, by the Home Mission Department in 1952. A new church, named St Andrew's, was planned, beginning with the construction of a hall in 1953-54. The hall was opened on 30 October 1954 by Sir Richard Costain (1902-66), chairman of the Harlow Development Corporation and member of a family with Methodist connections. The church envisaged in the 1950s was never built; instead, the hall was replaced by a purpose-built church in 2008-09.

Entry written by: DHR
Category: Place
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