Loughwood Meeting House is a historic Baptist chapel located 1 mile (1.6 km) south of the village of Dalwood, Devon, England. There was a meeting house on this site in 1653, although the current building may date from the late 17th century or early 18th century. It is one of the earliest surviving Baptist meeting houses. Since 1969 it has been owned by the National Trust.
The meeting house was founded by the Baptists of Kilmington, Devon, a village 1 mile (1.6 km) away to the southeast. Prior to the Act of Toleration 1689, the meeting house was illegal, but its location made it suitable as a refuge. It was built into a hillside, at that time surrounded by woodland and accessible only by narrow paths. Furthermore, it lay within a detached outlier of the county of Dorset, as the parish of Dalwood belonged to Dorset until 1842.
The building is of stone rubble with buttresses and a thatched roof. The interior dates from the mid 18th century to early 19th century, with a raised pulpit, box pews and a baptismal pool. There is also a musicians' gallery, built over retiring rooms.
Famous quotes containing the words meeting and/or house:
“They had met, and included in their meeting the thrust of the manifold grass stems, the cry of the peewit, the wheel of the stars.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Beauty is all very well at first sight; but who ever looks at it when it has been in the house three days?”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)