Providence Chapel, Charlwood

Joseph Flint was an early 19th-century shopkeeper in the village of Charlwood on the Surrey/Sussex border. Unlike most residents at the time, he was a Protestant Nonconformist and from around 1814 Meanwhile, during the Napoleonic Wars, a barracks existed in the Sussex market town of Horsham. A wooden guardroom or officers' mess was erected there in about 1800. without seeking planning permission, but any change of use would require approval from Mole Valley District Council. The purchaser would also have to keep the graveyard around the chapel in its existing condition and allow burials on request. In spring 2013, the Charlwood Society—a local history and preservation group—became the new…

Providence Chapel's architecture is considered unusual, especially in the context of the Surrey countryside. Ian Nairn and Nikolaus Pevsner called it "a startling building to find in Surrey, or even in England", and claimed that "it would not be out of place in the remotest part of East Kentucky". Strict Baptist historian Ralph Chambers likened it to "a pioneer's shack from some faraway backwood of Canada", while English Heritage state that it appears "more typical of New England than Surrey". Its importance is enhanced by its status as a "rare survival" from Napoleonic-era England, and it is considered the most unusual of the many 19th-century Nonconformist chapels across Surrey. The…