Hope Mansell Chapel in 1843 (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Thursday, September 12, 2019, 16:22 (1934 days ago) @ malcolm harrison

Good question Malcolm !

As I'm sure you know (I've often wondered), in modern parlance a C of E parish Church isn't generally known as a Chapel, but I've seen a few instances in old books and modern discussions where chapel has been used to describe very small churches, and St Michael's is certainly very small indeed, you may find the following video of interest. Similarly the word sometimes refers to the room or part within a Church or other building, see the first paragraph of this Wiki entry. It also often refers to a Non Conformist place of worship.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=minEkTtlNWE
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapel

I'm struggling to find a good online history resource for Hope Mansell. The best I've seen yet is below, which pays special attention to the spelling conundrum !.
http://www.westonnews.co.uk/hopemansellname.php

Unlike the parts of Glostershire adjoining Hope Mansell area, this part of Herefordshire has not yet been covered in the online section of the excellent Victoria British County History series of books which would usually cover this subject. However it may well be covered in the original book versions - like you Malcolm I don't live in the Forest, but my local library is the main one for my London Borough, and it has a complete set of these large red volumes covering the whole UK spreading across several shelves, perhaps you have a similar library set near you ?.
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Portal:Victoria_County_History

Trying to find an old map of the area, this 1888 edition of the OS maps is very detailed. Unfortunately I cannot find a map centred on Hope Mansell, if you zoom in you'll find it at bottom L/H corner. As you can see even by 1888 it was still a very small village, I cannot see any places apart from St Michael's Church where a Chapel may have been ?.
https://maps.nls.uk/view/101570424

The earliest edition of the OS map from 1841 is here, zoom into the area just below the centre for Hope Mansell, the Church is marked with a cross. As you can see this hamlet is not far from larger villages & Churches such as Ruardean (in Glos). St Michaels Church dates from the 1400s if not earlier, so much the same as Ruardean.
http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/maps/sheet/first_edition/sheet43

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Malcolm, I wonder if the term "Chapel" has been used in your references because, due to it's small size within a small hamlet, with larger villages & Churches closeby, is because St Michaels didn't have it's own dedicated minister ?
That Wiki page I mentioned earlier states
"A feature of all these types is that often no clergy were permanently resident or specifically attached to the chapel."

Of course, without knowing more about the "Chapel" references you have, or who wrote them and when, makes it difficult to say more. I certainly doubt that 1843 Hope Mansell had a Non-conformist community large enough to warrant their own Chapel.

Finally and as you probably know from your years on the forum, the Herefordshire side of the Forest area isn't overly covered by online Family History resources, but you might want to consider contacting this site.
https://www.herefordshirefhs.org.uk/

Also the newly-revamped Herefordshire Archives.
https://www.herefordshire.gov.uk/info/200164/herefordshire_archive_and_records_centre