NEW ROAD INDEPENDENT (CONGREGATIONAL) CHURCH and BURY UNITED REFORMED CHURCH (formerly...

CNR/1 Church Record Books (3) 1793-1953

CNR/2 Church Minute Books (4) 1849-1987

CNR/3 Deacons' (Elders') Minute Books (8) 1849-1987

CNR/4 Church Committee Minute Book (1) 1851-1876

CNR/5 Finance Committee Minute Books (5) 1894-1987

CNR/6 Baptism Registers & certificates (3) 1876-1972

CNR/7 Membership Roll Books (3) 1913-1974

CNR/8 Monthly Communion Record Books (3) 1869-1951

CNR/9 Pew Rent/Envelope Giving Books (9) 1873-1952

CNR/10 Treasurer's General Ledgers (3) 1870-1937

CNR/11 Treasurer's Cash Book (1) 1883-1894

CNR/12 Miscellaneous Financial Records (13) 1884-1941

CNR/13 Secretary's Papers (5) 1952-1965

CNR/14 Architectural Drawings (19) 1881-1974

CNR/15 Photographs (18) 1884-1965

CNR/16 Church Newsletters and Yearbooks (4) 1880-1897

CNR/17 Miscellaneous Church Records (13) 1800-1983

CNR/18 Ladies' Guild Minute Books (2) 1934-1964

CNR/19 Sunday School Teachers' Minutes (3) 1859-1910

CNR/20 Sunday School Admission Register (1) 1848-1964

CNR/21 Bury and District Free Church Federal Council Secretary's Papers (4) 1954-1964

• <corpname>New Road Independent (Congregational) Church, Bury, Lancashire</corpname>
• <corpname>New Road Independent (Congregational) Church, Bury, Greater Manchester</corpname>
• <corpname>Bury United Reformed Church, Lancashire</corpname>
• <corpname>Bury Congregational Church, Lancashire</corpname>

Earlier registers of baptisms 1795-1837 and burials 1818-1823 deposited with the Registrar General (now in the Public Record office, London refs. RG4/1916 and 2431) are available as microfilm copies at Bury Central Library.

These records were deposited by Bury United Reformed church in 1994.

The first New Road chapel was built in 1792 on the present site (Rochdale New Road and the first pastor, Samuel Laycock was appointed the following year. The congregation may have formed by a split from Bank Street Unitarian Church (archives ref. CBS), or from the parish church, and reputedly met from about 1790 in houses at Tenters and Moorside under the influence of William Roby, later pastor at Cannon Street Congregational Church in Manchester. A graveyard adjacent to the church seems to have been in use between 1797 and 1814 with a few later burials up to 1834; this was partly built over when the old church was demolished and the present building erected on the site in 1885, and a plan of unknown provenance (ref. PMX) exists showing the sites of the old graves, in addition to CNR/14/5 below. In addition to the sunday school, there was an infant day school between 1835 and 1882, but apparently no records of this survive. Members of the New Road congregation split off to form new churches at Bethel (1806) and Castlecroft (1838) as well as helping to revive the then moribund church at Park, Walmersley (1840); in addition, New Road collaborated with these churches in establishing missions in the town centre and at Freetown (for records of these churches see refs. CBL, CCA CFM and CPA).

Between 1944 and 1948, New Road shared a pastor with Castlecroft, and there were various earlier proposals for a union of congregational churches in the town; in 1965, it was decided Bethel, Castlecroft and New Road would amalgamate to form a new Bury Congregational Church on the New Road site. In 1972 this became part of the new United Reformed Church, and records for the amalgamated church have for convenience been included here with those for New Road. The records also include some papers for the Bury and District Free Church Federal Council 1954-1964, the secretary for which was a church member.