The Blisworth Wesleyan Methodists
By law it was required to register any house that was used as a meeting house, particularly a meeting house for non-conformist groups. The Baptists of Blisworth registered a number of places as such in the 19th century. Notable is the record of a Welseyan Methodist group registering a house, referred to as a chapel, on 6 April 1841 in the village centre. It has been a puzzle where this house was located in the village until, in the Baptists notes of June 1859, it is stated that there was a discussion at a Baptist Church Meeting on the Methodists who were using the house opposite that of William Rockingham. Evidently the noise from the house was causing a disturbance. Also in 1859, January 31 in fact, Benjamin Whitlock and his wife Elizabeth apply to join the Baptists from what is described in the baptists notes as a very small band of Wesleyan reformers. They had, in fact, joined by March 6, 1859 - perhaps the band did not survive long!
The location of the Methodist Chapel can be surmised starting from the Grafton record that in 1838 Richard Rockingham lived at the little house at the top of Little Lane (see plots 61 and 61a in the Grafton records and 'steamroller shed' in the 20th century) and operated the windmill presumably on behalf of Ann Westley. The 1841 census fails to confirm his house but records him, aged 50, at the windmill with a relative called Charles, aged 45 and a lacemaker. The 1851 census records Richard (aged 63 and a labourer with wife Elizabeth, 62, but no mention of Charles) and William Rockingham (aged 52 and a labourer with wife Ann, 46) occupying apparently neighbouring houses in the village. These two records are numbered 72 and 73 by the census enumerators with no indication where any of the houses in the village were located. The Grafton record of 1838 does mention that Richard then occupied one of a pair of small cottages. It is therefore a reasonable assumption to state that William Rockingham lived at the top of Little Lane. Probably Richard and William were brothers - they had both separately moved into lodgings elsewhere in the village by 1861.
The house, or chapel, opposite William Rockingham's house would likely be the barn or the adjoining large house ('Stoneacre' in the 20th century) tenanted by Samuel Basford (plots 44 and 45 in 1838) who was one of two or three blacksmiths in the village - retired by the time photographic records were made. Samuel was born abt. 1766 and his son William abt. 1796. The Basford family is recorded in the Baptists notes and so their non-conformist inclinations are evident. From 1841 until at least 1859 there was evidently a Methodist splinter-group which used Basford's premises. The location was not far from the Elm Tree and would fit the reference to 'the village centre'. There are no surviving records of the Methodists which presumably folded up before 1894 (perhaps well before), that being when the Parish Council was formed and relatively copious notes were made of village affairs.
There could be a family link between William Basford and the Arthur Eaton Basford (1886-1976), a Baptist, whose life has been described by George Freeston.
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