Foula Chapel

Shetlopedia - The Shetland Encyclopaedia

The Chapel in Foula
Photo from Shetland Museum and Archives

Mrs Marion Holbourn at church organ, beside the pulpit in Foula Chapel in the 1960's.
Photo from Shetland Museum and Archives.

The small chapel in Foula, also known as the "Baxter Chapel", is now owned by the National Mission.
Formerly it was a Congregational Church, built in the end of the 19th century. The money was given in memory of an ardent Congregationalist, Dr. William Baxter, by his two sisters.

The Haldane movement led to the Congregational Church in Foula being founded in 1817, preachers by the name of Kerr and Alexander visited the isle, and among the islanders impressed by their work was Laurence Christie who became the first Conregational Minister. Their original meeting place is not recorded, but is thought to have been a building that had previously been a dwelling house, and then a school. As the congregation grew a small Chapel was built on the Ayre of Ham, which in turn, when it also became too small, was replaced by the current chapel. Despite having a significant following during the 19th Century, the Congregational Church had withdrawn from the isle by the first quarter of the 20th Century.

Until 1990, when the last one left, Foula had a missionary/teacher. After a successfull petion from the islanders to the General Assembly for a compensation for their loss, the National Mission pays for six trips to Foula by the minister every year.