The Salvation Army in Eaton Bray

The Salvation Army Citadel July 2012

The Salvation Army citadel in Booth Place was originally a Primitive Methodist chapel. The 1st edition 25 inches to the mile Ordnance Survey map of 1880 marks the property as a Primitive chapel but the 2nd edition of 1901 shows it as a Salvation Army barracks. Kelly’s Directory of 1903 mentions the barracks but the previous directory for the county, 1898 does not.

However, the building in Booth Place was not the beginning of the Salvation Army in Eaton Bray. On 8th February 1888 Annie Ingram of Eaton Bray, Captain in the Salvation Army registered “a building in Bower Lane”. This was cancelled on revision on 16th April 1896. This may indicate that the former Primitive chapel was taken over in 1896 and that, for some reason, Kelly’s simply did not mention it in their directory of 1898.

The only other record at Bedfordshire and Luton Archives and Records Service for the Salvation Army in Eaton Bray comes from the parish council records. Three separate files of correspondence between 1980 and 1984 [PCEatonBray18/5, 8 and 13] chart the proposal to move the citadel from Booth Place to land donated by a villager for the good of the village which ultimately became the new recreation ground in School Lane.