Plunket Street Meeting House
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Plunket Street Meeting House, Dublin was, in succession, the site of two Protestant congregations, first a Presbyterian Church, then an independent reformed evangelical church. Plunket Street once stood where John Dillon Street and Thomas Davis Street now stand. It was situated between Patrick's Street and Francis Street.
A Presbyterian congregation was meeting in Bull Alley in Dublin from around the early 1660s. it was a union of two Cromwellian congregations led by Robert Chambers and Robert Norbury. The congregation's first longterm minister was the controversial Rev William Jacque who was the cause of a split within the congregation somewhere around 1668–1672. He took a section of his flock and opened a new meeting in Mary's Abbey, near Capel Street. The remaining congregation in Bull Alley moved to Plunket Street around 1692, to a property the landlord of which was Godwin Swift.[1]
The first minister in Bull Alley was a Rev. Alexander Sinclair who came to Dublin to take up the position in 1692. Rev. James Arbuckle ministered in Plunket Street, but left with some of the congregation in 1713 and joined Ushers Quay Church. Rev. Thomas Maquay ministered from 1717 until 1729. Rev. Matthew Chalmers was pastor for a short time, the Rev. John Alexander was minister from 1730 until his death in 1743. Rev. William Patten, who was minister from 1745 to 1749,[2] he was succeeded by Rev. Ebenezer Kilburn (whose son was the United Irishman, Rev. Sinclair Kilburn, A.B.),[3] from 1749 until his death in 1773.
After Kilburn's death in 1773, the congregation voted to merge with that which met in Usher's Quay.