United Free Church of Scotland, Chalmers

The Chalmers Church was one of three United Free congregations in Langholm. Prior to 1900, when some of the Free Church merged with the United Presbyterian Church, it had been the Langholm Free Church.

The Free Church was founded by a schism (‘the Disruption’) in 1843 about civil control over the Church of Scotland which had resulted in a system of patronage with ministers’ appointments typically being made by major landowners. After a failed legal challenge to civil control, the Church of Scotland’s General Assembly (its highest entity) held its annual meeting, during which about a third of its participants walked out, led by David Welsh and Thomas Chalmers.

Chalmers became the first moderator of the newly formed Free Church, and it was after him that the Chalmers Church in Langholm was renamed in 1900 when it became a United Free Church. It met in a building in Charles Street (Old), completed in 1846.

_{The former Chalmers Church after its conversion into a cinema}

One of the leading founders of the original Free Church congregation was Langholm-born Robert Smellie, a draper and grocer in the High Street. In retirement, he was secretary and treasurer of the Hope Hospital.

The Free Church of Scotland placed much emphasis on education and founded many primary schools and several theological colleges, including New College in Edinburgh. In Langholm, the congregation founded a school in 1850 which it ran until 1874 when the institution was merged into the newly-created Langholm School Board. The school building became Chalmers Hall, used for Sunday School and other church and community activities.

^{Sorting sphagnum moss in Chalmers Hall in the Great War}

The minister in 1915 was Rev David Inglis, appointed in 1905. Born in Edinburgh, he studied at Edinburgh University and New College, Edinburgh, and was an enthusiastic member of the Langholm Cricket Club. He was Chalmers minister until 1931, by which time much of the United Free denomination had joined the Church of Scotland and his congregation moved to the Parish Church.

^{David Inglis is in the back row, third from left (LAG)}

Eleven young men associated with the church were killed in the Great War, including James MacKnight on 25th September 1915, the first day of the Battle of Loos.