ABSTRACT
Physically Victorian Crewe might have been the 'railway town par excellence', a 'workingman's town' of small-scale, practical buildings dominated by Works and railway lines, but it was also a centre of a 'steady-going Puritan-like spirit' in which craft unionism and above all, the chapel, held sway (Jubilee, 1887). Despite the fact that Crewe was a new town, nonconformity in the local area had a long history. Both Congregationalism and the Particular Baptists in the area claimed to trace their origins back to the period of the English Civil War, the adjacent town of Nantwich having been an important stronghold of Parliamentarian puritanism. With such a various history, Crewe's many chapels held different stances on everything from theological teaching, church government and membership. Chapel life obviously differed markedly from chapel to chapel. The town's two Baptist chapels, for example, were divided by their theology.
