Chapel of the Cross (Chapel Hill, North Carolina)
|
Chapel of the Cross
|
|
 |
|
 
|
|
| Location | 304 E. Franklin St., Chapel Hill, North Carolina |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 35°54′58″N 79°2′39″W / 35.91611°N 79.04417°WCoordinates: 35°54′58″N 79°2′39″W / 35.91611°N 79.04417°W |
| Area | 1.5 acres (0.61 ha) |
| Built | 1843-1848 |
| Architect | Walter, Thomas U. |
| Architectural style | Gothic Revival |
| NRHP Reference # | 72000980 |
| Added to NRHP | February 1, 1972 |
Chapel of the Cross is a parish of the Episcopal Church of the United States in the Diocese of North Carolina. It is the spiritual home to more than 1,600 communicants, including a large number of students studying at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
The Church of England was established in Chapel Hill in 1752 when a “chapel of ease” was built at an important hilltop crossroads in the southern part of Orange County to spare remote parishioners a journey to the church in Hillsborough. The small log building, known as New Hope Chapel, stood where the Carolina Inn is now but disappeared during the American Revolution. The settlement on New Hope Chapel Hill remained, the University of North Carolina was founded in 1795, and traveling clergy visited; but a permanent Episcopal congregation did not form again for half a century.
In May 1842, the Rev. William Mercer Green, a Professor of Belles Lettres at the University of North Carolina, presided over the organization of the Church of the Atonement: an Episcopal parish with fifteen communicants and no church building.
The growing congregation worshiped in one another’s homes for five years as work on their little church went slowly, using handmade bricks fired in kilns on the Rev. Green’s property. On October 19, 1848, Bishop Levi Silliman Ives consecrated the new church – complete with a wooden gallery for slaves – “The Chapel of the Holy Cross.” He accurately described the scale of the building by calling it a chapel, but declared, “We’ll name it for the deed and not the doctrine.” The parish had twenty-two communicants, five of whom were University students. The Gothic Revival style church was designed by noted architect Thomas U. Walter. The red brick church has a gable roof and features a crenellated entrance tower and lancet windows. The original church was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972. It is located in the Chapel Hill Historic District.
...
Wikipedia