| The church was probably
built by the Particular Baptist
congregation who, ten years earlier at
the time of the 1851 census of religious
worship, had a chapel on London Road. The
old chapel had a capacity of about 400,
and George Wright the minister claimed it
was full both morning and evening. Thus,
presumably, the need for a new chapel.
This new chapel has itself been extended
recently to the rear by the Whitworth
Partnership, a sign of its continued
growth. To the casual
observer, the most interesting thing
about Beccles Baptist church is the large
tablet set above the main entrance. It
reads Near this spot Thomas Spicer,
John Deny and Edmund Poole were burned
for the Faith of Jesus, on the 21st May
1556. It continues with a typically
mawkish and flowery quotation from Foxe's
Actes and Monuments, as well as from
the Book of Revelation. Spicer, Denny and
Poole were from the Debenham area, and
were arrested under the orders of Sir
John Tyrrell of Gipping and brought to
Eye prison for refusing to conform to the
re-established Catholic church. After a
trial for heresy under the Chancellor of
the Diocese of Norwich at Beccles, the
three were burned at the stake together
in Beccles market place. It was the first
trial under the new act in the Norwich
Diocese, and Foxe maintains that the
Chancellor was in floods of tears as he
delivered the verdicts and sentences. A
century later, the Denny family were
significant puritans involved in
enforcing Cromwellian law in Suffolk.
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