John Sirgood

Who was John Sirgood?

John Sirgood was a Christian fundamentalist lay preacher, a London shoemaker, who founded the Society of Dependants in the 1850s. He had links with the Peculiar People a populist sect based in Southwark and founded by William Bridges, a Wesleyan lay preacher who had split from orthodox Methodism.

Sirgood was born at Avening, Gloucestershire in 1821. A shoemaker by trade he settled at Kennington in south London during the 1840s, where he became a disciple of William Bridges, founder of the Plumstead Peculiars.

Travelling to Loxwood on the Surrey-West Sussex border, a village not controlled by any great Anglican landowner, his evangelism took root amongst the poor labourers and small farmers and tradesmen. At first meetings were held on common lands until the Loxwood chapel was opened in 1861.

Sirgood was openly critical of the Anglican church and of inequalities in 19th century society, causing his movement to be harassed by landowners and clergy. His followers lived in an extremely austere manner and practised a form of Christian communism in the retail businesses and farms that they developed.

Sirgood died in 1885 and is buried at the chapel he founded at Loxwood.