Primitive Methodist Church

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Primitive Methodist Church. A branch of early 19th-cent. Methodism. In N. Staffordshire Hugh Bourne and William Clowes engaged in open-air preaching. The Liverpool Wesleyan Conference (1807) condemned their ‘highly improper’ meetings as ‘likely to be productive of considerable mischief’. Once expelled by the parent body, Bourne and Clowes officially formed the Primitive Methodist Connexion in 1811. In 1932 the denomination joined with the Wesleyan and United Methodists to form the Methodist Church of Great Britain and Ireland.